A new website launched recently to aggregate articles about education.
It is called “Realcleareducation,” associated with “Realclearpolitics.”
I have found some good articles in the site, which does a national sweep of education news.
But just like my blog, which is pro-public school, pro-teacher, and pro-parent, as well as anti-privatization and anti-high-stakes testing, the new site has a point of view. Realcleareducation, like Realclearpolitics tilts to the right.
The executive editor of “Realcleareducation” is Andrew Rotherham, head of Bellwether Associates and columnist for TIME. Although Andy worked in the Clinton administration, he is a strong supporter of the “reform” movement, an admirer of Teach for America, high-stakes testing, Michelle Rhee, charters, corporate reform, privatization, and all the old familiar memes of the status quo. Some of his clients are “reformers.” One of his associates at Bellwether is Andy Smarick, who longs for the day when public schools and democratic control are replaced by charters.
As David Sirota reported, Realcleareducation is funded in part by the Laura and John Arnold Foundation. A billionaire, Arnold is an outspoken opponent of public sector pensions. Sirota wrote:
“As part of his campaign to convince state and local governments “to stop promising a (retirement) benefit” to police officers, firefighters, teachers and other public workers, anti-pension Enron mogul John Arnold is now funding pension converge for Forbes Media’s RealClearEducation. According to a note on RealClearEducation disclosure page, “The Laura and John Arnold Foundation supports RealClearEducation’s coverage of issues affecting teacher pensions.” This appears to be part of Arnold’s larger move to fund media coverage of the same anti-pension campaign he is now waging in the political arena.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I somehow ended up on their email list– result of some data-mining somewhere I am sure. Thanks for clarity on where it comes from– Rotherham and Arnold, makes sense. It is also “real clear” why I am guessing we will never see an article there covering the Network for Public Education’s call for congressional hearings on the testing mania that is driving “reform” policy– with all its negative effects. And since hearings get at the facts of complex situations, with testimony from all sides and exhaustive investigation getting to the bottom of the matter, it seems odd that people in power would continue to turn a blind eye to the harmful effects of high-stakes testing, and misuse of the results. Except when you consider the agenda of those behind RCE, I guess it is not odd at all– it is in fact “real clear.”
See also http://bit.ly/1dqw0XY
“It is also “real clear” why I am guessing we will never see an article there covering the Network for Public Education’s call for congressional hearings on the testing mania that is driving “reform” policy– with all its negative effects.”
Yes, “real clear.” Imagine, a website about “education” with a “real clear” message of grammatical dysfunction. Oh, the irony.
Reblogged this on McBlog.
Enron? This Arnold person is from Enron? And he’s not afraid of showing his face in public? Sometimes the sheer arrogance of these guys and their contempt for plain old human decency is too incredible for words.
Why is John Arnold from Enron NOT in jail instead of trying to do to K-12 education what the tried to do with the “energy market” during his “Glory Days” at Enron?
“I don’t think I’m a criminal, number one.”
I don’t remember if he got to number two 🙂
Kenneth Lay
“The executive editor of “Realcleareducation” is Andrew Rotherham, head of Bellwether Associates and columnist for TIME. Although Andy worked in the Clinton administration, he is a strong supporter of the “reform” movement, an admirer of Teach for America, high-stakes testing, Michelle Rhee, charters, corporate reform, privatization, and all the old familiar memes of the status quo. Some of his clients are “reformers.” One of his associates at Bellwether is Andy Smarick, who longs for the day when public schools and democratic control are replaced by charters.”
Diane, as all the ultra-savvy people know, it’s a crackpot conspiracy theory they they want to take public education private.
They say it, but they don’t really mean it.
If we weren’t such idiot rubes we’d know that. They’re conducting a “thought experiment” on your local public school, and who better than this crowd to do it? They have their finger on the pulse of the working and middle class. Just ask them.
They didn’t call the Enron thieves and crooks the “smartest guys in the room” for nothing.
Well said.!
Chiara Duggan: the folks who brought us the pre-Iraq/Afghanistan fiasco called Vietnam were “the best and the brightest.”
According to themselves.
Ah, the self-styled “education reformers.” They would make an old dead French guy rethink his own observation:
“Never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence.” [Napoleon Bonaparte]
When it comes to amassing $tudent $ucce$$, the “leaders of the new civil rights movement” make a two-fer out of a one-fer.
😎
Democrats in the US House didn’t manage to get anything done to strengthen public schools, and they didn’t manage to get anything done for poor, working or middle class parents (and of course our children) but they did manage to work on a bill to get funding for building new charter schools.
