Read the full article at myphilanthropedia.org>>
Intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death. -Albert Einstein
Proposition 49 (2002) in California led to the creation of 4,000 new after-school programs. These programs were meant to tie academic standards to after school activities, were run by the district or community based organizations, included elements of youth development, and were mostly for students K-8 from 3-6pm. As awareness of the summer learning loss among disadvantaged students increased, new programming was created for students in the summer in the hopes of closing the achievement gap. The San Francisco Bay Area is notable for the enormous number of nonprofits working in the education space.
Compared to many other areas, donors give to education at a relatively high rate. In 2009, about 13% of total giving was to education nonprofits. That’s about $40 billion out of the $300 billion total. (From the Giving USA 2010 report.)
In order to capture the diversity of education nonprofits at work in the Bay Area, we split education into two groups: early childhood (preK-5th grade) and middle-secondary (6-12th grade). We surveyed 96 Bay Area middle-secondary education experts (with an average of 20 years of work experience in the field) to identify those organizations that were making the biggest impact. These experts (funders, researchers, nonprofit senior staff, government officials, etc.) identified 15 top middle-secondary education nonprofits (out of 137 total reviewed nonprofits) working in the San Francisco Bay Area.
We invited experts to recommend nonprofits working on school reform, the achievement gap, human capital, instructional improvement, curricular content development, low-performing schools turnarounds, data, standards and assessments, after school programming, summer programming, and/or parental involvement. This could include nonprofits working on research, policy, advocacy, training, traditional nonprofits or community based organizations, traditional after-school nonprofits, or even the public schools themselves.
The following is the list of the top-recommended high-impact nonprofits working on middle-secondary education in the Bay Area. “Agree” is the number of experts who agree that the nonprofit has had the most impact in this field. “Disagree” is the number of experts who disagree that the nonprofit has had the most impact in this field.
This week we will highlight the top 5 Bay Area middle-secondary education nonprofits. We invite you to visit the profiles of each of these top organizations on our website to read the expert reviews here. Experts commented on the impact each nonprofit has had, what the nonprofit’s other organizational strengths are, and how each organization could further improve.
