Is philanthropy streamlining yet?

May 22, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Over the last few years, WRAG has worked with Project Streamline to explore ways that funders can improve their application and processes to reduce the burden on grantees. Project Streamline, which is led by the Grants Managers Network, is now five years old. Their new report, Practices That Matter, looks at how far the sector has come – and how much further it needs to go – in the streamlining process.

Related in the Daily:
- WRAG members continue to streamline (April, 2013)
- Project Streamline: The Moriah Fund (June, 2011)
- Paperwork vs. progress: the case for streamlining (Sept, 2010)
- Scaling up vs. scaling back (Feb, 2010)

CHANGE | Most of you know Margaret O’Bryon, former CEO of the Consumer Health Foundation, for her commitment to social equity and her expansive thinking. In today’s Daily, she writes about one of the theories of social change that has greatly influenced her thinking. It is called Presencing (or Theory U). Look to hear more from Margaret as she takes on her latest role as the Nielsen Chair of Philanthropy at the Center for Public and Nonprofit Leadership and the Public Policy Institute at Georgetown University. (Daily, 5/22)

COMMUNITY | As part of its documentary festival this year, the AFI will screen Herblock: The Black & the White. It showcases the life and work of former Washington Post cartoonist Herb Block, whose successful career lead to the creation of The Herb Block Foundation. (CP, 5/22)

DEVELOPMENT | The Coalition for Smarter Growth’s Cheryl Cort writes about a report from the Prince George’s County Planning Board that says the county is at a crossroads. It can either “push for more transit-oriented development and walkable communities, or ‘be resigned to business as usual.’” (GGW, 5/22)

Related: Here’s a step in the right direction! The county’s Gateway Arts District received a big grant from ArtPlace America, which funds projects that generate economic development through the arts. (WBJ, 5/22)

EDUCATION | Here’s a look at per pupil school spending in our region. At a state level, the District is second to only New York. On a local level, the data show that Alexandria was the only school district in our region to increase spending from the previous year. (Examiner, 5/22)

PHILANTHROPY | Local philanthropist David Rubenstein talks about using more than just his money to achieve the social impact that he seeks. (GiveSmart, 5/22)

LOCAL | A sinkhole opened up just two blocks east of the White House yesterday. Fortunately, the only victim that it claimed was our sense of pedestrian safety. (WaPo, 5/22)

We’ll be much safer when we can get around like this. In the meantime, we have to live with the fact that, at any moment, we might just be swallowed into the swampy depths of D.C.

Finally, the list you’ve all been waiting for! The Eight Largest Zoos in the world (excluding Times Square)! Now I finally have an excuse to visit Nebraska.

Also, for some reason, today feels like a day for The Clash. How about Train in Vain or Police and Thieves?

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The nuts and bolts of mission investing

May 21, 2013 By Leave a Comment

PHILANTHROPY | Last week, Tamara wrote about how the Kellogg Foundation has used mission investing to maximize its impact. Today, Gretchen follows up with a closer look at the mechanics of mission investing – specifically, she writes about MRIs (not that kind) and PRIs. She also explores how the Consumer Health Foundation is using mission investing to improve our region. (Daily, 5/21)

Related:
- The Kellogg Foundation and Mission-Driven Investing (Daily, 5/16)

- How Philanthropists Can Help Companies Achieve Profit with a Purpose (Arabella, 5/14)

- Leveraging the Power of Foundations-An Analysis of Program-Related Investing (LFSP, 5/21)

OKLAHOMA | Our thoughts go out to Moore, Oklahoma, after yesterday’s monster tornado flattened huge parts of the city. Moore has been hit by similarly-destructive tornadoes three times in the last fifteen years. While the damage from the latest is devastating and the loss of life is significant, there is some relatively good news. Medical examiners have cut their death toll estimate in half, as of this morning. (Atlantic & WTOP, 5/12)

Our colleagues in Baltimore have pulled together a list of ways that you can help the victims. The Tulsa Community Foundation has also set up relief funds. And here are some options for local Oklahoma nonprofits.