Priorities! Or lobbyist clout. One of the two 🙂
We have passionate advocates for charter schools and vouchers and then we have “agnostics” and “relinquishers”.
This is why public schools are faring so poorly under ed reform leaders at the federal and state level. Our schools don’t have an advocate in government.
http://democrats.edworkforce.house.gov/bill/hr-2218-empowering-parents-through-quality-charter-schools-act
You can read some of the testimony that was taken at the “hearing” on the federal law to expand charter schools here.
To say it was “one-sided” is probably an understatement. It was a cheerleading squad.
Hearing Highlights Charter School Success
Members Examine Opportunities to Encourage Charter School Growth
Chairman Kline highlighted House efforts to support charter schools, noting the House-passed Student Success Act included provisions to reauthorize the Charter Schools Program and encourage the growth and expansion of these institutions. Read more about the Student Success Act here.
Here’s the totally unbiased witnesses, obviously a BROAD CROSS SECTION of people 🙂
Lisa Graham Keegan, Chair of the Board for the National Association of Charter School Authorizers, explained the benefits of charter schools. “Public charter schools were created specifically to advance achievement. They reflect the vision, the skills, and the heart of the team that founds them,” Ms. Keegan said. “They are intentional schools, schools built to order, to meet a need known but not met, a possibility understood but not yet realized. Public charter schools were envisioned to be the place that we could find solutions for America’s most intractable struggle to realize our children’s potential. And they have been America’s best public education tool.”
Alan Rosskamm, Chief Executive Officer of Breakthrough Schools in Cleveland, Ohio, described Breakthrough’s success in raising the bar on student achievement. “In 2012-2013, Breakthrough students, on average, outperformed their peers across the city, county, and state in every subject,” Mr. Rosskamm said. “Nationally, Breakthrough Schools were recognized as 1st in reading growth and 4th in math growth among urban charter school networks in the United States in a study by the CREDO Institute at Stanford University.”
Dr. Deborah McGriff, Chair of the Board for the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, stressed the importance of continuing the federal Charter Schools Program. “I don’t believe the public charter school sector’s growth to meet parental demand for educational options would have occurred the way it has without the presence of dedicated federal funding. Let me say that again to be perfectly clear: while public charter schools are inherently local, the movement would not have achieved its current success had it not been for the Federal Charter Schools Program.”
http://edworkforce.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=372593
In NYC the ads on tv show parents holding signs to save the PUBLIC charter schools.
Charter schools are private schools using public money, period.
This war will be won in the media which is owned by those who want to end everything important for the common good; they want an ignorant citizenry which will ‘buy’ every idea they vomit even as they buy and consume food that is making them unhealthy.
I worry that even with all the facts and information that Diane and the real educators disseminate, the oligarchs who need a stressed and stupid population will know only the propaganda they get from Fox news and clones.
There is an excellent overview of the Bellwether “partners” and their pay at http://publicschoolshakedown.org/three-non-profits-selling-out-public-education-in-the-name-of-public-education
In 2010-11, Bellwether received over $600,000 from the Rockefeller Foundation to beat the drum for “market-driven solutions to intractable social problems.”
In 2011, Bellwether received three grants from the Gates’ foundation; about $360,000 for general operating support; $255,000 for PR work intended to “shape public and policy debate on public education reform in the US,” and $600,000 to sponsor a “national fellowship program for progressive union leaders.”
Between 2010 and 2013 Bellwether received $845,000 from the Walton foundation “to shape educational reform policy.” This information is from the foundation websites.
Bellwether brags about a scheme it recommended to Boston for training its teachers and providing them with professional development. The scheme would by-pass university-based programs and make this operation as “a wholly owned subsidiary” of the district.
Bellwether claims credit for getting Rhode Island an RttT grant.
Bellwether co-partnered with another company in proposing a $2.5 million one-year campaign to change how Pittsburgh manages its schools.
Most of the information I have called “bragging” comes from Bellwether”s elaborate marketing pitch to the Pittsburgh School District. The proposal includes much more. It also shows that the lion’s share of the work in Pittsburgh would be delegated to work-for-hire “consultants” (2 consultants 100% of their time) and a hand full of part-time workers (50% of their time) with only symbolic participation by the partners whose credentials are forwarded as the main reason for the district to hire Bellwether. See https://www.pps.k12.pa.us/…/filedownload.ash…
Fair report.
Sent from my iPhone
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