SCHOTT FOUNDATION IMPACT REPORT 2024
In 2024, Schott pooled funds for Black- and Brown-led grassroots organizing in critical investment areas like building our multiracial democracy and the health and welfare of children and families.
Donor partners invest in Schott’s movement-building nationally as well as in the Northeast, South, and West through grantmaking, technical assistance, and the National Opportunity to Learn (OTL) Network.
2022 OTL Convening panelists
Contributor: Michael S. Wotorson
The National Opportunity to Learn Network is Schott’s flagship grantmaking program, comprising four national alliances and more than 40 grantee organizations, which encompass 306 local organizations across 32 states and 54 cities, actively coordinating 120,000 people and impacting more than 800,000.
Schott engages directly with movement organizations to fill gaps in infrastructure, working to co-design campaigns and support programs informed by our frontline partners. Schott links funding, resources, and organizations to strengthen and sustain movement infrastructure.
Members of the OTL Network benefit from Schott’s pooled grantmaking as well as leveraged funds. In 2024, members also received 1400 hours of technical assistance, with certain northeast grantees participating in the Technical Assistance Accelerator.
Stay tuned for the OTL Network Convening in May 2025. This year’s convening will bring together more than education advocates from across the country for peer learning, networking, collaboration and strategic planning.
Grassroots Arkansas
Caption: Nollie Jenkins Family Center
Contributor: Mike Woodward
In 2024, Schott substantially deepened donor investment in public education organizing and power building in the South. With the generous support of new partners, Schott expanded investments in grassroots organizations in North Carolina, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Mississippi.
In North Carolina, following Governor Roy Cooper’s declaration of a state of emergency for public education, Schott pooled resources from Dogwood Health Trust, John Rex Endowment, and the ChildTrust Foundation. The funds enabled local grassroots organizations statewide to coalesce, educate, and mobilize the public around a dangerous proposed private school voucher expansion.
In Louisiana, Schott increased its investment to support Step Up Louisiana’s statewide community schools campaign and Rethink’s youth organizing infrastructure in New Orleans. Schott leveraged its relationship with Someone Else’s Child Foundation which invested in these groups for the first time.
In Arkansas and Mississippi, Schott connected community groups like Grassroots Arkansas and the Nollie Jenkins Family Center with the Focus for Health Foundation. As a result, Focus for Health deepened its investment in the region.
Beyond pooling resources, these grantees are part of the National Opportunity to Learn Network, where they connect with other public education advocates and organizations to learn from each other, strategize, and grow.
Hearing Youth Voices members
Contributor: Precious Waldron-López
Hearing Youth Voices’ Youth Building Power membership group helps develop leadership skills and train new youth organizers in Connecticut. In 2024, the group met weekly to support each other in writing testimony aimed at the Board of Education and policymakers; they practiced their testimony and prepped to speak in front of elected officials. Their aim: wellness counselors and interventionists for students. Their campaign took them to four Board of Education meetings, five city council meetings, and the state legislature, where they attended and testified.
Their preparation, participation, and testimonies paid off. In the spring, they secured an additional $1.5 million for these critical positions.
Students Deserve members
Contributor: Michael S. Wotorson
Schott’s expansion to the Western region is more about building cross-regional relationships between California organizations and elsewhere, strengthening the movement strategically. Schott facilitates cross-organizational learning, which helps organizations in the South and Northeast with strategy ideas and organizations from the West. Conversely, it helps those in the West with Southern and Northeast strategy and organizing ideas.
In 2024, Schott is growing this connection through our evolving partnership with the Stuart Foundation through the Purpose of Education Initiative and the Youth Learning Initiative. These initiatives provide the perfect opportunity to promote and facilitate collaboration and information exchange.
In 2024, Students Deserve became one of the Schott Foundation’s newest grantee partners in California. With a rich history of pursuing positive systems and practice change for students and communities of color, the Schott Foundation recently invited Students Deserve to join the National OTL Network. There, they can share and learn about others’ movement strategies and successes from groups across the country working on similar issues.
Contributor: Precious Waldron-López
In 2024, the Nellie Mae Education Foundation approached the Schott Foundation with an interest in advancing the capacity of Northeast organizations to advocate for the policies and resources needed for New England communities (CT, RI, MA). In response, Schott leveraged its networks and partnership to create the Technical Assistance Accelerator. The program offers Northeast advocates sought-after communications, policy, research, and fundraising resources.
Donor partners who invest in the Schott TA Accelerator share our commitment to empowering grassroots organizations in the Northeast or their region and creating a sustainable framework that addresses immediate needs and strengthens long-term organizational capacity.
Contributor: Patrick St. John
Schott’s reports on Black male students in public education, released since 2004, highlight who loses out most through race and gender inequity and, therefore, have the most to give if we make our schools and communities equitable and just. Schott’s most recent edition of the report was released in May 2024: Love is the Foundation for Life: Schott Report on Black Males in Public Education
Schott’s detailed landscape reports, developed in partnership with the National Center for Youth Law, examine policy and outcome inequities in each grantee state. The profiles paint a picture that advocates can use to educate their members, craft strategies, and make policy changes.
Schott released the Educating America report in November 2023 as part of the GRAD Partnership. It provides the first in-depth analysis of the pandemic’s impact on high school graduation rates, uncovering some surprising trends often obscured by national averages.
Schott’s Loving Cities Index, launched in 2018, tracks 24 indicators —ranging from pre-K and school discipline to clean air to housing—allowing cities to assess whether they are truly “loving” to their residents. A new batch of city reports will be released in April 2025.
Contributor: Melissa Daar Carvajal
HEAL Together is a multi-partner initiative through which Schott supports grassroots campaigns and organizations combating the well-resourced, anti-democratic attacks that threaten our public schools, racial justice, and democracy.
In 2024, HEAL Together’s student and parent organizers shifted policy in their communities – defeating student censorship in Florida, winning community school funding in Norfolk, Virginia, defeating universal school vouchers in Tennessee, and promoting language access in Michigan. HEAL provides these organizers with funding, training, toolkits, and peer networks to build community power in local school districts, translating into state power.
In addition, HEAL’s Public School Strong campaign – started by parents, educators, and students in North Carolina – expanded to public school districts in Tennessee, Virginia, Ohio, and beyond. The campaign builds organizing teams, community power, and narrative to talk to policymakers, as well as to protect and promote public education.
Proud public school grads at the 2024 Accelerate conference.
Contributor: Patrick St. John
From legislators and artists to educators and community leaders, the alumni of U.S. public schools form the largest and most diverse network in the country, shaping our society in countless meaningful ways.
Yet, discussions about public education most often dwell on its perceived failures. The Schott Foundation believes it’s time to change the story—focusing instead on public schools’ critical role in fostering equity and opportunity in a multiracial democracy.
The #PublicSchoolGrad campaign is a multi-channel effort to change the narrative around our public schools, including live events, student performances, social media, and high-profile ambassadors to spread the message.
Check out some of these great public school grads.
