Is Google's Non-Tax Based Public School Funding Cause For Celebration?

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Is Google's Non-Tax Based Public School Funding Cause For Celebration?

Posted by timothy on Saturday September 20, 2014 @08:19AM from the more-the-merrier dept.

theodp (442580) writes "Google's "flash-funding" of teachers' projects via DonorsChoose continues to draw kudos from grateful mayors of the nation's largest cities. The latest comes from Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto (fresh from a Google-paid stay at the Google Zeitgeist resort), who joined Google officials at Taylor Allderdice HS, where Google announced it was 'flash funding' all Pittsburgh area teachers' crowd-funding campaigns on DonorsChoose.org. DonorsChoose reports that Google spent $64,657 to fund projects for 10,924 Pittsburgh kids. While the not-quite-$6-a-student is nice, it does pale by comparison to the $56,742 Google is ponying up to send one L.A. teacher's 34 students to London and Paris and the $35,858 it's spending to take another L.A. teacher's 52 kids to NYC, Gettysburg, and DC. So, is Google's non-tax based public school funding — which includes gender-based funding as well as "begfunding" — cause for celebration?"

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gender-based funding by Anonymous Coward · 2014-09-20 08:20 · Score: 5, Funny

Is that the newspeak for golddigging?
1. Re:gender-based funding by Bengie · 2014-09-20 09:22 · Score: 1, Interesting
  
  The female gender as a whole is getting preferential treatment in all schooling up to at least college. More funding, more attention, more positive support, anti-male pro-female teaching strategies. Boys get punished for being boys, which is starting to create emotional and personality issues in boys.
  
  See how these girls are sitting around talking about their feelings like good little children? Those boys are making fake guns with their hands and playing cops and robbers. Those little terrorists will now be arrested by a police officer, interrogated, then notify the parents after the child is emotionally scared for life, and not allowed to come back to school.
2. Re:gender-based funding by Anonymous Coward · 2014-09-20 09:25 · Score: 1
  
  "You're talking out of your ass and it smells that way too. [wikipedia.org]"
  It seems that you are incapable of fully grasping WHY there is income disparity. Do you think people earn income only based on their gender? Correlation is not causation.
3. Re:gender-based funding by Anonymous Coward · 2014-09-20 10:34 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  "The female gender as a whole is getting preferential treatment"
  You can tell by how much they rule the world. All those women presidents, senators, prime ministers... You can tell by their presence in the board rooms too. Ass. Correcting a wrong isn't a bad thing. Stop trying to pretend you're a victim because we're helping someone who isn't you....
4. Re:gender-based funding by Anonymous Coward · 2014-09-20 10:47 · Score: 1
  
  Are you not man enough to compete with both men and women of all ethnicities on a level playing field?
  It's ironic you should ask this question, when the entire point is that providing funding that benefits a single gender is the exact opposite of "a level playing field".
  
  Lets try an experiment. First, I'll tell you that I have a cousin who is unable to get into classes on things that they find interesting, due to gender-based discrimination. Now, you tell me, is that fair? No, I will not tell you the gender of my cousin. The only thing you have to go on is that the discrimination was gender-based. Because whether the person being discriminated against is man or woman, the discrimination is still wrong.
5. Re:gender-based funding by BarbaraHudson · 2014-09-20 12:11 · Score: 1
  
  It's called reverse discrimination, and it's wrong.
  Doing so in education teaches by action (and thus re-affirms) that somehow women can't compete. And yet, the majority of people graduating degree programs are women.
  You can't reduce gender bias by introducing even more gender bias. And since we're talking about education, what better place to practice / teach non-bias?
  
  --
  "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
6. Re:gender-based funding by Bengie · 2014-09-20 12:55 · Score: 1
  
  It's not just a lack of helping men, but actively making it worse for them. We went from one extreme to another. The rate of male drops outs is increasing and the rate of females going to college is increasing. A researcher jokingly said by 2040, the last man to ever go to college in the USA will be graduating at our current rate.
  
  He also mentioned that the men in college aren't minding the high female to male ratio, but it is starting to cause family issues as women still want children, but they're having a hard time finding men of equal income since women are catching up and passing men in the middle class. It's not currently a major issue, but it is a growing issue and it grows faster with time.
  
