Under Indiana’s former Secretary of Education Tony Bennett, the state determined to crack down on low-performing schools. Five schools were handed over to private management. The result was a disaster. Four schools made no progress at all. Enrollment plummeted at all the takeover schools.
Two recent comments point up the failure of private management in running public services. You would think that public officials would look at the record and stop privatizing public services and instead work to improve them.
Reader Chiara writes:
“What I love about the (bipartisan) mania for “running government like a business” is how they seem incapable of delivering basic government services.
“It’s the worst of both worlds. It’s not good government and it’s not good private sector. It’s this awful hybrid that we seem to be stuck with. Can we have two sectors again- a public sector and a private sector? Can we hire some people who don’t have complete contempt for the public sector they’re supposed to be improving?”
Another reader recounts the failure of private corporation Edison in Gary, Indiana.
“Roosevelt school in Gary, IN was taken over a few years ago by EdisonLeaning, a for profit charter school. There is a legal battle between the Gary Community Schools and EdisonLearning as to who is responsible for fixing up the school which is falling apart.
“Here is a partial quote from The Times of NW Indiana.
“GARY — As temperatures dipped below 20 degrees, Gary Roosevelt students and teachers stood outside the school Wednesday protesting a lack of heat in the building and the ability to get a quality education.
“Students have rarely been in the building since they returned from the Christmas holiday. The school was dismissed a half-day on a couple of days because of problems with the boilers that heat the building. It closed Jan. 8 due to the lack of heat and again Wednesday.
“The school is scheduled to be closed Thursday and Friday for development days.
“The students say enough is enough.
“Roosevelt senior Cary Martin said it’s really bad inside the building.
“Some of us have come to expect not being in the building because it’s too cold,” he said.
“This happens every year, but it’s time for a change. This is affecting our education. This is really sad.”
“He said there are also problems with water inside the building, with few water fountains working and none of the showers in the locker rooms.
“Some of my colleagues and friends stink after class because they can’t wash up,” Martin said.
“Food is also an issue, along with mold and damage in the school’s band room.
“In January 2014, due to the heating failures, a number of pipes burst causing the hallways near the gym to flood with up to 2 inches of water. In June 2014, Indiana American Water Co. turned off the water due to a lack of payment on the bill.
“Freshman English teacher Brandi Bullock said the temperature in the hallways ranges in the 40s, while the classroom temperatures are sporadic with some warm classrooms and others freezing.
“The problem is that we can’t be in the classrooms because there are not enough warm spaces,” she said. “It used to be that the library was a warm respite from the cold but the boiler that supported that room is not working.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
There’s a really interesting dynamic going on in Ohio where public schools systems are billing the state for the costs of the state-run charter system that the state refuses to fund adequately.
What our ed reform-captured lawmakers have done is establish a privatized state system and then push the unfunded portion of the state charter system onto the public systems.
They’re sticking public schools with the bill for their experiments, because public schools are required to pay out 7k for each charter student even if the state only sends them 2k per student.
7-2 still equals 5, even in ed reform-land, so the public system has to make up the difference by either tapping state funds that are supposed to go to their own students or re-directing 5k in local funding to charters.
It’s reached the point where it’s almost a stand-off. Right now public schools are toting up bills and sending them to the state but that has no force of law so they can’t collect. If that doesn’t get state lawmakers attention they’re going to have to go to more drastic measures, like refusing to foot the bill for a state charter system the state established and runs, but won’t fund.
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The word “performing” should never be used in reference to schools with out quote marks. Schools don’t “perform” at all, whether high or low. The students within those schools take tests, the scores of which are what we’re talking about when we talk about “high-performing schools” or “low performing schools”. Which in turn means we’re really just talking about average family socio-economic status of the students in the school.
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Dienne, you are exactly right. Schools don’t perform, students do.
Which brings up a pet peeve: charter “seats” are not high-performing or high-quality. And yet reformers say they will add another XXXX number of high-performing charter “seats.” Some magic about just sitting in a charter chair.
