Doug Garnett is a communications specialist and a regular reader of the blog. He writes here about reading “Policy Patrons,” by Megan Tomkins-Stange.
Been reading Policy Patrons. And it’s given me a different insight.
We all feel like Gates, Broad and others are “dictating” what happens. It’s hard – because they aren’t. What they’re doing is far more subtle but with similar results.
What they’ve done is create a “walled garden” of groups that are all paid to support their position. The list in this article is an example of creating that walled garden – a range of community organizations, researchers, university credibility, etc…
THEN, with the walled garden created, the foundations themselves never have to “tell the government what to do”. They are able to say “well, I know somebody who deals with that – you should talk with them”. Except the foundations have ensured that this “somebody” is somebody who will give the answer they want.
It’s incredibly deceptive – but politicians and press seem incapable of detecting when they’ve been had in this way. Because the “walled garden” of true “ed reform believers” are the only people they end up talking to. In a sense, Gates, Broad, et. al. deliver answers on a silver platter so that state education departments, school districts, politicians, and press don’t have to work hard.
This informal (but massive) walled garden they’ve build believes in testing as management, believes in CCSS, believes in charter schools, and believes that privatizing government services is always good.
As a result, state education bureaucrats NEVER have to wander outside the garden – so they never have to confront uncomfortable truths. (It’s dangerous outside those walls and that threatens one’s career.)
But this also explains why politicians are so shocked when citizens confront them with dissatisfaction with their policies – they’ve been blissfully living inside the Eden of Reform – unaware that they aren’t in touch with reality. I’ve seen this in Oregon. Our legislators cannot believe it when someone rational challenges what they’ve been doing.
It’s a HUGE problem for those of us who believe in public schools and believe in the value of researched answers. Because it’s not illegal what they’ve done. They believe it’s entirely moral. And they think they’re being “good people” by doing it. And it spreads blame by breaking it into tiny bits so no single organization can be blamed for much. Kind of a guaranteed “plausible deniability” clause.
Yet the result is entirely immoral – because it’s the future of our children.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Put this on your “funny you should mention it” board. The below link is from Inside Higher Education where the headline says: Strings Attached:
“University of Kentucky senate opposes terms of proposed $10 million deal with Koch and Papa John’s CEO to establish center for the study of free enterprise — funds for which could be revoked at any time.”
It could read: “Free (?) Enterprise from Inside the Wall.” Another oddity: Both Trump and the Oligarchs are all about building walls. Someone needs to tell them that creative ideas don’t work that way.
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/10/12/kentuckys-university-senate-opposes-terms-10m-deal-free-enterprise-center?utm_source=Inside+Higher+Ed&utm_campaign=820e272f29-DNU20161012&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_1fcbc04421-820e272f29-198488425&mc_cid=820e272f29&mc_eid=f743ca9d07
UnKochMyCampus.org by the Center for Media and Democracy is a website/organization with excellent insight and information.
Thank you for the link, Linda. I’ll pass it on.
Also, two George Mason University Law School students from UKMC were interviewed the other night–I forget whether it was on “Democracy Now” (which can be easily accessed by going to democracynow.org) or “The Big Picture” (Thom Hartmann)–which has got to be on YouTube. (Otherwise, it can probably be seen at the website Linda gives.)
This is exactly what Eli Broad has done in California…and now all over the US. He is top dog because of his billions in United Way, Calif. Endowment, Parent Revolution, and most other 501c3 and 501c4 agencies. They ALL do his bidding and walk on eggshells to keep in his good graces. He formed his Broad Foundation in 1999 and has carefully worked his plan for decades. Even Senator Diane Feinstein is careful to massage his ego which I have unhappily seen myself at meetings. Money talks, big money screams.
I wonder if, and hope that, this “walled garden” is made from the same material that a “house of cards” is made of, and will reach some sort of critical mass, and come tumbling down. It seems to be held in place by sustained funding.
Many Journalists turn around one or more reports a day, becoming a “jack of all issues, and master of none”
Thanks for sharing this. It goes a long way toward explaining the surprise of progressives who automatically assume that the Democratic party gets education policy right and the Republicans don’t.
