The Boston Globe used to be a liberal newspaper. But that was long ago. Now it opposes the teachers’ unions and it supports privatization of public education.
Massachusetts is the highest performing state in the nation, as judged by test scores; you would never know that if the Globe was your only source of information. Corporate reformers were audacious in choosing Massachusetts as their next big battleground to save poor kids from failing schools. Their ambition–to break public education–is outrageous in the nation’s top-performing state. Their promises ring hollow.
Our reader Christine Langhoff gives us an update on the escalation of hostilities as the air war for public opinion heats up.
She writes:
The Question 2 campaign continues to, as we say, “evolve”.
On Sunday, The Boston Globe published an advertorial scolding the Boston Teachers Union that it had better settle contract negotiations pretty quickly because “such changes are necessary to boost the quality of teaching and learning so the school system can compete more aggressively with independently run charter schools, a sector of public education that could grow dramatically in the coming years.”
The “research” comes from the Boston Municipal Research Bureau, whose President Sam Tyler, of course lives in the suburbs. Among the recommendations:
“Supporting and improving teacher quality and adding more time for learning in the BPS should be the mutual objectives of the City and BTU in these negotiations. To that end, the final three-year contract should include the following provisions:
*Teacher Compensation – Adopt a new fiscally responsible teacher compensation system that rewards teachers for performance and additional responsibilities rather than for academic credits and longevity.
* Mutual consent – Reinforce early hiring and mutual consent for teachers and extend mutual consent as the process for hiring paraprofessionals.
* SPC Teachers – Improve procedures for the assignment and evaluation of teachers in suitable professional capacity (SPC) positions in order to improve teacher quality and reduce the number of SPC teachers not hired after a year or who do not apply for positions.
* Teacher Evaluation – Improve the teacher evaluation process based on the BPS’ experience over the last three years.
* Excessing Procedures – Include language for excessing teachers that is consistent with retaining top quality teachers irrespective of seniority.
* Extended Time – Provide more time on learning for students in traditional Boston schools in a fiscally responsible and sustainable manner.”
In other words, credentialed, certified teachers, many with decades of classroom experience, ought to accept the kinds of working conditions that their uncertified, inexperienced colleagues find in charters.
The attack on compensation for academic credentials is particularly outrageous.
Massachusetts law, since the 1993 ed reform act (which also enabled charters), requires teachers to obtain a Master’s within the first five years of their careers if they wish to obtain professional status. There’s no re-imbursement of this expense, and the cost of an MA is Massachusetts is pretty pricey.
Here’s the six page attack (er, report) on unionized teachers in what’s been called the best urban school system:
Click to access SR16-6BPScontract.pdf
Then John Oliver presented his views on the Charter School industry.
In response, Chris Farone of the Boston Institute for Nonprofit Journalism’s DigBoston, a local alternative news organization, put the Globe and the Boston Municipal Research Bureau under its spotlight, noting that BMRB reps for businesses:
“…it wouldn’t take the Globe’s award-winning Spotlight team to see that BMRB’s board of directors boasts members from such companies as State Street Corporation, Suffolk Construction, Fidelity Investments, Liberty Mutual Insurance, Citizens Bank, Boston Properties, and John Hancock, among others in the corporate class whose money drives the pro- side of the charter war.”
The article is titled: “THE BOSTON GLOBE AND JOHN OLIVER: WHICH ONE IS FULL OF CRAP ABOUT CHARTER SCHOOLS?”
On Tuesday, the 23rd Globe published an article reviewing the Dobbie, Fryer research which shows that charters don’t do much in the way of improving test scores and may have a negative impact on earnings. (The question of whether those ought to be considered appropriate goals of education is not discussed.)
Here’s the study:
Click to access charters_7.15.16.pdf
and the Globe article:
Also on Tuesday, Boston’s other newspaper, the Boston Herald, posted the following column by Carol Doherty, member of the Taunton School Committee, questioning the flow of dark money and Wall Street connections for this ballot question:
And the Twitter exchange has been fierce, with Jeanne Allen and Dmitiri Melhorne accusing two Boston parents (one of whom writes a blog called Public School Mama) who have organized protests against the underfunding of BPS for the past year with such finely considered arguments as “Your grandchildren will be embarrassed by you 60 years from now” and “Oh, wait! Urban voters would choose to lift caps! It’s OUTSIDERS from suburbs who are blocking choice for Boston parents!” Sheesh!
Wednesday, it was reported that Massachusetts students had the highest ACT scores in the nation, undermining once again the rationale for increasing the number of charters, when we’re doing just fine without them, thanks.
http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2016/08/best_in_the_nation_massachuset.html
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“such changes are necessary to boost the quality of teaching and learning so the school system can compete more aggressively with independently run charter schools, a sector of public education that could grow dramatically in the coming years.”
That is guaranteed to grow dramatically because there will be a single-minded focus on expanding, promoting, marketing and increasing funding for charter schools.
As we have seen in state after state.
