Over $5.5 million has been poured into races for the Los Angeles school board., according to Thomas Hines of the LA Daily News. A large portion has gone into attack ads and flat-out lies in two races that put charter supporters against supporters of public education.
“Teachers union-supported groups have spent $82,630 opposing Galatzan’s bid for re-election. A recent flier gives the two-term incumbent an “F” for failing to support students and protect tax dollars – apparently blaming her for a recession that cut revenues prompting layoffs.
“Charter school groups that support Galatzan, meanwhile, have spent $141,211 attacking her opponent, Scott Schmerelson.
“According to the mailers, the retired LAUSD principal and teacher is actually a lobbyist, responsible for trying to convince legislators they should “increase the already bloated salaries and benefits for administrators, taking money out of the classroom.”
“Schmerelson is not a lobbyist. He’s also backed by the teachers union. A political newcomer, Schmerelson said he’s shocked by all the money and lies used in a nonpartisan race for the school board.
“I just can’t believe people would say things that are absolutely not true,” Schmerelson said.
“But the most vigorous attack ads were made in efforts to influence voters in areas of Eagle Rock, Echo Park and other neighborhoods inside District 5.
“Charter school advocacy groups have spent $554,604 in an effort to oust board member Bennett Kayser and install Ref Rodriguez.
“The onslaught started before the primary, when a mailer made the unfounded claim that Kayser tried to stop Latinos from attending “schools in white neighborhoods.” While the stir caused by the mailer prompted Rodriguez to disavow the group “Parent Teacher Alliance in Support of Rodriguez, Galatzan, Vladovic, and McKenna for School Board 2015,” the negative campaigning continues.
“Recent attacks portray Kayser as being responsible for the district’s plan to buy $1.3 billion in iPads. Kayser never voted for the contract that sent money to Apple and Pearson – a deal now under federal investigation – because he owned a small amount of stock in Apple. He was also an outspoken critic of the program’s failings.
“Meanwhile, groups funded by the teachers union have spent $167,582 attacking Rodriguez. Recent mailers have largely focused on an audit of a charter campus Rodriguez co-founded, Lakeview Charter Academy.
“The audit concluded Lakeview Charter Academy, which is one of 16 schools operated by Rodriguez’s Partnership to Uplift Communities, operated in the red and had poor fiscal oversight. According to the attack ads, Rodriguez tried to hide the audit from the public.”
One major difference between the ads directed at Kayser and at Rodriguez is that the anti-Kayser ads are manifestly false, while the anti-Rodriguez ads are demonstrably true.
The Los Angeles Times reported on April 29 that one of Rodriguez’s charter schools had been audited and that the audit was being withheld from public release. Reporter Howard Blume wrote:
“Two well-placed district sources said that the release of the audit was delayed at the request of school board member Monica Garcia, a political ally of candidate Ref Rodriguez. Rodriguez works for the charter organization.”
When the media obtained a copy of the audit, it showed that the charter school had multiple financial woes: “The audit focuses on the bookkeeping of one of PUC’s 16 schools from July 2011 to June 2013. It noted numerous fiscal “deficiencies,” including poorly documented expenditures, failure to meet minimum reserves and questionable oversight by the parent organization.” The school was “insolvent for nine years.”
Rodriguez was both a co-founder of the charter chain and its treasurer, so his fiscal stewardship is a legitate issue, not a smear.
Even more embarrassing to Rodriguez was the revelation that his charter chain had awarded a multi-million dollar contract for food services to a high-ranking official at the charter offices.
“A Los Angeles-based charter group awarded food-service contracts worth millions of dollars to a company partially owned by one of the schools’ high-ranking employees, a state investigation has found.
“The probe involved Jacqueline Duvivier Castillo, who is the director of business and development for PUC Schools and a part-owner in Better 4 You Meals, a company that has provided food to the charter group for the last five years. Investigators said the charter failed to demonstrate that the contract was “awarded properly despite the apparent conflict of interest.”
As treasurer of the chain, Ref Rodriguez is accountable for monitoring its finances and compliance with the law. His failure to do so is a legitimate campaign issue. It raises questions about his judgment and competence. Will he be vigilant about oversight of the city’s large charter sector or will he take a hands-off approach? Voters need to know.
They want the candidates who will support the establishment of more charter schools, who will overlook the needed scrutiny of the existing charter schools, and who will vote the way their masters (the big donors to their candidates) tell them to. http://www.examiner.com/article/what-is-still-made-america-after-centuries-students-education-and-futures
Here is my article published yesterday in City Watch Today on this subject.
CityWatch
LOS ANGELES Sunday, May 17th 2015 10:13
Why Would Anyone Want to Replicate Stupid, Greedy, Inept, Fraudulent?
16 May 2015
Written by Ellen Lubic
VOICES-On Tuesday there will be an election for three LAUSD Board of Education members. These candidates are Kayser (photo) v. Rodriguez, Galatzan v. Schmerelson, and Vladovic v. Gutierrez.
The most highly funded race by the billionaires who wish to privatize all of America’s public schools (with the goal of making public schools Free Market Wall Street opportunities for vast profit) is that of Rodriguez. They have poured over $2,000,000 into the coffers of Refugio Rodriguez who is the multi millionaire PUC charter school chain organizer, owner, CEO, treasurer…and other titles he chose over the years.
