This article provides an inside view of the charter racket in California.
If local districts oppose charter schools, it doesn’t matter. No matter what they say or how well the community organizes, the die is cast. State officials will approve the charter application, regardless of its flaws.
Rocketship charter chain wanted to move into the Mt. Diablo district. It had a federal grant to expand, and the chain wouldn’t let community opposition stand in its way. The district did not want Rocketship’s computer-based approach. It did not want a corporate chain whose headquarters was sixty miles away. Neither did the county board of education, which rejected Rocketship.
“This is the opposite of local control,” said Nellie Meyer, the superintendent of the Mt. Diablo Unified School District, who called the proposal deeply flawed and was followed by MDUSD’s general counsel, Deborah Cooksey, who said Rocketship had collected its petition signatures “under false pretenses,” by telling people—including parents who were non-English speakers—their kids could get kicked out of school if they didn’t sign.
“This is going to be something that will divide our community,” said Gloria Rios, who has lived in the Monument Corridor near the northeastern Bay Area city of Concord for 20 years and has three children in the district’s public schools. “Our children will suffer the consequences, and these funds can be used for the schools we already have.”
Rejected by the local community and the county board of education, Rocketship went to the State Board of Education.
Slam dunk.
“The first indication that the proceedings were tilted to Rocketship came when Cindy Chan, who oversees the California Education Department’s charter school program, summarized Rocketship’s petition and, using the same legal terms that the Mt. Diablo and Contra Costa County Boards used to reject Rocketship, concluded the opposite. Rocketship’s prograns were “sound” and they “will implement it,” she said.
“Rocketship’s Cheye Calvo, its chief growth and county engagement officer, then led the board through a powerpoint presentation filled with all the buzzwords of the charter school movement. He talked of closing the “achievement gap.” He said that most “Rocketeers” learn more than one year’s worth of studies every school year. He said the school collected 1,100 petition signatures from district residents. He said the computer labs were “personalized learning,” saying they were “no substitute” for instruction. He called their teachers “purposeful, focused.” He said they rely on data to “assess students” and focus on the “whole child.” He acknowledged that Rocketship has high turnover—losing 20 percent of its faculty annually, but said their “teachers are performance-driven professionals who strive to achieve gap-closing” results. Finally, he put up graphs that compared the test scores from Rocketship’s San Jose schools with students in the Mt. Diablo district, saying they can do better than the traditional public schools.
“The opponents, led by the Mt. Diablo School District superintendent and local school board president, said Rocketship’s persistence was an affront to local control. They recounted the major flaws in its curriculum, especially its shallow approach to teaching English to students who did not speak it at home or as a first language. The district’s programs, especially in the Monument Corridor, were appropriately bilingual and award-winning, they said, adding their approach was seen by Rocketship as a liability. They said that Rocketship was not invited by parents to come into the community, but was lured by local real estate developers.
“But mostly, the critique was aimed at Rocketship’s overreliance on its test-centered curriculum and its lack of attention to the needs of what was working in a low-income, bilingual community, and one where special education also was a challenge.
“We are outraged at Rocketship’s lack of information on special education,” said Cheryl Hansen, president of the Mt. Diablo School District Board. “This is not Rocketship’s first school. Rocketship has not been able to answer special education questions at the school board and county board level.” And returning to their English language instruction, Hansen said, “More than 75 percent of their charter schools show declining achievement in the last four years.”
Nothing the district said mattered. Diablo will get a Rocketship charter, despite its poor performance elsewhere, despite its rejection by the local community.
This process is a rejection of local control and a rejection of democracy. It serves corporate interests, not children.
If evidence, nothing rational, legal and peaceful works, then there are two choices left for people struggling to keep their freedom of choice and locally controlled, democratic, transparent, non-profit community based public schools from the private sector autocrats that worship at the alter of avarice. The people either submit and become drones doing what the corporations want or fight in the courts or in the streets. When given that choice in the 18th century, the U.S. Founding Fathers chose to fight and risk everything even their lives and the lives of their families.
Everyone can thank Gov. Brown for turning our CA educational system into big business! Whether funding silicon valley friends or grants to developers Brown is willing to hand out the dollars for things that NEVER benefit our children.
But Brown also appealed the Vergara decision and won. And there’s more:
How California Flipped The Education-Reform Script
“at least one state seems to have missed the war on public schools. … California is flowing more money into schools and has taken steps to ensure school funding is more equitable. Instead of tormenting teachers with shoddy evaluations, many California school principals are resisting the policy of using standardized test scores to judge teacher performance. And the state recently refused to include a teacher evaluation system based on student test screes in its application for a waiver form the mandates of No Child Left Behind Laws. (That was reported in April 2015)
https://ourfuture.org/20150421/how-california-flipped-the-education-reform-script
Just like so many other “progressive” politicians who THINK they are doing what is best for children, Brown gets on the privatization bus — knowingly, or unknowingly. Reform just sounds too good not to “join up” for the kids.
Add Sen. Sherrod Brown to that list.
What an idiot. Have you ever been inside a school before?
Who is the other Lofthouse that just popped up in this thread? It isn’t me.
Notice that my comments include my mug shot, and my first and last name that is also a link to who I am. That makes me transparent.
I think that the new and opaque Lofthouse (with no mug shot and no link to who that person really is) is a fake and created an anonymous Troll account using my last name.
The alleged Troll using my last name asked: “What an idiot. Have you ever been inside a school before?”
I have no idea who the alleged fake Lofthouse is asking that question, because there are other comments in this thread.
If the alleged and opaque Troll’s question was directed to the transparent Lloyd Lofthouse, me, then yes, I have been inside a public school before.
First, I was a child/student from K – 12, and then I was a public school teacher for thirty years (1975 – 2005) teaching in a minority community that had extremely high rates of poverty in addition to multi-generational street gangs that were dangerous and violent.
In between being a K-12 student and then a public school teacher that often worked 60 to 100 hours a week as a teacher, I was a U.S. Marine who fought in Vietnam and went to college on the GI Bill. I was also born into a family living in poverty and grew up struggling to overcome a severe case of dyslexia.
During those thirty years as a public school teacher, I worked with more than 6,000 students and most of them were minorities that lived in poverty.
The alleged and opaque Troll calling itself Lofthouse may learn more about the transparent Lofthouse’s teaching years here:
http://www.mysplendidconcubine.com/teachingyears.htm
If you click the link scroll down to read what was published in the Rowland Heights Highlander (a local newspaper near the high school where he taught) about Lloyd Lofthouse as a teacher. The lines that I blacked out where errors the reporter made in her reporting.
For more on this, go here:
or some letters here:
http://www.scoop.it/t/charter-choice-closer-look/p/4060952686/2016/03/09/rocketship-letter-from-contra-costa-county-community-sent-to-california-state-board-of-education
EXCERPT of those letters:
——————————————————–
Letter to Rocketship from Contra Costa County Community (also below)
For letters written by community members, parents, and others, I am including quotes without names and contact information out of respect for privacy.
– – – – – – – – –
“Dear State Board of Education:
“I am writing this letter in reference to the upcoming decision on the Rocketship Mt Diablo Charter school appeal. My school district was mentioned throughout the petition process at the local Mt Diablo Unified School District and Contra Costa County Office of Education levels. It is my opinion that the State Board of Education uphold the deny decisions of both the school district and the county office of education to not allow Rocketship Mt Diablo to be placed in said location.
“Throughout the petition process, Rocketship representatives have stated a strong positive relationship with the Franklin-McKinley School District. This is simply not true and the relationship is both poor and confrontational as Rocketship continually operates in unethical methods while pursuing their growth goals.
“Last year, as President of the Board of Trustees of the Franklin-McKinley School District, a petition was submitted to the district for yet another Rocketship school. This petition was denied by the school board after a thorough review due to many of the reasons outlined in Mt Diablo Unified School District report. With achievement scores declining over a four-year period, along with an unsound curriculum, Rocketship Education continues to be substandard to the education of our children of the Franklin-McKinley School District.
“Again, it should be noted that there is no strong – or positive – working relationship between Rocketship and the Franklin-McKinley School District. The claims by the Rocketship organization on this subject are incorrect and I request that this be noted in your records as you consider the appeal for the Contra Costa County Rocketship school.
“Therefore, I urge you to uphold the denial of this Rocketship petition.”
– – – – – – –
From a Physician in San Jose:
— “I am a physician at a Family Medicine clinic in a low income neighborhood in San Jose, near Rocketship schools. I see children and adults, many of whom live in this community. As part of my evaluation of children, both in well child annual exams and in office visits for acute illness, I frequently ask about school. As any doctor who practices pediatrics knows, school performance is one of several critical measures of a child’s current and predicted future well-being; in addition, a great deal can be learned about his social functioning and psychiatric health. Some illnesses like ADHD impair both social and academic function, and sometimes social dysfunction including bullying or domestic violence can impede cognitive, social, and even physical development in children.
