Giving Compass' Take:

• Jordan Weissmann discusses LeBron's unusual choice to fund a public school and the consequences of this decision. 

• Should funders be involved in public education? Can this school offer a scalable model for public education? 

• Learn more about I Promise school.

The most interesting thing about I Promise is that it’s a genuine public school, not a charter or a private school. James is shaping the school’s mission, and his family foundation is committed to spending at least $2 million annually to fund it. But Akron Public Schools will run the operation and provide the bulk of its resources. As the Cleveland Plain Dealer explains:

It’s a district-owned building. The district will hire and pay the teachers and administration. Kids will ride district buses to school. And they will all eat the free breakfast and lunch the district gives all students.

I Promise will eventually cost about $8 million a year to run out of the district’s regular budget, covered mostly by shifting students, teachers and money from other schools, the district says.

This is a refreshing departure from most celebrity forays into education, which have tended torevolve around the politically contentious charter school movement.

Charter schools can often offer their students (and teachers) these sorts of resources in part because they receive a good deal of private philanthropic support your typical neighborhood school lacks. James is doing something a bit unusual by bringing them to an Akron public school.

Some education writers see this as a sign of the deeper problems in how we fund education. “That’s not how civic institutions should be run,” the Washington Post’s Valerie Strauss wrote recently. “America’s public schools should not have to depend on any wealthy individual or private entity to be sustained or improved.”

Read the full article about why it matters that LeBron James is funding a public school by Jordan Weissmann at Slate Magazine.