The Melting of Mark Zuckerberg’s $100MM Donation to Newark Schools | Hacker News Reader

The Melting of Mark Zuckerberg’s $100MM Donation to Newark Schools

nytimes.com

56 pointsobilgic88 comments

Money is irrelevant to the problems of Newark schools. The problem that plagues Newark's schools is old-fashioned segregation [1]. The whole district is segregated, but individual schools are worse. Here's a school I literally just randomly chose: it's 2% non-Hispanic white [2]. If Brown v. Board disappeared tomorrow, no one in Newark would notice.

[1] http://www.nps.k12.nj.us/district/info/ [2] http://www.zillow.com/newark-nj/schools/louise-a-spencer-ele...

There is a great two-part story from This American Life [1] about this type of thing - it's a problem much bigger than Newark.

[1] http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/562/t...

I agree the This American Life stories were pretty good. They were based on a pro-publica story which has background statistics that make the picture more interesting:

http://www.propublica.org/article/ferguson-school-segregatio...

There was also recently this long article in the Tampa Bay times that I found at least as insightful, and with more perspective:

http://www.tampabay.com/projects/2015/investigations/pinella...

My concerns with this coverage is that they oversimplify the problems in their desire to find a solution (especially TAL). I'd also recommend the book 'Our Kids':

http://www.amazon.com/Our-Kids-American-Dream-Crisis/dp/1476...

Which is far more comprehensive but spectacularly depressing.

In theory, some of the money could have been used for desegregation. It really is a tragedy that there was no big purpose to which this money was put.

Desegregating Newark schools means integrating the schools in the surrounding suburbs, and the parents will fight it. They simply don't want their children educated alongside minorities.

That's odd because there are tons of Asians at their schools.

Asians and Indians don't count as minorities for purposes of the all important diversity narrative. Don't make that mistake too many times or the internet vigilantes will ruin you.

Desegregating Newark schools also means packing kids onto a bus each morning for a long bus ride. Then a long bus ride home. And if a parent needs to be there, it's no longer a walk to the neighborhood school, but more likely a trip on public transit.

I'd prefer just giving each poor school an extra $5000 per pupil per year, directly to the principal or the parent/teacher group.

Please, write the next check. Mark wrote the first.

For more on segregation and the effect it has on school performance see these two recent This American Life episodes[1][2].

[1] http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/562/t...

[2] http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/563/t...

The TAL episodes don't touch at all on the impact to the schools and other students. Except for a few clips of non-PC parent comments.

I don't think artificial integration is the solution. It certainly didn't work very well in San Francisco. Kids should go to school in their neighborhoods. Families should get involved. People need to start taking some responsibility for making things better. I know that sounds right-wing but I really think that's what needs to happen. And obviously it can. Just need humans to get together and decide to change.

So your position is "separate schools should make themselves more equal"?

Well, is that surprising? Politically speaking, in word the US is committed to integrated schools but in deed it is not really a priority and most of efforts do essentially look like "separate but equal." I think it's shameful but it's reality.

Not the OP, but that's the point of having a system of schools with multiple locations. They should be equal or else some kid is getting held back.

The big part of the problem is the continued use of property taxes and local bonds to pay for schools. Poor neighborhoods don't have the money for either.

I'm not even sure what "separate schools" means. Yes, schools are separate. But at some point, a school's constituents need to take some responsibility for improving conditions. You can't just send the kids across town, driving the wealthy kids out of the public system. That is not the solution.

I guess I'm just a little bit tired of the suggestions that the solutions lie with everyone else except for the people involved.

We have data that shows that desegregation is very effective. However, people seem to stop there and not question why it's so effective. It's not nice to think about, but isn't desegregation just "diluting the problem until it no longer creates a poisonous learning environment"?

I agree that I don't get the impression that some communities aren't doing all that they can to improve education irrespective of funding.

I've seen one example of integration (San Francisco) and it was a complete disaster. The TAL episode suggests the exact same thing happened in Boston. I don't see how it would not happen. Some people may benefit but the system takes a nose dive.

It doesn't sound all that right wing to me (I'm left wing). I think you're just highlighting one of the primary underlying issues: parents, likely because of personal and economic factors, don't have the time or energy to be involved in their children's education.

