KIPP TRUTH ACADEMY AND DALLAS SOCIAL VENTURE PARTNERS ANNOUNCE COMMUNITY FUNDRAISING CAMPAIGN

Campaign Kicks Off with Two-Week Challenge Grant, Boone Family Foundation Commits $1 for Every $2 Donated to the Nationally Recognized Charter School

DALLAS – June 30, 2010 – While most DFW middle-school students (and their teachers) are enjoying summer vacation, the team from South Dallas’ KIPP TRUTH Academy are already thinking about the upcoming school year. That’s because they have just two weeks to raise a remaining $35,000 as part of a community challenge grant issued by the Boone Family Foundation at the recent bigBANG! Social Innovation event hosted by Dallas Social Venture Partners (DSVP).

From now until July 12, the Boone Family Foundation will give $1 (up to $25,000) to the nationally recognized charter school for every $2 it raises from the community, making the total potential contribution to KIPP TRUTH $75,000.

Founded in 2003, KIPP TRUTH Academy is the Metroplex branch of the nationally renowned Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP). KIPP is a network of charter schools designed to transform and improve the educational opportunities available to low-income families, and ultimately, prepare students to enroll and succeed in college. KIPP has grown from a core of two middle schools established in the mid 1990s to a nationwide network of 82 schools in 19 states and the District of Columbia. All KIPP schools are free, open-enrollment, college-preparatory public schools located in under-resourced communities throughout the United States.

“This campaign is vital to the future of KIPP in Dallas/Ft. Worth,” said Bill Gedwed, chairman of the board of KIPP TRUTH Academy. “With these and other donations, we can build our current capacity and expand the reach of KIPP schools throughout the region – bringing proven and much-needed educational opportunities to thousands of underserved kids in our community.”

In order to meet this ambitious goal and attract the necessary matching dollars, KIPP and DSVP are working together to build awareness of KIPP and its leadership position in the charter school movement, as well as to grow its donor base.

“We believe in the power of leverage,” said DSVP President Stacy Caldwell. “When funders and donors work collaboratively around a project they believe in, the potential benefit to the community is exponential. DSVP is proud to support this campaign and work with KIPP to advance its vision.”

The launch of this campaign coincides with a landmark report issued June 22 by Mathematica, a nonpartisan research firm that examined demographic and achievement data from students in 22 KIPP schools in 14 school districts. As part of this rigorous multi-site study, researchers collected student level achievement data in each school and identified a matched comparison group of students in district schools who had similar achievement levels to the KIPP students in third and fourth grades.

Following are three key findings from the research (download the full report at www.kipp.org/mathematica):

1. KIPP does not attract more able students (as compared to neighboring public schools). In fact, most students enter KIPP with lower test scores than their peers in local district schools.
2. KIPP schools typically have a statistically significant impact on student achievement. Within two years of entering KIPP, students experience statistically significant, positive gains in math and reading.
3. Academic gains at many KIPP schools are large enough to substantially reduce race and income-based achievement gaps. In three years, half of all KIPP schools in the study closed one half or more of the black-white achievement gap in math, and one third of the black-white achievement gap in reading. In these KIPP schools, student gains are equivalent to 1.2 years of additional growth in mathematics and 0.9 years of extra growth in reading over three years.

According to Caldwell, donors and funders around the country are looking at the charter school model as an innovation – perhaps even a revolution – in America’s public education system, and they are anxious to help accelerate the positive impact and results that KIPP is demonstrating.

For more information about KIPP TRUTH or to contribute to the campaign, visit www.kipptruth.org.