A forced internal audit of his PUC charter chain was finally exposed only weeks ago despite his (and his ally on the Board, the notorious charter supporter, Monica Garcia, the clone of Tamar Galatzan and John Deasy) great efforts to hide it from public view until after the election. It showed repeated violations at many of his schools over a long period of time. Most were financial and some leading to his own enrichment.
Last week, the LA Progressive published the article linked below, showing his insider dirty dealings with his own Board leadership in contracting for food services from companies they actually owned, to provide all school meals. This was a very profitable, though probably illegal, enterprise for Rodriguez.
The LA Times, which endorsed Rodriguez (and Galatzan who is also a Deasy and charter supporter), has not backed down from their ill advised endorsement even though they published a similar story on his potential illegal and ostensibly fraudulent behaviors.
How come with this audit evidence and the facts on the food services contracts which are possibly indictable, Rodriguez has not resigned as a School Board candidate, after running one of the dirtiest campaigns in history? And why is he allowed to join with the Latino SouthWest Voters program to now bribe inner city Latino voters to come the polls for a payoff of $25,000?
An LASR article lauds them for getting out the vote with 2700 first time Latino student voters, who also are given the payoff motive to go to the polls. What a message for new voters, to sell their vote for cash and prizes! Of course, the ‘wink wink’ is to vote for the Latino surnamed candidate.
It would seem that the LA Times and their billionaire publisher Austin Beutner, and billionaire advisors Eli Broad and Richard Riordan, have learned nothing from the entire LAUSD/Deasy four year fiasco which cost the District over $167,000,000 in losses from the inept and possibly fraudulent dealings of former Superintendent John Deasy who is now being investigated by the FBI and the SEC, with his Apple and Pearson early emails indicating he gave them insider information on how to be the low bidders for $1.3 Billion for iPads and for Common Core Software curricula not even designed at that point of contractual assignment.
Also with Deasy’s poor judgement insisting on using the MiSiS software which he knew was flawed for many years, and at the point he insisted on using it in LAUSD, was still not viable. It failed, and it hurt students and schools immeasurably. Now LAUSD is trying to get some of the public’s money back from these rotten deals. Do not forget that this huge amount of $1.3 billion in probable sweetheart deals, was snatched from the Construction Bond Fund that LA voters and taxpayers approved to build new public schools and to repair old schools which are falling apart. Taxpayers were ‘snookered’ by these machinations of the billionaires and their puppets.
Only yesterday did the public learn that the BoE, once again in secret, was influenced to hire interim Superintendent Cortines back for another year despite his rancor with and against teachers and their unions, and despite the second sexual harassment law suit filed against him. He also recently named charter school supporter, Thelma de Melendez, as his second in charge.
At Beaudry, Cortines and the Board of Education evidently never did start a national search for a better superintendent than Deasy (who trained to be their “CEO” at the Broad Academy, and who has now been hired full time to work for Eli Broad), and they seem to have no intention of doing so in the near future. Is this more of Broad’s intrusion into the affairs of LAUSD?
Why are voters once again exposed to all this brouhaha and the buying of elections by these wildly wealthy Wall Street profiteers and non-educators who seek to bring all public services into the Free Market to expand their greed in forcing the direction of even more redistribution of American’s wealth upward, to themselves?
Stigler, Schumpeter, and Milton Friedman, with their Ayn Rand parroted theories of the Invisible Hand, and Creative Destruction, have long been proven false by modern Nobel Prize winner economists Joseph Stiglitz and Paul Krugman, looking at a Free Market that is anything but FREE.
Please use good judgement and vote for Bennett Kayser and Scott Schmerelson when you go to the polls, without being bribed, on Tuesday, May 19.
(Ellen Lubic, Director, Joining Forces for Education, Public Policy educator/writer. Views expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the views of CityWatch or its ownership.)
-cw
All these shenanigans read like a novel, don’t they? In other times or maybe in other cities, the public would reject these clowns outright. It’s a scary time when people like this are actually the front runners.
MORE than GROSS. Maybe the pollution in LA got into their souls.
It’s late in the game, but I just found this speech
that current & twice-elected LAUSD Board Member
Steve Zimmer recently gave in support of fellow
Board Member Bennett Kayser’s re-election—
given at a Kayser fundraiser:
(try reading along with the transcript…
it’s so poetic you can set it to music)
What’s telling is how Zimmer has done “a total 180”
on John Deasy. Remember the days when
Zimmer would reverently refer to Deasy as
“a catalytic change agent” for schools and children?
(That “change agent” quote is from a radio i
nterview with someone (Adolfo?) that is somewhere
on the net… right after Zimmer’s & the Board’s
October 2013 Board vote to keep Deasy and
extend his contract.)
Well, Zimmer’s “catalytic change agent” gushfest
days are totally OVER apparently.
In this latest speech, Zimmer channels
Emile Zola (“J’accuse!!! J’accuse!!!) and boldly
claims that Deasy deliberately caused severe
“disruption”, and willfully wrecked any “stability”
in LAUSD, in order to further privatization, even
if that meant causing “real collateral damage to
real children EVERY DAY” in the process.
In essence, Zimmer argues, and makes the accusation that …
… corporate reformers’ / privatizers’ ultimate and ignoble “ENDS”– privatization and teacher union-busting—in the long run…
… JUSTIFY…
… the corporate reformers’ / privatizers’ strategic and ignoble “MEANS” —“real collateral damage to real children EVERY DAY”—in the short run.
