Charles Best Quotes
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I founded DonorsChoose.org because I care about learning, and I believe every student in our country deserves a great education.
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Whether you're raising money for a cause, a personal need, or a project, most crowdfunding sites center on you hitting up people you already know. These sites make it easier to tap your social network for funds, but only the most compelling cases inspire support from strangers.
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DonorsChoose was conceived at a Bronx public high school where I taught social studies for five years. In the teachers' lunch room, my colleagues and I often lamented a problem that drained learning from students and creativity from teachers: a lack of funding for essential materials and for the activities that bring subject matter to life.
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After 14 years of running DonorsChoose.org as someone who had never written a line of code, I did do a three-month night school course. After all these years, I could at least speak some of the same vocabulary and have a first-hand appreciation for what my colleagues on the engineering team are doing.
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I believe if we can crowdsource educational solutions to teachers on the front lines, who often know their kids better than anyone, we will unearth and generate better-targeted, smarter ideas.
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No matter the circumstances, teachers show up each day ready to give their students every opportunity possible, and they never give up.
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We think the ability to rattle off people you are grateful to and thankful to is often sort of a proxy for openness to learning from others.
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At DonorsChoose.org, we believe that classroom teachers often know their students better than anybody else in the system and that their front-line experience gives them a special kind of wisdom.
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Learning is a critical part of our mission and organizational culture.
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For my 9th birthday, my only wish was to eat like a farmer boy. I had devoured 'The Little House on the Prairie' book series and wanted to be like Almanzo Wilder, the protagonist of 'Farmer Boy,' one of the later installments in the 'Little House' series.
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To take on the jobs of tomorrow, students must become more than good test takers. They need to become makers who design, sketch, build, and prototype. And their classrooms will need more than a chalkboard and a set of textbooks.
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At DonorsChoose.org, we believe that teachers are unsung heroes.
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If anything, we hope that DonorsChoose.org is going to be a prompt, a nudge in the side of the public school system to improve and to start delivering these materials and experiences that students need and to make it easier for teachers to innovate.
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If you just believe in our democracy, and you want an informed electorate, public schools are in your interest, and I think our country is dependent on public schools, whether or not you personally have a kid in the public school system.
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America's best teachers are always looking for new ways to bring learning to life.
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Within a single school, teachers often encounter differences in poverty levels, parent involvement, and student readiness.
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We've long believed teachers know best what their students need to succeed, and that includes the creation of healthy, supportive school communities.
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I was lucky enough to go to boarding school for my high school years, and I had all the resources that I possibly could needed - squash courts and every book you ever would have wanted, every art supply.
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We evaluate all business decisions based on how we can best serve public school teachers and their students.
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Hardworking, passionate teachers know their students' needs better than anyone else in the school environment. If we can tap into their needs, we can unleash smarter solutions and empower those people on the front lines.
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My colleagues and I were always having the same conversation in the teachers lunchroom about books we wanted our students to read, a field trip we knew would really bring a subject matter to life... And most of us would go into our own pockets to buy just paper and pencils.
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I think philanthropy is so much more in keeping with spirit of shouting someone out than a material reward.
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Students who learn to collaborate and negotiate - on Capitol Hill, in the board room, in everyday life - will outperform peers who have higher test scores.
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Acknowledging someone is an act of altruism in the first place, so converting that act of altruism into a pizza party or company fleece jacket or a gift card is fine, but it's not in keeping with spirit in which it all began.