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Meg Whitman, former eBay CEO and the 2010 Republican nominee for California governor, will help fund 10 new charter high schools on the Peninsula, a charter school organization has announced.
Summit Public Schools, which currently runs Summit Prep in Redwood City, said Whitman’s family foundation will donate $2.5 million over five years to its “Silicon Valley College Ready Corridor” initiative.
The initiative aims to launch 10 new charter high schools in Santa Clara and San Mateo counties by 2021. Summit currently operates three high schools in addition to the eight-year-old Summit: the two-year-old Everest Public High School in Redwood City and two campuses — Ranier and Tahoma — opening this fall in San Jose.
Summit Prep and Everest are chartered by the Sequoia Union High School District.
Whitman, an Atherton resident who led eBay for a decade and lost last November’s governor’s race to Democrat Jerry Brown, sits on the board of Summit.
“Summit Public Schools have created a cutting-edge instructional model that will challenge, support and graduate young men and women with the skills and drive to become productive adults, community leaders and industry pioneers,” Whitman said in a prepared statement.
“That’s the Silicon Valley spirit and the key to its future.”
Currently, one in every five Silicon Valley high school students does not graduate, and fewer than half graduate with the preparation needed to attend a four-year college, Summit founder and CEO Diane Tavenner said.
“Silicon Valley is the world’s innovation capital, yet its own students aren’t graduating ready to succeed at a four-year college,” Tavenner said.
Summit’s “college readiness corridor” is aimed at tackling that problem, and eventually will provide a high-quality high school education to 6,000 local students, she said.
Beyond their $2.5 million gift, Whitman and her husband, Stanford University neurosurgeon Griffith Harsh, offered another $2.5 million matching grant that will double the contributions of others donating to the college-readiness project.
In addition to Summit, Whitman recently joined the national board of Teach for America. She also sits on the boards of HP, Procter & Gamble and Zipcar.
Summit’s Redwood City campus was one of the schools featured in the 2010 documentary “ Waiting for Superman.” The movie follows the story of Emily Jones, who was one of 445 applicants for 110 spots in a lottery for admission to Summit.
Jones told the filmmakers she felt fortunate when she won the lottery and was able to attend Summit rather than her assigned school, Woodside High.
Much better use of her money than self-funding her run at the Governor’s office.
Queen Meg attempts to rehabilitate her image.
She’s running again.
How about a simple thank you Ms. Whitman for you generous contribution to the our youth and to their future. Or would you prefer making the schools give the money back if/when she decides to run for public office again. Thank the lady-it won’t hurt, and you can still vote your own beliefs!
Thank her for what? Doing her fair share, like thousands of wealthy people have for millenia? How about it being her responsibility to give back? That’s my pov. Of course this is an attempt to rebuild her tarnished image, she’s no dummy. Still heartless, but no dummy.
Hmmm, please give us a break. Here’s a person that has made the choice to educate herself, work hard, made lots of sacrifices, and she just so happens to have made a lot of money doing it. I think it’s called “the American Dream”. She’s doing her fair share, are you? I bet not. Meg and her ilk DO pay 70% of our taxes, I can pretty much guarantee that she gives out thousands, perhaps millions to non-profits, do you? You may not like her politics, but I would bet my home that she’s done more to contribute to her community than someone that sits around and posts negative blogs about something he/she doesn’t even know.
They pay 70% of our taxes? Hmmmm, they still pay less by percentage than many & they should pay the majority of the taxes because they have the majority of the wealth. Yes, of course I do my part. Who are you to question that? This story isn’t about MOI, it’s about her. I’m not cultivating political power or hitting my assistants or covering up anything w/my housekeeper. Are you? Oh, wait, that doesn’t matter, because YOU are not the subject of the story, either, Nutmeg is. As a politician, she is subject to ongoing potshots & that’s just the way it is.
Sacrifices? We all sacrifice plenty in life, that’s what it takes. But Nutmeg’s employees sure sacrificed a lot just to deal w/her.
