Ann O’Leary, who advises Hillary Clinton on education policy, wrote an article in which she corrected the impression that Hillary does not support charter schools. O’Leary explains that Hillary does support charter schools, so long as they meet their obligation to include students with disabilities and English language learners and stop suspending kids they don’t want.
O’Leary takes the tack that charters are public schools, and Hillary has always supported public school choice.
She writes:
Hillary believes that every public school should be serving our students and supporting our teachers. And when charter schools are producing results, she believes we should double down on their success by scaling the model and ensure that their innovations are widely disseminated throughout our traditional public schools. That was the original bargain of charter schools.
At the same time, we must also have the courage to shut down charters that are failing our kids. And don’t just take this from me, or Hillary, for that matter. Take it from Geoffrey Canada:
“You know, people tell me, ‘Yeah, those charter schools, a lot of them don’t work.’ A lot of them don’t. They should be closed. I mean, I really believe they should be closed.”
Geoffrey Canada (who stepped down last year as leader of the Harlem Children’s Zone and now spends a large part of his time lecturing about the glories of charter schools) was the star of the anti-teacher, anti-union, anti-public school propaganda film “Waiting for ‘Superman.'” He had two billionaires on the board of his Harlem Children’s Zone and $200 million in the bank. According to the New York Times, there are 15 students in a class with two licensed teachers, and individual tutors. His charter schools never lacked for money or whatever they wanted. Even so, their test scores were nothing to brag about. When his entering class failed to get high scores (according to Paul Tough’s book about Canada called “Whatever It Takes,“) Canada simply kicked the entire class out in May, when it was too late for them to get into a high school of choice. When I confronted Canada with Tough’s account on national television (“Education Nation”), he denied it and claimed he closed the whole school. But it wasn’t true. He kicked out the entering ninth grade class, everyone of them. A public school can’t do that.
In Ohio, Michigan, Florida, Pennsylvania, Arizona, and other states, charter school founders (all non-educators) have collected tens of millions of dollars in profit by running charter schools. No public school superintendent or principal can do that. In Chicago, 50 public schools were closed in a single day, to be replaced by privately managed charter schools where the citizenry has no voice. Eli Broad has proposed putting half the students in Los Angeles in privately managed charter schools; how many members of UTLA will be replaced by temps willing to work 60-hour weeks? Tennis star Andre Agassi (a high-school dropout) and his partner, investor Bobby Turner, are building charter schools for profit, and they are currently raising another $1 billion to profit from the taxpayers’ largesse. Does Hillary want to see more profiteers fatten from the taxpayers’ dollars?
I take issue with the claim that charter schools are public schools. When they have been brought to federal courts for violating the rights of employees under state law, their defense is that they are not public schools. When they have been hauled before the NLRB for fighting efforts to form a union, their defense is that they are not public schools. When charter operators in California were tried for embezzlement, the California Charter Schools Association defended them on grounds that they are not public schools and therefore not subject to the same laws. When Eva Moskowitz did not want to be audited, she went to court and insisted that the state had no right to audit her school (what public school can do that?); when she feels like holding a political rally in Albany or at City Hall, she closes her schools for half a day (what public schools can do that?).
Another point about Hillary and charters. 93% of charters are non-union. How can she simultaneously court the millions of teachers who belong to the NEA and AFT while praising a sector that is proudly, defiantly non-union? Almost all charters are non-union, and their owners fight to keep them non-union. That’s why the far-right Walton Family Foundation has invested $1 billion in expanding the charter sector: to eliminate teachers’ unions. That’s why charters are applauded by ALEC and the likes of Scott Walker, John Kasich, Jeb Bush, Rick Snyder, Rick Scott, and other rightwing governors. Is this the crowd that Hillary should be hanging with?
I do hope that Hillary thinks some more about her views of charter schools. We are hurtling towards mass privatization of public education in our urban districts. Some of these charters are for-profit or run by incompetent non-educators. For-profit charters should not get a penny of public money, not a penny. Charter chains that exclude students with severe disabilities and students who don’t speak English and students with low scores should not receive public funding. Charter chains run by foreign nationals should not get public funding. At present, charters are neither equitable nor accountable. And there is nothing in the law that would make them so.
Why should we eliminate public schools and replace them with privately managed, unaccountable charter schools? No high-performing nation in the world has charter schools.
