The continuing influence of the Gates Foundation on mainstream media reporting and the NY Times in particular

Reporter Tim Schwab just had a must-read piece in the Columbia Journalism Review about how the Gates Foundation provides grants to news outlets such as NPR, BBC, NBC, Al Jazeera, ProPublica, National Journal, The Guardian, Univision, Medium, the Financial Times, The Atlantic, the Texas Tribune, Gannett, Washington Monthly, Le Monde, the Seattle Times, and many others.  These outlets frequently provide favorable coverage of the Foundation and its grantees, and potential conflicts of interest are too rarely admitted by these outlets. 

He tells a particularly disturbing story about how two freelance journalists, Robert Fortner and Alex Park, investigated Gates' outsize influence on international public health policy in 2017 for the Dutch publication De Correspondent and in the HuffPost.  In both instances, the Foundation contacted their editors to try to steer them away from doing stories on this issue and hinted at a financial support if they did.  As Schwab writes:

During Park and Fortner’s investigation for De Correspondent, the head of Gates’s polio communications team, Rachel Lonsdale, made an unusual offer to the duo’s editor, writing, “We typically like to have a phone conversation with the editor of a publication employing freelancers we are engaging with, both to fully understand how we can help you with the specific project and to form a longer term relationship that could transcend the freelance assignment.”

When asked about this, the Foundation sent the following statement to CJR:

“As with many organizations, the foundation has an in-house media relations team that cultivates relationships with journalists and editors in order to serve as a resource for information gathering and to help facilitate thorough and accurate coverage of our issues.’ ”

One of the media organizations Schwab discusses, Solutions Journalism, has received $7.6 million from the Gates Foundation since 2014 to write articles suggesting practical solutions to social problems and train other reporters to do so as well.  Since then, as Schwab points out, SJ has repeatedly produced stories praising projects and companies that are Foundation grantees and/or have received personal investments from Bill Gates himself.   

Solutions Journalism was founded by David Bornstein and Tina Rosenberg in 2013 and they continue to run the organization and receive six figure salaries as CEO and VP for Innovation respectively. They explain their mission this way:

“Our mission is to spread the practice of solutions journalism: rigorous reporting on responses to social problems. We seek to rebalance the news, so that every day people are exposed to stories that help them understand problems and challenges, and stories that show potential ways to respond.”

Bornstein and Rosenberg also have a regular column in the NY Times called "Fixes", which according to Schwab has run at least 15 favorable stories promoting the work of the Gates Foundation by name, without any mention that the columnists are funded by the Foundation as well. 

I previously wrote about two pieces Tina Rosenberg wrote for the NY Times,  one in May 2013 and again in June 2016, praising Bridge International Academies, a for-profit company based in Cambridge Mass. that operates a controversial chain of private schools in Africa and India.  By most accounts, BIA schools feature shoddy facilities, a scripted curriculum, large classes, uncertified teachers, and tuition that is relatively expensive, especially considering the income levels in the developing countries in which they are located.  And as has been widely noted, Bill Gates has personally invested in this company.

In her 2016 article about BIA, Rosenberg omitted any mention that the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Education had recently sent a letter to the Liberian president, stating that its plan to outsource some of its public schools to this for-profit company represented a “gross violation” of its education obligations under the Sustainable Development Goal number four, which holds that by 2030, the nation would “ensure that all girls and boys complete free, equitable and quality primary and secondary education leading to relevant and effective learning outcomes.”  The  United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child had also opposed the expansion of these privately-run schools. 

Nor did Rosenberg mention an event that had been reported in the Washington Post on June 9  and Canadian news on June 11,  just days before:  that when Education International, an NGO, sent Curtis Riep, a Canadian academic, to Uganda to investigate the conditions in BIA schools, Bridge had placed a ‘wanted ad’ in a Ugandan newspaper, falsely accusing Riep of ‘illegally’ impersonating one of its employees.  This caused him to be briefly arrested before all charges were dropped. Subsequently, it was revealed that Bridge also had plans to use the personal data of its students to market products to families, as criticized by the Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

Rosenberg also authored a NY Times column in March 2015, praising New Classrooms, a much-hyped company that was spun off from a program in the NYC public schools, where it was called “School of One.”  This blended learning math program has received more than $31 million from the Gates Foundation since 2011, and features students receiving lessons and assessments from a computerized "playlist". Bill Gates has repeatedly praised the value of this program, most recently in April 2016 in a speech in which he called New Classrooms a model that “represents the future not only of math, but a number of subjects.”