Frankly, you don’t know what I do/don’t know about Nutmeg & her Sili Valley dealings or political shenanigans. Many, many people in the area have the scoop on her & aren’t blindsided by her wealth or ability to get an education. Hey, I have one, too. So do my spouse, my parents & my siblings & their spouses. In fact, the majority of this small group referenced has, individually, more education than Meg does. She has an MBA – like scads of smart people in the area.
Her greed & drive have, imo, this far, dominated her ability to do good. There’s a bit of hope, though – she has Bill Gates for a role model.
Thank you Diane Tavener and Meg Whitman.
Everest Junior Family
Take the HP job, Meg.
We need a real candidate in two years, one that listens to strategists and experienced political sheepherders. Not using the maid as an asset to dent the Latino vote was political malpractice. Then to fight her for 5 grand instead of buying her off during an election was stupid.
A vote for Tom Campbell. Or even Westly.
Ms. Hmmmmm, they DO in fact pay 70% of the taxes in this country.(billionaires) You obviously have not made the sacrifices or choices that Meg, or anyone else successful for that matter, have made. That’s your issue, not mine, not anyone else. Being jealous or envious of Meg seems a little childish, don’t you think? Hold yourself accountable, deal with your own choices in life, leave others alone that are in fact participating, contributing and worked hard, or perhaps got a little lucky, and were successful. Last time I checked we still have not toppled into socialism, although with your continued promoting of class warfare, it may happen soon.
“they DO in fact pay 70% of the taxes in this country.”
Don’t doubt it. What percentage of income do they account for? Are their effective tax rates higher or lower than a hard working middle class American?
Data usually shows they pay a lower tax rate than someone who works for their income as opposed to sitting around opening quarterly statements.
Buffett vs Buffett’s secretary being a case in point.
The majority of responses make Meg out to be a cross between Eva Braun and Lysistrata………IOW none but those who thank her sound too different than the usual subversive plot seekers who are neither rich or as educated as they claim.
Let Meg educate some people. It’s been a really selfish 10 years around the Silicon Valley with zero progress and investigations still going on with all kinds of department heads and former members who permitted the level of education sink into the pits.
Keltic – Another envy ridden individual?! Sad, very sad. I guess you have not read the latest on Mr. Buffet’s secretary, he was comparing her salary with his capital gain yields, hardly oranges v. oranges. This attitude that you, and other socialistic minded people is chockfull of issues. Issues like: WHO really are “millionaires”? Are they the $250K+ kind? Or the kind that own real estate worth $250K+? And is, $250K worth more in Gainesville Florida v. San Francisco?
How ’bout if you leave their incomes alone, work on cutting back wasteful spending and help others realize their American Dream, rather than trying to extort more dollars from those that have done MUCH more than “open their quarterly statements”. “Hard working middle class” is such a smack in the face to anyone that has worked hard and made better choices than those “hard working middle class”, you promote that these folks didn’t work as hard. Again, class warfare and envy, hardly a good formula for promoting the American Dream.
Buffet had it right:
If there’s a class war, then his class already won a long time ago…
Not even close.
Take spending and rates back to the 90’s.
A couple points higher for a balanced budget. Clinton gave us a budget surplus a short decade ago. Let’s get back to paying down debt. Everyone pitches in.
Move forward by returning to the 90’s when our rates and spending worked.
It’s interesting, Fair Share, that you feel compelled to resort to personal attacks to defend your not-so secret crush on Nutmeg.
Nutmeg didn’t pull her lil self up by her boostraps & make sacrifices. She was born w/a silver spoon clenched between her greedy little lips. She’s lived a life of privilege. So she’s smart – big deal. I’m not jealous one whit of Whitman. I think she’s a lousy politician and a mediocre businessperson who is driven, aggressive cold and mean-spirited. She’s a poor imitation of Ellison, & certainly no visionary like the Steves or Hewlett & Packard.
Your defense of her is actually pretty childish – Nutmeg can sure stand up for herself, as surely she stands on the shoulders of those poor souls she’s crushed on her scramble for that gold ring.
