Gyanam Knowledge

Education & entrepreneurship in New Orleans

• By Richard Branson -
• Apr 11, 2013

• 

After battling on the competitive field of US airlines in Newarkwith mood lighting and fleetwide wi-fi, I traveled to New Orleans to meet entrepreneurs at INC’s Growco. I also visited the students of KIPP: Believe, the highest performing open admissions school in New Orleans for the last seven years. There I met an entrepreneur with an inspiring story of adversity and triumph, a story that is shared by more than 3,000 young people in New Orleans.

It was a year before Hurricane Katrina when Adam Meinig took his first steps to start a public charter school. In a tough school district with few good options, Adam saw an opportunity to help more students lead better lives. Parents he tried to recruit would ask, "Where is the school located?" and he'd reply, "Well, I don't have a building yet." They'd ask, "Who are your teachers?" and he'd say, "I don't have teachers yet. I don't have the kids yet." They didn't think it could be done. But the one thing Adam had, which allowed him to recruit like-minded teachers and families to work together to start KIPP: Believe, was a passionately held belief: that all students can learn and succeed regardless of their socio-economic background.

Belief, passion, a team of wonderful people, and a challenged landscape that needed shaking up. Sound familiar to startup entrepreneurs?

Adam is as much an entrepreneur as he is a visionary educator. He started KIPP: Believe because he saw an opportunity, not just a problem. 99% of his students are African American, 94% of them qualify for free/reduced lunch, and their projected graduation rates were unacceptably low (high school graduation: 56%, college graduation: 8%). He believes that the achievement gap is really an opportunity gap, so opening up the landscape for more charter schools like KIPP allows New Orleans to grow better schools, better results - and future entrepreneurs.

We talked with KIPP students, who told us - aside from recommending the city's tasty beignets! - how they previously thought they needed to leave New Orleans to be successful. Shawn said that before KIPP, he attended "a really bad school: I didn't think New Orleans had schools where everybody wants to learn." Today, there are teachers using entrepreneurial spirit to actively and aggressively recruit students, students who before Katrina would not have had a choice in the schools they could attend.

More competition is better for the consumer. Just as Virgin is thriving in a competitive airline landscape through better customer experience, Adam is doing the same with his school. Students have more hours to learn, choice, commitment, higher expectations, and an environment where decisions are made without bureaucracy. Today, KIPP New Orleans students rank 6th out of 71 districts. The school walls are covered with quotes from visionary leaders, as well as the scribbled thoughts of students - a coming together of inspiration from the past, for the future.

Shawn's mother was working at Walmart when she heard the news that Shawn had earned a prestigious high school scholarship. Visibly moved, she tried to stifle her emotions - but when her fellow workers found out, they formed a circle around her, with all of them hugging and crying. Shawn is not just her child: he is New Orleans' child.

By Richard Branson. Founder of Virgin Group