Finally, here’s a heartwarming story amid the many sad ones. (Sky, 5/21)

POVERTY | Following up on yesterday’s news about the rise in suburban poverty, The Atlantic looks at some of the implications of suburban versus urban poverty (Atlantic, 5/21):

Poor people who live in high-rise apartments and dense urban blocks have neighbors who can pool childcare, or point each other to social services, or share rides to work. They have access to public transit, because transit follows density, too.
…
“That isolated poverty is a kind of hopeless poverty,” [Ford Foundation President Luis] Ubiñas said. It is also considerably less visible to the rest of us. “We won’t run into it on the subway or in the park,” he says. “We’ll drive past it on the highway.”

LOCAL | Here’s part two of WAMU’s investigation of local developers and their relationships with elected officials – Million-Dollar Properties, $1 Deals. (WAMU, 5/21)

TRANSIT | If you’ve been wondering how the Silver Spring transit center ended up as a $120 million-plus, useless mess, you’re in luck. The Post looks at the history of the project. (WaPo, 5/12)

JUVENILE JUSTICE | A new report from the National Youth Employment Center reviews the work of the organization’s Postsecondary Success Initiative, which works with disconnected and court-involved youth to help them achieve postsecondary credentials. The initiative is supported in part by the Open Society Foundations. (NYEC, 5/21)

EDUCATION | Process for Charters to Inherit Vacant DCPS Buildings Gets a Wee Bit Easier (CP, 5/21)

Ray Manzarek, a founding member of The Doors, passed away from cancer yesterday. It was a real tragedy that Doors lead singer Jim Morrison wasted his life on drugs, but the band’s impact on modern music was incredibly deep considering its short tenure. Here’s my favorite Doors song, which I think represents some of Manzarek’s best work - Riders on the Storm. It feels especially appropriate for today.

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Maximizing your impact through mission investing

May 21, 2013 By 1 Comment

By Gretchen Greiner-Lott
Vice President
Washington Regional Association of Grantmakers

Do you want to maximize your foundation’s impact? Are you willing to go beyond grantmaking to make a real difference in the community you serve? Consider mission investing.

Mission investing is the use of assets to make strategic investments that support the social mission of your foundation. Mission investing is a tool that has been available to foundations for over 40 years but has not yet become a standard practice. However, it has the potential to drive new capital into areas of need while providing financial returns to your foundation. What mission investing allows organizations to achieve is a double bottom line – both financial and social returns.

One type of mission investment is a mission-related investment (MRI). Basically, MRIs are investments in for-profit businesses that relate directly to a foundation’s mission. As Tamara wrote about last week, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation invested in “Acelero Learning, a for-profit company focused on efficiency and greater impact for Head Start, to support higher salaries for teachers.” Businesses like this, and the investments made in them, will have a positive social impact. However, MRIs are still a financial investment that must be made from the foundation’s corpus.

Program-related investments (PRIs), on the other hand, are investments that are consistent with a foundation’s charitable purpose but do not seek a market rate return. PRIs are treated much like grants for tax purposes and are typically counted toward a foundation’s minimum payout requirement. One of the great things about PRIs is that the money earned on the investment goes back to the foundation and can be reused, unlike a grant. Locally, the Consumer Health Foundation has been engaging in mission investing for over a decade. The foundation has used PRIs through an intermediary to support the growth and development of high quality nonprofit health care clinics in connection with the DC Primary Care Association’s Medical Homes DC Initiative, a clinic-based quality and capital improvement project.

Yanique Redwood, CEO of the Consumer Health Foundation, says, “As a small foundation, we’re constantly looking for ways to extend our reach. [PRIs were] one way for us to do that. The funds are being used to advance our mission, and we receive a below market rate return on the investment. We are now trying to figure out how to bring together mission investing and market rate returns. We’re learning from our peers here and around the country that this is entirely possible.”

