Teach For America and Teach For All : Creating an Intermediary Organization Network for Global Education Reform

Locally and globally among policymakers and edupreneurs, what constitutes “good teaching and learning” is highly contested, and prototypes that seem to embody “what works” are highly valued. In the United States, many accept Teach For America (TFA) as an exemplar of “what works.” As its U.S. operations continue to grow, TFA has recalibrated and expanded into Teach for All, an international organization with extensive reach. Teach For All not only finds historic roots in TFA, but it reflects TFA’s intentional expansion of its theory of change and implementation on a global scale. This exploratory essay investigates the linkages between TFA and TFAll, focusing on theory and implementation of education reform by comparing domestic TFA ideology and practices with those of TFAll. Also, we conceptualize the dimensions and anatomy of a global network of IOs epaa aape Education Policy Analysis Archives Vol. 20 No. 47 2 engaged in global education reform. In addition to providing insight on TFAll, our broader goal is to build the knowledge base around what we are calling global Intermediary Organization Networks (IONs).

"what works" are highly valued.In the United States, policymakers and popular media alike seem to accept Teach For America (TFA) as an exemplar of "what works."Conceived in the 1980s with a mission to rescue and reform schools in America's urban education centers from what was deemed sub-par teaching and teacher training as a result of a national teacher shortage, TFA receives hundreds of millions of dollars in philanthropic donations from the Gates, Walton, and Broad Foundations as well as federal funding given its status as an AmeriCorps organization.Operating in 50 U.S. regions and counting, TFA now has over 33,000 alumni (Teach For America, n.d.-c).
As its U.S. operations continue to grow, TFA has recalibrated its mission to look beyond simply placing its corps members in classrooms as it has expanded its aims of producing educational "leaders" who will enact pro-reform policies.Yet, this recalibration has not been limited to the U.S., as TFA has expanded into an international organization with extensive reach through its spinoff Teach For All (TFAll).Launched at the Clinton Global Initiative in 2007 (Dillon, 2011), TFAll is "the global network for expanding educational opportunity" (Teach For All, n.d.-e).TFAll's mission and vision for education reform stem from the domestic TFA philosophy.Supported by the United Kingdom's Teach First and social entrepreneurship communities, its stated goals include "leadership development, access to global resources, high-impact direct connections, and knowledge capture and direct partnership" (Teach For All, n.d.-b).Through a framework of measurable impact and accountability, and funded by a robust private network, TFAll operates "social enterprises" in 34 countries outside of the U.S. (Teach For All, n.d.-c), several of which are in the world's developing countries.
TFA and TFAll are thus interrelated in two key ways.First, TFAll finds ideological roots in TFA.TFAll has adopted TFA's sociopolitical ideologies that have proven attractive in the U.S. The organizations' common theory of change is situated in ideologies of equality, accountability, and measurable impact.Secondly, within this framework, TFA and TFAll operate as hub Intermediary Organizations (IOs) that are key nuclei in both a domestic (TFA) and a global (TFAll) Intermediary Organization Network (ION) engaged in corporate education reform on a global scale.Operating in "localized policy communities," IOs often include a range of lobbyists, think tanks, foundations, researchers, and media actors (Ball & Junemann, 2012;Lubienski, Scott, & DeBray, 2011).IOs are not simply interest groups as traditionally understood, but well-oiled mechanisms that serve any number of a range of functions that assemble, collect, interpret, package and convey research evidence to consumers for either substantive or symbolic use in policymaking.The fluid, elusive nature of networks of IOs contributes to IOs' dominance in educational policymaking (Scott & Jabbar, 2014).Indeed, TFA and TFAll are two such well-oiled IOs that operate in localized policy communities across "social enterprises" in the U.S. and globally.Their network includes a community that also wholly subscribes to neoliberal 1 ideologies in education reform.More specifically, TFA and its international iterations by way of TFAll, represent a systemic deregulation of teacher preparation away from state-run colleges of education while also producing corps members that embody neoliberal assumptions about meritocracy and credentialism as a means and method of individualistic economic competition.The global, TFA-TFAll led ION includes powerful 1 We define neoliberalism as both an ideology and practice that seeks to elevate the individual over the collective good.Such an attempt draws on the ideological foundations of Friedmanism that assume public education (and those activities and actors associated within) is best managed as an individualistic commodity with limited governmental regulation or intrusion.Here we use borrow Ball's (2012) definition of neoliberalism: "at its most visceral and intimate, neoliberalism involves the transformation of social relations into calculabilities and exchanges, that is into the market form, and thus the commodification of educational practice…Neoliberal technologies work on us to produce 'docile and productive' teacher and the student bodies, and responsible for enterprising teacher and the student selves" (p.29).corporate players such as former McKinsey and Company managers, the consulting firm that was also home to one of TFA's top leaders (Teach For America, n.d.-b); the Bezos Family and Robertson Foundations; financial institutions such as Visa and the World Bank; and, in several "social enterprises," state and local governments provide financial and resource support to the TFA and TFAll mission.Cloning TFA's ideological underpinnings and IO approach to constructing IONs with public and private funding, TFAll continues to influence global education reform.