Please, Hillary, think about it some more. Or better yet, meet with me so I can walk you through the issue.
Hillary Clinton is a neoliberal in thrall to Wall Street. Her policies on education are going to align with Obama’s and GWB’s: charters are part of the privatization game plan and there is simply no way she’ll truly criticize them for being what they are (in most cases).
Hillary’s record shows where her head and heart are. HO HILLARY 4 me.
HRC is trying to tweak, to reign in a bit of her donors greed so they don’t make each other look so bad. I’m glad this statement came out as it places her solidly in the camp of the charter profiteers who also seek to burden and destroy true public schools as a way of increasing the available turf that they can then move into. HRC is obviously out of touch if she believes this: “And when charter schools are producing results, she believes we should double down on their success by scaling the model and ensure that their innovations are widely disseminated throughout our traditional public schools. That was the original bargain of charter schools.” That idea ceased to exist a long time ago and cannot be brought back since it would mean that all charters would have to put something other than expansion for the sake of profits first, second, and third. This is fence sitting at it’s worst.
I think it is fence sitting at it’s best!
“HRC is obviously out of touch. . . ”
If HRC is so out of touch, what does that say about Lily and Randi and their oh so powerful “unions”?
“Hill of Beans”
Out of touch?
Well, not so much
With Wall Street profiteers
A Hill of beans
Is what it means
Her former charter smears
All three of the major components of current education policy are without evidentiary support– if the goal is equitable democratic education for life, work and citizenship. High-stakes testing subverts learning and motivation. Merit pay undermines teacher collaboration. However, charter schools– which encourage competition among schools for students and among families for entry– sabotages the very idea of social responsibility for learning for all and democratic governance in the guise of choice.
http://www.arthurcamins.com
I;m so glad that our entire national political conversation on public schools will focus exclusively on charter schools.
Did Ann O’Leary say anything about how Clinton plans to support public schools, or are are our schools just around to bully on testing and act as a back-up to the “choice” sector?
Has anyone in the ed reform “movement” discussed public schools yet this election, outside of veering wildly between bullying and then pandering on standardized testing?
Democrats might want to come up with a plan that includes something other than “choice” and “accountability” if they plan on somehow differentiating themselves from John Kasich and Jeb Bush. They must realize by now that if your kid’s school falls outside the “choice” sector that is all the rage in DC all you hear from them is stern lectures on testing and “failing schools”.
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education.
I only like good charters…spoken like someone trying to sound like a pragmatist.
I’ll do whatever works – which seems to be her message – I’ll say whatever I need to in order to be elected.
Her only criteria is an insanely broad definition of special needs students, and, what it takes to meet their needs (how severe should their disabilities be – how do you make charters spend on their students before their profit margin — how proportionate should the number of students be to local public schools especially when their creaming has skyrocketed the imbalance).
This is a complete non-answer as to shutting down “bad” charters – the definition of meeting the needs of special needs students in number and what a “good” charter is, that it allows all charters to be good while allowing her to say she’d shut down “bad” ones.
You can’t force private corporations to do these things after they’ve opened their doors – you can only make it conditional on their initial application but after they get in gear, shutting down a school is not like terminating a lease, it gets really messy and really expensive really fast if the schools don’t meet those initial application guidelines.
I think she knows this. I also think she knows exactly what she’s saying. This is the exact area where she can say “I’m on the side of public school teachers” while also saying “I’m on the side of families and kids” and also be on the side of those who “profit relentlessly on compelled government tax funds”.
Funny how noone ends up unhappy except those who want a well funded neighborhood school isn’t it? And teachers when their voting purpose is done for 4 more years and we can come back asking for more next time.
“Hillary’s Views on Charters”
(The Good, the Bad and the Ugly)
I’m only for the Good ones,
And really hate the Bad
And certainly, the Ugly ones
Were never more than fad
“Hillary’s Views on Everything”
(The Good, the Bad and the Ugly)
I’m only for the Good things,
And really hate the Bad
And certainly, the Ugly things
Were never more than fad
Of course she does. That was evident when she made her original statement. Anyone who took her statement to mean she doesn’t support charters hasn’t become fluent in politician-ese.
I agree, which is why the huge push-back from the “charter sector” is kind of alarming.
Is any deviation allowed from 24/7 charter cheerleading allowed in DC? I keep being told this is about “innovation” but the slightest veering from the “movement” line is always shut down immediately.