Not everyone can or should invest $100 million or 100 percent of their assets in mission investing. However, it is important to note that you don’t have to work at these levels to get started and make a real difference with your investments. Even doing something as simple as banking with a community development financial institution (CDFI) can be a step in the right direction.

WRAG members gathered together recently for a Member to Member Learning Exchange on mission investing. What they learned, ultimately, is that mission investing has the potential to not only maximize their missions but to drive new sources of capital into areas of need. That’s the real bottom line.

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Huge changes in suburban poverty

May 20, 2013 By Leave a Comment

As The Atlantic points out, the word “suburb” brings to mind a stereotype of cheery prosperity. Whatever truth might have once inspired that image is now colliding with major demographic shifts. New research from the Brookings Institution finds that over the last decade, poverty in American suburbs has overtaken cities (Atlantic, 5/20):

Between 2000 and 2011, the population living in American cities below the poverty line increased by 29 percent. During that same time, across the country in the suburbs of metropolitan areas as diverse as Atlanta and Detroit and Salt Lake City, the ranks of the poor grew by 64 percent. Today, more poor people live in the suburbs (16.4 million of them) than in U.S. cities (13.4 million), despite the perception that poverty remains a uniquely urban problem.

The research includes profiles of metropolitan areas across the country. The Greater Washington region’s profile finds the poverty rate still lower in suburbs, but the number of suburban poor has increased 55 percent. Read more about what is driving our local changes – and what the implications are for our region.

Related: Here’s a look at how nonprofits in Montgomery County are struggling to address the increase in suburban poverty. (WAMU, 5/20)

EDUCATION
- Studies have shown that the achievement gap between high and low-income children can begin forming as early as nine months old. Home visits from family support workers might be one way of preventing the gap from forming. (WaPo, 5/20)

- Montgomery County has an increasing trend of students failing math tests. What is causing the trend? Theories abound. (WaPo, 5/20)

Maybe students are stuck in a vortex of chaos and confusion due to the fact that the school system imposes a failing grade of “E” rather than the traditional “F.” E is for “Excellent!” F is for “Fail!”

NONPROFITS | NPR ran an interesting news segment on the work of Dan Pallotta, who argues in favor of a paradigm shift that would financially incentivize working in the nonprofit sector. Click the “Listen to the Story” box to hear it. (NPR, 5/17) Thanks very much to Nick Geisinger – founder of the Daily! – for passing this along.

HOUSING
- Opinion: To Curb Domestic Violence, Start With Housing by Terri Ludwig, President and CEO of Enterprise Community Partners (HuffPo, 5/9)

- Major Campaign Donors Score Hefty City Subsidies (WAMU, 5/20) For the second time in a week…Steve Urkel!

TRANSIT | Maryland has announced plans to run MARC train service between D.C. and Baltimore on the weekends! At the moment, the only easy option for getting between the two is Amtrak, which is unreasonably expensive. (WAMU, 5/17)

Related: Columbia, Maryland, was originally designed to be a connection point that would bridge the geographic gap between Baltimore and D.C. It didn’t quite work, but its story is fascinating.

I hope everyone had a nice weekend, even though none of us won Powerball…unless the winner from Florida is a Daily reader?! Anyhow, my weekend was glorious, mostly because my girlfriend and I ran into Arnold Schwarzenegger at Georgetown’s graduation ceremony. We didn’t talk to him, but I assume that when he saw us, he thought, “Who is dis lovely couple dat I get to share da sidewalk with?” Life changing moment.

On a completely unrelated note, I’ve had Dusty Springfield’s Son of a Preacher Man stuck in my head. Great tune!