I looked up some stats on Newark schools. $1B in expenditures for 43,000 students. Or: a relatively high $23,000 per student.

Increasing an already sufficient budget by 20%, when the district arguably can't effectively use its current funds seems like a mistake. It probably would have been more effective just to pay the families of the students $4600 as incentive to be more involved.

Interesting observation from link 1, is one full time employee per 6 students, but

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2010/11/nj_schools_struggle...

Claims that boots on the ground, the average math class size is 26 students. With 35K students that implies 1350 or so classroom teachers, and 4250 non-classroom instructor employees. Obviously not all four thousand are deadwood, somebody needs to empty the trash cans and somebody needs to be in charge, but "more or less" most of the 4000 deadwood could be fired with no negative impact to the students. That's a heck of an administrative load!

And thats how $100M disappears. (edited to add thats only $25K per deadwood)

I wouldn't go so far as to say it's irrelevant but you are making a very good point.

Socioeconomic discrimination is the great divide of our time.

How would having a more racial diverse demographic in Newark schools alleviate their problems?

My understanding of the most common argument is racially diverse =~ class-diverse and therefore a racially diverse group of schools all have similar tax bases. Unlike segregated schools which might have a lower class tax base for one school and an upper class tax base for the other.

But that probably isn't what your parent is invoking since they said money isn't the issue.

http://hanushek.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/publication...

Show me the list of affluent parents who are willing to send their children to schools in crime-ridden areas. It has nothing to do with race but with the violent culture these areas breed.

Of course it has to do with race. You yourself are using code words of "affluent" for white and "crime-ridden" and "violent culture" for non-white, which is the same coded language parents themselves might even use to justify their prejudices. However, just because a neighborhood is mixed-race does not imply it is "crime-ridden".

Spending part of this money on desegregation busing programs would have been a step in the right direction.

You are the one injecting race not me. There exists affluent families of many different races, sometimes interracially mixing.

However, just because a neighborhood is mixed-race does not imply it is "crime-ridden".

Exactly.

Spending part of this money on desegregation busing programs would have been a step in the right direction.

No, it would a step in the "race to the bottom" direction. Solutions should be based on bringing the lowest performing students up without affecting the best performing students. Those are the hardest solutions BTW which is why people like you are attracted to the easiest ones.

I don't think segregation is the model, but merely a subfactor. Segregation can be insidious, but it can't explain why getting a huge cash infusion doesn't work, especially since segregation arguments are often about unfair funding differences. But $200M ($100M from Zuckerberg) is a shit-ton of money to get. It's like saying if there were more white and Asian kids there, then money would be spent more wisely.

Given the information from the article, I think power play between major actors better explains how so much money vaporized. I mean, how did consultants get $20M? Because of racial distribution? I think it's because of power play dynamics.

I think tax revenue will be better spent because the flow is predictable, but when you get a sudden cash infusion with no plan, then you won't spend it as well as well-budgeted tax revenue. Perhaps it is also partially Zuckerberg's fault, because he should've realized the political fighting and released the money incrementally.

> The union boss, Joe Del Grosso, demanded a ransom of $31 million to compensate for what he felt members should have received in previous years — before agreeing to discuss any labor reforms.

Zuckerberg's relatively hands-off approach to the donation seemed curious to me. He's a savvy guy. Would he invest $100 million in a failing company without replacing the existing leadership?

The problem in places like Newark isn't money. Newark City and Camden spend $24-25k per student per year, just a couple of thousand less than expensive suburbs like Monmouth County, and double the national average. When a system that has plenty of money is that dysfunctional, there's a underlying reason, and pumping money into it won't fix the problem.

How depressing. A colossal windfall for an ailing public resource desperately in need of reform, and it's squandered in vendettas and hidden interests.

Even more depressing is that we didn't expect better.

Perhaps gifts like this should come with conditions like "75 cents out of every dollar must be spent on in-classroom improvements" or "40 million reserved for teacher requests." Second $100 million contingent on the first being spent properly or something.

What a waste — not that, as many point out, Newark's school system can be sorted out with a cash infusion. But $200 million buys a lot of band-aids.