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“High performing seats” always gives me a weird visual. Like going to a circus and seeing chairs walking on the tightrope or swinging from the trapeze.
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I went to a public meeting in Gary when Bennett first appeared there. I was the first one on my feet for comments but was stopped short. Bennett was hyping the work of a Chinese man who talked about our failing schools.
I mentioned Dr. Ravitch name and he sounded like he was unaware of it, her name. I was trying to compare the two viewpoints but was stopped because the audience did not understand what I was trying to portray.
There is a LOT of ignorance out there. Sad but true.
It is sometimes impossible to make headway when there is so much propaganda pushed and intelligent discourse takes a back seat.
Watching this blog and what is going on in American “education” is disheartening to say the least.
Just recently I talked with a SUPERB teacher who is ready to quit – among the very many talked about on this blog. That person is just burned out facing the political inanity of what has to be faced by the stupidity and ignorance of our politicians, if that is what it is, is appalling.
People have suggested this and I think that undoubtedly to some, probably great, degree they KNOW what they are doing.
It is just corporate greed – exemplified once again – where a huge pile of money is seen and a “mining” operation is underway to grab it.
Whatever the motivation when the “mining” is complete there will only be the garbage left behind as is what happens when a mining operation is over.
Appalling indeed the recent posting of some Southern state which now allows “teachers’ to be hired without even a college degree.
I for one can only fear for a country where money is accumulated by a very few who control everything. Historically nation after nation has succumbed to becoming rotten on the inside. Many of our enemies are sure that we are becoming that and are waiting for it to happen. They are patient. Must we be that patient too before it happens?
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There is much recent discussion of “markets” for education, meaning public schools compete with charters and private schools.
This is a noteworthy “conversation” only in this: It makes plain that charters are not public at all.
That is not big news except that the marketing and surround and branding of charters as “public” has been unrelenting and all too successful. This conversation comes forward in almost everything from the proponents of disruptive innovation. It is also a revival of older claims that the competition from charters would improve public schools…all of those innovations would be exemplary…like Doug Lemov discipline for poor and minority children, quickie training for the TFA temps and so on.
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The language is evolving. They used to talk about “competition”. Now they don’t. Now they talk about “collaboration” between public, charter and private schools, although the ed reform method and approach is exactly the same- only the words are different.
They must have gotten a bad batch of polling or something.
The language is really different from the heady days when they were all on television extolling the virtues of markets.
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My Republican State of Indiana Representative Hal Slager sent out a flyer boasting of the amount of money appropriated for education. A higher percentage of money is going to charter schools vs. public schools even though more students are enrolled in public schools.
How can anyone boast when students are freezing in schools located in poverty areas?
Quote from Hal Slager: “Did you know? We provided a record increase of $474 million to K-12 education funding, which brings the total to more than $16 billion in state aid over the next two years – the most ever provided.
legislators also allocated $70 million in teacher performance funding to reward effective and highly effective teachers.”
Public school administrators are continuously complaining in the local paper about the lack of funding for public schools.
My Republican State Senator Rick Niemeyer says the following: “The state budget must be balanced. The legislature must avoid tax increases. We should give spending priority to the services that do the most good for Hoosiers, including eduction, public safety and infrastructure.”
Politician bravado doesn’t carry far when students and teachers are suffering.
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At the UnKochMyCampus Facebook page there is a link to a petition that asks for transparency and safeguards relating to Koch funding at Indiana University. Please consider signing and forwarding, if you are an Indiana resident or have some connection to IU.
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And now BSU wants to turn the THEA BOWMAN CHARTER SCHOOL over to LIGHTHOUSE CMO management group. Lighthouse already has 3 existing charter schools with a state “F” rating. To turn THEA BOWMAN over to LIGHTHOUSE would create a Charter School management monopoly in Gary. I’m sorry, but isn’t the charter school, school choice argument against traditional schools focus on the publi school “monopoly” on education. These charter school authorizers like BSU and their CMO’s / EMO’s can’t have it both ways!
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