Donald Trump’s campaign released an ad to show how unlimited choice would “make America great again.” If every parent could choose to send their child to a religious school, a charter school, a storefront school, or whatever, then everyone would get a great education!
Our students do not need certified teachers or principals. They do not need smaller classes. They do not need anything but choice.
Forget the fact that the research on charters shows they do not produce better results than public schools (unless they exclude low-performing students), and that voucher schools perform worse than public schools.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
As you have mentioned before, school choice has failed in every country where it has already been tried, and even the director of Stanford’s CREDO center that’s financially supported by Bill Gates let slip that market forces that are designed to be competitive don’t work in education.
Sweden’s School choice Disaster
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_dismal_science/2014/07/sweden_school_choice_the_country_s_disastrous_experiment_with_milton_friedman.html
School Choice Fails to Make a Difference
“The Economist magazine reports that a team of academic economists found that students who won a lottery in Louisiana to receive vouchers to go to the public or private school of their choice did worse than students who didn’t win the lottery.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-02-12/school-choice-lotteries-fail-to-make-a-difference
The Failings of Chile’s Education System
“The introduction of education vouchers has produced an increasingly stratified school system in Chile on the basis of socioeconomic status … .”
http://www.coha.org/the-failings-of-chile%E2%80%99s-education-system-institutionalized-inequality-and-a-preference-for-the-affluent/
School choice in Germany had the same results. “A hard look at discrimination in education in Germany”
https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/voices/hard-look-discrimination-education-germany
Then there is Denmark
“According to experts throughout that country, the choice of an independent school in Denmark is based far less on academic status than on a school’s denominational affiliation, it’s political or social leanings; the mix of instructional languages; or, increasingly, the desire of some parents for old-fashioned discipline.” – Page 70, “What America Can Learn from School Choice in Other Countries” by David F. Salisbury.
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It is unfortunate that our policymakers cannot see the handwriting on the wall. They choose to listen to the “choice” echo chamber, and fail to see the evidence, even though you have provided valid links with information to the contrary. Too many of them more interested in feathering their own nests than serving the best interests of our young people.
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I don’t think you should have Germany in your line-up. That’s not about school choice. There are flaws in the public school system that have to do with too-early tracking between voc & acad, plus a vocational path that looks like it needs re-vamping. There are other Eur public-school systems that do the same thing much better e.g. Poland.
And Denmark/ Iceland’s school choice system is very old & hardly a disaster, tho it would probably make Friedrich roll in his grave. All teachers are paid the same whether in ‘gov’t-run’ (here the term is accurate) or independent schools; natl exams are same for all. School-funding is equalized as in other socialist democracies, except ind-school parents must pay 15% of per-pupil cost (subsidized for low-income). That’s because they need to have ‘skin in the game’– they must found them (24-family minimum) and run them. No corporations may be involved; no individuals may own them.
Other than those 2 exceptions I agree, & thanks for the link on Sweden.
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I read that in Denmark only 13 percent of the schools are private (and that percentage has stayed steady for decades), and I don’t think Denmark is out to deliberately destroy the traditional public schools, fire the teachers, close the schools, and deliberately replace them with opaque often fraudulent and inferior corporate charter schools that end up owning the property without paying for it that the public built and paid for with their tax dollars.
What’s happening in the United States is a clear con-game based on a foundation of lies, lies and more lies.
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Ms. Ravitch, have you been able to get a sit-down with Hillary Clinton yet? Someone needs to get her to start focussing on these issues and not just the racist comments that Trump is making!
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Nicholas, not a sit-down. We met very briefly. I am not giving up.
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Diane, how about a sit down with Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren? If that opportunity materialized, one good question at the end would be to ask them to recommend other members of both Houses of Congress you could have a sit down with, representatives that would give you time and listen to what you have to say.
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It is clear that Hillary is a proponent of Common Core. Trump has SAID that he’s going to get rid of Common Core. This is deemphasized on this blog. What more do you need to know?
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Donald Trump will get rid of Common Core AND public schools. No Thanks.
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Trump on Common Core.
The President can’t “get rid of” Common Core.
He or she has no power to tell states what to teach. Duncan used Race to the Top to evade the law and pretend that states “voluntarily” adopted Common Core. Untrue. They were not eligible for $5 billion in federal funds unless they adopted them.
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Does Hillary Clinton support the Common Core Standard and the high stakes tests being used with them to rank teachers, close schools and fire teachers?
The Common Core Standards and the high stakes tests are two different things that have been welded together by the enemies of community based, locally controlled, democratic, transparent, non-profit, professional and traditional public education. I’ve talked to teachers that I know who liked the CCS without the high stakes tests.
