NEWS & OPINIONS
Georgia Considers Privatization of Child Welfare System
A bill to privatize most of the state's child welfare services was introduced this week by Senator Unterman (R-Buford). The legislation, Senate Bill 350, would require the Department of Family and Children Services (DFCS) to develop a plan by January of 2015 by which...
School Choice – All Options Aren’t Created Equal
In a recent article addressing school choice alternatives – particularly the Georgia Tax Credit Scholarship program and its $58 million annual cap – some integral details regarding the execution of various school choice alternatives were somewhat blended together. We...
Capitol Update – February 7th, 2014
Roads Cleared, News Coverage Still Encountering Snow Related Congestion While last week’s winter weather is in the rear view mirror, the postmortem evaluation of the government’s response continues to receive considerable coverage. The General Assembly, however, has...
State Leaders Push for Employers to Hire Ex-Offenders
Georgia Center for Opportunity (GCO) is pleased to see Governor Nathan Deal and U.S. Attorney Sally Yates (Northern District of Georgia) exercise their influence to encourage business leaders across the state to hire ex-offenders. They are urging employers to give...
Snow Can’t Stop This Crowd for School Choice
By Dr. Danielle LeSure, GCO's Director of Education Policy Amazingly, over 600 students, parents, teachers, and school leaders crowded the Capitol in the middle of a snow storm to cheer for school choice options—charter schools, public school transfers, special needs...
Demand for Choice High: Education Tax Credit Cap Reached in Record 22 Days
Just this past week, Georgia's Tax Credit Scholarship program reached its cap of allowable donation commitments (currently, $58 million) in well under a month. That's the earliest the cap has been reached in the program's history, three and a half months earlier than...
Despite Guidelines, Many Georgia Students Not “College Ready”
Below is a guest blog by Dr. Eric Wearne of Georgia Gwinnett College and formerly with the Governor's Office of Student Achievement. Dr. Wearne currently leads GCO's College & Career Pathways working group. **************************** By: Dr. Eric Wearne What it...
Cage-Busting Leadership: Reforming Public Education from Within
Our team at GCO had the privilege of hosting Dr. Rick Hess this week. On Tuesday, Dr. Hess, who is an education scholar (and prolific writer) with the American Enterprise Institute, spoke at an early morning breakfast attended by a group of about 45 people that...
New Report: Increasing Employment Opportunities for Ex-Offenders
This week, Georgia Center for Opportunity (GCO) published its first report on ways to improve reentry for ex-offenders in the state. The report focuses on increasing employment opportunities for ex-offenders and offers six recommendations for the State of Georgia to...
Collective Impact “Knowledge Nuggets”
GCO’s Breakthrough Communities initiative is modeled, in part, on the collective impact framework developed by the Strive Partnership in Cincinnati, OH. Over the past few months we have participated in numerous opportunities to learn from Strive, most recently we...
MEDIA MENTIONS
GCO advice on increasing employment gets hearing in D.C.
In the post below, Executive Vice President Eric Cochling talks about a recent visit with leaders in Washington D.C. and how GCO's work is being noticed on Capitol Hill. I have to admit that last week was a tiring whirlwind of activity, but it turned out to be a...
Another study confirms Georgians want more choice in education
As lawmakers prepare to head back to the Capitol in January, Georgians have now received a glimpse of some issues that might move the needle in the 2018 election cycle. A new study released by the Georgia College Department of Government and Sociology finds that...
Show some love: The Angel Tree program is about more than gifts
The Christmas season is often marked by joy, but for many children with incarcerated parents, the holidays can be a painful reminder of their mom or dad’s absence. The Georgia Center for Opportunity is committed to building healthy family relationships and enabling...
Georgia’s 3 largest counties show need for the Success Sequence
Georgia Center for Opportunity focuses policy reform efforts around the success sequence. Research shows that those who graduate from high school, get a job, get married, and have kids (in that order) are less likely to end up in poverty. In fact, only 2 percent who...
Advocating for innovation, Steve Jobs championed school choice
Earlier this month, Apple made waves by introducing the iPhone 10. Since being unveiled, the updated smartphone and several other new products have received praise as the latest credit to Steve Jobs’ tech legacy. Years following his death, Americans still remember the...
Georgia Center for Opportunity announced as finalist for Atlas Network’s prestigious Templeton Freedom Award
Amid growing acknowledgment for efforts to reduce prison recidivism rates in Georgia, the Georgia Center for Opportunity (GCO) has been named as a finalist for the highly competitive Atlas Network Templeton Freedom Award. The honor recognizes GCO for recent efforts to...
Getting non-working men working again in Georgia
In the coming decades, could so-called “middle skills” jobs be a key factor in reversing the contemporary epidemic of non-working males in the U.S.? There is reason to hope the answer is a resounding yes. A phenomenon thoroughly documented by the American Enterprise...
GCO’s Healthy Families Initiative announces #FatherhoodFriday: Celebrating the joy of being a dad
Being a dad is one of the greatest challenges in life, but it often gets overlooked. Though the everyday joys of being a father are overshadowed in pop culture by fast-paced news and Hollywood gossip, that doesn't mean celebrity dads aren't talking about how their...
