The most hypocritical claim of “reformers” is that they are advancing “the civil rights issue of our time” by defunding and undermining public education and attacking the teaching profession.
Reader Michael Fiorillo comments on this deceptive rhetoric:
“So-called education reformers have successfully convinced many naifs that undermining public education, via charter schools, high stakes exams, punitive teacher evaluation schemes, etc., is somehow connected to social justice.
“Nothing could be further from the truth: destroying a public good for private venal and power-seeking ends, and busting unions, is inherently reactionary.”
Say I:
“Reform,” as currently defined, is a project of ALEC and every reactionary governor and free-market fundamentalist. Democrats have been conned. Civil rights is the civil rights issue of our time.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Amen.
Not all reformers are cynical free marketeers. If I were not a public school insider able to see public school realities up-close-and-personal, I would probably support charters. I’d look at the illiterate graduates of urban public high schools and think, “God, the teachers have not been doing their job.” I’d listen to teachers’ claims that poverty is the cause and think, “Ah, but why do impoverished Vietnamese kids rocket to the top of the class?” (Although, if I thought a bit more deeply, it might occur to me that the same teachers that “caused” the failures also “caused” these successes). I’d have a hard time understanding why we shouldn’t try something different.
Many regular people have succumbed to “failing public schools” narrative that has been promoted by billionaires and corporations. The pro-charter groups have spent millions to undermine the value of public education, and in reality there is room for improvement in public education. It has been more difficult to get the message out to the public about how important public schools are since pro-public school groups lack the money and resources to disseminate information.
When making a judgment, it is important to look at facts, not opinions or hype. Charter schools have been around for at least twenty years, they have been largely unsuccessful unless they are selective and have high attrition rates. There is a tremendous amount of waste and fraud in charter schools. While the original intent of charters was to be innovative, this intention has been lost. Charter school are more segregated than public schools. The recent for profit corporations have exploited too many students while they have destroyed local community schools. Fans of charters love to extol the value of choice. When they gain control of an area, choice is a lost option, and parents lose their right to have input in their children’s education. Charter schools represent a loss of democratic principles and the stability that public schools provide. Charter schools are mostly a failed experiment that are being sold to the public so a few can make money at the expense of many.http://www.nassp.org/Content.aspx?topic=The_Charter_School_Spin_Factor
Good points, but why are kids not mastering English and math at non-selective charter schools and many public schools? Poverty? Do we have a non-fuzzy answer? In the absence of a non-fuzzy answer, I can understand why many lay folks would hesitate to rush to the barricades to defend public schools.
I don’t think that poverty is a fuzzy answer. Poverty along with its inherent dysfunction is a real issue that is difficult to combat. I’m a retired ESL teacher that has worked with many poor students. Without getting too specific, these students live with lots of insecurities regarding basic needs, and my students had many family problems related to immigration. However, many of my students did graduate from high school, and many attended college on academic and sports’ scholarships. While my colleagues and I played a part, I think my students were more successful than others in schools with higher levels of poverty because they attended a well resourced, middle class school with less than one third poverty. Our schools were clean, safe, cheerful and repaired. We had books in the library and technology available. The high school ran a summer program for minority students to help them get into advanced classes. What some people fail to understand is that students learn a great deal from each other. My students learned pro-social behavior, work habits and responsibility from middle class kids that were aspirational. Our PTA did a wonderful job including these students, even if the families were unable to pay for some things. The community embraced them and helped them develop despite their disadvantages.
“Poverty” doesn’t seem like the right word, because poor immigrants (including Haitians and Nigerians) often fare much better than less-poor native-born students. This is why I think poverty is a fuzzy answer.