“I take care of many kids who are enrolled in both traditional district school and in Rocketship charter schools. I have been impressed with the number of children who attend Rocketship elementary schools who have presented with physical signs of extreme stress. Some come with headaches, some with abdominal pain, two have urinary problems. The stories are similar. They often involve bullying with an inadequate school response or frequent punishments for inadequate performance (incomplete homework packets resulting in detention, missing lunch and recess because of academic failures, etc.). I have asked parents to take their stressed out Kindergartners and 3rd graders to the park, to let them play and relax and have fun, to help their symptoms subside, but parents insist that there is no time after the long school day and the mountain of homework. I have attempted to call school administrators to discuss patients with them, but they do not return my calls. I have recommended that some patients seek testing for learning disabilities, but parents have told me that the school tells them they can’t have thorough testing there and they don’t have many services for children with LD so they should try a different school if they need those kinds of services. I have found traditional district schools much easier to work with, and I have not seen the same types of physical and psychological complaints among children attending these schools.”
…
“I worry that these issues stem from the ultra-high student to teacher ratio at Rocketship. The Mt. Diablo charter petition calls for 116 kindergarten students and 3 teachers, a student teacher ratio of 38:1 (See Appendix B) for children that are 6 years old!! I understand the rotation model, but there simply aren’t enough qualified staff at Rocketship to provide meaningful education. I believe this may be one part of the reason students experience extreme stress at Rocketship schools, and face unmitigated bullying. Worst of all, the evidence that this suffering produces meaningful outcomes is lacking. I fear than many of these kids will have lost an opportunity for a more cheerful elementary school experience, just to enter middle school and high school with no advantage from those hours doing homework packets and extended school days.
“Please do not allow these schools to propagate.”
From a Community Leader (Monument area):
— “… Many families have been telling me that Rocketship is like a private school and it will be free to the children in the Monument area. The families are very trusting, and they were misled by the people from Rocketship to get the signatures. I see that they want to make money using our people. The families think that the school will be located by Meadow Lane and Monument Blvd. I just found out that the school will be located by the police station. Many of the families who signed the petition live far from the police station. I am from Mexico and I am very proud of my culture and my people.
“Rocketship lied to get the signatures, so I don’t think that they will honor our culture and our traditions as the Mt. Diablo schools do. They schools in the Monument area are doing a great job serving the children and their families. I ask you to please deny the petition from Rocketship. Please do what is good for our children.”
– – – – – – –
From a Parent (Monument area):
— “… Rocketship people were collecting signatures on the outside of shops, in parks and various places deceiving people. They knocked on my door saying they would open a school for children; the school would have much more support for students but they never said they would ask the School District for funds.”
“My son is in his 9th grade at [local high school] and I am very proud to say that thanks to the help he received at Meadow Homes as an English learner he is taking advanced classes with excellent grades. For all these reasons our family does not agree on a Rocketship school, which in addition it will take away funding from schools of this district. This community does not need a school like the one Rocketship is offering.”
“Many parents and community members who spoke at the Advisory Commission on Charter Schools hearing on February 9th echoed similar accounts of discontent with the aggressive push to get signatures (see testimony at 4:22:23 in the video).
“The Executive Director of Monument Impact, a non-profit organization serving over 4,000 neighbors in the Monument area also sent a letter recommending denial of the appeal petition with many of the same themes described above (documenting “concern about statements that Rocketship misled Spanish-speaking parents in order to generate the “proof” of community support’).
His letter states,
— “…to get various points of view, I met with representatives from Rocketship and with community members and leaders, and I conclude that Rocketship will not improve the educational opportunities for children and youth in the community. I have questions about Rocketship’s abilities to support English language learners, who are a significant group in our neighborhood, and about their responsiveness to a community that holds a lot of wisdom about and hope for our youth.”
He added concern that the expansion of Rocketship would “likely increase gentrification in the community, which would also significantly disrupt many families in the area.”
– – – – – – –
The following is my letter (the blog owner’s, not mine, JACK).
“Dear Superintendent Torlakson, President Kirst, and State Board of Education Trustees,
“I am writing to encourage the denial of Rocketship’s appeal petition for a campus in the Mt. Diablo community. I teach Educational Psychology in the Multiple Subjects Credential Program at SJSU, am active as a community and youth advocate, and have seen first hand the social fracturing and community divisions that have resulted in the wake of Rocketship expansions in San Jose. My research and publications have focused on school climate, violence prevention, and the promotion of healthy social and emotional learning environments. Because of my public statements and critical questions about Rocketship’s practices, parents and teachers have reached out to me to share the concerns that they have also brought to their school’s administration and that remain unaddressed. Over the past two years, I have visited two of their local campuses (Los Suenos, and Si Se Puede), and have had over 30 hours of discussions with at least 15 current and former parents, teachers, administrators, instructional lab specialists, volunteers, and substitute teachers who have worked at the Rocketship schools.
“According to EC 47605(b), a charter petition must be “consistent with sound educational practice” if, in the SBE’s judgment, it is likely to be of educational benefit to pupils who attend.
“For purposes of EC Section 47605(b)(1), a charter petition shall be “an unsound educational program” if it is either of the following:
“A program that involves activities that the SBE determines would present the likelihood of physical, educational, or psychological harm to the affected pupils.
“A program that the SBE determines not likely to be of educational benefit to the pupils who attend.”
“The petition proposed for the Mt. Diablo site is effectively the same model as the sites that have been opened in San Jose. The following are examples of ongoing concerns that remain unaddressed and that relate specifically to 47605(b) (1) above. Should it be necessary, I can connect you specifically with the people with whom I have spoken and who have communicated each of the situations documented below:
“Repeated failure to respond to parent communication and requests about student safety at the schools [Multiple campuses with many parents/teachers expressing ongoing concern]
“February 23rd2016 referral from NAACP colleague by parent documenting racially hostile climate with lack of action or school-wide policy related to the ongoing harassment of a student.
“2014 public testimony from parent documenting hostile social climates, disregard for student safety and well-being, fear of retaliation, and ongoing lack of attention by school administrators [Si Se Puede campus] http://bit.ly/1UF83zi
— Militaristic, rigid, compliance driven social climates and frequent use of shame and humiliation as behavioral control measures [communicated by current/former teachers, ILS, substitutes]
— Children required to sit in complete silence during lunch [communicated by teachers, ILS, parents]
— Disregard for students’ physical needs (children not allowed to use restrooms for extended time blocks). Teachers documented high rates of student UTIs. Parent testimony reflects the same here: http://bit.ly/1UF83zi.
— Ongoing and high rates of faculty turnover [Review documents from denial of petitions, current and former teacher reports of many teachers leaving within weeks of starting and at middle of school year.]
— Excessive screen time in the very young grades, K-2, with no protections for children expressing headaches, neck-aches or fatigue from the screen (both ILS and substitute teachers have reported being required to push students to continue “logging hours” for the software regardless of student complaint).
— Punishment for misbehavior that includes requiring additional hours of screen time, up to all day [communicated/confirmed by current/former teachers and Instructional Lab Specialists]
“Rocketship claims to have an educationally “sound” model. However, to be educationally sound, a program must also be developmentally sound. Extended screen time for very young children remains unaddressed and effectively dismissed by the organization despite the fact that Rocketship students (at the youngest grades, K-2) are at a stage when their eyes and vision have not yet fully developed.
“According to the American Academy of Ophthalmology, “Focus, tracking, depth perception, and other aspects of vision continue to develop throughout early and middle childhood. Convergence, the ability of both eyes to focus on an object simultaneously, becomes more fully developed by about age seven.”
Fascinating testimony, Jack.
The word “progessive” education is used in place of “privatization” its a marketers dream selling charter schools to the state, county and school districts. Smiling faces, kids with trophies in their hands- then the US News and World Report nonsense is twisted and if that doesn’t work just bribe some politicians.
The LIE, of charter schools as “public” schools, was unmasked. The new terminology, “community” schools, won’t disguise contrived and invalid charter schools.
isn’t there something for you to do at the other end of the trailer? you really have too much free time on your hands sport!
Jack, the alleged “Lofthouse” that left this comment was not me, the real and transparent Lloyd Lofthouse. I suspect that the opaque Lofthouse is a Troll that set up a fake account using my last name in an attempt to stir up problems. For the real me, notice that a mug shot of my real face accompanies my comments and that my name, “Lloyd Lofthouse” is also a link to one of my Blogs.
“isn’t there something for you to do at the other end of the trailer? you really have too much free time on your hands sport!”
I love this guy!
Fortunately in our system of democracy, local decision-makers don’t always have the final say. If they did, there would be some communities where young women do not have equal opportunities because some local boards opposed what came to be known as Title 9.
Some youngsters with special needs would not have opportunities for free public education because some local boards opposed what came to be “Education for all Handicapped.”
Some people of color would not have voting rights because some local city councils, mayors, etc opposed voting rights.
There is a long list of rights that had to be obtained from states or the federal government because local control blocked them.
Having said that, state or regional authorities don’t always approve charters. In California and many other states with state-wide charter authorizers, some proposals are rejected. That’s good. Not all deserve to be supported.
