The New London school board voted 6-0 to withdraw its offer of a contract for the superintendent job to Terrence Carter, a leader of the school turnaround organization AUSL in Chicago.
After the “Hartford Courant” published articles about discrepancies in the background of the man chosen to be the next superintendent of the New London schools, the school board asked a law firm to investigate the claims made about Terrence Carter. Carter was a high-level official at the Academy for Urban School Leadership in Chicago, which was in charge of most of the city’s “turnaround” schools. He was well-credentialed as a reformer.
A few days ago, the law firm of Shipman & Goodwin released the results of its investigation.
It confirmed the charges leveled by reporters Jon Lender and Kathleen Megan.
It was painful for me to read. I felt badly for Mr. Carter. How many others have inflated their credentials to move ahead? I don’t find his conduct acceptable. I just felt embarrassed for him.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I disagree with you this time, Diane. This calls for more than “just” embarrassment! This was not just a case of “inflating” credentials; the man lied about his credentials, over and over. He INVENTED credentials and lied about where he attended university, and he did all of that over and over. He invented degrees! He plagiarized, he misrepresented his qualifications. HE STOLE MONEY THAT WAS PAID TO HIM IN SALARY AND RAISES BASED UPON DEGREES THAT DIDN’T EXIST. He should be arrested for fraud and theft.
He is a criminal – a liar, thief and a fraud.
Now let’s see The Courant perform the same public service that others won’t do and examine “Dr.” Steve Perry’s “dissertion.”
Brian,
I agree with your characterization of lying and plagiarism. I guess I felt embarrassed for him because his misbehavior was put out there for all the world to see. I could not take any glee in seeing him so thoroughly discredited.
If you have skeletons in your closet and set out for a high public office, whether elected or appointed, then exposure of your inappropriate transgressions is inherently a risk.
Considering his recent stints working in and studying education, Carter should have been acutely aware of the fact that public educators are held to a higher standard because they serve as models to the community, so honesty and integrity are tantamount.
Anyone who schemes to serve as an educational leader by circumventing the very principles he is expected to hold other educators to deserves to be outted and shamed. I think he should also be prosecuted for fraud, as well as larceny for the increased public pay he was given in Chicago based on a bogus doctorate.
Actually Brian, Mercedes already did just that. Maybe I will send to Jon Lender. See here:
Yes, but the crime here is that a university (so-called) actually passed this and granted him a Ph.d.!
Mary G., Mr. Carter did not receive a Ph.D. From Lesley University.
I was responding to the link Linda posted to Mercedes’ research on Steve Perry’s Ph.D; Perry’s dissertation could hardly be deemed sufficient for anything, much less a Ph.D., yet the University of Hartford saw fit to grant him one.
correction–Steve Perry has a “cereal box” Ed.D., not a cereal box Ph.D.–as if it matters! Actually, sometimes Perry himself has written Ph.D. instead of Ed.D.
I can’t believe that the state of Connecticut is allowing a school to offer such doctorates! Then again, they put that man Perry in charge of an entire school, and they were about to put Terrence Carter in charge of a district.
Mary G ~
Perry’s dissertation committee was a committee of ONE! One signature and an absolute FLUFF report of a so-called dissertation. Would never be allowed anywhere I know of. His report was not of any quality or standard. However, he is America’s most trusted educator. Excuse me while I hurl…
It is unfathomable, decent dedicated honest teachers are burned at the stake while liars & impostors are celebrated. Can this country survive with such crooks? Time will tell.
LOVE it, Brian. You’re right. He committed a clear-cut theft of service and should be thrown in jail. Maybe with 15 years, he’ll find the time to go throught the jail library system and earn a real doctorate there.
Diane, no one is talking “glee” here, only justice. I don’t take glee, but I would take comfort knowing that he would serve time in prison. It would be justice served to those he defrauded. He not only cheated tax payers, but he essentially robbed from the ultimate constituent and stakeholder here: the children.
I agree with Diane. There are people out there who want desperately to succeed but they can’t/won’t do it on their own merits. Yes, it is criminal but there’s something so pathetic about it that makes you want to turn away in embarrassment for them.
The educational deform movement is fraught with “leaders” (Steve Perry, John Deasy, Carter) with questionable degrees.
Of course this has been going on for a long time. I remember Los Angeles area principals getting “doctorates” from a place called “St Stephen’s Bible College” in the 1970s). The difference was that these people were usually confined to one or two districts and quickly exposed but now these charlatans are in districts across the nation.