Success Academy and KIPP seem to operate on the assumption that academic success demands mental discipline. They create a school culture that demands this. The result is that kids actually learn. Public schools are prevented from creating a culture of discipline –they are frequently loose, lax and sometimes chaotic places. Kids rule the roost and can work or not, as they please (often it pleases them not to work). For upper class kids, this is no disaster since they imbibe a lot of intellectual capital at home and come to school inclined to work because they know their career trajectory demands it. For lower class kids (whites included!) the result of this lax culture is often opportunity completely squandered as socializing and sassing their teachers for sport takes the place of mental cultivation. To me it is abuse for the adults to allow this squandering to occur; to many on this blog it is abuse for the adults to impose the sort of discipline that would prevent this squandering. Stern teachers are conflated with George Zimmerman; ignored is the fact that the teachers are trying to bestow a benefit while Zimmerman was making a gratuitous effort to assert his power. By empowering kids vis a vis their teachers, we disempower them in the long run.
Perhaps public schools are chaotic in many urban areas due to overcrowding, large class sizes, and a lack of support and materials. I taught in a well ordered, but not repressive, suburban school district, I student taught in an urban school, and have been in many urban schools. The urban schools I know are more crowded and chaotic, and many of the classrooms had minimal materials. As we know urban schools spend a lot less per pupil than suburban schools. It is unfair and unequal for urban students to receive less support than students in suburban schools.
As for Success and Kipp, they can select students, keep class size small, and “counsel out” problematic students. They also do not back fill when students leave resulting in smaller classes in which students can reap the benefits of more attention. These schools control the environment carefully to protect their image and brand. These schools may work out for the survivors, but they cannot be replicated on a large scale.
Yes, I know that KIPP/SA skim, and while I’m not sure that’s a bad thing, the fact that they’re dishonest about it is. However,your explanation for slack and disorderly schools is unconvincing. Lack of materials? Do you think beautiful iPads will turn teens from chatting and raucous clowning to serious scholarship? KIPP/SA may not be the solution, but at least they acknowledge there’s a problem. Honestly, when I read many of the comments here and EduShyster it seems there’s some serious denial of ugly realities going on. I can understand how Diane, who has not taught high school, might see things with rose colored glasses. But teachers should know better. What is their solution for slackness and insolence? “Restorative justice”? Well, I sincerely hope so, but let’s be honest: it has a pretty skimpy track record. I suspect many people of a certain ideological bent tacitly approve of students dissing their teachers and flouting the rules. It looks like standing up to the Man. But the teacher is not the Man –she’s a nice person who wants to empower the kids with knowledge if only they’ll stop texting.
Ponderosa,
I understand your point about unruly students. But I don’t think the solution is to create a parallel school system and skim off the well-behaved students. How does that help the teacher or the students left behind? Decades ago, there were schools for unruly students; now there are schools like KIPP and SA to skim the best. Isn’t it time to deal with the problems rather than have a dual school system?
Ponderosa, your points are wrong and I don’t know if it is intentional or you are simply oblivious to the reality of the two charter chains you mention, especially Success Academy. If anything, a close look at Success Academy proves how wrong you are.
Success Academy used to open schools to offer new opportunities to students in failing schools, but unfortunately, the result were that their schools that were losing huge numbers of the students. And the students who enrolled in Success Academy already had a huge leg up since they had parents who were savvy enough to sign then up for the lottery and willing to go the extra mile and sign a contract to get their kid in the school. But that did NOT mean Success Academy would teach them. Nope, because even though they were ONLY 5 and 6 and 7 years old, the teachers at Success Academy couldn’t seem to figure out a way to teach any child that didn’t respond to their system. And given how more than half the children weren’t responding, and were basically made to feel “misery” until they left (that’s the harsh discipline you think works for 5 and 6 year olds), your contention that the school is doing anything special is certainly not backed by facts. No public school has ever tried to simply take in a bunch of 5 and 6 year olds and keep weeding out any kids that can’t measure up as they age, but believe me, even the worst schools have some very teachable Kindergarten and first grade students. The problem is what happens to the rest — which is the main problem with public schools. Success Academy has abandoned those 5 and 6 year olds who they consider “unteachable” (who are most often poor), but refuses to admit it. Instead it did very sneaky and slimy things like open schools in districts with the smallest numbers of low-income students and drop priority in the lottery for low-income students. That way, they ended up with schools with few at-risk kids that also have low suspension and attrition rates! And in their schools that DO have lots of at-risk kids, you see Kindergarten and first graders with suspension rates as high as 20% (yes, of 5 year olds) and attrition rates that are similar. Getting rid of a 5 year old who isn’t learning fast enough is not a program that any ethical school would ever do, and the fact that Success Academy is so desperate to open more schools in wealthy districts instead of poor ones should tell you that the poor kids are the ones who aren’t “fitting” in their schools.