I guess she learned her lesson. “Choice” and “accountability” are the only things we may discuss and then only when we’re proposing technocratic tweaks to the Bush/Obama agenda.
What Clinton said about charters isn’t even true in my state. They don’t “cherrypick”. Instead they “flood the market” and then public schools and charter schools enter into a ridiculous, counter-productive race to grab students which leaves both systems weaker. It’s lose/lose in this state. No one wins.
What would be the innovations that have emerged from charter schools? Would it be the failed cyber charters, the iron fist discipline, the non-nurturing approach or the behaviorist drill and kill? There is not one ounce of innovation in anything coming out of charters. We even had dunce caps in the nineteenth century? How does one argue success? Is it performance on a bubble test? How can we trust any results that come from the charter sector when we know that they control the data, and some charters are known for lying and cooking the books? What we know is that the so called “high quality seat” charters keep the lid on by cherry picking students, high rates of suspension and attrition. That’s not innovation either! The only way in my opinion to evaluate the effectiveness of charters is to do a longitudinal study on how the graduates do in the real world.
There is no evidence that charters are worth all the disruption, to children, families and communities. Why should poor minority children be deprived of attending a free, public democratic neighborhood school? Why are poor parents that want to keep the local school open being ignored? Why are tax dollars being spent to set up a parallel corporate based system that duplicates education costs when there is no proof this is superior? Why not fund the public schools that exist better instead of trying to starve them? If America cares about its poor students, this is a far better option.
Hillary should look at the facts, and not just listen to her millionaire friends. She should talk to the people in public schools whose budgets have been decimated by charter expansion. She should find out how governors can ignore court orders to more equitably fund their poorest public schools. Instead, the governors are ready to close the schools and sell them off to charters. This is not how democratic education is supposed to work!
I want to know what in education could possibly be innovative at all? Military style discipline? Done that. Drill-and-kill lessons? Done that. Longer school days/years? Done that too. On the other end of the spectrum, we’ve also done many progressive things – social-emotional learning, project-based learning, collaborative learning, schools without walls, schools without books, schools without teachers, unschooling – we’ve tried them all. Some have worked better than others and I very definitely support many such progressive measures, but I certainly don’t pretend they’re “innovative” – John Dewey died over 60 years ago. And let’s not pretend that tech is “innovative” either. We had classes on our Commodore computers in junior high in 1982.
So what could possibly be “innovative” and why are we chasing it?
I don’t know-funny things sometimes happen. Systems are complicated and the Best And Brightest don’t actually know what will happen.
I sometimes think public schools may benefit from the lack of interest “at the highest levels”. It may be freeing for them. If no one in DC is supporting them anyway, then there’s no upside to going along with edu-fads and directives.
Dienne- I have participated in several of the so called experiments you have mentioned above within the confines of my public school career. You are right; some have worked better than others. The longer school day and year works well. This is a no brainer! Poor kids are behind, and they need more time. I would rather see tax money spent on this than on any charter school!
retired teacher wrote: “The longer school day and year works well. This is a no brainer! Poor kids are behind, and they need more time”
That’s not a “no brainer.” It’s not so simple. It entirely depends on what is done in those extra hours. More academics for children (especially poor children) will make things worse if it’s not done carefully. Especially if it’s more of the same, and the same was not good in the first place.
“Charter Winnowvation”
The charter winnowvation
Is only keep the “best”
The ones who bore
The highest score
On every single test
Ed Detective: I worked in a diverse community that actively applied for grants, spent the money well, and got legitimate results. Some of our successful programs were: an after school homework and tutorial center for poor ELLs, a Family Resource Center to outreach to poor families, summer school for poor students taught by certified teachers, and a summer “boot camp” to enable minority students to compete in Regents and AP classes. All of these initiatives were money well spent. We know this from our high graduation and college completion rates, and the number of successful poor students that returned to thank us for our efforts and by the contribution these students have made to the community.
retired teacher, I believe you, but my point still stands. Simply extending the school day or school year is not automatically a good thing. I have seen specific examples of it causing more harm than good. It really depends on the motives behind the operation, and how it is carried out.
Dianne – The one innovation that hasn’t been tried? Equitable funding of all our public schools, not based on, for example, property taxes. And I mean equitable, not equal, because our poorest kids with the highest educational needs have to have greater access to the educational experiences their parents are unable to provide for them.