  Don't wait for something to become a problem, nip it when it's small.
7. Re:gender-based funding by nbauman · 2014-09-20 19:00 · Score: 1
  
  "The female gender as a whole is getting preferential treatment"
  You can tell by how much they rule the world. All those women presidents, senators, prime ministers... You can tell by their presence in the board rooms too. Ass. Correcting a wrong isn't a bad thing. Stop trying to pretend you're a victim because we're helping someone who isn't you....
  When I was studying accounting I collected annual reports and 10-K financial statements of corporations. For example, I got the annual reports of media companies. For the Washington Post, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and McGraw-Hill, the controlling stock was owned by women.
  The reason was simple: most wealth in America is inherited family wealth. Men usually die before their wives, so their wives inherit their wealth and have control over it. So it was the family matriarchs that wound up owning the Post, Times, WSJ and M-H. And they usually managed the companies to some degree. Katherine Graham was a hands-on publisher, but even at the others, a woman usually made fundamental decisions such as hiring (or firing) a publisher and top executives.
  If there weren't enough women at the executive levels of those corporations, it was because Katherine Graham, Iphigenea Ochs Sulzberger, etc., didn't appoint them.
  When you talk about presidents, senators, prime ministers, and corporate board members, you're talking about the 1%. Almost any woman among them is more powerful than almost any man in the bottom 99%.
More links! by pspahn · 2014-09-20 08:24 · Score: 1

I bet if you rewrote this summary, you could probably stuff a few more link$ in there. You know, because that's what we prefer ... clicking to some random site rather than reading the content here.

--
Someone flopped a steamer in the gene pool.
1. Re:More links! by pspahn · 2014-09-20 09:01 · Score: 1
  
  A brief summary is great, I agree. I didn't bother to check all the links either, simply because the first one I clicked (the Zeitgeist reference) sent me to some kind of social network website with a bunch of photos and a poor design. I was expecting to be able to read a summary of what it was rather than sift through a bunch of photos of people.
  
  --
  Someone flopped a steamer in the gene pool.
Yes by kevinking.psyd · 2014-09-20 08:46 · Score: 1

Yes, it is cause for celebration. Even if there are inconsistencies in its funding practices, we should always celebrate any positive actions. By this we encourage others to do likewise.
1. Re:Yes by ShanghaiBill · 2014-09-20 11:50 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, it is cause for celebration.
  It is also cause for celebration because Google will make better decisions about resource allocation than the education bureaucracy. The bureaucrats tend to spend most additional money on increasing administrative staff.
2. Re:Yes by Ol+Olsoc · 2014-09-21 01:37 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, it is cause for celebration.
  It is also cause for celebration because Google will make better decisions about resource allocation than the education bureaucracy. The bureaucrats tend to spend most additional money on increasing administrative staff.
  And all will be puppydogs and unicorns until Google changes CEO's or has a bad year.
  Some times we can take the free market is pure and benevolent vs the evil stupid government thing to a stupid end.. This is one of those times
  
  --
  The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Marketing by Anonymous Coward · 2014-09-20 09:03 · Score: 2, Insightful

Thank you, Google, for your public works. Spending a tiny percentage of the amount tax that you save by screwing countries over using the Double Irish Arrangement with a Dutch Sandwich is really a great marketing ploy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Irish_arrangement
http://arstechnica.com/business/2013/10/to-reduce-its-tax-burden-google-expands-use-of-the-double-irish/
http://arstechnica.com/business/2014/01/silicon-valley-attempts-to-slow-new-global-tax-avoidance-reform-proposals/
Now you get to join the ranks of other philanthropic entities, such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Maybe you'll buy more good faith by funding NPR.
1. Re:Marketing by davydagger · 2014-09-20 14:40 · Score: 1
  
  not just does it reduce the amount of money the government has to spent by taxes, since its dirrectly giving to schools, it starts to assume the role of the government and will be able to dictate policy, such as schools will conform to google's vision to attract funding.
Non Tax Based?!? by Bob9113 · 2014-09-20 09:10 · Score: 5, Interesting

So, is Google's non-tax based public school funding
They pay billions in profits to an empty office in the Carribbean so they don't have to pay taxes, and give a small portion of that money back through school funding, and take that as a tax deduction.
In the process, they get enormous influence over the educational agenda. It is largely in a direction Slashdotters can agree with, but imagine it was a church doing this.
Like Al Capone giving some of his money to the Chicago slums, it may be better than if they weren't doing it, but it hardly gets Google out of the crooked, lobbying megacorp set.

