Leading Democrats have announced the creation of a new organization called Democrats for Public Education.
It will be led by Ted Strickland, former governor of Ohio, and Donna Brazile, political consultant.
Its name is a swipe at Democrats for Education Reform, which is dominated by hedge fund managers, and which funds candidates who support charter schools, Teach for America, and any other group that is antagonistic to public education.
Last year, the California Democratic Party passed a resolution calling on DFER to cease using the name “Democrats,” since their program is a front for the Republican and corporate agenda.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
This news is terrific. Ted Strickland was a wonderful governor and a champion of public education and teachers. My heart broke when Ohio elected John Kasich. And, Donna Brazile is informed and thoughtful and lacks the blind arrogance that stands in the way of positive change.
Sign me up!
Ditto!!
But the group cannot ignore the deep issues: testing, big data, charters, teacher evaluation (and VAM) – all strongly supported by this administration.
Let’s see if they have the courage …
Also, will they advocate for policies that seriously address child poverty, soaring tuition, inequitable funding, etc.?
Great news! When “bigger guns” decide to join the fight after the partisans have been hectoring the enemy and keeping them at bay for years, it’s another sign that the tide may in fact be turning in a much larger fashion. The key thing that we all must do is to contact our Democratic representatives ASAP and urge that they join up and get informed. I doubt there are any old school conservatives remaining in the Republican party or if there are that they have the guts to lend their support to Democrats for Public Ed, but stranger things have happened. Any one of them with the guts to publicly support this should be welcomed with open arms and saluted for their courage and independence.
Joe Williams of DFER gave a response to this new group that tells you all you need to know about what scumbags DFER are. He said “Welcome to the Jungle, baby.” In one short sentence, Williams confirms that DFER is all about politics, money, and influence and NOT about what’s best for kids.
Williams’ comments are going to bite him.
That reply – welcome to the jungle- made me sad. It was confrontational, wasn’t it? So disheartening how some people just want to fight and flex their own muscles rather than find a solution to help our public schools and children.
He is in full attack mode and arrogant enough to think he is untouchable. It actually made me happy that he put up no pretense.
Another one tweeted ” bring it on”.. Yeah,, WARCRY
“Welcome to the Jungle, baby.”
Well then Let’s Bungle in the Jungle!!
This is good news. We educators need to embed ourselves in both political parties en masse. We are trying this in my state. When there are 5 educators in the room for every political event, working together, educators can control the narrative and be quite convincing to grassroots members. Plus you have wide access to engage and lobby with candidates and lawmakers. We have to come to the “party,” en masse and just keep talking.
It’s about time. Go Donna!
Let us see if this fledgling organization enlists experts who are well informed and not easily deluded, especially by phony supporters.
I hope the leaders of this effort will take the time to educate themselves and recruit staff who are even more knowlegeable. No staff should be hired, nor personalities put on TV, unless they have read and understood the the consistent themes in the writing of Diane Ravitch and many others who have addressed the problems in current “reforms.” Mercedes Schnieder’s book, A Chronicale of Echoes should be one of several desk references for all of the leaders and staff.
Looks like a few Democrats in high places have started to wake up and smell the electoral coffee. FINALLY.
BREAKING NEWS:
The AFT convention debate is totally rigged in favor of supporting Common Core.
Only pro-Common Core party liners are being allowed to speak.
Watch it live NOW:
http://www.aft.org/convention/live.cfm
The common core debate?
It’s over.
Robert Sheperd won.
Sorry, Shepherd. As he says, the standards themselves are an amatuer rush job. That is a long way from the solid product they need to be, if national standards is even a relevant issue.
Wow. I can’t wait to see someone fighting for the INSTITUTION OF education.
INSTITUTION! Not schools! Word choice makes all the difference… the ‘madmen’ know that and they work for the politicians.
An institution is at the root of a society!
