When I started WonderWork, a very good friend brought me to meet Stanley F. Druckenmiller who is a genius investor, billionaire and avid charter school advocate. Druckenmiller told me he would give WonderWork $5 million and become one of our founding donors of WonderWork if I helped his charter school project, Harlem Children’s Zone, scale up their fundraising through direct mail. I was grateful for the opportunity. I spent almost six months working with Geoff Canada and his team at Harlem Children’s Zone. This may be the most successful charter school program in the United States. Their numbers are off the charts and they show just how smart, driven and ambitious these kids are. It was inspiring.

I learned a lot about this program, the students, the teachers and the parents and we created what we thought was a pretty strong direct mail test. Our goal was to acquire donors from all over the U.S. who would support this charter school program that is smack in the middle of the 100 poorest blocks of Harlem. In these neighborhoods, kids have a better chance of becoming a drug addict or a prostitute than going to college.

But Harlem Children’s Zone turns those odds upside down. Thanks to an incredible faculty of talented, experienced teachers and a really first-rate campus and facilities, 100% of HCZ students are admitted to college. Unfortunately, we never got the chance to see how our direct mail campaign worked because it was cancelled just before it was about to be printed. I think they were nervous about trying something so different than what they were used to. Having worked in advertising for many years, it certainly wasn’t the first time a client pulled the plug on a great campaign so we took it in stride and wished them well. I felt lucky to have had the opportunity to get to know what is probably the best charter school program in America.