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Broken child-care subsidy process makes getting off welfare much harder

May 16, 2013 By Leave a Comment

If you can make it past the first few paragraphs without banging your head on your desk in frustration, read the Post’s detailed look at the District’s maddeningly inefficient and insufficient child-care subsidy program. Things are about to get worse for parents as welfare changes loom (WaPo, 5/16):

This fall, the District will begin limiting how long families can stay on welfare to five years. Liberals and conservatives agree that affordable child care is essential in moving people off welfare and into jobs and in helping them keep those jobs.

But that goal is greatly complicated by the realities of the city’s child-care subsidy program — with its counterproductive system for receiving and renewing benefits, its inadequate funding for the subsidies themselves and the lack of child-care centers willing to accept the vouchers.

It’s utterly absurd that, in the digital age, a person would have to get in a physical line at 3:45 am just to have a shot at meeting with a case worker.

YOUTH | The Academic Pediatric Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics say that the effects of poverty on the health and well being of children are the most important issues facing American children. This is alarming, considering that the United States has one of the very worst child poverty rates in the developed world. A new task force is striving to develop comprehensive solutions to the problem. (WaPo, 5/15)

Related: Poverty as a Childhood Disease (NYT, 5/15)

EDUCATION
- Greater Greater Education poses a very interesting question: is a focus on college preparation for all students actually a bad thing? This is a great read. (GGE, 5/16)

- DCPS has set a goal of reducing the number of special education students who are sent to out-of-system schools. Their reduction strategy seems to be focused on stricter policies around identifying which students have legitimate special needs. (Examiner, 5/16)

PHILANTHROPY | Do you know about mission driven investing? In the Daily, Tamara writes about the Kellogg Foundation and how it is using investments in for-profit companies to achieve its mission. (Daily, 5/16)

GIVING | Everywhere you go, buildings, schools, hospitals, and so much more have names attached to them – frequently those of big donors. But how can public recognition reconcile with religious traditions that encourage humility? The New York Times explores the question. (NYT, 5/11)

If I ever win the lottery, which I plan to do with Powerball this week, I want to donate enough money to name institutions after fictional characters – like the Steven Quincy Urkel School of Science or the Willy Gilligan Institute for Marine Biology.

LOCAL | The Post created a nifty map that identifies date ideas near Metro stations. I’m not sure about the wisdom of relying on Metro to successfully deliver you to a date – especially on the weekends when the system basically stops functioning – but it’s still a cool map! (WaPo, 5/16)

British singer Laura Mvula is going to be huge. Check out her single That’s Alright – both the song and the video are fantastic.

Rebekah has the Daily tomorrow, so I wish you all a nice weekend. I will be attending six hundred different graduations – a consequence of having a big family, apparently!

- Christian

Filed Under: WRAG's "In the News"

The Kellogg Foundation and Mission-Driven Investing

May 16, 2013 By 3 Comments

By Tamara Copeland
President, Washington Regional Association of Grantmakers

A few years ago, W.K. Kellogg Foundation program officer Tom Reis came to CEO Sterling Speirn with a double bottom line idea.

Rather than just pursuing the foundation’s mission through traditional grantmaking, Reis proposed using foundation assets to invest in for-profit businesses that related directly to Kellogg’s mission. He wanted to make what Kellogg came to call mission-driven investments. His plea was impassioned and it was research-based. The Board agreed and committed $100 million.

The outcomes have been impressive. They’ve generated an unexpected triple bottom line. The Kellogg Foundation has received a financial return on its investment, a social return through positive change on the problems it cares about, as well as what Speirn calls a learning return.

In eight months, Kellogg received a 26% return on their investment in Wireless Generation, a technology company that creates tools for personalized learning and teaching. Through the foundation’s investment in Revolution Foods, 200,000 healthy meals are being delivered to school children in nine states and the foundation has learned that school kitchens are often designed to re-heat frozen food, not to cook fresh food. And, through their investment in Acelero Learning, a for-profit company focused on efficiency and greater impact for Head Start, Kellogg is supporting higher salaries for teachers – an intervention that works to ensure retention of teachers while also obtaining better educational outcomes for children and economic security for families.