Agree with Brian and Robert here. It’s time to start prosecuting this stuff. Feeling embarrassed for people (which I admit was also my first reaction) and then allowing them off easily is only helping to foster widespread corruption in our society. It’s time to start building up a more moral and just U.S. And that might mean for some of us to dampen down our natural proclivity toward kindness. And I see a lot of the “people can change” message coming from well-intentioned people, too–which I think also leads to letting an awful lot of dishonest folks off too easily. Look at John Rowland–drove me crazy to hear people defending him when he was on his radio show here.
“People can change–he’s found God,” etc. etc. Well, looks like old John is in trouble again. Time to stop coddling folks. Time to start throwing the book at them. There are plenty of folks out there with their admin. credentials who’d do a fine job as supt. in New London.Folks who actually taught and trained in Connecticut. Folks who HAVEN’T lied and misrepresented their through life. Good, decent, hardworking people who’ve earned their credentials and degrees the old-fashioned way. I know some of them personally–some of them who cannot find jobs because jerks like Carter are taking them. Enough!
Linda Johnson: what you pointed out.
Anybody else notice that “originality” in obtaining academic and professional titles and presenting them as the real thing in resumés is to the educrats/edufrauds/edubullies what “personalized learning” is to the kind of education molded by the high-stakes standardized tests promoted & mandated by the heavyweights of the charterite/privatizer movement?
It’s like trying to claim originality in ALEC-inspired legislation: “But look, among hundred or even thousands of words, this bill says [name the state/city/district] and that one has a different name. That means they’re different! Rheeally! In a Johnsonally sort of way…”
😡
And all this by the “thought leaders” of the “new civil rights movement of our time” who constantly bray about fighting against the “soft bigotry of low expectations” and insist that “poverty is not destiny.”
Think about it: they’re EduWidgets. The very thing they preach in their public spin sessions is what they practice in fact. The leading charterites/privatizers and their mad dog pursuit of $tudent $ucce$$? Public education and the struggle to ensure a “better education for all”? The former compared to the latter?
“Hypocrisy is the homage vice pays to virtue.” [François de la Rochefoucauld]
Indeed. And not even an old dead Greek guy…
😎
“Fraud is a deception deliberately practiced in order to secure unfair or unlawful gain (adjectival form fraudulent; to defraud is the verb). As a legal construct, fraud is both a civil wrong (i.e., a fraud victim may sue the fraud perpetrator to avoid the fraud and/or recover monetary compensation) and a criminal wrong (i.e., a fraud perpetrator may be prosecuted and imprisoned by governmental authorities). Defrauding people or organizations of money or valuables is the usual purpose of fraud, but it sometimes instead involves obtaining benefits without actually depriving anyone of money or valuables, such as obtaining a drivers license by way of false statements made in an application for the same.”
I’m not sure about charging him with theft, but it sure seems like he could be charged with fraud. “Obtaining benefits by way of false statements made in an application for the same.”
Perhaps, Diane, he was at one time a good person. I don’t know enough about him to know one way or the other. Perhaps he got caught up in the lure of money and power and prestige. Reminds me of a loan officer at the local bank in my home town in WV. He was the nicest man and would always help my father or us young adults get loans for this or that. But years later, he was convicted of fraud for doing something illegal at the bank, and he has been serving time in prison. I did (do) feel sad for him, but on the other hand, he did something wrong.
The CTSDE under Stefan Pryor and Dannel Malloy issued Carter an 092, admin cert, with an expiration of 2022 and then they froze it. Let me tell you this all started with one CT parent/educator providing information to the Hartford Courant.
The high priced search firm chosen by Pryor and Adamowski was a ruse. New London needs to recoup all fees from this sham corp. chosen by Stefan and Steven.
Carter was to follow orders and slice and dice up the schools with a variety of schemes: educational gerrymandering. He was to FOLLOW not lead.
See the big boys backpeddle here and read comments/view the certification.
The readers, parents, citizens are not fools. NOW they support the NLBOE they were strong-arming to take Terrence Carter….until……..
http://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-carter-follow-0830-20140829,0,4467897.story
So you are saying the Carter is the Arne Duncan of Connecticut’s governor? It sounds about right to me. Another not-so-bright official who just follows orders from those higher up.
Let’s do a bridge map here:
Duncan is to Obama as Carter is to Malloy. . . . .
No, no, Robert. Carter wasn’t that high up on the totem pole. His job was to slice and dice New London. There are other little foot soldiers in other key districts. PRYOR is Malloy’s Arne Duncan. With him on his way out, we’ll see who’s brought in next.
Carter is the laughing stock and an embarrassment to those of us who earn our higher education credentials the old fashioned way, the real way, and the scholarly and research-based way.
