Archives for the month of: February, 2014
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#resistTFA Tops Twitter Trend

By dianeravitch
February 18, 2014 //
15

The student-led movement to defend the teaching profession is off to a fast start:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Press Contacts:

Stephanie Rivera
Rutgers University
1.732.485.0508 srrivera92@gmail.com

Hannah Nguyen
University of Southern California
1.408.644.9717 hbnguyen@usc.edu

#ResistTFA (Resist Teach For America) Hashtag Tops Twitter Trend List

February 18 – Chicago, IL – The hashtag, #ResistTFA (Resist Teach For America), topped the Twitter trend list in the United States beginning around 9pm EST on February 17, 2014, and remained there well into the night. For much of the evening, #ResistTFA was more popular on Twitter than “Olympics”, #JimmyFallon, and #TheTonightShow on the night of Jimmy Fallon’s Tonight Show debut.

Students United for Public Education (SUPE), a grassroots, student-led organization founded by Stephanie Rivera, Rutgers University Graduate School of Education Student & Urban Teaching Fellow, and Hannah Nguyen, University of Southern California Student and SUPE Chapter Leader, organized the #ResistTFA “Twitter Chat” Monday evening as part of SUPE’s “Students Resisting Teach For America” national campaign. The goal of the event was to initiate a public debate around critical issues related to Teach For America’s impact on public education. Teach For America is a controversial nonprofit organization that places high-achieving college graduates in low-income school districts across the country to teach for a minimum of two years after receiving just five weeks of summer training. The timing of the #ResistTFA “Twitter Chat” was selected to coincide with Teach For America’s final 2014 application deadline.

Participants in the #ResistTFA “Twitter Chat” included students, former TFA participants, teachers and education professionals, parents, and concerned citizens. Topics of discussion primarily focused on:

· TFA’s five week training program deemed insufficient to prepare novice teachers to teach in some of America’s most challenging schools
· The lack of commitment TFA teachers have to the communities they are assigned to (the majority leave teaching within 2-3 years)
· The concern that TFA teachers may see their teaching experience as just a stepping stone to other careers
· TFA’s partnerships with privately managed charter schools and the impact that has on teachers unions and the teaching profession

A joint statement from SUPE co-founders Rivera and Nguyen asserts, “The overwhelming response to the #ResistTFA hashtag proves that there is an enormous concern among students, teachers, parents and citizens across the country regarding Teach For America’s disproportionate influence on public education. We are encouraged to see this massive outpouring on Twitter, and we look forward to continuing this important discussion about Teach For America on campuses across the country.”

About SUPE

Students United for Public Education (SUPE) evolved out of the work of college students involved in defending public education from its attackers. In particular, SUPE was founded to fill a void in the movement for public education — before SUPE, there was no national student organization devoted solely to this cause. Under the guise of “closing the achievement gap” and “school choice,” for-profit corporations and their political representatives have sought to privatize and sell off public education. SUPE understands that a profit motive cannot guarantee a good education. Instead, only a robust and well-supported public education system — along with the courage and will to directly confront problems of racial and economic inequality — can provide a quality education for all.

SUPE is a community based organization because we know that public schools are the heart of every community. In other words, SUPE understands that in order for our goals to be reached, we must work with, not only K-12 students, but parents, teachers, and community members as a whole. We are not here to tell any community or students what to do. Rather, we want to work with communities to find what their needs are, and have them lead the way in the struggle as we work as equals to organize the change they believe is best. Find out more about Students United for Public Education at: http://supe.k12newsnetwork.com.

About Students Resisting Teach For America

Students Resisting Teach For America is a national, student-led campaign by Students United For Public Education. Although TFA presents itself as a non-partisan, data-driven philanthropy, it is in fact a sophisticated and efficiently run political organization. We therefore oppose TFA as an organization on political grounds. We resist TFA because we believe that its approach to education is not only immediately harmful to the students, schools, and families that it affects, but also that it actively promotes a vision of both education and society more broadly that furthers inequality and degrades holistic learning. Find out more about Students Resisting Teach For America at: http://studentsresistingtfa.k12newsnetwork.com.

E-mail: SUPEcontact@gmail.com
Twitter: @supenational
Facebook: facebook.com/StudentsUnitedForPublicEducation
Website: http://supe.k12newsnetwork.com

Categories Resistance, Students, Teach for America

How Cybercharters Cheat Taxpayers

By dianeravitch
February 18, 2014 //
8

Temple University law professor Susan deJarnett studied Pennsylvania’s 16 Cybercharters and found that they make huge profits while providing few services.

“Parsing the tax documents for the 12 cyber charters for which information was available, she found that cyber charters carry large surpluses and spend what she considered a disproportionate amount of Pennsylvania tax dollars on advertising, travel expenses and contracts with outside management and service providers.”

Fewer teachers. No custodians. No heating bills. No savings.

The money for the Cybercharters comes out of each district’s budget, depending on its per pupil expenditure:

“If a regular-education student from Lower Merion school district attended a cyber-charter in 2011-2012, Lower Merion (which then had a per-pupil expenditure of $22,140.70) sent the cyber charter about $17,000.

“If a regular-education student from the Philadelphia school district attended the same cyber-charter, Philadelphia (which then had a per-pupil expenditure of $12,351.74) sent the cyber charter about $8,500.

“Same cyber school. Same cyber-education. Outrageously different price tag.”

An obvious incentive to poach students from rich districts.

Two of Pennsylvania’s best known charter founders are under indictment. With so many millions in play and no supervision or regulation, bad things can happen.

Categories Charter Schools, On-Line Education, Pennsylvania

A Stunning Article About the Obama Administration’s War on Public Education

By dianeravitch
February 18, 2014 //
46

This article by Michael Brenner, a professor of international relations at the University of Pittsburgh, is a trenchant summary of the relentless attack on public education launched by the Obama administration and backed by billions of federal and private dollars.

Brenner begins:

“A feature of the Obama presidency has been his campaign against the American public school system, eating way at the foundations of elementary education. That means the erosion of an institution that has been one of the keystones of the Republic. The project to remake it as a mixed public/private hybrid is inspired by a discredited dogma that charter schools perform better. This article of faith serves an alliance of interests — ideological and commercial — for whom the White House has been point man. A President whose tenure in office is best known for indecision, temporizing and vacillation has been relentless since day one in using the powers of his office to advance the cause. Such conviction and sustained dedication is observable in only one other area of public policy: the project to expand the powers and scope of the intelligence agencies that spy on, and monitor the behavior of persons and organizations at home as well as abroad.

“The audacity of the project is matched by the passive deference that it is accorded. There is no organized opposition — in civil society or politics. Only a few outgunned elements fight a rearguard action against a juggernaut that includes Republicans and Democrats, reactionaries and liberals — from Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York to the nativist Christian Right of the Bible Belt. All of this without the national “conversation” otherwise so dear to the hearts of the Obama people, without corroboration of its key premises, without serious review of its consequences, without focused media attention.

“This past week, as the deadline approached for states to make their submissions to Arne Duncan’s Department of Education requesting monies appropriated under the Race to the Top initiative, we were reminded that the DOE has decreed that no proposal will be considered where the state government has put a cap on charter schools. In other words, the federal government has put its thumb heavily on the scales of local deliberations as to what approach toward charter schools best serves their communities’ interests. Penalties are being imposed on those who choose to limit, in any quantitative way, the charter school movement.

“This heavy-handed use of federal leverage by the Obama administration should not come as a surprise. After all, Obama himself has been a consistent, highly vocal advocate of “privatization.” He has travelled the country from coast to coast, like Johnny Appleseed, sowing distrust of public schools and – especially – public school teachers. They have been blamed for what ails America – the young unprepared for the 21st century globalized economy; the shortage of engineers; high drop-out rates; school districts’ financial woes, whatever.*”

Please read the entire article, and you will hear loud echoes of the many voices who have posted here: the demoralized teachers, the frustrated parents, the outraged students. We are the outgunned rearguard. And we will not be silent. Our voices will grow louder and louder as we demand an end to policies that destroy public education and demonize teachers and stigmatize students.

Join us at the first annual conference of the Network for Public Education on March 1-2 in Austin, Texas, where we will strengthen our resolve to stop the juggernaut of privatization.