Purpose
To some, TFAll is a natural, obvious, and expected outgrowth of TFA given its widespread impact in the U.S.However, such a cursory estimation sells short two important points in TFAll growth: 1) TFAll not only finds historic roots in TFA, but it reflects TFA's intentional expansion of theory of change and implementation on a global scale.Such an expansion represents a new form of imperialism and colonization, as TFAll seeks to shape global education into its model that is informed by its narrow perspective about what is best for "other people's kids;" and, 2) Moreover, TFAll replicates TFA's approach to positioning itself at the center of a network of IOs and thus a key IO in education reform, a type of policy actor that operates in the space between research production and consumption -a relatively new subject of study in policy analysis.
Seeking to build theory on IOs, in this study we explore the linkages between TFA and TFAll, focusing on theory and implementation of education reform by comparing domestic TFA ideology and practices with those of TFAll.Also, we conceptualize the nature of a global network of IOs engaged in global education reform.In fulfilling these aims we draw upon several complementary conceptual frames including the Advocacy Coalition Framework (Ball & Junnemann, 2012), Local Advocacy Networks (DeBray, Scott, Lubienski, & Jabbar, 2014), as well as literature that highlights the important role of foundations in policymaking (Reckhow, 2013;Scott, 2009;Scott & Jabbar, 2014).In addition to providing insight on TFAll, our broader goal is to build the knowledge base around IONs.

Analytic Approach
To characterize TFA's and TFAll's global education reform efforts through an ION, we conducted a Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) of a range of documents.From the TFA and TFAll websites, we assembled a range of publicly available documents including tax refunds, Annual Reports, statements of approach and impact, and portraits of various sites and social enterprises.The TFA and TFAll websites, which offer a range of texts, videos, photos, and maps, enabled a material and textual understanding of the identity and character of these organizations.We also examined existing literature on TFA and IOs and publicly available data from the World Bank.Fairclough's (2003) tradition of CDA offers several tools to analyze discursive language such as assumptions, intertextuality, and difference.Specifically, we looked for the following: "What existential, propositional, or value assumptions are made?Is there a case for seeing any assumptions as ideological?Which of the following scenarios characterize the orientation to difference in the text…openness, accentuation, attempt to resolve, bracketing, or consensus/normalization" (Fairclough, 2003, p. 192)?These principles helped form a list of codes through which we analyzed the abovementioned documents and websites.Once we extracted chunks of data that typified assumptions, intertextuality, and difference, we explored linkages and patterns across the documents and websites.