That’s some pretty rough stuff.
In the middle of the speech, Zimmer concedes
that Bennett Kayser had tried to enlighten and
give warning to him about all of this, but
Zimmer says that he had long dismissed
Kayser’s dire forewarnings…
… until NOW., that is.
Zimmer proclaims that… finally (!!!)…
he (Zimmer) gets it:
————————————————–
————————————————–
(again try reading along with the transcript…
it’s so poetic you really can set it to music…
… also, he apparently did this “off-the-cuff”,
with no cards, teleprompter, or speech
cards to read from…. impressive!
… you can’t fake something like this…
to pull it off, you really have to feel and
believe it in your core)
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
STEVE ZIMMER:
“This (election) is NOT just about Board District 5.
This is about the ENTIRE CONTROL and FUTURE of LAUSD.
“This is about CONTROL. Make NO mistake about it.
The control of the (LAUSD) school board hangs in the balance.
“And listen…. you don’t have to applaud on this line,
but you can.
— (CROWD LAUGHS)
“I have a lot of dear friends in the room,
and sometimes we have disagreed,
and sometimes we look at an issue,
we see it from a different lens,
and sometimes there are painful moments.
“That’s true for me.
That’s been true for Jackie (Goldberg) in her service.
That’s been true for Bennett.
“But the difference between the people
who believe that it’s ALL of us TOGETHER—
—that it’s ALL of us working together,
that… that… that our employees,
that our teachers are our greatest partners.
“NOT our enemies,
NOT … NOT… litigants to be challenged in court,
NOT … NOT…. people to be blamed for
the crisis that is facing our children,
but the VERY PEOPLE who can
lift our children out of this crisis.
“Even if we disagree on some issues,
the difference between
the folks like Bennett Kayser,
the folks like Jackie Goldberg,
Jeff Horton before her…
“ … the folks… the folks who have tried
to fight the fight over the years that
I am proud to associate myself with.
“The difference between THAT and…
“And what the folks who are
trying to destroy Bennett Kayser—
NOT BEAT Bennett Kayser—DESTROY him
AS A PERSON, not just as a political figure, but
DESTROY him as a person.
“The difference between…
we who believe that it’s ALL OF US together.
“and …
“those who believe that it’s ‘us against them’…
“It’s NIGHT and DAY.
“We CANNOT let them
take control of the school board
because if they take control of the school board,
they’ll have control of who becomes the
next Superintendent of this district.
“They’ll have control over the budget.
They’ll have control over the policies.
They‘ll have control over the schools.
“And it took us too long for us to realize it—
Bennett realized it WAY before I did,
and I give him credit for it EVERY day—
“What John Deasy tried to do to this school district.
“He tried to bring public education DOWN.
And the MISIS crisis was NO accident.
That is… that WAS INTENTIONAL, because
if you read their websites,
if you read what they’re trying to do…
“ ‘Stability’ is an ugly word.
“ ‘Disruption’ is what it is about.
“But WE know
WE the teachers
WE the principals
WE the school workers
WE KNOW
WE THE PARENTS
WE KNOW that disruption causes
REAL collateral damage
to REAL children EVERY DAY!
“And Bennett and I have been
about trying to re-STABILIZE and
re-HUMANIZE our schools.
“And at the end of the day,
we are about an ALL-kids agenda—
ALL kids, NOT SOME kids.
“And if you go to a door, and if you’re on a phone.
and people say,
“ ‘Why should I care?‘
“ ‘Why should I vote?’
“PUBLIC education is about
EVERY CHILD that comes to the
schoolhouse door—those who are the most gifted,
and those who have the most DIFFICULT
of challenges that are facing them.
“What makes public education PUBLIC education is
that it’s EVERY child that comes to the schoolhouse door,
and no one, NO ONE—NOT ME, NOT anyone else—
has been a better champion of that than Bennett Kayser.
“That said…
the MOST reprehensible,
the most DISGUSTING thing that they have done
is to somehow challenge—that while
Bennett has struggled, and continues to struggle
valiantly, publicly, VICTORIOUSLY
against Parkinson’s disease,
they have SOMEHOW THOUGHT that it is okay
to suggest… to suggest that somehow,
because of this struggle, he is incapable of serving.
“Every … ANY one of us could go to a neurologist
some time over the next year,
and come out with that diagnosis—ANY ONE of us.
“And thank God we have Bennett Kayser to
show us that this is NOT a death sentence,
that it’s NOT a way of having to fade into
the background,
that you can serve with pride,
with integrity,
with intelligence
with capability.
“And DAMN THEM, DAMN THEM
for questioning that!
Damn them for questioning that!
“Don’t let that win!
“Because I’ve known Bennett for over 20 years,
but in our private conversations…
what he now knows is that there is a new
empathy for what our children with
the most challenges face.
“THERE IS NO ONE MORE APPROPRIATE
to serve on the Board of Education.
than someone who INTIMATELY
and PERSONALLY understands those challenges
because he will NEVER turn way from them.
“So these next three weeks, Bennett…
these next three weeks…
they are about you, but they are also about
the future of public education
in this country, and in this city.
“We will NOT let this stand, Bennett,
and we WILL stand by you.
“But the last thing I want to say, Bennett, is….
“Thank you for your courage, for enduring this
on behalf of all of us, and most especially
on behalf of all the children who need you
the most.
“Thank you, Bennett!”
