I recently visited Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Michigan, where I learned about a very successful program called “The Kalamazoo Promise.”
The concept is simple: Every student who attends the Kalamazoo Public Schools from kindergarten through senior year and graduates receives a full scholarship for any public or private university in Michigan where he or she is accepted. All costs, tuition, books, fees, are covered. For those who attend the KPS schools for four years of high school, 65% of tuition is covered.
The donor or donors are anonymous. They do not seek recognition or honor.
The effects of the Promise have been impressive. Enrollment in KPS, which had been declining before the Promise was launched in 2005, has increased by 25%. A pre-kindergarten program has been adopted by the schools. Students are working purposefully, knowing that they can win a debt-free college education if they persist. Parents, teachers, and the community are collaborating around the goal of student success. The Promise is available to students for two-year colleges, trade schools, or four-year colleges. It can be used at any point for ten years after graduation.
When I spoke in Seattle, I recommended that someone in the audience tell Bill Gates about the Kalamazoo Promise. It is far more successful and appreciated than any of his interventions into education. Without breaking a sweat, Bill Gates could launch the Washington State Promise and guarantee every high school graduate in the state a debt-free college education. Instead of being a goat for sinking billions into test-based teacher evaluation (which failed), Common Core (the reform that dare not speak its name), and charter schools (which are highly controversial and often ineffectual), he would be universally praised for making postsecondary education available at no cost to all high school graduates in the state. Washington State has no income taxes and no corporate taxes. This would be a swell way to give back.
For all those billionaires out there looking for a sound way to invest in education, explore the Kalamazoo Promise. We know that more and more students need a postsecondary education to succeed in the twenty-first century, and we know that the cost of that education burdens students with intolerable debt. Stepping in to aid students to reach that dream is a win-win.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Diane, we appreciated your visit to Kalamazoo probably more than you know.
We are so proud of our anonymous donors who don’t tell teachers how to teach, what tests to give or have a lot conditions attached. It is a tremendous gift to the Kalamazoo Public Schools community. I have worked in KPS for 2 decades and see first hand the fantastic results for so many.
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I was unaware of the Promise until I heard about it that night (not being from Michigan) and I must admit it is an impressive concept and could sense the pride in it from the audience.
Diane points out the most important part of it: “The donor or donors are anonymous. They do not seek recognition or honor.” I would also assume it is open-ended, that is, the funding for need and qualification will be met even if it is higher than expected. Unlike the caveat-seeking naysayers below, it seems to me that this is exactly what philanthropy should be: no strings attached, selfless anonymity, egalitarian community benefits. It raised my opinion of and respect for the city of Kalamazoo. Truly a model for the world.
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As a graduate of Western Michigan University who was there when the Promise was introduced I smiled when reading your article. I was an education major at the time of conception It has been over 10 years since this marvel was introduced with great success. Thank you for recognizing their work.
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It is hard to argue against such anonymous generosity. However . . .
The problem with this lovely example is that it is the legacy of GHW Bush’s Thousand Points of Light, which was essentially a way to erode social justice as a part of America’s social contract and replace it with private philanthropy. Charity is not justice. Charity is selective and insufficient.
I agree that it can be an example to other billionaires, but it also perpetuates a system in which we are dependent on and beholden to billionaires. I’d rather we progressively tax billionaires and create systems of justice and equity that serve all people. As we see with Gates, Broad, Walton and others, billionaires seldom give unconditionally. They give to impose their values and policy preferences on the rest of us.
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¡Sí señor, exacto!
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Amen!
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Bingo!
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Gates could use his money in better ways, but the REAL money is in corporate income taxes, which Microsoft does not pay in Washington state. There is a gross receipts tax in Washington, but it is only about 0.5%
Bill Gates company had a gross income of $55 billion in 2017.
If Microsoft had paid even 5% of that in state taxes (which is near the bottom for state corporate income tax rates), that would amount to some $2.75 billion that could go toward funding schools in Washington state. If they paid 12% (the rate for Iowa), that would bring in $6.6 billion.
Of course, the reality is that Microsoft evades paying even the taxes that it actually owes. Until very recently (when Trump slashed the tax rate from 35% to 15% on corporate offshore earnings) , Microsoft was evading some 35 billion in taxes on $100 billion held offshore. When the rate was slashed, Microsoft avoided paying $20 billion of the tax that it owed.
If we wanted to fully fund all of our schools and even build thousands of new schools around the country to replace decrepit and decaying old ones, we could easily do it simply by levying a tax on all corporations, say 1% annually.