In fact, anyone who has half a brain can see that having very small classes for those at-risk elementary school students — perhaps classes of 10 with 2 teachers — is the way to go. That’s why rich parents happily pay $40,000/year for that privilege. Eva Moskowitz adamantly disagrees and insists that at-risk 5 year olds should be able to learn in classes of 25 and 30, just like her schools, despite the fact that her schools DON’T teach those kids (that’s the dishonesty, but no one ever calls her out on her lies and I find it astonishing.)
I am all for discipline and even restorative discipline. As a parent, I can tell you that here is the difference between how a parent disciplines and how Success Academy disciplines. Parents discipline a child knowing that they will ALWAYS have that child. Success Academy disciplines a child knowing that if the child doesn’t respond stat, they get rid of him. Public schools discipline like parents because they plan on keeping the child to teach, not getting rid of the child if the punishment doesn’t work. If your child’s friend is an undisciplined terror, you can’t wait to get rid of him. If your own child is that undisciplined horror, you work your butt off to teach him. The students in public schools are treated as if they are the children of the school. The students at Success Academy are treated as if they are the children of your friends. You don’t really care if they don’t respond to your harsh tactics, because you know you can send them home forever if they don’t.
Having worked with many diverse students over the years, I generally solved my own discipline issues by being somewhat flexible. Sure, we had rules and consequences that worked for 90%. For the other 10%, I often had to figure out a plan. I have seen a few conduct disorder students placed in the class with very strict teacher that had previously taught in the South Bronx. The student was removed from the class because the teacher and student were about to kill each other. Even with discipline, one size does not always fit all.
Ponderosa – the majority of immigrants to this country are pretty affluent, especially compared to their home country – that’s how they had the resources to get here. The exceptions are the handfuls of refugees that the U.S. takes in, and many of those kids (like an awful lot of the Lost Boys, for instance) don’t do well. They’ve had far too much trauma and chaos in their lives. Those refugees who do make it have had intensive support services and opportunities since they set foot in the country.
And your comparison further down stream of Vietnamese immigrants to blacks is patently offensive. Vietnamese people haven’t been the victims of 400+ years of slavery, Jim Crow and on-going racism and discrimination. Knock it off with the model minority myth – it’s harmful not only to blacks but to Asians as well.
I appreciate the thoughtful responses. I like Diane’s idea about skimming out the most disruptive instead of the least disruptive as KIPP/SA do. Unfortunately, the trend in public schools is to eliminate suspensions and expulsions, and run away screaming from anything that might have a disparate impact on minority groups –I imagine that would include reform school. In this way I think a misguided political correctness is hurting the cause of public schools. I believe NYC Parent when she says that the KIPP/SA high-discipline model failed to work with difficult 5 and 6 year olds. But public schools are failing to educate most of these kids too (and these kids’ behaviors are diminishing the other kids’ educations). They get passed along from grade to grade, each year falling further and further behind. Often the bad behaviors intensify over this time as they become more and more disaffected. You hypothesize that tiny class size is the answer. This does seem like it would be a step in the right direction, though I’m not sure anyone really knows. Research on France’s early childhood education system shows that these kids would benefit from a huge knowledge infusion at an early age to parallel what professionals’ kids get in the home: this points to the need for curriculum reform. Dienne may be right that the high-achieving immigrants’ success relative to native-born Americans may be due to their home country social class –perhaps that is true. Thus it would be social class, not poverty, that accounts for the achievement gap. However Dienne was confusing my own views with those of the hypothetical education outsider who was using his own eyes to size up the public schools. Such a person, trying to be empirical, might reasonably wonder about this phenomenon of the Vietnamese gardener’s daughter being #1 in her high school class, don’t you think? Dienne’s hypothesis that 400 years of racism may account for lower achievement has a ring of plausibility, but I don’t think it’s self-evident nor has it been established as fact. It’s a decent hypothesis. My hunch is that that’s not the whole truth.
