The resisters in New Orleans have created a five-minute video about what they call the “corporate takeover of public education in New Orleans.”
This is an instance of what Naomi Klein describes as an application of the Shock Doctrine, or “disaster capitalism.”
When the New Orleans school system was battered by Hurricane Katrina, that was an opportune moment for politicians at the state and federal levels to take control of the district, eliminate most public schools, fire all the teachers, eliminate the union, and install charter schools and Teach for America.
This video is the beginning of a series created by residents who want a democratically controlled school system rather than a free market in education.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
How can the process be reversrd? Can it be reversed?
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For a review of Klein’s, Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, see Joseph E. Stiglitz’s review in the New York Times, Septemeber 30, 2007.
“There are no accidents in the world as seen by Naomi Klein. The destruction of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina expelled many poor black residents and allowed most of the city’s public schools to be replaced by privately run charter schools.”
(Joseph E. Stiglitz, a university professor at Columbia, was awarded the Nobel in economic science in 2001. His latest book is “Making Globalization Work.”)
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There is another paragraph in Stiglitz’s review that is relevant to the current reformation in education.
“Klein is not an academic and cannot be judged as one. There are many places in her book where she oversimplifies. But Friedman and the other shock therapists were also guilty of oversimplification, basing their belief in the perfection of market economies on models that assumed perfect information, perfect competition, perfect risk markets. Indeed, the case against these policies is even stronger than the one Klein makes.
––> They were never based on solid empirical and theoretical foundations, and even as many of these policies were being pushed, academic economists were explaining the limitations of markets — for instance, whenever information is imperfect, which is to say always.” !!
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FREE MARKET Education = HOAX!
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“The City of New Orleans” (Apologies to Steve Goodman, RIP)
Charter in the City Of New Orleans
Recovery District, charter Holy Grail
Fifty-eight schools and 33 thousand students
Superintendent; Fifty-eight principals
All along the dollar-bound odyssey – the charter pulls out a city key
And rolls along o’er teachers, staff, and parents
Closing schools where public rules, and PTA’s for neighborhoods
And the school yards of the rusted teacher mobile
Good morning, America, how are you?
Say, don’t you know me? I’m your charter son
I’m the charter called the City Of New Orleans
I’ll be gone with five-hundred thou, when the year is done
Playing test games with the CEO’s in the charters
Opening tests – ain’t no one watching store
Pass the paper bag with school-assignments
Seal the deals in backrooms ‘hind the door
And the grads of online programs, and the grads of TFA
Start their magic miracle charters for a steal
Hedge-funds with their pockets deep, flocking to the charter beat
And the rhythm of the jails they’ll never feel
Good morning, America, how are you?
Say, don’t you know me? I’m your charter son
I’m the charter called the City Of New Orleans
I’ll be gone with five-hundred thou, when the year is done
Charter-time in the City Of New Orleans
Closing schools is easy as can be
Halfway done – we’ll be there by morning
Through the Mississippi darkness, rolling down to the sea
And all the towns and people seem to fade into a charter dream
And the students still ain’t heard the news
The CEO sings his songs again – the local folks will please refrain
This place got the disappearing public-school blues
Good night, America, how are ya?
Said, don’t you know me? I’m your charter son
I’m the charter called the City Of New Orleans
I’ll be gone with five-hundred thou, when the year is done
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