4LAKids - Here we go again: BILLIONAIRE'S $50 MILLION CONTEST AIMS TO MODERNIZE HIGH SCHOOLS

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: Here we go again: BILLIONAIRE'S $50 MILLION CONTEST AIMS TO MODERNIZE HIGH SCHOOLS:

Here we go again: BILLIONAIRE'S $50 MILLION CONTEST AIMS TO MODERNIZE HIGH SCHOOLS

By Jill Tucker, Educataion Writer, San Francisco Chronicle | http://sfchron.cl/1NOJHPg

Photo: Lea Suzuki, The Chronicle Melissa Iglesias (l to r), 15; Abel Regalado, 16; and Vanessa Martinez, 15, all students at ARISE High School register at the XQ roadshow on Wednesday, December 9, 2015 in Oakland, Calif. 

December 28, 2015 Updated: December 28, 2015 5:09pm   ::  A national contest with a $50 million prize pool and a billionaire backer has spurred teams across the country to reinvent the American high school, overhauling an antiquated model that hasn’t changed in 100 years.

At least five winners will each get about $10 million over five years to make their schools come to life. The competition hopes to stimulate out-of-the-box thinking, with the eight-figure award luring public, private and nonprofit contestants, including San Francisco Unified School District, to vie for the money offered up by Palo Alto heiress Laurene Powell Jobs, widow of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs.

“In towns and cities far and wide, teams will be rethinking and building public schools that prepare students for the rigorous challenges of college, jobs, and life,” according to the contest literature from XQ: The Super School Project.

If the sales pitch sounds familiar, it’s because cash-prize contests to spur school reform are not new, having been bolstered by several philanthropic billionaires and a couple of U.S. presidents — often with less-than-stellar results. Yet, the contests continue, with cash-starved schools lining up to compete.

The XQ contest — like IQ, but with an X-factor — is funded by Powell Jobs through her nonprofit Emerson Collective, which advocates for social issues like education and immigration reform.

‘Wherever life takes them’

The $50 million has pushed her effort into high-profile territory, prompting hundreds of teams to work on entries that are due in February, with at least five winners expected to be announced in August. The competitors represent both traditional and charter schools, and their new or revamped programs would then launch the following fall.

“Imagine a learning environment you can’t see today that brings the best of technology, the best of teaching, that truly prepares young people to make choices, to be ready for wherever life takes them after high school,” said Russlyn Ali, chief executive of the XQ Institute.

The country’s high schools were last transformed in the early 1900s to accommodate the industrial revolution and factory work. That new system required students to spend an hour a day in each course, a standardization of education based on time spent in classroom seats. That’s a problem, Powell Jobs said at the September launch of the contest.

“Nearly every aspect of our daily lives — from how we communicate to how we work and play — has changed dramatically,” she said. “But our high schools have stayed frozen in time.”
While the contest leaves the door wide open to the kinds of changes teams can propose, several themes have popped up in the concepts submitted and reviewed by XQ officials in4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: Here we go again: BILLIONAIRE'S $50 MILLION CONTEST AIMS TO MODERNIZE HIGH SCHOOLS: