The Network for Public Education held its first annual conference at the LBJ Center of the University of Texas in Austin.
It was an amazing gathering of some 400 activists from across the nation: students, teachers, parents, principals, superintendents, journalists, union leaders.
Many familiar names, bloggers everywhere, interspersed with state and local heroes, people fighting for kids and public schools.
I gave the keynote address on the second day. It was called “Why We Will Win!” (The link has two parts.)
I can sum up my message in two points.
1. We will win because everything these faux reformers are doing is failing or has already failed. You can’t succeed if everything you do fails.
2. We will win because the tide is turning as students, teachers, parents, and communities organize to fight high-stakes testing and privatization.
Watch and enjoy!
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It seems to me that they won’t “win” when there is nothing to win. Education should not be about winners and losers. It is about kids. No kid should be forced into a false sense of belonging to a “loser school”. It is as absurd as saying the climate in Hawaii is a winner but in Vermont it is a loser. Or vice versa.
What are we doing?
I think, after many discussions within my family and friend groups and reading here and elsewhere, that the largest fight is to show the failure of private schools and to work to pass laws to prevent private entities to use tax money to get rich via private schools. To me, that is our first necessity.
As for testing, we need to boycott testing that is used for any purpose other than diagnostic. We need to boycott the gathering of data. We need to stop this cancer upon the educational process.
As for the CCSS, we need to look at it as a framework of possibilities, narrow it down to appropriate grade level student expectations, and eliminate the newspeak jargon that spews from the mouths of the trainers who have never dealt with a real child or teacher.
The CCSs has many enemies, particularly from those who believe it is New World Order. I guess Nostradamus’ predictions are being tied into this.
Let’s get real. Calm down. Figure out what is essential and what is total bs.
We are too fragmented and yet broadly connected to really tackle this quickly. Yes, much has been accomplished but we need to get a sharper focus and set priorities.
I think we could focus on what people actually want, rather than on what ed reformers are telling us people want.
In poll after poll, people say they want more funding for public schools and fewer standardized tests.
They’re right, too. There is less funding for public schools and more standardized tests under ed reform leadership. Apparently they have noticed this.
“Increasing funding for public schools and reducing the number of standardized tests students must take top the list of most effective changes Texas could make in public education, according to the University of Texas/Texas Tribune Poll.”
Opening more charters comes in dead last in this poll.
They want funding for their existing schools and fewer standardized tests. That isn’t what they’re getting from lawmakers. We should listen to them, because ed reformers aren’t listening to them.
http://www.texastribune.org/2014/02/25/uttt-poll-partisan-differences-education-also-some/
I agree, but there won’t be increased funding for Public schools if money is siphoned off and lining pockets of wealthy privatizers.
We need to DEMAND that public money cannot be given to PRIVATE corporations to start up or run for profit schools. I don’t care if the private schools are good, bad, or indifferent insofar as whether they should receive money from tax payers. This needs to stop. It should be illegal.
Let Gates completely fund his experiment and prove it works before palming it off on tax payers.
It feels as if a tornado has ripped through the heart of the educational process.
Deb,
I’m pleased to hear you acknowledge the potential benefits of the CCSS. I’m not saying that the standards are perfect; there are some expectations that go beyond absurd. However, this could be a really exciting time in education if people would stop complaining and just embrace the changes that will help us challenge students’ thinking in new ways.
That’s the reformer mantra, perfectly distilled. Is CCSS above reproach? Should it not be questioned? Are those asking questions impediments?
Diane, what is your view of (charter-based) Expeditionary Learning Schools such as the Rocky Mountain School of Expeditionary Learning?
thank you !
Thank You !!
THANK YOU !!!
My worry is that their failure – destroying schools, regimenting children, intimidating and firing teachers – is their success, since all those things facilitate their avarice and will to power.
What most readers of this blog see as a catastrophic loss of democracy and the public good, is seen as “winning” in the rapacious id of the Overclass.
“deb
March 6, 2014 at 4:18 pm
I agree, but there won’t be increased funding for Public schools if money is siphoned off and lining pockets of wealthy privatizers.
We need to DEMAND that public money cannot be given to PRIVATE corporations to start up or run for profit schools. I don’t care if the private schools are good, bad, or indifferent insofar as whether they should receive money from tax payers. This needs to stop. It should be illegal.”
I’m just talking about advocacy. Ed reformers are terrible advocates for public schools, generally. Public schools aren’t doing too well under their leadership. If they were GOOD advocates for “public schools” we would know that, because it’s been 2 decades. Are public schools better off or worse off?
Most people attend public schools. Therefore, we could advocate for sufficient funding for the public schools…. where most of the kids are 🙂
The legality of “for profit” and “non profit” is complicated. I can set up a non-profit legal entity and call it “my school” and then outsource the entire guts of the thing to for profit operators. Presto! I have a “non profit” that complies with the tax code and state charter code but it doesn’t mean “non profit” in any real sense.
I read these media reports where they write “non profit” as if that has a defined meaning outside the tax code, like it’s a magic word, and it just doesn’t. It doesn’t really mean anything, as a practical matter. You’d have to look at the books.
“deb
March 6, 2014 at 4:18 pm
I agree, but there won’t be increased funding for Public schools if money is siphoned off and lining pockets of wealthy privatizers.
We need to DEMAND that public money cannot be given to PRIVATE corporations to start up or run for profit schools. I don’t care if the private schools are good, bad, or indifferent insofar as whether they should receive money from tax payers. This needs to stop. It should be illegal.”
I think I would disagree with the focus for one reason: we have to make public school parents aware that their political leaders are not serving their schools well.
The way to do that, in my view, is not by talking about charter schools but by talking about public schools. We could be the people who don’t ignore public schools. At this point, we would be the ONLY people out there who don’t ignore public schools.
My sense is that public school parents aren’t listening for a debate on charters, and why would they be? Their kids don’t go to charter schools.
We could instead talk about their schools. How are their local public schools faring under ed reform leadership at the state and federal level? That’s the question they should be asking. If the answer is “not very well” then they need new political leadership, leaders who value their schools. When ed reform was sold we were told they would IMPROVE public schools. Have they done that? I would say “no”. That’s the measure for public school parents. Not how many charters they can open or how many public schools they can close, but how have they done by existing public schools? Not well, I think.
Correct. I just meant that tax payers need to realize that their money has not been going into improving public schools…if and when that is the case.
I have as yet to meet ANYone who thinks money spent on testing is a good idea.
Most people in Ohio don’t know charter schools are for-profit. I found that out during Issue Two (Ohio’s union busting law, which we overturned).
I spoke to many, many people who were shocked that “public schools” were now for-profits. It’s a rural area and we don’t have any charter schools here.
You really can’t make this stuff up:
“The 40-year-old Tuck is a Harvard Business School graduate who has worked as an investment banker for Salomon Brothers and as an executive at Model N, a revenue-management software company. He is a former president of Green Dot Public Schools, a charter school operation in Los Angeles, and later served as the first head of the Partnership for Los Angeles Schools — former Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s controversial education nonprofit that tried to improve 17 low-performing public schools, with mixed results.
Tuck’s candidacy is supported by the same mix of wealthy education privatizers, Silicon Valley and entertainment money, hedge fund and real estate interests that backed privatization candidates in the 2013 Los Angeles Unified School District school board election — when billionaire businessmen such as Eli Broad and Michael Bloomberg gave large campaign contributions to an unsuccessful effort to defeat board member Steve Zimmer. (The Broad Residency, an education management program operated by the Broad Foundation, lists Tuck as an alumnus.)”
Is he a parody of a privatizer, or what? 🙂
They really are coming for our schools, deb. It’s a 600 billion dollar market and they want to skim 15% off that, at least.
Other than Social Security, public education funding is the last big pot of public money that Harvard Business School graduates haven’t been able to get a slice of. They haven’t gotten Social Security, yet, but they are well on their way to robbing public education funds.
People on Social Security vote, that’s why it wasn’t privatized. Children don’t vote and their busy parents may not see the whole picture.
Just heard this commercial on local TV:
“Hello, I’m governor Andrew Cuomo. For all of us there is nothing more important than our children, and their education is everything. While the state’s new Common Core curriculum is headed in the right direction, testing on it is premature, it creates anxiety, and it’s just unfair. I won’t let our children’s scores count against them. Please tell your legislator to join me in protecting our children because education is about helping kids, not hurting them.”
YOU BASTARD!
Now that he has publicly declared CC/Pearson testing unfair will he withdraw APPR evaluations?
Now that he has publicly told the children of NYS that April tests essentially DO NOT COUNT, how can the scores be used in APPR evaluations.
NYSUT – you silence is deafening!
For those of us who have children, we have the following options:
A. keep our kids in public schools and watch them suffer with standardized testing, common core, etc. (This isn’t an option for me anymore.)
B. send our kids to Catholic schools or other parochial schools. (yes, the superstition is nauseating, but at least they will be free of testing.)
C. send our kids to private Day and boarding schools. Yes, they are expensive, but what is more important? I like the school in “Dead Poets Society.”
D. homeschool. This is weird to me, and mostly for extremists and nuts. But, if you don’t have money for private…Many teachers I know are going this route.
E. hire a private tutor. This appeals to me. The best teaching is 1 to 1, but I think you need other kids around for social skills, etc.
I am going with option C for myself. I am very happy to leave the public schools and Arne Duncan, Obama, and Bill Gates behind. I don’t have to think about them anymore or worry about their destruction of my kids’ education. My kids will never set foot in a public school again. Wow, what a great feeling. Good luck fighting the good fight.
Your A option is the TRUTH…
and the reason for this War!!
Diane’s summary is Powerful and is Spot On!!
1. We will win because everything these faux reformers are doing is failing or has already failed. You can’t succeed if everything you do fails.
2. We will win because the tide is turning as students, teachers, parents, and communities organize to fight high-stakes testing and privatization
Gosh, Mike, wouldn’t it be better if you just kept them home and indoctrinated them with your own values?
We don’t need to wait for Bill Gates to find out if his experiment worked. We already know how this will turn out. The “Chicago Boys” implemented their privatization scheme in Chile. Look what has happened to education now….
“After the military overthrew then-President Salvador Allende in 1973, Admiral Hugo Castro Jiménez was named Minister of Education and charged with implementing the military government’s vision for Chile’s educational system. Pinochet’s neoliberal dream was that the free market would optimize education and wean educational institutions off state support. Military “rectors” were appointed to the universities and charged with purging them of dissenting faculty and students. Over time, funding for public education was systematically slashed in order to create an educational vacuum that could be filled by private enterprise.
This makes sense if one regards education as a privilege rather than a need, and Pinochet did: he recast secondary and higher education as non-essential, matters for individual choice. His 1979 Presidential Directive on National Education, which set out his entire educational program, stipulates that while primary education is necessary, secondary and university education should be regarded as atypical and even luxurious: these are “the exception for young people,” Pinochet wrote, “and those who enjoy [secondary or higher education] must earn it with effort and pay for it” or compensate the “national community” in some other way……
Chile’s primary education is the world’s most expensive, yet it ranks 119th of 144 countries.
But the plan backfired. Instead, three tiers developed: the private schools for which the student paid full price; the subsidized private schools, which generally required that the student pay a small fee to supplement the government subsidy; and the public schools. Wealthy and middle-class students fled public schools in favor of private or subsidized private schools. Poorer students, for whom the vouchers were primarily intended, were much less likely to attend the subsidized private schools. Some couldn’t get to schools across town, some couldn’t afford the supplementary fee, and some students or their families simply didn’t understand or act on the opportunity. Swamped with applications, many subsidized schools started “creaming off” and accepting only the highest-achieving students—those who were easiest and cheapest to teach and who most likely could afford to pay. Government funding that had previously gone to public schools was diverted to subsidized private schools, leaving public schools with shrinking budgets to educate the country’s most vulnerable and disadvantaged students. …..”
http://bostonreview.net/world/%E2%80%9Cno-profit%E2%80%9D
A corporation listed as, 97th in the Fortune 500, has the mission, “To forward the cause of education and promote the welfare of the teaching profession…” (1) Why would TIAA’s Institute co-author a paper with the Arnold Foundation? (2) Why would the Chair of the David Koch Theater, be a member of the TIAA-CREF Board of Overseers?
Let’s ask the SEC to provide a list of financial firms that are working to abolish Social Security and pensions. The FDA warns us of threats, to our physical health. Why not warn us of the corporate threat to our ability to provide for ourselves in old age, a protection, we earned, while working?
Diane, NPE was featured in an article by Charles P. Pierce!
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/diane-ravitch-education-030314?src=soc_twtr