And in many states, authorizers themselves are reviewed periodically by the state to determine whether they should continue to operate. Moreover, most state legislatures have modified their original charter laws both to expand, refine opportunities, and in cases outlaw abuses that have developed.
Our system of government gives no group total power. I think that’s one of the genius ideas of the country.
Happy Memorial Day.
Joe, your argument is nonsensical.
You’re equating one group:
1) parents and community members who put forth detailed, documented objections to charter schools being forced upon them against their will, and who detail the damage that will result from such an imposition, again with evidence of damage to children in other locales where these charters have been imposed in the past …
… with …
2) people who oppose equal protections for women under Title IX
3) people who oppose education for the handicapped
… and …
4) people who oppose voting rights for African-Americans
Outside of the objection to loss of local control, there’s no equivalency — none, ZERO, ZIP, NADA — between the first group, and the last three. If anything, the first group would be diametrically opposed to, and would be the first to condemn the actions and goals of the last three.
Nice try.
Complete local control is either ok or it’s not. I think it’s not.
I understand that many who post here don’t want any options other than what a local school district will provide.
Joe Nathan logic:
There was a time when handicapped kids were educated in expensive special schools — paid for by public schools — instead of being accommodated right in the public school.
Therefore it is fine for charter schools to push out expensive handicapped kids! Because public schools once didn’t accommodate them and paid for them to be taught elsewhere and according to Joe that’s no different than pushing them right out the door and letting them fend for themselves!
The IRONY of what Joe just posted is that charter schools are exempt from most of those regulations he just cited as being so good! In the privatization world, those nasty “bureaucratic” rules that mean that charters have to use their money in ways that cut funds from administrator salaries or hurt their test scores are a no go.
Charters are required to follow federal laws regarding education of all handicapped.
Joe Nathan, you are equating civil rights guarantees with the desire by private enterprise to take over school districts? That’s nonsensical. Meanwhile, school districts in California cannot require charters to adhere to protections of civil rights that school districts must obey.
I’m saying there are downsides to complete local control. As noted, some people who post here don’t want families (especially low income families) who are not able to afford exclusive well funded suburban school districts to have any other options except what the local board agrees to provide.
Fortunately on a bi-partisan basis, legislators in many states have agreed that all families deserve options.
Jack, thank you for replying to Joe Nathan. You nailed it.
There is something entirely dishonest about how he posts on here. Who underwrites him?
Karen Wolfe,
Joe Nathan has also posted that because some public high schools have high drop out rates, it’s perfectly find for a charter elementary school to make a 6 year old special needs kid to feel unwanted and misery if it helps to get him out of their school. Because some 16 year olds drop out of public high school!
See, no difference. As you point out, because there were once no civil rights protections for special needs kids in public schools, Joe Nathan has no problem with there being no protections for special needs kids in charter schools now!
Because there are billionaires who own some politicians who tell us that it is all okay.
I made no assertion that it’s perfectly fine for any school to push out a kid. In fact quite the reverse.
JOE NATHAN: “Charters are required to follow federal laws regarding education of all handicapped.”
Then how do you explain this?
Here’s NYC parent Jaye Bee Smalley telling her story about what happened after her child’s number was picked in the Success Academy lottery, effectively winning her child a seat n Eva’s wonderful charter chain organization.
Happy ending? Ehhh… not quite.
JAYBEE SMALLEY: “My name is Jaybee Smalley. I’m a parent, yes. I have two children with special needs. I have one child who I applied to the Harlem Success Academy through the lottery process to see if she could be… would be accepted.
“When she WAS accepted through the lottery, I reached out to them (Harlem Success Academy) before I attended any sort of a orientation to see if they would be able to accommodate her I.E.P. She has a 12-to-1-to-1 I.E.P. for a year-round program, with four different related services.
“They didn’t respond to me through email at all.. and finally, after the second meeting had come, I called them —- I had a very difficult time getting through to them —- Before I could get the words ’12-to-1-to-1′ out of my mouth, they immediately told me that they would absolutely not be able to accommodate that sort of child in their school.”
————————————
Regarding what Ms. Smalley says in the video, is Ms. Smalley:
A) lying?
B) delusional? (as she is recounting visual and auditory hallucinations that never happened, as they are nothing but her imaginary encounters with Success Academy administrators that she is describing);
C) telling the truth?
———————-
I’m voting for “C”.
Or perhaps you’ll offer the “anomaly” defense. Like Charlotte Dial, the Success Academy person who dealt with Ms. Smalley was a rogue agent who, acting on her own and against Success Academy policy, treated Ms. Smalley and her children this way.
The problem is there are a lot of parents suing over this kind of treatment their their children received.
Here’s a story of one:
Here’s a scanned copy of that lawsuit itself:
Click to access sa_lawsuit.pdf
Here’s another such lawsuit:
Here’s a scanned copy of that lawsuit itself:
Click to access lawton-lawsuit.pdf
At the bottom of all of this, here’s the problem: to Eva and the charter school industry, Ms. Smalley’s daughter is a commodity, not a human being. Her daughter is “a thing”, if you will who is judged by the following criteria:
1) the revenue that her daughter bring in — the tax money that accompanies her attending SUCCESS ACADEMY;
2) the cost — the less the better — the funds that it will require to educate her; in this case the cost is higher than a non-Special Ed. student due to having a 12-to-1-to-1 ration (Student-to-Special Ed. teacher-to-classroom-aide), and other costs inherent in educating such a child… Hey, we ain’t paying for that!
3) Ms. Smalley’s child’s eventual ability or inability to generate high test scores (a form of profits, if you will, to these deranged charter-ites … Success Academy hiigh-up leader even bragged to New York magazine about turning these children in to “little test-taking machines” … as if this was a goal to which any school should aspire).
The message that Eva and the charter school industry gives Ms. Smalley & her child and other parents & their child:
“Your child is nothing! You, Ms. Smalley, are nothing! Get out of our sight, you nothings!”
Good question, Jack. I hope advocacy groups including attorneys in NYC will contact this parent and offer to help her. If you are in NYC, I hope you will offer to help.
Joe, Jack Covey teaches in California. I don’t think he has the resources or availability to help a parent in New York. Perhaps you could talk to your friends in the charter industry in NY to help the parent who has been ill-treated.
Fair enough, Diane. I will. Since you live in NYC and are far more familiar with resources there, I hope you will do the same.
Joe
This is one of the most bizarre assertions I have ever read on this or any other blog—
“some people who post here don’t want families (especially low income families) who are not able to afford exclusive well funded suburban school districts to have any other options except what the local board agrees to provide.”
If this fits anyone, it describes those promoting, defending and mandating corporate education reform because THEY work furiously to decide what choices everyone else can have.
😧
There have been numerous assertions posted here that charters other than approved by local boards should not be allowed to exist.
“There have been numerous assertions posted here that charters other than approved by local boards should not be allowed to exist.”
No, but after a local board has denied a certain charter — based on overwhelming community input — and then later to the State Board of Ed, a community again overwhelmingly voices its opposition to having certain charters like those of the Rocketship chain forced upon them against their will… and again, provides mountains of evidence citing the wide-ranging and damaging effects these charters previously have had on other districts, and will have on their district, should one or more of these charters open in their district, then hell-yeah … that community’s “choice” is the one that should be respected, and yeah, that school should “not exist.”
Joe you keep talking about how parents should have “choices” and “a right to choose” … blah-blah-blah….
Well, what if that “choice” is a well-funded traditional public school, under the governance and oversight of a school board elected by the community, and includes a full, rich curriculum with music, the arts, P.E., etc. with credentialed full-time teachers teaching these courses who are dedicated only to that school — not roving itinerants — and that has low class sizes, and that is staffed with fully credentialed, unionized teachers in each classroom, most of whom possess years of experience and expertise?
Should that “choice” — if that’s what the parents desire — be respected?
On that score, check out how Rocketship — in collusion with the idiot corporate ed. reform school officials in Tennessee — respected the “right to choose” of parents in one community.
In this instance, parents who merely attended an informational session about the Rocketship Charter School, were horrified to discover that their child’s records were pulled without their consent by local district officials, and those parents’ kids’ school of attendance was involuntarily moved to the new Rocketship charter school. When they brought their child to their zoned school, they were barred from entry, and informed by officials that their children now must attend Rocketship, like it or not:
http://www.tnparents.com/our-voicesblog/rocketship-charter-school-nightmare-in-tn
—————-
“Apparently ANY family that went to an info session about the new Rocketship Charter Schools had their records pulled without permission. So students and parents showed up the first day of school only to find out that they were not registered at their zoned school. Their children were registered at Rocketship without their permission.
“So they went to Rocketship to get their children switched back to their zoned school, and it was like walking into a high-pressure timeshare sales job. Rocketship pressured them to stick around and try it. It was a nightmare to get Rocketship to release their child’s records to re-enroll in their zoned school.
“This happened to over 100 families. A bait-and-switch nightmare with their children’s school placement.