Ponderosa,
I don’t believe in expelling unruly students or putting them in schools for the unruly. I do believe that administrators should devise strategies to help them calm down and not let them disrupt others who want to learn.
The original idea of charters was not to skim off the best students but to take the least motivated, most disengaged students and come up with answers to helping them, then share those good ideas with public schools.
Ponderosa, I did not say that certain so-called “successful” charter schools can’t teach “unruly” 5 and 6 year olds. I said 5 and 6 year olds in charter schools who can’t be taught by the most inexperienced teachers in the cheapest possible way are made to feel misery until they leave. Calling so many young children “unruly” is a sign that something is wrong with your school. As any parent knows, the wrong way to teach a struggling child is to make him feel stressed until he learns it, because it will often just backfire. The way to teach a struggling child is to understand that children respond to all different kinds of teaching methods, as most experienced teachers know. But the young ones think if they just keep using the same method over and over again with “more discipline”, the child should miraculously get it.
If the only successful charter model is that 40% or 50% or 60% of AT RISK 7 or 8 year olds are “unruly” because they aren’t responding to their methods, then I guarantee you it is the methods, not the children. The fact that a charter school is politically connected enough to get rid of many of those “unruly” at-risk children and then pretend they have a “secret sauce” to educate at-risk students (for less money!) and are able to garner millions in donations on that false claim — sorry, but I find that terrible. Do you?
Ponderosa:
I heard you well.
You wrote ;”” “Ah, but why do impoverished Vietnamese kids rocket to the top of the class?” “”
I am ever surprised that you are a teacher because the way you sound as if you have never been an ACADEMIC student, LEFT ALONE YOU ARE A TEACHER.
Let’s get back to the VERY BASIC time and money management in order to acknowledge that besides time and money, there is an utmost important factor of the INDIVIDUAL state of mind and spirit regardless of race, gender, class, and parental background from a specific person, NOT a generic NATIONALITY that would greatly impact on specific person’s success. Back2basic
Ponderosa, please note that I didn’t say all so-called education reformers are cynical free marketeers. Those funding so-called reform are cynical beyond description but, as I said in my initial comment, most are naive.
Is Ponderosa cynical or naive? I find it very telling that the two charter schools he cited as models for teaching at-risk kids (Success Academy and Kipp) are the same ones that the free marketers cite and are propped up by many millions in hedge fund donations (as well as right-wing foundations who want to privatize education). In fact, Kipp did seem to stop getting rid of so many at-risk students, and as a result — in NYC at least — their 2 charter school’s lower elementary grade test scores are far below average compared to NYC public schools. And Success Academy schools with the best test results are either losing huge swaths of low-income students, or in the case of Success Academy Upper West, their new “flagship”, mysteriously never had very many low-income students in the first place. There may be an extremely limited value for charter schools to cherrypick the easiest students and teach them, but given how much their costs are subsidized by many, many, many millions of dollars, it is clear that the charter school’s very high cost of teaching the easiest students would be far better spent on teaching the most difficult ones. But it will not be as profitable for the charter chains, and their “profit” is what pays their administrators very high salaries despite the “non-profit” label.
What’s the reform plan for all of the urban poor students, or non English speakers, or disruptive students? Austerity in education won’t work. Pay now or pay later. Why does the Dept. of Ed give funding to states that underfund education? That would be one obvious role for the federal gov. If the civil right to an education is violated in Michigan or Arizona, why does the federal gov. give them any money?
How convenient for the proponents of charter schools to forget about our most challenging, vulnerable and expensive to educate!
Hi Diane,
Do you think you’d be able to convince any of the current pool of democratic candidates of this? Hillary? Bernie Sanders? Is there any hope that anyone can see things from this perspective?