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
Here’s where you can donate on-line to Bennett’s campaign:
http://www.bennett2015.com/donate-online.html
Here’s his website in general:
http://www.bennett2015.com/
In the Eagle Rock area, where I live, the pro-charter forces are very aggressive and obviously well funded. For example, yesterday alone I received SEVEN separate mailers that attacked Keyser and/or praised Rodriguez. No pro-Keyser mailing yesterday, though I have received some over the weeks. I’d say the ratio of Rodriguez to Keyser advertisements is ten to one.
I wish just one reporter would ask incumbent Galatzan about her attempt to run for LA City Council on 2009, just two years into her first four year term. If she had won, LAUSD would have had to fork over millions to hold a special election. When board member Marguerite LaMotte passed away suddenly, the special election held to replace her last year reportedly cost LAUSD approx. 2.5 million.
The next question should be whether or not she intends to run for another office in the near future. While there is great doubt that she would answer truthfully, it would at least put the public on notice.
I keep wondering when Jamie Alter-Lynton, sibling of the dubious Jonathan Alter, will have her “news” blog — LA School Report — cover the either Lakeview Audit, or the Jacqueline Duvivier Castillo (Better 4 You Meals) self-dealing scandal, or both? Alter-Lynton’s site claims that it practices “journalism in the public interest”, yet somehow misses two of the biggest Los Angeles education scandals of the year, both centering around their candidate: charter industry profiteer Ref Rodriguez.
This quote says it all: “audits…indicated charter officials [i.e. Ref Rodriguez] knew of the alleged conflict of interest” http://4lakidsnews.blogspot.com/2015/05/lausd-charter-group-gave-food-contract.html
The well heeled Rodriguez was PUC Corporation’s CEO, and then their Board Treasurer during both the Lakeview financial malfeasance and Duvivier Castillo incidents. He claims to have known absolutely nothing about either situation, the former occurring for over a decade, the latter for several years now. Giving him the benefit of the doubt, that means Rodriguez is either grossly incompetent, or criminally complicit (there are some that would posit he manages to be both). Neither of those are not desirable qualities for a trustee of the nation’s second largest school district.
The Lyntons, he a head honcho at Sony and she owns LASR, are firmly in the 1% with their personal vast wealth. Their recent exchange of family emails shown widely on Wikileaks, depicts their Rheeform milieu. Hope someone posts that here.
And our L.A. Times endorsed, you guessed it, Ref Rodriguez and Tamar Galatzan…do they even read their own paper???
Reblogged this on Crazy Normal – the Classroom Exposé and commented:
The lies are also flowing like a river in the Bay Area near San Francisco between Steve Glazer and Susan Bonilla for a state senate seat. Glazer is the corporate school reform lobby’s candidate and the money is flooding into his campaign from special interests and oligarchs.
The lies are also flowing like a river in the Bay Area near San Francisco between Steve Glazer and Susan Bonilla for a state senate seat. Glazer is the corporate school reform lobby’s candidate, and the money is flooding into his campaign from special interests and oligarchs.
It is easy to get upset at a politician’s mailers and what they proclaim. Ref Rodriguez’s ones are deceitful and full of insipid bluster.
The MONEY behind the mailer’s is where the Power lies. The mailers themselves are the symptom.
Whose money supports Rodriguez’s and Galatzan’s cause?
Not only Eli Broad’s, Michael Bloomberg’s, the Walton’s, the United Way and John Deasy’s, but the entire Ed Reform machinery have gone all out for these two. Their campaign contributions come from the highest pockets of wealth and power in the US.
I would love to see if ANY of these contributors have their own children in the system.
The LA TIMES editorial board and their lead education opinion-ist Karin Klein are rapturous about these individuals AND THEIR EDUCATION PEDAGOGY. She supports THEIR IDEAS for education for the working class kids of color for LAUSD. In the paper’s editorial of support for Galatzan and Rodriguez, they reiterated that these candidate’s NOTIONS an METHODS of education policy are what our children need the most.
It is extraordinary the damage the LA TIMES has advocated for our kids that they would never in a million years deem appropriate for their own kids in schools safely removed from the challenges of LAUSD. Karin Klein has never honestly addressed what PEDAGOGY of Deasy and his ilk was something she wished ALL children had and although she states how she too criticized the iPads, the Times’ has never addressed how the iPads was somehow an anomaly in Deasy’s behavior or ideology that was different from almost anything else he directed.
Klein and The Times, in their support of Deasy, Rodriguez and Galatzan, keep trying to separate the Iraq War from George Bush’s presidency in their steadfast advocacy of their belief in what our children need.
Of course I am appalled by the perversion of public education not only in LA, but across the country, but Progressives need to directly challenge not only the Right and GOP on education issues, but the establishment Democrats who live plush lives elsewhere who advocate their fellow “Democrats” Rodriguez’s and Galatzan’s on OUR children.
The battle in urban school systems is between these two Democrat visions’ whether they are Washington DC, New York, Chicago, Baltimore, New Orleans or Los Angeles.
John Deasy may be “gone” from LAUSD, but the money and ideology are not. The LA TIMES is the repulsive champion of the rich profiteers who back all the Rodriguez’s and Galatzan’s across the country and by electing these two, it assures LA that Deasy-ism is still the operating education ideology for the children.
Well, other people’s children…not theirs.
Very well said.
Exactly!