I’m pretty happy w/my life, my accomplishments & my goals. How about you? Are you paid to defend Meg? While I’ve never wanted Nutmeg’s life, I’ve known many who’ve unfortunately had to deal with her.
Yeah, like everyone else in this country who can read, I am well aware of how LITTLE billionaires pay in taxes. One doesn’t have to have any socialist leanings to be less than thrilled about the current bilionaire-to-tax ratio. Ever hear of Warren Buffett? Even if I currently am, had been or wanted to be a socialist, I’d have that right in this country. But no, I’m a capitalist, a voting, stockholding, educated capitalist like so many here in Sili Valley.
BTW, if you continue these personal attacks, I’ll be flagging your comments.
Mr. Editor – I’d like to fully understand how your editorial process works? Mr. “Hmmmm” trashes a fellow citizen of Menlo Park, Ms. Whitman, and you determine that MY rebuttals are personal attacks? Odd. This guy promotes class warfare, calls me childish, calls Meg “Nutmeg’, calls her a mediocre businessperson, cold, mean spirited…………and I go really far out there and tell him/her that he/she is envious. Makes no sense for any type of flagging.
Mr. Editor – I’d like to fully understand how your editorial process works? Mr. “Hmmmm” trashes a fellow citizen of Menlo Park, Ms. Whitman, and you determine that MY rebuttals are personal attacks? Odd. This guy promotes class warfare, calls me childish, calls Meg “Nutmeg’, calls her a mediocre businessperson, cold, mean spirited…………and I go really far out there and tell him/her that he/she is envious. Makes no sense for any type of flagging.
It’s MS. Hmmm. Nutmeg is a public figure – it doesn’t matter where she lives (see the negative commentary on this board re other public figures, be they local or national), so people get to criticize her as they see fit, while attacking other posters here is not acceptable. I haven’t yet flagged any of your posts, but I’m about to start…you can’t even get your story straight in your plea to the editor. You started attacking another poster and me, I responded by mostly focusing on Nutmeg and taking a couple of jabs at you. If you can’t stand the heat…
Flagged, Fair Share. You should sell your HP stock now while you can get a decent price for it.
Have a good evening – I’ll be off inciting class warfare (funny that you used a standard socialist comment) amongst the downtrodden.
If all of you who wish to be on her party list…..under your real names, why not post them if you want to be on her List again, or would rather be protesting by sending your kids out with signs in the old BMW’s you gave them for graduation?
This area has such a large amount of loyalists.She may have spent a lot of money to be Prez. but she DOES know how to buy back friends in a land like ours.
It is sad to see the thinly-disguised misogynism on this thread. I may not agree with Whitman’s politics, but she is one of the most successful women of our time. Maybe, thanks to her, the next generation of up-and-coming women won’t have to deal with as much public vitriol.
There are quite a few multi-$$$ men in this area who would rather spend their money buying themselves toys than supporting any charitable causes. I have to applaud Meg for putting her money into an innovative education program — a strong investment in our children — when it sometimes seems as though everyone else in the state wants to borrow from the kids to pay for current extravagances.
And let’s see how she does with HP before casting judgment. I’m betting she’s going to outshine the last two CEOs.
Uh, it wouldn’t be hard to outshine HP’s last 2 CEOs – that’s setting the bar pretty low. It’s also not Nutmeg herself giving the money – her husband is as well.
It’s all too easy to paint peoples’ dislike & disrespect of her as misogyny, but a lot of people can’t stand her because of the reasons they’ve stated, not due to gender. I don’t have a problem w/her gender, I have a problem w/her. Let’s hope the young women of today & tomorrow are little like her. One can be a powerful woman w/out resorting to Whitman’s behavior & tactics.
MEG IS DOING A GOOD JOB FOR SOME CHILDREN WHICH NOT MANY PEOPLE EXCEPT THOSE WHO BACKED CHARTER SCHOOLS FOR THEIR PROGENY.
THIS IS NOT AN AREA KNOWN FOR ITS CARING OF THE MAJORITY.