Next thing you know, Carter will partner with McDonald’s to create a school of McDoctorates. . . . . . Just drive right through . . . . 2 for $3 dollars. . . . over billions and billions served . . . . . .
Unfortunately this is happening more and more frequently. We now have 2 district administrators, one an asst. superintendent of instruction and the other the director of school improvement who both “achieved” a doctorate (one a PhD and the other an EdD) from online ‘universities’.
I read both of their dissertations and they were an embarrassment. I saw better writing (and more correct grammar and spelling) in freshman English essays. Their ‘research’ was laughable and little more than a regurgitation of the latest reformist talking points.
And now they are bringing chaos and disaster to the thousands of students and teachers in my district. In my own doctoral program, which I never completed (I was one of the many ABD students, LOL) I would have been counseled out of the program if I had turned in anything as weak and unfounded as these ‘dissertations’ yet both were rewarded degrees.
Such is the state of higher education today, I guess.
‘rewarded’ should be ‘awarded’ — dang autocorrect!
you don’t want to say who they are?
No Jonathan, LOL, I won’t embarrass these 2 gentlemen any further. I’m sure they will both transition back to the business world sooner rather than later and their reputations as reformist kings will remain intact.
“I won’t embarrass these 2 gentlemen any further. I’m sure they will both transition back to the business world sooner rather than later and their reputations as reformist kings will remain intact.”
REALLY? You don’t want to “embarrass” them? THIS kind of attitude is part of the reason that the ed reform agenda has gotten as far as it has in this country. Don’t want to “embarrass” them? Don’t you think they deserve to be embarrassed for taking the easy way into the profession, taking jobs away from the people who earned their degrees/credentials the legitimate way? STOP CODDLING THESE PEOPLE! If you want to put and end to this shite you need to call these cockroaches out wherever you identify them! Teachers/administrators/board of ed members are in a unique position to identify these folks most quickly. CALL THEM OUT! You’re defending your chosen profession, for goodness’ sake!
Well, msavage, my local school board is fully aware of the credentials these people profess to have attained. They also were aware when they hired, with a unanimous vote, a non-educator to be our superintendent. They cheered as he fired dozens and dozens of career educators with honest and real credentials and replaced them all with young business ‘talent’ who haven’t a clue what they are doing. This has all been documented in our local newspaper and cheered along by the usual school hater commenters.
I would like to offer myself as a sacrifice for your lofty goal of meaningless exposure here but I have a family and a future to think of myself. I am 2 years away from retirement and getting fired now for making these kinds of statements on this blog will not end the practice of hiring edufrauds nor stop the reformist train wreck that is Florida. These dissertations are freely available online and easy to locate with a simple Google search for anyone who chooses to look for them and read them, like I did.
I am not a hero here — I’m in survival mode myself and I choose my battles and weigh the good against the bad. And I trust that the total incompetence of these folks, which just keeps getting more and more obvious, will eventually registrar with parents and voters who are right now showing nothing but support for them and their reformy ways.
First of all, Chris in Florida–my lofty goal? I’m not even a teacher. Ending the ed reform scam as quickly as possible should be the goal of every teacher, administrator, parent, student in the country. The corporate takeover of public schools is just part of a much larger agenda–funneling public monies into private hands. Every middle class citizen in the country should be invested in putting an end to this as quickly as possible.
And “meaningless exposure.” I have to disagree with you here. Exposure has done a lot to advance the war here in CT. Pryor is out early. Carter has been sent packing. Vallas is gone. Adamowski has a target on his back. FUSE/Jumoke exposed. There is an FBI investigation ongoing as we speak–involving examination of some of Pryor’s emails. Exposure is the key to sending the roaches scattering.
Also, Chris in Florida–your initial reply voiced a reluctance to “embarrass these gentlemen further.” That’s a whole lot different than self-preservation. Which is it–you don’t want to embarrass these charlatans? Or you’re afraid for your job? Those are two very different motives. I’m sure many of us can relate to self-preservation.
msavage, my statement about not wanting to embarrass these charlatans was a diversionary way of saying I’m watching my own assets, to spin an off-color phrase.
These people read this blog and they are constantly going after people who challenge them, including a duly-elected school board member.
I’m no fool. I do agree with you and I am working on creating a network of retired teachers and concerned citizens that can expose and speak out about these abuses and frauds without fear of retaliation.
They can be the voices of the teachers who are threatened with termination if they attempt to bring about change.
I am with you Chris in Florida. I too am close to the finish line of this rapidly disappearing career. There is more than enough info out there for those who are interested.
