The recent call for a moratorium on new charters by the NAACP, the Movement for Black Lives, and Journey for Justice has caused a crisis of confidence among corporate reformers. Suddenly they must confront the fact that they are leading “the civil rights issue of our time” by promoting school choice.
Robert Pondiscio of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute tackles the problem head on. Specifically he calls on Peter Cunningham to step down as editor of Education Post and give his job to a talented woman of color who is a charter school teacher and accomplished journalist. This would be very painful for Peter, who raised $12 million to start the blog from the Waltons, Eli Broad, and Michael Bloomberg.
He further suggests that other white reform leaders make way for people of color. Farewell, Wendy Kopp, Mike Petrilli, Michael Feinberg, David Levin, Richard Barth, the Kramers of Minneapolis, and dozens more who must give up their good jobs in education reform. Now, if only the billionaires would turn over their fortunes to people of color…
Diane Ravitch's blog 
From Alternet this morning. I suspect the tide is turning to the point that people will not be able to hide behind the label progressive and support this attack on Public Schools. The NAACP may be the tip of the iceberg in uncovering this “VAST RIGHT WING CONSPIRACY”
http://www.alternet.org/education/who-controls-our-schools-how-billionaire-sponsored-privatization-destroying-democracy-and
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Oh, that your words are true.
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Ooops:
“We fill this gap by analyzing longitudinal data for students (grades 3-8) in Indianapolis, using student fixed effects models to estimate the impacts of students switching from a traditional public school to a charter, magnet, Catholic, or other private school. Generally, we find that students experience no differences in their achievement gains after transferring from a traditional public school to a charter school. However, students switching to magnet schools experience modest annual losses of −0.09 SD in mathematics and −0.11 SD in English-Language Arts. Students switching to Catholic schools also experience annual losses of −0.18 SD in mathematics. These findings are robust to a series of alternative model specifications.”
This national experiment in abandoning public schools to promote charter and private schools MIGHT have carried some downside risk
Oh, well. We all know they’ll completely ignore “the data” in Indiana because they’re ideological zealots and whole adult careers are now dependent on this “public schools suck” theory.
We’ll never know what would have happened if they hadn’t have chased “choice” for 20 years, of course.
Stay the course, ed reformers! Double down, even. More choice! Markets will work,eventually.
http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/EDFP_a_00225#.WBH-nNArLnC
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Yes, the paramount and lamentable world construct, yesterday, today, and forward, stems from U.S. oligarchy replacing democracy.
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Indianapolis is very choice-ey. My brother in law lives there and none of the kids in his neighborhood attend the same school. None of them know one another. They bring in kids from their respective schools to socialize.
It’s great- you have the magnet kids who don’t mix with the general admission kids who don’t mix with the “no excuses” charter kids who don’t mix with the religious school kids. They fragmented these neighborhoods into factions and for what? They’re not getting test score gains anyway.
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Keeping the 99%, from association and collective grievance is the plan. If the people unite, America’s richest 0.1% become threatened, very quickly. An example of the least painful scenario for the rich, is forcing oligarchs to pay a very progressive income tax rate in colonies like the northwest’s Washington.
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Another Ooops: In my mailbox today from the Institute of Education Sciences on what RttT funding produced.
Nada on student achievement, much on compliance with rules imposed by Duncan in the hope of tgettin RttT money during the peak of the great recession.
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Will Mr Pondisco be stepping down? My guess is that Cunningham has a new job with his old buddy Arne
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I don’t know anything about whether white ed reformers should step aside, but I would suggest that if ed reformers plan on continuing to tell 7th graders to pursue vocational training they MIGHT want to find a spokesperson who once worked in a trade or would even CONSIDER working in a trade, rather they relying upon Michael Bloomberg and a banker.
Penny Pritzer in a hard hat isn’t really cutting it. Surely there’s someone who isn’t a billionaire who can do this. Someone even remotely credible.