Best regards,
Mira Karabin
Hartsdale, NY
Hillary has stated in a conference with teachers that she supports the Common Core. Therefore she is demonstrating that she cog in the machinery of politics rather than a free thinking human being. I’m saddened.
She also thinks it comes down to “unions” vs. “reformers”, as if there are only two sides that break down that neatly. Nevermind that most union leaders are in bed with the rephormers.
I beg those of you who can possibly get a copy of the NATION, June 15th edition and read what is going on, not just in education but the mindset that seems to be permeating our society. Look at what is happening TO our nation. It is terrifying. As educators, not just teachers nor instructors it is vital to see the big picture of what is happening to society, and to think deeply about what our role in it should be.
It is NOT an overstatement that so many workers now are virtual slaves to the moneyed interests. People who are timed to the second, like human robots leading to grievous health problems et al. “Do this faster or get fired”.
Public education is a part of this mindset. Children are expected to assimilate “facts” unquestioned. Accept what people tell them, do it without thinking. You are a widget, a cog in the industrial nightmare where money supplants people in importance. This is HORRENDOUS for a so called democratic society. Fascist societies do this, not democracies.
One article alone on what has happened here in Indiana, p. 31, is worthy of your time to read.
Much of the magazine has to do with technological issues. This was dealt with in this blog a day or two ago. Also, A day or two ago in this blog it was mentioned that young teachers today entering the “profession” do not even question the loss of the art of teaching but as this is all they know, the teach that which politicians promote as “truth” rather than what has traditionally been the case, scholarship by our best thinkers and scholars. Don’t question authority, just do what you are told.
THAT is a road to perdition.
“Checks and (bank) Balances”
(Federalist Numero Uno)
The wealthy class must lead
Our leaders must wear tweed
The men of means
Must be the deans
Deciding what we need
“Contempt for Democracy”
They don’t believe in democracy
In fact, they have contempt
For any vote by you and me
From which they act exempt
“Rooting out Democracy”
Public education
Democracy in action
Demands eradication
By oligarchic faction
From “A Damthology of Deform”
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Texas Education.
The Washington Post editorial board neglects to mention that the one and only reason the Common Core testing was questioned at all is because parents and teachers (loudly) objected:
“The Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC), the consortium that developed the tests used in the District, Maryland and 10 other states, voted last month to shave 90 minutes off the approximate 10-hour annual tests and to shift the testing to later in the school year. This was the first year for the tests, and while they were generally praised as a more effective measure of student learning, there were complaints about the length of time they took and disruption caused by spreading the tests over two months, one in early spring and one in late spring. The revamped tests will take effect with the 2015-2016 school year, and officials say the changes won’t diminish the ability to gauge student achievement. ”
What would it take for ed reformers to object to this test? 15 hours? 20 hours?
I love the passive phrasing, too: “there were complaints”. 🙂
Maybe they need a catchy slogan, 8 1/2 hrs of uselessness is better than 10. Who could resist that?
What parent in his right mind would support testing to the exclusion of learning. The amount of testing is absurd. Who would support a test that is designed to fail two thirds of the students? We just can’t give students a test that is above their grade level and call it “raising standards.” I would call it an inappropriate, invalid test.
The newspapers have been paid off and or the reporters are too young and inexperienced with children themselves to understand this reform goes against human nature and healthy child development.
Illinois Guv Bruce Rauner is also on the “Corporate Reform = Social Justice’ bandwagon.
In the 2012 video below, a pre-governorship Rauner blathers about the “tragedy” in Chicago that “hundreds of thousands of students” have been having their “futures damaged” simply because they are not yet attending privatized, non-union charter schools, instead of those traditional public schools filled with corrupt incompetent union thug teachers.
CLASSIC, MUST-BE-SEEN VIDEO … trust me on this, folks. (long post, but you’ll enjoy it)
http://chicagotonight.wttw.com/2012/09/19/mayors-adviser-attacks-ctu
It’s from an incendiary 2012 TV forum back when Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner was merely Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s “advisor”, (though back then he was hinting at his eventual run for governor in 2014).
