Critics of Michigan’s letter-grades for schools denounced the system as a Trojan horse, designed to push schools with low grades into the state-created Educational Achievement Authority.
“Legislation creating a letter grading system for Michigan public schools is coming under scrutiny because it contains a provision that may speed the transfer of failing schools into the troubled Education Achievement Authority.
“The legislation mandates that schools with an “F” letter grade under the new system with low test scores twice in three years be placed under control of the state school reform office.
“That office has the contractual power to place failing schools under the control of the EAA, a fledgling school system that operates 15 schools formerly part of Detroit Public Schools under an agreement with DPS and Eastern Michigan University.
“Critics of the EAA say the letter grade legislation is a “Trojan horse” for expanding the EAA, which has seen its enrollment plummet by 24 percent after one year and faces questions about its long-term financial viability.
“The EAA’s operations have been heavily subsidized by private donations raised by supporters of Gov. Rick Snyder.”
The EAA is a transparent attempt by Governor Snyder to continue his effort to destroy public education in the state, picking off more schools each year.
“This is a back-door way of getting schools into the EAA without passing the EAA legislation,” said state Rep. Ellen Cogen Lipton, D-Huntington Woods.
From The Detroit News: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20131206/SCHOOLS/312060025#ixzz2mlDVvc00
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Then, I give an F to the potus, scotus, and congress.
“under an agreement with DPS and Eastern Michigan University.”
I’m not an education person, so perhaps people who are in this general field can explain this to me, but why are public universities not only going along with privatization, but seemingly completely on-board with it?
I read yesterday that Pennsylvania is set to vastly expand the “charter sector” by giving colleges and universities “authorizer” status as an end-run around local people and local school boards. Pennsylvania’s charter school system is an unregulated, corrupt mess.
For public colleges and universities, are they really not aware that THEY’RE NEXT? If they’re privatizing public K-12 ed, they will of course move to public higher ed. We actually saw this in Ohio, where the attack on unionized K-12 teachers included higher ed.
Am I missing something here? If you’re a “reformer” at a public college or university, are you blind to the fact that you’re threatened by privatization too? Why do they think this will end with Michigan K-12? It won’t.
I think universities and colleges are more comfortable with the idea that students can choose to attend or not. They are also accustomed to fever meant money being given to private schools.
Many of us are aware in higher education we are next and it is happening already in places. But not all people at universities are aware and some of these agreements were made years ago when universities were hired as consultants for turnaround schools.Diane was not the only one fooled by the large agenda. Many of us in higher education have been working on school improvement for years. I never dreamed that the larger agenda was to destroy public education, until this past year. We thought we were helping. Many smart people were fooled. Many smart people still are.
Thanks for the explanation.
It wasn’t an attack. I’ve just been somewhat baffled watching this. If I worked for a public university and I found myself as the “authorizer” for public schools being converted to publicly-funded schools in an end-run AROUND elected school boards and local people, I think I would give that some thought before I climbed onboard.
As public schools themselves they have a dual duty, I would think, preserve the “public” in public education. I know it will never happen, but how would it go if it went the other way? A local school board decides a public college is “underperforming” and “authorizes” privatization.
The EMU Regent Board is appointed by Govenor Snyder, not elected. So they serve at his beck and call. EMU faculty were never consulted, but they’re pushing back now big time. Why Detroit Public School honchos support the EAA, I cannot guess, but I do know curriculum people within DPS do not! But academic people do not run the DPS.
Let me amend that. DPS is of course run by Govenor Snyder’s appointee, an “emergency manager”, who shares his privatization agenda. Some idiots within DPS support this dismantling of public schools through closings, charters and the EAA, it is extremely short sighted.
Thanks for explanation.
They are selling out for the money. They get a certain percentage of the school’s budget (shameful) for consulting, etc. The EAA is one big pile of junk. I can’t believe any university would want to attach their name to this junk. Snyder and his friends must have control over the local media because you never see any critical stories about the EAA and many of the rip-off charters. I know people who worked in the EAA and quickly quit because it was awful. I know people who currently work there who said that many of the promises made to teachers never came through. One friend witnessed a fight with 200-300 students that was never reported on the news. I still can’t believe that Chelsea Clinton hosted a propaganda show about the EAA in Detroit. It was nothing but a bunch of bull. Who do they think they are fooling? The local people in Detroit know it’s garbage. Who is the propaganda for? Can you imagine the state taking over more schools? Don’t forget that Arne Duncan came to visit the EAA and teamed up with Gov. Snyder. Shameful
I don’t recall all the details, but I seem to remember reading in an article a few months back that EMU was trying to disassociate itself with the EAA because of the direction it has taken. By the way, the chancellor of the EAA is John Covington, a Broad. No surprise there.
EMU faculty is pushing back against Snyder appointed EMU Brd of Regents. 46 faculty members signed a letter demanding Emu withdraw from EAA. Dean of Education resigned from EAA board. Next Tues. at Regent meeting, protests continue. http://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/index.ssf/2013/12/emu_stands_by_eaa_partnership.html
I am curios about what you mean by “privatization” in reference to higher education. Is it that students can choose which schools to attend and that public money can go directly to private schools?
Chiara:
It’s important to know that many “reformers” at the university level are commercializing intellectual property and that’s why they are promoting “reform” for PK-12. Teachers and administrators are unaware of how they are used for local licenses through vendor contracts and purchase orders that are set-up at the university level to funnel royalties from the vendor back to the university and individuals every quarter for every license sold.
The UT-System is at the forefront of commercializing low quality for-profit assessments and curriculum kits using federal and state tax funds.
