NewSchools Summit: Where Equity Meets Entrepreneurship

The NewSchool Venture Fund Summit opens this morning at the SFO Marriott. Co-hosted with Aspen and covered by NBC, the event gets better every year.
This crowd starts with an unquestionable commitment to educational equality.  They embrace entrepreneurship.  Most would still prefer to support or work for a nonprofit just because they want absolute mission clarity.
Leaders of the American education reform movement will consider if the Movement is Moving Fast Enough during their opening session.  The answer is obviously, “NO,” but most Summiters have embraced the potential of online and blended learning–the rocket boosters the edreform, new school development, and school improvement efforts need.
Launched in 1998 by Kim Smith, NewSchools played an integral role in cultivating many of the high performing charter networks that still represent one of the most important contribution to quality at scale in US education.  More broadly, with TFA, NewSchools brought new talent and a culture of entrepreneurship to the sector.  In many respects, this laid the groundwork for the current edtech renaissance.
NewSchools has a big and talented group of partners led by Ted Mitchell, former CA state board chair and Occidental president.
The LearnCapital team appreciates the opportunity to occasionally co-invest with NewSchools’ Seed Fund.  Some of our co-investment portfolio companies are here at the Summit: ClassDojoJunyoMasteryConnectLearnZillion.
Stay tuned for more live Summit coverage on GettingSmart.com.

Tom Vander Ark

Tom Vander Ark is the CEO of Getting Smart. He has written or co-authored more than 50 books and papers including Getting Smart, Smart Cities, Smart Parents, Better Together, The Power of Place and Difference Making. He served as a public school superintendent and the first Executive Director of Education for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

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