Mark Zuckerberg Starts Spending His Billion-Dollar Charitable Fund

Since donating 18 million shares of the company’s stock to the Silicon Valley Community Foundation in December 2012, co-founder and chief executive of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, have been very quiet about how he intends to spread the money around. Now, the billionaire couple is focusing the attention and monetary support of their foundation fund, valued at nearly $500 million, on the hot topic of immigration reform through Fwd.us, the immigration advocacy group that he helped to start.

A Massachusetts start-up called Panorama Education plans to announce that Zuckerberg, through his foundation Startup: Education, will co-lead a $4 million round of seed funding to help the company expand its business. Panorama uses surveys of teachers, parents, students and staff to give school districts feedback about various issues and says it is currently working with more than 4,000 schools. Zuckerberg has also begun distributing some of the newer fund through other nonprofits focused on technology in education.