While Rosenberg quoted from the sole favorable study that supported this program, a December 2014 research study by Doug Ready of Columbia, she left out this disclaimer in the study:

“It is important to stress again that these findings cannot be attributed to TTO [Teach to One, another name for the program] without the use of experimental or quasi-experimental designs. In other words, we cannot state definitively that TTO caused the above-average achievement gains noted above.” 

Just months later,  a more authoritative 2015 study was released– a randomized experimental evaluation by Jonah Rockoff of Columbia, that concluded that “School of One had no statistically significant effects on student achievement—positive or negative–relative to traditional math instruction.”  In 2019,  a three-year federally-funded evaluation of the program’s implementation in Elizabeth NJ schools, entitled “Final Impact Results from the i3 Implementation of Teach to One: Math was released, also showing null results.  Unsurprisingly, neither of these studies have been featured in any follow-up piece in the NY Times or by Rosenberg in her column, which after all, focuses on “solutions” no matter how unreliable they may turn out to be.

Rosenberg also wrote not one but two columns praising “Flipped Classrooms,” which has also been one of Bill Gates’ favorite concepts – in which students watch video lessons at home such as those from the Khan Academy and then do their homework in class.  The Gates Foundation has given millions to flipped classrooms and to the Khan Academy, despite little research to back up this method of instruction.  

Since I wrote my blog on these Rosenberg’s columns, I noted that Bornstein has written two other pieces for the NY Times, one in 2012 and another in 2018, praising an ed tech software program called PowerMyLearning, which has received more than $11 million from the Gates Foundation since 2011.

Asked by Schwab if he could provide examples of any SJ critical reporting about Gates or the projects they support, David Bornstein responded, “Most of the stories that we fund are stories that look at efforts to solve problems, so they tend to be not as critical as traditional journalism."

Hmm.  If someone is  really interested in producing rigorous reporting on potential solutions to important public problems, wouldn't they want to cast an objective, analytic eye on whether these ideas really work? If not, aren't their columns really PR in disguise?

But perhaps the most troubling aspect of the “Fixes” columns in the NY Times is that they rarely mention that many the programs they promote are funded by Gates -- and in none of their columns do they reveal that the authors themselves work for an organization that is dependent on Gates Foundation support. This glaring conflict of interest and lack of disclosure appears to violate both the NY Times ethical standards, as I pointed out in my blog, and the standards of Solutions Journalism itself.  

The Times standards include this statement: 

 "…it is essential that we preserve a professional detachment, free of any whiff of bias... Scrupulous practice requires that periodically we step back and take a hard look at whether we have drifted too close to sources we deal with regularly... Staff members may not accept employment or compensation of any sort from individuals or organizations who figure or are likely to figure in coverage they provide, edit, package or supervise… In some cases, disclosure is enough. But if The Times considers the problem serious, the staff member may have to withdraw from certain coverage.”

These rules also pertain to reporters who are not formally on staff: “Our contracts with freelance contributors require them to avoid conflicts of interest, real or apparent."

The lack of disclosure also appears to violate the standards of Solutions Journalism itself. Here is the relevant passage on their webpage entitled Ethics:

“The Solutions Journalism Network is a nonpartisan organization committed to transparency and editorial independence. We do not support or advocate for any particular idea, model, organization, or agenda…. SJN’s grant recipients, whether newsrooms or individual journalists, should adhere to the highest standards of conduct as set forth in by bodies such as the Society of Professional Journalists…We require that our grant recipients remain completely transparent about any potential conflicts of interest that could arise in the context of reporting on an issue of interest to a Solutions Journalism Network funder.” 

In his CJR article, Tim Schwab asked Tina Rosenberg about these apparent, ongoing conflicts of interest in which she and Bornstein promote the work of Gates Foundation and its grantees.  She responded this way:  

“We do disclose our relationship with SJN in every column, and SJN’s funders are listed on our website. But you are correct that when we write about projects that get Gates funding, we should specifically say that SJN receives Gates funding as well....Our policy going forward with the NY Times will be clearer and will ensure disclosures.”  

Yet her response ignores that in many of her columns, there is no mention of her connection to Solutions Journalism, so that even the most interested reader would not be able to make that inference. Only beginning in May 2016 did the NY Times even identify her as a co-founder of SJ.  Moreover, after I raised these same concerns about the lack of disclosure of conflicts of interest on this blog over three years ago, I followed up by emailing the NYT ombudsperson twice, in August and October 2016, without any response. 