“School” is Duncan/gates jargon, just as ‘teaching’ is the word he uses to replace the crucial ingredient… LEARNING! We cannot let our Secretary of Education twist the language and substitute “slogans” that sell magic elixirs… CHARTER SCHOOLS disguised as CHOICE. Orwell’s double-speak!
The art of subtle manipulation has been mastered by the madmen, and moved into the political arena.The legislature is packed with liars, beholden to the kings and barons who own EVERYTHING, and are making their global move AT THIS MOMENT IN HISTORY. They are selling us their version of THE INSTITUTION which is CRUCIAL to our democracy.
Make no mistake about this, there are real, insidious forces in motion, visible to anyone who is looking. But this nation is sleepwalking, ignorant beyond belief, and exhausted from the stress inflicted on them by unnecessary austerity. The media became the message as McLuhan predicted, and Fox news and its clones gave the pulpit to Duncan thanks to Gates/BroadWalton/Koch! We saw how PBS secretly gave the pulpit to Gates! Eli Broad and The Waltons and the Kochs pay for Rhee and clones to do the rest.
Duncan was the purveyor of THEIR Narrative. He had at his disposal, the greatest propaganda machine in history, the tv networks and the media of the country, AND he delivered a narrative about bad teachers and failing schools, and tests and technology that must replace the veteran professionals.
It is time the democrats fought for a return to an educated citizenry and our INSTITUTION OF PUBLIC EDUCATION, WHICH IS THE ROAD TO OPPORTUNITY.
good point.
But can this group be successful if there’s no gazillionbazillionaire backing it?
Yes. In politics, two things matter: money and numbers. Teachers have numbers.
I suspect the need for financing might be why this group allied with the AFT, at least to help launch them. Genuine progressive and liberal Democrats are waking up to how the “New Democrats” are privatizers who “take necessities from the many to give luxuries to a few” (MLK, 1959), not liberals who aim to preserve public services for the benefit of the many, fight social and economic injustice and support labor, so there may soon be more who will join and can lend financial support.
This means helping more folks to recognize who the political pawns of big business are in the party, as well as the wizards pulling strings behind the party: billionaire hedge funders, banksters, Gates et al. It also means demonstrating how the wealthy and their bought politicians promote practices that are inconsistent with policies supportive of middle and lower income people who are struggling to find opportunities on the president’s mythical “ladder” to success, including jobs with livable wages.
Many of those struggling workers are skilled professionals with college degrees, including 70% of the professoriate in higher education –which is now under attack by Obama and Duncan. Few of them are members of unions, but those who are belong primarily to NEA, so it might be beneficial to ally with them as well, at least initially.
Yes. Most definitely, because our side has The Truth to counter their (literally) 100 to 1 advantage in $$$$$.
But here in Washington State we ended up in a statistical tie against the truly odious charter “school” ballot initiative that was financed almost exclusively by a handful of elitist billionaires, none of whom have any children in public schools.
They outspent we opponents by a 17 to 1 margin yet barely eked out a “victory” in a year where they KNEW that their natural and most formidable opponents would be putting almost all of their time and resources into the governors race by necessity, given his Tea Party loving opponent who was neck and neck with his Democratic challenger right up to election day—and who thankfully won.
But the 17 to 1 spending advantage is actually inaccurate: the REAL spending gap was at least double that; by some estimates the pro charter forces in reality ourspent charter opponents by somewhere between 36 or 45 to 1, when you consider that every single “ed reform” group in our state, from “The League of Education Voters” to “Stand For Children”, to “Teachers United” and several more ALL ordered everyone of their ma you staff members to stop working on anything else and devote every waking minute of their time from May to November, to working for this repulsive anti education initiative.
PLUS the Seattle Chamber of Commerce poured massive amounts of money into their own “independent” pro charter effort, and almost every single media outlet in the state, led by the vicious and mendacious editorials of the Seattle Times, backed this pro charter initiative with absolute intensity.
Altogether, the REAL gap between the pro and anti charter sides was probably more like 65 or 70 to 1.
