Communities for Public Education Reform (CPER) supports the growing field of education organizing through grants and technical assistance to community organizations working to ensure that parents and students have a strong voice in shaping the policies that affect their public schools. By bringing new resources to multiple sites for at least six years, CPER promotes innovation and supports systemic reforms that address educational inequities.
CPER links a wide range of funders to:
- Increase the visibility of and support for effective education organizing campaigns at the local, state and national levels;
- Leverage local dollars with national funds;
- Engage in mutual learning and strategizing;
- Facilitate collaboration among the grant partners to form a more strategically connected group with a related set of messages and stories;
- Encourage the emergence of new voices in the public discourse around public education reform;
- Help organizing groups strengthen and improve their ability to effect systemic education reform; and
- Support the development of a national movement for educational justice.
Grantmaking
To date, CPER has invested $10 million in grants and technical assistance to 22 local education organizing and allied organizations and three coalitions (involving 13 groups) in Illinois, Colorado, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. In each site, local CPER funders leverage national funding through a match ratio of at least one local dollar to each national dollar, with a $500,000 cap. CPER’s anticipated Fall 2010 grantmaking in California and Mississippi will increase total grantmaking to potentially more than $11.5 million. In addition, through its Learning Network CPER provides support to organizing groups and allied organizations at three affiliate sites in Boston, New York and Washington, D.C.
Key Donors
CPER represents an unparalleled investment in grassroots-led education reform. CPER receives national support from the Ford Foundation, W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Carnegie Corporation of New York, Marguerite Casey Foundation, Prudential Foundation, Schott Foundation for Public Education, Edward W. Hazen Foundation, Cricket Island Foundation, Charles Stewart Mott Foundation and more than 50 local funders.
For more information about the Fund and its work, visit the CPER website.