That’s a great idea, Chris in Florida. Develop a network of retired educators and perhaps concerned parents. Funnel information to them about the assholes in your midst. Have them do the speaking out for you. I like it! Sounds like a great model. As long as the speaking out and pushing back is being done on some level–and quickly! Keeping quiet for too long is how we got into this mess in the first place! I remember teachers whispering quietly among themselves about NCLB TEN years ago! Yet when you asked questions, they’d clam up. Were afraid to share the info even with parents. Glad to hear that’s not the case any more.
It’s been more than a decade since I signed up to speak at a meeting of the Chicago Board of Education about frauds, often using the title of my remarks “hoaxacious mendacities” or hoaxacious mythologizers.” So without blushing many people here in Chicago are simply going to say “We told you so…” but you weren’t paying attention.
We’ve been tracking the Chicago Boys and Girls who have fraudulently wormed their way into school leadership positions across the USA despite having no teaching experience (and usually no administrative credentials others than a “Broad Leadership” training line on their resumes). Anyone interested can begin by compiling the list regularly at substancenews.net. As to the list of “doctors” with mail order degrees, we’ve been tracking that, too. Once upon a time, Nova University was considered a scam. Not any more. We used to say that people were getting to use the term “doctor” from outfits that advertised on matchbooks. Now that matchbooks are rare, it’s the Internet that advertises these scams and makes them even easier.
But the first rule should probably be to demand that boards of education stop using these cheapy “search” consultants to create the short lists for the leadership. In every case I know of where a Chicago fraud got a top job in a school district in another state, a “search” consultant was involved, and there was little or no evidence that anyone on the local school board did much due diligence. In a number of recent cases (Minneapolis, Philadelphia, Reno, and Sarasota come to mind immediately, with Broward County close), we hear from a school district after — AFTER!? — they have hired some fraud like Terrence Carter. And it’s not that hard to check a little further when these guys and gals come to town sporting their Chicago pedigrees. But in order to expose them, the Board members have to stop playing “We’ve got a rock star who knows Arne Duncan!” game and simply boycott anyone trying to find a job with a Chicago line on their resume. There are thousands of real doctorates out there and tens of thousands of real teachers and principals who don’t spawn at New Leaders for New Schools or in the Broad Leadership training thingies.
Maybe 2014 and 2015 will finally put a cap on these frauds. But it’s still be an expensive lesson for a lot of school districts who have had to buy out the descendants of frauds like Paul Vallas and Arne Duncan after they made the mistake of hiring these hoaxacious mendacities.
Msavage, posting factual and documented information has merit; so does suggesting people check more deeply.
But there can be legal and ethical issues; at what point does this become an enemies list?
I once had some teachers suggest we create a list of students people suspected of cheating, so they could be watched more closely. Imagine the consequences of that.
Who the assholes are (your word) is not always real clear.
Feeling badly for crooks? Because that’s exactly what these people are. This was the time for a strong statement against the forces of profit, not a tear!
Diane ~ I am surprised that you felt bad for Dr?Carter. I could not be embarrassed for him…I was glad that many educators on Twitter stayed on top of this fraud and did not allow him to Schmutz our profession, more than it is already. Guarantee, he will reinvent himself and resurface in a school system near us. Have seen it numerous times.
In my experience, there is a small number of charletons who think they can fool anybody and get a way with it. He received pay at the doctoral level in Chicago for years while paraded around with fake credentials, didn’t stop there and climbed higher. He was a dumb criminal! The dumbest! I even questioned if he had any higher education.
Many of our schools are run by poor, poor, poor administrators and teachers are run off cliffs. I have seen such an increase of marginally educated and certified principals, mostly in urban schools, that the entire urban education thrust to improve learning is hinged on this.
I live in a large urban metro area with many educational challenges. We have several metro school systems which are flooded with similar principals and central office positions – ruining teachers’ careers, ruining schools, ruining school systems, and routinely under SACS improvement pressures.
We constantly hear about bad teachers as a sales pitch by Reformers. In my assessment, the quality of urban principals has rarely been examined, scrutinized, but millions of teachers are impacted by them.
RTTT $$ were used to pay for such principals to receive PhDs in a faltering, under SACS supervision, 100,000 student school system, where teachers’ salaries were cut, furlough days, no $$ for schools, kids, books, TP, soap…but several Superintendents were in jail, left with GoldenParachutes, still in litigation…and on, and on!
To me, Dr?Charter was the Poster Charletons of this widespread abuse of these administrative positions. These key positions have become key positions of abuse and misuse of power. The CorpEdReformers squeeze and principals hold the choak hold on teachers & kids.
Just saying like it is in my neck of the woods.
