ATLANTA—Georgia State University’s National Institute for Student Success (NISS) is among eight organizations worldwide that will receive long-term support from the newly formed Greater Share Education Fund, a first-of-its-kind philanthropic investment model.
The investment stands to be one of the largest in Georgia State University’s history and will support the NISS’ work to develop and disseminate the next generation of data-driven interventions designed to help college students graduate.
“Education has never been more of a priority and Greater Share provides a unique opportunity for investors to impact the lives of children across the globe,” said Paul Fletcher, chairman of the board of Greater Share. “By harnessing the expertise of the world’s top private equity funds and of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that are successfully transforming how children in marginalized communities are able to learn, we can create real and measurable change for children.”
The NISS was founded in fall 2020 at Georgia State, the national leader in eliminating achievement gaps in higher education. Widely recognized for designing and implementing scalable models for student success, over the past six years more than 500 institutions serving more than 3 million students have sent teams to Georgia State to learn more about the university’s approaches to helping students graduate.
“Over the next decade, one of our major strategic pillars emphasizes a continued commitment to student success,” said Georgia State President M. Brian Blake. “In that spirit, this incredible opportunity will positively impact the lives of thousands of students.”
“The NISS is humbled to have been selected from more than 4,000 education nonprofit organizations globally that were vetted by Greater Share,” said Timothy Renick, founding executive director of the NISS. “Just as the NISS’ work reducing equity gaps and improving outcomes for college students has been transformative, so too is Greater Share’s decade-long commitment to accelerate our work through sustained funding.”
Noting that hundreds of millions of students worldwide leave school without basic reading and math skills, and millions more are still affected by the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Greater Share said it focuses on evidence-based, student-centric models of education with the aim of reimagining and resetting antiquated systems.
“Greater Share is more than just an innovative model for funding individual organizations — it’s an ambition to build an entirely new vision for how we can deliver education globally with greater impact,” said Liesbet Steer, director of Greater Share’s Education Committee.
Through its “fund of funds” model, investors commit capital that is invested across a number of high-performing private equity funds. Investors will donate the majority of their capital gains, and the private equity firms will donate their fees and carry.
Organizations receiving Greater Share funds will also benefit from ongoing strategic, operational and legal assistance from Greater Share’s community of supporters, further building their ability to improve outcomes for children and reduce inequality by closing the education gap.
Greater Share’s private equity partners include Advent International, Bain Capital, Cinven, Hg Capital, Nautic Partners and Permira.
For more information on its education partners, visit https://www.greatershare.com/the-greater-share-portfolio.
