In response to litigation, the Louisiana Department of Education released a trove of emails that shows a department obsessed with public relations while flailing about to impose new rules nd programs.
Worst of all is the deal that John White made to share confidential student data (including names and addresses, test scores and grades and other information) to an organization jointly created by the Gates Foundation and Rupert Murdoch’s organization Wireless Generation.
The story says:
“Copies of emails released to LouisianaVoice by the Department of Education (DOE) under threat of litigation reveal an agency over which there is little or no oversight, where escalating costs of expensive programs appear to be of no concern to administrators and a department that appears to be flailing about in search of some direction. The electronic communications also unveil a cozy relationship between DOE, Rupert Murdoch and his company, News Corp., which apparently will be provided personal information on Louisiana public school students for use by a company affiliated with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. News Corp. is the parent company of Fox News Network. In 2011, News Corp. was implicated in a major phone hacking scandal in which private telephone records were compromised.”
Education in LA looks like the biggest cluster ever. A foreshadowing of gridlock to come, if the rest of America is foolish enough to follow the pied piper of reform.
Well Golly! May the legal machine crank up and start humming and may the suits start flying. Cha-ching!
Glad you have discovered Louisiana Voice. The dude who wites that blog is awesome!!
Meanwhile Louisiana State Education Superintendent John White refuses to honor Freedom of Information requests of student data from the research groups and media outlets. Research on Reforms, a New Orleans research group, and other groups have filed suit against the Louisiana Department of Education for their refusal to release basic information (attendance, tests data, suspension …etc) that has made available to researchers and the media for years.
Inability to think, follow the law and use common sense. Well, I guess that’s why they love standardized tests. NO thought required.
The sounds of bells and whistles are deafing.
~deafening
I’d flunk. I am not compliant and I hate noise. Noise pollution is REAL.
Maybe Colbert can ask Bill about this next time he has him on.
Here’s a detailed explanation of the Gates/Murdoch personal data exploitation axis discussed in the emails.
“With $100M From The Gates Foundation & Others, inBloom Wants To Transform Education By Unleashing Its Data”
“On top of that, nine states (representing over 11 million students) are currently participating in the development and pilot of its services, including Colorado, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, New York and North Carolina. Five of those states have already selected districts to be part of the pilot testing.”
This is so illegal. I’ll bet the special education parents are foaming at the mouth getting their lawsuits ready.