And of course, if these corporations just paid the taxes they actually owe, that alone would go a long ways. The recent tax windfall for corporations holding nearly $3 trillion offshore allowed America’s largest companies to avoid paying about half a trillion dollars in taxes. This alone would have financed nearly 17,000 brand new schools at $30 million apiece.
The money is there, but the political will is not
Not for the Republicans and not for the Democrats.
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¡Sí señor, exacto también!
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My figures above for the amount that would be brought in by a 5% and 12% sales tax on Microsoft are wrong.
I used gross income, when it should be net ( gross minus deductions.)
For 2017,Microsoft’s net income was 21 billion, so 5% and 12% of that would be about $1 billion and 2.52 billion, resp
But that also does not include the deferred deduction, so it’s more complicated than I thought.🙂
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Income tax, not sales tax
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Not incidentally, the specific amount thst Microsoft would owe in state income tax (whether the rate were 5% or 12%) is not the most important thing.
It’s the order of magnitude that is key.
And Microsoft is just one of many corporations based in Washington state.
A corporate income tax of even 5% would mean billions of dollars in income to the state.
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This claim I made above is also wrong (not even close):
If we wanted to fully fund all of our schools and even build thousands of new schools around the country to replace decrepit and decaying old ones, we could easily do it simply by levying a tax on all corporations, say 1% annually.
Total US corporate profits for 2017 were about $9 trillion so if that were taxed at 1%, it would bring in about $90 billion.
That’s significant, but nowhere near the amount required for what I claimed.
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Determining the amount of local and state taxes avoided by corporations and businesses is even more complicated because many state and local governments offer tax breaks and free infrastructure upgrades to businesses… “incentives” in the parlance of politicians and economic development offices. Amazon’s crass bidding for tax breaks and infrastructure upgrades happens all the time. When corporations get tax breaks, someone has to backfill the lost revenues… and that someone is homeowners. https://waynegersen.com/2015/05/20/when-corporations-get-tax-breaks-someone-has-to-pay-and-that-someone-is-the-homeowner/
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Didn’t Bill and Melinda do that with a group of minority students? And it has been very successful. It was on 60 Minutes the other night.
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Made for great PR, eh!
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They did, and they “discovered” that minority students can achieve at high levels. Since they have so much money, it would be great if they continued to support deserving minority students. However, it will not make more money for Microsoft the way that “personalized” learning will. That seems to be his preference for everyone else’s child that is not superior.
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Bill and Melinda?? Your familiar use indicates that you’ve fallen for the folksy, personal image they cultivate. And because it was on 60 Minutes it is both true and very, very important, I’m sure.
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“Bill” also appeared on a sitcom recently. Cool.
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I understand all those who would prefer a purist, democratic approach, like that of a number of European countries–free tuition to all who qualify. But I would hope you’d take a look at the backside of the Kalamazoo Promise–its effect on local K-12 education and the surrounding community.
By offering free to tuition to graduates of one fully public district, K-Promise did something rare: created an incentive to invest in an urban public district that wasn’t tied to test scores or punishment. It pushed families to buy homes in the city, so their children could take advantage of the KP program. It pushed schools in the district to diversify their offerings to better meet student needs and parent wishes (friends who live in the district had four excellent choices for their kids’ elementary school education, finally settling on a Spanish Immersion school, which they love). It brought businesses back into the city.
And–deeper still–it caused a re-think on the part of the high schools: to offer more college-bound coursework to students at the more urban HS (where kids had not considered college a real option before). And for the more suburban HS, to stop believing they were a ‘better’ school because more kids went to college, and to work cooperatively with the other school in supporting college admission as well as long-term college success.
It caused the local community college, Kalamazoo Valley CC, to develop a range of unique and innovative programs (including an exciting “Wind Energy Technologies” AA), since kids could now afford a technical degree in programs where workers are urgently needed.
Best of all, charter schools were shut down, as students returned to their home district.
SO–perhaps free tuition has benefits when offered locally, rather than across the board.
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Fabulous! Thank you for sharing that insight.
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Almost anything is better than test and punish, charters, vouchers and enhanced segregation. Unfortunately, in many cities developers are working with politicians to “gentrify” the urban core. The plan often includes pushing out minorities, renovating or building new homes for white families that then send their children to mostly white charter schools. Minority families get displaced to an area where there are cheap charters for them. That is a road map to enhancing segregation while making lots of money for developers. In some cases the developers even own the charter schools too.
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I lived and taught for 25 years in the suburban ring around Detroit, where some of the worst, let-it-rot-then-we’ll-scoop-it-up gentrification has taken place, in a thoroughly segregated school system. What you describe is what’s happened there, to a large extent.