I teach a course on teacher leadership. Recently, one of the participants in my class excitedly shared a group she had just found: Democrats for Education Reform! At last, she said–an organization that will promote better policy to support public education. As if.
EdTrust Midwest has the prettiest walled garden in Michigan, and has put “research”-based tentacles into the state Dept of Ed, the state school board association and administrative organizations, the unions and the legislature. They are driving the policy bus with full support from elected officials and the media.
Also in Michigan, Nancy. And you are so right. Can’t read an article without Amber Arellano weighing in. It’s amazing how so much empty policy seems to be in agreement with EdTrust Midwest. And it usually happens to be perfectly aligned with the same nonsense we read from Gates.
In Ohio, the go-to spokesperson for all ed. issues is Fordham. I’d estimate 90% of the media articles quote the same source.
In one recent Dayton Daily News article about voucher research, both Fordham’s and the Ohio Dept. of Ed.’s spokespersons echoed the same refrain about a “finding” in the study. The journalist even took the bait, describing the research as corroborating an opinion about the value of competition. Problem is, the “finding” conclusion wasn’t even addressed by the research paper.
Boy, I hate to step back into this fire again, but I just have to ask: what’s the difference between philanthrocapitalism and the Clinton Foundation?
From what I read (and I am not an expert on what Clinton Foundation does), it is not spending its money primarily to drive policy changes in spending of public money – which these foundations are doing.
In fact, I am shocked how the Gates foundation is so wealthy but doesn’t spend its money on philanthropy. I believe Clintons spend money directly on solving the problems, – Gates et. Al, don’t.
Also, Gates et. al. use their money to impose business school capitalist ideas into policy – like CCSS or standardized testing and VAM.
Clinton inspiration is different and better for society from what I can tell.
You really have to ask? It isn’t apparent in terms of the different outcomes of each foundation’s efforts? A Gates-funded organization describing what it plans to achieve ($22 mil. from Gates to New Schools Venture Fund), “to develop diverse charter school organizations that produce different BRANDS (my caps) on a large scale.” Is it nitpicking to point out that Bill Gates, not his Foundation, is an investor in the largest retailer of schools-in- a-box, a business model that its founder describes, as appealing to investors, in part, because of its 20% return?
Clinton Foundation does not seem to use donations to create public policy, at least know that I know of. Broad Foundation, Walton Family Foundation, etc use their foundations mainly to create public policy.
Waltons and Broad literally created Parent Revolution and financed the Parent Empowerment Act of 2010 in California. The Waltons, through their foundation, have been the purveyors of the cash behind Stand Your Ground gun carry laws in many states.
Diametric differences between using foundation money to affect public policy (that also may also affect their private corporate cash flow), and using it to improve society by feeding the poor, building schools and hospitals, etc..
NPR ran a story today comparing the Clinton Foundation and the Trump Foundation.
The big difference is that the Clinton Foundation spends 90% of its funding on good works. The Trump Foundation doesn’t do anything notable and doesn’t even have a full-time employee. Mike Pence claims that the Clinton Foundation spends only 10% on charitable programs; the fact is exactly the opposite. http://www.npr.org/2016/10/17/498154413/theres-really-no-comparison-between-the-trump-and-clinton-foundations
It kind of surprises me (although, given this election season, not really) that people fail to see the parallels between the Gates and Clinton Foundations. In both cases you have vast amounts of money concentrated in a few private hands being used to promote the Foundation’s ideas of what constitutes “good”. In both cases, they get involved in issues which they have very little experience with and they refuse to deal directly with the people on the ground. Both “charities” are a form of colonialism – affluent white people imposing their ideas on poor and/or indigenous peoples “for their own good”. Read about the Clinton Foundation’s efforts in, for instance, Haiti or Malawi and tell me you don’t see parallels with Gates’ efforts in education. At best, such efforts would have to be characterized as gross incompetence. The Haitian people were trying to help themselves, but they kept getting brushed aside and overruled by foreign NGO operatives and they never did get the resources they needed, most of which vanished into unknown hands.
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/09/hillary-clinton-email-213110
There are thre really important differences.
First, Clintons are not destroying the US public schools.