“Rocketship also confused ELL and immigrant families by misleading them to believe that they were supposed to go to charters. It is a mess. Strangely, the media isn’t picking up on it. There is a lot of hush-hush. Some are wondering if they are trying to keep students there past the 20th day to get the ADA funding and to boost their enrollment numbers.”
“Parents fight back:
http://www.stoprocketship.com is a website created by parents and community members to expose the money, politics, inconsistencies, broken promises, and real stories about the Rocketship charter school scheme happening in their communities. These advocates contributed to StopRocketShip.com, with data, graphs, letters, videos and information. They have no political or outside ties. They are fighting for what they think is right and for what is best for their community.
“Tennessee parents want fully funded public schools that benefit all students, not greedy, manipulative investors.”
—————-
Read that last line, Joe. Isn’t that a choice worth respecting?
Jack, fortunately America respects desires of various groups, not just one. And what some view quite negatively, others view quite positively.
So as you know, we elect state and federal legislators who make tough decisions about these situations.
And our system of government allows those folks to be voted out.
But I’m glad for example, that the federal government over-ruled local and in some cases state decision-makers who wanted to go with what they felt the majority wanted on women’s rights, rights of people of color, and most recently, transgender individuals.
Are you in favor of making all decisions about education and other human rights up to what people in each individual community want?
I’m not.
Joe, since you support parental choice, do you also respect parents’ choice to opt out of state testing?
Yes I do, Diane.
Glad to hear it, Joe.
Except that government is not calling the shots, business and corporations are.the difference between now and in the past, the 1 per cent hide their involvement and the extent of their involvement, now they don’t care if the public knows. Take taxpayer money and enrich themselves while the public has drunk the Kool aide of educational reform, here’s wishing that that fantasy dies a quick death and the public reclaims control of their finances.
Joe Nathan sounds scarily like the segregationists in the south who wanted to start their own state funded schools. You know, give a “choice” to kids. Hey, just because their parents “choose” a school that teaches white history is superior and treat white kids one way and minority kids another way in order to “help” the kids they don’t want realize that they will be better served in a different school, why should Joe object? He is all about that “choice”. And as long as there are some parents who feel that a school that teaches the proper white history want a charter school, that’s all the reason Joe needs to say “go on, open one!” Choice.
“Our system of government gives no group total power.”
I suggest you study government. Our system of government is democracy with PROTECTIONS for minorities rights so that the majority does not trample on the minority. We don’t say “just because the majority elected you we decided we don’t have to recognize that you were voted in”. I take that back — that is EXACTLY what the Republicans say to a Democratic President. So Joe, I can now see where you are coming from.
Joe thinks we shouldn’t take issue with the freedom of charter schools to get rid of any kid who doesn’t fit. There is an “oversight board” that doesn’t have to lift a darn finger if the charter kicks out kids and there is absolutely nothing the people in the community can do about it. If the oversight board wants to look the other way as charter schools suspend high numbers of 5 year olds and lose half their lottery winners along the way, then that is what has to happen in the name of all that is right and good in America! If there aren’t charter schools to dump their unwanted kids in underfunded public schools, then it just isn’t right, according to Joe.
LOL at not giving any group “total power”. That is exactly what the billionaire reformers have been given in communities all over this country. The power to open a charter school that can advertise all their bells and whistles to the “proper” kind of kids while relegating the rest into the underfunded public schools where those very same reformers are more than happy to see them rot. A charter CEO gets on national TV and claims that more than 20% of the 5 and 6 year olds who win the lottery in some of her schools are violent and need to be suspended and not one single person in the reform movement will even say “how dare you!” “How dare you make such an outrageous claim about low-income minority kids and expect us to believe it!” Instead you have people like Joe saying “it could be true” after all and “no one knows for sure if she just happened to have lots of violent 5 year olds and I’m sure that it is probably true because otherwise someone would have put a stop to it year ago and of course, they not only didn’t they rewarded her so it must be true that those kids are violent.” Right Joe? Some kids just aren’t worthy and should be treated as dirt because a charter school leader who no one in the reform movement dare question says that they are worthless.
You are deluded. Keep mixing and serving up the koolaid, but by all means, Joe, don’t drink it – drinking it is for other people and their kids, right?
From an educator on the ground at Rocketship:
http://www.scoop.it/doc/download/1k8itUfZ_sfWg5UxhHb4@hP
EXCERPTS:
————-
“As a former Rocketship educator, who spent considerable time in several labs and professional developments across the Rocketship Education Network, I can attest to the ineffectual nature of the Learning Labs. Despite having raised concerns to School Leaders (school administrators) and Network Staff (Rocketship Network higher-ups), changes to the health and safety of labs happened agonizingly slow or not at all.
“The following is a list of concerns so individuals can
1) understand health and safety concerns common among many Learning Labs and
2) better advocate for developmentally appropriate elementary education.
” … ”
“The realities, however, are for from what is proposed or pitched to individuals. Whole group instruction, small group instruction, targeted instruction, team learning, online learning, and enrichment are not all practiced (not even required) in labs.
“Below are concerns and observed incidences in the Learning Lab that were gathered from numerous labs across the Bay Area locations of the Rocketship Network:
“Physical and psychological health concerns:
“Student OLP Outputs: Rocketeers are required to complete a certain amount of minutes per program each week. … The amount of hours a class spends consecutively in Learning Lab largely depends on scheduling, but many classes endure uninterrupted blocks that range from 1 hour and 20 minutes to about 2 hours a day (a possible length during specific testing days). With so much time allocated to these blocks, appropriate read aloud breaks and stretch breaks should be required, not skipped or cut short because a particular student did not finish her/his daily/weekly minutes.
“Not finishing programs often results in punitive actions, such as losing out in read alouds and/or losing recess. Again, developmentally appropriate restrictions should also be considered here, since these lab minutes do not even include computer minutes students may accumulate during class time centers. !
“Double-coaching – ILSs call the practice of coaching more than one class at a time double-coaching (three classes is called triple-coaching, and so on and so forth). …
“Since a class size will generally range from 22-30, covering another class to “double-coach” puts ILSs in an unsafe ratio (about 44-60 students with two classes). There have also been instances, however, where ratios of ILS to students were 1:70-80 (about three classes). Although exceeding ILS to students ratio is common practice, many ILSs do not know safe (or legal) instructor to student ratios.
“Testing at all costs:
“There have been incidences where students with particularly contagious ailments…. This test-at-all-cost practice happens because data is required to evaluate student understanding, formulate lessons (action plan), and assess effective teachers. However, is there not enough data ascertained from the 20-30 assessments and tests a Rocketeer takes to draw fair conclusions?
“This demand for testing can be especially damaging for students, and it puts other students in unnecessary risk of infection. ! Infections: Lice, ear infections, and pink eye (aside from regular colds and flus) are the most common infections spread around the Learning Labs.
” … ”
“Simply, lab cleanliness is not prioritized. Students, consequently, suffer and endure the humiliation of many infections that could have been prevented. Hundreds of students share headphones daily, and the rates of lice at Rocketship are astounding. There have been cases where large portions of classes have been sent home. Ironically, data should be kept on these types of numbers to maximize productivity in the lab. Of course, with the high rates and numbers, it is understandable why data isn’t accurate or provided when it comes to honest concerns like infections.
“Bathroom breaks:
“With the amount of classes (which varies by school) in computer lab, schools struggle to regulate bathroom usage. And when children at these ages have issues regulating their own bladders, this becomes a difficult situation.
“Bathroom procedures, however, often follow top-down instruction that places caps on bathroom use (i.e., only x amount of students per class can go per learning lab time). Although these limits on students vary by school site, many caps were about 5-9 students per class per Learning Lab block. With approximately 1 ½ hours in lab, students undoubtedly need to use the restroom at high rates, especially when they are discouraged to use the restroom during “invaluable” instructional time.
“As a result, students with Learning Lab blocks following lunch appeared to be disproportionately affected with UTIs. Network staff and administrators should consider doing internal research on these issues. Unfortunately, blame is often passed onto family hygiene rather than bathroom policies – probably because it is a more favorable correlation; all the while, Learning Lab on average experiences the most bathroom accidents per class.
“And considering how traumatic a bathroom accident can be on a young child, these policies are psychologically damaging. In addition, students should not be made to return back to lab and continue working in urinated clothes because parents could not be reached or extra clothes not found.
“The problem is much more complicated, however, since this explanation nevertheless does not take into account water breaks, which sometimes are factored into bathroom caps and does not allow a student that needs to use the restroom to go at the same time. Reasonable ILSs skirt some of these procedures; still, School Leaders occasionally monitor bathrooms and send students back, later reprimanding teachers/ILSs for their actions.
” … ”
“Harmful productivity trackers:
“Class and personal trackers are displayed to incentivize students, thus increasing their performance through competition. Trackers, on the other hand, demean children and cultivate bullying. Displayed trackers consist of computerized test scores (NWEA and Benchmark), English and math OLP percentage completion levels or goals met (for each OLP – about 6 or 8 programs in all), behavior colors throughout the week, intervention tutoring goals, and bathroom usage (yes, classes would compete to see who could go to the bathroom less). !