There is a governance issue to consider. Local control over schools is tightly bound to local funding, and nothing is more local than property. The more school funding relies on states or the federal government for funding, the more control states and the federal government will take. There is a trade-off.
retired teacher and Ed Detective –
I know it keeps being repeated that a longer school day is a positive. I would like to see some research to support that. My personal observation is that the efficacy of instruction just drops off after too many hours. I think many want to keep kids in school for longer hours just to keep ’em out of the public sphere. Young children in my city are on board buses by 7:00 AM and aren’t home until after winter dark at 4:30 PM – and this is for public schools, not charters.
Parents, understandably, need child care while they are at work, but many have confused the role of schools in educating kids rather than providing safe recreational spaces in the afternoons.
“Some of our successful programs were: an after school homework and tutorial center for poor ELLs, a Family Resource Center to outreach to poor families, summer school for poor students taught by certified teachers, and a summer “boot camp” to enable minority students to compete in Regents and AP classes.”
In effect, the school year is extended for some sub-groups, making them the source of the problem. In the early ’70’s I taught in our bilingual program and class sizes were maxed out at 20 kids, often with a para-professional to help out, so I think reducing class size throughout the day for our highest needs kids would allow them to accelerate learning within the regular school day. Now we are penalizing kids by making normal after school and summer activities, such as sports, theater, and summer camp out of bounds for them. Affluent parents wouldn’t stand for such long school hours for their progeny – when would they have time to meet with their private squash coach?
As to AP, my experience in a 87% minority school, with 2/3 of our students working in English as a second language and 80% qualifying for free lunch informs my opinion: it’s just become the ultimate standardized test metric guaranteeing a revenue stream for the College Board. AP was once legit; those who taught the courses could select the students who participated and they could devise the content they saw worked best for their students. Now teachers must be approved by the College Board ($), their syllabi must be submitted ($), there has been a proliferation of College Board approved materials for schools ($) and consultants doing PD to vertically align curricula ($). This push for AP for All has perverted the process and in a short time. When my oldest daughter was applying to colleges, her AP courses allowed her to graduate from Wellesley in three years (and one year’s less tuition!), but by the time her younger siblings were applying four years later, I was told by the same caliber of colleges that the “AP credential had been devalued”.
Christine-To clarify, the after school program for ELLs was mostly for help parents could not provide. Our ELLs loved our summer school program which included experience based projects and field trips into NYC. It was not a repeat of the same type of in class instruction they experienced during the school year.
“How can she simultaneously court the millions of teachers who belong to the NEA and AFT while praising a sector that is proudly, defiantly non-union?”
You’d have to ask Randi and Lily that. In fact, I think that very question may be why they both happen to have prior commitments on the day of the next NPE conference.
For me it is not just about union versus non union. It’s about qualified versus unprepared. There is a reason states have certification requirements. It is to ensure that the people working with children have met minimum qualifying standards. Now states want the right to violate their own minimum standards and use public money to put so called “teachers” that may not have met the benchmarks that the state itself has set. Their willingness to do this shows that their real intent is to union bust, not innovate.
Personally, I’m fine with those two not being at the conference. I didn’t learn anything from them the last two years other than to confirm my suspicion that they’re on the wrong side of the public school battles. For me they were a freak sideshow from the tail end of the circus parade. But you have to admire their ability to use the NPE conference for their own gains and then when their feet would be held to the fire at the next conference, to ever so politely beg out, cowards and sycophants to the edudeformers that they are.
They have failed, I’m talking 5/100 points, their constituencies.
“The Clinton Superposition”
Simultaneously good and bad
Hillary has said
Charters are like Schrödinger’s Cat
Both alive and dead
“How can she simultaneously court the millions of teachers who belong to the NEA and AFT while praising a sector that is proudly, defiantly non-union?”
Because Randi Weingarten supports Hillary’s position on charters.