Last month, Speirn explored this model with WRAG CEOs. He acknowledged that every foundation doesn’t have what Kellogg did when it agreed to this work – an asset base in the billions, a broad mission statement that allows for an expansive determination of which businesses might help them further that mission, and a board and staff leadership team that was open to out-of-the-box thinking.

But he continued on to advise that the approach is flexible and can work at many levels, based on the given circumstances for each foundation. As he urged the WRAG CEOS to explore mission-driven investing, he poignantly noted, “We don’t always know the cost of success. We only know the cost of failure.”

For more information on mission related investing, visit:

- W.K. Kellogg Foundation – Mission Driven Investing
- Mission Investing Glossary
- Tools to get you started
- Confluence Philanthropy
- Mission Investors Exchange

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School closures mostly impact primarily-minority neighborhoods

May 15, 2013 By Leave a Comment

EDUCATION | City Paper’s Aaron Weiner writes about the planned DCPS school closures,  all but two of which are in majority black/Hispanic neighborhoods. The other two schools have student populations that are majority black/Hispanic. However, there is a reasonable explanation (CP, 5/15):

Parents in the poorer, eastern neighborhoods of the city—which tend to be overwhelmingly black—are more likely to want to send their kids to charter or out-of-boundary schools, to get them away from rougher schools or rougher streets on the way to school or both. This doesn’t happen as much at schools in richer parts of town…So schools in poorer (and, yes, blacker and more Hispanic) neighborhoods get depopulated and close down.

While the explanation makes sense, it also implies a self-perpetuating cycle of disadvantage. Students have to commute further. Parents face the added stress of seeking out less convenient education options for their kids. And neighborhoods become less attractive to prospective residents. Not good.

LOCAL | DCist mapped out public sector employment in the Greater Washington region by neighborhood. The results are interesting and give us a really great sense of the employment diversity in our region. (DCist, 5/15)

HOUSING | The Nonprofit Roundtable retweeted an interesting report that asks a great question – are student loans causing home and auto sales to decline? (Federal Reserve, 4/17) Yes, they are. Believe you me.

Related: Young Americans are driving less and buying fewer cars. (NYT, 5/14)

Event: This Saturday, the Communications Action Network (CAN), is sponsoring its Parade of Homes. The event features open houses at 20 affordable housing communities across the region. It’s a great opportunity to see the many types of local affordable housing options and how they are impacting the region. [Learn more.]

WORKFORCE | A proposal in front of the D.C. Council would require “big box” stores to set a higher minimum wage ($11.25 hr) than other local businesses. (WAMU, 5/14)

Here are couple of thoughts on this. The minimum wage should be higher across the board. Singling out one type of business over another seems unfair and arbitrary. And “higher” and “hire” are homophones.

PHILANTHROPY | Charities Want More Insight Into Grant-Making Decisions, Says Study (Chronicle, 5/15)

DEMOCRACY | In hopes of building the levels of civic engagement, Takoma Park will now allow most 16 and 17 year-olds to vote in local elections. (WAMU, 5/15) One might argue that a 16 year-old isn’t informed enough to vote. I would respond by laughing heartily and pointing out that many adults aren’t either.

Imagine looking up on a sunny day and seeing this! That’s pretty darn funny.

Also, here’s a fun comparison – biopic actors and the real people they play. Part one and part two.

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Focusing on literacy to meet the demands of the workforce

May 14, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Funding for adult literacy in the District has been declining steadily, but the need remains incredibly high. More than 80 percent of D.C. jobs are projected to require at least a high school degree within the next five years, but more than 64,000 residents don’t have a high school credential.

Terri Lee Freeman, president of the Community Foundation for the National Capital Region and chair of the WRAG board, co-authored an op-ed for the Post that outlines the importance of increased literacy funding (WaPo, 5/11):

With limited basic math, reading and digital literacy skills, these residents have difficulty following written instructions, completing paperwork, communicating effectively with colleagues or helping their children with homework. This undermines the job security of workers, the economic viability of local businesses and the well-being of families.