Conceptualizing Global Networks of Intermediary Organizations
In the Western Enlightenment tradition, the notion of rational approaches to social problems would suggest an objective diagnosis of an issue, an even-handed weighing of various policy options, and then the implementation and evaluation of a policy remedy (Davies & Nultey, 2008).Yet policy scholars have noted for decades that the simple problem-solution model is wholly inadequate for explaining what actually happens in policymaking processes (Kingdon, 1984).The old notion of the "iron triangle" in American politics highlighted the rather exclusive relationships between the legislative branch, the bureaucracy, and the entrenched interest groups focused on a given issue.But more recent scholarship and events -for example, the disenfranchisement of the "education establishment" during the formulation of No Child Left Behind legislation (DeBray, 2006) -point to the need for more open-ended, fluid and nuanced theoretical tools for understanding policymaking processes (Heclo, 1978).Perspectives that emphasize issue networks, such as the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF), represent a promising approach to such complex issues (Sabatier & Jenkins-Smith, 1999).
Using the ACF, we can better appreciate some of the recent trends in policymaking, particularly in areas such as education.Indeed, recent scholarship is highlighting the growing influence of advocacy organizations that are serving an intermediary function in education policy processes -a phenomenon not accounted for in the older "iron triangle" model, much less in simplistic problem-solution paradigms (Lubienski et al., 2011).In economic terms, we can conceive of these IOs as "brokers" that may neither produce nor use research per se, but instead seek to match consumers in policymaking positions with particular research evidence from producers.They may be "marketers" who want to "push" certain evidence to shape policy; or they can be "aggregators" selecting or "pulling" evidence to support a particular agenda.For instance, the Program on Education Policy and Governance (PEPG) at Harvard regularly releases reports showing the benefits of school choice policies, and then promotes these reports through press releases and shorter versions for its associated organ, Education Next.Similarly, without necessarily producing new evidence, the Center for Education Reform regularly assembles a (rather slanted and selectively represented) list of studies to demonstrate that the "evidence" on school choice shows this to be a wonderful policy option (Center for Education Reform, 2001).They also created the "Media Bullpen" to rate the media's reporting on these issues (see http://mediabullpen.com/).At the same time, groups like People for the American Way, or Americans United for the Separation of Church and State assemble evidence into reports and press releases to show the dangers of some forms of choice (People for the American Way, 2000).These push-pull dynamics suggest a type of marketplace where supply and demand are fluid and not tightly coupled; producers often provide research for which there is little demand, and policymakers often seek evidence on issues only to find that there is a glut of conflicting conclusions in the research literature, or, at other times, no research at all (Naidorf, 2014).
In this environment, IOs can be seen as politically oriented evidence brokers that facilitate the transfer of research evidence from producers to consumers by packaging and promoting particular research in order to advance an agenda (Lubienski et al., 2011).While they may function in ways that facilitate the use of research in policymaking overall, each IO is itself typically more interested in advancing a particular narrative about the research evidence than in promoting the use of research evidence in general, much less the best evidence on a given topic.For example, drawing on cases outside of education, few would doubt that the American Petroleum Institute or the (now defunct) Tobacco Institute would push evidence favorable to their positions to policymakers while ignoring (or seeking to undercut) research that challenged their interests.
In education policy, we are seeing a plethora of such IOs at the federal, state and local levels in the US (Lubienski et al., 2011).While this intermediary function has traditionally been associated with think tanks such as, say, the Heritage Foundation or the Economic Policy Institute, newer advocacy groups such as the Center for Education Reform or the Network for Public Education are also playing this role, thus suggesting that IOs are a category that encompass and go beyond more traditional forms such as think tanks or advocacy groups.That is, since IOs occupy the intermediary space between evidence producers and consumers, they include organizations that are typically associated with a number of such brokering functions, including think tanks, advocacy outfits, media outfits, bloggers, foundations and unions active in policy advocacy, and philanthropic funders promoting a particular agenda.In fact, with the rise of large-scale organizations like the Gates Foundation and the Broad Foundation in education policy, it is important to note that an intermediary function does not have to be played only by organizations that embrace that single role.Instead, IOs can include multi-faceted entities that may themselves produce or use research evidence, but also serve a brokering function within larger networks.For instance, the aforementioned PEPG, the Fordham Foundation, or the Economic Policy Institute produce evidence, but then also work to promote awareness of their studies through press releases, media events and conferences, thus serving both intermediary and producer functions.Likewise, the Walton Family Foundation funds evidence production by funding certain researchers but also advocates on these issues, for instance, by supporting policy advocacy.As we note below, TFAll also embodies many of these functions.
Indeed, drawing from ACF, the idea of networks is critical to understanding how intermediaries function within the broader policymaking dynamics.ACF posits that issue networks are ephemeral, since they organize into loose coalitions based on specific issues and beliefs then rising in policy streams.While their members find common cause on a given question of some importance at a specific moment, they might disagree on secondary aspects, or even find themselves in opposition to each other on other issues (Sabatier & Jenkins-Smith, 1999).And these members act largely within issue-specific coalitions that form to include multiple functions, including research production, funding, and advocacy.Intermediaries are a critical element in a larger process of knowledge mobilization, but depend on and work with other allied entities in order to transfer knowledge to targeted users.While an IO may select research to highlight, or organize dissemination efforts, these groups will typically partner with other entities in order to better perform those tasks.For instance, an IO might work with certain research organizations by commissioning research likely to be favorable to the broader coalition's agenda, or it may cooperate with specific bloggers who have the reach and dispositions that will help advance the message on an issue.Thus, IOs are not necessarily discreet organizations operating on their own, but instead serve their function by working within larger, issue-based coalitions of researchers, funders, activists, new and old media, lobbyists, policymakers, and others (DeBray, Scott, & Lubienski, 2013).
Researchers are only beginning to develop a more complete understanding of how intermediaries operate in education policy processes, but a few key findings stand out.First of all, we are seeing a remarkable ideological diversity of these IOs.Just as the ideological range of the more established think tank sector has broadened over the last decade or so, so too has the diversity of the emerging IO sector (DeBray-Pelot & McGuinn, 2009).Many IOs are reflecting positions that would have been seen as extreme in previous periods, and are acting in concert with more respected and established partners in advocacy coalitions (DeBray et al., 2014).Another finding worth noting is that IOs have been a leading force in capitalizing on new media forms to disseminate research evidence.Even as IOs have so far been rather limited in how they employ online strategies, policymakers report drawing on blogs and other online forums as a primary source of information on research, and IOs have proven to be particularly adept at using such media to deliver their message (Cooper, 2014;Malin & Lubienski, 2015).Finally, it must be noted that one of the main sources fueling IOs active around education in the US is the philanthropic sector of foundations at the national and local levels (Reckhow, 2013;Scott, 2009).Indeed, it is through these funding streams that the outlines of the coalitions in which IOs operate are most apparent, as they partner with like-minded entities that focus on research production, funding, etc.
Just as research on the role of intermediaries in US education policymaking is relatively new, the study of these entities on the global stage is also very much in its infancy.We know that organizations across this increasingly connected world are sharing ideas and strategies, especially as they promote what Pasi Sahlberg (2012) has called the "Global Education Reform Movement," where education reforms in relatively different nations are embracing the same basic tenets.In fact, such patterns reflect a tradition of policy-borrowing that has been noted by scholars in the past, just as the adoption of such policies are often justified by "research borrowing," where evidence on the success of a given set of policies in one context is used to support (or oppose) their transference to another context (Fowler, 1994;Ginsburg, Cooper, Raghu, & Zegarra, 1990;Halpin & Troyna, 1995;Miner, 1997;Ochs, 2006).Yet little is known about the specific mechanisms of such policy transference, particularly between intermediaries.Recent work that has focused on policy mobilities in general has tended toward the theoretical (McCann & Ward, 2013;Peck & Theodore, 2012), and the groundbreaking work by Stephen Ball (2007Ball ( , 2012) ) along with his colleagues (Ball & Junemann, 2012) begins to map out these cross-national policy networks.However, we have little collective understanding at this point as to how intermediaries operate cross-nationally in advocacy coalitions to select and disseminate knowledge.In particular, we have virtually no research on how intermediaries interact with their counterparts in what we might call IONs to advance particular education policy agendas.
TFA is one such IO which brokers evidence and functions within a vast policymaking network toward the fulfillment of four key aims: solve a problem (of educational achievement for kids in poverty), enlist committed individuals, invest in leaders, and fuel long-term impact (Teach For America, n.d.-d).At the center of its IO network, TFA marshals evidence and policy alongside supportive IOs that include well endowed "venture philanthropists" (see Saltman, 2010;Scott, 2009); local, state, and federal policymakers; charter authorizers; and a range of school choice advocacy outfits.Given that TFAll is mimicking TFA's intermediary functions, namely, seeking to produce cadres of alternatively certified teachers, and given TFA's significant impact upon U.S. education reform and policymaking, the examination of the TFA-TFAll case contributes to a more complete understanding of how IONs' participation in global education policy processes.

