Stand for Children is an American education advocacy group. Founded in 1996 following a Children's Defense Fund rally the non-profit advocates for equity in public education. Stand for Children's mission is "to ensure all students receive a high quality, relevant education, especially those whose boundless potential is overlooked and under-tapped because of their skin color, zip code, first language, or disability." Over the years, the organization has shifted its focus from children's issues to improving public education funding, and from funding to improving the public education system. The organization includes both a 501 advocacy organization called Stand for Children, as well as a 501 training organization called Stand for Children Leadership Center.
History
On June 1, 1996, over 300,000 people rallied in Washington, D.C. for "Stand for Children Day" at the Lincoln Memorial. This event was the largest demonstration in support of children in U.S. history. Rosa Parks, civil rights movement icon, made a statement that challenged the people of nation to commit themselves to improving the lives of children, saying, "If I can sit down for justice, you can stand up for children." Two days later, Time featured a cover with the headline, "Who Speaks for Kids?," and an interview with long-time children's activist Marian Wright Edelman, the mother of Stand for Children's CEO and co-founder, Jonah Edelman. Following their work at the rally, Jonah Edelman and Eliza Leighton founded Stand for Children, seeking to pursue ongoing advocacy for the nation's children. The organization backed hundreds of rallies nationwide over the next two years, before moving toward more systemic changes. Today, Jonah Edelman is the CEO of Stand for Children, and Eliza Leighton is a member of the Board of Directors of Stand for Children Leadership Center. Stand for Children opened a series of offices around the United States that had a local focus. Over time, Stand began focusing on statewide issues—particularly public education funding, which seemed of highest concern to parents and other community members.
Affiliate offices
Currently, Stand for Children has eleven state affiliates: Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Louisiana, Oregon, Tennessee, Texas and Washington. The affiliates are supported by the national office in Portland, Oregon. While Stand for Children and Stand for Children Leadership Center are jointly led by CEO Jonah Edelman, they have distinct goals and methods of execution aligned with the sections of the federal tax code under which they are each described. Stand for Children, which is described under section 501 is the grassroots advocacy group that works to mobilize concerned citizen activists at the local and state level to convince elected officials and voters to pass education reforms. Stand for Children Leadership Center is a section 501 organization that trains people to be effective citizen leaders capable of solving problems facing children, both locally and statewide. In 2011, Stand for Children was praised in Time for "delivering results and changing how politicians think about grassroots education reform." The praise was attributed to the group's work to improve school funding in Oregon, teacher evaluations in Colorado, and teacher policy in Illinois.
Criticism
Critics of the group assert that it represents business interests.—major funders include the Walton Family and Bill & Melinda Gates Foundations. Education policy analyst Diane Ravitch criticized the group for opposing teacher's unions and seeking to impose standardized testing on public schools. Susan Barrett, former volunteer co-leader of a Stand for Children team in Portland, Oregon, left the organization due to concerns that corporate donors and wealthy board members influence reforms. In 2009, Stand for Children volunteers in Massachusetts witnessed an organizational change in favor of promoting charter schools. The former volunteers organized to protest a ballot initiative filed by Stand for Children. Former Stand for Children volunteers said the ballot measure puts the careers of teachers at the mercy of a rating system while doing nothing to improve teaching in schools. Regarding Stand For Children's success in Illinois, Edelman stated: "They essentially gave away every single provision related to teacher effectiveness that we had proposed — everything we had fought for in Colorado. We hired 11 lobbyists, including four of the absolute best insiders and seven of the best minority lobbyists, preventing the unions from hiring them." He further stated, "There was a palpable sense of concern if not shock on the part of the teachers' unions of Illinois that Speaker Madigan had changed allegiance and that we had clear political capability to potentially jam this proposal down their throats the same way that pension reform had been jammed down their throats six months earlier." The Chicago Tribune called Stand for Children "a new force in Illinois politics." In all, two Chicago newspapers published editorials in favor of Performance Counts. Some journalists questioned the $2.9 million raised by Stand for Children's Illinois PAC due to the affiliate's recent formation and fundraising in the months before a new Illinois law capped campaign contributions for individuals and corporations. These funds, donated by a small number of businesspeople giving hundreds of thousands of dollars each, led detractors question the organization's grassroots support in the state.