“Inflexible labs:
“Learning Labs are not as dynamic as advertised. Instead, these spaces are inflexible, especially if the adaptability comes at the cost of missed computer time. For example, punishment for not finishing computer work is sometimes the confiscation of a break time from computers (i.e., the individual student does not get to participate in class read alouds, or even recess).
” .. ”
“Enrichment, unfortunately, is the least valued subject.
“In fact, when students need to be pulled for any reason (e.g., to start or make up testing), they are taken from enrichment. ! Blended Learning: There is nothing blended about the learning done in the labs with that in the classrooms. In fact, the majority of teachers are clueless on accessing online student data reports or the actual online learning program platforms themselves.
“There are two main reasons for this disconnect: 1) teachers are too preoccupied to sift through the morass of data (NWEA tests, Benchmark tests, STEP tests, and Formative Assessments to name a few) OLPs further supply or 2) OLPs are incompatible with what is being taught in class (exacerbated by the fact that some adaptive programs put students on a diverse range of levels).
“Internet safety:
“Internet filters initially were nonexistent. To the extent where basic parental controls were not even put in place! In fact, there were several notable instances where students succeeded in accessing lewd material. Despite being more “technology-driven” than traditional schools, Rocketship has sputtered in protecting students online.
” … ”
“Student and Instructor rights: As much coaching as employees get, they are rarely briefed on the legalities of students’ rights or teachers’ rights. As ILSs are forced to work through breaks and, at times, through lunches, they may not be fully aware either of students’ rights. Often ill-equipped from the outset, these paraprofessionals do not get sufficient training in providing support for students with extra services. In fact, ILSs are not regularly informed about – or do not have access to the information of – students who require extra services.
“So, if ILSs are not advised in this information, how can an ILS be expected to create an inclusive environment that upholds and protects student rights? In summation, these concerns need to be addressed through Rocketship and followed up by outside oversight and regulation.
“After reviewing many of the listed concerns, it should be evident that several common practices across Rocketship are unhealthy for children. If Rocketship claims, however, they are merely innovating, do these listed policies sound like innovation? Or, are these innovations desirable? Currently, these holding stations are aptly called Learning Labs because students, at best, are receiving experimental learning.
“So, if students are supposedly being blasted off to the frontiers of learning, Rocketship should, at the very least, be considerate of their Rocketeers’ well-being and address these concerns stemming from their model.”
I am impressed that Mt. Diablo even went through the motions. In Los Angeles, most charters are approved simply because the board knows they will be approved by the county or the state anyway.
School board members, like elected officials at every level of government in California, are stuck between a rock and a hard place: If they fight charters and do the right thing for their constituents and their school districts, they’ll face the wrath of the powerful lobby, the California Charter Schools Association (founded by Caprice Young, former LAUSD school board president and current Director of Magnolia Charters, California’s Gulen affiliate). They’ll also be going against a very popular and very independent governor who has a love affair with charters and seems to ignore all evidence that contradicts his affection for them.
Karen wrote, “In Los Angeles, most charters are approved simply because the board knows they will be approved by the county or the state anyway.”
Tomorrow I will check with CDE to see what the statistics are on percentage of charter appeals that are submitted to them (the state)
If anyone has other independent source of those facts, (ie independent of the California charter association, or independent of CTA and the state’s school boards association, I hope she/he will post that data so we can, if anyone cares to, discuss this with facts on hand.
Why wait until tomorrow?
“Fixing California’s charter school authorizing process”
http://watchdog.org/260215/charterschool/
How do you define a failing school when failing schools almost always have many students living in poverty but successful schools do not?
The fact is that if we were to move all the students from a so-called failing school to a successful school by swapping the students and not the teachers, we’d soon discover that the failing label will follow the students the same as the successful label does?
By the end of the next school year, the so-called failing school will be successful and the successful school will have turned into a failing school without any change in the teaching staff.
Therefore, a failing school is caused by too many children living in poverty and not incompetent teachers.
Lloyd, 2 things. First, I did not see statistics in the article you mentioned that answer the question I asked – what % of proposals submitted to CDE were rejected. Do you see this statistic in the article? If I missed it, I apologize.
Second, there are some students who are less successful in one school and more successful in a different school. Reasons vary. It can be one or more of the following factors: different curriculum, different discipline policies, different academic climate, different school leadership, community school approach in which the school shares space and works closely with social service agenices.
Poverty makes success considerably more difficult for many students. But there are some schools, district and charter, that have been able to help some previously unsuccessful students succeed….if success means among other things, actions such as graduate, move into a job or the military or go into higher education, move away from criminal behavior.
“But there are some schools, district and charter, that have been able to help some previously unsuccessful students succeed”
Okay, so why throw out the baby with the bathwater? The amount of money, lies, dirty politics, fraud, etc that are being used by the authoritarian, for profit corporate war against traditional public education, public school teachers and teachers’ unions is totally unnecessary when the same money and effort should have been focused on revealing what successful traditional public schools across the country did and are doing that works and then replicate it in other traditional public schools.
It was not my experience as a public school teacher for thirty years that teachers were not open to new ideas that worked. In fact, the teachers I knew were eager to learn what worked when that information was made available for them and to even try it out in their own classrooms. And I also know that the teachers’ unions never stood in the way of teachers improving their skills and methods or even the number of hours teachers voluntarily worked at their job as educators.
And the results of this war on the traditional public schools, the teaching profession and teachers’ unions have been for the most part a failure causing widespread disruption and theft of public funds.
The Stanford CREDO studies have revealed more than once that almost three quarters of the private sector charter schools are either worse or the same as the public schools they are competing with and then there is all the fraud and theft of public money taking place across the country that is draining money away from traditional public schools.
That is why I think private schools and corporate charters should not receive one penny from public funds meant for education that should go to only the community based, democratic, transparent, non-profit public schools that must comply with the education codes in each state.
The public schools can easily learn from the 1 in 4 private sector charters that have been successful, but I think that number is not 1 in 4 but is a lot less once we include the cherry picking of students, the trick that charter schools use to get rid of the most challenging students to teach and send them back to the public schools that don’t have as much money to educate them as they had before this war.
Lloyd, the research I trust most, as well as my 45 years experience, suggests that we should be learning from the district or charter public schools that are most effective with various students. I’ve already described various measures of success.
And just how many schools fit what you think are “most effective”? Through my life I have learned that top down micromanaging does not achieve the best results. The best results are achieved when the decisions are made bottom up, specially in education.
Lloyd, as noted earlier, your point is why a group of us worked successfully to help convince Mn legislators to give startup funds for teacher gov public (district) schools. This idea is developing all over the country: http://www.teacherpowered.org/
Those schools have been around for decades. What’s in a name? Charter school or Alternative school or Continuation school. And it didn’t take a gaggle of for profit at any price, Test obsessed corporate vultures to make this happen.
In the district where I taught for thirty years, they had three high schools and we called one of them an alternative high school but it is listed as a continuation school that teaches grades 9 to 12, and it operates just like charter schools were originally intended to work in everything but name only — with more independence but inside a public school district.
The teachers were in charge (not district administration micromanaging from above) and the alternative high school worked with the most challenging students and also had the lowest teacher turn over in the district. Even the hours were flexible to fit the students schedules because so many of them had jobs/worked during the day to help their family living in poverty to survive financially.
This high school is called Santana, it’s a public school within a public school district.
Most of the community this district serves is poor and mostly minority.
Santana High School
http://www.santanahs.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?uREC_ID=94054&type=d&pREC_ID=172269&hideMenu=1
Alternative Instructional Programs in Rowland Unified are available through Santana High School.
How to Enroll:
Student must be between 16-18 years old.
Student must be referred by the school of residence.
Student and parent MUST attend an orientation.
Submit: transcript(s) from previous high school, updated immunizations, and proof of residence.
Welcome to Santana High School, located at the Le Seda Educational Complex in La Puente. Santana High School is a WASC accredited alternative high school. Our mission is to assist students significantly behind in credits to make up their credits, get on track for graduation and graduate with options after high school. Working as a team of students, staff, parents and community, we believe that through hard work our students will be in a position to elect to enter college, vocational training, the military or the world of work. The choice will be theirs because they have set short, medium and long term goals for themselves and have taken ownership of their learning.
Santana High School, long established as a California Model Continuation high school, provides educational options for high school students in Rowland Unified. Students attending Santana are provided the opportunity for credit recovery or acceleration through the use of individualized and personalized instructional methodologies. A high point of the Santana High School program is a focus on student support services. The entire staff works to provide ongoing support to encourage and advance student academic, career and personal/social development.
Santana was in operation when I was earning my teaching credential in 1975-76.
But Santana was not the only alternative program this district developed long before the fraudulent, lying monsters and hucksters who worship at the alter of avarice declared war on traditional public schools, the teaching profession and teachers’ unions.