I appreciate the sentiment but I don't think allowing Mark Zuckerberg to direct exactly how the money is to be spent is really the best solution to the problem.

Sounds like it could hardly be worse?

Is it better than what actually happened? You're going to wait a long time if you're waiting for the "best" solution to your problems.

No, I'd say letting someone with no expertise play superintendent because he's got a lot of money is arguably worse.

There was long-form about this awhile back. Interestingly the blame for waste seemed to lay with both teacher's union and pro-reform consultants demanding a big piece of the action. When teacher's union didn't get what they wanted they manipulated the community of parents against the deal, which also ensured the politicians/bureaucrats would not be held accountable for the squandered opportunities and wasted money.

In short, it seems like places like Newark have bad schools because of bad governance and rent-seeking behavior running rampant at the local level. The state should be more firmly involved to police these issues.

What makes you think the state would do so much better?

More people are watching NJ than Newark. State elections have higher turnout than local elections as well.

The state is not perfect either but typically a larger organization has more (professional) eyes on it, thus making it harder to mismanage or corrupt for a special interest. Same rational as why Michigan steps in to run Detroit as it was going bankrupt.

I don't understand the "schools need more money". My wife teaches in a Title 1 school housed in a brand new facility. It's not about the facilities or even teachers as much as it is the student's family situation. The common trend with her students is those who's parents who are involved perform better. The focus should be how to create more of that.

Maybe "more" isn't the operative problem, but when underpaid teachers pay out of their own pockets to supply & decorate their classrooms, there would appear to be a money problem.

There's also the general observation that if we want to empower teachers & attract good candidates, it needs to be a reputable job and $32k salaries are a major obstacle to that.

I think you're missing my point. If the student does not have the basic understanding of why an education is good for them and a parent who stays on top of them, it does not matter how much money you throw at teacher salaries or school facilities. There's case study after case study confirming that it's not about funding. No doubt my wife would like a higher salary, but that is not going to motivate an unmotivated student. It's the whole lead a horse to water thing...

Not to comment about your wife, but the notion is that if teaching is reputable & pays well enough, they will be able to attract to the profession more of the incredible individuals who as teachers can motivate & draw in those unmotivated students.

I'm not sure if case-studies can cover this particular notion. It's a big picture problem, like not enough women in engineering.

You could try to make the perverse counter-argument, that pathetic salaries actually selects for people who care so much about the kids they will self-sacrifice and perhaps those people are more likely to be the phenomenal-teacher variety, but I've never seen evidence to support that.

Anyway my ultimate point is that whether or not increasing teacher pay to the level they deserve fixes education and saves under performing students, shouldn't preclude paying teachers what they deserve! But perhaps it is simply an unrelated issue that is not relevant.

In retrospect, what would have been the best way for Mark Zuckerberg's donation to have a meaningful impact on the Newark Schools?

Him overseeing spending personally.

But since that's not feasible, surely he could appoint someone in his network who should be able to tease out better results?

Used his power and influence to replace incompetent and corrupt officials and bring in some low skilled job to improve the socioeconomic status of the population.

There is a much better article [0] of what went wrong here.

[0]http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/05/19/schooled

Sad and frustrating. Not only will this deter future donations but it once again highlights adults behaving badly. Given Newark's track record, the money should have been: -given to a foundation to manage -restrictions should have been placed on how the money could have been utilized -Newark as a whole or individual schools or community partnerships should have been required to submit spending plans -A grant writer could have been hired to leverage this gift far beyond the $200 million as there are probably any number of federal, state and private grants that could have been pursued to - some measurement of the impact of the various initiatives that were funded from the gift should also have been tied to funding What Newark can not do is cry poor mouth again.

This seems a bit analogous to people winning the lottery. In other words, a one time windfall without structures in place to handle it isn't likely to make a lasting difference.

Any news on his second donation to Bay Area schools? Was anything learned or just another well-intentioned boon for useless consultants?

tldr: The money was wasted.

Did we really expect any different?

I remember the hype around this announcement, and yes, everyone expected it to turn out differently.

Why? Money and education results don't correlate. Every single factor in education is overwhelmed by parental involvement.

So maybe that $100 million should of been used to pay parents to participate in their children's education.