Even more troubling is how Rosenberg and Bornstein argue that there is no reason to disclose any potential conflict of interest in her columns praising Bridge International, since Bill Gates did not donate to these schools through his foundation, but directly via his personal wealth:

“The writers argue that SJN’s ties are to the Gates Foundation, not to Bill Gates himself, so no disclosure is needed. “This is a significant distinction,” Rosenberg and Bornstein stated in an email.”

This claim represents an astonishing lapse of judgement. So, reporters can continue to praise the “solutions” provided by for-profit companies that Bill Gates has personally investments in, while getting their salaries partly subsidized by his Foundation, without any responsibility to admit to this potential conflict of interest? Meanwhile, his Foundation continues to provide Gates with a hefty tax deduction, helping him to accumulate even more wealth, which then he can invest in other, for-profit companies.  Without transparency, this lack of disclosure could be seen as a kind of money laundering. 

In any case, the NY Times does not seem eager to do its part to provide the minimal amount of candor required.  As Schwab writes:

Months after Bornstein and Rosenberg say they asked their editors to add financial disclosures to their columns, those pieces remain uncorrected. Marc Charney, a senior editor at the Times, said he wasn’t sure if or when the paper would add the disclosures, citing technical difficulties and other newsroom priorities. 

Technical difficulties?  Seems like a substantial, ongoing ethical failure to me. 

More sloppy & non-fact based journalism from NY Times on charter schools

David Leonhardt

David Leonhardt's latest NY Times column touting charter schools is full of bogus claims and sloppy journalism.  He inveighs against progressive critics, writes that he wants a fact-based debate over education reform “in a more nuanced, less absolutist way than often happens" but then adds: "Initially, charters’ overall results were no better than average. But they are now." The link is to a CREDO website that doesn't show this.

The most recent CREDO national study of charters from 2013 examined charters in 26 states plus NYC and found significant (if tiny) learning gains in reading on average but none in math.  CREDO is generally considered a pro-charter organization, funded by the Walton Foundation and many independent scholars have critiqued its methodology.

Moreover, the main finding of the 2013 study was that the vast majority of charter schools do no better than public schools, as Wendy Lecker has pointed out.  In 2009, CREDO found, 83 percent of charters had the same or worse results in terms of test scores than public schools, and in 2013, about 71-75 percent had the same or worse results.

Finally, to the extent that in some urban districts, there are studies showing that charters outperform public schools on test scores,  there are many possible ways to explain these results, including an overemphasis on test prep, differential student populations, peer effects, higher student attrition rates and under-funding of most urban public schools.

Leonhardt also writes that "The harshest critics of reform, meanwhile, do their own fact-twisting. They wave away reams of rigorous research on the academic gains in New Orleans, Boston, Washington, New York, Chicago and other cities, in favor of one or two cherry-picked discouraging statistics. It’s classic whataboutism. "

Yet three out of these four links have nothing to do with charter schools, nor are they peer-reviewed studies. The NYC study by Roland Fryer instead focuses on which attributes of NYC charter schools seemed to be correlated with higher test scores compared to other NYC charter schools.

The Chicago link goes to a NY Times column Leonhardt himself wrote on overall increases in test scores and graduation rates in Chicago public schools that doesn’t even mention charter schools.  The DC link also is far from “rigorous research,” but sends you to a DCPS press release about the increase in 2017 PARCC scores, with again no mention of charter schools, or even “reform” more broadly.  

 

If there is indeed “reams of rigorous research” supporting charter schools, one might expect that Leonhardt would link to at least one actual, rigorous study showing this. 

Leonhardt's previous column on charter schools discussed this recent report from Doug Harris of Tulane's  Education Research Alliance on the improved results of New Orleans charter schools.  Others including Mercedes Schneider have critiqued the Harris study.  I immediately focused on the section of the report in which Harris mentions possible alternative explanations for these schools' academic progress, including their substantial increased funding after Katrina.  

