The George Lucas Educational Foundation is a nonprofit

publisher Publishing is the activities of making information, literature, music, software, and other content, physical or digital, available to the public for sale or free of charge. Traditionally, the term publishing refers to the creation and distribu ...

that documents and publicizes exemplary K-12 education practices and programs, especially through video. It does this primarily through the Edutopia website.

Organizational history

An organization named "The Media Tree" was founded on 4 August 1983 in

Mill Valley, California Mill Valley is a city in Marin County, California, United States, located about north of San Francisco via the Golden Gate Bridge and from Napa Valley. The population was 14,231 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Mill Valley is lo ...

John Korty John Korty (June 22, 1936 – March 9, 2022), was an American film director and animator, best known for the television film '' The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman'' and the documentary '' Who Are the DeBolts? And Where Did They Get Nineteen K ...

and others. It engaged in public relations for media content creators to the public of

Marin County Marin County ( ) is a county located in the northwestern part of the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 262,231. Its county seat and largest city is San Rafael. Marin County is ac ...

. On 4 September 1990, the organization was renamed to "The George Lucas Educational Foundation". The George Lucas Educational Foundation is widely reported to have been founded in 1991 by

George Lucas George Walton Lucas Jr. (born May 14, 1944) is an American filmmaker and philanthropist. He created the ''Star Wars'' and ''Indiana Jones'' franchises and founded Lucasfilm, LucasArts, Industrial Light & Magic and THX. He served as chairman ...

and Steve Arnold. Lucas originally planned for the foundation to develop technology for schools, but soon determined that schools were not interested or able to use this technology. The foundation was one of the first philanthropies to invest in digital learning technology. The foundation does not usually provide grants. In 2006, Lucas donated $175 million to his alma mater the

University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in ...

through the foundation. In 2010, the foundation had a $6 million annual budget and eighteen full-time staff. In 2012, the Foundation significantly increased its assets when it received the majority of the proceeds from the $4.05 billion sale of

Lucasfilm Lucasfilm Ltd. LLC is an American film and television production company founded by filmmaker George Lucas in December 10, 1971 in San Rafael, California, and later moved to San Francisco in 2005. It is best known for creating and producing th ...

The Walt Disney Company The Walt Disney Company, commonly referred to as simply Disney, is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was founded on October 16 ...

Publications

Print publications

About 1994, the Foundation began publishing a

newsletter A newsletter is a printed or electronic report containing news concerning the activities of a business or an organization that is sent to its members, customers, employees or other subscribers. Newsletters generally contain one main topic of ...

entitled ''Edutopia''. In September 2004, the foundation launched a free glossy

magazine A magazine is a periodical literature, periodical publication, print or digital, produced on a regular schedule, that contains any of a variety of subject-oriented textual and visual content (media), content forms. Magazines are generally fin ...

, also titled ''Edutopia'' with educators as the

target audience The target audience is the intended audience or readership of a publication, advertisement, or other message catered specifically to the previously intended audience. In marketing and advertising, the target audience is a particular group of cons ...

. From its inception, the print magazine had 85,000 subscribers. By 2006, it has 100,000 subscribers. The print magazine was discontinued in Spring 2010. but the website continued as an

online magazine An online magazine is a magazine published on the Internet, through bulletin board systems and other forms of public computer networks. One of the first magazines to convert from a print magazine format to an online only magazine was the comput ...

Edutopia.org

The Edutopia.org website was started in 2002. In 2009, the foundation launched an advertising campaign, leading the website to receive 300,000 readers per month in 2010, a 70% increase from 2009. Robert Pondiscio described Edutopia.org as an inspirational resource for teachers, exuding "unabashed idealism and cheerful optimism". The website features a video series titled "Schools That Work" of in-depth profiles of specific schools. Edutopia.org includes interactive features including comments,

blog A blog (a Clipping (morphology), truncation of "weblog") is an informational website consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries also known as posts. Posts are typically displayed in Reverse chronology, reverse chronologic ...

s, and internet forums.

Advocacy

The Foundation has sometimes included in its mission spreading

best practices A best practice is a method or technique that has been generally accepted as superior to alternatives because it tends to produce superior results. Best practices are used to achieve quality as an alternative to mandatory standards. Best practice ...

. However, in practice, Edutopia is a nonprofit

media company A media conglomerate, media company, media group, or media institution is a company that owns numerous companies involved in mass media enterprises, such as music, television, radio, publishing, motion pictures, video games, amusement parks, or ...

focused on satisfying and increasing its audience, not an

educational reform Education reform is the goal of changing public education. The meaning and educational methods have changed through debates over what content or experiences result in an educated individual or an educated society. Historically, the motivations for ...

advocacy organization strategizing to change educational systems. The foundation has endorsed as its core principles: "comprehensive assessment, integrated studies, project-based learning,

social and emotional learning Social organisms, including human(s), live collectively in interacting populations. This interaction is considered social whether they are aware of it or not, and whether the exchange is voluntary or not. Etymology The word "social" derives fro ...

, teacher development, and technology integration". Robert Pondiscio has been critical of Edutopia's tagline "what works in public education" given the lack of empirical support for these recommendations and uncertainty about how they were developed.

Research findings

Edutopia increases teachers engagement with educational best practices by packaging it in an appealing multisensory video format. Edutopia disseminates scientific/factual knowledge, technical knowledge, and practical wisdom, with a greater emphasis on practical wisdom, which includes judgments, values, and beliefs. Many of the tips and strategies on Edutopia have not been systematically researched.

References

External links

* {{George Lucas Organizations based in Marin County, California Non-profit organizations based in the San Francisco Bay Area Organizations established in 1991 Educational foundations based in the United States George Lucas Project-based learning 1991 establishments in California