Start here:
http://www.uth.tmc.edu/otm/for-inventors/roalty-sharing-policy.html
Pursuant to The University of Texas Intellectual Property Policy (Policy 201), and after certain costs of licensing and patenting are recaptured (i.e. outside patenting costs), UTHealth divides any remaining royalty income as follows:
50% Creator(s)
5% Lab of Creator(s)
5% School of Creator(s)
5% Department of Creator(s)
35% Office of Technology Management
Wireless Generation, now owned by Rupert Murdoch (inBloom) and Teachscape offer huge “kickbacks” (royalties) for the commercialized intellectual property. Again, the “creators” benefit financially with quarterly royalty checks funneled to them from the university via the vendor.
Follow the Texas Primary Reading Instrument (TPRI), Reading First, eCircle, mClass, etc. to get background about the insiders who get the kickbacks as districts make purchases using federal and state grant funds that are approved by the local school boards.
The royalty generating vendors are not mentioned at the link below, but have a look at the “authors” also known as “creators.” They are university employees who get the federal and state grants to develop “products” for PK-12 on the backs of taxpayers. In addition, the “creators” also publish research without financial disclosure. The vendors promote the products on their websites and through other marketing materials as “research based.”
It’s all about the MONEY. It’s not about ethics, integrity or the children.
http://www.uth.tmc.edu/otm/available-technologies/copyright-n-software.html
I will be testifying at the Michigan State Board of Education meeting scheduled for December 17, 2013, via youtube post. I have been asked to speak about letter grade manipulations that benefit the New Orleans Recovery School District (RSD) and about the convoluted process that is New Orleans “school choice.”
The video will be between two and five minutes long. Once I know my time limit, I will produce the video. The plan includes distributing the video to Michigan parents prior to the board meeting as well as playing the video in the meeting itself.
I will also post the video on my blog (deutshc29.wordpress.com).
Sorry: deutsch29.wordpress.com
Thanks so much. I am looking forward to it. Your investigative research work has been among the most thorough I have read.
I’m also a big fan. So glad to hear you are branching out to help other states. Can’t wait to see the vid. We can all benefit from your work. Thank you
deutsch29: thank you for all your efforts.
😎
Mercedes,
Please try to incorporate Wilson’s work as to the invalidities involved in using a simple letter grade to describe complex human activities.
Duane
For example something to this effect:
“It requires an enormous suspension of rational thinking to believe that the best way to describe the complexity of any human [school’s] achievement, any person’s [schools capabilities] skill in a complex field of human endeavour [as is the teaching and learning processes], is with a number [/grade] that is determined by the number of test items [and/or rubric points] they got correct [and/or earned]. Yet so conditioned are we that it takes a few moments of strict logical reflection to appreciate the absurdity of this.”
That is Wilson’s quote from page 4 of Ch.15 “The Psychometric Fudge” with my additions in [ ] of “Educational Standards and the Problem of Error” found at http://epaa.asu.edu/ojs/article/view/577/700
I don’t think Snyder is out to destroy public funding of education in Michigan, only the power of the unions. A non-unionized education work force is the objective. If he could succeed at that without charterization, he wouldn’t be trying to move schools into a state run district.
That unions in the public sector can be toxic to public financing is illustrated by the current Detroit bankruptcy, in which the pension board kept increasing payouts to retired workers even as it was borrowing money to fund the pensions. That sort of thing can’t go on forever, and the public union retirees are now paying the price of the mismanagement and corruption they benefitted from before hand.
Ultimately, probably, all public sector pensions will have to become defined contribution plans rather than defined benefit plans, and that is the way is SHOULD be.
Harlan, I think you’re right about Snyder’s objective. Though you do leave out some important details.
First, Snyder signed right-to-work legislation in last year’s ridiculous lame-duck charade. This would seem pretty disruptive on its own.
Second, new teachers really have no choice but to have a 401k style retirement plan now. Pension reform legislation passed by Snyder gave teachers options to choose between the two plans. It’s a false choice. I asked a friend who works for Northwestern Mutual to advise on my choice. He said that at this stage of my career (18th year)that I had no option but to pay the additional 7% contribution because of the amount I’d already dumped in. When I asked him to consult for a rookie teacher friend of mine, he said 401k was the only real option. So that part is already a done deal.
Third, charterization is no guarantee of non-union. In fact, the oldest charter in the state, Cesar Chavez Academy, unionized last year. As teacher wages and other compensation decrease, expect more of this.
Lastly, the fund is crippled by the decreasing amount of people paying into it. The population of Michigan has been decreasing for years. (Snyder’s claims about stemming this tide are incorrect. Merely more political propaganda.) Second, the uncontrolled proliferation of charter schools adds to the mess since those employees do not pay into the system. Another back door way of destroying the pension fund.
Getting back to the original premise of the article,it’s a total Trojan Horse for the EAA. Students left it in huge numbers this year. Republicans say that school choice is important. Looks like one year was enough of an experience for others to choose something else. With these numbers,Snyder has to rely on even more philanthropic donations to stay afloat. But this legislation would usher in thousands more students and keep it financially viable.
Also, read the Detroit News article. Wealthier suburban superintendents say that the formula would put their already test-successful schools at risk of joining the EAA. (Which would no doubt boost its reputation with those better test scores.) Face it, this is a really sneaky piece of legislation.
Harlan, I’d suggest you try eating cat food before you recommend replacing defined benefit pensions with 401Ks.
Diane,
I can’t find your email address anywhere, so I’ll just post this news about Michigan’s EAA fiasco here.
http://www.eclectablog.com/2014/01/education-achievement-authority-teachers-speak-out-on-abuse-of-students-and-the-failure-of-the-eaa.html