Who are you going to support the Republicats or Demoblicans?
Neither.
Education was once about searching for ultimate “truth”.
How far we have fallen.
When lies, half truths, propaganda proliferate and “truth” is mortally wounded what possibility for a bright future exists.
EDUCATORS must step forward forcefully. You shall know the truth and the truth will make you free will happen only if truth is known by enough people to make a difference.
On the subject of class and socio-economic status in this election, some things need to be said.
Ref portrays himself as a poor Chicano from the barrios of Cypress Park, one who cares about the education well-being of poor Chicanos in the barrios of Cypress Park and elsewhere.
Well, let’s see… because his PUC charters are unregulated, Ref can pay himself whatever he wants, and his workers as little (or as much) as he wants.
So given that unchecked power, how does Ref use it to provide for the well-being of his fellow poor Chicanos from the barrio?
Public records show that Rodriguez pays himself $350,000 (a third of a million dollars) annually, while he pays his custodial and cafeteria workers—all low-income Latinos—$8/hour instead of the living wage that their counterparts in the traditional public schools get paid… while principals in traditional public schools (a brutal job in so many ways) earn only around $100,000 annually. To quote Gordon Gekko, that’s a zero-sum game. The money that Ref pays himself is money that doesn’t go to those workers, (or doesn’t get to the classroom, for that matter)
Try to live in L.A. on $8/hour. (Custodial and cafeteria workers in traditional public schools get more than double that.)
Now let’s say that you’re a parent (or just a citizen concerned about public education) that objects to the gross salaries that Ref and other bosses at PUC receive, and also object to the custodial and cafeteria workers (all low-income Latinos) get paid slave wages… You want to go in front of the LAUSD Board (the one Ref is trying get elected to) and demand a reduction in the bosses’ salaries, and an increase in those workers’ salaries … as those are your economic peers in the community.
WELL, YOU CAN’T. Well, you can, but you’d be wasting your breath. That’s the way this whole privatized charter thing works. A huge multi-million-dollar amount of your tax money gets dumped into an account and is the school’s annual budget. And then THAT’S IT as far as any oversight that the Board has from that point on. The charter bosses can spend that money any way they damn please (concerns about “Better Meals 4 You”-style nepotism corruption be damned). You can only uncover such corruption after the fact, and by that time, your tax money is gone, baby, gone… never to be returned.
Ref makes $350,000 for supervising about 3,000 students, while LAUSD Superintendent Cortines gets less, ($300,000) for supervising 670,000 students.
I would like to know exactly what Ref does in a typical 9-to-5, 40-hour week to justify getting paid that kind of cash? It can’t be improving the operations of the school, or helping teachers… critiquing instruction, helping design a lesson plan, assisting in classroom management, leading I.E.P. / S.S.T. meetings, or leading any professional development. Ref has ZERO education, training, or experience teaching high school or working as an administrator. (Just out of college, he got in early on the whole charter school racket (1999), without ever learning anything from the ground up.)
As opposed to incumbent Board Member Bennett Kayser, who has 30 years in classroom followed by years as an administrator. Kayser went straight from decades of dedicated work in the schoolhouse to then serve on the Board, so he has an intimate, and detailed knowledge of what students, need, what teachers need, and, in general, what schools need.
Also… Bennet’s most certainly not in it for the money… the job pays only $40,000 year., and that’s all he earns, or desires to.
The choice is easy, but the trouble is that Ref is outspending Bennet 8-to-1…. dozens of colored cardboard stuffing your mailbox attest to this.
Now, think about that for a second. Billionaires from out of the state and within the state–money-motivated privatizers who don’t even live here in LAUSD, whose kids don’t go to school here—have pumped in $5 million total tp a PAC to elect Ref.. for a political office that pays only $40,000 ???!!
And we’re supposed to believe that they’re doing it because they care so much about the education of poor and middle class students? Does that pass the smell test? Look closer and you see how—once Ref is elected and has to power to do their bidding—they will profit from chunk after chunk of the district being given to charter school companies owned and/or allied with them (and then removed from any public oversight), and also profit from companies that they own—in whole or in part—that will reap billions in exchange for providing dubious digital learning, on-line learning, curriculum. etc. to both charters and traditional public schools.
Ref’s backers are those oxymoronic and entrepreneurial creatures that populate today’s landscape of what’s called neo-liberalism… “vulture philanthropists”… “philanthro-preneurs”. Unrelieved greed covered the thinnest false veneer of social responsibility.
If you want to keep a money-motivated privatizer like Ref Rodriguez (and his corporate backers) out of power…
if you want to keep our schools truly public—accountable & transparent to the public, controlled by the public via democratically-elected school boards, and educating all of the public, including… as the Good Book says…. the “least of our brethren”… the most vulnerable… special ed. kids, ESL kids, homeless, foster care kids… (the ones charters kick out with abandon, or refuse to accept in the first place)…
If you want all this, then donate to Ref’s opponent, Bennett Kayser—a 30-year teacher and administrator who’s not in it for the money, but for the students, and for the community. Tell eveyrone you know in District 5 to vote for Bennett Kayser–friends, neighbors, co-workers, people you went to high school with, grade school, college, whatever.
