Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan’s charity organization is making a major change in strategy after laying off 48 people. Read the leaked emails.

• The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative conducted layoffs this week, in a major blow to its education team.
• In an email, Priscilla Chan said the changes are part of a “refreshed strategy.”
• CZI is now moving away from education policy work and a program it developed.

As part of its first-ever layoffs, Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan’s philanthropic organization is undergoing some broader changes.

The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, which was founded about eight years ago as a vehicle for Meta founder Zuckerberg and his wife Chan to grant and invest their massive wealth, laid off 48 people yesterday, according to Insider. According to a person familiar with the organization, the layoffs at CZI were similar to those at Meta, with a focus on manager-level positions and more junior level roles. The cuts, however, were entirely focused on employees in technology and grantmaking in CZI’s education department, which has been a core pillar of the organization since its inception.

According to the person familiar with the situation, the layoffs affected approximately 30% of the education team at CZI. Another person familiar with the organization stated that the magnitude of the cuts called into question how much work CZI will do in education in the future.

Indeed, CZI’s approach to educational issues is being “refreshed,” according to an email sent by Chan on Wednesday and obtained by Insider.

“Our education investment has taught us a lot over the past eight years,” Chan wrote. “I’m confident that this next chapter, which builds on our previous work and lessons learned, will be our best yet as we combine our building and funding efforts to solve a common CZI-shaped problem.”

Two leaders in CZI’s education work are leaving their positions as part of the changes. Brooke Stafford-Brizard, vice president of research to practice and director of CZI’s education grantmaking, is leaving the company at the end of the year. Meanwhile, Dakarai Aarons, CZI’s current director of education policy, is transitioning to a new position in human resources.

Sandra Liu Huang, CZI’s head of education and vice president of product, added in a separate email that CZI is “sunsetting,” or eliminating, its entire policy grants portfolio for education. According to its website, the organization has given over 100 grants focused on educational policy since 2018, but none since 2022. Huang stated that CZI’s focus will shift to achieving “key milestones” in policy work for previously granted funds.

She went on to say that the organization is “transitioning the Summit Learning Platform to support the program’s evolution and shifting to incubating point solutions.” Summit Learning is a well-known student-teacher program developed by CZI and funded through grants to Gradient Learning. However, in recent years, the program, which was initially developed by Facebook engineers, has come under fire. In 2020, the National Education Policy Center at the University of Colorado at Boulder published research that found “no solid research evidence” to support Summit Learning’s marketed claims of success and raised concerns about “massive amounts of student data” being collected.

Huang stated on Wednesday that Summit Learning’s “evolution” will include new work. “That requires a different skill set than our work supporting the Summit Learning platform, which is a more mature tool.”

CZI’s spokeswoman declined to comment.

Complete versions of Chan’s and Huang’s emails are available below:

Good day, team.

I have some important news about our team’s future. As I previously stated, we are moving forward with a stronger integration of grantmaking and technology to better address CZI-shaped problems in education. With our new strategy comes new bodies of work that necessitate reorganizing teams and prioritizing different skill sets. The Education leads and I evaluated all roles and responsibilities across teams, comparing them to our current and projected priorities. After careful consideration, I identified and decided to eliminate 48 roles across our technology and grantmaking teams in order to position the team to execute the strategy.

In terms of technology, we are transitioning the Summit Learning Platform to support the program’s evolution over the next year, as well as shifting to incubating point solutions that integrate research, practices, and content to address chronic teacher challenges and unlock student potential. This necessitates a different skill set than our work supporting the Summit Learning platform, which is a more mature tool.

In grantmaking, we are retiring the policy grants portfolio and concentrating our measures and practices and educator capacity portfolios on achieving the key milestones outlined in each active grant. As the measures and practices and educator capacity grant portfolios reach these key milestones over the next few years, we will shift our grant focus to support product development, as we did with Along.

These changes will strengthen the partnership and shared purpose between grantmaking and technology, and they are guided by what we’ve learned over the last eight years about the challenges and roadblocks that teachers and students face.

Helping Our Team

Our trust in this decision and its reasoning does little to make this news easier to hear or share. These changes affect not only our teammates, but also our friends and their families. The decision was made after many months of strategic planning and the creation of a final plan in recent weeks.

We are committed to making the transition from CZI as smooth as possible by offering a 16-week severance package that includes four months of CZI-paid health insurance, a prorated bonus payout for work completed this year, and a $10,000 stipend to use as needed. Our teammates whose roles are affected will remain on the job until Wednesday, August 23. While we will restrict access to critical systems beginning today due to the nature of our work with schools, Slack and email will remain operational until impacted teammates complete their work transitions – this Friday, August 11, for those in technology and next Friday, August 18, for those in program and operations.

In addition to the roles listed above, some of our education teammates will leave the team in the next 1-2 years as we finish the Learning Platform transition next year and shift our grants strategy over the next two years. We have contacted each person with a longer transition timeline and will work with them to support their transition as they complete their work, including assisting them in finding other roles within CZI where possible.

Finally, I’d like to use this moment of transition to discuss two distinct leadership transitions. First and foremost, Brooke Stafford-Brizard has decided to leave CZI at the end of the year to pursue other opportunities. She will continue to work as a consultant for CZI. Second, beginning Monday, September 18, Dakarai Aarons will join the People Team in a new role to increase engagement in CZI’s employee philanthropy programs and expand programming. Brooke and Dakarai have helped shape our Education strategy in profound ways for over a decade, and I will be eternally grateful for their impact on our work and team.

This is one of the most difficult times we’ve faced as an organization, and getting through it will require patience and care. Without the contributions of CZlers past and present, our team would not be where it is today, poised to enter a dynamic and innovative next chapter. Each of you has left your mark on our work with educators and students, as well as on each other as teammates and friends.

Sandra

Priscilla Chan, August 9, 2023

Dear colleagues,

I’m following up on Sandra’s note about the Education team changes. Though these changes are difficult, they will allow the Education team to move forward with focus and clarity as we transform our refreshed strategy into powerful new tools that unlock student potential and address long-standing teacher challenges.

While today’s announcement is most directly affecting our colleagues in Education, I know we are all affected regardless of where we are in the organization. On Thursday, August 24, I will host a Check-in with Sandra to allow us to connect and discuss these changes.

We’ll make it through this together. I am grateful to all of our Education teammates, past and present, whose contributions have enabled us to achieve our goals thus far and paved our way forward. Over the last eight years, our education investment has taught us a lot. I’m confident that this next chapter, which builds on our previous work and lessons learned, will be our best yet as we combine our building and funding efforts to solve a common CZI-shaped problem.

With caution,

Priscilla