--
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
1. Re:Non Tax Based?!? by Anonymous Coward · 2014-09-20 09:37 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  Charity by it's very definition is undemocratic. Ironically made obvious by the name of this very charity "Donors Choose".
  You could very well make the argument that taxes for social programs are just a different spin on the same beast... i.e. "bureaucrats choose", but at least there is an attempt being made there to make it a democratic system.
  Regardless though, taxes are high on the middles class, low on the wealthy, and income disparity is growing. Thus the reality is that both rich people and bureaucrats are the only ones doing any choosing.
  We need to stop pretending the market will solve everything with perfect self interest. We need to stop pretending that democracy can overcome corruption. It's time for new solutions, smart, simple regulation. The removal of money from politics. A limit on verbose laws and loopholes. These things only exist because we let them.
2. Re:Non Tax Based?!? by lsatenstein · 2014-09-21 13:59 · Score: 1
  
  So, is Google's non-tax based public school funding
  They pay billions in profits to an empty office in the Carribbean so they don't have to pay taxes, and give a small portion of that money back through school funding, and take that as a tax deduction.
  In the process, they get enormous influence over the educational agenda. It is largely in a direction Slashdotters can agree with, but imagine it was a church doing this.
  Like Al Capone giving some of his money to the Chicago slums, it may be better than if they weren't doing it, but it hardly gets Google out of the crooked, lobbying megacorp set.
  Google always throws out the bait and then two years later, after everyone has bitten it, pulls in the line. What they do today is for something they plan in two years time. Beware the gods bearing gifts.
  
  --
  Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
3. Re:Non Tax Based?!? by dywolf · 2014-09-22 01:26 · Score: 1
  
  bingo.
  it's purely a PR move.
  teachers, nay anyone, cannot rely on the beneficent feelings of mega corps or rich donors.
  1) most of them wont get the funding they need. which is why we have taxes to ensure that those things get funded that need it (in theory...idiots who think teachers SHOULD be funded by bake sales not withstanding)
  2) those who do will feel a lot of pressure to...adjust...their curriculum to continue recieving the funding. And as Chief Justice Roberts recently stated, that's "not corruption". /sarcasm
  
  --
  The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
Immoral by Anonymous Coward · 2014-09-20 09:23 · Score: 1

This further dilutes the ideal of free public education for all Americans. Rich benefactors are great, but they should not be deciding where the funds are directed.
We have a real and very visible problem with public education. Google is simply using it to promote their brand.
1. Re:Immoral by matbury · 2014-09-20 10:23 · Score: 1
  
  More than promote their brand, they want as big a slice of the public education budget as they can get. They want to be THE IT provider to education systems worldwide and are working towards that end as we speak.
  On the crowdfunding front, having public education and curriculum policy decisions made by consumerist popularity polls, PR, and marketing couldn't possibly go wrong, could it? I mean, our democratic electoral systems are doing just fine right now, aren't they? There's no problem with corporations' money distorting the public political discourse, is there? I don't think Google and Pearson Education would try to influence such a system to their advantage, do you?
Google Zeitgeist '14 Event Site Locked Down by theodp · 2014-09-20 09:57 · Score: 1

Here's a link to the Google Zeitgeist website. Maybe your Mayor can loan you his username and password if you're curious. :-)
Non Tax Based?!? by Anonymous Coward · 2014-09-20 10:02 · Score: 2, Interesting

Yeah, I'd rather that Google paid the taxes that it owes to the US government. That would end up putting more money into the schools than $40K here and $60K there for one-off trips.
It doesn't OWE the taxes by Bruce66423 · 2014-09-20 10:45 · Score: 2

It may be argued to have a moral duty to pay them, but 'owe' implies a legal obligation. The reality is that corporate lobbyists have created some loop holes that the corporations are legally using to avoid paying what they don't have to pay. However unless you forgo ALL the tax claw backs you are eligible for, it is questionable if you have a right to criticise Google.
1. Re:It doesn't OWE the taxes by drinkypoo · 2014-09-21 00:27 · Score: 1
  
  However unless you forgo ALL the tax claw backs you are eligible for, it is questionable if you have a right to criticise Google.
  Great. Let's answer that question. The answer is yes, yes you do. A person is not the same thing as a corporation. For one thing, a person is real, and a corporation is a legal fiction which was created by government and which does not exist without its protection. Government is meant to serve the citizenry (hahaha) and corporations thus must also serve the citizenry (HAHAHA) or they should not be permitted to exist. Indeed, one of the tests for granting of a corporate charter used to be public interest, but now it's simply shareholder interest.
  