Roots and Recruits
TFA founder Wendy Kopp launched the idea for a national teacher corps in her 1989 Bachelor of Arts thesis when she was a student in Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.Upon graduation, Kopp began to turn her teaching organization into a reality and received initial financial and legal backing from Union Carbide and Mobile (Kopp, 2001).Since 1990, TFA has trained over 33,000 alternatively certified teachers at nine training institutes and placed them in schools across its 50 TFA-specific U.S. regions.TFA recruits individuals who seek to enter the classroom (temporarily or permanently) -though, the majority of TFA corps members stay only for their two-year commitments in historically underperforming schools -usually in urban settings (Donaldson & Johnson, 2011).Increasingly, TFA is growing in rural settings as a result of fewer teacher shortages in urban settings (Kretchmar, Sondel, & Ferrare, 2014).
TFA "corps members" (i.e.individuals accepted into the organization to teach students) are recent college graduates who embody the organization's assumptions about necessary characteristics needed for successful teaching such as rigorous academic record, high Grade Point Average, and manifested leadership experiences.Following numerous rounds of interviews and a 5-minute mock sample lesson, recruits attend a 5-week summer Institute where they are exposed to TFA's pedagogical framework and participate in limited student teaching.In all, corps members accumulate 125 hours of pedagogical training and 18 hours of student teaching (Brewer, 2014).

Impact on Student Achievement
TFA's effects on student achievement are varied and controversial.The Center for Research on Education Outcomes's (CREDO) 2001 evaluation of TFA Houston found corps' impact as positive, though not statistically significant, and TFA quality as less varied than their non-TFA teacher counterparts (Raymond, Fletcher, & Luque, 2001).Separate studies of similar TFA Houston data found uncertified teachers, including uncertified TFA recruits, were less effective than certified teachers; and certified TFA recruits often left the profession after two to three years, a phenomenon closely related to preservice preparation (Darling-Hammond, Holtzman, Gatlin, & Heilig, 2005;Donaldson & Johnson, 2011).In a study of 109 pairs of Arizona teachers that similarly examined relationships between teacher certification and student academic achievement, Laczko-Kerr and Berliner (2002) found student achievement among TFA recruits and other under-certified teachers was not statistically different, and certified teachers' students performed better than those of un/under-certified teachers.A more comprehensive, national evaluation of TFA noted the following with regard to teacher preparation and student outcomes: a) TFA teachers had stronger academic backgrounds than all and/or novice control group teachers; b) TFA teachers had poorer educationspecific training than all control group teachers; c) only three percent of TFA teachers held a teaching degree when they began teaching; d) TFA teachers, all control group, and novice control group teachers had varying, and often low, levels of student teaching experience; e) students of TFA teachers performed better in math, but not in reading, than students of control group teachers; f) and finally, there was no statistical significance between TFA teachers and control group teachers on student behavior, retention, or absenteeism (Decker, Mayer, & Glazerman, 2004).More recently, Mathematica researchers conducted a similar evaluation of TFA and concluded that students of TFA corps experienced 2.6 additional months of learning in secondary math (Clark et al., 2013).This assertion is grounded in the exceedingly problematic approach of converting scores on standardized tests into days/months of time -a metric not measured by tests (see, for example, Rubinstein, 2013;Vasquez Heilig, 2014).Additionally, the Mathematica estimation of 2.6 months of additional learning was derived from a statistic that accounts for just 0.015% of the variation between student scores in math (Vasquez Heilig, & Jez, 2014).Moreover, even if the increase in learning is accurate, two glaring issues must be considered with the Mathematica study: (1) the conclusions are not generalizable to all of TFA because the sample is not representative and most TFA corps do not teach high school math; and (2) given the immense focus on testing that is synonymous with TFA's pedagogical approach, any test score gains could likely be illusory and temporary, providing little to no lasting benefit for students.
As is common with evaluations of controversial education reform policy, the abovementioned studies' findings and implications vary in criticism and support of TFA.Nevertheless, TFA stands behind the limited and problematic evidence which finds positive effects of its approach, posting these findings on their website under "research."Moreover, TFA continues the neoliberal practice of elevating achievement data as the standard by which student learning is to be measured.This elevation of test data aligns with notions of meritocracy and the credentialing of students for the purpose of individualistic economic competition (Labaree, 1988(Labaree, , 1997)).And while achievement data is an important consideration, reliance on this single factor alone in casting judgment on student outputs -and those teachers who lead students there (TFA or not) -is exceedingly problematic given the limitations of achievement data.A recent examination of TFA's "research page" revealed that of those twelve studies highlighted by TFA as evidence of the organization's positive impact on student academic outputs, four were classified as irrelevant given there was no bearing on performance, seven were classified as problematic/mixed given that the results were not conclusive, and one was classified as positive yet potentially misleading (Kovacs & Slate-Young, 2013).Taken alone, the data on the effects of TFA teachers on student achievement are reason for pause: until they become fully certified, TFA recruits are neither teaching students any better than their certified counterparts nor are improving larger school climate and improvement issues (e.g.absenteeism, discipline).Moreover, while the reasons are likely obvious, TFA does not generally include information on critical research where the conclusions strongly contradict TFA's rhetoric and marketing (see, for example, Crawford-Garrett, 2013;Darling-Hammond, Holtzman, Gatlin, & Vasquez, 2005;Jacobsen & Linkow, 2014;Kovacs & Slate-Young, 2013;Kretchmar et al., 2014;Vasquez Heilig & Jez, 2014;Veltri, 2008).Yet, the organization does dedicate a portion of its site to responding to some reports and research that are critical of the organization in an attempt to undermine the conclusions as "misguided" (Chovnik, in press).