Related: Business startup program aims to reduce unemployment in DC (Elevation, 5/14)

AGING | With the number of elderly immigrants having doubled over the last two decades, there is a growing trend of senior facilities catering to specific nationalities and cultures. As Berkeley professor Andrew Scharlach puts it (WaPo, 5/14):

In our fast-paced society, people with old languages and old customs often find they don’t have a place…Having a place where their knowledge, wisdom and skills are recognized is important.”

ARTS
- Rebekah reflects on creative strategies for advocating for increased philanthropic support of the local arts sector. (Daily, 5/14)

- Painting a path of hope for homeless youth through art education (WTOP, 5/14)

EDUCATION | The D.C. Council is pushing for parents to be given at least one year’s notice before school boundaries are changed. That would delay Chancellor Henderson’s plan for boundary changes by an entire year. (WaPo, 5/14)

GIVING | Rockefeller Pledges $100-Million to Help 100 Cities Cope With Crises (Chronicle, 5/14) Do political crises count? Speaking of which…

NONPROFITS | With the news that the nonpartisan IRS is actually quite partisan, there is concern that the impending fallout will impact the agency’s ability to regulate nonprofit organizations. (Chronicle, 5/14) And the IRS was doing such a great job before this whole thing broke!

Well, it’s been about five months since the last time we experienced what it means to be Washington sports fans. I guess the Caps thought we were overdue for a reminder.

Anyway, the recipe for Coca-Cola is a highly-guarded secret. However, a “treasure hunter” in Georgia thinks he found the secret recipe in a box of old letters. I wonder what other mysteries are hidden in forgotten places?

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Uneven pay among the region’s teachers threatens the stability of some school systems

May 13, 2013 By Leave a Comment

EDUCATION | There are an incredible number of factors that influence the success of the public education systems in our regions. One of the leading ones is teacher effectiveness. Unfortunately, some local jurisdictions are struggling to retain their best educators as other jurisdictions offer higher wages (WaPo, 5/12):

Discrepancies in teacher pay across the region are large, and the recession has sharpened the divide, sending some teachers looking for better deals. Beginning teachers in the Washington area make between $42,800 and $51,500 — a difference of 20 percent — and average salaries range from $58,500 to $77,500, a 32 percent difference. Parents and school officials worry that if such disparities in teacher pay deepen, districts that are already struggling to stay competitive will fall further behind as their best teaching talent moves elsewhere.

- Every year, a huge number of school-aged teens drop out and take the GED rather than finishing high school. In Prince George’s County, for example, a third of GED test takers are under 18. This loophole is generating calls for stricter access to the test, which was designed to give adults a pathway to higher education. (WaPo, 5/13)

- Here’s an interview with Fight for Children’s Skip McKoy, who is the newly elected chairman of the DC Public School Charter Board. (Examiner, 5/13)

WRAG | We live in hectic times in a very busy region, so it’s easy to rush past important things that are right in front of us. In her latest column, Tamara reflects on something she’s rushed past for the last six years – a quilt in WRAG’s office commemorating the life of Reggie Blaxton. Who was he? Find out! (Daily, 5/13)

YOUTH | Ed Davies, president of the Children and Youth Investment Trust Corporation, outlines the 2013 DC One City Summer Initiative. The initiative will build on successes from the past two years, which have included a major reduction in violence (WashTimes, 5/10):

One of the most tangible successes of the summer initiative so far is that we have seen a reduction in crime in some of the neighborhoods targeted during the summer for intensive programming. We believe if we increase programming, and not just police presence, youth will opt to engage in constructive activities, and not crime. Violent crimes declined in the target areas with homicide down 70%, robbery down 15% and armed burglary down 25%. Juvenile arrests for select violent crimes decreased by an average of 40% in the target areas. That is a true summer success story.