He’s appearing with Chicago Teachers Union Vice-President Jesse Sharkey, pinch-hitting for CTU President Karen Lewis (perhaps Rauner didn’t want to share the same news desk with Karen… who knows?).
It’s from Chicago’s PBS affiliate’s show “CHICAGO TONIGHT,” moderated by Chicago TV news veteran Carol Marin, who was awesome. At the time, she was indirectly employed by Rauner at the Chicago Sun-Times newspaper, where Marin also worked, and of which Rauner was part owner. Rauner did not happy getting grilled by one of his underlings like that.
http://chicagotonight.wttw.com/2012/09/19/mayors-adviser-attacks-ctu
When asked why he thinks that 75% of Chicagoans supported CTU in the recent strike, Rauner basically implies the parents and general public are simply too stupid or at least too gullible, so they got taken in by union “misinformation”, and cannot realize how evil teachers’ unions are.
———————————
( 02:26 – 03:00 )
CAROL MARIN: “And yet, there were parents standing with teachers on the picket lines. What meaning do you take from that?”
BRUCE RAUNER: “That the union has been… uhh… aggressively marketing and running a huge PR campaign of misinformation. Many parents don’t really understand what’s going on inside their schools As long as their child feels safe, and their… their teacher is a pleasant person, they think things are all right. The tragedy… the tragedy is … uhh… hundreds of thousands of children in the Chicago Public Schools are receiving an inadequate education, and their futures are being damaged because of it.”
———————————-
Really, Bruce? “A tragedy” for “hundreds of thousands of children” who are having “their futures damaged”? Exaggerate much? And your claim that the parents are too gullible or too obtuse to see through, or resist manipulation at the hands of their kids’ teachers? You basically just called all those parents idiots.
Bruce, those parents are the folks who talk to their kids every ding-dong day about what’s going on in their kids’ schools… at the breakfast table… at the dinner table… in the car rides to and from school… or whenever. Those parents whose mental faculties you deride are the same folks who regularly meet with teachers in conferences, monitor their kids’ education. review their report cars, etc.. Some even volunteer as unpaid aides, or visit their schools in session, then talk among each other, share their opinion, compare notes on their kids’ teachers, administrators, etc…. and on and on…
Seriously, Bruce? You think that ALL those parents—hundreds of thousands of them–with all that information and first-hand experience and second-hand info from their kids and others, are just wrong, wrong, wrong… and that you and your corporate reform allies know better than them what’s good for their kids, that they need a right-wing consciousness raising so they can face the “tragedy” that their kids’ teachers are all scum, as are their schools?
Am I hearing your right?
Wow… is all I have to say to that one.
Jesse then lays him out:
( 03:05 – 03:42)
JESSE SHARKEY: “I’m both a public school parent—I have two students in the schools— and am a twelve year teacher, and was publicly elected democratically by the members our union. It’s ironic that someone who is a billionaire, whose interests in the schools aren’t based on his long-standing work in that school system—talking about how what’s ruining the schools—in contrast to the very people who work in those schools every day, who pour their heart and soul into the public education and their students every day. Frankly, if you want to know what’s wrong the public education system, it’s been a series of efforts with corporate or top-down reform that don’t take the opinions of the actual educators into account.”
————————————
I don’t have time to transcribe all this, but the moderator Carol Marin then accuses Rauner of constantly using extreme and “inflammatory rhetoric” against teachers and their unions. She reads back and quotes from some of his indescribably vicious prior statements that damn the vast majority of Chicago’s teachers with a broad brush.
Rauner awkwardly responds by saying “This is a war with huge stakes,” but clarifies that, in contrast to the quotes just heard from himself and from Sharkey, that Rauner is actually “an advocate and supporter of teachers… a huge advocate…” and cites his philanthropic donations to schools as proof.
Really? “An advocate and supporter… a huge advocate…”? In your “hundreds of thousands of students being damaged” quote a little earlier show itself, you just implicitly accused the overwhelming majority of teachers of being greedy, dishonest, and incompetent union thugs… and then, on top of that, you just declared “war” on all of them… but yet, you still maintain that you’re “a huge advocate” of teachers?