And they STILL had to wait until the very last ballots were counted for their “win” to be official; however that didn’t keep this arrogant, entitled crowd from holding a press conference—in George W. Bush “Florida 2000” style—and declaring “a clear and overwhelming mandate for school choice in Washington State” several days before the winning side was announced, while ignoring the substantive legal challenge facing it. (And which they are STILL facing!)
A year later, this same crowd had their heads hands to them when their “overwhelmingly favored” Seattle School Board candidate was crushed by public schools advocate, Sue Peters by almost 10 percentage points, despite being outspent by 9 to 1.
The point is that IF The Truth is on your side, it will almost always win, or at least force the opposition to spend obscene amounts in an effort to just bury and hide The Truth—at least until Election Day.
So yes, thus new group WILL be a formidable opponent for the anti public education, hedge fund and billionaire funded groups because even Gates Money can’t buy the truth, which is never for sale at any price!
Strickland is a fine person and works for the middle class. He was blamed for the national recession but Ohio was doing much better under his policies. Right now, Ohio lags the national rate on job growth and many Ohioans have simply left the labor market. The schools bear the brunt of the new administration’s austerity measures along with local governments. The anti-teacher movement is in full swing. One district (Reynoldsburg) is dropping raises and health care for teachers – opting for pay only based on metrics and test scores and forcing teachers on the individual health insurance market.
I think Strickland was good for public schools, too. I don’t know if establishing the 527 is political expediency or not but Strickland has some actions to back up this rhetoric and that should be a measure.
I don’t have much hope for national Democrats. You can’t have a dialogue with people who respond to every objection with “status quo!” or “look over there! unions!” or “conspiracy theory!”
It’s not a debate, nationally. Duncan announces almost weekly that any debate is over. Private parties are writing policy papers on what “governance” scheme works best with the “portfolio”. “The community has to have a role!” I think that’s wildly generous of them, don’t you?
Chiara, please run for office. 🙂
it is pure comedy and would be funny if it were not so tragic.
I have hope for neither Dems or GOP. Dems, save for a few with more populist leanings, seem like the good cop to the Republican bad cop in a bad, B rated police movie. Republicans complain about food stamps, schools, and social programs creating a burgeoning deficit, yet last week passed an unpaid for $257 billion giveaway to business. And Portman is still referring to ideas of the discredited Reinhart and Rogoff study on deficits. Yet while Republicans are anti-education, we have to contend with Dem teacher-bashers like Duncan and about anyone else from Obama’s administration. Now Reynoldsburg schools seem to take the whole insanity to a new level dropping health insurance for all teachers and proposing a bizarre, “competitive” pay plan that looks like Wall Street in the worst way.
It gives me great pleasure in knowing that the likes of Andrew Cuomo, Chris Christie and Bobby Jindal have all lost their chances for the presidency because of their abuse of teachers. Never underestimate the power of teachers (and their families, students and neighbors). No, we don’t have money but we’ve got numbers and we vote.
Don’t forget Jeb Bush!
Oh, he’s been “gone” so long I didn’t even think about him! But you’re right.
Crossing my fingers that this will wake up the Democratic Party. But like others have stated, it just can’t be icing on the same cake. We need fighters with influence.
Agree Schoolgal.
But as FDR once reportedly said, we the people need to make our natural allies—teachers, parents and progressives—aware of these vital issues and the very real danger facing our schools and then we’ll have a large enough force to turn to our elected officials and “MAKE them do it”, which they will, in both parties, once the public understands what so -called “ed reform” really is and how it threatens ALL public schools, in conservative small towns, moderate suburbs and progressive cities.
And make no mistake about it: people are beginning to understand what this is really all about; it means that your community will no longer control your own local schools despite the fact that you will still be expected to pay for those schools out of your hard earned tax dollars, as always.
I will not get excited about this or any other group that says it wants to help public education, especially when politicians are involved. I have lost all faith in or elected officials with the current administration.
