Mike Feinberg co-founded the Texas School Venture Fund in 2018 to give families in underserved Houston neighborhoods more choices in education, from early childhood through adulthood. He serves as president of the organization alongside his role at Career For All, the nonprofit that has incubated a range of programs under the fund’s umbrella.
Before starting TXSVF, Feinberg spent more than two decades building KIPP, the national charter school network he co-founded in 1994 after teaching bilingual fifth grade in Houston through Teach For America. KIPP grew into a network of more than 270 public schools serving students from prekindergarten through 12th grade. Feinberg also helped launch the KIPP Foundation in 2000 to support the network’s growth nationwide.
Feinberg started TXSVF with several KIPP alumni and longtime supporters after concluding that the charter school movement had focused too heavily on scaling college-prep models while overlooking other options students needed, including trade schools, early childhood programs and support for court-involved youth.
“We wish someone else would start other types of schools than the KIPP and the Nobles and the YES Preps out there,” Feinberg said. “Let’s actually start to do it.”
Under Career For All, TXSVF has helped launch Westchase Neighborhood School and Eastex-Jensen Neighborhood School, two tuition-free charter schools serving students from prekindergarten through eighth grade. The fund also backs Neighborhood Preschools, aimed at expanding access to early childhood education, and Project Remix Ventures, a program at the Harris County Juvenile Probation Department’s Opportunity Center that pairs GED instruction with vocational training for young people navigating the justice system.
One of the fund’s largest undertakings is WorkTexas, a tuition-free trade school serving adults, high school students and youth transitioning out of the justice system across Houston. Feinberg partnered with Gallery Furniture owner Jim McIngvale, a longtime KIPP donor known locally as “Mattress Mack,” to open the program’s first campus inside a converted furniture showroom.
Feinberg holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania, where he delivered the 2005 commencement address for the College of Arts and Sciences, and a master’s in education from National-Louis University. He received honorary doctorates from Yale University in 2010 and Duke University in 2015, along with the National Community Service Award from Spelman College. He is a member of the Society of Fellows at the University of Houston’s Honors College.
Feinberg’s early work in Houston, including his effort to open a school for Hurricane Katrina evacuees within 10 days in 2005, was chronicled in Washington Post reporter Jay Mathews’ book “Work Hard. Be Nice.” He has also appeared on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” and “60 Minutes.”
He lives in Houston with his wife, Colleen Dippel, and their two children, Gus and Abadit.