| Two core research questions motivate this study. First, where and how do foundations get involved in urban education politics? Certain districts receive the bulk of foundation grants while other, similarly troubled districts, receive none. I track foundation grants to the 100 largest school districts and show how political characteristics and the district's capacity for nonprofit and policy expertise guide where grants go. Second, what are the political consequences of foundation involvement? I focus on two cases of large scale foundation involvement in urban education---New York City and Los Angeles.;Using an original data set of more than 3,000 foundation grants, I find that the share of grants to the public sector (school districts and states) shrank from 2000 to 2005, and the share of grants to charter schools, private schools, and venture philanthropy for education nonprofit start-ups grew substantially. Using multivariate models, I find that districts with mayoral or state control, rather than an elected school board, receive more grant dollars, as do districts with greater capacity for nonprofit expertise; these characteristics are stronger predictors of grants to a district than graduation rate or the share of students in poverty.;In New York, foundations have adopted a top-down funding strategy focused on the district bureaucracy and nonprofits. In Los Angeles, the funding strategy is bottom-up, with grant dollars supporting alternatives to the district such as charter schools. I use social network analysis to present a funding network of foundations and their grantees, and I create networks of policy information exchange based on survey results. My findings in New York show that a coalition of policy experts---foundations, the school district bureaucracy, and education nonprofits---is setting the agenda for education reform. Parents, community organizations, and unions are largely excluded from this coalition. Although Los Angeles seems to lack centralized leadership for reform, there is a core set of diverse actors that are closely linked by sharing policy information. The core includes major foundations, charter management organizations, advocacy organizations, and district leaders. |