Randi is resurrecting Albert Shanker’s support of charters as “incubators of innovative ideas.” She touts the success of University Prep, “a charter school in the South Bronx that the UFT co-founded with Green Dot public schools” when she was UFT president.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/randi-weingarten/charter-schools-as-incuba_b_8568128.html
It seems that the AFT position is that charter schools were the brainchild of Albert Shanker, and that there are good charters and bad charters. (Glenda to Dorothy, “Are you a good witch or a bad witch?”)
http://www.aft.org/ae/winter2014-2015/kahlenberg_potter
Kahlenberg and Polley, in their position paper on the AFT website say that Shanker imagined a “new kind of public school – charter schools – that would allow teachers to experiment with innovative approaches to educating students”…”publicly funded by independently managed…for a set period of time and …renewed only if they succeeded.” Kahlenberg and Polley state, “But somewhere along the way, charter schools went in a very different direction than the one Shanker originally envisioned”..and that Shanker’s charters “these schools offer a sensible way out of the charter school wars by rejecting competing visions in which charter schools are either to be vanquished or completely victorious”.
Here’s the kicker:
“We disagree with charter opponents who would simply abandon the experiment entirely. Because of their freedom and flexibility, charters have the potential to provide excellent learning environments for students”…”even fierce critics such as Diane Ravitch note that ‘charters are here to stay.’ ”
Dienne, I recall a previous post of yours warning us to watch out for this piece of union history.
If you like a dual school system, one free to choose its students, the other required to accept all students, stick with charters.
This account fails to mention that Al Shanker turned against charters in 1993 and said they were no different from vouchers. He became a fierce critic of the idea he once espoused.
Sorry for the many typos: “…publicly funded BUT independently managed…” and the authors are Kahlenberg and POTTER not Polley.
Once again, here’s the link to the position paper that is posted on the AFT website.
http://www.aft.org/ae/winter2014-2015/kahlenberg_potter
Richard Kahlenberg is a senior fellow at The Century Foundation and Halley Potter is a fellow at The Century Foundation and a former charter school teacher.
I agree with you, Dr. Ravitch. The position paper goes into much more detail about the history of Shanker’s vision and documents his rejection of it before he died.
I believe it is important for all of us to be aware of this piece as it is posted on the AFT website, which implies endorsement, It presents Shanker’s vision as a noble cause that was co-opted and deformed by the Conservative right. The author’s position is that we are fighting a losing game by calling for the end of charters, and that we must fight for a return to Shanker’s vision.
I do NOT endorse this view, I am merely presenting it as a key to Randi Weingarten’s, and thereby the AFT’s position on the issue. I think it’s crucial that those of us who are members know about this.
This paper is taken from a book (published by Teachers College Press) by Kahlenber & Potter, “A Smarter Charter: Finding What Works for Charter Schools and Public Education.”
Duane, I guess both of them anticipate being too busy integrating themselves into Hillary’s ed department to be able to attend.
Al Shanker has been dead for almost twenty years.
Although he was prescient enough to see where charters were going (unlike Gates/Broad willing captive Randi Weingarten), both sides of this debate should stop leaning on pronouncements made a generation ago.
DC politicking aside, I thought this was an interesting piece about a public school in Ohio:
http://www.cleveland.com/akron/index.ssf/2015/11/akron_schools_court_lawmakers.html#incart_m-rpt-1
I can’t remember the last time a politician in this state went out of their way to find a public school to celebrate, and the entire piece isn’t about test scores! There’s actually some discussion about what the students do in the school!
Maybe the 15 year “status quo” of using public schools as political punching bags to promote “the choice sector” is ending in Ohio, and the public schools who serve 93% of children will finally get some attention.
The commenters in this thread have pointed out the obvious: HRC has made a meaningless verbal concession to her union supporters that doesn’t take account of the rheephorm reality that is beating down (and attempting to replace/eliminate/displace) public schools.
She is not waffling. By repeating the talking points of self-styled “education reform” she is coming down firmly on the side of the heavyweights and enforcers and enablers of those that are in creatively disruptive pursuit of $tudent $ucce$$.
However, I am appreciative of the owner of this blog for offering her wise counsel—to have someone tell HRC what she NEEDS to hear if she truly want to do the right thing, not what she WANTS to hear to fill her campaign coffers.
Thanks to all for their observations.
😎
So this is why our unions were in such a rush to endorse Hillary?
Feel the Bern.
I agree, GST.
The Bern hasn’t come out on this issue very clearly, as yet, but at least he is educable. The Hill is not because she is so dependent upon corporate money (in particular, Wall Street).
The Clintons know how to milk the cow, but they also know in order to get that milk, they need to carefully attend to the cow’s needs. It’s a symbiotic relationship for them, but together they act as a parasite on our children.
