Daily News Roundup: 10 Schools to Share $100 Milllion From Powell Jobs Venture

Laurene Powell Jobs Group Awards $100 Million in School-Reform Contest: The XQ Institute chaired by the Silicon Valley billionaire announced the winners Wednesday in its Super School Project, a competition for proposals to rethink high school education, reports The New York Times. Ten schools from across the country will get $10 million each to implement reforms such as operating without standard class periods and programs for students who are homeless or in foster care. Russlynn Ali, XQ’s chief executive, said the institute doubled the initial $50 million commitment for the contest after receiving far more applications than expected. Read more about Laurene Powell Jobs and other women to watch in philanthropy in a Chronicle special report.

Clinton Health Charity to Break With Foundation if Hillary Wins: The Clinton Health Access Initiative will get a new name and a Clinton-free board if Hillary Clinton is elected president, CNN reports. The largest subsidiary of the Clinton Foundation announced it would fully separate from the parent organization and replace its five-member board, which currently includes Bill and Chelsea Clinton and three longtime aides to the family. The 14-year-old public-health charity, the foundation’s largest affiliate and a linchpin of its efforts to make AIDS drugs more widely and cheaply available, will retain the acronym CHAI but remove “Clinton” from its name should Hillary Clinton win in November.

N.F.L. Pledges $100 Million to Address Head Injuries: Announcing the commitment in an open letter, National Football League Commissioner Roger Goodell said it will include $40 million to support medical research on the effect of concussions and head trauma on long-term health and funding for technological and training advancements to protect players on the field, The New York Times writes. Mr. Goodell acknowledged “skepticism” about the league’s past work in this area – critics contend the N.F.L. has downplayed the risk to players from repeated head impacts and steered research grants to league-friendly scientists – and said the new research will be overseen by an independent advisory board and its findings made public.

Head of William Penn Foundation Leaving for Cooper Union: Laura Sparks is stepping down after 14 months leading the $2.3 billion Philadelphia grant maker to become president of the New York City private college, of which she will be the first female leader, reports The Philadelphia Inquirer. Ms. Sparks will leave the foundation in the fall and take up her Cooper Union post on January 4. She served as Penn’s chief philanthropy officer before replacing Peter Degnan, who resigned in the summer of 2014 after serving only six months at the largest private foundation primarily focused on the Philadelphia region.

Facebook Share Sales Bring $285 Million to Chan-Zuckerberg Philanthropy: Mark Zuckerberg sold another $95 million in his social-media company’s stock in recent days, according to federal filings, Silicon Valley Business Journal reports. It’s the third such transaction Facebook has disclosed in the past month as the company CEO and his wife, Priscilla Chan, begin funding their giving and impact-investing venture, the Chan Zuckerberg initiative. The couple has said it will sell up to $1 billion in stock in each of the next three years as they ramp up their philanthropy and social investing.

U.S.C. and U. of Virginia Get Major Gifts: A University of Southern California alumna who became a global leader in social work has donated $60 million to support her alma mater’s programs in the field, reports the Los Angeles Times. The U.S.C. School of Social Work will be renamed for Suzanne Dworak-Peck, a former present of the National Association of Social Workers who also built a fortune as a real-estate investor. The University of Virginia’s College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences received a $40 million gift from Thompson Dean, a private-equity executive and 1979 graduate, The Daily Progress of Charlottesville, Va., writes. The funds will support a range of curricular initiatives.

Big-Name Seattle Donors Team on Project for Homeless Students: The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation, and the Raikes Foundation led by a former Gates CEO are contributing to Schoolhouse Washington, a $1.9 million effort to help the state’s nearly 35,000 homeless students. Another Seattle-based grant maker, the Campion Foundation, is also providing funding, and the partnership includes Columbia Legal Services, a social-justice nonprofit that will advocate for policies to address student homelessness, which primarily affects black and Native American youth in the region.

Global Survey Finds U.S. Fertile Ground for Social Entrepreneurs: The United States ranks No. 1 among the world’s 45 biggest economies for nurturing businesses seeking to tackle social problems, according to a Thompson Reuters Foundation poll of experts in the field. Canada, Britain, Singapore, and Israel rounded out the top five in the survey of nearly 900 social entrepreneurs, academics, investors, and others active on the issue; Turkey ranked last. While social entrepreneurship is growing, nearly 60 percent of respondents said people do not really know what it is, which creates challenges in raising funds and securing support from governments.