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anything mike bloomberg is involved with is definitely corrupt
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Chiara, On Indianapolis: Mind Trust is the conduit for charterizing the city schools, and the 990 shows a lot of the money comes from Teach for America. Mind Trust is a darling of the market-based is best non-profits.
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That’s weird. The donation list to TFA, posted a few weeks ago by a commenter at this site, showed a $150,000-$200,000 donation from Indianapolis public schools to TFA. Indianapolis was the only school district in the nation that was on the list of donors.
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I have been waiting for African American groups to grasp the consequences of privatization. I have been waiting for them to challenge the separate and unequal nature of charters. Many charter schools in urban areas increase segregation by creating cheap charters for black and brown children and white charters for the new yuppie population that moves in after developers have moved out the local minority population.
Improving public schools that always aspire to create equity are a far better option. Teachers are trained professionals that are trained in teaching diverse students. “Reformers” have done a smear campaign on public education. However, public schools unlike charters are not selling a corporate brand; they are there to serve students, families and communities. What needs to change in public education are equitable funds and increased opportunities to promote more integration. Those of the issues that need to be addressed, not creating a bunch of splinter schools that dilute funding for all. These schools are run by corporations that seek profit; they are often run by amateurs with little to no training. They are frequently not trained professionals, and many staff members leave after a couple of years.
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The corporate reformers are losing their damn minds. At the first sign of public disapproval of charter schools these plunderers start attacking each other. The funniest part of this is the suggestion that there are actual Democrats involved with ed reform groups like Education Post and Democrats for Education Reform–both of which are corporatist organizations, funded with hedge fund dollars, and run by Neo-Liberals who are committed to destroying public schools and replacing them with new profit centers.
I’m happy to just sit back and watch these vandals snipe away at each other as their “movement” runs right off the cliff.
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An epiphany in 2016?
How about data on the ratio of TFA’ers of color, who get executive positions in the ed. organizations linked to the privatizers? Media’s demographic profile of privatizers’ business employment, showed a lack of proportional diversity.
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I am the “talented woman of color who is a charter school teacher and accomplished journalist” in Diane Ravitch’s piece. Here’s my response to Pondiscio’s suggestion that I take Peter Cunningham’s Ed Post job: “White Educators, I Don’t Want Your Job. I Want Change.” http://www.realcleareducation.com/articles/2016/10/20/white_education_reformers_i_dont_want_your_job_i_want_change_1320.html
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Thank you for posting your letter. Spiritual leading takes a very special person. Using a situation that relies on unique people, to construct national policy, faces major and, IMO, insurmountable hurdles. “Ideal education” is as remote as “ideal students” and “ideal funding”. Relying on democracy, with prohibitions against administrative influence from the rich, is an excellent starting point for school design. The wealthy, currently driving, education policy, have no relevant experience and their self-serving motives make them suspect.
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Thanks, Linda for you reply! Let us not forget that the core of Dr. King’s Civil Rights Movement was a spiritual (the black church), and the core of Mahatma Gandhi’s movement, as well. How else could a nonviolent social movement succeed in the face of such horrid hatred, oppression, and violence? Addressing the spiritual dimension of this education equity fight, I would argue, is the major key to changing hearts and minds of man; it allows us to overcome our natural human tendency to exert power over and oppress others (i.e. racism, classism, sexism) and is the first step on the path to achieve true, sustainable education equity. There are no “insurmountable hurdles” with God, and a little love for ones neighbors–and especially ones enemies–is more powerful that any human construct. That’s what I believe, and that’s why I started Teachers Who Pray:)
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We agree that great men have found courage and the ability to persuade, through spirituality. Even decades later, examples of their sacrifices continue to embolden us and, their accomplishments give us hope. My viewpoint, at the tactical level, relates to the public service/common good that we, as a nation, decide people deserve. A sense of public trust, when the collective funds of taxpayers are used, is imperative.