Impact On Policymaking
Through its ION, TFA has achieved a significant impact on U.S. education policymaking.TFA's influence is readily visible on pushing for an extension to a loophole that classifies teachers that are "in-training" as highly qualified -a designation required under NCLB or subsequent notification to the parents of students.Accordingly, the Bill that ended the 2013 U.S. government shutdown included an amendment introduced by TFA-supportive Senator Tom Harkin (Stanford, 2013;Strauss, 2013) that extended the loophole, set to expire in 2014, through 2016.Additionally, new insight is being gleaned on the impact that TFA alumni have on the policymaking process as they are ferried into elected policymaking positions by way of TFA's 501(c)4 spin-off organization Leadership for Educational Equity (LEE).The political campaigns of TFA alumni are managed by LEE in an effort to increase TFA's footing in the policymaking process by installing alumni into policy decision positions (Cersonsky, 2012;Simon, 2013).Moreover, recent research suggests that TFA alumni who enter into elected policymaking positions largely support pro-reform policies more than non-TFA alumni officials (Jacobsen & Linkow, 2014).

Constructing TFAll And A Global Education Reform ION
TFA's roots and impact on policymaking bear closely upon the construction of TFAll and a global network of intermediary organizations for education reform.TFAll CEO Wendy Kopp and TFAll Board Members, who were involved with the inception and expansion of TFA, have borrowed TFA ideology and approach to intermediary functions in order to scale TFAll internationally.As the central IO that oversees Local Social Enterprises (i.e., individual countries) and local partner IOs, TFAll creates unity within its global network of organizations around a common problem of educational inequality and the need for teacher and leader transformation.Similar to TFA, TFAll ensures that its national affiliates thrive through robust funding with publicprivate partnerships.The TFAll global education reform ION started with the U.K.'s Teach First and now includes 34 "Local Social Enterprises" and counting.

TFA's First Clone and The First Global ION Member: Teach First
Understanding the construction of TFAll in a material and representative sense underscores the magnitude and complexities of TFA's global education reform agenda.TFAll has benefitted from generational privilege -the organization's philosophy, leadership, funding, and goals were birthed by TFA and then taken up by Teach First.Teach First's mission to "end inequality in education by building a community of exceptional leaders who create change within classrooms, schools, and across society" (Teach First, n.d.) mirrors that of TFA."The first adaptation of Teach For America's model in the U.K." (Teach For America, 2011, p. 14), Teach First was founded in 2002 by ex-McKinsey & Company consultant Brett Wigdortz.Fourteen universities trained Teach First's 1575 "ambassadors" (i.e.individuals accepted into the organization to teach students) who work in 87 schools across 8 regions in the U.K. Its high volume of private, voluntary donations also mimics TFA's business development model (Kretchmar et al., 2014).In 2011, 22 percent of Teach First's funding derived from voluntary contributions, the highest contributions of which came from consulting firms and banks such as Accenture, McKinsey & Company, Deloitte Consulting, Canary Wharf Group, Goldman Sachs, HSBC, and UBS. Figure 1 (Ball & Junemann, 2012) depicts the network of IOs within which Teach First operates.As is the case with TFA in the U.S., Teach First is at the hub of this U.K. network, which includes postsecondary teacher training institutions, federal and local departments of education, advocacy organizations, and a range of financial institutions.