Margaret Mead said it: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Obama, U.S. Department of Education, U.S. education, US Education, Vouchers

Breaking News! Ras Baraka’s Campaign Bus Burned

By dianeravitch
February 18, 2014 //
12

Veteran journalist Bob Braun reports that mayoral candidate Ras Baraka’s campaign bus was burned soon after the launch of his campaign.

As you know, the race for mayor of Newark represents a pivotal struggle over not only the future of Newark, but the future of its children and its public schools. And for that matter, the future of democracy. Newark’s citizens have been deprived of any role in governing their schools for 20 years.

Ras Baraka is an experienced educator who he wants to stop the Christie Administration’s assault on the Newark public schools. He wants to end the giveaway of public schools to charter operators.

This will be a mean race. His major opponent supports charters and privatization and corporate control.

Categories New Jersey

The Network for Public Education Endorses Ras Baraka for Mayor of Newark

By dianeravitch
February 18, 2014 //
3

The Network for Public Education enthusiastically endorsed Ras Baraka for the position of mayor of Newark, New Jersey.

Baraka is an experienced teacher and administrator, now a city councilman, fighting school closings and privatization. He stands strong for the children and people of Newark, not for the Christie administration and hedge fund managers seeking to disassemble and privatize public education.

Here is his education statement.

Veteran journalist Bob Braun writes about the race here. He views the race as a test of whether Newark voters support Christie’s plan to close their public schools.

Expect big money to pour into Newark from Democrats for Education Reform, B4NJKids, and other hedge fund managers and deep pocket supporters of corporate reform (school closings, charters, high-stakes testing). For more about the supporters of “reform” in New Jersey, read here. Learn about the billionaire who has made school reform his favorite pastime.

Categories Network for Public Education, New Jersey

Forward Institute: Milwaukee Charter Study Shows Effects of Truancy, Poverty, and Experienced Teachers

By dianeravitch
February 18, 2014 //
32

The Forward Institute has released a study of charter schools in Milwaukee, comparing district charters, privately managed charters, and public schools.

The findings are instructive. The 2R charter schools are the privately managed charters.

The privately managed charters are skimming, doing grievous harm to the public school system. Any educational “gains” are the result of skimming, not educational effectiveness.

 

Summary of most significant findings

1. School to school comparisons:

  • MPS/2R raw scores – We need to take into account that 2R charter schools have lower truancy and student poverty rates. When we equalize for those factors, the difference becomes insignificant. This means that the 2R Charter school type is NOT creating higher scores.
  • 2R/MPS Charters – We need to take into account that 2R charter schools have lower truancy rates and higher rate of fully licensed teachers. When we equalize for those factors, the difference becomes insignificant. This means that the 2R Charter type is NOT creating higher scores.
  • MPS public/MPS Charters – We need to take into account that MPS public schools have higher disabled enrollment, teacher experience, and student poverty rates than MPS charter schools. When we equalize for these factors, we find that the difference BECOMES significant. This means that MPS public school Report Card Scores actually ARE higher than MPS charter schools.

2. The most significant factor in the Milwaukee School Report Card scores is habitual truancy (Truancy effect slope figure). We can explain almost the entire effect on Report Card scores by three significant factors – habitual truancy rate, student poverty, and the percent of teachers with at least five years of experience. It is important to underscore that “Percent of Teachers with 5 years experience” have the same POSITIVE effect with scores as student poverty has negative effect. The negative truancy effect is 3 times that of the teacher and student poverty effects.

3. The negative effect of truancy is equal across schools. No school type counters these effects through educational effectiveness.

4. The data presented in this study along with other cited research indicates a strong likelihood of student selectivity (“skimming”) by 2R charter schools. This factor creates perceived positive effects which are overstated and unrelated to school type.

5. We suggest that school and parental bias factors are theorized to have a negative effect on the students left behind by an opt-out system which functions as a new form of segregation based on prior student achievement, parental participation, and schools picking “desirable students.”

The study reached the following conclusions:

1. There is strong evidence that 2R charter schools [privately managed charters] have selection biases which reinforce each other, and have nothing to do with educational efficacy – confirming theorized “skimming” effects.