Second, Gates et al are not doing good in society with their money, they are using it to manipulate government money – to cause our tax dollars to be wasted.
Third, the Gates Foundation has $34 billion in assets. The Clinton foundation has $189 million. Broad Foundation, Ford, and Kellog each have over $2B.
That much money can buy a LOT more.
I’m reminded of that adage where short-sighted logic leads people to step over dollars to pick up pennies….so much noise about a political brouhaha while the true puppet masters hold their unobstructed sway.
I’m having trouble seeing how this article is an indictment of the Clinton foundation in Haiti. Chelsea Clinton seemed to give a very honest assessment of the international relief effort failures there. Are you saying that the foundation ignored her report? My daughter was in Haiti just recently; from her report the organization with whom she went was very focused on needs identified by the Haitians in a effort coordinated with local Haitian relief agencies, but that coordination has taken real effort to create beyond what we could possibly understand. Just think of the failures of FEMA during Katrina. There is much more to the story than the incompetence of the international relief effort.
The right wing is notorious for false equivalencies e.g. charter schools are public schools, the campaign spending of worker collectives, which represent millions of people, paying taxes and living in the communities where they elect politicians is similar to the political influence of the richest 0.1%, avoiding taxes and living in far distant wealthy enclaves. I’d go on with examples but, it’s evident that there’s a cottage industry within Republican PR, that creates false equivalencies.
This insulated and isolated method of forming policy may not be illegal or immoral, but it is not how a democracy is supposed to work. Our representatives are supposed to work for us in a government of, by and for the people. Government should not be relying on foundations with special interests and agendas, deep pocketed billionaires and corporations to set policy. In a democracy policy should reflect the will of the people. “Reform” policy has been created in a vacuum, and it has attempted at every turn to avoid democratic input and has taken every opportunity to exclude and suppress democratic participation. Nothing about “reform” has reflects a grassroots, authentic movement. If fact, prior to the government enacting laws that monetized our schools, there was very little interest from foundations and billionaires to be involved in public education. Now teachers cannot even voice their opinions about the problems that “reform” has created without fear of reprisals. “Reform” has always been an exclusionary vision that is top down and fueled by special interests.
As an aside, this morning I watched an interview with the Kaines. Ann Holton was asked what public service she would like to do if her husband were elected VP. She said, “I would like to go around the country and listen to the concerns of teachers.” This could be a good thing. It would help to breach the walled garden created by the Obama administration and favored friends.
YES,,,and Elizabeth Warren started her speech today by saying, “let’s hear if for teachers” and she proceeded to talk about the value of America’s teachers, citing a story on her love of teaching from her childhood to today.
I’ve really gotten to where I loathe the phrases that come out of think tanks because they’re always repeated as fact and some of them are just nonsense.
The “skills gap” was wildly popular for a while. They were ALL repeating it over and over. The first time I heard it was when Governor Walker and the CEO of Caterpillar were reciting it and then- zoom!- it took off and they were ALL saying it. It was never “fact”- it was ALWAYS disputed:
“This “skills mismatch” theory is a favorite of corporate executives and the think tanks they fund. But it is based on scant evidence. Individual companies may be struggling to fill specific jobs, but the data shows little sign of an industrywide shortage of skilled workers. In fact, it’s not clear that companies are really trying hard to fill many of these jobs at all.”
The other that sets my teeth on edge is “digital native”. So CLEARLY cooked up by marketing. Really? Normal adults believe that children LEARN differently using a computer program? Why? Are they a new species? There’s not one thing different about “learning to code” than learning anything else. It’s not a unique and exotic skill any more than knitting is a unique and exotic skill, or playing the piano, or constructing a sentence with words.
Ridiculous, “digital native”, but repeated by all The Smartest People with ZERO evidence. There’s an agenda behind this stuff. They’re pushing something with it.
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/dont-blame-a-skills-gap-for-lack-of-hiring-in-manufacturing/
A walled garden, the fruits of which are highly poisonous…
Kinda like Eden, Michael???
