Michelle Rhee's Backers Include Obama Bundler Billionaire, Big Romney Backer
Politics is once again making strange bedfellows. A top Mitt Romney supporter and one of Barack Obama's wealthier contributors have a common cause: They're both backing Michelle Rhee.
Until now, identifying Rhee's usually anonymous donors has been largely a guessing game. But recent lobbying filings in Pennsylvania name New Jersey hedge funder and Romney backer David Tepper and the Texas-based Laura and John Arnold Foundation as among the largest donors to StudentsFirst, Rhee's national lobbying and advocacy group that pushes for rigorous teacher evaluations and school choice. And though the filings don't give dollar amounts, a source close to the donor community said the Arnold grant amounted to tens of millions of dollars.
Rhee, one of the biggest names in the education reform movement, drew attention during her stint as chancellor of Washington, D.C., schools. There, her oft-lauded teacher evaluation system, teacher firings and bureaucratic shakeup landed a broom-wielding Rhee on the cover of Time magazine and made her the focus of the documentary "Waiting for Superman." Her critics point to allegations that her record in D.C. was inflated by cheating, a matter that has yet to be settled by an ongoing federal investigation (though its scope has been narrowed to 35 classrooms).
After Adrian Fenty, the mayor who appointed Rhee, was voted out of office, Rhee left to found StudentsFirst. SF has quickly become a big name in the education reform lobby, angering unions and working with legislatures that have altered their teacher hiring laws to the group's liking.
more . . . http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/24/michelle-rhees-backers-in_n_1300146.html
