Recent Layoffs Raise Questions About the Future of Education Funding at CZI

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Recent developments at Chan Zuckerberg Initiative haven’t received much attention: During the second week of August, the philanthropy created by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, cut its education team, laying off 48 people.

The 74 broke the story, and Business Insider followed up with more details; it described the layoffs as the latest phase in Mark Zuckerberg’s so-called “Year of Efficiency,” which started at Meta (formerly Facebook). As the pandemic eased, the company famously faced slow growth, a sinking stock price and new expenses as it struggled to get its much-vaunted “Metaverse” up and running. Zuckerberg announced plans to cut costs and create a leaner company last November in a message to employees, and then updated those plans in March. Thousands of Meta employees have been laid off since November. 

Given all the turmoil at Meta, it probably shouldn’t come as a huge surprise that the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI) also got chopped. While CZI is a separate LLC that channels Zuckerberg and Chan’s wealth, and not part of Meta, the soul-searching and tough operations decisions taking place throughout Zuckerberg world don’t seem to be sparing the philanthropy. In fact, CZI already conducted a small number of layoffs in February, according to Business Insider. The publication also obtained internal documents showing that, last year, Zuckerberg and Chan asked CZI executives to “clarify the scope of their work” and told them to "create strategies with an unwavering focus on CZI-shaped problems."

It is unclear exactly what the couple meant by “CZI-shaped problems,” but they may not take the shape of education going forward, given where most of the layoffs took place. Thirty percent of the education team was let go, according to a Business Insider source. On the app Blind, a CZI employee called the layoffs a “bloodbath.”

Moving toward “coherence”

News of the CZI layoffs came during a week in August crowded with big news: fires in Hawaii, another Trump indictment, and much else besides. But for education philanthropy, the cuts at CZI are a significant story, given that the philanthropy has been a committed education funder since its founding eight years ago. It also looked like an education funder that would stick around, given that it’s fueled by the fortune of Mark Zuckerberg, who, with a net worth of over $102 billion, is one of the wealthiest people on the planet. In addition, Priscilla Chan, CZI’s co-CEO, has a background in education and has been closely involved with CZI’s work in the area.

The philanthropy gives across numerous areas in addition to education, including health, science and community development. Still, its education investments topped $7 million from 2020 to 2022 alone according to Candid data. And The 74 reported that, since 2015, CZI has given grants to almost 1,000 organizations “working to aid teachers in supporting students to thrive in and beyond the classroom.” It has underwritten a range of education initiatives, many of which we’ve covered at Inside Philanthropy, including support for early childhood education, underserved students, teachers and teacher diversity, and most recently, college and career pathways. 

​​True to its Silicon Valley DNA, CZI has also supported ed tech and remote learning. That includes the development of the digital education tools Summit Learning and Along. (Summit Learning has drawn criticism from education experts who have disputed claims of its effectiveness and warned of its potential threat to student privacy).

Where is the philanthropy’s education giving heading next? In emails leaked to Business Insider, Sandra Liu Huang, the philanthropy’s head of education and vice president of product, told members of the education team that the new strategy will focus on educational product development, while the foundation will phase out its ed policy support. 

“In grantmaking, we are sunsetting the policy grants portfolio and focusing our measures and practices and educator capacity portfolios to reach the key milestones we scoped in each active grant,” Huang wrote. “As the measures and practices and educator capacity grant portfolios achieve these key milestones over the next couple of years, we will be shifting the focus of our grants to support product development, much like we did with Along.”

In another email to the education team, Priscilla Chan wrote, “Though these changes are hard, they will allow the Education team to move forward with focus and clarity as we turn our refreshed strategy into powerful new tools that unlock student potential and address chronic challenges facing teachers.” 

Last week, Huang published a lengthy post on the CZI website that provided an overview of the foundation’s work and its plans going forward — but made no mention of the staff cuts. “The idea here isn’t to reinvent the wheel, but to identify what’s working and help scale those solutions through product experiences inspired by and designed with our nation’s educators and students,” she wrote. “… This moment demands not just investment but innovation — and that’s why we are building a team of experts and partners to identify opportunities where technology and grantmaking can drive coherence.“

An ed “refresh” — or on its way out?

Do the cuts at CZI foretell a slow easing away from its education commitments? Education philanthropy, after all, has seen some of the world’s richest people back countless “big ideas,” “bold initiatives,” and “cutting-edge strategies,” only to watch those grand plans fizzle when the education miracles they hoped for never materialized. 

“Public education is a legendary graveyard for ambitious philanthropic plans,” we pointed out back in 2018. Examples span the decades: the disappointing outcomes of the 1993 Annenberg Challenge; several Gates Foundation-backed projects including the data collection initiative InBloom, which fizzled out; and Gates’ Intensive Partnerships for Effective Teaching, which a RAND study concluded didn’t reach its goals. And let’s not forget the decidedly mixed results of Mark Zuckerberg’s own 2010 investment in charter schools in Newark, which has long served as a textbook example of tech philanthropy’s capacity for overreach.

Then there were the significant investments that many big ed philanthropies made in charter schools over the years. Charter schools initially had bipartisan support and exuberant foundation backing, but enthusiasm has waned as the model has failed to scale or produce the education breakthroughs many of its early backers heralded. 

Education is a tough area that doesn’t lend itself to quick, easy solutions. It also may not lend itself to the contracted timelines of tech billionaires or their conviction that tech tools can answer all of society’s problems — despite so much evidence to the contrary. Yet with an apparent heightened focus on “product development” and “product experiences,” that seems to be the exact direction CZI’s leaning further into.

If the past several decades in ed philanthropy (and philanthropy generally) have taught us anything, it’s that we should be wary when billionaires swoop in and attempt to “fix” education or other social problems that require long-term, sustained investments and structural reform. In the case of education, that includes changes in the tax code, fairer distribution of federal and state dollars so that all children have access to well-resourced schools with well-compensated teachers, as well as support systems for students, families and communities.

To be fair, CZI seems to recognize the complexities at play here. In her recent post, Sandra Lui Huang acknowledged these challenges and underscored the organization’s ongoing commitment to the sector. “The truth is, the depth of needs and the complexity of our education system requires constant questioning, strong partnerships and the willingness to iterate. No single organization can accomplish all of what is needed for systems change — and at CZI, we want to sharpen who we are and how we can best serve through our educational research investments, our relationships with educators and students, and our ability to build useful applications with our technology team.”

Of course, one could argue that true systems change would mean a reordering of this country’s priorities (and tax codes) which currently permit and encourage one man to own multiple properties (at least 10 homes in California and Hawaii), while many families struggle to afford school lunches for their children.

In the meantime, it would be a shame if CZI abandoned its education work altogether, and the statements from Chan and Huang indicate that they don’t intend to. The Gates Foundation, to take another example, has continued to invest in education work despite many setbacks, and CZI will hopefully elect to do the same. Still, some observers, including CZI employees, believe they see the writing on the wall. “Seems like the beginning of the end for CZI education,” remarked that one disaffected employee on Blind.

“People familiar with the organization see a future where education is another abandoned ‘pillar’ at CZI,” Business Insider reported, and quoted one who said of its education work, “‘I give it two more years.’”