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The translation of “step aside” is as follows: “We are continuing to lose the battle for the hearts and minds of parents because more and more of them are seeing through our lies and corruption while taking note of the abject failure of our policies. We believe that it will be much harder, culturally and politically, for our opposition to speak out against the people of color that we set up as figureheads and spokesmodels. This holds true for whites especially, but also for the NAACP and other representatives and champions of underserved nonwhites whose power and legitimacy as advocates will be called into question. Meanwhile, the people behind the scenes who are driving and funding the ideology of reform will remain in control of the overall enterprise, unseen and unknown by the vast majority of parents. Obviously, this affords us the opportunity to attack and delegitimize progressives and all others who oppose us by accusing them of racism while simultaneously providing cover for the defacto racism of our policies. This will also allow those on the right to (falsely) claim common cause with and compassion for people of color, co-opting them for future political gains. Why didn’t we think of this sooner?”
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It’s called tokenism, just ask Shaver Jeffries.
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The privatization of public schools…supported by billionaires, hedge fund managers, and their paid for conspirators.
Supported by private money (investments) and public money (public tax dollars)…
Advertised by right-wing think tanks, paraded around by their charter parents and children’s whose sole purpose is. that of a mascot.
Legalized by governors, state commissioners, and legislators…sworn to protect the public, but behind closed doors signing actions that secretly destroy democratic values.
an argument built on lies, built on deception, built on false alarms, built on scare tactics, built on a hidden at first, but exposed conspiracy…
An argument on wobbly legs
An argument worthy of the trash bin
An argument built on “quicksand”.
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The civil rights movement of our time…
“Protect our Public Schools, and all Children of our Nation!”
This an argument that should never, ever be debated or challenged.
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Good idea, Pondiscio. The new hires are more likely to cross paths with the people they harm. And, cultural/demographic research indicates that they’ll care more.
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I predicted that ed reform would go bonkers and ruin the whole idea of vocational education and they are:
“Governor Kasich wants Ohio students to get some work experience while still in high school. Speaking at a conference in Cleveland Tuesday Kasich questioned whether schools are training kids for 21st century jobs.
“The fact is the system is broken. It’s a broken system. So one of the things we’re going to try to do is put in the Cristo Rey model, the Catholic model for poor. You go to school for three weeks and the fourth week you go out and work. We’re going to try to do it… Probably won’t get it done but we’re going to try.”
I would suggest that going into working class neighborhoods and telling high school students they should work a week a month rather than go to school is a tad “elitist”
This is an apprenticeship that he’s describing. He’s probably not familiar with them but Ohio already has them. Those are for adults, not 14 year olds. Can they possibly see their way clear to funding a high school education for the lower classes without insisting they all go on a “career track” and forego college?
Are there any adults in this movement? Do they hear how they sound? Are they familiar with the concept of “restraint” and able to resist indulging their every ideological fancy?
Stop experimenting on our schools. It’s arrogant and none of you built these schools and none of these kids are YOUR kids. Stop over-reaching. Show some humility.
http://www.ideastream.org/stateimpact/2016/09/28/governor-kasich-wants-high-school-work-study-programs
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My heart bleeds–bleeds!–for poor Peter Cunningham.
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Education Post, along with the Fordham Institute, are charter promotion orgs anyway.
Does it matter that much who they hire to run them? In a very real sense they’re not “about” public schools anyway. They’re “about” ed reform, and ed reform is privatization promotion and creating measurement metrics.
I read these people. Other than a “litany of horribles” regarding public schools and scolding public school parents on testing there’s not much to them.
The Obama Administration architects say it themselves: this is about “choice” and “accountability”. That’s all it’s about. Pretty grim stuff if you’re not in the “choice” sector.
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Here’s Fordham Ohio. Read it yourself:
https://twitter.com/ohiogadfly?lang=en
Charter schools, charter schools, charter schools and report cards and testing for public schools.
93% of the kids in this state of ALL income levels attend public schools. You’d never know it reading the lobbyists and politicians.
I don’t mind the lobbyists so much- they do what they do and I’m not paying them- but it’s kind of outrageous when all the public employees JOIN the lobbyists.