Here’s where you can donate on-line to Bennett Kayser’s campaign:
http://www.bennett2015.com/donate-online.html
Here’s his website in general:
http://www.bennett2015.com
ONE MORE THING:
The L.A. Weekly article—the one that doesn’t mention the “Food-gate” scandal currently embroiling Ref and officials at PUC—does, on the other hand mention that Ref is getting support form Netflix CEO Reed Hastings. (Hastings dumped $1.4 million into the PAC that is trying to elect Ref Rodriguez and his allies in the other two elections.)
http://www.laweekly.com/news/whoever-wins-this-lausd-board-seat-could-determine-the-fate-of-charter-schools-5565005
This is the same Reed Hastings that called for the abolishing of all school boards when he gave the keynote speech at last years California Charter Schools Association convention (where Ref also spoke, but did not contradict or disavow Hastings’ speech):
Incredibly, Ref Rodriguez’ backers DON’T EVEN BELIEVE IN THE EXISTENCE OF DEMOCRATIC SCHOOL BOARDS LIKE THE ONE FOR WHICH RODRIGUEZ IS RUNNING.The California Charter School Association’s true and openly-expressed (BELOW) end game is to abolish the Board that meets down at 3rd and Beaudry. Their goal is to eliminate any voting or input from the public, and have unelected charter school boards—made up of businessmen, profiteers, and non-educators—free to whatever they want, whenever they want to maximize profits, and with no one to stop them.
In short, Rodriguez is cynically running for an elected position, and to serve on an elected body that—per his masters’ marching orders—whose functioning he will endeavor to undermine and hopefully eliminate… or, failing to do that while in office, Ref will do his corporate masters’ bidding and do as much damage to the board’s functioning, and lessen the number schools under its oversight, and make as much progress towards the board’s elimination as he can while serving on it.
His whole campaign is an affront to the citizens and taxpayers in his district.Tell them a bunch of lies to trick them into voting for someone—funded by out-of-state billionaires—who will endeavor to… END THOSE SAME CITIZENS’ POWER TO VOTE FOR, AND ULTIMATELY TO CONTROL PUBLIC SCHOOLS.
In his keynote address at the California Charter School Association’s annual dinner last year, Netflix CEO and corporate ed. reformer Reed Hastings stated the CCSA’s goal should be to abolish all democratically elected school boards, and end any input and participations of citizen-taxpayers in how their tax money in spent in education, and in which people are chosen to decide how money is spent.(CCSA is Rodriguez primary financial backer… he serves on its board)
Don’t beliieve me? Watch this:
That’s the billionaire privatizers’ gameplan that, if elected, a useful (and well-paid) idiot like Ref will execute as he follows the orders of his corporate masters. In short, there’s no New Orleans’ Hurricaine Katrina to go all “Shock Doctrine” on the public school systems in other cities like Los Angeles, so what’s a privatizer to do?
Just induce a financial and political crisis that will eventrually destroy the public schools (re-read Smarick’s plan above). Again, it’s straight out of The Shock Doctrine.
Eventually, as the percentage of traditional LAUSD public schools shrinks, and the percentage of charter schools within LAUSD grows, the cost of maintaining the district’s salary, health benefits, retirement, etc.will cause the district to collapse from within.The end game is then to replace our current board (and democratic system) with a small pseudo-“board” whose sole function is to rubber stamp charter school authorizing… and which has no control actual over charter schools’/charter chains’ functions after doing so… no transparency to the public, no accountability to the public, and that can and will refuse to educate all of the public—i.,e. those who are expensive to educate, and who will not produce high scores on tests… special ed., English language learners, recent immigrants, homeless, foster care.
That’s why out-of-state billionaires, Wall Street hedge fund charter proponents, etc. are pumping millions into his campaign.Even though Ref has more money, this fact can be used against him—ju jitsu stye—as it was successfully used in the Zimmer, Ratliff, and McKenna campaigns (and in Bennett’s first race for the board.)
If the public knows all this, there’s no way they will want to to vote for Ref Rodriguez (or for Tamar Galatzan, or for Lydia Guttierez, for that matter.)
Again, for a short video summary of Smarick’s plan, watch the Reed Hastings’ speech again:
(Each time I listen to this, I think, “Are these guys so clueless and arrogant to consider that someone in the room could videotape this?” Like when Mitt Romney told a business luncheon that more than 50% of Americans are moochers off the government…)
Charter Schools goal: “Get rid of School Boards”Charter Schools goal: “Get rid of School Boards”
REED HASTINGS (March 3, 2004):“The importance of the charter school movement is to evolve America from a system where governance is constantly changing… (i.e. democratically elected school boards, where the citizen-taxpayers have decision-making power.) to an all-charter school system, with no traditional public schools under the governance of an elected school board.
Hastings further says charter school chains are superior because “they don’t have an elected school board.” He celebrates New Orleans system where every school is a privately-run charter with ZERO accountability to the public, and where the public has ZERO power to influence their governance.
“Now if we go to the general public and we say, ‘Here’s an argument for why we should get rid of school boards,’ of course, no one’s going to go for that.School boards have been and iconic part of America for 200 years.”
Since in most cities, corporate reformers cannot do a New Orleans-style wiping out of democratically controlled school boards—as there’s no Katrina-like catastrophe to exploit—Hastings instead recommends a slow, deceptive, stealth strategy.He instructs the charter schools and their advocates to “work with districts” quietly and “grow steadily”.This means that the charter industry will falsely profess that they wish to co-exist with the traditional public schools, and complement the public school system, while the truth is that they are merely putting on that façade with the ultimate goal being the total elimination of public schools via this “slow growth” strategy.