AGING | Here’s a look at how house call programs can help seniors age in place. (WAMU, 5/13)

EQUITY | Income Inequality: It’s Not Just for Older People Anymore (Time, 5/13) This knight perfectly articulates how I feel about the findings in this article.

Though I frequently refer to my office as a cave, it has nothing on these super cool houses that are built into real caves. Then again…my office does have two action figures from Tron and an electric stapler. So my cave wins after all!

On another note, LET’S GO CAPS! The Washington Capitals, not capital letters. Sorry, I can see how that might have been confusing.

Filed Under: WRAG's "In the News"

Using technology to combat senior isolation

May 9, 2013 By Leave a Comment

People often lament the fact that technology is deteriorating human relationships. But for seniors, the opposite might be true. A new pilot program funded by the AARP Foundation is building technological connections for seniors as a way of combating isolation. The program provides iPads to seniors, as well as classes on how to use the Internet, social media, Skype, and more (WaPo, 5/9):

In the District, the program selected low-income seniors at high risk of being disconnected from friends and family, said Najeeb Uddin, the AARP Foundation’s vice president of technology.

“We’re targeting people on the verge of being isolated and depressed. Their spouse might have passed away,” he said. “It’s about connecting to the community. It just happens to be that we’re using technology to do it.”

YOUTH | The Children’s Law Center has released its 2013 Children’s Mental Health Report Card. This year’s marks for the District are mixed, but hopeful (WAMU, 5/9):

Judith Sandalow is the executive director of Children’s Law Center, a nonprofit in D.C. She says there are “promising beginnings” when it comes to how the District serves children with mental health needs.
…
But Sandalow says there is still a long way to go. She says there are too many agencies involved leading to what she calls “bureaucratic fragmentation.” And Sandalow says how soon a child gets treatment is also a problem.

Read the report here.

Related: Pushing for More Progress in the District’s Children’s Mental Health System (HuffPo, 5/9)

HEALTH | Jacqueline Bowens has been named to succeed Sharon Baskerville as the CEO of the D.C. Primary Care Coalition. (WBJ, 5/9)

Related: The D.C. Primary Care Coalition is one of the key players in our Beyond Dollars story on expanding the health care safety net. You can check out the report here.

EDUCATION
- The District is set to open a “hybrid traditional-charter” school in Southeast. Chancellor Kaya Henderson says, “It’s an animal that we’ve never seen before.” (WaPo, 5/9) Is it a unicorn? I bet it’s a unicorn. I knew they existed!

- Putting Inner City Students on a Path to High-Paying Jobs, For Real (Atlantic, 5/9)

HOUSING
- In case the economic collapse didn’t do it already, Richard Florida has deflated the American dream of homeownership. He digs into a report about the relationship between unemployment and homeownership and says, “Higher rates of homeownership lead to higher rates of unemployment.” (Atlantic, 5/9)

Related: Florida discusses the relationship between housing and commuting. We looked at the same issue in our recent report on housing affordability.

- Greater Greater Washington’s Dave Aplert explains how the increased production of high-end rental units in our region could trigger drops in rent through a process called “filtering.” (GGW, 5/9) Contrary to my initial expectation, this does not mean refraining from swearing at leasing agents to get better rates.

LOCAL
- Arlington’s population is expected to continue booming, thanks especially to the Columbia Pike Neighborhoods Plan. (WTOP, 5/9)

- Robert McCartney writes about how impressed he is about regional collaboration to clean sewage. (WaPo, 5/9)

- Lots of great stuff from The Atlantic today. Here’s a look at how highway construction ruined Southwest D.C. – and how new development could resurrect it. (Atlantic, 5/9)

I forgot to post this yesterday, but Jimmy Fallon and John Krasinski (from The Office) had a hilarious lip syncing competition. It’s pretty funny. (Note: I downgraded my sentiment and didn’t even notice when I published.)

And, here’s an amusing connection between autocomplete and the platypus.

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