This article, which appeared at The Daily Kos, explains how “Fractivists” won the battle to ban hydraulic fracking in New York State.
The Fractivists planned a political battle and a smart strategy. Education activists in every state can learn lessons from their success.
Whenever people say, “What can we do? The other side has so much money, the other side has so much political power. We are helpless.” Read what the Fractivists did. They had neither money nor political power, and they won.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Indeed,I have often described the corporate raiders of public education as Edufrackers … their toxic method is very similar.
LikeLike
On the recent Battlestar Galactica TV series they used “Frack” because they couldn’t say F#@$ . I like your word coinage but prefer the premium cable version more.
LikeLike
“Drilling for $$ in the Schools”
Testing is like fracking
Toxic the result
Wealthy is the backing
Local the revolt
Opting out of testing
In city and in town
Probably the best thing
To shut the drilling down
LikeLike
LOVE your poem.
LikeLike
The “Fractivists” won this battle to ban hydraulic fracking in New York State, but will they win the war?
As we have seen over the last thirty years in the WAR against Public Education starting with the release of the flawed and fraud of “A Nation at Risk”, progressive legislation and gains from the early 20th century have been driven back dramatically, and the war never ends. Winning a battle is not winning the war. The enemy fights dirty, and we can’t win if we fight by the rules they refuse to follow.
LikeLike
Lloyd,
Winning many battles has known to be critical to winning wars . . . . .
LikeLike
The U.S. won almost all the battles during the 19 years of the Vietnam War and we lost.
LikeLike
Yes, but what about the American Revolution (the first one. . . not the one that may come if things don’t straighten out . . . .)?
LikeLike
Why did the British Empire lose the colonies?
1. The British had to maintain long supply lines back to the UK
2. The entry of France to the war in 1778 tipped the military balance in the Americans’ favour and after a decisive defeat at Yorktown in 1781, Britain began negotiating peace terms. American independence was acknowledged at the Peace of Paris in 1783.
LikeLike
Lloyd, England also lost against us for some very hardcore tactical reasons, and that is that the redcoats insisted on protocol, marching, regimentation, organized lines and stiff, brittle drills; those trying to break away practiced very sneaky guerilla warfare strategies that too often took the rigid Brits by surprise.
The organically and fluidly moving revolutionaries were too flexible and mobile for the British.
LikeLike
I am hoping that we have the will and tenacity to turn back this corporate takeover of our public schools. It may take some time, but we cannot surrender. For the kids sake we have to press on.
LikeLike
Remember, even if the resistance looks like it is wining, as long qs the fake reform movement is supported by Bill Gates and other billionaire oligarchs, it will never end. Stopping the flow of money from the oligarchs is the only way to stop this.
Unless Congress and/or the Supreme Court acts, this is a war that might never end and the fake reformers fight dirty with bribes, lies and manipulated data.
This is a war that very well might last for generations and only end through brutal violence.
Either the 1% suppresses the resistance by eliminating those who resit or the 99% gets rid of the 1%. And I don’t think Bill Gates and the other oligarchs will stop.
LikeLike
But the least we can do, is make sure the VOICE OF THE TEACHER is there, even if the media ignores it. We must be dauntless in our truth-telling.
LikeLike
Persistence
Discipline
Never give up
LikeLike
Lloyd, thank you for the dose of reality. I understand that money is doing the talking these days on a grand scale. I just got through reading “Losing Our Way” by Bob Herbert. He pointed out that it will take a large grass roots movement to reverse the course that America is taking. The chasm between the haves and have nots is immense. This economic, sociocultural phenomenon has direly impacted our public education system.
Herbert points out that it took a seemingly small act of four college students from the all-black North Carolina A & T College sitting at a lunch counter at Woolworth’s that only served white customers along with other similar small acts to begin a huge change in the American psyche. We commonly call this the Civil Rights Movement.
Perhaps, this is what will be needed to break free of corporate control in education. Fortunately, there are plenty of small acts occurring throughout the education community which not only includes educators, but also students and parents.
LikeLike
Always the cynic, I know, but I’m not sure it was the “fracktivists” who won the war so much as OPEC felt their monopoly was threatened, so they’ve reduced gas prices to put the frackers out of business (for now).
LikeLike
The only way to win is to keep fighting, in every intelligent way possible. Winning is getting up one more time than falling down.
LikeLike
I just want to make sure I say Happy Holidays to my favorite teacher advocate. Bless all that you do. You are a role model for all of us. Happy New Year, too.
LikeLike
It is easier to rally support for clean water than for public education, which has been the victim of relentless negative hype for the last ten years. The constant bashing of teachers, unions and tenure has left some members of the public with a negative perception of public schools. Supporters of public education must work to overcome this perception. The middle class must get information about what is at stake. Most of the charter assaults have been in urban areas where many middle class parents do not reside.Greed is a powerful motivator. If the corporation succeed in the cites, the suburbs will be in the crosshairs. The parents of public students are the best allies of this cause. Their children’s future and opportunities are at stake. These parents need access to the facts, not faux perceptions distilled by corporate spin doctors.
LikeLike
Any lawyers out there?
Could a municipality have an ordinance that said (some thing to the affect)
All Non-Private Schools located in this Municipality shall be under the direct control of our duly elected Board of Education.
LikeLike
What would the purpose of the ordinance be?
LikeLike
School boards with a reformist bent are being handily installed nationwide. We have to get people out to vote for boards that are backers of traditional public education.
LikeLike
We may not be winning fast enough, but we lose this plutocratic war if and ONLY if we say we do. . . . . . . .