Even the tests would have been okay if all the stakeholders had been part of the process, there had been no secrecy developing them, and the only purpose of the tests was for teachers to use the results to improve what they do in the classroom.
I suggest you read On The Issues to discover what Hillary Clinton said about Ed Reform in Arkansas.
Q: “How do you feel about the testing mania forced upon our children by No Child Left Behind?”
A: “I believe in accountability. In 1983, I led the effort in Arkansas to improve our schools, and I do think there is a place for testing. But we should not look at our children as though they are little, walking tests, and we’ve gone way overboard. So I would like to see us do assessments, but understand we need a broad, rich curriculum that honors the spark of learning in every child.”
http://www.ontheissues.org/2016/Hillary_Clinton_Education.htm
From what I read, it wasn’t clearly stated that HRC wants to use test results to rank teachers, fire them like Bill Gates wants to do, and close public schools turning them over the autocratic, opaque, often fraudulent and inferior corporate charter schools.
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And extremely lucrative for folks at the top!
“Trump spoke to a small, invitation-only crowd in the cafeteria of the Cleveland Arts and Social Sciences Academy, run by Accel Schools, an Arizona-based, for-profit operator of charter schools.”
Trump actually called out the for-profit CEO by name. The CEO claims he “owns” public charter schools. I guess he does.
They’ve created a whole new industry- charter school operators- wholly funded by the public, but completely opaque. No one knows who works at Accel, what they make, anything about them. They’re not even based in Ohio.
Low income children in Cleveland now send part of every Ohio tax dollar to a for-profit operator in Arizona. This money doesn’t even stay in their community. It’s shipped OUT of their community.
What a freaking shameful scam.
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How sad it is that Donald Trump’s education message is identical to that of our elected representatives in DC.
Why is bashing public schools so fashionable in elite circles? I’m to the point where I can predict these speeches and it doesn’t matter at all which member of the choir is delivering the message.
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By the way, as is true of all ed reformers, Trump didn’t “choose” some garbage for-profit cybercharter in a strip mall for his own children. He chose elite “tradittionalist” schools.
These experiments they conduct? They’re reserved for the lower classes. They don’t ever experiment on their own children.
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Ah, very “eugenics” oriented…
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I was looking at photos of the Obama Administration charter school tour. They’re pushing tech product in public schools.
Every single photo of children in these tech heavy schools has them staring at a screen.
They might want to look at the photos they take. These children are not “active users”. The photos directly contradict the claims about tech in schools. They’re using canned programs delivered on a computer. They know this is identical to a canned program delivered without a computer, right?
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Hmmmm … I wonder who is getting “what” kind of kick-back?
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Public money should not go to for-profit charter schools. Public money should remain with public schools that were underfunded even before charter schools began draining away public money to fund schools with dubious success rates in educating their students. If parents want their children in private often segregated schools, they should have to pay the bill for their sense of superiority and elitism.
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To put it kindly
Trump has NEVER had a high regard for the truth
but
it seems he has a real talent for making people believe him.
SCARY !!!!!
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And he has an exceptionally keen eye for a good scam.
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Got me to thinking…
When it comes to corporate education reform, “choice” trumps quality, practicality and reliability.
No expense or effort spared, of course, where the children of the heavyweights of rheephorm are concerned…
Bill Gates. His own children. Lakeside School.
‘Nuff said.
😎
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I couldn’t find the ad mentioned above but I did dig up this one on YouTube. It has Trump blasting the alleged “Common Core”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIvJBu16_j0
Hmmm. Food for thought. Anyway…..
I was thinking this morning as I was driving towards Monticello: it’s clear that Donald Trump is the Anti-Ravitch. All the good things that Diane Ravitch is, Donald represents the opposite in my mind. Diane is wise, humane, well spoken and fair-minded. Honest. The Donald so often epitomizes the opposite. Lincoln spoke of the “better angels of our nature.” Well, i wouldn’t go as far to say Trump is the devil. But he certainly personifies the crass and gimmicky in our nation. The base. I remember walking into Trump Tower back in the 1980s just for fun and thinking, wow, what a bunch of crap. It’s like cheap snack food -but for the eyes. Stale pork rinds.
It leads me to wonder: did the general citizenry 50, 60, 70 years ago have more class? I mean, just in general. The typical citizen. Democratic, Republican, rich, poor, black or white, college educated or not…. were we just more civil? Were we more polite to one another? Were we actually smarter in some ways? Could a tawdry huckster like Trump have come this close to actually leading a great country like ours?
Warren Harding, Richard Nixon, hell, you can even throw the Clintons into the mix when you think about that question if you want.