Hillary is a politician who will say anything to get elected. She is an entrenched part of the system and supports and interacts in it, that said, of course she supports charters. She also supports the lie about public charters not being private. Doublespeak as I commented before. Public ed has been sold out by Demos and Repubs but they will reap what they sow.
Good to see Hilary making amends with big-city voters who were likely very surprised to hear that public schools accept all kids.
Secretary Clinton, after Diane walks you through the issue, take your own walk down the street where your husband used to have his offices. Visit between 3-5 pm or so. Talk to some of the hundreds of kids you’ll see leaving schools, both district and charter, and their families. Ask them how they feel about charters and choice. Ask them if they are perturbed by the lack of charter schools in Finland.
Read the CREDO studies on New York City and urban charter school performance. Look at the schools in your adopted hometown and read up on current zoning issues in New York City to understand how entrenched and immovable segregation is in traditional district schools. Think back to your legal education and what you learned about “separate and equal.” Make sure to consult with Paul Tractenberg when formulating your urban public school policies.
And good luck! As more and more state houses trend Republican and as the US House looks to be permanently red, it is essential that the Democratic Party hold the executive branch, if only to control the Supreme Court nomination process.
FYI, charter schools in New York are REQUIRED to take all kids. Some public schools are test-in by order of the state legislature. Or they are selective and publish their criteria. Neither the public schools that are test-in nor the public schools that are selective have ever used their test results to undermine charter schools. Neither do the public schools who have affluent college-educated parents use their scores to undermine that public schools that have poor parents. If you can cite one example of public school parents at ps 6 DEMANDING more resources be taken from failing public school X and given to their school due to their top test performance, than please cite it here. But that is exactly what charter schools do. And it is shameful.
If the charter school industry wants to lobby Albany to allow them to run super selective charter schools for high-performing kids where any child who can’t make the grade is asked to leave each year, then DO IT. I have no doubt that you will be successful in getting exactly those kind of “selective” charter schools you are so desperate to get. Cuomo does your bidding. It mystifies me why you aren’t just changing the charter school establishment rules so that they don’t have to lie to run their schools and make parents whose kids don’t make the grade feel as if their children are failures instead of understanding that the charter school has about as much interest in educating an average “at risk” child as Stuy does. In other words, they are happy to do so as long as the child can make the grade.
Of course, that would require a degree of HONESTY that the pro-charter folks have never shown. After all, they need to lie and say that every at-risk child is welcome when in truth, the most ‘successful’ charter school CEOs would not touch most of the at-risk kid with a ten-foot pole. How do I know? Because right now, they only have the at-risk kids with the most motivated and dedicated parents and they still insist that so many of them “got to go”.
That you do not understand the psychological damage such lies cause to 5 and 6 year old at-risk children is truly beyond my understanding.
NYC Public Parent-You make some valid points that Hillary, whose understanding of charters seems outdated, should read and consider. You have a deep understanding of the issues from your experience with charters in NYC.
“Good to see Hilary making amends with big-city voters who were likely very surprised to hear that public schools accept all kids.”
Unlike the charter industry, the public school system does take responsibility for ALL children. Every. Single. One.
Not every public school, or even every public school district, serves every child who would like to attend. And what the traditional district system counts among its greatest successes — well-funded, high-performing schools and districts with low numbers of at-risk children — are more often than not built on a foundation of public- and private-sector racism: mortgage discrimination, redlining, and steering; exclusionary zoning rules meant to thwart the development of affordable housing; and intimidation on the part of private citizens and (most consequentially) law enforcement.
Tim, public schools might not serve “every child who wants to attend” but they are all served within the public school system, and almost always in their district. You have this desperate need to pretend that public schools push out special needs kids the way that your favorite charter school chain does and I wish you would stop already. You actually don’t care about those kids at all — they are pawns for you to excuse the fact that a charter school network with 11,000 students — MORE than most small cities — expects the public schools to handle all the children they deem to be “special needs”. And the fact that Success Academy claims that 20% or more of the at-risk students with very motivated and involved parents NEED District 75 schools because they are way too severely disabled for Success Academy to teach due to their extreme violence at age 5 and 6 is why your argument just falls apart.
In your world, Tim, 20% of the low-income minority students with the most motivated parents willing to do all that is needed to get them a good education are “special needs” and should be warehoused in District 75 schools. I wonder exactly how many of the at-risk children who don’t have such motivated parents are “special needs”? Is it 90%? 100%?