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You are right. it is intolerable for citizens to pay ODE public employees and Senators Sherrod Brown and Rob Portman to undermine public education.
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How callous does a person have to be (twitter link) to say that, paying a utility bill so that a family has lights (and, heat), won’t raise a kid’s test scores?
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Thanks for the shout-out, Diane. To be clear, I am not demanding that all “white leaders” in ed reform step aside. I merely find it curious — ok, hypocritical — that so many in ed reform are willing to loudly proclaim that ed reform organizations must be led by people of of color, but see no obligation to practice what they preach. It just won’t do to demand that others walk your talk (to be clear, I believe the diversity is an intrinsic good. But unlike many others I don’t see education reform as an exclusively race-based movement, so it’s not my theory of change).
I don’t have a lot of patience with intellectual monocultures or political orthodoxy in education. But I have no patience at all for hypocrisy. Practice what you preach, or stop preaching. Simple.
Best,
Robert Pondiscio
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“I have no patience at all for hypocrisy…”
If only this were true. If it was, you would have spoken out against the high suspension rates of at-risk 5 and 6 year old children in the highest performing charter schools and their “got to go” lists long ago. A charter school for years has claimed that over 20% of their 5 year olds were doing violent things — children whose parents were the most dedicated to their education — and you didn’t say a word.
‘Practicing what you preach” means that the charter school movement can’t claim to be concerned with the tens of thousands of children “trapped in failing public schools” while at the same time condoning the charters who are more than willing to throw many of those children under the bus because getting high test scores trumps educating those children any day.
Not being a hypocrite means that you don’t pretend that a high performing charter school would ever have an attrition rate shockingly higher than a mediocre to crappy charter school and you don’t pretend that at-risk parents would go running from well-funded high performing charter schools far more frequently than they go running from mediocre charter schools. Attrition rates at the BEST public schools are low. Attrition rates at the BEST charter schools are high. That is a feature, not a bug, except to you.
So you never speak out about the fact that at-risk parents are leaving high performing charter schools at twice the rate they are leaving lower performing ones. Instead, you look the other way: “but parents leave terrible failing public schools, too, so there is no need to ask any questions because I, Robert Pondiscio, know that at-risk families just don’t like high performing charter schools and I refuse to believe those charter schools aren’t making ALL children feel welcome.”
You wrote one article about how it’s fine for some charters to be for “strivers” – sort of acknowledging the fact that obviously some high performing charters made a practice of ridding themselves of non-strivers – and then you shut up when those very same charters claimed that they were getting miraculous results with every child.
Perhaps there is no better evidence of your own hypocrisy than your statement that “I have no patience at all for hypocrisy”. Of course you do, as long as the billionaire reformers are willing to underwrite that hypocrisy.
Practice what you preach, Mr. Pondiscio. Or maybe you just buy into the notion that a disproportionate number of very young low-income minority children tend to be very, very violent, even if they have the most committed parents in the school system. If you believe that, then maybe you are not a hypocrite. Just a racist.
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^^^correction: I apologize for an error here. I mistakenly believed that at one time you weren’t a hypocrite because you called for some charters to be only for “strivers”. But that was another reformer. It’s possible you once wrote something that wasn’t an example of hypocrisy, but I’m unaware of it.
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In ‘reform’ minority teachers in public schools often lose their jobs while the charters hire upper middle class white staff members. New Orleans is a perfect example of a ‘reform’ that destroyed middle class teaching jobs for many educated black teachers, most of whom were women, while it expanded jobs for white staff. This smacks of colonialism, and it is contributing to income inequality.
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Robert, you JUST NOW NOTICED this?
Look around your colleagues of undereducated, non-credentialed BILLIONAIRE bottom feeders who frantically grab the $M flying about while dedicated qualified teachers are forced to leave the profession, TFA thrives and millions of children in Poverty are on testing treadmills, losing Real Teachers, Real Education & many are treated with harsh & unethical malpractice >No Excuses discipline…all for being poor and vulnerable.