  --
  "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:Gender based funding summarized: by maliqua · 2014-09-20 10:45 · Score: 1

[Citations Needed]
These "projects" you mention. Care to give examples of each? I know, coming up with actual facts is much too difficult. Especially hen those pesky facts interfere with your biases. Poor baby!
Girl launches discrimination suit to join boys only wrestling team
http://www.takepart.com/articl...
Girl files discrimination suit to join boy scouts
http://www.bsa-discrimination....
Strip Club sued because it didn't want women patrons.
http://www.nbclosangeles.com/n...
Want more?
This is a bad thing by davydagger · 2014-09-20 12:43 · Score: 3, Interesting

So basicly good has financial control over public education. Even without making demands, it is now understood that google is a player than you pander to for funding. So Administrators will adjust coursework, perhaps disciplinary actions, etc... not only to cater to what google wants done, but perhaps might even start censoring negtive opinions about google in the classroom.

Then, it becomes very possible that google can use financial incentives, penalties, and other more "active" measures to ensure compliance with their goals.

Many of google's goals in the short term seem noble, and I am thankful for this, but its a really bad dangerous trend towards privitization that can take a really nasty turn down the road if it ever takes hold. It also sets precident and opens the door for other companies to do the same.

What we are going to have in 25 years, is a return to feudalism, where various companies control all matters of public life in various diffrent spaces, and their users will be made to fight against eachother for the sake of the company.

We see this beginning with Apple vs Google vs Microsoft. They have entire continuums of space where you are expected to use the entire range of company products, and socially identify with the company, and your fellow users.
Re:Google is a member of ALEC by davydagger · 2014-09-20 12:44 · Score: 1

of course, they push to remove public funding of schools, then pick up the slack themselves, making a problem to solve, then taking over dirrection for a system they caused to fail.
Democratic regression. by manu0601 · 2014-09-20 13:47 · Score: 4, Interesting

First they fight like hell to dodge taxes, then they spend money in public goods in place of taxpayer money.
The difference is that taxpayer money is spent under democratic control (or at least it should be, your mileage may vary depending on how much your political system is kinked). And Google will probably spend depending on its own interest instead of on the general interest.
1. Re:Democratic regression. by nbauman · 2014-09-20 19:20 · Score: 1
  
  The other problem is that, in addition to spending things that are in their own interest, they can spend things on sheer whim.
  Bill Gates listened to a few glib educational theorists and bought the idea of destroying the public education system and replacing them with private charter schools.
  He and his billionaire friends funded a movement that is wrecking the educational system, and running everything by high-stakes testing that has never been validated and has been proven to be invalid. They're lowering teacher salaries, and humiliating teachers.
2. Re:Democratic regression. by nbauman · 2014-09-20 19:22 · Score: 1
  
  Feel free to expose Microsoft and Apple.
  Yeah, it's bad to have padrones run society.
  Yeah, it's bad when somebody who managed to make a lot of money once decides that makes him competent to run areas of society that they know nothing about, like education.
Re:Google is a member of ALEC by Anonymous Coward · 2014-09-20 14:14 · Score: 2, Informative

Ok thank you I can see it now
ALECs support for stand your ground laws are anti-bad police office, their support for privatizing prisons is anti-bad prison guard, their support for labeling animal rights organizations and environmentalists as "terrorists" is anti-bad veterinarian / EPA worker, support for prohibiting public broadband is anti-bad telecommunications worker, voter ID laws (anti bad poll workers)
Maybe I am delusional, but here is what I do know for certain.
I am a public high school math teacher in Arizona(The state that's taken the brunt of ALEC's agendas'), I am sure that I am not the best math teacher (but I am certain I am the best the district can afford) and when they find someone better I will gladly step aside, I have 40+ students in each class, no text books, broken furniture, and limited technology. So far this year, I've spent about $500 of my own money on books and supplies (and it doesn't even come close to what is needed). So yeah, maybe I am delusional, but my students are being hurt by ALEC and Google IS a member of ALEC so funding trips to Europe is frankly insulting to me
In a working democracy it would not be by Casandro · 2014-09-20 17:32 · Score: 2

In a working democracy the public would be able to decide what to do with the tax money. However since in the US the democratic system is severely broken, it's not surprising parallel systems are starting to come up.
Let's keep perspective, please. by garote · 2014-09-20 20:58 · Score: 1

