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Education Circle
The Challenge
Of the one million students who attend public school in the Bay Area, about half are not performing at grade level. And while dropout statistics are a subject of some dispute, as many as a third of Bay Area students drop out of school before graduating. Of those who do graduate, only a third meet the requirements to apply to a four-year college. Averages across the general population mask even more dismal demographic trends; for example, the college-ready graduation rate for Hispanic and African-American males in the Bay Area is well below 10 percent.
Statistics such as these would be cause for concern in any community, but in the high-rent, tech-charged Bay Area they are particularly troubling.
Our Goal
Full Circle Fund's Education Circle strives to improve the effectiveness of public education in the Bay Area, especially for underserved communities.
Our Approach
 To address this complex problem, Full Circle Fund has developed an Education Impact Guide that attempts to encapsulate and broadly sort the Theories of Change that can be brought to education reform. Most of our work focuses on the following key aspects of the issue:
- Student readiness and the impact of parent involvement
- School choice
- Curriculum standards
- Systemic changes, such as charter schools, decentralization, and effective governance
- Increased sources and optimized allocation of funding
- Recruitment, retention, compensation and professional development of teachers
- Instructional time per student
- Measurement of outcomes
The Education Circle has partnered with outstanding social innovators and nonprofits to explore different approaches to educational reform, with the ultimate goal of improving both educational access and outcomes for children.
Current Grantees
Selected by the Education Circle in May 2008:
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"When I think about the improvements at Oakland Unified, the help we enjoyed from Full Circle Fund is high on the list of contributors. Full Circle Fund's members are smart and talented; they bring outstanding connections; and when they make a commitment they follow through."
Randolph Ward
Former State Administrator, Oakland Unified School District
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