We all continue to make gains and push back. There are no doubt shifts!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thank you, Diane, for this critical article.
The fight’s just startin’ . . . . .
Put up your dukes, everyone. A herd of water buffalo can beat the crap out of the most vicious of lions and tigers . . . . . . Power in organized numbers.
Margaret Meade was right about a small group of citizens . . . . . . .
LikeLike
Thank you (Mr. Rendo) Robert.
I would repeatedly remind all educators and non-educators that:
“Put up your dukes, everyone. A herd of water buffalo can beat the crap out of the most vicious of lions and tigers . . . . . . Power in organized numbers.”
It is the saddest and most critical condition that we do not have the absolute truth in the unity of the leader group in educational field which composes of all of Union Leaders, all Deans in all faculties of all universities, and all veterans Teachers retired and non-retired.
This is called “Power in organized numbers.” Back2basic
LikeLike
The fracking issue is one of the reasons we got two Republicans (one of them big in ALEC) out of our General Assembly in western NC.
Funny how those concerned about envirornment are also concerned about community.
LikeLike
For sll you nay-sayers. For, sad to say, despite Diane’s daily exhortations, the typical response is, oh, woe is me, we’re helpless.
From the Daily Kos link: “And then those local anti-fracking organizers began doing something brilliant, something that, in the end, may have been the single most important tactical move in the whole war, though I doubt very few people realized its significance at the time. They began pressuring their local city governments to ban fracking within their city limits using zoning laws or passing new ones if necessary. And they began to win those fights. Cities, towns and villages began using local laws to ban fracking locally.”
Key among the lawsuits cited is that of Dryden, NY, the tiny area in which I was raised. It is small, rural, & conservative, mellowed by spillover from nearby college-town Ithaca: http://www.ithacajournal.com/story/news/local/2014/12/17/dryden-lawsuit-new-york-fracking-ban/20554997/ Yet it won; the court agreed it hadthe right to ban fracking within its borders.
Most of the ed-reform movement has directed itself to inner cities, whose residents are desperate for alternatives to violent & chaotic public schools– which often as not are run by the state & thus residents have little or no say in what happens in their schools. Yet even there, in Newark– although many ed-reform changes have been implemented– Gov Chris Christie has backed off on his support for his appointed hatchet-lady Cami Anderson, thanks to belated but persevering activism by locals (& its consequence, election of Mayor Res Baraka).
In those rural & suburban areas which are still are run by local school-boards, we have no excuse.
In NJ, I have seen even my wealthy local town, second only to Princeton in decades-long excellent ed stats, cave to Christie’s ed fiats, accepting Common Core & VAM testing without so much as a whimper. I believe Christie accomplished this with a bait-&-switch maneuver: he already had the upper hand because we kick a huge amount of local taxes back to poor schools; we’ve compensated for decades by ponying up the difference w/our property taxes. Before Christie came into office we were at the breaking point. So he has been able to manipulate by promising add’l state aid providing his latest agenda is met.
I recommend we push for Dryden NY’s MO: let’s get behind the municipality & sue the state: we will conduct ed as we see fit within our municipal borders. Particularly for municipalities such as mine, which already pays 96% of its school budget from its own property taxesn.
LikeLike
I agree with what you are saying and I believe we could start by banning public schools being under private control (see my previous comment). Again, I don’t know the legalities here, but it seems that if a municipality has a duly elected BOE that the BOE should be in control of every Public school in that municipality.
LikeLike
I’m all for prohibiting fracking in New York. But I wonder what Cuomo wants to extract from the New York Assembly for the price of his support for a ban on fracking. Many localities had already banned fracking through zoning laws – which were upheld in the state’s highest court, the Court of Appeals. Cuomo had less to lose on fracking at this point but a lot to gain on his hedge fund supporters’ biggest priority – the privatization of education in New York City, and maybe beyond. Can anyone say quid pro quo? Would anyone be surprised? Could it possibly be that a ban on fracking will lead to an increased assault on public education? Be wary, my friends…
LikeLike
If I’m not mistaken, the local laws were effective and upheld in New York due to the practice of “local home rule.” The rural anti-frackers were largely concerned about their property, and fought to protect it. One influential group was comprised of people like Yoko Ono, who did not want their pristine rural farms ruined. So, money and influence speak. We don’t have that scenario with education. But we must try the local law route nonetheless. I’m not sure the public understands the connections among the corporate takeover of education, common core testing, and their own property values. Certainly, ed deformers are attempting to exploit that connection by painting public schools in NY as failures based on test scores. School boards and municipalities need to be educated about the movement to steal public property to benefit private corporations. But I, too, like Jason fear that the fracking moratorium was just another quid pro Cuomo.
LikeLike
I wish Yoko would speak up for public schools. . . . . She and others could care less.
LikeLike
They won because the media carried the stories and the public saw the frightening possibilities
The media ignores education, and the public does not follow education which is TOO COMPLEX. This muddled complexity is not helped by the division … 15,880 districts in 50 states…. the public cannot possibly put it all together, and there is no one entity that speaks for all teachers. it should be the AFT but that is a political entity run by political people who talk a good game, but do nothing to change anything.
LikeLike
Fracking failed in NY because of lower oil prices making gas less attractive. Watch oil prices because fracking will revisit. Don’t be fooled by Gov Cuomo; he likes money. Just follow it & his motivation will ultimately reveal his outcome. That said, yes, keep the pressure on as fracking is dangerous & a waste of water.
LikeLike