Governor Rick Snyder declared a financial emergency in Pontiac, setting a course to name an emergency manager, with the powers to cancel all contracts and–if he or she chooses–to privatize the public schools and give them to charter corporations.

Categories Michigan

14 Comments Post your own or leave a trackback: Trackback URL

Michael Paul Goldenberg says:

August 6, 2013 at 9:35 pm

I thought the state was already running Pontiac and its schools.

LikeLike

Reply
- Jon Awbrey says:
  
  August 6, 2013 at 10:28 pm
  
  That was the city, not the school district, I believe.
  
  LikeLike
  
  Reply
Yvonne Siu-Runyan says:

August 6, 2013 at 10:44 pm

OMG!

LikeLike

Reply
Ellen Lubic says:

August 7, 2013 at 12:15 am

I have come to the conclusion that many of the failing cities and school districts are being run by those who went to questionable institutions of higher ed such as La Verne, National, etc. These ill trained folks who never took the time to work their way through real university training are just not capable enough to run much of anything. Add to that those with larceny in their hearts, and you get Bell, Stockton, and Riverside in California, Detroit and Pontiac in Michigan…and on and on.

Some of these folks end up as teachers, administrators, and even superintendents. And they hire their peers…and so it goes. California State University system is purported to turn out the major portion of elementary and secondary educators, yet today I read the promo for National, and they claim to have produced the greatest number of our teachers. What to believe??? But it is worth reading the false claims they make about the abundance of teaching jobs available to their online students.

I have seen it coming for many years in California where governmental department heads are pushed up beyond their ability and urged to get quick credentials from these play-for-pay schools. It permeates American society, from the IRS to county and city officials.

In the 60s there was a rash of law schools opening all over California training non-university graduates so they could take the Bar exam endlessly until they got the gestalt down enough to pass….then they became the plethora of ‘slip and fall’ hacks that now inundate our state and overload our courts with frivolous law suits.

Even major universities have over the years watered down requirements for advanced
degrees so that now one can spend 10 or more years getting a PhD.

This is the real dumbing down of American education. We were better off long ago with 2 year teacher colleges which really were stringent in preparing elementary school teachers. And now it is TFA using the smarter of our grads to teach with virtually no training. What is going on in American education?

I look at our mentor Diane Ravitch who got her PhD at Columbia, and I can understand why she is ‘right on’about society today….but then I look at Arne Duncan who went to Harvard, and wonder if I am all wrong. A conundrum! Forgot to mention that this is called the free market…Milton Friedman must be thrilled at how it all turned out.

LikeLike

Reply
ME says:

August 7, 2013 at 1:30 am

Pontiac already privatized their water. It has lead to outstanding results:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/01/26/1058648/-EXCLUSIVE-The-cost-of-privatization-Pontiac-has-water-contamination-issues-under-United-Water#

http://www.a2politico.com/2011/06/savaged-michigan-efm-outsources-water-treatment-to-company-indicted-by-doj-for-felony-violations-of-the-clean-water-act/

LikeLike

Reply
- ME says:
  
  August 7, 2013 at 1:30 am
  
  Sorry – its late – *led to outstanding results.
  
  LikeLike
  
  Reply
  - Duane Swacker says:
    
    August 7, 2013 at 8:29 pm
    
    I thought you were talking about lead in the water supply!
    
    LikeLike
Deb says:

August 7, 2013 at 7:02 am

How does one get the general public to examine these things or to even know or read about them? I know plenty of teachers and others who are simply “too busy” trying to run in the hamster wheel of their jobs to give any of this a second thought. Others are sitting back waiting to pounce on the unsuspecting. And, there are many who absolutley give no credence to the idea that there is a concerted effort to change things nationwide. They think they are just having local difficulties, so the cretins continue to syphon off hope and funding.

The frustrating thing is that there are those, even who post on this blog, who are so pro-self that they see no problems with corporations vaccuuming up every public service. It seems they don’t even care one bit about the survival of society. I get the idea that some would just as soon that certain “types” would die off, leaving the wealth to them and their progeny. They justify their beliefs in either their interpretation of the Bible or the Constitution, cherry picking their ideas to suit their selfish motives. To me, the bottom line is that they really don’t want a society that allows for individual freedoms, except for themselves.

LikeLike

Reply
- Harlan Underhill says:
  
  August 7, 2013 at 8:28 am
  
  A serious charge, to be sure, that those who disagree with you are “pro-self” and “don’t even care one bit about the survival of society.”
  
