On June 12, 2018, Eva Moskowitz’s Success Academies (SA) posted this job ad for middle school math and science teachers. Moskowitz is using Teach for America (TFA) spinoff org, The New Teacher Project (now known simply as TNTP) to “run the hiring process” in order to fill those teacher vacancies.
SA suffers from high levels of teacher turnover that SA doesn’t care to address, according to multiple comments by former employees on Glassdoor. Commenters also note that due to high attrition, promotion comes quickly, outpacing competence.
More teachers are always needed– which makes the services of a teacher pipeline useful.
The SA ad begins, “TNTP has partnered with Success Academy….” That’s what TNTP does— it sells its services to school districts, supplying “both vision and manpower.”
The SA job ad describes TNTP as “a national nonprofit founded by teachers.” Well, that is a stretch. TNTP was founded in 1995 by former TFAer, Michelle Rhee (with TFA founder, Wendy Kopp, serving on the TNTP board “as needed”); Rhee left TNTP in 2007 to become DC chancellor. (Note that Rhee’s DC assistant superintendent, Kaya Henderson, was also a TNTP “partner,” as noted on TNTP’s 2000 tax form.)
The year of Rhee’s TNTP departure (2007), current TNTP president, Karolyn Belcher, began to show up on TNTP’s tax forms as one of its “highest-compensated employees.” In 2015, Belcher became TNTP president; her 2017 total compensation was $301,882.
Like Rhee, Belcher also hails from TFA, having taught only two years (1990-92).
In December 2015, I wrote a post about Belcher’s rise in TNTP— and the fact that Belcher operated a Harlem-based charter school that had its charter revoked; a 2004 report by the Charter School Institute indicated that Belcher’s school, Reisenbach Charter School, received a negative report, including issues of low 8th-grade test scores, high teacher turnover, and fiscal problems.
Despite Reisenbach’s negative history, as a city councilwoman in 2004, Moskowitz argued to keep the Belcher’s school open.
Once again, it seems that Moskowitz might be trying to lend a hand to Belcher, a fellow corporate reformer. And since SA experiences high teacher attrition, one might think of the SA-TNTP agreement as one corporate reformer hand washing another.
But will SA provide enough soap?
According to TNTP’s tax forms (see end of post for links), TNTP revenue is finding it difficult to keep up with TNTP expenses:
- 2012: total revenue: $50.3M; total expenses: $50.8M
- 2013: total revenue: $57.9M; total expenses: $55.5M
- 2014: total revenue: $57.2M; total expenses: $63.4M
- 2015: total revenue: $83.5M; total expenses: $62.7M
- 2016: total revenue: $49.7M; total expenses: $61.7M
In 2015, the unusual increase in revenue was from unusually high “contributions and grants”, with “program revenue” falling from the previous year:
- 2012: contributions and grants: $18.2M; program revenue: $32.1M
- 2013: contributions and grants: $21.3M; program revenue: $36.3M
- 2014: contributions and grants: $20.1M; program revenue: $36.9M
- 2015: contributions and grants: $48.8M; program revenue: $34.5M
- 2016: contributions and grants: $16.6M; program revenue: $32.9M
The 2015 revenue boost looks like a philanthropic bailout. But there was no such boost in 2016….
Note that on its “our finances” webpage, TNTP advertises itself as follows:
To ensure the long-term sustainability of our work, TNTP is a revenue-generating non-profit.
However, TNTP’s program revenue has been on the decline since 2014– which defies TNTP’s statement about revenue generation ensuring TNTP’s long-term sustainability.
Whether adding Moskowitz as a client will help TNTP’s questionable finances remains to be seen. But TNTP may help keep Moskowitz’s SA teacher revolving door turning, at least for a while.
TNTP Tax Forms:
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Want to read about the history of charter schools and vouchers?
School Choice: The End of Public Education?
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Schneider is a southern Louisiana native, career teacher, trained researcher, and author of two other books: A Chronicle of Echoes: Who’s Who In the Implosion of American Public Education and Common Core Dilemma: Who Owns Our Schools?. You should buy these books. They’re great. No, really.