The mind boggles.
But here’s where it gets good, REALLY good.
My hat’s off to Carol Marin for provoking the riveting exchange in the transcript below. Finally, somebody from the media is doing their freakin’ job!
First, a little background:
Keep in mind that Chicago is a huge union town… from the private sector unions of pipe fitters and electricians to the public sector unions of police, nurses, firefighters, etc. … and that even non-union folks vigorously and overwhelmingly support unions and their members. Further keep in mind that Rauner’s a plutocrat who embraces an extreme right-wing ideology, and thus, hates all unions, and everyone of their members.
Of course, Rauner and his ilk (i.e. Scott Walker) wants them all crushed—public and private. Just like Walker, Rauner’s plan is to go after teachers first, then the rest of public and private union members after. To quote Walker, “You just divide and conquer.” See that quote from Walker here as he blabs this strategy to a female Wisconsin billionaire supporter:
Any-hoo, back to Rauner in 2012.
However, Rauner can’t dare SAY or ADMIT TO any of that, as he was planning his run for governor at the time, and he needs to hide his hatred of the working and middle classes, and thus, trick all these union worker voters and non-union union-supporters into voting for him in two years.
In that context, Carol then asks if he feels the same antagonism towards ALL unions, and Rauner runs from the question.
What then ensues is truly a FROST-NIXON or 60 MINUTES-ish exchange that must be seen again and again. Unlike Rauner, Marin keeps her cool, them calmy but firmly refuses to let Rauner (her then-boss at the Sun-Times) get away:
http://chicagotonight.wttw.com/2012/09/19/mayors-adviser-attacks-ctu
—————————————————————–
——————-
( approximately … 05:00 – 7:00 )
BRUCE RAUNER: (finishes an anti-teacher union diatribe) ” … and we’ve got to fight them hard.”
CAROL MARIN: “Is this your view on ALL unions, or JUST the teachers’ union?”
BRUCE RAUNER: (uncomfortable) “Tonight, this is focused about the schools, and making our schools the best in the nation.”
CAROL MARIN: “No, I understand ‘tonight’, but in general, IS that your view of unions?”
BRUCE RAUNER: (more uncomfortable) “That’s a different subject.”
CAROL MARIN: “It is, but it IS the question.”
BRUCE RAUNER: (slightly angry) “But it’s not the subject of tonight.”
CAROL MARIN: “It is, but the question is: globally, is this the problem of collective bargaining being a problem systemically in our society?”
(What follows is TOTAL DUCKING OF THE QUESTION… Rauner just regurgitates more anti-teacher talking points that he had memorized for the show, and that have no bearing on the question asked of him)
BRUCE RAUNER: “The teachers’ union is engaged in a conflict of interests… (then goes into a stock diatribe against teachers’ unions specifically, effectively ducking the global question about his opinions of unions in general… because he can’t share that and get elected governor)
CAROL MARIN: (gives up on RAUNER, then turns to JESSE SHARKEY): “Mr. Sharkey, your point of view on this I gather would be different.”
JESSE SHARKEY: “If I could, Mr. Rauner isn’t answering the question, because he’s ideologically committed to a right-wing program that basically sees unions as an impediment to, frankly, privatizing public schools. In New York, private equity fund managers like himself have been involved in a scheme where they buy up under-utilized or unused school buildings on the cheap, and then lease those schools back to charter schools for profit. And I understand that Mr. Rauner himself is trying to do the exactly the same kind of scheme in Chicago.
“The teachers’ union is one of the organizations is this city is advocating for public schools… (then goes into detail about how the charterization of Chicago schools has been a total failure) ”
——————————–
Marin then asks if the conflict between unions and corporate reformers like Rauner is “personal,” and Jesse gives a great comeback that I’m too busy to transcribe, but he goes into detail about how the highest-performing school districts have the strongest unions, and the strongest job protections… and on and on…
Marin then poses a question to Rauner about how the “jury is in,” and all the studies show charters perform no better than public schools. (She could have added that, given charters ability to cherry pick and kick out kids, it’s not a level playing field, so they should be doing better… but oh well… ) Rauner denies this of course, then paints his wet dream of wiping out all public schools, and replacing the entire Chicago School District with groups of charter chains own by him and others of the 1%.
