The race for State Superintendent of Education in California pits veteran educator Tom Torlakson–who has held the job since 2010–against Marshall Tuck, who is closely associated with the privatization movement. A third candidate, Lydia Gutierrez, is notable in the race for her opposition to Common Core. With the unions supporting Torlakson and the business sector behind Tuck, Gutierrez is considered a long shot.
The election will be held on June 3.
Gary Cohn, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter, profiled the two men.
Cohn writes about Marshall Tuck:
“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.)”
Torlakson, by contrast, takes pride in his years as a teacher. “Torlakson is a veteran science teacher and track coach. Torlakson, who is still a teacher on leave from Contra Costa County’s Mount Diablo Unified School District, says he usually teaches one community college course every year. He was elected as California’s 27th State Superintendent of Public Instruction in 2010 after serving in the state legislature.”
Tuck supports the parent trigger law, which allows a simple majority of parents to seize control of their school and hand it over to a charter corporation. He also supports the plaintiffs in the Vergara case, a lawsuit that seeks to eliminate teachers’ due process rights.
Robert D. Skeels, writing in L.A. Progressive, rips Marshall Tuck for closing down ethnic studies programs and heritage language studies programs while running the Partnership for Los Angeles Schools. He reviews Tuck’s record at Green Dot charter schools and the Mayor’s Partnership and renders a scathing judgment.
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Diane Ravitch's blog 
You know what I would like to know? How is the Broad Supe school allowed to operate? How are the bogus masters degree programs of tfa allowed to operate? How are certified, degreed, with years of teaching experience, who get their certifications and endorsements to move up through to administration get passed over for 25 year olds who have gone through the tfa/Broad jiffy quick process? How is that allowed to happen?
I hope Tuck gets his clock cleaned. There should be no shortcuts, and when the background includes Soloman Brothers, and Broad, and charters, the candidate should be stinking to high heaven. THAT should be the voters first, 2nd and 3rd clues to say NO.
Hope everyone read the link to Robert Skeels excellent article on Tuck, substantiated with facts. Yes, Donna, Tuck should have his clock cleaned.
Voting for Gutierrez. Against Common Core got my vote. The other two are just part of the same mess.
Lydia’s Tea Party endorsements are a bit much for most Californians, I would guess. http://octeapartyblog.com/2014/04/16/endorsements-the-orange-county-tea-party-blog/.
Torlakson is the only viable candidate for educators, parents, and the public. He is not supported by the Tea Party nor Eli Broad.
I was initially attracted to Gutierrez, but I think privatization and charters are an even greater threat than Common Core. She doesn’t seem to have much of a plan, and as a Republican, she may lean toward privatization.
Ms. Gutierrez is a staunch opponent of privatization and charters. She is a strong unionist and advocates for students. However, as an evangelical she holds questionable stances on social issues that makes her unpalatable to progressives. She also somewhat wishy-washy on subjects like supporting state-wide integration of Ethnic Studies for K12. I’ve know her for roughly a decade, and while I have an entirely different world view from her, I can vouch for her record as being anti- CCSS, charter, RttT, NCLB, etc. We can fault her on the things she’s bad on, but we should make things up about her.
Like Ratliffe, she’ll get more votes than people think.
Where Have All the Flowers Gone?
As a young college grad and naive southern belle from NC, moving to Cali while my husband was in grad school at UC Davis & Cal Berkeley was an enlightenment for me, as well as a culture shock. I had grown up in the pre-Civil Rights, ambivalent, narcissistic, “be quiet and stay in your place” Old South, and “don’t notice there is another race of people being discriminated against.”
At that time in my youth, I only knew how to be “obedient” and “proper”, and put on make-up like I was going to the prom everyday. People in California were going barefoot, braless, and without makeup! And, they were not afraid to speak up to “authority”. I thought I had escaped my narcissistic roots and was free at last!
I was so inspired by the civil disobedience of the Cal students. Freedom Park was in its heyday and I joined in the anti-Viet Nam protests, I cheered on the Panthers who were standing up to racial oppression in Oakland, and I stopped wearing so much make-up. Smart enlightened young people in California were not afraid to give voice to inequity and injustice then.
I miss those days when so many young people were able to recognize a “wolf in sheep’s clothing” and were not afraid to speak the truth and stand up to those who abuse power.
During my first week here in Berkeley, while visiting with friends at a coffee shop, I met two elementary teachers who confessed they are transferring to lower elementary grades next year to avoid the CCSS testing stress. I also visited with a young teacher who is highly regarded by students and parents, but he recently resigned to become a full time tutor. He said he was already getting an Anxiety Disorder from seeing the CCSS changes that are coming in. I gave him a copy of the Common Core Protest Poster and wished him well. On the way home, I walked by Freedom Park, but the silence was eerie. There were only a few homeless folks napping.
What a pity! Narcissism is contagious! We get it from the 1%. Since Marshall Tuck’s candidacy is supported by the same mix of wealthy education privatizers that are breaking down the public schools in other states, California can expect it here if he is elected, with teachers and children just collateral damage.
California, can you risk having all the flowers gone?
Duane, Thanks for the memories…..:-)
When will they ever learn?
