The Walton Family Foundation announced today that it will put another $25.5 million in KIPP charter schools over the next five years to expand the number of children they can enroll from 32,000 to 59,000.
The announcement doesn’t say if the anticipated expansion includes Arkansas, but Education Week’s report indicates KIPP will go “deeper” in areas in which it already has schools. KIPP has been expected to open a Little Rock school for some time. The Little Rock School District should make a public offer to turn over to KIPP operation of one of its poorest performing schools, with the students assigned to that school.
The Walton Foundation, by the way, touts Mathematica research (paid for by the Waltons and Gates and other billionaires) as finding superiority in KIPP work. I’ve mentioned previously that some have taken a different view of that Mathematica research. Education Week gets into that here, including press management of the study to benefit the interests of the financial backers and criticism of potential conflicts of interest. Education Week has also written about the mixed results of charter school management organizations.