History

Communities for Public Education Reform (CPER) is a funding collaborative that supports "education organizing" - community organizing for school reform. CPER is an outgrowth of the Working Group on Education Organizing (WGEO), a group of national, state-level and local funders supporting community-led efforts to improve educational opportunities and outcomes for students in low-income communities.

Despite its growing successes, the field of education organizing remains fragile and under-resourced. In 2006, WGEO members believed the time had come for funders to work together, nationally and across multiple locales, to capitalize on the potential of organizing to have large-scale, sustained impact on schools and student opportunities and outcomes. WGEO members also sought to increase the visibility of and support for the nascent field.

To that end, WGEO members approached Public Interest Projects (PIP) about managing CPER. PIP is a 501(c)(3) public charity that operates grantmaking, technical assistance and strategic-planning programs for donors addressing social justice issues. After a year-long planning and site-selection process, CPER formally launched in May 2007.

As a collaborative fund, CPER offers grantmakers the opportunity to pool resources, extend their geographic reach, increase learning and build capacity among both funders and grantees. CPER supports education organizing campaigns through grants and technical assistance to local organizations and coalitions working to ensure that parents and students in low-income communities have a strong voice in shaping their public schools. By bringing new resources to multiple sites for a minimum of three years, CPER promotes innovation and supports systemic reforms that address educational inequities at scale.