Jane McPartland, you should learn about and join the Network for Public Education. No politicians. All educators and parents who want to support public schools, stop the attacks, and make schools better. Also, we endorse candidates. We don’t send money, since we have no billionaires, but our endorsement helps the voters know who is the true friend of public schools and who is a shill for corporate interests.
When the organization is formally started, just tell us where to sign up. Yes, sometimes you have to make a rift in a political party to eventually put things right. The rift may cause us to lose in the short term, but win in the long time–and I mean win morally and ethically. Think back to the 1948 Democratic Convention, when Hubert Humphrey among others forced the party to incorporate a plank supporting true Civil Rights. It caused the creation of Dixiecrats and would eventually end the Democratic hold on the solid south causing our party to lose many national elections. By the way, Mr. Obama should realize that if it were not for such Democrats, he would have never been elected president a half a century later.
This education reform movement isn’t Dem or Rep. It is big money. It is an attack against the unions. It is an attack against the middle class. Big money just gets bigger and bigger. The gap between wages is growing and it is no accident. The pendulum went too far to the left now it is going too far to the right. If every group was just fair there would be success for everyone.
You are right Bill.. really and truly there is no difference between dems and repubs nowadays with the exception of which big business interests support them! But let this be the wake up call that politicians are supposed to be “by and for the People”! Numbers of disenfranchised voters are growing.
When exactly did this pendulum you refer to go “too far to the left”? Can you specify exact what you’re talking about or do you just like the superficial “symmetry” of such false equivalences?
IF ONLY this mythical—yet dramatic, I will concede—pendulum REALLY existed, our country would be a lot more like Finland or Denmark rather than Angola or Honduras.
Please do not allow privatization-enabling, Common Core-cheerleading Randi Weingarten nor Michael Mulgrew anywhere near this new group.
Whether this is real or an election ploy for the midterms will come clear when we see if they separate themselves from the Duncan (Obama)-Gates-regimes. Being against privatization for Democrats isn’t a huge step away. Taking on testing, data, VAM evaluation, etc. is.
Joe Williams has done well with DFER. His income has grown, he has met wealthy hedge fund and other fat cats, and he has used the Democratic party for his own aggrandizement. Not bad for someone with no discernible talent re: education. Just check out DFER, its Board, its members, and you will realize what is meant by “Wolf in sheep’s clothing.”
“Last year, the California Democratic Party passed a resolution calling on DFER to cease using the name “Democrats,” since their program is a front for the Republican and corporate agenda.”
Just wondering: Can Obama still use the name “Democrat?”
On a related note, Michelle Rhee is listed as a Neo-Liberalist on her Wikipedia page.
Good news. but I hope they take a strong stand against the dual system of education that is creeping like a shadow across many cities, in which “neighborhood” charter contract operator end up allocated more money than actual neighborhood public schools, of which a hefty portion of cash goes to “executive Directors” salaries, topped off with even more money for the “executive” from their “foundation”, and not actually helping their neighborhoods one bit.
All while families are told repeatedly how LUCKY they are to be “accepted” to school, and they better tow the charter line.
About time. Interesting comment on the dfer website, “welcome to the jungle, baby” I don’t know who they think they are talking to, but education professionals are smart, tough people. At this point a fight based on the truth would serve us well. The American public is underestimated by these folks. Where the truth is known the public is not very happy with the reformers. One of my colleagues worked at a Detroit charter last year. His experience was unbelievable. Listen at http://doubleddemocrat.blogspot.com/?m=1 look under the videos tab at EAA Truth.
I hop that this group succeeds. I will happily both campaign and vote for a candidate who supports public education.
I think many people are ready to get involved now.
How do I contact this group to offer any support possible?
Marilyn, I don’t know yet. When I do, I will post information on Democrats for Public Education.