> Money and education results don't correlate

Even if they did, see my math analysis above that roughly 1/5 of employees are front line instructional and 4/5 are deadwood administrative. Therefore even in the most superficial analysis 80% of the money will be wasted on metrics and TPS reports and consultants. The reality of course is deadwood can cause much more damage than a front line instructor, lets say 2x as much, so of the $100M at least $90M would be wasted on deadwood and only $10M would get to the instructors.

$10M to the instructors sounds helpful, but its a big district so it divides out to only $10K or so per instructor. Figure a substantial portion of that will be lost in paperwork and corruption (4 out of 5 employees exist to get in the way...) so you only get $5K per teacher effective.

Assuming money equaled results, $5K isn't much. A math teacher could buy 50 brand new TI calculators, assuming buying brand new calculators increased student results, which they probably don't. Or about ten ipads, so the ten worst troublemakers could play angry birds and get out of the way of the rest of the class. Or $5K is about two sets of new overpriced textbooks for newark's very large class sizes. Again assuming any of those expenses give results anywhere but the product sellers bottom lines... But even if they did give results, they couldn't give much.

Money thrown at things in general doesn't work. It's not specific to education. See VICE's piece on the Afghanistan reconstruction and how much of American money is wasted.

Ex: Afghanis are tearing down equipment, planes, etc, so that they can request to purchase new ones using American money.

I think money and education do correlate in a way that is difficult to disentangle, because more money in education probably correlates to higher property values, and higher property values probably means more money in education. And these things probably correlate to parents who are more likely to be professionals and more likely to value educational involvement.

But revenue from taxes might be spent more carefully, with a budget already planned out, whereas a sudden cash infusion was not planned. So the money's potential was unexpressed.

$20M went to consultants!

I seem to recall seeing a lot of people predicting it would be a massive waste.

Really? I feel the consensus around the time was that it coincided with the release of The Social Network movie and that Zuckerberg was basically trying to buy some good press to offset how he was portrayed in the movie.

Every single factor in education is overwhelmed by parental involvement. If Mr. Zuckerberg wanted his $100 million to have an impact, he should have payed parents to participate in their children's education.

I think teaching parents how to effectively participate in their younger children's education would be a fantastic initiative. I know there is a subset of parents who just aren't interested in participating, but I suspect there's a larger subset who are interested but don't really know what to do. Would be interested if anybody know of any initiatives like that!

"But it is downright chilling to watch the leadership team throw around buzz phrases from business best-sellers with minimal focus on the nuanced requirements of applying these principles to the education ecosystem generally"

Replace "education" with software and still applies. :)

Consultants worth $20M? My god.

Can't he designate one person to make sure that a $100 million investment works out better?

Sort of too late now... but could probably have been done by not donating the lump sum, but setting up a "trust fund" that would give out money (or not) for specific projects. This probably would have been met with more resistance and more discussions, because it easily looks like someone external enforcing a specific way, so everybody who is unhappy complains about that. And Zuckerberg probably gives a good enemy figure for many in that regard.

Also, the structural issues would remain and even more impossible to tackle, so I think a fund mostly could have slowed the process and probably would have redirected the money to more small-scale issues (because these are easier to get through). Which probably would have been the better alternative with what we know now...

Yeah, dropping in $100 million at once without seemingly much of a vision doesn't seem exceedingly prudent.

I don't understand why if a financier or businessman says they're gonna "pull their business" if higher taxes or minimum wage is enacted, this is seen as a very important thing to take into account.

Meanwhile, if a teacher or a nurse says the same thing, you get:

> The union boss, Joe Del Grosso, demanded a ransom of $31 million to compensate for what he felt members should have received in previous years — before agreeing to discuss any labor reforms.

Why isn't this "ransom" language used when businesspeople threaten to move their business elsewhere, fire people, etc.?

I really don't see the similarity here. Threatening to leave a locale is completely different from asking for a specific amount of money up front.

....no, not really.

"If you do not do X, I will do Y" is very much the ransom formula regardless.

That's not ransom (which is all about extorting money).

Saying if conditions change then you'll take a different action is just stating fact. Every change will have it's consequences, that doesn't make it ransom or somehow wrong.

Getting things that make you money and cost the other party money is extorting money.

