Posted on 06/08/2005 1:11:42 AM PDT by calcowgirl
Occidental College President Theodore R. Mitchell, a politically connected education expert credited with reinvigorating his Los Angeles campus over the past six years, said Tuesday that he would step down Sept. 1.
Mitchell, 49, is leaving the private liberal arts college to become chief executive of NewSchools Venture Fund, a nonprofit group based in San Francisco.
NewSchools, founded in 1998 by a group including Silicon Valley venture capitalists John Doerr and Brook Byers, has invested $40 million in efforts to improve public education in urban areas.
Mitchell said he decided to take the job at NewSchools because "there is a great need for all of us who can make a difference to try to make a difference in public K-12 education."
"My area of scholarly interest, my area of teaching and policy work has been in educational access and opportunity," added Mitchell, who before coming to Occidental in 1999 was a dean of the graduate school of education at UCLA and who also held positions at Stanford and Dartmouth universities.
Mitchell was appointed in April by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to head a 15-member committee to study ways to overhaul the state's public school system. He said Tuesday that he expected to continue in that role.
During his tenure at Occidental, Mitchell's ties to Los Angeles power brokers led to controversy. In 2002, he was privately approached by former Mayor Richard Riordan and billionaire businessman Eli Broad to run for a seat on the Los Angeles Board of Education, in an effort they were pushing to unseat incumbent David Tokofsky.
Critics cried foul when it was disclosed that Broad offered to donate $10 million to a program at Occidental and that Riordan said he could pay for an administrator to assist Mitchell with his duties on campus.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Mitchell, a Schwarzenegger appointee guiding the state in education matters, joins "NewSchools", founded by John Doerr and Brook Byers.
John Doerr and Brook Byers, are both with the venture capital firm of Kleiner, Perkins, et al.
John Doerr was one of the top guys behind the $6 Billion stem-cell initiative.
Are we turning the state's education over to Venture Capitalists, or have they just found opportunity given the state's $115+ Billion budget?
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