Bill Gates' Stay-In-School TV Show & Charter Prosperity

by Mike Smith · 2009-09-13 14:53:00 UTC
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Having invested $2 billion in education programs, Bill and Melinda Gates are teaming up with Viacom to produce TV show "Get Schooled." It will aim to cut the dropout rate by encouraging kids to stay in school. It'll feature celebrities, but focus on the people working behind the celebrities, and how important education was to them. The AP report goes off on a strange tangent to praise charter schools, which seems irrelevant — this isn't about quality, but about inspiring kids to stick around. Do charter schools do a better job of this? They're certainly seeing a surge of students, and a surge of funding from private investors which can't hurt.

[Photo credit: World Economic Forum]

Mike Smith is associate editor at Change.org.
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