The charter school industry plans a half-million dollar TV campaign this week in New York City, capped by a big rally later in the week. By closing their schools, they can turn out tens of thousands of children and parents, especially if their charter school directs them to show for the rally and provides buses to transport them.
What if the public schools held a rally for the 1.1 million children they enroll? What if their parents or guardians showed up too?
Then the politicians could compare a rally with 60,000 children and a rally with 1.1 million children?
Too bad the public schools can’t or won’t order their students to attend a rally. The charters school leaders do and will, thus magnifying their numbers and inflating their importance.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“We’re public schools! But, we can shut down at any time and coerce our students to attend political rallies!”
Would it even be legal for a public school to do the same thing?
Unlikely, even though the event could be justified as educationally important. Not likely because the legal liabilities are too many, in addition to parents not wanting their children to be enlisted in the scheme. The charter operators are actually putting themselves at risk if they are the agents of record in getting the kids to be there.
Isn’t this where ed reformers deliver a stern, patronizing lecture on how “politics” has no place in education and this isn’t competitive but is instead collaborative?
Oh, yeah, that only applies when public school advocates make demands for finite resources. That’s outrageous and divisive and “playing politics”. How dare they.
Chiara: what you said.
😎
“with 1.1 million children?”
The public school kids could hire an advocate who would represent their interests. They probably thought they had one or two in government already but that may have been a bad assumption, turns out.
How is this legal? Since these crooks will only stop when they are legally forced to do so, where’s the mandate from the top down? I understand the legislature of New York State is corrupted, and the Mayor of New York City seems unable to contain the mess that their school privatization crowd is making of their schools – but this looks like a slaughter of true public schools to me, and by whom? Crass power grabbing ex-city council people? How did this happen to New York, one of the greatest cities in the world?
Oh, how the mighty have fallen.
I would also like to know how it is legal for them to close schools and pay for buses to bring parents and students to a rally.
Does this count as a mandated day of schooling? You’d think they’d be doing test prep.
This is called: RIP OFFs and CONs at work.
The public schools can indeed have their own million-plus students, teachers, and parents show up on a reg school day for an immense rally to silence Eva and to shame her Wall St backers and her Governor Cuomo. Such an action should be called by one of the public sector advocacy groups, like Class Size Matters or Action for Quality Education or CORE, who announce a grand protest march for the public sector. The teacher union leaders like Mulgrew and Weingartern of course don’t want such a thing upsetting their arrangement, but all they need to do here is do nothing; same for the PTA’s, and the principals’ assoc, just look the other way, let word spread and let it happen, and refuse to pursue penalties. The law is of course against social justice and the needs of kids and families. Such law cannot limit hearts, minds, and feet, if folks are ready to put up a fight.
Where is the morality in the wealthy encouraging the rest of us to advocate for a system in which non-privileged parents must compete for access to schools that are by design and assumption of varying quality?
http://www.arthurcamins.com/?p=255
We need to reframe the education debate based on values of democracy, equity and mutual responsibility.
http://www.arthurcamins.com/?p=290
Arthur,
Your statement that “..non-privileged parents must compete for access to schools that are by design and assumption of varying quality?” would seem to me to describe the traditional public school system, except that if a parent can not afford to live in a high quality school’s catchment area, they can not compete at all (or even be lotteried into the school)
Critique of charter schools as an individualist, non-systemic solution to systemic inequity does not imply defense of the current system. Quite the contrary. As a societal solution proposal, charter schools prioritize individual success over the well-being of the entire community. When I talk about mutual responsibility I am calling attention to a different value: The success of individuals in inextricably linked to the well-being of the larger community. It’s a “family value:” responsibility for others. To be clear, I am not challenging individuals who choose to work in or sent their children to charter schools. I am challenging the policy choice of charter schools based on values and evidence.
Charter schools don’t measure up, not just on moral grounds, but strategically. There is no evidence that market competition results in equity or quality for all.
Our policy choices are not charter schools or the status quo. I and countless others have proposed alternate solutions.
Arthur,
I am puzzled that you do not at least find the critique of charter schools as an implicate defense of the current, traditional, public system as that is the alternative for most current charter school students.
More generally I favor disconnecting street address from admission requirements because it allows a greater variety of approaches to education. My local public school district, for example, only has traditional zoned schools. The local school board is careful to ensure as much uniformity across the schools as possible so that the somewhat arbitrary catchment line decisions can be seen as relatively unimportant. The private schools in my town, on the other hand, show a wide variation in approaches. There is a large private Montessori school, a smaller progressive school and a Waldorf school. There are also some religiously affiliated schools as well. By allowing the students to pick the school you can allow the schools the freedom to be different from each other.
What is the definition of ‘high quality school’? It is defined by the people who believe they live in high quality catchment?
Concerned,
The school I had in mind was PS 321 where Dr. Ravitch’s grandchildren go to school.
Why is PS 321 a high quality school? I don’t live in NYC so that means nothing to me.
Concerned,
That is the public school Dr. Ravitch’s grandchildren attend and she has characterized it as a high quality public school. I am not sure what her evaluation is based on. It is also true that when some folks were removed from the school when the catchment area was changed, they were very upset. You can read about it here: http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20121129/park-slope/controversial-rezoning-for-park-slopes-ps-321-approved
Here’s “rock star” ed reformer Chris Christie deploring political advocacy in public schools:
“Scaring students in the classroom, scaring parents with the notes home in the bookbags, and the mandatory ‘Project Democracy Homework’ asking your parents about what they’re going to do in the school board election, and reporting back to your teachers union representatives, using the students like drug mules to carry information back to the classroom, is reprehensible.”
