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The George Gund Foundation will give $2.5 million to help launch a Cleveland schools “transformation plan” and will add another $4 million over the next two years if it likes what it sees.

 The full commitment would give the struggling district a good jump on raising nearly $72 million that officials say they need for a top-to-bottom reshaping of instruction and operations. The money would pay three years’ worth of start-up expenses that include training, technology, materials and consulting.

Gund’s initial grant, its largest ever for education, is dependent on the school board approving the plan March 9. The board delayed voting this month so it could tweak a list of 18 schools to be closed or moved.

The foundation is urging the board to approve the plan, move ahead with the closings and focus on new ways to educate children.

“The very human tendency to think of the future in terms of the past is very disabling,” Gund Executive Director David Abbott said in an interview at the foundation’s downtown headquarters. “The world has changed so much.”

Schools chief Eugene Sanders is counting on the federal government, philanthropy and business to provide the bulk of the start-up funds. He hopes to amass at least $11 million for the first year.