In an earlier post, I noted that the original branch of the rapidly growing 50CAN, NYCAN, and other charter-advocacy groups stemmed from ConnCAN. I said that ConnCAN, in Connecticut, was started by hedge fund managers, who are its usual supporters wherever it launches. I also pointed out (correctly) that in the psychiatric literature, the term CAN refers to “child abuse and neglect.”
Leonie Haimson, leader of Class Size Matters in New York, sent the following correction to my post:
Leonie Haimson writes:
Actually CAN was founded not by hedgefunders but by Jonathan Sackler, heir to a Perdue Phama, makers of the controversial drug Oxycontin. Sackler is a big supporter of charter schools, especially Achievement First. As the NY Times reported, “in 2007 Purdue Pharma agreed to pay $600 million in fines and other payments to resolve the charge that the company had misled doctors and patients by claiming that the drug’s [Oxycontin’s] long-acting quality made it less likely to be abused than traditional narcotics. The company’s president, medical director and top lawyer pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of misbranding and paid more than $34 million in fines”.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/01/business/01sackler.html?_r=0
As Edushyster noted, http://edushyster.com/?p=386, “Last year alone the drug generated $2.8 billion in sales for Purdue Pharma. And with Purdue desperate to extend the patent on OxyContin, the company recently began testing the drug on children. “
She also points out, “In 2010 his daughter Madeleine released a “documentary” called “The Lottery,” chronicling four New York City kids competing to get into a New York City Charter School. The Wall Street Journal praised the film, noting hopefully that it “could change the national debate about public education.” No mention of Ms. Sackler’s antecedents–or the role of OxyContin sales in funding her film–was ever made.”
My addition to Leonie Haimson’s correction: Madeleine Sackler’s “documentary” was a paean of praise to Eva Moskowitz’s Harlem Success Academy. Viewed critically, it shows how the chain whips up a frenzy over the lottery as a way of creating market demand and branding the schools as exclusive.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Oh, so it was OxyConCAN … an easy mistake to make …
Is OxyContin more controversial because it is an addictive painkiller? Perhaps we should outlaw all painkillers that have been shown to be addictive.
I take one every time you post.
I have been following the corruption that is endemic in eduction for more than a decade.
The failed human beings who run the show here in America are liars and manipulators who have never experienced enforcement of the laws that govern society, and thus business.
We saw what lack of accountability did to our financial institution.
The institution of health has been denigrated to the point that people have to choose between food, rent and health care because those who control the reigns are corrupt.
The environment is going down, as the liars control the conversation about global climate so that the pipeline and fracking can continue unabated.
How surprising is it, that the same liars who have total control over the media, can control the conversation about public schools, and create “market demand’ for their BRAND of education.
The $$$ is winning because education is a complex issue, like medicine, and the voice of the professional is MISSING IN ACTION. Thus, Sackler CAN CON, the people and no one knows that ConnCan was started by hedge fund managers.
Forgive the pun. This is not funny. it is so sad. I wish Al Franken would write another book entitled “Lies, and the Lying Liars That Tell Them,” this time shining the spotlight on the liars who perpetrate the BIG CON, the snake oil salesmen who are spinning the truth about what really is needed to make LEARNING HAPPEN IN A SCHOOL!
Franken also wrote a book called “The Truth.” Neither deal with the mendacity of the deformers and the puppet masters who evicerated the American public schools, and have effectively ended opportunity for Americans not born with silver spoons.
Sigh!
Sackler does also fit the description of money manager. The following from SHU website. March 2013 – Education philanthropist Jonathan Sackler was the guest speaker at Sacred Heart University on the topic of “New School Creation: The Emergence of a New Public Education Model and What it Means to You.” The event was sponsored by SHU’s Isabelle Farrington College of Education.
Sackler, a Greenwich resident who is managing partner for the investment management company Kokino LLC.
Yes he still sits on Purdue Pharma Board. He is Achievement First as well.
Susan, read Mercedes Schneider’s book, ” A Chronicle of Liars.” The book you want is this one. All the players are there.
Linda, LOL
Diane,
What Mercedes wrote to you in her ‘Acknowledgement’ regarding your mentorship to her was just a beautiful testament to you. We should all be so fortunate! God bless you both.
I intend to read the book, but I have a crate in the back room filled with the lies of the principals, and the superintendent, and the a journal and log of what “my’ union did for me, my husband, in desparation appealed to Randi Weingarten herself, because the principal– the woman with the ph’d, who took my work around the country for the standards research, who was the staff developer at my school before she became director of curricula (and before she was demoted to principal of our tiny magnet school, was saying that I threatened to kill her.
So, forgive me if I know the liars are lawless because DUE PROCESS IS DEAD in NYC, and I know why.
Several years back when I first became aware of this crap I contacted Sackler’s office and his secretary was quite informative. There was a 501c4 named ConnAD that, along with ConnCAN, was listed as being run out of his office at Pardu Pharma. At the time another organization named Connecticut Alliance for Great Schools was also listed as being headquartered at Sackler’s address. The Secretary and Director of ConnAd was Alexander Troy, formerly of Smith Barney, hedge fund powerhouse Perry Partners, who started his own company, Troy Capital, in 2003, located at Stamford Forum, the purported headquarters of ConnAD. Director Robert Furek was a former President and CEO of Hublein and served as Chair of the Board of Trustees of the Hartford school system for several years when Governor Rowland took control of the system in 1997 (Furek did get their financial house in order, but student achievement was still abysmal when he departed). So, yes – there is a deep connection to the corrupt financial industry at ConnCAN.
The former head of ConnCAN, Alex Johnston, a member of the New Haven Board of Education and another reform policy pusher with no experience in education, was also involved in the illegal attempt to hijack the Bridgeport Board of Ed a handful of years back. When he was head of ConnCAN, he used a ficticious human charcter for propoganda purposes named Ed. Ironically, he was a white guy who looked like Waldo of Where’s Waldo fame (and a bit like Johnston). I found this rather amusing as the purported idea was to improve educational opportunities for students of color.