But I think Trump is a new sort of phenomena. And, I’m embarrassed for our nation.
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What is the link to the ad in question? Did John O. identify it?
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Oops! I did it again.
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I watched the video and true to Trump, it’s packed with one misleading lie after another.
On Sat, Sep 17, 2016 at 7:39 PM, Diane Ravitch’s blog wrote:
> dianeravitch commented: “Oops! I did it again. > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsC8e5Uz9nE&feature=em-uploademail” >
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Just watched the whole ad….twice. That’s sort of like hitting your thumb with a framing hammer….then doing it again.
There’s an odd phrase in there, at about 34 seconds. I had to replay it repeatedly: “It’ll be American teachers, American parents, that remake our schools.” What???
Who has been “remaking our schools” to date? Mexicans? The Chinese? ISIS? I don’t get it. Maybe some of you do. (Someone go check David Coleman’s birth certificate. And, is that Arne Duncan dressed as a Somali elder?? Whoa!)
Of course, it seems that Trump can say just about anything at this point and the words don’t really matter. It’s his same, basic, divisive idea: “Us vs. Them”.
I will say it is a slick ad. And, it does a good job of pushing people’s buttons -at least the people out there who have these sorts of “buttons” that are ready to be manipulated.
I keep looking a the polls and, boy, I’ve got to tell you, I’m scared. Maybe I was in denial over the summer. Maybe Trump was so busy shooting himself in the foot that it seemed like he’d never get out of the blocks.
Our country has been lucky in that when times were desperate (Civil War, Great Depression, for example) we’ve had presidents who could step up and do great things. Let’s hope Hillary has some of that same ability. I guess this is a true test for her. For all of us.
A footnote (and on a lighter note, too): I’m happy to see someone else making mistakes with this technology. “Oops! I did it again”. Yup, Diane. I spend a large part of my day saying that, too.
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“Who has been “remaking our schools” to date? Mexicans? The Chinese? ISIS?”
You forgot the Turks.
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The Gulen charter school chain did pass through my brain…..Interesting.
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And yet this is still not in mainstream news.
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Re: your comment…”Who has been “remaking our schools” to date? Mexicans? The Chinese? ISIS? I don’t get it.”
Did it ever occur to you that Trump is referring to the fact that it is educrats in DC and also in the State Boards of Education who are remaking our schools instead of letting teachers and parents be in control? I took this comment as being SUPPORTIVE of teachers and parents, and that it indicates that the remaking of our schools should be in the hands of teachers and parents, rather than educrats. Fair is fair! But then, those who will always find fault in anything Trump says will interpret it so that it is consistent with their own political agendas.
BTW, I’m NOT a Trump apologist — just a fair-minded person.
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Well, I include the “educrats in DC” and the “State Boards of Education” as being “Americans”, Joanne. That’s clearly the word Trump uses, “Americans”. Why not just say teachers…..why not just say parents?
He’s dividing our country. You’ve got the true Americans vs. “THEM”. It seems for Trump, “them” could be living outside the U.S. or maybe someone who works right down the street.
I see your point…..but I still find the whole thing to be….odd. Like Trump.
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Have to love how the public school is depicted as grey and horrible and the charter and private schools are depicted as colorful and lively.
Lines up really well with the ed reform echo chamber, actually. Go to any of their sites- if public schools are mentioned at all (which is rare) they’re all depicted as utter failures.
If I were a wealthy person from NYC who hasn’t been near a public school in 2 generations I would believe all public schools suck too- it’s the overwhelming impression left by ed reformers in both the private sector and government.
Trump is just acting on what he’s been told, over and over and over.
The real shame is we can’t seem to hire anyone in state government who supports public schools either. Seems odd for the public to be paying thousands of state employees to replace public schools with privatized systems. I’m unclear why we’re paying these people to replace the public schools they promised to “improve”.
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I’m not an educational researcher or an expert, but it occurs to me that charters have not been successful in states with unlimited, deregulated growth (OH, FL, CA,PA, MI, AZ) and have been more successful where their growth is capped.
Is the cap the element that creates better charters?
Seems like ed researchers would ask that question, unless it’s an echo chamber and it didn’t occur to them to ask.
Are Massachusetts charters better BECAUSE there are fewer of them?
Seems like real unbiased researchers would ask that obvious question. Unless they’re just charter school cheerleaders, of course.
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On August 30, our Collier County (FL) community united across party lines to prevent school choice and voucher advocates from gaining the majority of seats on the school board. Unfortunately, the state legislature got school-choice boosters, and Trump’s platform is virtually identical. One step forward, two steps back? No, thank you!
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Anne, congratulations to Collier County!
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