Mark Zuckerberg puts on free school for needy children after turning to Trump

When Mark Zuckerberg announced the beginning of the year that Meta will change its policies For moderation to allow more « free expression », no one imagined that it included the definitive closure of the free school founded by the Founder of Facebook and his wife at Silicon Valley.

Mark Zuckerberg, for the reasons you will read later, is doing everything to win the favor of US President Trump. But this time he finished it.

Non -privileged families in eastern Palo Alto (California) learned with frustration that the standard school where they had the chance to send their children, thanks to Mark Zuckerberg, would finally close its doors in 2026.

The news came with a statement issued by the Primary School on April 21. A « very difficult » decision, the address said, according to information from the Le Monde.

The school was founded in 2016

Elementary School was founded in 2016 by the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI), the Mark Zuckerberg Charity – the second largest in the world, estimated by the Forbes that it will be worth $ 177 billion ($ 163 billion) in 207 and 20 billion euros.

Elementary School is located at East Palo Alto, a ten -minute drive from Meta, the parent company on Facebook, and has more than 400 students, from the first to sixth grade.

Of these, 61% are Latinos, 7% black and 7% of the Pacific islands. In 2015, Mark Zuckerberg himself announced the creation of this « new kind » school, which will integrate education and health with the ambition « to help children from disadvantaged communities to fully utilize their potential ».

The experiment has been successfully crowned: Since opening, all elementary school students and their families have benefited from medical and dental care, a unique privilege in the United States.

Why end it? The Zuckerbergs have not explained their decision. The East Palo Alto school and his brother school on the other side of the Gulf in San Leandro will not close before the summer of 2026.

In the press release issued, the address promises an investment of $ 50 million (44 million euros) to « secure a careful transition » for families. Students will benefit from educational savings programs that will allow them to finance their higher education.

‘They should be ashamed’

At the local level, the announcement of the elementary school’s closure was considered a betrayal. There is a special cruelty in creating hope in a community, creating deep relationships with students and parents, and then suddenly taking them all, « reacted former mayor Antonio Lopez.

« Honestly, Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan should be ashamed of themselves, » he also said.

The couple is not just closing school. Stops other actions like some that have to do with diversity

Isabel Vargas, the mother of a student, recalled that many families had already been displaced due to raising housing prices when Facebook built its headquarters. « Now they will get us too! It’s unfair, « he told San Francisco Standard.

Elementary School is just one of the victims of the radical reorganization of Zuckerberg’s charity priorities.

And they don’t just close the school

Since February, the CZI has stopped funding a constellation of associations that dealt with – in one way or another – with social justice and promoting diversity, the concept that US President Donald Trump intends to eliminate the public sphere, whether it is educational, either.

Twelve associations that help the homeless and promote social housing in California have recently been warned that their grants would not be renewed. This, despite the fact that in April 2024, on the fifth anniversary of their initiative, Priscilla Chan explained how important access to housing is to « promote racial equality and economic integration ».

Awaiting a critical decision

CZI, which is one of Bay Area’s top charities with more than $ 6.3 billion in 2023, explained that it is focusing on biomedical research again. An area that is less subject to the hostile moods of the world of Maga (« Make America Great Again ») of the slogans of Donald Trump’s supporters.

Meta Managing Director Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan in the Statue Hall of the US Capitol before lunch on the day of swearing -in of the second president of US President Donald Trump in Washington

Now, a staunch supporter of Donald Trump, whose swearing -in has helped fund $ 1 billion, Facebook’s founder is awaiting a critical decision for his empire: the outcome of the case by the Federal Committee on the Federal Committee of competition.

In early April, with less than two weeks left for the start of the trial, he was still trying to negotiate the fine at the White House. « Everyone knows that Mark Zuckerberg needs something from the president of the United States, » commented Juan Ernandez, chief executive of Creser Capital Fund, a non -profit organization providing loans to Latin American businessmen and on April 15.

‘If that was your child’

But while it is not surprising that Jacques is flirting with the White House, as well as many of his colleagues in the technological industry, Priscilla Chan’s wife’s attitude is alarming for many mothers of Palo Alto students.

On Facebook, one of them, Michelle Lopez, addressed the pediatrician directly: « If that was your child and finally found a place where he felt safe, how would you feel about seeing him being deprived of it? »

Born in Massachusetts to Chinese parents who fled to Vietnam, Priscilla Chan was the first to her family to go to university. In Harvard he studied biology. For a long time, the « human » face of Zuckerberg, the Buddhist doctor who continued her work with the most vulnerable at San Francisco General Hospital, was considered the « human » face of Zuckerberg.

At Silicon Valley, compassion has given Realpolitik.