The cat’s climbing out of the bag. National Journal recently wrote about Bellwether Education Partners(pdf). Ed Week’s McNeill, the Fordham Flypaper blog and a few others did as well and New Schools has a press release with some information. More to come this spring.
Basically, Bellwether will be a hybrid organization that is part think tank, part organization builder, and part professional services firm. It’s non-profit and funded by a blend of grants and specialized and actionable services the organization will provide. While the organization is ecumenical about who it works with — public and private sector, philanthropy, NGOs, socially entrepreneurial ventures, and individuals — Bellwether only works with entities with a clear and demonstrated commitment to dramatically improving educational outcomes for low-income youngsters.
Bellwether’s work is organized around four core areas: Executive search and placement, strategic advising and consulting, leadership and organizational development, and thought leadership and knowledge generation. Monisha Lozier, Mary Wells, Kim Smith, and I will lead those four areas, respectively, but we’re in the process of adding and figuring out relationships with some terrific people in different roles. Sara Mead is on-board as well, adding some great capacity on a few issues.
For my part, I’m also going to do a few other things including publishing, along with John Bailey, a subscription-based forecasting and analytic newsletter about trends and likely outcomes in education policymaking. That will be published by WhiteBoard Advisors, a non-lobbying affiliate of Dutko Worldwide.
And I’ll continue to pen this blog. Starting next week Eduwonk will look a little different, physically, but will otherwise be the same. Depending on who you are I guess that’s good or bad news.
Stay tuned for some news about what’s next at ES, some good stuff. The ES experience has been a great 5+ years for me and I’m excited about what’s next for the organization and about what’s next for me.
WOW–another advertisement for yourself. Obviously you only care about fattening your wallet.
Getting into the EMO game huh? Lets steal some more money from schools and tax payers in the name of student achievement.
D.B.
i am very pleased to know about Bellwether that works for such an important work without any profit motive objective
I’m glad to hear you’re focusing on education for low-income children. I used to work in the nonprofit sector and it always was such a shame to see these bright kids with so little future – just because they were poor and getting their education in a failing school district.