HAHurley,
The story is the same in my district. Improperly credentialed people are swarming all over the place posing as administrators and consultants. A teacher misrepresenting her qualifications would be run out of town in a minute. There is no sympathy coming from my quarter.
My 2¢ worth…
Our teachers are being harmed by the millions of Deformers, and our children have little opportunity to experience the wonderful school experience that most of us had, kids are working from sunrise to sunset, drive-thru dinners and barely experience family life, all in the name of being 1st in the world —- in WHAT?
Given the utter CHAOS created by Deformers where in many of our schools WRONG is RIGHT…RIGHT is WRONG, we owe it to our profession and to everyone who has dedicated their career to our children, >>>> we owe it to uphold our standards. Educate ourselves to the utmost, honor true credentials and support the scholars, scholarship and research of all who are HONEST!
Actually, I think we should honor degrees and honest credentials by referring to PhDs as Dr. Just because the Deformers and Charletons have belittled and shamed our professional scholarship, we do not need to honor their non-education PoliSci & BS PublicPolicy so-called scholarship. To me, they are the enemy of our children.
Together, my husband and I have spent 85 (40+45) years in Special Education with dedication, honesty, care and integrity. We know we made a difference and still are.
Was not that hard.
As all you bloggers and readers know, it can be done!
We cannot look away and allow crooks to do this.
See something…say something!
“Normalized Crime”
Fake degrees
And fake reform
Like birds and bees
Are just the norm
VAMs and testing
Victimless crime
No arresting
And doing time
While your inability to derive pleasure from the downfall of this charlatan reveals the fine quality of your character, Diane – I, petty person that I am, delight in seeing the public humiliation of these vicious frauds, and eagerly await more – their public exposure and discrediting (ideally to be followed by indictments and jail terms) is cause for hopeful celebration for defenders of public education.
Why not award a PhD to Michelle Rhee and Campbell Brown? Now there go two really star studded rock star scholars. . . . . .
Can we all agree to only use the title of “doctor” for the medical field?
Yes, list your academic titles after your name.
I will be much more impressed when I find out your qualifications on my own.
What’s wrong with the title of superintendent, or professor?
Dave Barry once asked: “Do you feel that people who insist upon referring to themselves as “doctor” simply because they hold PhD degrees, which are about as rare as air molecules, tend to be self-important weenies?” Sums it up for me.
I have mixed feelings about this. I have a Ph.D. and if I walked around a college or university expecting people to call me “doctor’ they’d fall on the floor laughing. It’s a cultural thing–everyone’s got a Ph.D. at the university, and it’s not a big deal. People are addressed as “Professor” or by first name.
In K-12 education, however, people expect to address me as Doctor and I accept that. And when I am asked, elsewhere, “is it Miss or Mrs.” I am proud to reply, “It’s ‘Doctor’.”
I worked ten hard years for my degree, completed original research and published a 500 page dissertation. The title goes with all the hard work and indicates the acceptance of my research by the members of my highly qualified committee, and legitimate university that prides itself on training scholars, not churning out charlatans.
Shame on the frauds who write, or approve, 40 page “dissertations,” or parade around with unearned titles.
For the rest of us, in the right cultural context I am proud of my title and the hard work and achievement that it represents.
But would you yell at a 7th grade student if they called you Ms. or Mr. instead of Dr.? I had a principal do that. I am fine to call people Dr., and I’m sure you did FAR more to earn your doctorate than some of these “reformers” have done. Dave Barry is a humor columnist, so he’s expected to exaggerate. But I find his comments to be a true a lot of the time. To each his or her own, I guess. But yelling at a student about it is beyond the pale.
This is happening everywhere with the anointed/appointed principals, admins, supes and charter school founders. They get their drive-through credentials, or flat out lie that they have “X” years teaching experience and degrees from ………………
They are positioned strategically, and fawned over to dupe the public. Do we really think the higher ups who pull his strings and move him across the education chess board didn’t know he was a fraud?
The reform soup is loaded with frauds. Their darling Rhee’s resume is overflowing with lies, the same as every time she opened her liar mouth.
Keep exposing the frauds, keep exposing the truth of it all.
I take no delight in Mr. Carter’s situation; its one he and his puppet masters created and perpetrated on us taxpayers…..but I cannot say I do not delight in his exposure. Sadly, I do believe he will fall into another reform position, perhaps with students first or with campbell brown …. follow the story to the end; you’ll see he’ll be just fine racking in a great salary; maybe even Obama and Duncan will give him a presidential appointment.
The New London board and the law firm deserve great credit for outing what happens too often. One might feel sorrow for the person – I don’t – but his actions were wrong and need to be on the record. He is not credible.