The other prong of this strategy—one that Ref will be engaging in—is to sabotage the traditional public schools through starving of them of funds, jacking up class size, cutting the arts, libraries, etc. … all to trigger low performance… and use that low performance that they initially and actually caused, as justification for closing public schools and replacing them with private charter management.
Eventually, as the percentage of traditional LAUSD public schools shrinks, and the percentage of charter schools within LAUSD grows, they cost of maintaining the salary, health benefits, retirement, etc.will cause the district to collapse from within.The end game is a small pseudo-“board” whose sole function is to rubber stamp charter school authorizing… and no control actual over charter schools’ functions after doing so… no transparency to the public, no accountability to the public, and that can and will refuse to educate all of the public—i.,e. those who are expensive to educate, and who will not produce high scores on tests… special ed., English language learners, recent immigrants, homeless, foster care.
That’s why out-of-state billionaires, Wall Street hedge fund charter proponents, etc.
are pumping millions into his campaign.Even though Ref has more money, this fact can be used against him—ju jitsu stye—as it was successfully used in the Zimmer, Ratliff, and McKenna campaigns (and in Bennett’s first race for the board.)
If the public knows all this, there’s no way they will want to to vote for Ref Rodriguez (or for Tamar Galatzan, or for Lydia Guttierez, for that matter.
Oh.. and right after Hastings’ speech at the same CCSA celebration, guess who gets an award from the CCSA—the “2014 Hart Vision Elected Official of the Year”?
Why it’s the privatizers’ and corporate reform’s bought-and-paid-for LAUSD School Board Member Monica Garcia: (A few seconds in, look to Ms. Garcia’s left and see who’s standing there…. hint, his initials are “R.R.”):
The best part of her speech is when Garcia courageously uses this opportunity of her acceptance speech to respectfully contradict Hastings’ fervent dream—expressed moments earlier to a rapturous standing ovation—that school boards like the one on which she serves should not be wiped off the face of the earth, as Hastings so desires… as, you know, Hastings’ goal would end two centuries of democratic control of schools in the United States… and how she and Ref Rodriguez not responding and contradicting Hastings would be a total betrayal of the voters who voted for her to serve on the LAUSD Board, not destroy it through a Smarick-ian, Hastings-ish slow stealth charterization / privatization.
Just kidding 😉 she never says anything of the kind… and NEITHER DOES REF!!!!! In his own speech at this event, Ref could have said, “Hell no, Reed. Democracy in school governance must be preserved,” BUT NEITHER HE NOR MS. GARCIA WANT TO UPSET THEIR CORPORATE MASTERS!!!
Seriously, when Garcia asks the charter honchos in the audience, “Do you believe that all kids can learn?” and they chant “Yes”, keep in mind that included in those charter leaders chanting are folks who have unashamedly kicked out… errr… counseled out up to 70% of their students before graduation. (see Caroline Grannan’s investigation on charter school attrition)
Somebody emailed me and asked what “Smarick-ian” mean? That’s a reference to corporate ed. reform theorist and strategist Andy Smarick, who has let the cat out of the bag as to their secret game plan… still available on-line. (link BELOW) In districts where there is still an elected school board, people like Reed Hastings, Bill Gates, Eli Broad, etc. finance the campaigns of corporate puppets like Ref to carry it out.
BELOW Smarick details this plan of using a slow, stealth charterization to cause the collapse of public school districts and public ecudation overall:
http://educationnext.org/wave-of-the-future/
(If any privatization ever tries to claim that they want charter schools to complement the public school system, or co-exist with public schools to provide parents with “a family of different school options—public, charter private”… RE-READ THIS BELOW. The privatizers don’t want co-existence; they want to conquer and devour all… and don’t you forget it—check out New Orleans… THE WALL STREET PRIVATIZERS / CHARTERIZERS WANT IT ALL).
(CAPS MINE and parentheticals () mine, Jack)
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ANDY SMARICK:
“Clearly we can’t expect the political process to swiftly bring about charter districts in all of America’s big cities. However, if charter advocates carefully target specific systems with an exacting strategy, the current policy environment will allow them to create examples of a new, high-performing system of public education in urban America.
“Here, in short, is one roadmap for chartering’s way forward:
“FIRST, commit to drastically increasing the charter market share in a few select communities until it is the dominant system and the district is reduced to a secondary provider. The target should be 75 percent.
“SECOND, choose the target communities wisely. Each should begin with a solid charter base (at least 5 percent market share), a policy environment that will enable growth (fair funding, nondistrict authorizers, and no legislated caps), and a favorable political environment (friendly elected officials and editorial boards, a positive experience with charters to date, and unorganized opposition).
“For example, in New York a concerted effort could be made to site in Albany or Buffalo a large percentage of the 100 new charters allowed under the raised cap. Other potentially fertile districts include Denver, Detroit, Kansas City, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, New Orleans, Oakland, and Washington, D.C.
“THIRD, secure proven operators to open new schools. To the greatest extent possible, growth should be driven by replicating successful local charters and recruiting high-performing operators from other areas (see Figure 2).
“FOURTH, engage key allies like Teach For America, New Leaders for New Schools, and national and local foundations to ensure the effort has the human and financial capital needed.
“LAST, commit to rigorously assessing charter performance in each community and working with authorizers to close the charters that fail to significantly improve student achievement.