Making TFAll And Expanding The Global ION: Common Problem, Teacher Transformation, Implementation in Growing Economies, And Robust Funding
In 2007, Teach First and TFA leadership joined forces and founded TFAll, which operates "social enterprises" in 34 countries and counting (Teach For All, n.d.-e).Based on "the same theory of change that Teach For America pioneered -and with the same sense of urgency and entrepreneurial spirit that characterizes (TFA's) work in the U.S." (Teach For America, 2011, p. 14), TFAll seeks to "expand educational opportunity around the world by increasing and accelerating the impact of social enterprises that are cultivating the leadership necessary for change" (Teach For All, n.d.-j).And it is on these grounds that TFAll operates as a mechanism by which global neoliberalism takes root.As Michael Peters puts it, "in the realm of education policy, especially in OECD countries but also in developing countries, at every opportunity the market has been substituted for the state: students are now 'customers' or 'clients' and teachers are 'providers'" (2011, p. 157).In terms of Peters's assertion, TFAll represents the global manifestation of TFA in its quest to redefine the recruitment, funding, and training of teacher 'providers' while instilling pedagogical assumptions and methods that reinforce individualistic notions of competitive schooling by way of test scores and grades (Brewer & Cody, 2014.)Each "local social enterprise," operates independently in partnership with public and private sectors in the host country and region (Teach For All, n.d.-f).
CEOs of social enterprises commit to recruitment and selection, training and development, teacher placement for two years, accelerating the leadership of alumni, and driving measurable impact.
After leading TFA in the U.S. for 24 years, Wendy Kopp is now the TFAll CEO (Teach For All, n.d.-d) -though, Kopp presently also serves as Chair of the Board of TFA.To prepare for her new leadership post, Kopp traveled extensively leading up to the founding and early years of TFAll, and she met with "entrepreneurs eager to start branches of the group, and with young people ready to try out classroom teaching" (Dillon, 2011).TFAll's Board of Directors is steeped with expertise from finance, consulting, and venture philanthropy (Table 1).Similar to the leadership (i.e.management team and Board) of TFA and Teach First, the keepers of TFAll hold a great deal of expertise in areas other than education policy such as automotive, investment banking, and management consulting.Exceptions to the business-savvy board include Andreas Schleicher and Rufus Black.A University of Heidelberg Honorary Professor, Schleicher was previously the Director for Analysis at the International Association for Educational Achievement (IEA) and is currently Special Advisor on Education Policy to the Secretary-General at the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in Paris.With a background in ethics, theology, and law, Rufus Black is the Master of Ormond College at the University of Melbourne as well as the Deputy Chancellor of Victoria University.One voice, one shared problem.TFA's and Teach First's histories, agendas, values, and impacts are used to legitimize and substantiate the TFAll model.Intertextuality is thus uni-dialogical: the TFA and Teach First voices merge through Teach For All. TFAll reserves a special place for "supporters'" voices with a short summary and links to their respective websites.Social enterprise CEOs', Leadership, and Board members' voices also appear, together and in brief, in explaining the Partnership Structure.The authority voice, TFAll, is thus textured as an outcome, a product, a branch of its successors' voices, Teach First and TFA.To make clear the notion that "we all have other kids' educational inequality in common," TFAll does a great deal of indirect reporting.Summaries of poor academic achievement data are used to justify a "Global Challenge": "The social enterprises that comprise Teach For All are working to address the educational needs facing children growing up today, while building larger movements to promote the fundamental, systemic changes necessary to ensure educational opportunity over the long term" (Teach For All, n.d.-b).TFAll summarizes, echoes, and links TFA and TFAll websites and achievement studies in order to justify "Fundamental Change" and "Student Outcomes." TFAll uses language of solidarity and community to decontextualize cultural differences and normalize issues of inequality.In a video that features several CEOS of TFAll "social enterprises," the Teach Brazil CEO explains that TFAll values local problems and solutions; yet immediately thereafter, the Teach Chile CEO explains that the purpose of the TFAll network is to accelerate each other's impact.Also, the Teach Estonia CEO suggests that issues of inequality are local only in a geographic and political sense and that the "issues struggled with are all the same…this is comforting to know you're not alone" (Teach For All, n.d.-g).Throughout the TFAll website one can observe instances wherein the organization honors difference and the "localness" of its "social enterprises," yet all the while a focus on educational equality is achieved through normalization of difference and language of unification.
Transform inequality by transforming teachers.This TFA-TFAll neoliberal education reform philosophy of "we all have educational inequity in common" is hyper focused on teacher quality reform as a vehicle to ameliorate systems of inequality.Four key ideological assumptions underscore this mission: 1) traditional teacher preparation does not work; 2) teacher education students are less academically inclined; 3) subject-matter knowledge and general intelligence constitute sufficient preparation; and 4) and school district-led preparation and ongoing development of teachers is a sustainable phenomenon (Darling-Hammond, 1996).TFA corps in the U.S. are told that their efforts alone dictate student outcomes and lead to systemic impact upon domestic and international poverty and economy (Brewer, 2014).Drawing a generalized, evidencefree, casual relationship between social welfare improvements and education, TFAll suggests that, "as educational outcomes improve…poverty rates go down…, healthcare advances…, human rights conditions get better…, and economies grow stronger" (Teach For All, n.d.-g).This ideology starkly contrasts the research showing that student socioeconomic factors carry more weight in shaping educational outcomes than teacher quality (Berliner, 2014;Lubienski & Lubienski, 2014).In the TFA-TFAll ideology, little attention is paid to the longstanding empirical base of literature that documents the ways in which systemic sociopolitical, achievement, and attainment issues in P-20 education are reflective of issues of class, race, language, and ethnicity.