Sadly after a few years he will be hired without such scrutiny elsewhere in a high position.
The New London Board of Education didn’t “out” Mr.Carter. In fact, the BoE was on the verge of signing a contract with him, an action prevented only by the timely and excellent reporting of the Hartford Courant and The Day [New London], whose investigative reporters did the basic work that the Board and the shoddy search firm they employed should have performed.
Actually, The Day and The Courant were spoon-fed the info by members of the public. But at least they did something with it this time.
Terrence Carter had to know he was part of a con game. He deserves to be exposed and embarrassed. He deserves to go to prison for the lies. He allowed himself to be a pawn in a billionaire’s game plan. because he was greedy and dishonest.
The only reward he deserves is a prison cell and lots of coverage in the media to warn other pawns of the corporate manufactured education reform movement to show them what will happen to them if they get caught spinning lies to help destroy the democratic, transparent public schools.
Do these guys really end up losers? No. If you’ve seen the film, “They Wolf of Wall Street”, the real Jordon Belfort only spent 22 months in prison and today he’s a millionaire again. He even lectures on how he pulled off his con and gets paid thousands for each lecture. It seems there are plenty of con-men out there willing to take a chance if it makes them wealthy.
White collar criminals need punishments euqal to those handed out to individuals who go to prison for decades for just having a few ounces of an illegal drug on them.
Who causes more damage?
A young man who smokes marijuana or a guy who bilks people out of millions/billions of dollars, destroys pension plans, community schools, causes people to lose jobs, etc.
Amen, Lloyd!
In case you missed the George O’Leary Sory:
Shortest tenure as a Notre Dane coach. Now head coach at Central Florida. One who admitted and apologized (with some pressure) for his misrepresentations.
Peter, I followed your link, and reading it, thought THIS (see BELOW) is the kind of statement Carter should have issued—instead of this defiant accusations of racism, internet slander, etc. throughout the last month or so.
When caught in the same fraud as Carter, Coach Leary gave an unqualified admission and apology (and it took him only 36 hours to do so):
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
” ”Due to a selfish and thoughtless act many years ago, I have personally embarrassed Notre Dame, its alumni and fans,’ O’Leary said in a statement to the university Thursday night, which university officials released today.
” ‘The integrity and credibility of Notre Dame is impeccable, and with that in mind, I will resign my position as head football coach effective Dec. 13, 2001.’ ”
“‘ ‘Many years ago, as a young, married father, I sought to pursue my dream as a football coach,” the statement reads. ‘In seeking employment, I prepared a résumé that contained inaccuracies regarding my completion of course work for a master’s degree and also my level of participation in football at my alma mater. These misstatements were never stricken from my résumé or biographical sketch in later years.’
“The statement continues:
” ‘During my coaching career, I believe I have been hired because of the success of my players on the field and the evaluations of my peers. However, these misstatements have resurfaced and become a distraction and embarrassment to the University of Notre Dame, an institution I dearly love.’ “
Carter is a businessman, not a genuine educator with much (if any) classroom teaching experience, so he made up lofty titles for himself. Even what he listed as his AUSL title on his resume sounded more impressive than the title they reported for him on their 990s.
Some new things I learned about Carter from the investigative report:
Carter submitted a case report that was dated 2007 of his school turnaround work in Chicago with his application to New London which indicated that he had a doctorate from Lesley University, but he didn’t even begin studying there until 2010.
In 2011, his biography submitted to the National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality indicated he was “doing post-doctoral research at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business and the Graduate School” –which was highly unlikely unless he had already earned a doctorate in BUSINESS.
He stated that his mother does his taxes and put “Dr” on them, but when the matter of his failure to recall his 1999 bankruptcy filing came up, he said he had a “tax accountant” who he spoke to and then reminded him of it. (It turned out “Dr.” was not listed on his own taxes but was on the 990s for an organization where he sat on the board.) Who has their mother do their taxes –especially when they are paying a tax accountant???
This guy is a pathological liar who lies so much and so badly that he can’t possibly keep his stories straight. That’s his own doing and the consequences for innocent students and teachers of his being an imposter are potentially too immense for me to feel sorry for him. He could probably just go back into business. No doubt he would be embraced by those cut-throats.
The irony of all this is that, today, it’s not what you know, it’s who you know, and business people are valued a lot more than educators to the powers that be running education. So, in a lot of places, Carter did not even have to lie about his credentials, or lack thereof, in order to get the top job in education, such as in Chicago and DC.
