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George Lucas Educational Foundation
American nonprofit publisher From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The George Lucas Educational Foundation is a nonprofit publisher that documents and publicizes exemplary K-12 education practices and programs, especially through video.[3][4][5] It does this primarily through the Edutopia website.
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Organizational history
An organization named "The Media Tree" was founded on 4 August 1983 in Mill Valley, California by John Korty and others. It engaged in public relations for media content creators to the public of Marin County.[6] On 4 September 1990, the organization was renamed to "The George Lucas Educational Foundation".[7] The George Lucas Educational Foundation is widely reported to have been founded in 1991[8][9] by George Lucas and Steve Arnold.[1] Lucas originally planned for the foundation to develop technology for schools, but soon determined that schools were not interested or able to use this technology.[3] The foundation was one of the first philanthropies to invest in digital learning technology.[3]
The foundation does not usually provide grants.[citation needed] In 2006, Lucas donated $175 million to his alma mater the University of Southern California through the foundation.[10]
In 2010, the foundation had a $6 million annual budget and eighteen full-time staff.[9] In 2012, the Foundation significantly increased its assets when it received the majority of the proceeds from the $4.05 billion sale of Lucasfilm to The Walt Disney Company[3][10]
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Publications
Print publications
About 1994, the Foundation began publishing a newsletter entitled Edutopia.[11][1] In September 2004, the foundation launched a free glossy magazine, also titled Edutopia[12][8][1][4] with educators as the target audience.[1][13] From its inception, the print magazine had 85,000 subscribers.[12][13][8] By 2006, it has 100,000 subscribers.[14][15] The print magazine was discontinued in Spring 2010. but the website continued as an online magazine.[1][3]
Edutopia.org
The Edutopia.org website was started in 2002.[16] In 2009, the foundation launched an advertising campaign, leading the website to receive 300,000 readers per month in 2010, a 70% increase from 2009.[9] Robert Pondiscio described Edutopia.org as an inspirational resource for teachers, exuding "unabashed idealism and cheerful optimism".[9] The website features a video series titled "Schools That Work" of in-depth profiles of specific schools.[9] Edutopia.org includes interactive features including comments, blogs, and internet forums.[17]
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Advocacy
The Foundation has sometimes included in its mission spreading best practices.[4] However, in practice, Edutopia is a nonprofit media company focused on satisfying and increasing its audience, not an educational reform advocacy organization strategizing to change educational systems.[9][5] The foundation has endorsed as its core principles: "comprehensive assessment, integrated studies, project-based learning, social and emotional learning, teacher development, and technology integration".[17][9][18] Robert Pondiscio has been critical of Edutopia's tagline "what works in public education" given the lack of empirical support for these recommendations and uncertainty about how they were developed.[9]
Research findings
Edutopia increases teachers engagement with educational best practices by packaging it in an appealing multisensory video format.[19] Edutopia disseminates scientific/factual knowledge, technical knowledge, and practical wisdom, with a greater emphasis on practical wisdom, which includes judgments, values, and beliefs.[20] Many of the tips and strategies on Edutopia have not been systematically researched.[19]
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References
Further reading
External links
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