I LIKE MEG AND SUPPORT HER AND I GOT MY INVITATION AND A LIST ON NAMES OF PRODUCTIVE PEOPLE.
“thinly-disguised misogynism”
Misogyny? hardly.
A bunch of folks were pretty offended her only reason for running was to cut her cap gains tax rate to zero. She said so in one of the debates.
Spent $150 million to cut her cap gains to nothing. After a couple years, she would have been out of the red and in the black. A sound business choice, tax wise, for her. She just screwed it up REALLY badly and got crunched by Brown in a landslide.
Was willing to sell the state down the road, to cut revenues for personal gain, force others to suffer or make up the revenues.
Misogyny? Nice misdirection.
Not.
I don’t personally love her, but she is more effective than anyone except for the liberal billionaires in Silicon Valley and people like Buffet.
She is one smart lady and “gift horse” is absolutely dead on when speaking of misogyny and how men react to powerful women in the world both now and in the past.
Fortunately,those old keep the wife in the kitchen types who came here in covered wagons have seen their last bunch of sunsets and their spoiled “kids” just run for offices in order to play golf and barter.I would be thrilled to find an attorney (male) worth his salt in this area today.
As a woman who is in the highest income bracket I know the envy we stir in business and we are increasing and have surpassed men in graduates again.
Pretty funny to call it misogyny when so many of the anti-Nutmeg comments are from us females.
“thinly-disguised misogynism”
Please accept this as a challenge to prove your statement based on facts, not your claims of anecdotal evidence elsewhere.
Start with how Meg beat Brown with the female votes…. uh-oh….wait a minute…. “while women supported Brown by 16 points (56 percent vs. 40 percent)” http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20021593-503544.html
Oh dear, those darn misogynistic women, voting AGAINST Meg at a higher rate than the general population, which detested Meg at a 53-41 rate.
Any other evidence?
Don’t worry, Carly lost the women’s vote, too.
Seems women are pretty smart.
Nope, women are their own worst enemies. IVANA is correct — men and women alike feel threatened by smart, successful women. Time and again, research has shown that men and women would rather have a male boss. Why should it even matter?
Actions do speak louder than words, especially when those words are taken out of context. If she were making a donation of this magnitude just to curry favor with the moneyed elite, she’d write a check to Stanford. Instead, she is handing over cash to the public schools. How anyone can criticize her just baffles me.
Actually, I don’t feel threatened at all by successful women. I also consider there to be more than one definition of success. I do, however, feel threatened by nasty, mean-spirited, greedy, aggressive, self-promoting *people* of any gender who don’t have my interests, as a California voter, at heart. Nutmeg’s her own worst enemy thus far, not other members of her gender.
She ran for public office spending her own money (no public bailouts for Whitman!) She lost. She’s moved on, and I don’t see any point in bashing her for actions she might have theoretically taken had she been elected.
Meanwhile, she’s supporting the education of thousands of local teens, a short-term and longer-term benefit to our community. Some of you seem to be annoyed that she’s donating her money to a worthwhile cause instead of giving it to you!
The only appropriate reaction to this news is “thank you, Meg.”
So you can’t prove your “thinly-disguised misogynism” claim, so you waffle over to:
“…men and women alike feel threatened by smart, successful women.”
Huh? Based on your own fears? Based on some anecdotal story?
Admit that is was a dumb statement, don’t ignore it once you get called on it. Or shift to some random baseless claim: “(no public bailouts for Whitman!)”
So who got “public bailouts” in the last election?
I’m not a big Meg fan, but good for her for giving her money to public education. The fundamental problem with charter schools is that they are a piecemeal solution that is unsustainable financially in terms of educating all of the students. Summit only educates about 10% of the Sequoia UHSD students, so the model only works if it can be extrapolated to serve ALL the students who would thrive in that type of educational environment. And that takes money.
Wow! A Republican just acknowledged that money can make schools better. That is HUGE! That is something to celebrate!
I still wouldn’t vote for her, but tip my hat to her putting her money in the right place.
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