If a person consciously tells lies in order to achieve personal gain, then is “found out,” I think that person is merely experiencing natural consequences. Maybe our society needs to acknowledge reality and responsibility for personal choices. No sympathy here. Thank goodness for diligent investigative journalists!
I am not embarrassed for this person. I am absolutely ashamed that he was among the ranks of “professional” educators and in a leadership position none-the-less. As educators we should uphold those values that we profess to encourage in the classroom. He deserves to hang his head in shame and reflect on what he has done (and from a jail cell). How can we ask our nation’s neediest children to have honor and integrity in their actions despite the hardships of life which are often so overwhelming for them if we do not have the very same honor and integrity (and in often less dire circumstances). No, I am definitely not embarrassed for this imposter who is a biological male but not a man!
YOU’VE GOT TO BE KIDDING, Diane! (Sorry for shouting, but…)…
Instead of feeling “painful” for Terrence Carter, please instead feel pained for all the children at Barton Elementary School in Chicago (where he got in as principal without any teaching experience) or at the schools that were reconstituted under the Academy for Urban School Leadership (AUSL) — when Carter was supposedly an education expert working for them.
One of the schools screwed in Chicago by CPS, Terrence Carter and his plutocratic AUSL buddies was Collins High School where I worked decades ago when I first decided to remain in the inner city high schools as a teacher and union person. The very new Collins building (1313 S. Sacramento in the Lawndale community) was a few blocks from where Dr. King stayed in Chicago in 1966. It was created as “the school in the park” by means of the same struggles that brought Dr. King to Chicago. And it was destroyed by corporate reform and the Terrence Carters of the Barack Obama generation.
George Collins High School was declared “underperforming” by the Chicago Board of Education more than a decade ago, and the building was given to AUSL (for a “turnaround” school) and to a charter school (North Lawndale College Prep) which has not only “failed” — er, “underperformed” — but killed three of its students through negligence during a field trip!).
I was on the founding staff of Collins in 1976 and taught English there until 1978 (I also began the first co-ed weightlifting and bodybuilding club in Chicago’s public schools, but that’s another story for yet another time).
I have remained friends with the founding principal of Collins, Dr. Grady Jordan, for all these decades since I moved on from Collins to a dozen other inner city Chicago publlc high schools (before Paul Vallas fired and blacklisted me for publishing the odious CASE tests 14 years ago this month).
After Terrence Carter and his AUSL buddies took over Collins High School, Dr. Jordan strode into the building. Dr. Jordan forcefully removed his picture from the wall where the photographs of all the administrators had been displayed and warned the crooks and cronies now running the place not to use his name in that “temple for the destruction of public schools and the hypocrisy of corporate school reform” ever again. Dr. Jordan is on the staff of Substance now, both of us retired, me from teaching English and Dr. Jorden from his last job in Chicago as high school superintendent (before Chicago became corporate crazed and began having “CEOs” and such).
Terrence Carter and that whole crooked crowd he worked with here in Chicago is a major part of the problem. His frauds are just a minor league error compared with other guys like him who have won their “race to the top” by slavishly selling out our communities and foisting corporate school reform on the USA. The more well known among them begin with Barack and Michelle Obama and continue through Adrian Fenty, Deval Patrick, and Cory Booker. They were selected, screened repeatedly, and then when proven loyal dispatched by their ruling class masters to do the privatization dance on the graves of public institutions the past decade or so. Carter is part of the problem, not anyone to “feel sorry” for. In a just world, he would be tried for his crimes just as the bankers who have escaped justice after their crimes still run around.
As we’ve reported at substancenews.net (why are you so intent on continuing the blacklist against Substance began by corporate “reform” and Paul Vallas, by the way?), several states have now experienced the hypocrisies of the “Chicago Boys and Girls.” They hire Chicago’s “administrators” based on frauds, most of which are not as obvious as Terrence Carter’s. To this day, Chicago continues to export its Terrence Carters and assorted other liars and crooks. And they wind up running schools and districts from Reno to Sarasota up to New Bedford.
If some education writers and recently arrived critics of corporate school reform had paid as much attention to how the crooked cadre Chicago Boys and Girls have been swarming out across the USA (almost all of them, like Terrence Carter, without any classroom teaching experience, but with backing from the plutocracy and the Broads), a lot of suffering (and millions of dollars) would have been saved.
As I’ve reported from the beginning (when he was made CEO of CPS in July 2001) and since, the most noisome of the Chicago Boys exports is of course Arne Duncan. But there are dozens of others who have swarmed across the country without real education credentials to take over major school districts — all based on the Chicago fraud, the hope of craven school board members that the “Arne Duncan Buddy” effect will pay off, and the fact that most reporters don’t bother to check out these guys and ladies.