2. Recent published research (Dr. Kern Alexander, U of I, Journal of Education Finance, Fall 2012)[1] confirms what is now known from 20 years of Cognitive Science research[2] – that people make decisions based on deeply held values, beliefs, and cultural biases – not from best information. This is critical in understanding how ANY publicly subsidized, parallel education system is based on a false premise – that people will select a school based on educational effectiveness. THIS IS FALSE. In education decisions, as in economics, people do not behave as rational actors. WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?

3. The system in Milwaukee is leading to selection bias on the part of schools and parents, which is causing predictably higher performing students to opt out of public schools for multiple bias reasons, leaving higher concentrations of higher needs student in the public schools.

4. Higher concentrations of higher needs students places more stress on a school, requiring more resources – which are not there because of funding required for the parallel, publicly subsidized schools which are skimming funding as well as students.

5. The cycle is now continuous as funding for higher needs, public school students continues to be cut. These are the schools in our most distressed communities which will be faced with closure, only to be replaced by 2R style charter schools which do NOT offer a better education for a more select group of students – leaving many behind.

This is becoming a vicious, downward spiral in Milwaukee. Current policy being debated would perpetuate this cycle through inappropriate use of School Report Cards. School Report Cards provide local schools with another rung on the educational ladder of success. They provide insights into what works, and what requires further development and investment to ensure educational opportunity for every child. Instead, there are policymakers who would have the Report Cards be used as a wrecking ball – to literally wreck public schools in our most distressed communities, and replace them with schools that do not provide equal opportunity for every child.

Policy Recommendations

1. The entire Milwaukee community (and the state of Wisconsin) should commit to a proactive, wide reaching truancy project. One place to start is the model program “Walking School Bus” which has been successful in getting kids to school in other urban areas.

2. A ten year plan to sunset the 2R charter and any publicly subsidized private schools. A 20 year experiment has cost hundreds of millions of dollars, and shown no real educational benefit or effectiveness beyond what is available in public schools.

3. Develop criteria for proper use of School Report Cards as another means for local districts to gauge successes and further needs – not as a wrecking ball.

4. Address the issue of inequitable funding in Wisconsin Public Schools in the face of increasing populations of high needs students.

5. The state needs to begin addressing the real issues facing communities in distress, as schools will follow.

 

Categories Charter Schools, Milwaukee, Privatization

Why Isn’t Andre Agassi Building Tennis Camps Instead of Charter Schools?

By dianeravitch
February 18, 2014 //
49

Andre Agassi is one of our nation’s greatest tennis stars. In his heyday, he was one of the most exciting people in the game.

Because he was a child prodigy, he dropped out of high school in ninth grade to concentrate on his game. It was a good decision for him.

But now in his retirement, he has decided that he should open a chain of for-profit charter schools, despite his lack of education or experience in education.

He raised $750 million from a group of investors in Los Angeles called Canyon Capital to open his own brand of schools.

He is not only opening new charters in Las Vegas  but is expanding into Milwaukee, Memphis, and elsewhere. He hopes eventually to have his chain run “100s” of charter schools.

Meanwhile his own model school has experienced a series of embarrassing scandals.

Agassi, who knows nothing about schooling, proudly proclaims that “the private sector is best for schooling,” because that is what he is selling. Agassi frankly admits that his schools are private sector schools, not public schools.

His model in Las Vegas receives about $6,400 per student from the state, like public schools, but then supplements it with another $6,000 per student from private sources. Having double the budget of public schools does give the “model” an advantage. Although the article says that “all” 34 seniors graduated, it is not clear how many students left the class before senior year.

One local newspaper shined a harsh light on the charter, not because it spends double the amount available to local public schools, but because of high teacher turnover (the school considers high teacher turnover a plus) and discipline problems.

Step back for a moment and ask yourself: Is America building a stronger and better education system by turning its kids over to celebrities and athletes who are not themselves educated?

Categories Charter Schools, Education Industry, Privatization

Jason Stanford: Sandy Kress Registers to Lobby for Amplify and Pre-K Testing LINK ADDED!