Incidentally? The moment they expand charters they’ll begin lobbying for vouchers. Voters in Massachusetts have that to look forward to Plan on state lawmakers devoting at least the next 5 years to ‘choice”.
As we have also seen in state after state after state.
What will be completely and utterly ignored? Existing public schools. They’re already ignored in this political campaign. Completely omitted. It’s as if the public schools are already gone.
Get used to it Massachusetts. This is what capture looks like. Good luck!
The Boston Globe is a commercial enterprise. Its does not serve society, it serves itself.
As a business, it’s barely treading water.
And it serves those who keep it afloat.
Namely, the pushers of a private agenda.
Everyone serves themselves, including teachers and their unions.
Uh-huh. And then what?
If the reason national ed reformers are replacing public schools with charter schools in Boston is because charters are so high quality in Boston, then why do they run campaigns that are identical to this one in states and cities where charters are NOT high quality?
This isn’t based on “quality”. If it was we wouldn’t see identical charter promotions in every state and from the federal government.
If “quality” is the measure then why are they doing this in OH, MI, FL, CA and a whole host of other states? If quality is the reason then shouldn’t they be rolling back the reforms they jammed thru in the “low quality” states?
I’ll tell you why they haven’t. They haven’t because the moment the “quality” rationale became obviously false they simply changed arguments- they went to “choice”.
They literally can’t lose. If it isn’t “quality” it’s “choice”. There is no way they fail at this, because “choice” is foolproof.
If the reformers BELIEVED in quality they would be working to establish choice schools within the system. Choice schools that are part of the system do exactly what their argument for charters do.
But the reformers insist on privately run choice schools because they already understand that if they have to serve every child they will fail just as public schools fail with some kids. And they are not honest enough to admit it.
The people like Dmitiri Melhorne don’t really care what kind of reform works best. They care about what kind of reform the people who pay them lots and lots of money want them to promote. And if those same people who pay them lots and lots of money tell them to look the other way or defend racist practices, those reformers will do it in a minute.
They are in it for their own families bank account and if a few low income kids benefit, they can rationalize the many children harmed by lies.
I love the Boston Globe’s rationale:
“We need more charter schools so public schools can ‘compete’ and do better.”
Can you imagine these ignoramuses saying the same thing about other public goods:
“We need more private health insurance for seniors citizens who are allowed to dump any senior citizen who gets sick or needs any medicine beyond the basics because that will make Medicare better if they have that “competition” for the healthiest patients.”
“We need a competing electricity utility that will only serve you if you live in a certain area and are cheap for them to serve in order to ‘compete’ with the public utility that has to serve every customer.”
“We need a private garbage collection service that will only serve certain streets where they find it cheap to operate and will dump you if you generate more than 1 bag of trash per week in order to ‘compete’ with the public garbage collection service that has to serve every home.”
Are they really this ignorant? Or are they finding it financially rewarding to be this ignorant?
Government schools aren’t fashionable. Either are labor unions.
The only time the people funding this encounter a labor union member is when they’re remodeling their summer house. They may as well live on the moon.
The counterattack to John Oliver’s negative critique of charter schools includes pot calling the kettle black article in U.S. News and World Report whereby choice, such as public alternative magnet schools exist and thereby since public schools have choice within their system, the critics of private management choice are being hypocrites.
What this counterattack overlooks is the difference between the two systems is not “choice” but public verses private management.
Privately managed charter schools are not public schools.
Jim2812, right! This is the reformers’ usual excuse for handing public funds to unaccountable private entities. Any choice within the public system justifies choice to abandon public system
The article in US News demonstrate exactly how little rationale the proponents of private charter schools now have.
Here is what that article said:
There are magnet choice schools that work within the public system. They make their admissions criteria perfectly clear and if they are for academically advanced students, they advertise that fact.
Therefore it is perfectly fine for a charter to take lots of federal funding and private donations under the false pretenses that they are committed to educating any at-risk student stuck in a failing school while deliberately getting rid of any child who isn’t performing up to their standards. It is fine for charter schools and their supporters to use bald face lies to promote their schools because public schools are truthful about their magnet schools. And if the bald face lies are that 20% of the 5 and 6 year olds — almost always minority children — are violently acting out to such a dangerous degree that the school had no choice but to suspend them then that is just something that the author of the US News piece thinks is perfectly justified. Because somewhere there is a public magnet school that is honest about their admissions criteria.
That these people are paid enormous amounts of money to say things that would make Donald Trump proud is truly frightening. That are embraced by the Democratic Party AND in charge of teaching children that dishonesty is fine as long as you personally benefit is truly appalling. It’s a philosophy worthy of Donald Trump and his supporters — exactly the ones who adore charter schools and want them to take over all of public education.
It may just be that education is not a public good. It may exclusively be a private good only. If so, then what? Everyone should be homeschooled. In fact, the truth is that every child is already home schooled. The differences in parent education are what show up in the public schools. I suspect that Mass. has the best public schools because the kids come from smarter, wealthier homes.
