The Tennessee Legislature is rushing to pass legislation that would allow charters to apply to the state to get authorization, instead of the local school board. As noted in an earlier post, the legislation would apply only to Nashville and Memphis.

Note the rationale for targeting these two districts: they already have the most charter schools, so they of course need many more and the state must do it, not the local board.

This legislation–gutting local control–comes right out of the ALEC playbook, which considers privatization to be a higher value than local control. This is evidence not of conservatism–which respects local control–but of radicalism in the service of corporate interests.

ALEC pushed through the same idea as a constitutional amendment in Georgia, and big-money came from the Waltons and others interested in increasing privatization while claiming they are doing it “for the children.”