By dianeravitch
February 17, 2014 //
38

Everyone–well, almost everyone–seems to think that pre-K is a great idea that will help children develop vocabulary and learn the social skills to prepare for kindergarten.

But, wait! Who knew that Race to the Top, round 2, included funding for pre-K testing?

Jason Stanford, intrepid Texas journalist, noticed that Sandy Kress registered to lobby for Rupert Murdoch’s Amplify, the big for-profit run by Joel Klein (and joined recently by ex-New Jersey Commissioner Chris Cerf).

Kress was the architect of No Child Left Behind and lobbies in Texas for Pearson. He persuaded the Texas legislature to commit nearly $500 million to Pearson for a five-year contract (a five-year contract in New York with Pearson cost “only” $32 million; Texas must get all the best questions and answers).

But the new big-bucks frontier is pre-K assessment.

Stanford writes:

“Making a 4-year-old take a high-stakes test at an age when it’s hard to make them take a nap sounds like heaping child abuse on top of a failed educational theory. But at least we can all rest assured that Kress has figured out a way to get his cut of the early-education bonanza. It’s time we saw schools as a place to create opportunities for children, not profiteers.”

Categories Childhood, Pre-K, K, Race to the Top, Testing

NC State Chancellor: We Don’t Have a Music Major

By dianeravitch
February 17, 2014 //
76

On my recent visit to North Carolina, I met any wonderful people who are working hard to change the state for the better.

I saw Former Governor Hunt, who is well respected in the state. I visited the East Durham Children’s Initiative, a very ambitious effort to meet the needs of children and families in the poorest section of town.

But the most shocking moment of my visit came at the leadership dinner for about 300 state leaders. A group of young women sang a Capella to great applause. Then the chancellor of the North Carolina State University got up to praise them and added, with what sounded like pride, we don’t have a music major at NC state. We have math majors, science majors, no music major.

I was stunned. Why no music major? How embarrassing! Just from an economic standpoint (which I hate to mention), the music industry is huge and a major export. Just trying to put it into the economic terms the chancellor might understand.

If you live in NC, please let him know.

Categories North Carolina

Arizona Chief of Public Schools Makes Robo-Calls Promoting Private Schools

By dianeravitch
February 17, 2014 //
34

John Huppenthal, Arizona’s state superintendent of PUBLIC instruction, is taking part in a campaign to urge parents to take advantage of tax credits to send their child to private school. He is doing it with public dollars. But, as usual, follow the money.

.

This video contains the robo-call he has made so far to 50,000 parents, touting the virtues of private schools.

Question: Why isn’t this man State Commissioner of Non-public Schools? Why is he “State Superintendent of Public Instruction?

He should be ashamed of himself. Presumably it is his job to improve public instruction in Arizona, not to urge parents to abandon it.

But, wait!!

A teacher in Arizona sends Huppenthal’s explanation:

“Below is a letter sent to all the public school teachers in AZ this week by John Huppenthal who is our elected Republican State Superintendent of Public Instruction. He is trying to dig himself out of a hole.

“According to an article in the Arizona Republic on Feb. 13, front page headline, he “recorded a series of calls touting a program that diverts taxpayer dollars to private schools. Public-education advocates, however, were outraged at the calls, which they claim are politically motivated and inappropriate given his role as the state’s top advocate for public instruction.”

“The robocalls went out to about 15,000 families in low-performing school districts in Phoenix and Tucson on Tuesday. In them, Huppenthal promotes Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship Accounts”……(we all know that’s a fancy title for “vouchers”)……”The program is open to special-ed students, children in foster care, children whose parents serve in the military, and children who attend public schools that received a “D’ or “F” grade from the State Department of Education.”

“In defending himself, he goes on to say “I’m the Superintendent of Public Instruction, not the Superintendent of Public Schools.” Say what?!! OK that makes a whole lot of reformy sense I guess.

“He is up for re-election in the fall against Democratic candidate David Garcia, who stated in the same article, “…The answer is to improve public schools, not abandon public schools.” One to watch, perhaps? We shall see.”

Yes, we will watch this election.

Categories Accountability, Administrators, superintendents, Arizona
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