Kalamazoo is not like that. Housing stock is in better shape. Having a good school keeps families in the city. Neighborhoods (and their schools) have more value to preserve. And one of the effects of the KP has been more integration in the public school system–certainly a worthy goal.
Kalamazoo also has a Math-Science magnet school that’s highly regarded, and open to all. All of these resources are obviously better than charter start-ups–for families of color and white families, as well as folks at all economic levels. If the charters have been pushed out of the city, it’s not because minorities have been displaced.
This is Michigan, remember–the Wild West of disgusting charter dysfunction and corruption. Every charter that shuts down because it can’t compete with a public school is good news. KP has acted, in many ways, as a roadblock to white developers snaring cheap housing and pushing out POC.
One other thing–there has been rampant speculation, since KP was proposed and launched, about who the funder was.But that has never been publicly revealed (although lots of us assume we know). Unlike the Billionaire Boys Club (which appears to have just purchased another superintendent, in LA), what we’re dealing with here is an anonymous benefactor.
The KP has spurred private investment in Kalamazoo, bringing in new business, arts opportunities and a beautiful, walkable downtown. In its central park, city authorities are currently in the process of dismantling an old sculpture because it represented a stereotype. I don’t see anything of these as signs that the city has been co-opted.
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Thank you, Nancy.
Of course state and federal governments should pay the cost of higher education for those who can’t afford it. That should be a promise that we make and keep. But while government retreats from that obligation, it is wonderful that an anonymous benefactor does that in Kalamazoo
Other cities, a few, have created their own Promise programs.
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Don’t you think all of that should have been being done to begin with?
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I do think all of those things should have happened–w/out the financial incentive to send any kid to college.
But they didn’t, and in hundreds of similar-sized, similar-demographic cities around the country, they aren’t happening.
So–while we’re fighting the real fight, pushing back against the idea that social supports and social justice should be ‘charity’ and not government-sponsored– isn’t it possible to look at what happens when all kids believe they can attend college? Good things. Should the kids in Kalamazoo, or those attending Western Michigan University and succeeding, have to wait until the country gets its head on straight?
It’s not that I don’t believe there may come a time when our people step up and reshape government so it’s really by the people, for the people. That will happen, I believe, at the ballot box and in the streets of cities like Kalamazoo, once people are educated enough to know that they can have an equitable society.
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I’ll tell you what: You find enough billionaires to set up a similar program in every district across America, and then I’ll applaud. As I commented above, the companion to these exceptional instances is a further disintegration of the social contract. For years conservatives have pointed to the “successes” of programs like this as a way to reject tax levies, refuse to constitutionally fund all schools and claim that free enterprise and charity can make everything better. It is the big lie of the last 40 years and has only these results: deteriorating budgets, deteriorated schools, demoralized teachers, re-segregation, massive poverty, crumbling infrastructure, wealth differentials surpassing any developed nation on Earth and an endangered environment, caused by money controlling politics.
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I understand that the goal of the oligarchs is to persuade the public to abandon any sense of responsibility for the common good and to substitute charity.
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Having been in Kalamazoo when The Promise was first launched and watched it over the years I think the best you can say is it took the barriers off the kitchen table conversation regarding college affordability. As significant as that may seem, Dr. Ravitch needs to do a better job of getting behind her numbers: enrollment actually cannibalized from surrounding, poorer communities who had left KPS previously due to poor performance, The Promise college drop-out rates remain unacceptably high and should be scrutinized better before criticizing Gates (Millennial Scholar Program) or anyone else. The pre k program was a community effort-NOT lead by the current Superintendent but by community organizations/foundations who researched and understood the value of certified Pre K. It put incredible pressure on the local community college who was faced with students ill prepared for college level work and working under a 1992 funding model for recovery of students basic skills. For those of us who were there at it’s inception, little has changed in these dynamics: It was an economic incentive for small business and put pressure on an urban school district still struggling with achievement, poverty, health and safety. I applaud the dedicated and generous donors and those who benefitted from the opportunity…it’s still and always will be about college readiness and graduation-not high school! This feels like someone from The Promise organization fed her a bunch of bunk for PR purposes.
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Actually, I got my data about the Promise primarily from an article by Professor Gary Miron in the “Educational Researcher.” A very reputable publication.
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Now this Promise program sounds great—much better than the TN fake Promise program.
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Kalamazoo certainly still has its challenges as an urban, segregated school system. For those kids who now have a chance at college, it is worth it. They still have to do a better job preparing students for college and careers, but all school systems need to do that.
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