This is factually wrong. It was clear from the emails I FOILED from the NYS Ed Dept that the Gates Foundation deals with many state govts and ed Departments all the time – flies them to meeting around the country where they pay for their hotels, travel, and offer them grants if they agree to their various priorities, whether it be related to teacher evaluation, Common Core, charter cooperation through their charter compacts, or student data collection and sharing via inBloom. These meetings take place all the time and they try to lure state officials who are involved in one project to agree to another, hook line and sinker. I have multiple emails where they are sending messages to a large number of state ed commissioners and staff to show this. In addition, as regards inBloom, they tried to get Commissioner king to sign a non-disclosure agreement, saying State Ed would say NOTHING about the project without first getting their okay, even facts that were already in the public realm. to John King’s credit, he pointed out that he was a public official and had a Bd of Regents to report to and couldn’t agree to such a blanket non-disclosure agreement, though the pressure was intense.
The Gates Foundation also use their funded groups to put out bogus reports, to lobby other elected officials, to network with reporters and get them to parrot their spin, to hold endless webinars and forums in DC and elsewhere to disseminate their policies and message. But behind the scenes with state officials, the Gates Foundation is directly pushing them every day. Not to mention communicating with the state officials who are in their payroll — like the Regents fellows funded by Gates who were working out of NY State Ed dept in charge of implementing the Common Core, teacher evaluation and inBloom projects.
The story of these emails, how I got them, and excerpts are posted in four Parts starting here: http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2015/12/our-inbloom-foil-saga-part-i-waiting.html
I agree that Gates Foundation people meet with officials. What is discussed in Policy Patrons is that they have a large legal team that Gates employees must meet with before every meeting in order to establish groundwork for what they can/can not say.
The book claims that if, say, they are discussing graduation rates they aren’t supposed to directly advocate specific policies because that violates their tax status. (And no one has ever apparently had their tax status revoked so it’s not clear it would be a problem.)
Instead, they advise them to talk to one of the groups inside their walled garden.
Am continuing to read your note. And any direct thoughts about what’s in the NY transcript would be useful.
The Gates-funded, Aspen Senior Congressional Education Staff Network, in its self-description, says its non-partisan and NON-IDEOLOGICAL. The description even talks about creating a “safe space”. It seems logical that congressional staffers want safety to impose oligarchy but, taxes shouldn’t be voided to provide that space.
Heartland Institute uses the same kind of puffery in its self description, Linda.
http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/art/artifact/Ga_Cartoon/Ga_cartoon_38_00392.htm
Keppler’s political cartoon from 1889 pretty much says it all. Funny how my daughter is having to research this in her 9th grade US History class and we were looking at it last night.
“incapable of detecting that they’ve been had”? The Ohio Dept. of Ed. is well aware of its complicity and that of Ohio’s politicians. (1) Ohio school districts provide evidence at KnowYourCharter.com and, by their signatures, demanding that Ohio’s Congress reimburse them. (2) The fleecing of taxpayers by the corrupt charters and by on-line charter schools has played out in courts, reported widely by media. (3) The academic failure of charters was so profound it required data scrubbing, which led to the resignation of a top education official, who happened to be the husband of Kasich’s campaign manager and former chief of staff.
It may only be in Oregon and Colorado that I’ve found that situation. 😦
If the politicians and their appointed hacks, have to pretend that they didn’t know, in order to back track from the theft of America’s most important common good, democracy was robbed, too.
Speaking from my own pre-Ravitch ignorance of the privatization cancer, I always thought the Gates’ (for one) were well-meaning people. So if the break with (authentic) public schooling is detrimental the democracy and to the democratic spirit (via–garden walls and closed gates–pun intended), and it is, then the question becomes whether Gates and the other oligarchs that are pushing for profit via privatization are really as anti-democratic as well as biased against minority groups, the poor, and several other groups, as is suggested; OR whether they are indeed well-meaning but just unaware.
If the latter, then that unawareness (it seems to me) is not situated in what most of us and them would deem “a good education” for, in the short run, some good education can occur in public or private situations; but also in a basic misunderstanding of the difference between (1) corporate and (2) democratic institutions at the level of foundations.