Why don’t you just lobby Albany to allow charter schools to ONLY accept kids who can pass a state test without needing much teaching? No other child is welcome. That’s what you want. And I’m sure Cuomo will do your bidding. But I find it truly reprehensible that you want to classify so many low-income children as special needs and make them feel like failures because charter schools refuse to be HONEST about who they want to educate. I get it — you don’t want the kids who take more money and time. Just admit it already. Because you desire to make those 5 year olds seem like criminals or severely disturbed to get them out of your school is an awful thing and I hope you realize it. Stop it.
Way to go, Dr. Ravitch! You tell the truth. I just hope Madame Secretary will listen.
Ann O’Leary Liu, another “education policy advisor” who has no experience in public K-12 education. Beware the bestest and brightestest!!
So glad the “movement” successfully shut down any national debate on replacing public schools with charter schools by focusing exclusively on one charter chain in NYC.
Can I do that? Can I point to a strong set of public schools in my state (which is not NY) to argue that public schools shouldn’t be replaced by charter schools, and instead should be supported by the political classes in DC? If not, why not?
Clinton knows that when she lands in Ohio and says her goal is to expand charter schools she’ll be met with bewilderment, right?
It was front page news in this state when the Obama Adminstration inexplicably and cluelessly rewarded the charter sector with a huge grant, because charter schools don’t outperform public schools here. I hope she’s ready to explain why national ed reformers keep pushing to replace public schools with charter schools here and in other states where they don’t outperform public schools, states like Michigan and Pennsylvania.
Am I missing something? Is there a “strong” charter chain in NYC? There seem to be charter schools with a majority of middle class students, which do well. There seems to be charter chains with a majority of at-risk students who either have mediocre results or infamously get rid of many of the starting Kindergartners to have stellar results with the much smaller number of students who remain.
Bear in mind your use of the word ‘success’ and ‘perform’. Are scores on standardized, corporate-created tests a measure of educational success? I don’t buy into that definition and find it both shallow and distracting (and, probably, debilitating if it persists).
A ‘successful’ education produces active, happy, confident, thoughtful, contributing citizens in a vibrant community.
By the time this ‘testing’ experiment’ proves it’s demerit (say in 30 years or so), it will be too late. Even now, however there are signs that bowing to the testing idol produces inactive (sit in your seat, repeat after me), sad, insecure people who learn to respond to the tyranny of the test and to follow orders, not contribute in community decision-making.
Pedagogy is more effective at teaching than content. This is why Socrates held ‘dialogues’.
I was a STEM teacher, by the way.
Have the Democrats in Congress come up with anything to say on public schools other than that we have to test? I look forward to another stern, scolding lecture from DC on how public school students aren’t collecting enough data to satisfy Congress that our schools are worth funding. They know we send them the money, right? It isn’t coming from Broad or Gates? Can we possibly talk them into sending some back to schools?
There are many more successful public schools to use as models for the “under performing” ones. The question should be “How can we learn from the successful public schools (rich communities) and implement their successful strategies (money) in poor schools. Successful public schools have a longer history of successes than any charter. Most public schools and teachers are very successful regardless of union involvement.
Hillary’s choice to disregard successful public schools in her comparisons is deliberately pro-charters.
It’s not only what wealthy school districts do, it’s what they don’t have to do and spend money on that help to make them successful. Most children of affluent families come prepared for school and require far less compensatory and special education services. The district can put more money into instruction for the general population than poor districts can. Plus, since schools are funded through the tax base, they generally get more money in general. Poor students do much better in integrated schools that still offer the services the poor students need, and poor students learn to function in a middle class environment. You can call it “modeling upward” or whatever you want to call it, but it works. Poor students learn to become more aspirational in integrated schools that contain a range of socioeconomic levels. The middle class kids learn to be more tolerant and less judgmental. In order to do this, we would have to incentivize desegregation in some way.
I wonder if it’s awkward for the Democratic Party that they sound exactly like the new Tea Party governor in Kentucky on public education:
“Bevin, speaking on the Mandy Connell talk show on WHAS Radio in Louisville last night, reaffirmed the support he voiced during his gubernatorial campaign for charter schools as a means of strengthening the state’s public education system.