All the money mentioned by the OP that was directly spent by Google is about the salary, resource, and insurance costs for ONE veteran software engineer.
Here's what happened: A handful of directors got together in some enclave of the overgrown dorm-scape that is Google's HQ, and one of them stood up and said "I'm sick of managing coders all day, I wanna fix the educational system instead!"
And they got a new position created with this very charter, with funding pulled from some other less-protected project, because if the other directors said "no", then he/she could potentially raise a huge stink, bring down a bunch of other pet projects, and unearth enough dead bodies to get a few people fired. Best to say "yes", call it "outreach", and let them have their fun.
Honestly, these projects and this money could have come from any private citizen, and in fact DOES elsewhere on DonorsChoose, but since Google can claim involvement, Google is rattling for press coverage. Just remember that, like everything else Google does, it's funded by money laundered from advertisers. The apple doesn't fall too far from the tree.
The bottom line is it works... by HycoWhit · 2014-09-21 04:30 · Score: 1

My wife is a teacher and her school has been very successful with DonersChoose. It is kind of amazing actually. The various classrooms have added/upgraded/replaced technology in just about every classroom. The teachers get exactly what they want and it typically takes less than two weeks from the time the teacher writes up the request until the product is in the classroom. The parents this year have already bought new tablets for the class--right at 10 days total time from asking until the devices were in the kid's hands. Hard to argue with results. Beats the six plus months (if ever) from the old request process. The school has even adopted a new process to ensure the devices get configured and secured according to the school's IT policy that gets the job done without interuption to the teacher or class. (i.e. the new stuff doesn't arrive--then sit on some IT guy's desk for a month waiting for them to get around to putting an asset tag on the device.)
Corporations are belong to people = have rights by Bruce66423 · 2014-09-21 07:56 · Score: 1

Because people have the right, under law, to create corporations and benefit from them, they inherit much the same right to act in the interest of those people as those people have. [Yes, this has probably been over-extended in the Supreme Court case that lets them do political donations to their hearts' content]. However the core idea in the organisation of a society is that laws lock in rights and expectations; if I set up an organisation with certain rights, then I have to right to expect to see those right protected.

Specifically if I invest money in a corporation with certain rights, I have the right to expect to see those rights not tampered with. What you are proposed is to overthrow that principle - technically this constitutes a breach of the constraint on the Congress not to pass a 'post facto' law - see section 9 of the US constitution, Whilst you may regret this situation, to assert that the situation can be reversed is not legitimate.
1. Re:Corporations are belong to people = have rights by drinkypoo · 2014-09-21 09:58 · Score: 1
  
  Specifically if I invest money in a corporation with certain rights, I have the right to expect to see those rights not tampered with.
  Nonsense. Laws are changed all the time. There's no constitutional guarantee to any of those rights, and many of them are based on deliberate misinterpretation of existing laws in any case.
  
  --
  "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:We're billions or a trillion short still. by russotto · 2014-09-21 09:06 · Score: 2

What Google's PR / charity funding is, it's a reminder that our society and our government (reflecting the public's apathy and lack of intense desire to provide our kids better education and to FUND it with our taxes so it will happen) are running a system that's not only very underfunded, it's not built to evenly distribute what funding we do get.
You're half-right. It's not underfunded; education funding per pupil has doubled in real terms over the past few decades. But it isn't built to evenly distribute the funding; in general poor areas are favored over more wealthy areas.
So what else does the ban on post-facto laws mean? by Bruce66423 · 2014-09-21 10:45 · Score: 1

In extremis. Of course you are right that laws change all the time, but at some level the constitutional principle has some significance. Certainly whole scale expropriation without compensation of things owned by corporations would be illegitimate. The issue is where to draw the line; the challenge is to resist being totally dogmatic in both directions!
Re:So what else does the ban on post-facto laws me by drinkypoo · 2014-09-21 20:45 · Score: 1

Certainly whole scale expropriation without compensation of things owned by corporations would be illegitimate.

You mean nationalization? It's legal if you pass a law that says it is.

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Expropriation Nationalisation by Bruce66423 · 2014-09-21 23:17 · Score: 1

Expropriation is the theft of a company by the state with no compensation - or as a result of a court order in connection with something else. Nationalisation is the state taking ownership but paying the owners a fair price for the assets. There is obviously a spectrum here; many Asian owned businesses in East Africa in the 60s and 70s were 'nationalised', but the price was paid in government bonds in an non-convertible currency that promptly inflated to zero value.

In the Western context, the process of nationalisation is essentially the same as compulsory purchase of land with a similar expectation of fair value paid. To do otherwise does constitute the state stealing the asset, and would probably constitute a post facto law; this, of course is why we have constitutions...