  I’ve asked you before to clarify what you consider “society” to be and how the right to own property interferes with it. You seem to have designs on the wealth of the wealthy, and object to inheritance.
  
  The Constitution is supposed to be the supreme law of the land and to protect all citizens, yes, even the rich, before the law. I thought the essence of the American idea was that we are all equal before the law, rich or poor.
  
  Sir Thomas More says somewhere that he would give the devil himself due process in order to protect his own right to due process.
  
  I want my individual freedom, you want yours, I want everyone else to have the same freedoms I have, among them “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Are you equating “economic freedom” with legal freedom? I should think you would want to grant at least in the abstract the right of even the rich to “own” their wealth so that you are protected in the ownership of even your little corner of the world.
  
  That 40% of the wealth of the country is controlled by only 1% of the population does mean that they can hire lobbyists and attorneys to protect their interests by legislation in Washington and in the state capitals, and so you might argue that my view is naive and that true equality before the law does not in fact exist, and thus only the rich have true freedom of action and agency. To some extent that may be true.
  
  My idea is to try to RETURN the country to being a constitutional republic, governed by laws and not by plutocrats or socialists, which at the present moment are in control because the won the election. They are trying to take over health care, and just recently, the President proposed new banking rules which would effectively take over that sector of the economy too, diminishing all our freedoms.
  
  It seems to me that if we all hold freedom dear, we should work together to preserve it, but we may have to discuss first what our conceptions of “freedom” are.
  
  LikeLike
  
  Reply
  - Harlan Underhill says:
    
    August 7, 2013 at 8:46 am
    
    The purpose of the government is supposed to be to protect our rights, both personal and economic, and not to turn into an enemy of the people, as it has become. The purpose of the government is to protect each individual from being stolen from, both directly and indirectly. The Declaration of Independence calls them at one point “inalienable” and at another that we are endowed with those rights by our “Creator.”
    Either way, we conceive those rights to belong to us intrinsically. And when someone, or even the government, tries to diminish or eliminate those rights, we still have them, but the government just isn’t doing its job of looking after them for us properly. I don’t believe that it is selfish to want one’s constitutional rights. That position may violate your own personal sense of compassion or morality, but shouldn’t everyone have, at a minimum, their basic constitutional rights? We can debate about whether health care or education or even a full-time job with a living wage is among the rights protected by the Constitution.
    
    I just don’t see how it is SELFISH to want one’s constitutional rights. It’s not an excuse for being selfish. We may disagree for the moment about what those rights are. That’s the purpose of discussion, to help each other clarify our views.
    
    But it simply can’t be legitimately be called selfish just to want one’s rights, whatever they are, to be protected. I don’t think we differ on the principle, just on the question of what is a “right” and what is not. It’s not obvious, to my mind.
    
    LikeLike
Allison says:

August 7, 2013 at 11:05 am

Last November we (the citizens of Michigan) voted down the old emergency manager law as a ballot initiative. But then in December Snyder and his gang in Lansing passed a new one in the lame duck session (during which MI also became right-to-work). Its like the will of the people is nothing more than a fly to be swatted away.

LikeLike

Reply
T. McCormick says:

August 7, 2013 at 3:54 pm

Allison is correct, and “lame duck session” doesn’t even begin to tell the story. I was there with a lot of other angry but non-violent citizens, locked out of the Capital during votes by riot police and tear gas. Harlan’s idea of constitutionality has been summarily dismissed by the powers that be in Michigan. It’s easy to declare an emergency when you’ve raided the School Aid Fund (supposedly a dedicated source of money for public education) of well over a billion dollars to give your corporate buddies, leaving school systems grossly underfunded across the state. Start siphoning off what’s left of public school funds to give to charter schools, and you have the mess that is currently Michigan. Diane’s choice of wording is amusing, “if he or she chooses”; of course that is the purpose of the emergency managers!

LikeLike

Reply
- Duane Swacker says:
  
  August 7, 2013 at 8:31 pm
  
  The riot police and tear gas got to vote?
  
  LikeLike
  
  Reply
Allison says:

August 7, 2013 at 11:11 pm

T. McCormick – you must be Terri. I’m a Troy teacher. Thought I’d say hi, and thank you for all of your work this summer ( well not just this summer) and your dedication. Thanks for getting the word out on the TEA fb page. That’s how I found this blog, which has consumed my entire summer!

LikeLike

Reply