After citing the the abundant research that spending matters when it comes to student outcomes, and admitting that the NOLA schools saw a $1,358 funding increase per student after privatization, Harris then argues:

It is questionable, however, whether the results from these studies provide a valid indication of the counterfactual in this case. First, the corruption and dysfunction in the Orleans Parish School Board prior to the storm implies that the additional resources would not have been used to generate better outcomes to the extent that the average district did in the above school funding studies. Second, the city’s spending increase, which came mainly from local funding and philanthropists, may have been partly caused by the reforms. The same inefficiencies that led to public disenchantment with the local OPSB pre-Katrina led to a widespread perception in the city that the reforms improved schools (Cowen Institute, 2016). This increased public support likely contributed to political support for local property tax levies and the backing of philanthropists that produced the spending increase. Any effect of spending on student outcomes, in this sense, may not be just an alternative explanation, but rather an indirect effect of the reforms. Therefore, while spending almost certainly contributed to the overall effect, it is unclear whether it was a substantial cause.

Here Doug Harris maintains that he doesn't even have to attempt to disentangle the differential impact of increased funding in NOLA schools on student outcomes from their charterization, since in his estimation, it was unlikely that philanthropic support or increased local spending would have occurred without privatization happening first.  Thus he posits that the political will to fund schools properly was an effect of charterization, and thus not a possible cause of their academic improvements - a speculative argument at best.

One could study whether increased funding for schools has occurred primarily in those school districts that charters have taken over.  One could also analyze the degree to which public support for public schools has become dependent on their privatization.  Harris doesn't attempt either, as far as I know.  In any case, if either statement is true, this says more about the weaknesses in our political system than the inherent quality of charter schools.

Leonhardt, of course, doesn't mention this weakness of Harris' argument in his column on the NOLA report, nor does he mention any of the evidence that the growth of charter schools nationally has also been associated with reports of corruption, increased segregation, suspension rates, abuse of student rights, and loss of funding for democratically-governed public schools, as the recent NPE/Schott report card points out, among others. 

Research studies focusing on other aspects of the corporate “reform” agenda more generally, including the implementation of the Common Core, teacher evaluation linked to test scores, more closures of public schools, and expansion of online learning, have shown generally dismal academic results.  It is indeed time to engage in more “fact-based” discussions of these trends, and I would urge NY Times columnists like Leonhardt to start doing so.  

Updated: 83% of NYC school buildings have elevated levels of lead -- check the results here -- and more confusing messages from DOE

Update: See the interview on NY1 with Dr. Marc Edwards saying there is no safe level of lead in water.  See also today's NY Times says DOE is  flushing water from affected schools in addition to other remediation efforts -- which still doesn't explain how many schools have had fixtures replaced and how many have successfully brought down lead levels below the state limits.  The NYT also takes credit for the DOE testing the water correctly with the first draw and without pre-flushing, though unmentioned is that a new  state law required all districts to retest schools according to the new protocol by October 31.  

The NYT also repeats the standard DOE quote that "there had never been a known case of lead poisoning traced to drinking water in schools" without explaining that school-age children are rarely tested for lead. Nor as far as I know has the Paper of Record ever reported on the recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics that remediation be required in any school where lead levels are above 1 ppb, rather than the 15 ppb limit currently in state law.

See the DOE spreadsheet of results from testing the outlets for leaD in each school posted here.  To the right is the summary of the results.

Despite  the claim by DOE below that a more detailed breakdown of the results is available here on the NY State Department of Health  website, they don’t seem to be included in that comprehensive list– perhaps because DOE completed their testing months later than all the other districts in the state  and months after the legal deadline.

The spreadsheet they did provide has lots of important data missing, including how many affected outlets there were in each school and what actual levels of lead `were found. 

The fact that 83% of schools had at least one affected water outlet does not appear to support the rosy tone of the DOE statement below that “the number of elevations are minimal” – or the assurances that “There has never been a known case of lead poisoning due to drinking water in schools” given the fact that few children are tested for lead after age 4, and any detectable level of lead in a child’s blood has been linked to intellectual and behavioral problems.

Lead experts Dr. Marc Edwards of Virginia Tech and Dr. Morri Markowitz of Montefiore Hospital, both quoted in an earlier NY Post article here, would probably not be so optimistic.  I am quoted in today's DNAinfo that the DOE should consider the need to test students for lead, especially in schools where the highest concentrations were found -- though Dr. Edwards said that might give parents false confidence since even excessive amounts of lead are removed from a child's  blood within 30 days, and after that, the damage has probably been done.  

The DOE also omits the information that I wrote about here, that the American Pediatric Association recommends remediation for any fixture or outlet where the water tests more than 1 ppb, vs. the 15 ppb that NY state has adopted -- because any detectable level of lead has been shown to have a negative impact on children's behavior and intellectual abilities.  In addition to considering the stricter standard, the city should also test water outlets in public libraries and recreation centers for lead, as Washington DC has now done.