I know first hand how hard those professional teachers worked and are still working offering support and alternative programs to help students succeed and earn an education, because I was there and often worked 60 to 100 hours a week like many of the other teachers and many still do.
And yet, thanks to the Testocracy for-profit at any price industry, this school has only about 10 percent of its students scoring at proficient or advanced on state standardized tests.
Santana will probably be the last high school standing in this district because it already takes the students most private sector corporate charter schools refuse to take or get rid of as soon as possible.
But maybe that will not protect Santana because there is already an IQ Academy Charter powered by K12 in the district. They have a fancy website and they opened in 2010.
“As long as Internet access is available, students can log into iQ Academy and get to their courses anywhere, anytime.”
Yep, this K12 publicly funded, private sector so-called CHARTER school is an On Line Learning school.
We already know how well they works and who really benefits and it isn’t the children or teachers.
Historically online charter schools have the lowest high school graduation rate in the country.
Karen,
I recently chanced upon the website of this local Los Angeles astroturf group claiming to be the “voice of parents”, and demanding full-steam-ahead charter school expansion in Los Angeles —
“Speak Up” :
http://speakupparents.org/blog
Here’s the kicker, “Speak Up” is a one-person show run by Kate Braude, who is … wait for it … a current member of the Los Angeles County Board of Education — the same board that keeps reversing LAUSD”s decisions to deny charter school applications for approval or deny applications for renewal: (CLICK and jog down to the bottom of this page)
http://speakupparents.org/vision/
According to this, Kate was appointed to, and currently serves on that L.A. County BOE after stints at KIPP and other charter school organizations. She also currently runs her own “Katie Braude Consulting”, which is an organization that benefits from charter expansion as its clients are local Los Angeles charter school companies.
Here’s the link to the site of current Katie’s for-profit, charter-expansion-supporting business:
https://katiebraudeconsulting.com/
And here’s a list of Katie’s paying clients:
https://katiebraudeconsulting.com/clients/
—————————-
KATE BRAUDE:
“Since opening KBC in January 2010, I have had the pleasure to work with some outstanding organizations:
— KIPP LA Schools
— Valor Academy Charter School
— Bright Star Schools
— Doris and Donald Fisher Fund
— The Partnership for Los Angeles Schools”
—————————
Maybe that’s just my bitter cynicism coming to the fore, but Katie sure doesn’t sound like an objective person to be given the power to approve or renew charter school applications.
Indeed, doesn’t her dual roles — serving on the L.A. County Board that approves / denies charter school applications, while simultaneously running a for-profit company that provides services for those same charter schools — constitute a conflict of interest?
But then again, maybe that’s just me. I’m sure that like all corporate education reformers, Katie’s all about “the kids.”
CLICK, then jog down to the bottom of this page:
http://speakupparents.org/vision/
——————————–
“LEADERSHIP:
“KATIE BRAUDE, founder
“Katie is a member of the Los Angeles County Board of Education (LACOE), where she has served since 2011.
“Katie Braude is the founder of Katie Braude Consulting, providing support to organizations and efforts seeking to achieve excellence and equity in public education and achieve long-term positive outcomes for all children. Areas of focus include parent engagement, early childhood education, education of vulnerable populations including juvenile offenders and foster children, access to health care and good nutrition for children, and public school choice.
“Katie has participated in public education efforts in Los Angeles since the late 1980s. In the 1990s, Braude helped lead parents and teachers in the launch and implementation of Palisades Charter School Complex, the first K-12 public charter school complex in the country. From 2005-2010, she served as Director of Advancement to the KIPP LA Schools. She is a senior consultant to Abriendo Puertas/Opening Doors, the nation’s first evidence-based parent leadership training program for Latino parents of children 5 and under.”
———————————
Since “Speak Up” purports to be “the voice of parents” of school children, this begs the question:
Was or is Katie an actual parent of an actual public school student, or does she just “help lead parents”? It’s hard to tell from reading this.
One thing is for sure: hers is the only name I can find anywhere on “Speak Up”‘s website. You would think if ANY … or ANY MORE actual parents were involved with “Speak up”, they’d also have some position in the organization and be included as leaders on the website, but maybe I’m taking the pitch too literally when it says it claims to be “the voice of parents.”
As to what services Katie and her organization provides, it appears hers is a for-profit org that gets paid to assist non-profit charter school groups and their boards in marketing, fundraising, expansion, retreats, management, etc.
Check out this page here for Kate Braude Consulting (KBC):
https://katiebraudeconsulting.com/services/
————————–
“Services
“Non-profit organizations face more than the usual challenges in today’s economy. Whether your organization depends on public financing or operates entirely on private philanthropy, dollars are limited.
“If your non-profit operates or supports reform-focused public schools, the availability of state and local dollars has a direct impact on your ability to deliver the resources and services that result in high quality education.
“Here in California, the limited public dollars for education make it nearly impossible to do so without philanthropic support. This added pressure can be daunting to both new and established schools and management organizations, as well as non-profits that support their efforts.
“KBC can help your organization develop sound strategies and tools to increase your fundraising revenues, improve your external communications and marketing, and support the development of a board of directors that is effectively engaged in the fundraising process.
“Marshaling more than two decades of experience working with the education philanthropy community, local and state leaders, and the media, KBC will help you target your fundraising and communications for the greatest effect.
– – – – – – – –
“Fundraising
“KBC will work with your fundraising team to develop the optimal strategies to increase your philanthropic gifts in all areas:
— Foundation and Corporate Grants
— Individual Giving
— Major Gifts
— Capital Campaigns
– – – – – – – –
“Communications
“KBC will help your team maintain a strong, positive community presence by developing key communications strategies. When effectively implemented, these practices will support teacher and student recruitment, fundraising, community relationships, and board development.
— Media Relations
— Constituent Outreach
— Marketing
— Community Outreach
– – – – – – – –
“Board Development
“KBC will work with executive and board leadership teams to develop strategies that optimize your board culture and membership, promoting engaged fundraisers, thoughtful overseers, and effective ambassadors for your organization.
— Board Expansion
— Board Training in Fundraising Practices
— Board Roles and Responsibilities
— Board Retreats”
Karen,
I just found the “Welcome” page of Katie Braude’s “Speak Up” astroturf org, where it identifies “Speak Up” as “a new grassroots movement dedicated to giving voice to California’s parents and families”:
http://speakupparents.org/blog/2016/3/22/welcome
————
“Welcome to Speak UP!
“March 29, 2016
“Welcome to Speak UP, a new grassroots movement dedicated to giving voice to California’s parents and families. This is your space: an opportunity to share your opinion, learn about the issues and join in the decision-making process that determines how our children are educated.
“In the coming weeks, we hope that this site will provide a space to reflect on the issues and concerns identified by our members, including you. Our goal is to help you stay informed and engaged.
“Our initial local focus will be on Los Angeles Unified, the nation’s second-largest school district. There has never been a more pivotal time in LAUSD’s history: District enrollment is declining, and finances are in jeopardy, despite increased state funding. The majority of LAUSD’s students still can’t read at grade level, and most who graduate are not prepared for college or post-secondary careers.
“Many parents feel the district is unresponsive when they seek to improve the quality of education, introduce innovative curriculum or increase local autonomy at their children’s schools. Outside the school and district building walls, a heated controversy is raging over the best way to improve educational outcomes for the most students. Parent voices are critical to this conversation.”
———–
… and on it goes.
Karen, could you imagine if any of the seven LAUSD Board members perpetrated a propagandist, conflict-of-interest-ridden farce like this? It would be an outrage. The other six LAUSD Board members would vote to expel the one who did something this reprehensible. At least Ref and Monica G. have some minimal standards of propriety, whatever else you can say of them.
I guess it works differently for L.A. County Board of Ed. members.
Talk about laws that support fascism like Walt Disney did! You take Mickey Mouse DFER politicians, Goofy tech billionaires, and Dumbo real estate millionaires all lobbying… and navigating California charter school law becomes a dizzying Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride on the Mad Hatter’s Tea Cups. 1950’s Tomorrowland Rocketships and Rocketeers? Rheeally? Listen to the Rocketeers sing their club song, Rocketship’t:
Who’s the leader of the club
That’s made sans you or me?
R-O-C-K-E-T-S-H-I-P-T
Get Rocketship’t!
Donald Duck!
Edu-Mickey Mouse!
Donald Duck!
Forever corporate banners waving
High, heil, high. High!
Come along and mouth our song
And stare into the screen,
R-O-C
See you in the bread lines
K-E-T
Teachers are just technicians
S-H-I-T-E-eeee
We are losing this battle in urban, low income districts in CA. Santa Ana Unified, the sixth largest district in CA is in continuing declining enrollment due to the loss of thousands of students each year. If the district denies a charter, it opens up in the city anyway. We will hit the tipping point this year where local public schools will have to be shut down and probably handed over to charters. Two new charters open up this Fall, Magnolia Academy (Gulen charter) and USC’s Ednovate school. Santa Ana Unified currently has 50 excess teachers and layoffs will have to come in the 2016-2017 school year. In the meantime, credentialed teachers are in search of jobs all over the county and all they are finding is charter jobs, jobs that offer no job security and low pay as well as burdensome hours and conditions. Newly credentialed teachers give up on finding a job in a regular public school district, take a charter job and then continue to search for what I call a “real” job while they are stuck in these schools. It is very telling that these schools have this type of turnover rate and job dissatisfaction. While the media decries the “teacher shortage”, the only shortage we have in Orange County is a shortage of decent teaching jobs.
