In Philadelphia, thanks to state law, the city’s public schools are in dire need of renovation, while charter schools build and acquire facilities they can’t afford. Here is one of the articles that revealed this scandalous situation. It is not sustainable to maintain two school systems in one city or state.
The editorial board of the Philadelphia Inquirer writes:
“Philadelphia’s regular public school buildings are so run down that the cost to repair them is estimated at $4 billion. Those buildings aren’t likely to get face-lifts with the School District limping from funding crisis to funding crisis. In contrast, the city’s charter schools have received $500 million in taxpayer-backed bonds for new or improved buildings….
“With no one saying no, some charters are in a frenzy to acquire or renovate buildings and finance the transactions with bond issues they can’t afford. The Philadelphia Industrial Development Corp. issues bonds for charters, but fees for lawyers, consultants, and others who profit from the deals aren’t fully disclosed.
“Bonds for charters cost more because the risks are higher, Rutgers University professor Bruce Baker told Philly.com’s Alex Wigglesworth and Ryan Briggs. Those risks are passed on to taxpayers, who get stuck with even more costs when charters default, which has become common nationally.
“Consider the Walter D. Palmer Leadership Learning Partners Charter School. It was the first Philadelphia charter to receive bond funding, and the first to default. The Northern Liberties school spent $11 million in bond funds in 2005, but closed abruptly in December. Taxpayers have paid $6 million in debt service, but the building will likely be sold to pay creditors.
“String Theory Charter School in Center City is paying $5.6 million a year in debt service on the $55 million it borrowed to purchase a swanky building. The charter’s debt service has helped put String Theory $500,000 in the red and forced it to cancel some classes and bus service.
“The $3,895 per student String Theory spends on debt service for the high-rise it bought far exceeds the average of $875 per student being spent on district schools such as Solis-Cohen Elementary in the Northeast, which was so run-down that its students had to be transferred for safety.”
Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/20150917_Debt_chokes_charters.html#2tmyqUMjHoGHOjhp.99
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Business as usual. Little that is new here. Money supplants people in importance. Our future decimated with short term monetary profits for the wealthy.
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It may be getting worse in Arizona, Diane! best, Max
http://tucson.com/news/local/education/arizona-panel-crafting-changes-to-school-funding-system/article_dc8abda4-1605-563f-8408-d16effdadc85.html Arizona panel crafting changes to school funding system
14 HOURS AGO • BY HOWARD FISCHER CAPITOL MEDIA SERVICES
PHOENIX — A gubernatorial panel is crafting changes in how schools are funded in a way that, absent more money, is likely to create winners and losers.
And there is no new money in the plan.
Preliminary recommendations discussed Tuesday would equalize funding for all schools on a per-student basis. The idea, according to committee co-chairman Jim Swanson, is to minimize some of the differences between traditional public schools and charter schools.
But that equalization has major implications.
Charter schools get more state aid per pupil because they do not have access to local funds for things like voter-approved bonds and overrides. But the charters contend that still leaves them with less.
So that could mean boosting state aid to charters, taking away the ability of traditional public schools to get local money — or both — if the plan is to achieve the parity that Swanson said he and Gov. Doug Ducey want.
“We’re looking at an equitable funding system where every kid in our state has a chance of an excellent education no matter where they attend school,” said Swanson, the president and chief executive of Kitchell Corp.
But nothing in what the Classrooms First Initiative Council is proposing would be linked to the state providing additional dollars for education. And Swanson said that’s at the direction of Ducey.
“The governor, from the very first day I started doing this, has made it very clear that it’s not about the size of the pie, it’s about the pie,” he said.
Swanson said he told the governor there are “a lot of complex issues that involve money.” For example, there’s the question of how much additional state aid should go to schools that have to educate students with special needs.
But that, Swanson said, is not on the table.
“We’re trying to say, ‘how do we do this revenue-neutral,’” he said, without considering whether lawmakers and voters might approve Ducey’s plan to tap the principal of state trust lands for at least a quick cash infusion.
http://tucson.com/news/local/education/arizona-panel-crafting-changes-to-school-funding-system/article_dc8abda4-1605-563f-8408-d16effdadc85.html?print=true&c… 1/2
trust lands for at least a quick cash infusion.
9/23/2015 Arizona panel crafting changes to school funding system
Swanson conceded that shifting resources with no net change in dollars means that what one school gains means less for someone else.
“We do not want to have a world where we take ‘haves’ and make them ‘have nots,’” he said.
Swanson said there may be ways to move money around.
For example, the state aid formula includes an equation designed to help boost funding in districts with more experienced teachers. Swanson said that money could be diverted. Yet one goal of the panel is to recruit and retain experienced teachers.
Differences between traditional and charter schools aside, the proposal also includes some other changes in how the state funds education.
For example, A-rated schools — those where students are excelling according to standardized tests — would be eligible for additional per-student funding. Ditto for those rated B or C if they showed marked improvement from the prior year.
But here, too, there are no additional dollars, which raises the question of whether the money would be taken away from other schools.
“Obviously we need to settle the lawsuit before we talk about the money,” said Tim Ogle, executive director of the Arizona School Boards Association.