If education were not agreed to be a public good then we wouldn’t be having this discussion at all, since there would be no justification for using public funds and other resources to support it.
Reading that editorial, one really couldn’t blame parents for fleeing Boston Public Schools. It’s all loss and impending doom. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
You’d be crazy to stick around if all the politicians are bailing on the public schools. Not a hard choice, really. Attend a charter school that’s supported by those in power or attend a public school that’s being “wound down”? Parents are essentially being put on notice that all of these decisions have already been made.
Yes, that’s the idea. Charter schools are the chain stores who move into a neighborhood to drive the mom and pop out of business. They can lose tons of money while being propped up by billionaires and offer a “better deal” that the public school being intentionally underfunded by the same powerful people.
Once all the public schools are closed, there will no doubt be a public school/jail for the charter school dumpees to congregate.
And then we will REALLY see what the dog eat dog world of charter school privatization brings. The small time charter operators will be stuck with the leftovers while the big chains rake in the big bucks. It’s all about business, and nothing but business. Children are merely objects for the larger goal of making money.
Charter schools are corporate chains, like Walmart. Their spread is parasitical, the Walmartization of education.
The BG is and remains a perfectly “liberal” news outlet, by the current definitions. It’s a perfectly “liberal” position to be for reform and against teachers unions now. In fact, that’s part of the genius of the reform movement: it has successfully engaged and mobilized both sides of the political spectrum quite thoroughly. It’s one of our real challenges on our side that I don’t think we have fully percieved the enormity of.
In spite of reports to the contrary, we are not winning the narrative war. There are certainly highlights for our side (John Oliver, etc) but as long as media organizations like the BG etc continue to forcefully side with the reformers, we will continue to struggle.
The big issue for us is that the problem here is actually a broader issue beyond the education battle…..it’s about the current left’s abandonment of organized labor, it’s very short historical memory and knowledge, and the ease by which simple rhetoric based on the language of civil rights, liberation, and social justice can easily buy it off, generally in the service of corporate and capitalist interest. We need to engage that broader philosophical challenge in order to make any headway with our fight within education.
Agreed
I would not say that the current left has abandoned organized labor. I would say that labeling those who have abandoned labor left, is part of the problem. A socially liberal, neo liberal is actually a “compassionate conservative”.
Reblogged this on Crazy Normal – the Classroom Exposé and commented:
If you don’t think that U.S. community based, democratic, transparent, non-profit, traditional public schools aren’t at war with profit-hungry, child-abusing, corporate autocrats, think again.
Good point Lloyd.
What continues to amaze me about ed reform is how they never offer any benefits to public school children or parents. I think it’s evidence of what an echo chamber it is, since so many of the paid people are political professionals.
Reading that editorial from the public school perspective, this is what they’re offering:
less pay for teachers, less funding and less programming for existing public schools.
Who wouldn’t jump at that deal! Loss, impending doom and dire predictions along with a stern scolding! Sign me up! 🙂
“Adopt a new fiscally responsible teacher compensation system that rewards teachers for performance and additional responsibilities rather than for academic credits and longevity.” In other words, to the veteran teachers, drop dead, please, and as soon as possible. We don’t need no stinking contracts, tenure, seniority or LIFO. Rewards and additional responsibilities (for which you will not be compensated) is code for the destruction of the union and fairly negotiated contracts; contracts become just so much toilet paper under the reformy agenda.
Thank you, Diane.
The Chairman of the Education Committee of the New England Area Conference of the NAACP just weighed in at the Boston Globe:
AUGUST 27, 2016
IT IS precisely because of our grave concerns about the devastating impact on black and brown children that the NAACP is part of a broad-based statewide coalition to defeat Question 2, which would lead to unfettered charter school growth, taking billions of dollars in state aid away from local district public schools (“Charter question divides Democrats,” Metro, Aug. 16).
The battle over this ballot question is not between teachers unions and low-income and minority families. On one side are those who believe that we must stop defunding the public schools that educate 96 percent of our students. On the other are those who support the diversion of billions of dollars of education resources to publicly funded, privately managed, selective, separate, and unequal charter schools.
John L. Reed
Chairman
Education Committee
NAACP — New England Area Conference
West Roxbury
http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/letters/2016/08/26/group-fears-impact-more-charters-children-color/VNabfDqrYztsnKNn3d67yK/story.html?event=event25#comments
Some additional biographical material:
“A member of NEA’s Board of Directors, Reed served as chair of the NEA Black Caucus for two years. He also held offices in the Massachusetts Teachers Association as well as the Barnstable Teachers Association.”
http://www.nea.org/home/12567.htm
“John L. Reed, chair of the NEAC’s Education Committee and a former member of the MTA Board of Directors, was instrumental in promoting the new partnership between the two organizations.” (The two organizations being the NAACP New England Area Conference and the Mass Teachers Association (MTA)).
http://www.massteacher.org/news/archive/2013/naacp.aspx