Schools Portal

A guide to the companies, lobbyists and think tanks involved in the privatisation of schools

What is happening to our schools? The opening up of schools to private companies has been described as ‘the largest market opportunity’ since healthcare was privatised. 'Let's all go forth. Let's all make hay,' as one private equity investor said at a 2015 UK education investment conference. A vast education industry now exists to profit from schools. It includes: education publishers, global technology firms, privately-managed school chains, and financial sector investors. Our profiles of these and other players on the Schools Portal aim to show which companies are leading the reforms; the networks of lobbyists working for them across continents; the politicians aiding them; the messages being used to sell these changes and more. This portal is part of Powerbase—your guide to networks of power, lobbying and deceptive PR. Powerbase has a policy of strict referencing and is overseen by a managing editor.

Who are the education refom lobbyists? CLICK FOR THE COMPLETE LIST OF PROFILED EDUCATON REFORMERS. They include the following: EdTech companies Pearson Google Knewton K12 Promethean Education investors GSV Capital Sovereign Capital Learn Capital NewSchools Venture Fund 500 Startups Education reformers Michael Gove Michael Barber James Tooley James O'Shaughnessy UK reform lobby groups Nesta Education Foundation Innovation Unit Centre for the Study of Market Reform of Education New Schools Network Education Reform Articles & Resources George Joseph, Teach for America Has Gone Global, and Its Board Has Strange Ideas About What Poor Kids Need, The Nation, 1 July 2016 Back to ALEC, Back to (Private) School, PR Watch, 31 August 2015 Jonathan Kozol, The Big Enchilada, Harper's Magazine, August 2007

Latest articles What’s more inconvenient – a teachers’ strike or Nicky Morgan’s plan?, Left Foot Forward, 6 July 2016 Fun ways to stop corporations taking over schools, Open Democracy, 27 April 2016 It’s not just English schools that the government wants to see in private hands, Left Foot Forward, 14 April 2016 The final frontier for privatisation: schools, Open Democracy, 31 March 2016 This article is part of the Spinwatch privatisation of Schools Portal project.

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