"We" Feel Better When We Serve.Complementing principles that teachers are responsible for the globe's common issue of educational inequality, TFAll suggests that this moral imperative bears positively upon one's soul.TFAll proposes that prospective teachers can transform "a child's life, your (i.e.their own) life, and society" (Teach For All, n.d.-g).In the TFAll "Global Recruitment" video, teachers comment on feeling "happier" and "better" from their two-year teaching stints.A Teach First Deutschland 2009 Corps Member commented, "I earned a lot of money in the pharmaceutical industry, but I was really, really bored.And I saw no sense in what I was doing.I went for two years to Germany to help young students on their future and reach their goals, and it made me happy."Similarly, a Teach For India 2009 Corps Member commented, "I just had one thing in mind -that I'll get a classroom to teach, it will be in a slum, and I'll learn a lot over there.And in the two years of the time, I learned more than what I've given to my kids."Similar to TFA recruits who come from top-tier universities in the U.S. and remain in classrooms for, on average, two to three years, TFAll teachers suggest the "two-year opportunity" is a way to "give back" and "serve the people who need it most," which in turn helps one learn about oneself.
Implement in growing economies.The shared mission among TFA and TFAll to rescue underserved students and reform teachers' preparation and identities guides TFAll's targeted implementation approach (Table 2).TFAll began its operations in Latin America (e.g.Chile) Eastern Europe (i.e.Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia) and since they have spread mostly in Europe and Asia.TFAll reviews applications from social entrepreneurs and selects these entrepreneurs as CEOs of "Local social enterprises".TFAll's 34 and growing enterprises operate in quite diverse contexts.There are enterprises in developing (e.g., Malaysia, Mexico, Colombia), developed (e.g., Germany, Spain, New Zealand), and growing economies (e.g.China).Unemployment and population varies widely among TFAll's Local Social Enterprises.TFAll serves the most (e.g., India, China) and far less populated countries (e.g.Estonia, Qatar) in the world.Yet population seems to bear little importance on impact.For example, while both Israel's and Bulgaria's populations hover under eight million people, Teach First Israel employed at least 395 corps since 2011, whereas Teach For Bulgaria has only trained 133 corps since 2011.
Despite the diversity among TFAll's Local Social Enterprises, certain socioeconomic similarities are noteworthy.First, 25 of the 30 Local Social Enterprises founded between 2007 and 2013, are located in Upper Middle Income or High Income countries (The World Bank, 2013).Secondly, the organization also seems to approve applications from social entrepreneurs who apply from economies that boast strong primary completion but dismal tertiary school enrollment rates.In 12 of the 30 Local Social Enterprises founded between 2007 and 2013, less than half of the students are enrolled in tertiary school.Lastly, 19 of TFAll's local social enterprises spend between 4.5 to 6 percent of their Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on education, despite the fact that GDP ranges drastically.Germany and China, for example, both spend about 4.5% of GDP on education even though each country's GDP differs by over three trillion USD.While many of TFAll's Local Social Enterprises are indeed economically dissimilar on the whole, certain metrics such as education funding as a percentage of GDP, employment, and primary and tertiary school enrollment seem to be important criteria in determining the eligibility and viability of a new Local Social Enterprise.
The bedrock of corporatized global education reform: High volume, private financial contributions.Important members in the TFA-TFAll global education reform ION that support TFAll and the realization of the abovementioned ideologies are high volume, private, voluntary donors.As mentioned at the outset of this essay, the Gates, Walton, and Broad Foundations give hundreds of millions of dollars in philanthropic donations to TFA.In 2011, public and private sources funded 30 percent and 70 percent, respectively, of TFA's 270 million USD in operating revenue.Noteworthy donations of greater than five million USD came from the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, the Eli & Edythe Broad Foundation, Sue and Steve Mandel, the Robertson Foundation, Arthur and Toni Rembe Rock, and the Walton Family Foundation (Teach For America, 2013).Similarly, TFAll's largest "Global Partners" (i.e. at least one million USD) include The Bezos Family Foundation, Deutsche Post DHL, Google, John Wren of the Omnicon Group, New Profit Inc., Visa, Susan and Stephen Mandel, and the Robertson Foundation.From 2011 to 2012, TFAll's gifts, grants, and contributions rose 85% from 14.5 to 26.8 million USD, and the organization earned a total of $72.5 million USD in gifts, grants, and contributions between 2006 and 2012.
There is a great deal of alignment across venture philanthropic organizations in both TFA and TFAll.Several members of the TFAll Board of Directors and Leadership Team are former McKinsey and Company employees (Teach For All, n.d.-a) -the consulting firm where Matt Kramer worked prior to joining TFA as past president and current co-CEO.Susan and Stephen Mandel, along with the Walton Family Foundation are the only two entities that have given more than $50,000,000 to TFA as "part of Broad's [Foundation's] effort to establish a $100 million endowment" (deMarrais, 2012, p. 288).Presently, the Mandel and Walton Family Foundation are listed as "$5 million+ Champion Investors" with TFA (Teach For America, n.d.-a) and as "Global Champions" for TFAll (Teach For All, n.d.-d).The Robertson and Bezos Family Foundations also donate substantial amounts to both TFA and TFAll.Additionally, The Bezos Family Foundation supports other reform organizations associated with TFA, including the charter network of Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP), Uncommon Schools, and the Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) (Bezos Family Foundation, n.d.) -all of which have a vested interest in neoliberal reforms.Accordingly, TFAll's financial coffers are bolstered by many of the same individuals and organizations that provide financial support for TFA.
TFAll has thus established itself as the hub of an ION dedicated to global education reform.Articulating a shared problem of educational inequality and a crisis in teaching and leadership, TFAll engages Local Social Enterprises around clear, common ideology.Additionally, TFAll has successfully adopted the TFA intermediary approach -to engage public and private donors to serve as both leaders and funders of its mission in order to create density, sustainability, and further reach within the international network.