So if I win a client from a competing business, I'm extorting money?

Reactionary changes are just that. Raise taxes or min. wage and businesses move to do what's best for them. That's not ransom.

> I really don't see the similarity here. Threatening to leave a locale is completely different from asking for a specific amount of money up front.

A) Keyword is "threatening" as in proactive, not reactive.

B) This is the clearly in the context of private individuals demanding stuff from government.

It seems you're replying to the wrong post. That was just a subjective word used by another HN user. It's not the keyword in anything.

It's just stating the reaction that will happen to proposed changes. And what's wrong with proactively warning the other side? It's the smart thing to do.

The actually important point is that both sides are completely free to do as they like. The company isn't forcefully demanding money or causing harm so there's no ransom or extortion going on here.

http://www.businessinsider.com/states-where-teachers-unions-...

You can bust teachers unions.

Remind me again how they are forcefully demanding money?

What does this link from 2011 have to do with anything? I'm not sure about the legalities of teachers unions or what bill was curtailing their bargaining rights (which understandably would cause protests) but there is no ransom involved in that either.

Perhaps you should read these links:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ransom

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extortion

Are you confused as to what comment thread you are replying to? XD

From the OP of this conversation:

> Why isn't this "ransom" language used when businesspeople threaten to move their business elsewhere, fire people, etc.?

Because it's not ransom. We're going in circles here...

So employees at Ycombinator startups are extorting money from their employers? I find your definition of ransom and extortion quite bewildering.

That really is a misleading definition of a ransom. A ransom is more like, "If you do not pay X, I will do Y"

Businesses get vilified all the time for that behavior.

Tesla got attacked a lot for their attempts to leverage the best deal possible when pursuing a location for the gigafactory. Articles are still being written about it. I must have read two dozen negative articles against the company regarding that one thing alone. A few of which were on HN's front page. And in that case it wasn't even Tesla threatening to pull existing business from a location.

Why is it seen as an important thing? Ask California how much they've enjoyed Texas pulling business from the state. Of course it's an important consideration, the states compete with each other in most things including where businesses choose to locate facilities.

I think the main question here is balance.

We could have the same argument with pretty much everything - not only companies / unions.

In the end each party is motivated to use its own power to optimize for their end.

Systems like markets only seek equilibrium if there is a balance in power between parties.

Balance needs to be a neutral position that's still beneficial (read fair) for all sides.

That's such nonsense though. The gigfactory didn't exist and they were looking for a place to build it. That is not quite the same as threatening to move an existing business that presumably employs a lot of people in the area.

>Meanwhile, if a teacher or a nurse says the same thing, you get:

>> The union boss, Joe Del Grosso,

non-sequitur. Del Grosso isn't a teacher or a nurse. Unions in New Jersey is a pretty specific kind of entrepreneural activity and well covered in many famous literature and TV works.

>The superintendent, Cami Anderson, demanded accountability from schools but set her own performance goals only after the academic year was largely over and relied on expensive consultants — whose total bill ultimately exceeded $20 million

having grown in USSR/Russia, my first instinctive calculation produces $15M kickback such situation must involve ... of course here things are completely different and expensive consultants is just an expensive and necessary cost of teaching math and reading to schoolchildren :)

Business people who move jurisdictions due to tax hikes are not 'ransoming' anyone - its their own private property and they can move where ever they want.

Politicians who are too stupid to realize that raising taxes causes capital flight deserve to lose businesses from their city/state.

Your idea is against the whole notion of private property. "Work like sheep for the government all you business owners and if you move or close it down we're going to arrest you"

It doesn't work that way in professional sports where team owners raking in guaranteed profits hold their host cities ransom every 20 years looking for a new public subsidized stadium. One that could be paid for out of pocket by investing a portion of the profit made over those 20 years.

Fananciers and businessmen don't base their calls to raise their salaries at the public expense on the premise that it'll be good for children.

I do think the author of the NYT article used an unfairly mischaracterizing word. The better replacement would be "tough negotiation". From what I've read, the union leader was not threatening a strike, but merely refusing to engage in talks.

"I'm not even willing to listen to your position until you pay me" may not be ransom, but it is an extremely unproductive relationship.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com