I said in a post this morning that there was “a glimmer of hope” in Florida because the state board had upheld Miami-Dade’s decision to turn down three virtual charter schools.
But Florida parent leader Rita Solnet wrote to correct me. She attended the state board meeting, and she says the state board offered no glimmer of hope, as I thought, because the Puppetmaster was behind the curtain, pulling the strings. The state board overturned the decision of the Palm Beach County school board to reject four charter applications. It is startling to realize–as Solnet mentions below–that the city of Miami already has 122 charter schools!
Thanks to Rita Solnet for reminding us that nothing will change until there is new leadership in the state of Florida, leadership that is willing to stop the rampant privatization of the state’s public schools.
At that same meeting, the State Board of Ed over-turned Palm Beach County’s decision to deny applications for four (4) charters.
One must understand that Jeb Bush owns Miami. He runs the FL BOE. He controls the Ed Commissioner. The education staff are hand-picked loyalists of Jeb. If Jeb wanted the Miami-Dade charter approved, they would have been approved.
Did I mention that Miami-Dade already has 122 charter schools? 122!
I attended this meeting. I’m an optimist at heart. I missed the glimmer of hope.
Instead I heard impending doom. A lengthy discussion on blended learning which is the Jeb Bush method of introducing more reliance on virtual charters. (ease them into it)
I heard scripted questions come flowing from board members with a purpose during a masterfully well-orchestrated Agenda..
I heard the Digital Learning speaker, Deirdre Flynn, discuss 270 students and 6 teachers in blended learning classes. (Oh, did I mention Flynn is Deputy Director for Jeb’s Foundation? No, the Board didn’t mention that either.)
I heard FL BOE member Chartrand request “a McKinsey study to see if we are doing this blended learning thing right.” (Former McKinsey education leader, Michael Barber, is the Pearson Education Adviser.)
I heard BOE member Chartrand ask to inject language into a new vision/mission statement which specified “highly effective teachers” only.
Later I spoke at length with FL Commissioner Robinson.
No, not yesterday. I saw no glimmer of hope at the FL BOE meeting. Sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings but yesterday was not a hopeful day. Yesterday reinforced how much work we have ahead of us. Yesterday reinforced that we need a new regime at the top.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
So is it fair to say that if there is one most important factor for this explosion of privatization of public dollars it would be the Obama administration’s educational policies?
The Obama administration has favored charters. Duncan is a cheerleader for charters. Neither the Secretary nor the President has made a public statement of this runaway privatization. And in 2011, when the public workers of Madison, Wisconsin, were demonstrating against the loss of their rights, Obama and Duncan flew to Miami to have a public celebration of Jeb Bush’s education policies. Very odd.
Having been in education in FL for over 30 years, it is gut wrenching to me to watch what is going on. Jeb Bush and his band of merry men (and women) have taken over public education in FL. Some of the best and most innovative public educators I have known are now working for him or one of his groups. I am beginning to think folks in FL have decided the privatization of public education in FL is inevitable, and our best shot at helping kids is to get involved now in that transition to make sure there will be some folks in those private enterprises that actually care for kids. The climate and culture in the public schools has become toxic to people who believe in the duty of the state to provide a free quality education to our kids (that’s actually in the FL Constitution).
I observed in a summer school class today for students who didn’t pass the third grade FCAT. Their only shot at fourth grade is to pass a similar test this summer. The teachers in those classes are some of the best in our county. And most of the summer has been spent in quality reading instruction. But the final two to three weeks is totally focused on test prep and testing, teaching ‘strategies’ to use to pass the test. “Remember, next Wednesday, use all these strategies so you can pass the big test.” You can see the stress in the faces of these eight year old children. They get one more chance to bubble in the right answers, or they get to spend another year in third grade.
What are we doing? Have we all lost our minds?
A glimmer is only for an instant.
This scenario will be replayed in NY over the next few years. All the players are in place, and the same decisions are being made in Albany. It may take a few more years, but you’ll be able to republish the piece above – just use the “find & replace” in your word processor: replace FL with NY and Bush with Cuomo.
I have been at least peripherally involved with education since the early 70s and have certainly witnessed many “innovations” in the profession. Over the past ten years in the profession, however, I have felt a growing uneasiness with the way good teaching was being defined.
I am becoming a more critical consumer of educational publishing. As a(n unemployed) special education teacher, I belong to the usual assortment of organizations and follow both classroom and administrative internet newsletters. I now find myself checking the authors of the articles referenced, linked with , or published by these newsletters as I am now attuned to the corporate speak in education reform. It is distressing to find the number of articles that are being published by non-educators.
I also find myself snapping to attention every time someone prefaces a comment with “research says” or eagerly describes the latest “research based” instructional gimmick. I was being caught by my own naive assumption that educational writers would, of course, only refer to high quality research. What has happened to reputable peer review?
I am through being manipulated. Unfortunately, I am also probably through being a teacher.
“research says” When I hear that I say show me the research, and they usually never have it.
I had a conversation with one of our assistant superintendents. She wanted me to request to have an interactive white board as we needed to become more technologically savvy. She stated that research shows that student achievement increases by 17% for students whose teacher uses an interactive board. I requested the research. Looked it up and read it. It was by Marzano paid for by an interactive white board company. It took me a few seconds doing an internet search to find a “peer review” that totally destroyed Marzano’s “research”. I relayed that peer review to her but that didn’t stop her from repeating the 17% nonsense.
But that 17% increase in student achievement was the buzz that year. I heard that figure from many different people on a number of different occasions. Great marketing strategy.
I still don’t have an interactive whiteboard. I told the Asst Sup that I’d prefer that the district spend its money on actual teachers (we are in the bottom 1% in student/teacher ratio in the state).
Sounds like the claim that “three great teachers in a row close the achievement gap,” except no one knows who those three great teachers are or where to find them.
Sort of like “three great teachers in a row” assure kids of success,, how about “Six teachers fired for low student scores”. ( The same low functioning kids)
It will go something like this… a cohort of low functioning kids start school at the same time.. The first year they take tests, their scores shoot one teacher down. They are “socially promoted”. The next year they perform poorly again and shoot teacher 2 down. They are “socially promoted” again… and again…and…
By the time this group is out of school,they will have ended a dozen careers because of VAM and unreliable testing and evaluation requirements. Maybe that’s why the TFA folks get out before they prove to be failures under NCLB and RTtT. Just a thought.