All this talk recently of Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg donating $100 million to Newark, NJ public schools got me thinking about how great an opportunity that would’ve been for Detroit Public Schools to capitalize on had we been offered a gift like that.

So, how appropriate was it then that I came across this Nolan Finley piece today in the Detroit News discussing that very situation?  Detroit, was in fact, offered a great deal of money (two times as much as what Zuckerberg donated) back during the rule of Kwame some six years ago and it was turned down.

Who was this generous figure you ask? Apparently, a man by the name of Bob Thompson who worked as a road builder in Plymouth wanted to donate half is wealth after retirement to build 15 state-of-the-art, high-performance charter schools in the city.

Instead of grabbing the money and doing a happy dance, Detroiters, as is their custom, wailed about a suburban outsider taking away their schools and stealing their children.

Then-Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick told Thompson to just drop off the check and let Detroit Public Schools decide how to spend it. Gov. Jennifer Granholm stood in the schoolhouse door, assuring unionized teachers she wouldn’t allow Thompson’s charters to come in and take their jobs.

So, six years later, does it really matter what might have, could have, should have happened? Does it really do us any good to dwell on the shortcomings of a mindset in Detroit that seems, for the most part, to be ceding to a more positive and welcoming outlook that is staring to take hold?  Perhaps not.  But then again, it’s sometimes compelling to dwell on what might have been. 

You can read Nolan Finley’s full piece here.

Thoughts? Comments? Feel free to discuss.