Peter Greene noticed that the CEO of Green Dot Charters, Marco Petruzzi, has started a new blog. This provided Greene with the opportunity to take a look at Green Dot and its leadership. First, he pulled up a three-year-old article about the munificent salaries paid to Green Dot executives. But, really, this can’t be surprising since Petruzzi was formerly a partner at Bain Consulting (Mitt Romney’s old firm), and he didn’t go into education to get a lowly teacher’s salary. After Greene read Petruzzi’s first post, he concluded that he inhabits an alternate universe from real public schools.

 

“Say hello to Marc Petruzzi, CEO of Green Dot Public Schools. Today he made his first blog entry at Green Dot’s Website of Bloggy Goodness.

If you’re unfamiliar with the Green Dot charter chain, I can tell you that it’s one more fine example of the modern charter movement, depending on student skimming, political connections, and the pushing aside of public schools, as well as demonstrating the ways in which a non-profit can be used to generate profits. Petruzzi himself came to the charter world from a partnership at Bain, and makes sure that he himself is well paid for his great-hearted work for the poor. If you want a long, hard look at Green Dot from an insider, try this piece which notes both their liberal use of TFA staffing and their spectacularly bad teacher retention issues. Read here for a discussion of their “issues” with students with special needs.

 

So the fact that he bills himself as the CEO of a “public” school lets us know right off the bat that we have entered some sort of alternate universe. I must be sure to let my superintendent know that she is missing out by not calling herself “CEO” and setting her own ginormous salary.

 

Petruzzi, contemplating his entry into blogland, decides that he will tackle some Big Questions. So let’s see how these Big Questions are answered in Petruzzi’s alternate universe….

 

Can’t we all just get along. Petruzzi thinks we should stop saying that union members only care about their jobs and reformsters only want to make a buck. It is not clear whether he is trying to argue that both those things are true.

 

Aren’t we all “reformers” to some degree? Don’t we all want to improve the system for the benefit of students? Can’t the continuing debate about methodology be one of honesty and mutual respect?

 

These are good questions. Unfortunately, in this universe it certainly appears that the answer to the second question is, “no.” When you’re using political connections to smash public schools and doing your best to turn teaching inside your own schools into a low-paying low-skills temp job, it’s hard to feel the waves of love and respect.

 

I agree that an atmosphere of mutual respect is a good thing, and there are reformsters I actually respect even as I believe they’re wrong about almost anything. But too many reformsters have displayed an attitude of zero respect for teachers from the first moment they showed up on the scene, shouldering aside teachers with accusations that public schools sucked and teachers were the problem. And Green Dot’s record of love and respect for public education and the teachers who woirk there is not great. So pardon me for being standoffish until I have reason not to be.

 

The Challenges of Reform

 

Oh, boy. In the Petruzziverse, reform “has unleashed a wave of innovations that have jolted the current system and forced it to confront some hard truths.” Um, name one. Charters were billed as laboratories of educational innovation, like a scholastic space program. But as yet, we cannot point to a single solitary development, not so much as a jar of Tang, that made the rest of the education world sit up and say, “Wow! Slice us off a piece of that.” Nothing.

 

There have also been, apparently, “talented and passionate individuals,” and I think it’s just as well he didn’t name names. Petruzzi admits that some ideas didn’t pan out (in his universe “some” and “all” are apparently synonyms). And here’s a fun quote: “Some talented individuals have failed to make the announced progress with students.” I bet back at Bain, when corporate bosses of companies they were invested in “failed to make the announced progress,” that was an occasion for laughter and parties.

 

It is a cinch that Peter Greene will not continue to patronize this alternate universe.