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx I often feel this way. I think what pushed us to the wall in the late ’60’s/ early ’70’s was the draft. As a sr in college, I was simultaneously hearing about two close friends who died over there– & a close gf’s fiancé getting drafted– as we anxiously awaited the results of the first draft lottery– panicked if a friend got a low number, guilty but relieved if fiancé got a high number (my lucky situation). This was at an Ivy League school where we’d already had 5 yrs or more of background– enough published history & news to see through the ‘Domino Theory’ propagandized by fed gov & understand we were simply cannon fodder to support an extremist viewpoint, a holdover from McCarthy days bought into on a bipartisan basis & thrust down our throats. Hence the protests.
My point: it was do or die. Ed reform doesn’t meet that bar.
However: a smaller, perhaps more enlightened branch of the same generation was protesting tooth-&-nail against apartheid in So Afr; they had no stake there. I even had a cousin, of whom I’m proud, who eschewed professorship in favor of piloting a group that advised corporations how to dis-invest in S.Africa. I like to think those longterm efforts played a part in the demise of apartheid.
The time may be ripe to engage our teens & twenty-somethings in the anti-privatization struggle. Let’s hope it doesn’t take as long as it took in Chile.
Lovely memories, Joyce.
Yes, People’s Park and Mario Savio helped change the direction of the nation…leading to Civil Rights Laws and the end of the Viet Nam war.
Your question is not only operant as to this election, but now that a second California lawsuit, this one a class action against the State of California, has been announced today (with Vergara still waiting for a ruling), and with teachers and students used in the promotion for longer teaching hours, it certainly applies to not only education, but to the values of the greater society.
Although the premise is absolutely valid, and the suit is brought by ACLU and Public Counsel, we all need to be careful of how this unfolds. Public Counsel pro bono lawyers are mainly from the biggest firms representing Broad and Gates and others of the privatizers.
The thrust of this suit is the ostensible discrimination in funding of named inner city schools, leading to students losing class time, counselors, librarians, and claiming these and other losses of necessary education personnel is not the norm at schools in affluent parts of the state. All true claims it would seem from empiric studies.
I, like many of us, have become so sensitized to the red flags of secret incursions of these privatizers that I am always a skeptic. This could be an excellent suit but I wish the lead organizers did not include Public Counsel which was so instrumental in getting Deasy’s contract renewed and in the farce of last Oct. 29 with the United Way/Parent Revolution political theater staged in his support.
O’, what a tangled web we weave….
addendum
The suit is titled Cruz vs. California. It will be pleaded as a civil rights case and generally says that the inequality defies the California Constitution.
My greatest fear is that the plutocracy gets business banker Tuck elected, then Broad/Welch’s lawsuit wins, requiring the entire California Education Code be rewritten with their acolyte sitting at the helm in Sacramento. These are dire times.
Ordinarily I would make a shameless plug for my essay on Tuck, but it’s linked in the above article, and even I have limits to my shamelessness.
It’s a primary. The real election is in November, even if a candidate gets over 50% in the primary. (Yes, all three are probably Democrats. It’s technically a non-partisan race, and in any case, California now has top-two primaries where anyone can vote for any party.)
If there’s a runoff, the amounts of money the plutocracy will spend to get Tuck elected will be mind boggling. The $1.2 million they spent against me will look like pocket change compared to that.
Yves42, tell bi-partisan billionaire collaborators Eli Broad and Bill Bloomfield who donated $1.2 million to ensure victory for “Democrat” Tuck that this is not a “real election.”
California’s open primaries mean that all candidates appear on one primary ballot and all voters of any party vote using the same ballot. If a candidate receives over 50% of the vote, there is no run-off. So this is a very “real election.” With a low turn-out expected, everyone who understands the danger of the influence the corporate privatizers have on education should get in gear and tell ten friends why it’s critical for Torlakson to win.
What is Tuck going to do to change that 45th, magic!!
CA is the most populous state and my guess is that CA has more students growing up in poverty!
He doesn’t respect teachers from the ads I have heard ! I will stick with the professional Tom Torkalson!
He’s not much different from Tuck.
I am voting for Lydia Gutierrez. Torlakson supports Common Core.
I will be telling all friends, family and fellow teachers to go vote on Tuesday and to vote for Torlakson.
Anyone who votes for Gutierrez is basically voting for Tuck. I am not a proponent of common core, however, I know Torlakson and I know that he truly supports students and teachers in California. He believes in public education, something I cannot say for the other two candidates. Robert Skeels brings up an excellent point in that if Tuck were to win & the Vergara lawsuit is successful, you can bet that any voice teachers thought they had will be completely eliminated.
Both Torlakson and Tuck support Common Core. Gutierrez is the only candidate who opposes it.
Anyone who is planning on voting for Lydia Gutierrez should read this page first, particularly the comments section. Not only was Lydia Gutierrez a Prop 8 supporter (a very hateful anti-gay marriage initiative in CA), but she has also been very evasive when asked questions about this issue and others as well.
http://www.wehodaily.com/2011/05/16/prop-8-supporter-vies-school-board-17th-election/
She campaigns with the BAT logo on her webpage despite having been repeatedly asked to remove it by BAT administrators, because she was not endorsed by the BATs, and furthermore, she was banned from the BAT Facebook page.
She is pictured waving and standing next to arch-conservative candidate Tim Donnelly at one of Donnelly’s campaign rallies.
This is not a one-issue campaign. I’m against the Common Core myself, but I’m unwilling to trade a vote against Common Core for a vote for someone who inspires so much unease in so many other areas of importance to me when it comes to what I value for statewide officeholders.
I sent in my ballot for Tom Torlackson. I would urge others to do the same.