Robert, your high horsemanship can only reach higher levels if you hold your white nose straight up & even higher. The view from above is so stress-free while making recommendations for people living everyday lives. You know BEST!?
You are a huge part of the destruction of public education. No doubt, you and your Fordham buddies will always follow the money. Right now, privatization is serving you guys well, while our children, teachers & public education are on life-support.
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Sorry to inform you, Mr. Pondiscio, but so-called education form is a textbook example of intellectual (and but for a few well-paid shills, a racial one, as well) monoculture and political orthodoxy.
The robotic repetition of stale talking points, the banal, insipid language used to mask vicious policies and behavior, the deceptiveness, the hypocrisy… yeah, the shoe fits you all, perfectly.
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A purely tactical response so they can better “speak for” Our side probably does it too.
Sent from my iPhone
>
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If the white reformers do as requested, they will appoint John King Jr., or someone just like him, to everyone of those positions. Nothing will change.
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The translation of “step aside” is as follows: “We are losing the battle for the hearts and minds of parents because more and more of them are seeing through our lies and corruption while taking note of the abject failure of our policies. We believe that it will be much harder, culturally and politically, for our opposition to speak out against the people of color that we set up as figureheads and spokesmodels. This holds true for whites especially, but also for the NAACP and other representatives and champions of underserved nonwhites whose power and legitimacy as advocates will be called into question. Meanwhile, the people behind the scenes who are driving and funding the ideology of reform will remain in control of the overall enterprise, unseen and unknown by the vast majority of parents. Obviously, this affords us the opportunity to attack and delegitimize progressives and all others who oppose us by accusing them of racism while simultaneously providing cover for the defacto racism of our policies. This will also allow those on the right to (falsely) claim common cause with and compassion for people of color, co-opting them for future political gains. Why didn’t we think of this sooner?”
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Alas, the racist, anti-labor paternalists funding “the civil rights issue of our time” have a mounting PR problem, and are casting about for some Black and Latino puppets to ease the way for their hostile takeover of the public schools…
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I suspect that Mr. Pondiscio, who has enjoy attacking me when I’ve criticized charter schools, has a different strategy in mind than empowering educators of color. One wide criticism of ed reform, particularly “no excuses” charters, is that the treatment of children of color is condescending and implicitly (sometimes explicitly) racist – the idea that poor black and brown children are in need of “control.” As the reform leader Whitney Tilson once remarked, the tough disciplinary practices are because those children “need it,” unlike his own children or the privileged children in my school, who apparently need gentler and more loving care.
So, he may think, putting black educators in these positions inoculates the ugly aspects of the charter movement against this very justified criticism. It is a transparent bit of exploitation. There are, of course, women and men of color who believe “tough love” is an appropriate or effective way to treat children. They are as wrong as the white non-educators who impose these practices on children – and it’s a shame.
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Steve my question for you (speaking of hypocrisy) remains the same: how many low-income families do you serve at The Calhoun School? How many apply? Do you do any outreach to low-income families of color? If you are looking to rescue families from the depredations of charters, including mine, I will happily steer some your way. Yes, I’m serious. Your board of wealthy benefactors, who no doubt share your commitment to social justice, will surely applaud you for doing so. (They will, right?) As will the families who pay $40K+ to live their progressive values and support public education the way a flying buttress supports a church: from the outside.
When you’re ready to walk YOUR talk, Steve, I’m ready to help. You know where to find me.
ro
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Robert,
I am all in favor of choice, so long as parents are willing to pay for it. You are wrong to reprimand Steve Nelson for supporting public education at the same time that he is headmaster of an excellent private school. He is not asking taxpayers to underwrite his school.
The top performing nations in the world do NOT have charter schools: they have equitable public school systems.
Have you ever visited Finland, which the OECD said is the best school system in the world? There are no charters there.
Charters exclude children with disabilities and ELLs. There is nothing equitable about them.
You should not promote the Walton agenda and pretend that it is about children. If they cared about children, they would pay their 1.3 million workers a living wage.
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Perfect response!