Sleepy campaign for D.C. Board of Education goes national
When Tierra Jolly thumbed through her mail on Monday, she was surprised to see campaign literature touting her bid for a seat on the D.C. State Board of Education.
Jolly, a teacher at a Bishop McNamara Catholic High School in Forestville, Maryland, didn’t recognize the mailings, which featured her photograph and images of her students. And she said she’d never heard of Education Reform Now, the group that paid for the glossy literature.
“Without my permission or knowledge, people that I didn’t know took photographs and my life story and took photographs of my students and they used them,” said Jolly, who is running in Tuesday’s special election to fill the vacant Ward 8 seat on the school board.
After researching Education Reform Now, Jolly said she was disturbed to learn the group is connected to Democrats for Education Reform, a nonprofit group created by hedge fund managers to promote charter schools, tenure reform and other policies that teachers unions have traditionally fought.
“I was not pleased,” Jolly said. “I support unions. I’m a member of a teachers union. I support individual charter schools that happen to be good public schools, but I’m not an acolyte of the privatization movement.”
Lea Crusey, deputy director of Democrats for Education Reform, did not respond to questions about how much her group is spending on behalf of Jolly’s campaign or how it learned of her candidacy. It is illegal for groups such as Education Reform Now to coordinate with candidates for public office.
“I’ll just offer this: We were intrigued by Tierra’s profile,” Crusey wrote in a e-mail. “The core of our work is cultivating leaders in our party, and we view her as someone with potentially a strong future in leadership.”
As of Friday, Education Reform Now sent two mailings to residents in Ward 8, the city’s southernmost ward, which covers a swath of Southeast Washington and is home to about 54,000 registered voters.
http://tinyurl.com/pa8a8nm
I should add that Ward 8 is the poorest ward in DC.
When I was growing up, some adults would use the word jungle to describe the areas the poor, black people lived.
Amid all the bad news we often hear, with it often seeming like everything is going in the wrong direction (especially here in LA with Deasy), this is a piece of not just good news, but really great news!
Donna Brazile is very influential in the Democratic Party. She was Al Gore’s campaign manager in 2000. She is Vice Chair of Voter Registration and Participation at the Democratic National Committee, and formerly was the interim National Chair of the Democratic National Committee as well as the former chair of the DNC’s Voting Rights Institute. She frequently appears on the Sunday talk shows.
Wouldn’t it be great if she starts speaking up about this on those Sunday talk shows, and elsewhere?
I hope they recruit Gov. Brown of California to join this movement.
I hope they get after Obama to change course and dump Duncan. Not likely for that to happen this late in the game, but they should try. (I am sure that Brazile knows Obama personally.)
One Democrat I especially hope they get after–Hillary Clinton. I think that most likely HC will be our next president, starting in just a couple of years. Although there should be a push to change the current administration’s policies (and I am so happy about the NEA’s call to “Dump Duncan”0, there is not much chance that the current administration will change its education policies, although we should try. But there needs to be a major push to work on getting a change with the new president who will take office in January 2017. As I think the next presideint will most likely be Hillary Clinton, I think anyone who can should get after her now about these issues. (Not waint until she becomes president, and has been lobbied to death by the other side.)
Diane– Are you involved with this group? I hope so. They are political people, and need to consult with education experts like yourself in order to fully understand the issues.
Thanks again for your great work!
Anyone know if Democrats for Public Education has a website or FB page so we can join in the discussion?
Not helpful for new group to announce its existence with no public communication forums available. Oops. I wanted to join.
https://www.facebook.com/demsforpubliced
Reblogged this on National Mobilization For Equity and commented:
According to this morning’s Politico, “Education rarely shows up as a top concern for voters in national polls. But it’s been a galvanizing force in recent mayoral elections in New York and Newark, and unions believe it will stir voters on the state level in a year roiling with debates about the Common Core, standardized testing and the soaring cost of college….Common talking points include college affordability, student loans and concerns about too much standardized testing.” Further, emphasis will be on state level elections