Basically, corporations are ideological and open to questions and experimentation EXCEPT about corporate ideology and its foundational orders; whereas democracy is rooted in the experimentation of “the people.” Therefore democracy or the education that flows from it is not ideological; it’s open to all questions including ABOUT its political foundations. The hope is that “the people” will embrace it again and again and, if they don’t, then it will be a democracy no longer. Democracy, then, is where the creative spirit is best and most likely to be fostered and to manifest. (If anyone should know this, it’s Bill Gates.)
It sounds like those who run corporations, however, are not willing to take the risk of raising unpleasant questions that is endemic to what democratic institutions, and education in particular, are all about.
In the Policy Patrons book, top Gates employees admit the invented policies they were told to and there was no basis in knowledge… I believe the term was that they were “winging it” when it came to policies.
I wonder if the Gates ever wondered WHY public schools weren’t working; or if they were being sold “a bill of goods” about the “poor” condition of that public institution; and if the schools WERE working, what about public education needs to be continued and supported? like properly supported teachers and administrators, class sizes that match what the research says, and the systematic building of communications and educational bridges to the parents and caregivers of the children who attend their schools?
To Gates: democracies can be capitalistic, but capitalism is not democracy and, in its zero-sum profit-making state of affairs, at its deepest levels of order, also can be in complete conflict with what is best about democracies.
Has Gates thought it through? I doubt if he really has.
He lives inside his own tech garden where, watching Microsoft for decades, he is brilliant at the linear tech issues and miserable with the people issues.
Even after copying the Apple operating system, Windows never discovered how humans use computers. Same with his tablet work. Same with his software.
Microsoft is one of the all time great knock off companies – never in coating but brilliant at taking what other people have made and making a lot of money from it. (A very valid approach to business – risk in innovation is huge. Reduced risk is wise to many.)
Shift to education and there’s nothing that suggests Gates would understand the very human issues in education. And his solutions show that one dimensional quality – disconnected from students and motivating teachers.
Hello Doug Garnett: Thank you for your thoughtful reply. Perhaps my question is not for this blog, but my long-term interest is cognitional theory and the philosophy of mind; and so “how people think,” and the disparity in that field between (a) the thinking of the rich and powerful and (b) that of those who have a family history of financial (and other kinds of) poverty always attracts my attention–and to where democracy (as embattled as it is) has brought us.
Of course, that “power-thinking” becomes concrete when it influences other people, and especially the political order we live in, namely, a democratic state. So in that sense, (for instance) the Gates’ understanding, motivations, and intentions as (for instance) naive, short-sighted and overly-optimistic, biased, or politically “dark” and authoritarian (like the Koch brothers seem to be) are important to our thinking–especially so where their claim to legitimacy in a democracy cannot be kingship by blood or divine connections, but rather is only the size of their bank account. The import also concerns how they understand themselves and their role. So it’s not only about my personal interest in how mind’s work, but also it can inform the directions and activities of such movements as the one that fuels Diane’s blog.
A brief example of how that question works itself out can be found in a recent New Yorker magazine article (October 10) by Tad Friend entitled: “ADDING A ZERO: Is Y Combinator’s Sam Altman fixing the world or trying to take over Silicon Valley?” In that article, Friend says: “Like everyone in Silicon Valley, Altman professes to want to save the world. Unlike almost everyone there, he has a plan to do it.”
To me, the picture that emerges in the article is of another buck-powerful well-meaning person (as only example) who has little, no, or a bad understanding of what “saving the world” in fact would entail. And like with the Gates,’ it seems there is no understanding of what democracy means, or of setting the conditions for it to survive, namely, through fostering conditions for a democratically-founded education of all concerned. That missing or inadequate understanding is coupled with a distinctly “I’m going to do this” attitude that rings of illegitimate power but yet grounded in top-down authoritarian thinking. It sounds like a bunch of (so far) nice little boys with nothing to do who have no understanding, either, of their own dependence on their long-term political infrastructure (from whence their freedoms and funds actually emerged), but with a great deal of money to play with.
I don’t mean to bore others here with my meanderings, but there is a lack of the fullness of a real education there, and it’s an interesting place where such freedoms have brought us. I appreciate your response to my note.
What the heck is “cognitional theory”? From what you have said, I get the impression that you are not talking about neurology, biology, or even really psychology, but rather your interests lies in sociology and how one’s social environment affects actions.