Still, the summary available on the DOE spreadsheet is far more informative that the letter that principals are supposed to send home to parent and the statement below. Instead of mentioning the 83% figure, the letter  says this: "Using State standards, 92% of our fixtures system-wide tested below guidance. This demonstrates that we do not have any systemic issues with water in our school buildings and our remediation protocol is effective."  Again, the messages sent out by DOE is confusing.  Is this after remediation or before?  

And see this from below: "Our comprehensive remediation protocol also includes replacing fixtures with elevated results as well as piping to the walls, and placing schools with elevated results on a weekly morning flushing protocol."  Why are they still flushing the pipes if remediation has worked?  Flushing as opposed to replacement is  not an approved  strategy according to the state law or or the EPA.

____

Message to reporters from the DOE:

New York City water is of the highest quality and water in schools is safe for students and staff to drink. The DOE’s rigorous testing protocol was developed in partnership with City and State agencies and we recently completed water testing on all school buildings across the City. Of all of the potential drinking water sources in the 1,544 buildings that were tested for the presence of lead, 8 percent (10,633 of 132,276) of samples taken had results over 15ppb. This is lower than the statewide average of 14 percent. Additionally, the number of drinking fixtures with results over 15ppb is 1.5 percent of all fixtures that were tested. A summary is attached and a detailed breakdown of the results is available here.

92 percent of all fixtures sampled tested below the action level of 15ppb. This demonstrates that our water system as a whole is safe and reliable. All cooking and drinking water fixtures with results over 15ppb are immediately taken offline and are only placed back online once they have been remediated and results from updated tests are below 15ppb. Our comprehensive remediation protocol also includes replacing fixtures with elevated results as well as piping to the walls, and placing schools with elevated results on a weekly morning flushing protocol.

Testing began in late November and families have been receiving detailed letters with results about their child’s school on a rolling basis. Schools and families received these letters within 10 days of when the DOE received the results, and in many cases, letters were distributed within 24 hours. The letter and the complete laboratory reports are also posted on each school’s website, with translated versions available in 10 languages. We continue to host community meetings across the City to ensure all questions from families and staff are being addressed.

The documents that are being shared with schools and families include details on the City’s water source, an overview of the DOE’s testing and remediation protocols, and information from DOHMH about the health effects of lead and what parents should do if they are concerned about their child’s exposure to lead. New York City water that is delivered from the upstate reservoir system is lead free and DEP conducts over 500,000 tests annually throughout the system. There has never been a known case of lead poisoning due to drinking water in schools. DOHMH investigates cases of elevated lead levels in blood samples from children, and the most common source of lead exposure for children with elevated blood lead levels is lead-based paint.

Nothing is more important than the safety of students and staff and we remain vigilant in our testing and remediation processes. As outlined in our testing protocol and as required by the State, samples are taken on a first draw basis only after water has been stagnant for a minimum of 8 hours, and sometimes much longer. When the water runs for even a few seconds, fresh water flows through the fixture and has lower lead levels.

This round of citywide testing also included all charter schools in DOE buildings. The New York City Health Code requires child care programs, including Pre-K for All programs, to test their water for lead levels, report results to DOHMH and remediate any outlet with test results above 15ppb. Information about test results at child care programs and the status of any remediation is on DOHMH’s website, Child Care Connect.

Attributable to Deputy Chancellor Elizabeth Rose: “Families should rest assured that water in schools is safe for students and staff to drink. As our citywide test results confirm, the number of elevations are minimal and we take immediate action to remediate all fixtures with results above 15ppb. We have shared detailed information with schools and families, and will continue to keep communities updated.”

Attributable to First Deputy Health Commissioner Dr. Oxiris Barbot: “Since 2005 we have seen an 86% decline in lead poisoning cases among children. We feel confident that the DOE is taking the right actions by taking drinking fixtures that have had lead exceedances off line until they can be replaced. Generally, these elevated levels are not reflective of the water children drink throughout the day, but concerned parents should speak to their child’s health care provider.”

Attributable to DEP Acting Commissioner Vincent Sapienza: “New York City tap water is world renowned for its taste and high quality. Our scientists conduct more than 500,000 tests each year to ensure the water meets or exceeds all state and federal health and safety guidelines.”