A trial judge already has ruled the state owes public schools more than $330 million for failing to fully fund a voter-mandated formula to boost aid annually because of inflation. State lawmakers disagree and have appealed.
And there’s the separate question of whether schools are due more than $1 billion for prior years when the inflation formula was disregarded.
“There is no money for those kinds of purposes,” Ogle said. And even if there were, he questioned whether it makes educational sense.
“While it makes sense in the private sector to incentivize that type of thing, there’s really no research across the country that that’s an effective way to increase student achievement,” he said.
Andrew Morrill, president of the Arizona Education Association, zeroed in on a proposal to have vacant or underused public schools made available quickly for charter schools that need more classrooms. Morrill said while charter schools are technically public schools, they can be operated as for-profit entities. More to the point, their assets belong to the charter operator and even can be sold off if no longer needed or the school goes out of business.
“How is that a reform?” Morrill asked. “It’s a money-laundering operation.” On Twitter: @azcapmedia
http://tucson.com/news/local/education/arizona-panel-crafting-changes-to-school-funding-system/article_dc8abda4-1605-563f-8408-d16effdadc85.html?print=true&c… 2/2
>
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The same people who support charters are sending emails to a link to a Huff Post piece by Linda Darling-Hammond. The Nellie Mae Education Foundation sent an email that states:
Featured This Month
A Learning Policy Institute for a New Moment in Education
To best prepare students for our rapidly changing economy, we need an adaptable and equitable education system that can respond to massive changes in learning through policy. The newly created Learning Policy Institute – led by renowned researcher and policy expert Dr. Linda Darling-Hammond – looks to conduct high-quality evidence-based research to build policies that can support the needs of every child.
Here is the link to the Huff Piece: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/linda-darlinghammond/a-new-moment-in-education_b_8073130.html
Please excuse my ignorance if I am behind in the news, but which side is Dr. Darling-Hammond on? The piece sounds reformy, and has their usual talking points:
“The problem is, our current education system was designed to meet the needs of the industrial revolution, not the knowledge revolution. And our education policies are too often designed to hold the old factory model in place, rather than to stimulate this new learning and create the settings in which it can thrive.”
“It’s become clear to many that fighting old, divisive battles over last century’s educational models won’t prepare our children for the new world they face. I invite you to join me in a new conversation, grounded in evidence about what works and focused on the learning our nation needs.”
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Thank you for the info.
I went to the HuffPost piece and clicked on the link to the Learning Policy Institute. I would suggest others explore the website, including the senior research fellows [under “People”].
Let’s see what actions follow the initial words.
😎
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For what it’s worth from LDH’s new institute site:
Initial support for the Learning Policy Institute is provided by The Atlantic Philanthropies, S.D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the Sandler Foundation and the Stuart Foundation.
and from her article on Huffpo:
“Inequality is the single most fundamental reason for our country’s lackluster performance on measures like the Program in International Student Assessment (PISA), where we rank 21st in reading and 32nd in mathematics. Our focus on lower-level basic skills, rather than the higher-level abilities evaluated by PISA, is the other.
That our recent policies have not sufficiently changed the nature of learning and the extent of inequality is demonstrated by the fact that U.S. scores on PISA declined in every subject area between 2000 and 2012, with large racial and economic gaps among children’s opportunities and performance persisting.”
Considering that LDH is using PISA as a means of evaluating American education, I’m skeptical of the focus of this group. And then this:
“but policy that will promote deeper learning for all children to meet the needs of our society today. We believe that learning opportunities for children, educators, and schools need to evolve to meet the demands of today’s society, and that education systems must evolve to meet those needs. We believe that systems can learn when they are designed to promote continuous improvement – and that policy can be designed to create such learning systems.
Our name also signals how we will work. That is, we are eager to learn with and from others in the education arena and other fields of work, within the U.S. and globally, as well as from data-driven research.”
I tend to distrust those who, in regards to the teaching and learning process, use such terms as “evolve to meet the demands of today’s society” (as if that is a fundamental purpose of public k12 education), or “systems can learn when they are designed to promote continuous improvement”. Hey, LDH, those systems can’t accomplish that and never will. Now can the humans in those systems attempt to do so? Yes, but that “continuous improvement meme is straight out of the efficiency movement of the last century. Or “will promote deeper learning for all children to meet the needs of our society” which sees the child as a component/widget to be shaped to supposedly “meet the needs (sic) of society”. Who gives a shit about the needs of the child?
Ay ay ay ay ay!
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Exactly my concerns, Duane…. Thanks KrazyTA for checking it out.
Doesn’t look promising, but time will tell.
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I’ve frequently found Nellie Mae, Ford and Hewlett foundations listed, when I checked funders of various reformy activities.
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Thanks for that info, Linda. I’m not well versed on many of the various foundations and their tilt. I was hoping someone who knows would pipe in. Thanks!!
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And with those foundations being so, I now understand more why LDH uses the language that she does. And that language does not lend itself to a “child centered” teaching and learning process.