To 2old2teach: No–though related to all in your note, my interest is philosophy. From that, cognitional theory is about how we learn, self-correct, and hide from our own questions and insights that are aimed at truth. In brief, it’s about the question: What is human education?
Interesting area of interest. I think Silicon Valley and tech add more complicatio because part of Gates weakness is that he believes in systems over the human. And that is very common in tech.
Doug says: ” I think Silicon Valley and tech add more complicatio because part of Gates weakness is that he believes in systems over the human. And that is very common in tech.”
If such a weakness is the case for some, then it’s a weakness of their understanding–an unbalanced view of the complexity and historical nature of human beings at work in their thinking, which creates a horizon of thought out of which we can think, and about which we can become quite dogmatic. Such horizons can inspire commitment and, without self-reflection that can produce the ground for a broadening of understanding and, with it, one’s horizon, we just cannot imagine why anyone would want to think otherwise. But of course some do, which should provide a clue, and that clue, further questions–but it only seems to inspire power moves by many.
But that mindset is not the same as a well thought-out embrace of oligarchy and biased nose-holding when it comes to thinking about or associating with the demos of a democracy. Such a money-equals-legitimate-stature attitudes seem to come with a fully conscious embrace of some forms of libertarian thought (like it seems the Kochs ascribe to).
My original point was that to focus on laws, and on the education of the polity, is good and constitutes potential remedies. However, for some who are against public education, it’s a matter well-meaning intentions coupled with willful ignorance, and not yet a hard-and-fast, conscious embrace of bias, contempt born of a false elitism, and anti-democratic motivations. Approaches, then, can be varied. Thanks again.
Apparatchiks feeding from the malanthropists dog food bowl, when challenged, may smile (or more likely, smirk) and say they are “winging it” or “building the plane while we’re flying it” (yes, they’ve actually made such demented statements), but the “tell” in all this is that virtually every policy recommendation they come up with fortifies the economic, financial and political interests of the malanthropists themselves.
If it walks like a duck…
(1) Corporations are autocratic. (2) The corporation contrivance was developed to protect its owners from liability. (3) The sole goal of a corporation is to serve its owners. There is no mechanism within its structuring to serve any lofty goal or any constituency other than its owners.
(a) Boards of Directors, may write something altruistic as a goal but, there’s nothing to back it up, in the structure. Trump made the point, with hyperbole, when he said his investors would sue him if he didn’t take every opportunity to make a profit. (b) Evidence shows Boards comply with what top management wants, on almost all issues.
Non-profit corporations are similar to for-profits in almost all regards except making a profit. The transmutation of non-profit TIAA-CREF into what it is today is illustrative.
It’s not just politicians who are inside the walled garden. Major media is, too. That’s why so many of their editorials sound the same. Today’s NYT editorial on charter schools could well have been written by a lobbying group:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/13/opinion/a-misguided-attack-on-charter-schools.html
The editorial urges the NAACP to support charter expansion. We can only hope that the leadership of this proud, 100-year-old organization gets its facts from outside the walled garden and recognizes the harmful educational practices and racial disparities baked into the charter school system.
Another editorial, this one in the Washington Post, is a little more balanced, probably because the writers know that student privacy is big issue with its readership. But you’ll still see the usual industry talking points about student data and “personalized” learning:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/facebook-backed-school-software-shows-promise–and-raises-privacy-concerns/2016/10/11/2580f9fe-80c6-11e6-b002-307601806392_story.html
To the NAACP leadership and everyone concerned about civil rights: please read the two editorials together. You’ll see how the people who are pushing for charters and parental choice want to solve the problem of inequality: by replacing professionally-trained teachers with soul-less machines. The machines may be able to raise test scores—though it’s unproven—but they will never produce equal opportunity and they will never close the education gap between rich and poor. That requires schools that operate like those where rich folks send their own kids, not the “no excuses” prison-like schools where creativity, individualism and free thought is totally stifled.
Couldn’t agree more. Reporting on education shows a remarkable lack of curiosity and remarkable consistency (as you note). That’s unusual for a media where reporters make their careers noticeable by discovering the surprising…
ken derstien
Here is my review of another book on philanthro-capitalism: No such thing as a free gift
The book is primarily about the Gates Foundation, but several mentions of the Clinton Foundation in similar activities, among other “philanthropic” foundations and wonderful benefactors of trickle-down capitalist goodness.