Steve Wollmer, a spokesman for the NJEA, said a third-grade teacher in Monroe distributed the homework as part of a civics lesson on voter participation, and it had nothing to do with how parents would vote.”
What a bunch of phonies.
http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2010/04/gov_chris_christie_accuses_nj.html
The power of advertising may be far worse than letting 60,000 students in colorful t-shirts loose in Foley Square.. The persistent message about the terrible public schools, creating fear of complete failure if parent doesn’t act now, right now. Sadly negative ads work far too well and leave a perceived, lingering bad taste.
This is nauseating and disgusting. Shame on them.
Exactly the same thing is happening in Philadelphia with a four week media blitz promoting charters.
Families for Excellent Schools has organized a chapter in Bridgeport, CT. They just spent 30 days organizing a citywide petition drive. Neither the petition, fliers or their t-shirts identified themselves as a pro-charter school advocacy organization. I started video recoding them in front of our true public schools, Walgreens, etc. Please visit Youtube and type in ” Families for Excellent Schools Telling Lies.” The complete lies their canvassers told people was just absolutely deplorable and unethical.
They rapped up their month long event with a rally and event at the Bridgeport Board of Education meeting last week and claimed to have turned in 16,000 signatures from Bridgeport residents. The operations manager and two FES organizers that reside in NY attended. There was a nicely dressed man from Boston there. A teacher asked him why he was in attendance and he answered by stating he wasn’t really sure, however he was told to drive to the meeting from Boston. FES claims to have 1,900 members in Bridgeport. Once you subtracted all the paid staff from FES, charter school staff and pro-charter school staff and the young children, there were less than 25 adults. So much for their grass roots support and 1,900 members. It was a complete bust!
We had professional signs made that said ” Families for Ex$ellent Shysters.”
The chairman, vice-chair and treasurer are all Wall Street executives closely tied to charter school organizations. One is actually the founder of a charter school chain. The treasurer attended a private high school in NJ whose tuition is over $30,000 annually. The chairman listed his residential address as one located on Central Park West in NYC. I visited the NYC tax assessor’s website and his residence was assessed at $22,600,500. When all three of these Wall Street millionaires put their children or grandchildren in a charter school, then we can talk. Until then, shut the hell up.
Maria,
Surly you don’t think that people should only advocate for the kind of school they sent their children to attend, do you?
Most people recognize that advocating for one kind of schooling for everyone else’s kids while sending your own to an entirely different kind of school is called hypocrisy.
Dienne,
You and Dr. Ravitch advocate in favor of public schools yet sent children to private schools, Joe Nathan and I advocate for charter schools yet sent children to traditional zoned public schools (full disclosure my middle son did take one virtual class from K-12 and seven from the local university while at his traditional zoned high school). Are we all hypocrites?
I am a graduate of the Bridgeport Public Schools as our my five siblings. I advocate for TRUE public schools, not charter schools. The millionaires and billionaires that fund and invest in the vast majority of charter schools could care less about poor minority children in urban cities. What they care about is how to make themselves, their families, their friends and their investors even wealthier.
Families for Ex$ellent Shysters is a completely dishonest and disreputable organization. If you don’t believe me just go to Youtube and search ” Families for Excellent Schools Telling Lies.” It is black and white, not hearsay
You don’t come into a community to circulate a petition to residents, lie to them about BPS, and fail to disclose that your only mission is to support and expand charter schools.
Quite the contrarian, you are. Any shyster can start a charter school. They were never tried, they were never tested, and few succeed.
Patriciahale,
It seems to me that if you want a higher standards for those starting a charter school, that is a reasonable call for increased regulation of charter schools, not an argument for closing all charter schools.
TE,
Do you honestly believe the people Maria mentions are targeting Bridgeport for altruistic reasons?
Concerned,
I don’t know what the motivations of the folks are that Maria posts about or even what Maria’s motivations might be. I would rather concentrate on the arguments being presented than speculate and criticize motivations.
Ohio has adopted every ed reform policy and fad and gimmick that came down the pike, led by the Fordham Institute. That’s the same Fordham Institute who are quoted endlessly in national media as experts on ed reform.
This is ed reforms actual record in Ohio:
“An analysis of the latest data from student report cards by noted education expert Howard Fleeter showed the state has made little or no progress the past eight years on narrowing the learning gap between underperforming, low-wealth school districts and their wealthier counterparts. Some examples:
Test scores found 50.8 percent of disadvantaged, eighth-grade students proficient at science while 82.5 percent of nondisadvantaged students were deemed proficient. Disadvantaged is defined as a student eligible for the state’s free or reduced lunch program.
Fifth-grade math found 53.1 percent of disadvantaged students proficient, compared to 81.9 percent of nondisadvantaged students.
The racial disparity in test scores remained as disturbing as ever. For example, 36.2 percent of fifth-grade black students were proficient in science, compared to 77 percent of the white fifth-graders.”
Don’t do it, NY. If the reforms don’t work they’ll simply double down on the same reforms. They’ve been “reforming” public education here for going on 20 years, and these are the results. Everything Cuomo wants to do in NY we’ve already done in Ohio.
http://www.cleveland.com/opinion/index.ssf/2014/09/education_issues_conspicuously.html