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Darling-Hammond has quite mixed outlook, shall we say. It was her work at Stanford that has led to the notorious edTPA, which purports to determine which student teachers are up to snuff via videos. Some states have now made a passing score a requisite to obtain a teaching license. While still in the role-out phase, it was imposed on students at UMass Amherst during their practicum. Their professor was subsequently “not renewed” when some 87 of the 89 students refused to participate.
Fortunately, Barbara Madeloni found another position – as President of the Massachusetts Teachers Association.
“The incursion of for profit companies into higher education occurs with willing collaborators. Whether misguided, fearful, subject to the lure of the advancement of their own careers, or standing to profit themselves we cannot know, but across the country faculty join administrators in advancing practices that open the door for the privatization of our work. The accountability regimes supported by accrediting agencies and professional organizations have become entryways for companies like Pearson, Inc. to not only sell their products, but to control our practices. In teacher education, the Teacher Performance Assessment (TPA) is being pushed as a national assessment for student teaching by faculty from Stanford and the American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education (AACTE)…”
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I have been working on the following to put on my facebook page. It is unfinished. I wish to tweak it considerably but perhaps it may contain ideas which some of you might use when you write letters to the editor, your political representatives, facebook etc.
It has been alleged that capitalism has given us our high standard of living. True, untrue or just partially true? Is the capitalistic system giving everyone a higher standard of living now or just the top 1 or 2 percent? Is crony capitalism even the same as capitalism and is what is now called capitalism even capitalism in its best sense? Have we been propagandized to the extent that most of us never even question this assumption? Has our capitalistic system overwhelmed our political system?
We have been told that socialism is bad and it is pointed to the Soviet Union as a prime example. Is that a fair example? How many in the U. S. wish to give up their Social Security, Medicare, roads, water, army, navy and other Socialistic, governmental help programs? Is it better to pay the 3- 5% overhead to our medicare system or the 25 – 30% overhead to the corporate health system? Has the corporate system “pulled the plug on grandma”, hired people to try to keep from paying out benefits? Is it better to pay the head of Health and Human Services about $200,000 a year or the health corporate CEOs the 3 – 6 million a year to run their corporations? People are taught to eschew taxes. If one gets more for less money, why are taxes anathema?
Has the real benefits to our standard of living come from Capitalism more than from our public school system, socialistic, which has trained our scientists, capitalist CEOs, our schools, universities, technicians et al or is perhaps the capitalistic system the prime cause?
This is NOT to promote Socialism per se but to think more rationally about what causes our societal progress. Any system could be helpful IF the public good is the raison d’etre. The public schools are now under attack by those who many of us believe are looking to make the bottom line of schools the profit motive and not for the benefit of children, society. Public schools have been denigrated and falsehoods, that our schools do not compare in quality to those of other nations has been shouted out so loud and so long that it is now accepted as a truism by most. Misleading statistics have been quoted for so long that few except scholars studying the question accept it without question.
Five corporations control 80% of the media upon which people depend for news. Obviously corporations promote corporate agenda just like Goebbels promoted Hitler’s agenda. Germany suffered horrifically because the German people mostly accepted the propaganda with tragic results. We must take note of this and delve deeply for the truth before it is too late. Corporations declared the tobacco industry safe. The auto industry has deliberately lied, declared their vehicles safe with tragic results, etc etc. Yet people tend to believe corporate propaganda, advertising even although they sometimes know better.
So, think this through for yourself. Go beyond corporate “news” sources. A lot of untruths, half truths, and yes, lies are out there and only scholarly research for sources beyond corporate “news” must be found and studied. It is there if you choose to look.
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Let us know when you get it going, Gordon!
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It’s shocking how susceptible people are to scams, big broad publicly funded, publicized and politicized scams. In this day and age.
The information or deformation age?
Shocked. Shocked. Sho-o-o-ck-ck-ckt!
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Reblogged this on 21st Century Theater.
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Not all the charters in Philly are in poor areas. Northern Liberties is close to center city and a big “yuppie” area. Nevertheless, it is shameful that charters are getting partiality, little to no accountability, use of the public purse, and then they can walk away when the deal goes south. This is a major problem with charters. Students and their right to an education are not just a line item in a millionaire’s portfolio. As a market based entity, they are far too unstable to entrust them students’ education and futures. It’s like going to Las Vegas with your kids’ college fund. What is more repugnant is that the rest of the students suffer because they get to attend decaying schools because charters are siphoning off the funding for which, I think, the formula should be reviewed, especially since the last governor was untrustworthy.
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I just flipped through my new Temple University alumni magazine. “Temple has formed a partnership with the Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP), a national network of charter schools, to increase college completion rates for graduates… This partnership helps us identify several highly motivated and ambitious students whose leadership skills will improve the quality of Temple’s community.” It reads like an ad for KIPP.
Temple totally turned their back on public city schools. Just when you think Temple did something progressive by becoming SAT optional, you see where their loyalties lie.
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I am sorry to hear it as I am a Temple alumna too. Perhaps they got a big donation from Kipp or one of their supporters. They should know better than joining forces with the “no excuses” charter as they always had a reputable school of education.
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