“This informal (but massive) walled garden they’ve build believes in testing as management, believes in CCSS, believes in charter schools, and believes that privatizing government services is always good.”
In other words, the billionaires’ brotherhood have created a religion, and the walled garden is their church.
A religion doesn’t have to provide evidence to its claims and interpretations of how things are, the justifications just need to appear reasonable to those who cannot or don’t want to rationally analyze complex matters.
Magic or just the promise of magic are much more attractive than tedious reasoning.
No doubt, Gatesian wizards have been quite clever in making people believe that swishing their magic VAM-wand will turn schools around and make poverty disappear. In reality, though, the idea behind their mind control is as old as our consciousness.
It is beyond belief that dictators harm democracy and in the end of their struggles, they turn to democratic society to seek their refugee. for example the case of Fetullah Gulen, and all previous Nazi officers.
In the same vein, why on earth does Bill Gates et al tries to destroy the good education system where their children and grand children definitely need to learn from?
In the clear water, fish cannot survive, as well as in the polluted water, all fishes die.
Please, all beat around the bush whiners be serious about Trump. We cannot expect the perfect politician or billionaire. However, we expect the DECENCY in leadership.
We know the “WALLED GARDEN “. We can effectively publish and words by mouth “who they are” in all forums. This will effectively cultivate the awareness in public, parents and students at all levels.
Hopefully, the REASONABLE AND DECENT credibility in leadership will be mattered to all voters. Back2basic
“In the same vein, why on earth does Bill Gates et al tries to destroy the good education system where their children and grand children definitely need to learn from?”
Good education doesn’t need good mass education. Billionaires still plan to have good education for their families that ensures their leadership, and only the rest of the population will go under militaristic robot training.
In reality, the billionaires’ economy doesn’t need well educated, creative, happy people; it needs obedient workers.
I actually believe that the billionaires do want to eliminate poverty: poor people cannot buy their products. But I also believe that they use the elimination of poverty as an excuse to take over mass education and turn it into a big factory that produces workers whose only purpose and hope is to survive in the economy.
Great point. I have spoken with many administrators and policymakers who face this choice:
Listen to parents, study evidence, acknowledge that the Common Core is a fraud.
Go along, collect a salary, don’t be reprimanded by superiors.
It is shameful how many people choose option 2. It’s not good for one’s soul. (Sartre called in inauthenticity.)
How is subtlety defined? More than a decade ago, in Philanthropy Roundtable, the founder/co-founder of TFA, Bellwether, Pahara Aspen and New Schools Venture fund (all of which received Gates funding), was interviewed. Kim Smith described NSVF’s “marching orders…To develop diverse charter school organizations that produce different brands on a large scale.” A couple of years ago, an external affairs manager of a Gates-funded organization wrote at Philanthropy Roundtable, “….reformers…. declare we’ve got to blow up the ed schools.”
A Microsoft Canada manager was quoted in Entrepreneur magazine, “Teachers will have to shift or get off the pot.”
“Teachers have to shift or get off the pot” means that taxpayers must let the tech industry take the communities’ money, and students be damned.
Thank you Máté Wierdl:
Yes, yes and yes, your statement is forever true.
[start statement]
In reality, the billionaires’ economy doesn’t need well educated, creative, happy people; it needs obedient workers.
[close statement]
Your conclusion is the best.
[start conclusion]
I actually believe that the billionaires do want to eliminate poverty: poor people cannot buy their products.
But I also believe that they use the elimination of poverty as an excuse to take over mass education and turn it into a big factory that produces workers whose only purpose and hope is to survive in the economy.
[end conclusion]
It is very shameful to acknowledge that:
“Listen to parents, study evidence, and acknowledge that the Common Core is a fraud.”
However, most of experts, like Peter Cunningham and educators on board with Gates and Pearson prefer to “go along, collect a salary, and don’t care for the welfare of young American generations.”Sigh!
It is painful and anguished thought for all conscientious educators, parents, and students. Back2basic