“In total, these strategies should lead to rapid, high-quality charter growth and the development of a public school marketplace marked by parental choice, the regular start-up of new schools, the improvement of middling schools, the replication of high-performing schools, and the shuttering of low-performing schools.
“AS CHARTERING INCREASES ITS MARKET SHARE IN A CITY, THE DISTRICT WILL COME UNDER GROWING FINANCIAL PRESSURE. The district, despite educating fewer and fewer students, will still require a large administrative staff to process payroll and benefits, administer federal programs, and oversee special education. WITH A LOPSIDED ADULT-TO-STUDENT RATIO, THE DISTRICT’S PER-PUPIL COSTS WILL SKYROCKET.
“At some point along the district’s path from monopoly provider to financially unsustainable marginal player, the city’s investors and stakeholders—taxpayers, foundations, business leaders, elected officials, and editorial boards—are likely to demand fundamental change.
“That is, EVENTUALLY THE FINANCIAL CRISIS WILL BECOME A POLITICAL CRISIS.
“If the district has progressive leadership, ONE OF TWO BEST-CASE SCENARIOS WILL RESULT:
“THE DISTRICT COULD VOLUNTARILY BEGIN THE SHIFT (from an elected school board, JACK) TO AN AUTHORIZER, developing a new relationship with its schools and reworking its administrative structure to meet the new conditions.
“Or, believing the organization is unable to make this change, THE DISTRICT COULD GRADUALLY TRANSFER ITS SCHOOLS TO AN ESTABLISHED AUTHORIZER.
(In other words… Bye, bye, traditional public schools—the ones accountable and transparent to the citizen-taxpayers! Hello, total privatization of schools where the public loses all input and decision-making power to the private sector! Andy Smarick’s wet-dream-come-true! JACK)
“A more probable district reaction to the mounting pressure would be an aggressive political response. Its leadership team might fight for a charter moratorium or seek protection from the courts. Failing that, they might lobby for additional funding so the district could maintain its administrative structure despite the vast loss of students. Reformers should expect and prepare for this phase of the transition process.
“In many ways, replacing the district system seems inconceivable, almost heretical. Districts have existed for generations, and in many minds, the traditional system is synonymous with public education.
“However, the history of urban districts’ inability to provide a high-quality education to their low-income students is nearly as long. It’s clear that we need a new type of system for urban public education, one that is able to respond nimbly to great school success, chronic school failure, and everything in between. A chartered system could do precisely that.”
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In a nutshell, what you just read ABOVE is the the billionaire privatizers’ gameplan that, if elected, a useful (and well-paid) idiot like Ref will execute as he follows the orders of his corporate masters. In short, there’s no New Orleans’ Hurricaine Katrina to go all “Shock Doctrine” on the public school systems in other cities like Los Angeles, so what’s a privatizer to do?
Just induce a financial and political crisis—a premeditated and pre-planned disruption and de-stabilization of a district’s existing public schools—that will eventrually weaken, if not destroy the public schools (re-read Smarick’s plan above).
Again, it’s straight out of The Shock Doctrine.
Eventually, as the percentage of traditional LAUSD public schools shrinks, and the percentage of charter schools within LAUSD grows, the cost of maintaining the district’s salary, health benefits, retirement, etc.will cause the district to collapse from within.The end game is then to replace our current board (and democratic system) with a small pseudo-“board” whose sole function is to rubber stamp charter school authorizing… and which has no control actual over charter schools’/charter chains’ functions after doing so… no transparency to the public, no accountability to the public, and that can and will refuse to educate all of the public—i.,e. those who are expensive to educate, and who will not produce high scores on tests… special ed., English language learners, recent immigrants, homeless, foster care.
That’s why out-of-state billionaires, Wall Street hedge fund charter proponents, etc. are pumping millions into his campaign. Even though Ref has more money, this fact can be used against him—ju jitsu stye—as it was successfully used in the Zimmer, Ratliff, and McKenna campaigns (and in Bennett’s first race for the board.)
If the public knows all this, there’s no way they will want to to vote for Ref Rodriguez (or for Tamar Galatzan, or for Lydia Guttierez, for that matter.)
Again, for a short video summary of Smarick’s plan, watch the Reed Hastings’ speech again:
(Each time I listen to this, I think, “Are these guys so clueless and arrogant not to consider that someone in the room could videotape this?” Like when Mitt Romney told a business luncheon that 47% of Americans are just moochers off the government…)
It is shocking and a sign of how seriously our country has become totally decimated by big money running our elections. It was reported by CNN yesterday that the entire British election for Prime Minister last week, which was won by Cameron, cost $30 Million.
Yet in this minor school board election in Los Angeles, the big donors have blanketed the campaign with cash for the two Rheeformers, and the total cost will be close to $6 Million.
Why would anyone who is legit and dedicated want to run for office in this this climate of domination by the free market gluttons? And only an 8% turnout is expected…..of course there will be lots of Rodriguez’s (and Monica Garcia’s and Eli Broad’s and United Way’s and Latino SouthWest Voters project) ‘bribed to vote’ inner city gang at the polls.
This New World Order is tragic. Prove to me that democracy is not dead in America.
Blame the Citizens United.
Yes, Raj. The most dangerously activist SCOTUS in our history imposed Citizen’s United on us, and then ratcheted it even more with McCutcheon. Even the Right Wing Five seem to be completely owned by the Wall Street greed meisters.