You have no doubt heard the story of Parent Revolution. That is the group that wants to “empower” parents to seize control of their schools so they can turn it overto a charter operator.
The founder of Parent Revolution previously worked for Green Dot charters. Then he got funded by Walton, Gates, and Broad to start Parent Revolution.
A typical corporate reform sham since there are no parents involved, unless you count Ben Austin, the executive director.
An investigative reporter just did a story about Parent Revolution and was able to determine that the big funding comes from Walton, which has put more than $6 million into the endeavor. Walton is the most conservative of the big foundations. And clever too.
Walton has an agenda, and it can be summed up in one word: privatization.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Interesting read.. from Miami-Dade County Florida… and Parent Trigger…
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/04/10/v-fullstory/3336512/the-dark-side-of-parent-trigger.html
Once again, we have to watch our words.
“Privatization”, taken literally, would mean that all schools would be private schools, operating on private capital. That is not what the corporate raiders are after, now is it? Their end-game is something analogous to the defense industry.
sadly, the transformation (or hi-jacking) of the meaning of privatization occurred more than a decade ago… privatization now means using PUBLIC dollars to fund PRIVATE profits
And the initials for “Parent Revolution” are “PR”. Coincidence?
…. yes? Or are the Puerto Ricans behind it?
Too bad Walton can’t put that $6 million into paying their workers a living wage.
Scum! He needs to go and try to run his failing stores due to underpayment and abuse of staff.
I don’t understand how the Waltons have so much money when they don’t even pay their own employees enough to keep them off food stamps.
The answer is in your statement!
The public needs to ask the following questions of the Parent Trigger:
1. What guarantee is there that a “high” quality charter will enter into the bidding process?
2. What guarantee is there that the proposed charter will include parents and teachers in the decision-making process?
3. What guarantees are there that the proposed charter will service the same children(sp. ed and ELL)?
4. What guarantees are there that the proposed charter will hire experienced teachers, and not just cheaper TFAs and other newcomers?
5. What guarantee is there that the authorizer will close down the charter if it fails to live up to its promises and/or fails to follow charter law and policies? If the school IS closed down, then what? Can the trigger be pulled on a trigger school?
A case study can easily be done in Adelanto, the site of the first parent trigger. The charter petition of the winning charter(a decision made by only 53 parents) specifically ensures that parents will never have the opportunity to have a majority vote. The school states that it will include TFAs, but word is out that few teachers are interested in working at the new school. If the charter follows its present school’s policies, no sp. ed students or ELLs will be welcomed. Last year, the CDE states that almost 50% of its teachers were in their first year of teaching. Why did the school have to replace so many of its faculty?????
No guarantees unless you buy the special warrenty insurance that costs $100/month per month. Caveat Emptor.
warranty not warrenty (must have been subconscious since I live in Warren County and teach at Warrenton HS).
Parent Revolution is already working its ‘magic’ in Los Angeles although, strangely, in contrast to verifiable fact, it is [according to the LATimes] “a locally based group that has lobbied for parent-trigger laws across the country.” See, grassroots! And that grass is spread alllll over the country!
Link: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-0411-parent-vote-20130411,0,6821401.story
The scheme as described for a specific LAUSD school sounds a lot like “colocation” in New York City. What’s that? you ask.
Link: http://insidecolocation.tumblr.com
And Parent Revolution has other LAUSD targets in their sight. How fair is the competition? While the Superintendent of LAUSD leaves the schools to fend for themselves [in effect, the coach of the ‘public school’ team is calling plays that favor the ‘charter’ team], Parent Revolution rents houses in the neighborhoods where the target schools are located and hires full-time organizers brought/bought from outside to chat up residents. Do the math: easily in excess of $10,000 a month per target against, well, whatever little time and energy is left after the teaching staff at these schools are finished [really? is it ever really finished?] working and collaborating and raising their own families and participating in community activities and recuperating from physical ailments and emotion exhaustion and everything else that happens to real people in real life.
You don’t win a the hundred-yard dash by shackling your own player at the start line and putting your competitor on the ninety-yard line. At least, not if you want YOUR side to win.
Remember the oft-repeated promise of the charterites/privatizers [accompanied by solemn chants of ‘parent choice’ and ‘poverty is not destiny’ and ‘no excuses’ and ‘the bigotry of soft expectations’] that a rising tide would lift all? Not if you hold almost our heads under your rising tide until we run out of oxygen…
That’s not called competition. That’s called a sucker punch…
In my opinion Ben Austin and “Parent Revolution” are astroturf and a giant joke on us by the billionaires. Austin lives in a very high end house in what is called a “Tony” location. They all drive real nice cars and stuff after all look at who funds them. Steve Barr, formally also from Green Dot, got caught with $60,000 for free from their non profit tax records which are open to the public. In California you do not have the right to a charter schools detailed books as they are “PRIVATE.” In the new Florida “Parent Trigger” law there are clauses that make charter schools books open. Amazing. Of course there are other clauses and sections which make the law bad. “Parent Trigger” is not bad as long as parents, teachers and community can “Pull the Trigger” themselves and eliminate the billionaires. For all of you out there who hate your district and whose district does not listen to you and you have a “Parent Trigger” that you can use, do it. Show what parents, teachers and community can do in properly running your own school since your superintendent and board do not care as in LAUSD. That is why we are looking at just this here as LAUSD is a criminal organization. Another word to describe it is RICO. Everyones goal should be to not have charter schools, which do not perform, but a properly operating school district. What are you supposed to do when parents, students, teachers, staff and the community is treated in illegal and outrageous ways just sit there and go “Woe is me, I don’t know what to do.” Well, here we have that “Trigger” and the public can also use it not just the crooks. Does anyone really want to say that you should not do it because I do not like Austin and Parent Revolution so I will cut my arm off and then my head? That is self destructive not only to you but to our youth. I have seen enough destruction and know that all they understand when they are this far gone is FEAR. Watch the LAUSD Board Meeting on Tuesday on agenda item 29 which is about teacher jail and those falsely accused of child abuse. We will have three cameras there ourselves and they transmit on cable and over the air. We will load the show on You Tube at George1la and at perdaily.com.
This is from the comments section of the above mentioned article: “Public Schools, Private Agendas, Parent Revolution,” by Gary Cohn.
http://fryingpannews.org/2013/04/02/public-schools-private-agendas-parent-revolution/
enufwthebs: “Thanks to a little discussed law passed in 2000, at the end of Bill Clinton’s presidency, banks and equity funds that invest in charter schools and other projects in underserved areas can take advantage of a very generous tax credit – as much as 39% — to help offset their
expenditure in such projects. In essence, that credit amounts to doubling the amount of money they have invested within just seven years. Moreover, they are allowed to combine that tax credit with job creation credits and other types of credit, as well collect interest payments on the money they are lending out –
all of which can add up to far more than double in returns. This is,
no doubt, why many big banks and equity funds are so invested in the expansion of charter schools. There is big money being made here — because
investment is nearly a sure thing. And it’s not just U.S. investors who see the upside of investing in charters. Rich donors throughout the world are now sending money to fund our charter schools. Why? Because if they invest at least $500,000 to charters under a federal program called EB-5, they’re allowed to purchase immigration visas for themselves and family members — yet another mechanism in place to ensure that the money keeps rolling in.”