Discussion and Conclusions
TFAll's approach to implementation is just one element borrowed from TFA. TFAll mimics TFA's model of establishing a shared, context-neutral view of educational inequality; maintaining a strong focus on teacher preparation and accountability; and positioning itself at the center of a network that boasts private and public funding and partnerships.It is through this theory of change that TFAll has helped to spur a massive, global ION that promotes neoliberal education reform.As an IO that acts as a hub for national-level affiliates, TFAll explicitly facilitates a neoliberal economic and political discourse through the TFA theory of change.It proposes power through a public sphere (i.e.Teach For All) that opposes the state, mediates the society and state through reasoned opinion, and gains attention and power through supervision (Habermas, 2006).Change happens in a few key ways: 1) Through the press and private sector: The TFAll sphere embraces disinvestment from the state and investment in capital over labor (Grossberg, 2005).The business model thrives on its vast and deep funding network and a short, swift retention of human capital.TFAll's foundation upon TFA's venture philanthropic funding (deMarrais, Lewis, & Wenner, 2013) stands to further the spread of neoliberal ideologies (Ball, 2012) throughout these private philanthropists, all of which have demonstrated ongoing interest in the neoliberal dismantling of public education in favor of privatized and commoditized schooling (Horn & Libby, 2011;Saltman, 2010Saltman, , 2012)).2) Through consensus politics and gold plating (Sennett, 2007).The neoliberal platform of adaptability, efficiency and innovation weaves in recontextualized facts to capitalize on social enterprises' uniqueness, positioning the uniqueness, when useful, as scary and jolting.3) Through a strong narrative that is grounded in usefulness (Sennett, 2007): CEOs and teacher recruits find a strong anchor in the TFAll narrative.The enterprise provides a sense of accomplishment, happiness, betterment, and commitment to the value of transforming their society.In the Partnerships overview, a few CEOs of TFAll enterprises and Wendy Kopp educate viewers on "the importance of educational opportunity, …expanding the Teach For All model internationally, …and being a part of the global network."The social entrepreneurs speak of sharing, "getting there together," learning from each other, and a feeling of comfort knowing that they are "facing the same issues" together (Teach For All, n.d.-g).They evoke a sense of "belonging" to that country, despite that in some cases the leaders' racial, ethnic, and linguistic identities may differ from those children whom their enterprise serves.Their collaboration and engagement with one another in a unified mission is presumed to help the social enterprises achieve greater educational opportunity.
Unfortunately, much of TFAll's theory of change misrepresents longstanding research on the relationships between socioeconomic welfare and student achievement and is underscored by an epistemological base of idealism, deficit lenses, meritocracy, and a view of communities of color as "desperate" (Ahlquist, Gorski, & Montano, 2011;Bowles & Gintis, 1976;Darling-Hammond, 2004;Glass, 2008;Rothstein, 2004;Sacks, 2007;Spring, 2011).One example of this is the Organizational Design of the Partnership Structure (Teach For All, n.d.-g).Presuming a climate of government control and traditional paradigms (in every single partnership), the framework proposes "adaptation and innovation" and "partnerships with public and private sectors" that could result in "increased accountability and scale over time," (Teach For All, n.d.-g) while neglecting the well-documented background factors that trump organizational issues in shaping student outcomes.Research has, for decades, concluded that the largest explanation for variation in student academic outcomes lies outside of the school, yet many policies seek only to reform schools -an inherently limited effort at addressing systemic social inequities.Yet, TFA reinforces the belief that reforming the teaching profession will naturally solve social inequities.Moreover, the organization's pedagogical framework insists that its corps members embrace a sense of hyper-accountability towards accomplishing such a lofty goal.Namely, this is seen in the organization's creation and use of its Academic Impact Model that asserts that teachers are the root cause for student achievement or failure.That is, student achievement is informed solely by a teacher's mindsets, skills, and beliefs (Brewer, 2014) and not the plethora of contextual out-of-school factors that actually inform student achievement (Berliner & Glass, 2014;Rothstein, 2008).This approach and philosophy to teaching has significant impacts on corps members' perspectives, motivations, and focus -which naturally impact the type of teaching students are exposed to.Providing teachers with a framework of hyper-accountability has led to corps members quitting prior to completing their two-year teaching stints, instances of manic depression, thoughts of suicide, and neglecting personal care like eating, sleep, and bathing (Brewer, 2014).
These foundational values at the base of TFA appear to be cloned or replicated in other contexts by TFAll, without the compelling evidentiary basis that reformers have claimed.We believe that this highlights the importance of individual IOs as well as their networks and connections with other intermediaries.Intermediary actors work to advance evidence favorable to their cause and to advance their cause regardless of the evidence.TFAll's notable global proliferation demonstrates how the values and dispositions of this brand of education reform can disseminate through formal or informal networks of like-minded advocates in vastly different contexts.As Teach For All's acquisition of "troubled" regions and social enterprises proliferate, critical conversations must continue to uncover the micro-and macro-level ways this important IO and its ION is a part of the greater context of global capitalism and "unmaking and remaking of schooling" (McCarthy, 2011).

Table 1
Teach For All Board Members and their Former/Current Organizational Affiliation

Table 1 .
Contd.Teach For All Board Members and their Former/Current Organizational AffiliationIndicates that this affiliation is shared by another member of the Board (Ensena Chile and Teach For Australia are Teach For All organizations)

Table 2
Teach For All Local Social Enterprises Selected World Bank IndicatorsThe number of current corps and alumni as well as the number of schools in each Local Social Enterprise were obtained from Teach For All.**As of 1 July 2013, the World Bank income classifications by GNI per capita are as follows: Low income: $1,035 or less; Lower middle income: $1,036 to $4,085; Upper middle income: $4,086 to $12,615; High income: $12,616 or more" (The World Bank, 2014).