To the Editor:
Your Jan. 17, 2007, In Perspective article “Venture Fund Fueling Push for New Schools” provides readers with some sketchy data on how privately managed charters are doing compared to the neighborhood public schools with which they compete. Yet you offer very little in the way of critical commentary on the role of corporate philanthropy and its growing influence over school reform. The piece has one small quote from a critic, Alex Molnar, but that’s it.
Could it be that Education Week’s policy of having corporate philanthropies, in this case the Annenberg Foundation, directly fund its articles on corporate philanthropy make your writers think twice before thinking critically?
Mike Klonsky
Chicago, Ill.