Here are letters to the editor printed in the Los Angeles Times in reaction to its editorial criticizing the Gates Foundation and other wealthy philanthropists for trying to control the nation’s education agenda.
The theme of the letters is: why don’t people listen to teachers? If Gates had, he would have spent his $3 billion wisely and well. But instead, he squandered it on his own faulty ideas.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
In an act of blatant self-promotion here’s my blog post dealing with the Gates report and the LA Times editorial.
http://bloom-at.blogspot.com/2016/06/gates-gets-schooled.html
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Well done blog that is informative and entertaining! Has Bill Gates learned his lesson? I doubt it. He is “doubling down” on the CCSS, and he has been given the green light to inflict “personalized learning” on Chicago. It is clear Chicago has little regard for its students or teachers as I think a hidden agenda is to “union bust.” The only thing bigger than Gates’ arrogance is the ridiculous amount of money he has to spend to forward his agenda and dictate policy. http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2016/06/de-personalized-learning-coming-to.html
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Stu…your website is terrific…thanks for the link.
Below, is a comment I just made on the same theme at Diane’s Anthony Cody post on the LA Times. Was delighted to read the Letters to the Editor in support of teachers…and amazed that they were chosen for publication. Having Karin Klein gone seems to have loosened up the editorial page. So many retired teacher/members of Joining Forces for Education regularly send letters in support of public schools and teachers, and against charters and TFA, but rarely get published.
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Ellen Lubic
June 5, 2016 at 3:10 pm
Thanks Anthony for this accurate portrayal of the LA Times. I took some public heat from Karin Klein a few years ago after writing an article at City Watch Today on The LA Times Love Affair with John Deasy (which can be googled). This article not only garnered over 693,000 hits within a few hours of publication, but many teachers left comments in support and told their own horror stories of working with Deasy.
Karin Klein took offense at my perspective and complained in the comment section that I was not reporting fairly and accurately. She was evidently incensed that I would take on the Times re her own editorialized opinions of how great Deasy, (currently under scrutiny by the FBI and the SEC) was serving LAUSD as the Superintendent, and fresh from his gig with Gates.
So glad to have Cody voice his accurate in-depth views. Too many readers of the biased LA Times think that all their Education reporters are fair and accurate…..when actually most report what they are allowed to, interview only charter school and parent trigger leaders, and generally slant their articles in favor of not only Gates, but more often of Eli Broad who pays handsomely for them to do this.
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Your blog post contentions are blindingly obvious to fellow teachers. To Gates? Not so much, I fear.
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@Ellen Lubic. Afraid you’ve got your facts wrong. I wrote that editorial and continue to write the education editorials for the L.A. Times. Nor was this this first time, despite what people assume, that I have written editorials with the same theme. That is not to say that the editorial board is anti-reform, but it feels that public schools must, as one of the editorials put it, set their own agenda.
http://articles.latimes.com/2013/apr/11/opinion/la-ed-gates-testing-teacher-evaluations-20130411
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/jan/12/opinion/la-ed-consult12-2010jan12
— Karin Klein
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Thanks for responding, Karin. And thanks for telling the philanthropists to stop imposing their half-baked ideas on public schools. Now, I hope you will write an editorial about the importance of stopping the privatization of schools across California.
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The one problem I have with your editorials is that you give the billionaires a pass when it comes to responsibility for the direction of public policy. Really? I find it a little disingenuous to imply that there is no link between people developing federal/state policy and the big private funders of educational reform. It would be highly interesting if you would do some investigative reporting on the number of people who have come from and/or gone to organizations that support reform who are supposedly serving the public good. It appears that you are trying to provide a handy scapegoat for these reformers who, after all, are just big-hearted teddy bears who want to do good.
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Reformers talk at and past teachers, never with teachers. But beware, next will come pseudo-surveys and politically stacked reform committees. Here in Ohio, we’ve seen a string of these surveys that are restricted to certain responses or near impossible to complete. And we have committees that are stacked with Republican appointees and sympathizers to the GOP idea of test and punish. The conservatives in our state recoil with a reptilian brain fear at the idea of teachers having professional organizations (unions) or suggesting approaches different from the Randian, free market religion now prevalent in education.
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Are you our old friend, MathVale???
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Yes. No longer teaching math. Formerly MathVale. Ohio is not the best state for math or ELA as the testing in those subjects is relentless and punitive. I still support teachers, education, and Diane’s efforts. But at a minimum wage salary after deductions, Republicans leading our state telling me I stink each year, and a community that no longer values education, it is time to move on after 7 years. Best of luck to the teachers better and more resilient than I am. I had to consider health, family, and finances. Not sure what to do next, but I will miss teaching math.
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So sorry to see this, Math ‘Teacher’…the world, particularly the world of education, needs gifted math teachers. In our area, math teachers are too rare, yet with budget constraints, often middle and high schools encourage volunteers to come into classrooms….not the best source for educating students on how to do algebra, geometry, advanced algebra, calculus, trig….so I hope, dear colleague, you find a new situation rapidly to be able to teach what you know so well.
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So sorry to hear you had to pack it in. Please don’t leave us! You provide a unique and informative point of view.
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Gates = Hubris, that’s why.
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Reblogged this on stopcommoncorenys.
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Diane,
If Deasy had listened to teachers, he might still be Superintendent.
Having been a testing coordinator from the time of “A Nation at Risk” until 2000 and having run a candy sale in the East Bronx, I could have told him what he was getting into on his tech projects. I am glad he did not ask.
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Deasy does not have the mentality to actually listen to teachers — or anyone else, for that matter.
He barks orders and simply expects those “under” him to follow like good soldiers.
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