Are Philanthropists Backing the Best Charter Schools? | Andrew J. Coulson | Cato Institute: Commentary

Are Philanthropists Backing the Best Charter Schools? | Andrew J. Coulson | Cato Institute: Commentary: "there already are a number of places around the globe where educational excellence is scaling up. Where top teachers use the Web to reach not hundreds or thousands of students but hundreds of thousands. And where they are rewarded for doing so with salaries in the millions of dollars. There are successful networks of schools that have grown not merely to a few dozen schools in a few dozen states, but to tens of thousands of schools in scores of countries.

Why do top teachers in Korea's for-profit tutoring sector become celebrities who earn more than the nation's professional baseball players? Why has the Japanese tutoring chain, Kumon, expanded to serve over four million students worldwide? Could it be because the tutoring sector operates within the same free enterprise system that has resulted in the massive scale-up of excellence in every other field? Is it an accident that when we reward education entrepreneurs for their success, their success grows? Could it be that philanthropists have failed to consistently fund the best charter schools because they do not expect a return on their investment, as hard-nosed venture capitalists do?"