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Ah, it’s always a pleasure to reconnect with old friends, Robert. Answers: 30% of our students are from low income families. Yes, we do constant outreach and have a staff member specifically for this work. We don’t depend on Prep for Prep or similar programs for our diversity. Our board is not, of course, all “wealthy benefactors,” although I sure do like wealthy benefactors who are committed to social justice! Beats the hell out of wealthy benefactors who are undermining public education. And, of course, as Diane kindly pointed out, we take no tax dollars, yet all of our wealthy and not-so-wealthy families pay taxes and support public education. And we are partners with public schools. And we have invested a great deal in anti-racist work. You, and others, have a field day attempting to delegitimize me by attacking either my acknowledged privilege or wealth of some folks in our school community. That’s rich! The entire reform edifice is constructed on staggering wealth, accumulated, in some instances, by folks who degrade the environment, exploit their workers and appear to have very little regard for social justice. Can you spell Walton?
But, as always, it’s good to hear from you.
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We are not friends, Steve, make no mistake. We have not met because you refused my several invitations to visit my school and meet those you airily condescend too. But no matter, lesson learned. With luck, the students I and others work with today in those dark, satanic charter schools will one day have the means to send their children to Calhoun and not depend on noblesse oblige for admission or tuition.
Until then, old friend…
Robert
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Robert,
It took three years for Eva to get any of her “scholars” into an exam high school, despite their suspiciously high state scores.
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Thank you, Steve Nelson.
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Diane,
According to Calhoun’s website “all tuition grants are for partial assistance” and “families are expected to contribute a minimum of $1,500/year toward tuition.” This is, needless to say, beyond the reach of the vast majority of low-income families Steve Nelson purports cares so deeply about.
So thank goodness those kids at least have some chance to get into an exam high school. Because they are not welcome at Calhoun.
Robert
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If they go to a charter school, staffed by inexperienced uncertified teachers, they have almost no chance of getting into an exam school
But the CEO will be paid $500,000-600,00, so it works for someone
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rpondiscio says “and not depend on noblesse oblige for admission or tuition…”
I know this will shock you, Mr. Pondiscio, but there are thousands of low-income students in top high schools all over NYC. I love your delusion that they could have never achieved that without your help. Or the help of charters. On the contrary, 99% of the low-income students in the top high schools were educated in public schools. And those public schools didn’t even treat them like dirt, nor did they decide that those children could only be educated at the expense of the unwanted children who need to be thrown out with the trash. That kind of thinking is only found in charter folks like yourself. You are so convinced of your own goodness and importance to those at-risk children — talk about noblesse oblige!!! — that you give yourself and other charter folks the ultimate power to decide which OTHER children shall be deemed “unworthy” so that those chosen children may be educated in the manner in which you insist is the only way those children can learn. Not that your funders would allow their own children to be treated that way, of course, but then hypocrisy is the most prominent feature of charter school defenders like yourself who has never seen a high performing charter school worthy of criticism. They are great! They are good! They are NOBLE in their work of educating those little children who would be lost without you and your “oblige”. And of course, the nice salaries you all pay yourselves is just a little compensation for all that “good work” you do to choose which of the at-risk kids are worthy of your own “noblesse oblige” and which should be publicly characterized as violent so you have the excuse to treat them in the manner in which you know they deserve to get them out of your school.
You are a snob. A racist who defends those who identify so many 5 year old African-American children as violent because you insist they are honestly trying to “help” those very violent children when they humiliate them publicly and suspend them. A racist who keeps insisting there is nothing suspicious about so many very violent 5 year olds ending up in top performing charters and not in low performing charters. Because you would have us believe that parents who “choose” top performing charter schools have far more violent children than parents who “choose” low performing charter schools. Nothing suspicious there. Just high attrition rates that are absolutely necessary, says Robert Pondiscio, to get those violent 6 year old children out of your high performing charters where they mysteriously keep ending up and must be weeded out stat! Because you feel that oh so strong “obligation” to teach the easiest to teach kids who will be a credit to you. How very noble of you.