Don’t they want to keep those public schools as repositories for the unwanted kids?
How can charters profit if they have to educate EVERY child? It’s important that there is a warehouse/jail (sorry, I mean an underfunded public school) for the kids who are just too much bother. And if they KEEP those kids, how can they attract the middle class kids (and “striver” poor kids) they are absolutely dying to serve far more than the at-risk kids they are actually happy to throw under the bus?
I think of our district’s few remaining all-student PUBLIC schools as “clean-up institutions” — schools still legally bound (and financially dependent upon) enrolling any and all students. Our ever attenuating number of inner-city public schools will even enroll students from surrounding districts as they are ESSA invaded and systematically push out their unwanted students.
NYC public school parent–apparently, the charters in Orange County haven’t thought that far. If the whole district became charter, they would see that teaching every child who comes through the schoolyard gate makes “success” a little more challenging.
Maybe there can be the “failure” charter school that takes the rejects from other charters. It can spend almost nothing on those high needs kids and pay their administrators enough money in 3 years to set them up for life (taking home a cool $10 million, perhaps, and contracting with their relatives for-profit teaching companies). Then that “failure” charter school gets closed and the next one in line gets to open so that another one of the “reform” profiteers can get rich by running his failing school for a while.
The bottom line is that the reformers do NOT want to spend a penny more to educate the REAL at-risk students who need the money. They have truly washed their hands of those kids because they are non-strivers who make their skin crawl (as we saw with that Success Academy teacher’s attitude toward the girl she punished). That is how they feel about those kids — they find them disgusting and worthless and as Eva Moskowitz stated publicly — we shouldn’t question that she find 20% of the 5 year olds doing “violent” things and needing to be suspended when she runs a school that serves 90% at-risk kids. Those kids are worthless and if suspending them a few times at age 6 doesn’t turn them into scholars worthy of a charter school education,they deserve to be in falling apart public schools in classes of 40 where they belong and out of sight of the worthy kids.
That’s the reformers’ ideal America! The worthy kids in charter schools and the unworthy where they belong.
Educating every child (to a certain level) is not the goal of the privatizers. Getting rid of unions and running the schools (very lucrative) are the goals.
Gov. Brown doesn’t get it– as we all know at this point. He actually thinks Charter Schools work in the older sense of how Charters were originally developed in the 1990’s. As a little itty bitty teacher, I spoke with members of the CA State Education committee over winter break and was told that Gov. Brown thinks Charter Schools still operate as they did when he sat on the board of the two he ran in Oakland when he was Mayor there at the time. He even recently vetoed a measure that would have forced Charter Schools to follow the same rules and regulations as their public counter parts.
The disconnect between what Brown’s perception is and the reality of how Charter Schools in the state are really run is cavernous. He’s a smart man but, how can he be such an ignoramus on this issue? I question Brown’s motives, letting things run amok–is his agenda for education in CA the same as the privatizers??? Seems pretty obvious to me since the upcoming CA budget has $22 million allocated for new Charter School start ups.
Please, Diane and Tina Andres (BATS/CA BATS), go and talk to him……..this is critical, as you well know.
The overruling of local school boards is a terrible problem in California. Now that it’s hitting an upper-income community (actually, the Mt Diablo district is mixed in its demographics), middle class parents will see what poorer urban districts have had to contend with for years.
Stories abound of charter schools not only wanting the equivalent of what real public schools get, but feeling like they deserve even more. Their mode of operation is to achieve through political connections what they can’t obtain by deceptive marketing practices or bullying of local school boards.
At the bottom of this post are links to stories of a charter network called Caliber, which operates in the poor districts of Richmond and Vallejo, CA. It has another questionable educational program, especially for math, which consists of plopping kids in front of a computer for endless repetition and test prep, masquerading, of course, as “personalized learning”. All that Caliber really does is siphon badly needed funds from other schools for a relatively select group of students that it can profit from.
Once particularly interesting thing about Caliber is the couple which founded it: Ron Beller and Jennifer Moses. Mr. Beller was famous for the collapse of his hedge fund and an odd story of a secretary embezzling millions of dollars. Both are part of a cabal of rich individuals that have torn apart the public education system in England, with Ms. Moses funding and pushing heavily for charter schools there. They left London a few years ago for unexplained reasons, but possibly because they smelled blood and opportunity in the charter-infested waters of Northern California.
Many people wonder, if charter schools like Caliber are non-profit, and they’re spending the same money as real community-run schools, how can anyone accuse founders of profiteering? The answer: land grabs and self-dealing. Many of the networks that run these schools, like Rocketship, buy their products (software, supplies and more) from the same companies they or their friends invest in. The properties they purchase are securitized by taxpayer dollars, allowing them to leverage an investment in the same manner as a Real-Estate Investment Trust (REIT). Since there is no public oversight over their purchasing, no bid requirements, no review of salaries or per-pupil spending, they can quite literally get away with anything.
The motives of investors like Ron Beller and Jennifer Moses are not philanthropic. That’s why they and so many other hedge-fund managers love the story of failing schools, so they can cover-up what they’re doing by pretending to serve poor minorities and other victims of some mythical failing system. No matter what jargon is used to describe their “personalized” or “no excuses” model, making poor minority students walk in straight lines, silently, and then plopping them in front of a brain-numbing computer program is not giving them the same educational opportunities as kids in, say, Lafayette, CA (right next door to Mt Diablo). It’s greed, pure and simple, as evidenced by Goldman Sachs seminars telling investors exactly how to make money through the privatization of schools. It is destroying public education in this country, and it’s going to worsen our problems of racism, community polarization, and income inequality.
We can only hope that Jerry Brown will “get it” soon. He understood similar issues with redevelopment agencies, and he ended them early in his first term. Perhaps ending the insidious invasion of charter schools will be his second term legacy.
****************
http://www.eastbaytimes.com/contra-costa-times/ci_23866222/county-school-board-overrules-rejection-caliber-charter-school
http://www.eastbaytimes.com/west-county-times/ci_26553653/richmond-district-saddled-cost-house-charter-school
http://www.timesheraldonline.com/general-news/20160511/richmond-proposed-sale-of-school-site-for-charter-campus-draws-fire/3
http://www.timesheraldonline.com/general-news/20160509/new-vallejo-charter-school-seeks-more-student-bathrooms
http://www.timesheraldonline.com/social-affairs/20160218/charter-school-in-vallejo-seeks-better-offer
Here’s a letter from a Rocketship teacher that will be 3 years old in October. It was posted here on this blog:
—————————————————
“Dear Diane,
I have been reading the coverage on your blog on the lawsuit against Rocketship in its quest to build Rocketship Tamien in San Jose. I appreciate your attention to this issue. I am a current Rocketship teacher who is also concerned about Rocketship’s expansion. With a vote by the San Jose City Council coming this Tuesday, I decided I could not longer remain silent. Below you will find an anonymous letter I sent to the San Jose City Council, as well as the parent group against Tamien you featured on your blog. I wanted to send this letter to you as well. I’m not sure if it is something you would be interested in posting on your blog, but even so I wanted you to know you helped encourage me to write it.
Thank you!
A Rocketship Teacher
——————————————–
To all those concerned and involved with the Rocketship Tamien dispute,
I am a Rocketship Teacher who has become increasingly concerned and frustrated while silently watching the dispute over Rocketship Tamien. In this letter, I hope to bring a perspective of a current Rocketship teacher. I am just one perspective and do not claim to speak for other Rocketship teachers. However, I do think my point of view, without a union for protection, is silenced and hidden in this debate. By raising my voice, I am fearful my job could be in danger. Therefore, I have chosen to write this letter anonymously and leave out many details of my own personal experience.
I have structured the letter under a few key points of my feelings about Rocketship as an organization and the direction we are headed. I hope this perspective might raise new questions in the ongoing debate over opening Rocketship Tamien. I have tremendous respect for many of the teachers I work with at Rocketship and by no means wish to attack the incredible effort and energy they put into this difficult job.
Rapid Expansion Without a Clear Model:
Just a few months into the last school year, Rocketship announced to teachers the start of “redesign.” I say announced, because it was not offered as a conversation, but as a mandate. We would be changing many of our schools to an “open-space” model. This model’s vision would have placed 100 students in a room with two credentialed teachers and one learning specialist (including in Kindergarten and first grade). Without research or proof that this was a good idea for our students, redesign was launched at several Rocketship campuses. Teachers, without a union, had no choice but to follow blindly into the “redesign” path, many teachers staying nightly until 9pm trying to figure out what in the world they were going to do in a new space with that many students.