In response, Sharkey later says that he is horrified that billionaires like Rauner have usurped the people’s democratic control of schools, merely because they have a lot of money, and that no citizens or teachers have the personal acccess and influence that billionaires like Rauner have with Mayor Emanuel and other politicians.
Finally, Marin asks if the two sides have any “common ground”. Rauner says no, he has “no common ground” with teachers’ unions, or with Mr. Sharkey (or, he might add, with ALL unions and their members… SEE ABOVE for his ducking of that question).
However, he allows that he DOES have “common ground with the teachers” in Chicago’s teacher unions—you know, the very same ones—the vast majority—whom he constantly calls greedy, corrupt, incompetent union thugs, and on whom he has just declared “war.”
That’s probably not a good way to reach out to folks with whom you claim to have common ground.
Read the COMMENTS. They’re great, so I’ll finish with one:
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“Sue • 3 years ago
“Just watching this guy (Rauner) is like being in the middle of some 1950’s sci-fi horror flick. The world is being taken over by peapod people or zombies or space aliens, and you keep waiting to wake up. You try repeating, ‘It’s only a movie, it’s only a movie,’ but then you discover that it’s for real. This is the guy who’s calling the shots for our schools, our teachers, and our children? Frightening.”
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Sue, little did you know that, in just two years, he’d be governor.
No one should be in debt to a college that defrauded them—forgiving students is the right decision. Thx, @usedgov.
Why is Hillary Clinton thanking the US Dept of Ed?
She should be thanking the 100 students, volunteer organizers and volunteer lawyers who put a solid year of unpaid labor into shaming the US government into acting.
The students and lawyers made it happen. The US taxpayers foot the bill, and the DeptEd enabled and failed to regulate education scammers. Thx for a glimpse into the future of education corporatization, privatize the profits, socialize the losses.
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/govt-makes-it-easier-for-corinthian-students-to-erase-debt/ar-BBkQskJ
The federal DoE should NOT be congratulated. Corinthian’s problems have been reported for years and the DoE dragged their feet on this. Under Title IV of the Higher Education Act, Corinthian is culpable for government subsidized student loans distributed at their school. If the feds had acted sooner, instead of bailing out another corporation they deemed to be “too big to fail”, then just like students, Corinthian would not have been able to discharge their student loan debts in bankruptcy. Now these debts will have to be covered by tax payers.
“The Storm Chasers”
Democrats conned themselves
About the ed reform
They put good sense on shelves
And headed for the storm
“The Perfect Reform Storm”
When public school reform
Becomes a perfect storm
The stakes align
Like fronts in time
And chaos is the norm
Nobody on this blog writes as tidily and pointedly as Michael Fiorillo.
Michael, keep writing, as I will always look for what you have to say.
You term “overclass” should become standardized vocabulary, and I love how you once stated that the “overclass uses democracy to destroy democracy.”
Brilliant, my friend. My wife and I are Fiorillo groupies for quite some time now.
What Robert Rendo said. Great post & comments (special thanks to Jack for all the effort on that long & informative one) as well.
And they win the argument because many parents believe everything the school system tells them and they fail to question the Department of Education. So how do we get parents to wake up?
In other news, Chris Christie proves again what a creep he is.
Signs a pension law in 2011 where teachers agree to pay more after almost 20 years of extreme underfunding and non payment and teachers agree to clean up their mess if the gov’t will start funding them – not the teachers fault.
Go to court, find out a law can be “aspirational” and courts don’t want to wade into funding priorities.
Government gets a give-back for nothing.
Why will teachers ever trust a promise from a jersey governor again? It seems like jersey is banking on collecting money from teachers and eventually being able to dump the contracts (never mind that teachers also accept lower pay in addition to payments that are not going towards their intended purpose)
To claim that ALEC is about free markets is like saying Monsanto is about the environment….