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Ah, so the mask of civility comes off, and the inherent nastiness of so-called reformers is revealed.
That didn’t take much did it?
Notice that Mr. Pondiscio’s head almost explodes when challenged by Steve Nelson, who has the effrontery of being the headmaster of a private school that admits to being such, unlike the promoters of publicly-funded private schools (aka charters) that falsely claim to be public.
Nasty people, doing nasty things, every single aspect of which are propped up by Orwellian falsehoods.
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Robert, I don’t think of you as friend or enemy. I am disappointed that my admittedly sharp criticism of charters and their disciplinary practices draws immediate attacks about me and my school. I do have conflict over my role. I didn’t go to a private school, my children didn’t go to private schools and I was not a child of privilege. But i love my school and deeply believe in our mission, our progressive principles and our intense social justice work. We don’t just “talk.” We engage our students in important work and we embrace each child’s identity. We acknowledge, every day, our privilege, our white privilege and the injustice in our country. In my forthcoming book I begin by acknowledging this ambivalence. But my privilege and my school’s privilege don’t disqualify me from caring about all children. It’s not hypocrisy. In fact, my privilege demands that I care about all children and work for justice and speak truth to power.
In these exchanges, you fail to respond to the issues I raise. The issue isn’t about me or Calhoun. It is about the charter movement, what it is doing to public education, and how children are treated in these schools. I am prepared to argue against “no excuses” discipline and rigid pedagogy from a psychological, neurobiological and human point of view. Your response is that my school is expensive. My school does not detract from the well-being of New York’s (or America’s) children. In some small ways, I think we help. Those things are on our website too, but you prefer to prosecute your irrelevant case.
But despite all of this, I regret acrimony. Life is too short for that.
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Steve,
Feel free to email me at rpondiscio@aol.com. I’d be happy to continue this discussion in a setting more conducive to civility than on Diane’s blog. I have pretty thick skin. but I find it hard to maintain my focus and a civil tongue when faced with charges that I’m a corporate shill, a racist, a snob, etc.
I look forward — earnestly — to hearing from you.
Robert
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Are the people who attack Black Lives Matter and say they are raising issues of racism that don’t exist racist?
Robert Pondiscio, you attack people who point out the racism inherent in charters who claim that so many 5 year old minority students are violent. Does that make you racist? Or are you just a truth-teller who knows those kids really ARE violent and deserved every punishment?
I don’t think all people who run charters are racists. I only think that people like you who defend high suspension rates of (supposedly violent) 6 year olds and insist that unusually high attrition rates are just minority parents choosing to leave a high performing charter because they don’t like good schools.
I’m calling your bluff. Is it true that the highest performing charter school in the country gets a disproportionate number of violent African-American children who need to be suspended?
I apologize if you are saying that charter is lying about all the violent very young non-white children in it. I thought you were saying it was telling the truth and that’s why I called you a racist.
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Read the following claims from a July 14, 2016, Fordham employee commentary, in the Columbus Dispatch, about Dr. Figlio’s Ohio voucher research. “He studied Edchoice…its competitive effects …competition generated by EdChoice improved academic achievement… (one of his) findings demonstrated the benefits of healthy ed competition.” Now, read Figlio’s research paper and POINT OUT WHERE THAT FINDING IS !!!!!!
Are the odds, zero, that Fordham calls Gov. Kasich, while the Governor tours, promoting vouchers (Figlio provided evidence that Ohio vouchers are a failure), to tell him, “whoops, about that competition finding”? “Hypocrisy” is definitely the affront to call out… right.
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This makes sense so long as the blacks who replace the outgoing white reformers are people of character who are in it for the good of the community and not focused on the profit angle.
Greed is color blind.
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How did Pondiscio single out just one hypocrisy, from so many? Why not the following (1) Walmart, operates as a monopoly in many communities and (2) almost all newspapers operate as monopolies? Yet, the first, funds Fordham’s talking points praising competition, and the second, publishes them.
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