Unfortunately, the experiment Rocketship embarked on with their students and communities proved to be rash. This year, they have slowed down and redesign is happening, for most schools, only in 4th and 5th grade classrooms. I think my biggest concern when thinking about redesign, which left many teachers bitter and caused many to leave Rocketship, is that even though Rocketship is experimenting with its model and unsure of its future direction, it still seeks to rapidly expand across San Jose and across America. It is irresponsible and egotistical to believe that a model that you have not figured out is superior to established public schools in the neighborhoods you are interrupting. This is especially true in light of last year’s CST scores which showed a decline at every Rocketship campus.
No Teacher Sustainability, Little Experience at All Levels:
Working at Rocketship is not sustainable. I personally have never had a colleague tell me, “I could work as a Rocketship teacher for the next 10 years.” I haven’t even heard a colleague say they could work as a Rocketship teacher for 5 years. Rocketship relies heavily on Teach for America corps members. Many TFA teachers come into the classroom with no experience and no perspective on what a traditional school is like. Without experience of a traditional model, I think many TFA teachers come into Rocketship blindly and follow the unreasonable expectations blindly. They grind through their two year commitment of late hours, ridiculous test score pressure, and tumultuous school and organizational environment. At the end of those two years, or even before it, many will leave Rocketship. Some will go into traditional public schools; some will run away from teaching, or what they believe from Rocketship to be teaching, forever. This turnover and burnout robs the San Jose community of veteran teachers that have worked in and understand the community.
It is not just inexperience on the teacher end, it is also inexperience on the administrative end. If you teach for three years at Rocketship, you may have just as much or more teaching experience as some administrators at Rocketship. Rocketship claims to have a robust teacher training and development program, but unfortunately that training comes from inexperienced educators, which I think highly questions the value of such training. When I have heard this concern brought up, usually the value of veteran teachers and experience is scoffed at as unnecessary. This, I think, is part of a larger issue at Rocketship. In my opinion, Rocketship believes itself superior without the experience or results to support it.
Instability of Student’s Day:
Rocketship, to save money by hiring fewer teachers, has a rotational model. Students move throughout the day between different classrooms and spaces, largely three: 1) Literacy, 2) Math, 3) Learning Lab. Literacy teachers have two classes during the day, while math teachers have four, which I think greatly contributes to lack of teacher sustainability. Building relationships with 60 or 120 elementary students and their families, as well as maintaining classroom culture throughout the day, is difficult, emotionally draining, and exhausting.
I truly believe that this middle school model of rotation is not appropriate for elementary school students and creates a culture of instability that breeds behavioral issues. When students are rotating through multiple spaces throughout the day, they do not have consistent behavior expectations, consistent authority figures, or often enough eyes monitoring the transitions. I do not believe this model suits every child, particularly those with special needs. I believe many of our students crave a more stable environment, especially for our students who may experience instability at home.
Students also spend about one hour a day on computers which, as Rocketship has admitted in the PBS special, is not currently effective in pushing student learning. However, because we have a higher student to teacher ratio than traditional schools, students continue to be “held” in the learning lab until their math and literacy classes open up. I do believe that online learning has incredible potential, but Rocketship is using it for too long every day which breeds a lack of investment and boredom in our student’s experience in the learning lab.
Anti-Union Anti-Traditional Public School Rhetoric:
Rocketship claims unions will block their ability to expand and innovate. What that means practically for teachers in the case of the “redesign” experiment last year and day to day decisions of the organization, is that we effectively have no voice or tangible power in this organization.
The PBS special had two Rocketship teachers who claimed that they did not need a union, that they were valuable to Rocketship and safe. Both of those teachers were slated and have now become administrators at Rocketship. PBS didn’t dig, but if they had done some digging, they would have found plenty of disillusioned teachers for their interviews. Or perhaps, they wouldn’t have since we have no union protection. Rocketship also pushes its anti-union, anti-traditional public school rhetoric on our families. I have had many interactions with parents where claims are made about unions or public schools in the area, that have been garnered from Rocketship, that are wrong or over-generalized.
Rocketship, I believe, is not here to provide pressure and competition to traditional public schools. They, with their goals of expansion to reach 1 million students, are here to take over. It is essential to that goal then, to discredit traditional public schools and the teachers at those schools. Students, because of state funding per child, become dollars Rocketship takes from a traditional public school with every child it recruits. This in turn puts more pressure on established districts to lay off teachers and will, eventually, lead to school closures.
Test Scores as the Ultimate Goal:
Rocketship is obsessed with its tests scores. As a charter, they live or die by those test scores. We are now asking our students to learn how to bubble multiple choice questions as early as kindergarten. Teachers are constantly in cycles of testing (which again, is to 60 or 120 students which contributes to the unsustainability).
I believe that knowing where our students are and working to address knowledge gaps is important, but test scores have taken over the culture of Rocketship schools. The stress put on teachers I believe translates directly to the students who are constantly being assessed. Last year, my and other teachers’ salaries were based largely on one computer examination that is given to the students three times during the year. Science, social studies, art and general play time have all become victim to the testing grind. I do not believe Rocketship is cultivating creative, innovative, challenging, minds.
In closing, I do not believe that Rocketship is an organization to be given blind trust. The parents at Rocketship are just like the parents protesting against Rocketship Tamien. They want the best educational experience for their students. I send this letter in the hopes of raising more pause towards Rocketship, its lobbyists, and the tighter hold it is trying to establish over San Jose’s elementary schools.
Kim Smith, is on the Rocketship board. Her organizations, Bellwether (“human capital pipeline” schools, New Schools Venture Fund, Pahara Aspen Institute and TFA, all received Gates funding. In an interview at Philanthropy Roundtable, she described her “marching orders” and the “goal” for New Schools Venture Fund ($22 mil. in Gates grants), “to develop charter management organizations that produce a diverse supply of different brands on a large scale.” It’s a strategic step for market expansion of retailer, Bridge International Academies, a firm owned by Bill Gates, Z-berg, Pearson,…,
that sells schools-in-a-box.
The strongest advocates for rephorm, know the American public would reject the long term plot of Silicon Valley and hedge funds. For that reason, I believe that they are traitors to American democracy.
Re: parental choice
I’m surprised that no one called out Nathan, who posted several times above, for his belief that parents have a right to choose any school they want—at taxpayer expense. It’s not a right in any normal sense of the word. Even if such a right existed, it would have to be balanced against many other rights, including the right of children to receive a quality education at schools which are equitably funded and open to all, and the right of democratically-elected school boards to weigh in on the meaning of “quality education”.
The balancing act is vastly more difficult when some children are siphoned off by charter schools. When that happens, actual community-based public schools suffer in two ways: they are left with a higher percentage of children that are hard to teach (and which the charters don’t want); and, with even a small drop in enrollment, they lose vital programs and employees, like nurses and librarians. As a result, the funding of actual community-based public schools becomes unsustainable, and the schools—even the very best—can go into a vicious downward cycle. Communities across America are starting to realize this. It explains why the Mt Diablo district has a legitimate complaint against Rocketship and why the state of California should not override the local school board’s decision.
Here’s a very simple question for Nathan to ponder, and anyone else who thinks parents have an inherent right to choose: why stop with schools? Why not let families decide what police force should serve them, or what fire station, or what parks and recreation dept? After all, it’s their tax dollars. The reason, of course, is that all of these things would be unsustainable if everyone got to choose. And with a lack of public oversight, conditions for many get worse. As parents across Florida, Ohio and other states have noticed, there’s a distinct smell of graft, corruption, and crony capitalism.
Schools are no different than any other public service we rely on; they’re not on some elevated plane because children are involved. If the public feels the public school system is not working (and it’s not in many cases), then it should be fixed. Just like with police, fire, parks and rec, or even the DMV, fixing starts with more control by the public (not less), it often requires more funding (not less), and it continues right on through to a high level of professionalism, where professionalism means adequate training and pay for employees and some notion of a career in public service (not a two-year stint).
By all means, Nathan, if you’re a parent and you don’t like your children’s school, then fight for a better school. But don’t argue you have a right to send your children to a quasi-private school at taxpayer expense, any more than you have a right to shift your tax dollars to a quasi-private security firm because you feel unsafe. Asserting such a right would fracture your community and make everyone else less safe.
Beautifully written.
I wonder if the privatizers like Joe Nathan are too short sighted to understand the parallels they are drawing.
In the future, Joe Nathan will also support ALL public institutions getting “competition” from privately run organizations that can profit from providing services ONLY when it is cheap and refusing to provide services when it is expensive.
It’s exactly why public goods can’t be thrown into the “market”. Because unlike private goods, each “customer” is not the same. Some are costly and some are cheap and there is NO incentive to take on an expensive customer. Of course a charter will do everything in its power to get rid of expensive kids since Joe and his pals have created a system that encourages them to do so! That is what the “market” is all about.
The point of public education is to spread the uneven cost of each child’s education over a broad population. The point of charters is to use that uneven cost to their advantage by only serving the cheapest students and using the savings to pay high administrator salaries and market to even more cheap students.