Carter was a fraud from the day he arrived in CPS from New Leaders for New Schools. Sadly, he gobbled down more than a million dollars in taxpayer funds during his time in Chicago, and only got caught because Connecticut, alone among the states, has reporters willing and ready to research and write the truth about the Chicago Boys and Girls.
Here’s the video of Duncan et al. in attendance at the suspected backroom deal (in violation of the open meetings act) to close Collins high school: http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2009/11/breakfast-at-ednas-backroom-starring.html
Thank you for this much-needed context. When the trial in CT began against Paul Vallas and his inadequate education credentials, Substance News was a critical resource–one that unfortunately was not readily accessible even 2-3 years ago. It has been hard to grasp the connections among the various fraudulent ed reformers and their pet privatizing programs, but now more of us are informed and we have made connections.
I am puzzled about the “blacklist” of Substance News continued by Diane Ravitch–can you explain? Substance News did the invaluable service of discovering that Paul Vallas never taught anywhere, which did not stop him from lying–even on the witness stand in a Bridgeport, Connecticut Courtroom. Unfortunately, no one was ever able to get that story out before Vallas resigned. One investigation in Substance News is worth a dozen Hartford Courant pieces.
It’s time to get the word out about Arne Duncan.
Check this out regarding Terrence Carter’s former employer, AUSL:
“AUSL’s Urban Teacher Residency program pairs recent college graduates and mid-career teachers with experienced anchor teachers who serve as their mentors for an intensive, year-long apprenticeship. During the year, teacher residents also earn a master’s degree at either National-Louis University or the University of Illinois at Chicago and state teaching certification….”–National Louis University is one of the certificate programs Terrence Carter attended; he also did this internship/training as a principal–one year of mentorship, and then 4-5 years of being a principal! All thanks to that intellectual light-weight Arne Duncan, with support from the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation: http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Media-Center/Press-Releases/2008/01/Academy-for-Urban-School-Leadership-to-Manage-Turnaround-Efforts-in-Struggling-Chicago-Public-Schools
msavage: In response to your observation that “The Day and The Courant were spoon-fed the info by members of the public.” I don’t have definitive information about the source of The Courant’s story about Carter’s misrepresentations of his degrees. But I do know that The Day’s exposure of Carter’s plagiarism resulted from the reporter’s own initiative. He wasn’t “fed” this information by any outside source.
It doesn’t really matter how Jon Lender and the Hartford Courant got wind of Carter’s plagiarism and faked résumé. The investigation proved that every charge against him was accurate. Better to find out now rather than later.
To many of us, the importance here in CT, especially for the political hacks and hedgeucators, is that parents, teachers and citizens are paying attention and many are conducting their own research.
We don’t trust Malloy, the CT Dems and the uber wealthy to care about our children, our schools, our teachers or our families.
We are aware and united so BEWARE. We are watching every move.
Diane: Mary G. was referring to Steve Perry’s Ph.D. from the University of Hartford, not to Carter’s (unawarded) Ph.D. from Lesley University.
Colin conducted more research and that is true.
But believe msavage because ALL of this started with primarily one (and a few more supporting and verifying) CT parent/educator researching, compiling, linking, and sending DATA to the Hartford Courant.
Not sure the tsunami would have happened without her.
Also, many of the CT revelations over the past two years began with the Pelto blog and news articles researched/written by Wendy Lecker, Sarah Darer Littman and Jonathan Pelto.
Vallas gone, Carter never to be, Pryor out the door, and no one trusts Adamowski, so beware Waterbury….he’s coming your way.
And next on the list..one and done Dannel.
Yes, Linda. The important thing to note about the Carter story–and the reason it’s important to note that the kernel of the story came from a citizen researcher–is to give due credit to Jon Pelto, Wendy Lecker, Sarah Darer Littman, Without Jon Pelto’s blog, and the impetus it provided for others, we wouldn’t have experienced the progress we’ve made in CT. Jon emboldened/encouraged others. Wendy Lecker and Sarah Darer Littman did the same. Pelto’s blog sent out waves in every direction, resulted in untold others doing their own digging, spreading the word. Don’t think we would have had the Day and Courant stories without it. And the citizen researcher who did the actual digging into Carter’s background, of course.
Here, here. Jonathan Pelto has been a crucial voice in the exposure of the fraud and vacuity of ed reformers like Vallas, Pryor, Adamowski, Sharpe, Carter, Perry, in addition to informing the public about numerous other matters of urgency.
I meant “hear, hear!” Sorry, it’s been a long week/weekend!