DC Education Compact 
Merger with Public Education Partnership Fund
December 1, 2005

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DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
EDUCATION COMPACT

4000 Wisconsin Ave., NW North Tower-Suite One Washington, DC 20016
(P) 202-274-8039 (F) 202-274-8101

DC Education Compact and Public Education Partnership Fund Announce Merger
New Organization Committed to DC Public School Children

Washington, D.C. – - The DC Education Compact (DCEC) and the Public Education Partnership Fund (the PEP Fund) recently announced the two groups will join forces. Merging these groups will allow for better leveraging of the organizations’ complementary expertise and investment in public education in Washington, DC.

The new organization will assume the DCEC name, and will be led by Juanita Wade, as Executive Director, and Charles Hiteshew, as Deputy Director.

The new DCEC will continue to focus on the shared mission of the two organizations, promoting civic engagement, investment and collaboration in support of public education in the District of Columbia.

DCEC was formed in 2004 as a broad community collaborative to ensure that DC public schools (DCPS) provide excellent student learning and achievement for all DC children. The PEP Fund was established in 2003 to mobilize the community to invest in the ongoing improvement in the quality of education for all children in the DC’s public schools.

“It became increasingly clear that bringing together these two dedicated organizations made sense,” said Stacey D. Stewart, member of the DCEC Planning Committee and president and CEO of the Fannie Mae Foundation. “This entity has the resources and the staying power to work with public officials, private citizens, education advocates, and other interested citizens to effect the critical changes our schools need.”

Both organizations have had success in raising awareness around the issues that face DC Public Schools and engaging the community to help build and sustain a broad movement around school reform. Both DCEC and the PEP Fund have seen the need for more integrative collaboration among the many stakeholders in the DC public education system.

“With this merger, we will be better positioned to bring the school system, stakeholders, and community together,” said Terri Freeman, chair of the PEP Fund. “We look forward to leveraging off of our past success to focus on strategic investment with measurable results.”

In the past year, the PEP Fund has launched its first major investment in a system-wide partnership between DCPS and the College Board. This project incorporates a collegeready curriculum component in 26 participating schools over the course of its 3-year duration, and will help to establish more advanced placement classes in the eight participating high schools. Currently, the PEP Fund is working with DCPS to support a National Teacher Certification project whereby 500 teachers over the next five years will become accredited through a national process that is widely regarded as the gold standard in professional development.

During the past several weeks, DC Public Schools and the DC Education Compact held open houses to gather feedback on cross-cutting educational issues. This feedback will be used to help develop the Master Education Plan (MEP) to be released by Superintendent Clifford Janey in the coming months. The MEP will serve as a blueprint outlining the educational priorities for DC Public Schools.