“We are one of seven states that offers absolutely no competition for public education dollars. This is one of the reasons we are behind other states. We’ve got to introduce school choice into the state of Kentucky,” the Louisville Republican said.”
Maybe Clinton can campaign with him on a bipartisan “privatization” ticket.
http://www.kyforward.com/bevin-says-he-will-champion-school-choice-wants-better-prepared-graduates-calls-kea-too-powerful/
Even the “good” charter schools, which studies show are a minority among them, have bad effects, in that they drain resources from and undermine the public schools.
They might help a percentage of the children enrolled in them (if you consider training in a Skinner Box and being turned into “little test-taking machines,” as per Success Academy, to be “help”) but on an institutional/policy level, they are highly destructive of public education, as the men behind the curtain intend them to be.
Hillary is a very intelligent woman, and knows this, but she also knows that a significant portion of Democratic primary voters support the public schools, so she dissembles. Her comments are misdirection, intended to distract and deceive, something she and her hubby are masters of.
I am not entirely sure the charters do help. Even at Success Academy, they TEST children who come in for grade 1 – 4 and only allow children to join their appropriate grade if they decide it is okay. The others are given a choice to “repeat” or stay at their current school, and I suspect most of them don’t repeat. So given how few of the “random” at-risk students remain (who all have very motivated parents who have already attended meetings setting out the high expectations), the jury is DEFINITELY still out as to whether that school makes much of a difference. Except to point out that if you shower a school with millions in donations where they want for nothing, and can spend all their time focusing on the students who are easy to teach, you might get better results.
Success Academy is the last place that would come to my mind when thinking about charters that help students. Behaviorist sweat shops help nobody. I mentioned it only because Eva has been successful riding the test score gravy train.
I was thinking about smaller, community-based, mom-and-pop charters (they do exist, though on a fiscal level that doesn’t make them any less destructive to public education), some of which do make honest efforts to enroll a broad range of students.
The following set of rules was posted (in German of course–this is my translation) on the wall of a school built in 1908 in Neukolln in Berlin. Someone above asked about the impact of such rules, much less test-and-punish, on future citizens. Let’s just think where these 1908 school children were at 25 years later.
–Students must sit up straight
–Feet must be placed side by side on the floor
–Students must keep their eyes on the teacher
–Laughing, whispering, talking, moving or looking around are forbidden.
–Students must signal with the pointer finger of the right hand; the left hand supporting the elbow.
The link isn’t working. Was this Ann O’Leary piece removed?
Bulls**t Hillary. This reminds me of the people who defended slavery because “we always treated our slaves kindly, it’s not fair to punish the good slaveholders because some didn’t.”
Okay, this is tangential, but why do we feel it’s okay to refer to her by her first name only (“Hilary”) when none of the male candidates get that treatment? We don’t say, “Donald,” “Chris,” “Bobby,” et cetera. Rankled in college when professors would talk about “Emily” but then “Hopkins,” “Sylvia” but then “Hughes.” It’s inappropriately familiar and wrong.
The Donald?
Bernie?
Part of the Problem,
People refer to Trump as “The Donald.” Hillary’s ads say “Hillary”
I truly hope that Hillary takes up your invitation to meet with you and discuss the truth about charter schools (Ohio has so many scandals based on those type of schools and don’t forget how poorly NOLA’s Recovery schools – another mess) and how the public schools are being starved into closure.
One thing I would like to mention is the Clinton’s abilities to speak in a “human voice”. Hillary’s using the skillful art of “communication”, just like her husband, to say what the people want to hear even if she’s not in favor of that particular issue. And she will use the pros and cons of school choice to say something that means nothing and leaving the public to think that she’s defending their belief. She’s very deft in her speech but her political beliefs are clearly defined.
Even the Wikipedia defines the Clintonism as, “… critics of Clinton define Clintonism as (a) “coddling big money (except guns and tobacco), financial scandals, winning at any cost, flip-flopping and prevaricating”[2] or more generally, (b) “political self-preservation”.
The link to O’Leary’s post: https://medium.com/@Ann_OLeary/yes-hillary-clinton-supports-charter-schools-she-also-supports-equity-and-inclusion-59fade63fc16#.n2e96esxa
Reblogged this on patthaleblog and commented:
It should come as no surprise that Hillary Clinton supports Charter Schools and their profiteering. Where’s her stand on support for public schools?