The Mind Trust: Attracting Supporting and Empowering Educational Entreprenuers in Indianapolis, Indiana

our impact

Impact Highlights

EDUCATION ENTREPRENEUR FELLOWSHIP

The Mind Trust’s signature initiative, the Education Entrepreneur Fellowship, provides ambitious entrepreneurs with an opportunity to develop fresh ideas and launch initiatives to transform public education, particularly in underserved communities. Launched in fall 2007, the Fellowship is the first of its kind incubator for education entrepreneurs in the country.

A summary of the applicant pool from which Dr. Bitz was selected is below:

  • Applicants for the first cohort of fellows included 146 people from 24 states and Puerto Rico, ranging in age from 21-69.  Drawn from a variety of backgrounds, candidates for the first cohort included: Ivy League and Big Ten faculty members, nonprofit executive directors, a former partner of a large law firm, a former VP of a large hospital network, a general counsel for a state agency, a former manager at a U.S. embassy and an International Election Supervisor, former Peace Corps members, a former reporter for a major newspaper, and a founder of a church.
  • The Mind Trust recently selected Dr. Michael Bitz as its first Fellowship recipient. Previously, Dr. Bitz was on the faculty at Columbia University where he launched a highly successful program, The Comic Book Project, focused on developing literacy skills in low-income students. Dr. Bitz will use his Fellowship to incubate the Youth Music Exchange (YME), through which students will create record labels that they own and manage. Students will create a self-sustaining business by writing and recording music, developing marketing plans, designing CD artwork, creating business plans, and selling their music. YME’s activities will be aligned with state standards to ensure students master grade-appropriate academic skills while engaging in the assignments to create the record label. YME seeks to tackle the “engagement gap” by linking learning with student interests, thereby increasing student motivation to achieve.
  • A team of experts in social and education entrepreneurship assisted The Mind Trust in reviewing applications and interviewing candidates.  This group included: Ariela Rozman, CEO, The New Teacher Project; Rick Hess, Director of Education Policy Studies, American Enterprise Institute; Marty West, Assistant Professor, Brown University; Cathleen Coyle, Center for Public Leadership, Harvard University; Larry Berger, CEO, Wireless Generation; Bruno Manno, Senior Associate, Annie E. Casey Foundation; and former Indianapolis Mayor Bart Peterson.
  • Applications for the second cohort of fellows are due September 5, 2008.  The Mind Trust expects its second cohort to include three fellows.

VENTURE FUND

The Mind Trust created the Venture Fund to recruit to Indianapolis the nation’s most successful entrepreneurial educational initiatives.  To date, The Mind Trust has made Venture Fund investments totaling $2,885,000 in the following organizations:

Teach For America (TFA) recruits a corps of outstanding recent college graduates who commit two years to teach in disadvantaged urban and rural public schools.

  • Thanks to the generous support of Lilly Endowment and Rollin Dick, The Mind Trust made a $2.15 million Venture Fund investment to support the launch of TFA in Indianapolis.  The United Way and Former Ambassador Randall Tobias also contributed to TFA’s launch in Indianapolis.
  • In 2008, 50 TFA corps members will be placed in Indianapolis Public Schools (IPS), reaching approximately 4,250 students during the 2008-09 school year.  A new class of 50 TFA corps members will be placed in public schools in Indianapolis each school year going forward.
  • These new teachers are among the 3,600+ outstanding college graduates in Teach For America’s incoming corps, selected from an applicant pool of nearly 25,000.  This includes 11% of Yale’s, 9% of Harvard’s, 14% of DePauw’s, and 9% of Notre Dame’s senior classes.
  • Rigorous studies, including a recent Urban Institute analysis, have shown that TFA’s young teachers perform well in their classrooms compared with non-TFA teachers.
  • The majority of corps members stay involved in education beyond their two years in TFA, benefiting Indianapolis for years to come.

College Summit, the nation’s premier college access program for low-income students, works in partnership with schools, districts, and colleges to develop a sustainable model for raising college enrollment and retention rates community-wide.

  • A $100,000 Venture Fund investment by The Mind Trust began a pilot project in IPS’s Manual High School in the 07-08 school year.  Nearly the entire Manual senior class (202 students) participated in the pilot by enrolling in College Summit’s college preparatory course. 
  • As of Spring 2008, 84% of participating Manual High School seniors had completed a list of their preferred colleges or universities, 81% had completed their personal statements for their college applications, and over 50% had applied to college.
  • A $455,000 Venture Fund investment by The Mind Trust will expand College Summit into other schools and school districts in the upcoming school year, thanks to the generous support of Lumina Foundation for Education.

The New Teacher Project (TNTP), a New York-based nonprofit, operates a highly successful initiative designed to help mid-career professionals transition into teaching.  TNTP seeks out talented people with expertise in fields where teacher shortages exist, such as math, science, special education and Spanish.

  • A $75,000 Venture Fund investment by The Mind Trust helped The New Teacher Project launch the Indianapolis Teaching Fellows in IPS.  Forty-two TNTP teachers, drawn from 844 applicants, began teaching in IPS in the fall of 2007.
  • An additional $105,000 Venture Fund investment by The Mind Trust is enabling TNTP to recruit additional Indianapolis Teaching Fellows into IPS in the 2008-2009 school year as well as expand into seven Mayor-sponsored charter schools.
  • As of mid-May 2008, TNTP reports that 829 individuals applied for placement in fall 2008, and 90 individuals received offers and enrolled in the Fellows program.  Of these individuals, 35% of enrollees self-report as people of color, 37% have a Master’s degree, 5% have a PhD, and male enrollees increased by 8% over last year’s enrollment.
  • In May 2008, Indianapolis Teaching Fellow Jeff Steinbronn led Howe High School’s Science Bowl Team to the state championship.