The Network for Public Education and the NPE Action Fund has created a toolkit for citizens to use to protest the confirmation of a totally unqualified person for Secretary of Education. Billionaire Betsy is a lobbyist for vouchers and charters. She has wrecked the schools of her home state. Do not let her ruin the nation’s public schools. Resist!
Please use the toolkit to let your Senators know that you oppose her confirmation.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Follow Leia’s advice:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rDhP-pOSYs
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Number 1, of the toolkit, permits a click- through to the link. I was unable to get a click- through, for numbers 2 & 3.
For Cincinnati residents, Sen. Portman’s office is at 312 Walnut St, Suite 3075. Sen. Brown’s office is at 425 Walnut St., Suite 2310.
I contacted Sen. Brown’s government office and his campaign office, asking if he receives funding from charter schools. No reply was forth-coming.
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Linda, you have written often that Brown requested the infamous $71 DoEd grant for Ohio charters. I haven’t been able to find documentation on that. Please post if you have it. All I can find are his lukewarm statements on how those funds need to be monitored. I’d appreciate any guidance you can provide.
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If I recall correctly (1) Diane provided a link to the letter in a post.
(2) Brown’s office e-mailed it, to citizens who had contacted his office. Ohio media wrote about the letter as well.
The U.S. Department of Education authorized $71 mil. Then, its release, was held up, when the disaster of the state’s charter schools, was publicized. Brown’s letter ASKED FOR THE RELEASE of that money! The letter included the hackneyed, “if only”, the money can be better controlled, as if, that was a realistic expectation, given the state’s gerrymandering and, the amount that the charters have given to the Ohio Republican Party, or even that it was the main issue. In reference to Diane’s post about Brown’s letter, I commented, at the blog, that I inferred from Brown’s letter that he would be in favor of Ohio’s Walton/Fordham-funded charter schools. The public deserves an answer from Brown to the question, “do charter schools have democratically elected schools boards?”. Then, he should defend why OUR Taxes, OUR communities should be boxed out of decisions about OUR kids. He should answer why there are charters in Ohio, when the only time a segment of voters were asked, they said they didn’t want them. He should answer about Reed Hastings’ (partnered in a charter chain) appearance in a YouTube video, calling for an end to democratically elected schools boards. He should answer to the citizens, for the charter school chain that is allegedly linked to Gulen. He should answer to the point that “public-private partnerships invariably reward big businesses and freezes out smaller businesses”. He should explain why he is supporting the $2 bil.+, agenda of the anti-union Walton’s and Bill Gates, an investor in the largest seller of schools-in-a-box and, a man who lives in the state with the most regressive tax system in the nation. Brown should answer for systematic charter school segregation- privatization, originally proposed by racist, Georgia Gov./Sen. Talmadge.
The citizens of the U.S. deserved to know, from their senators and representatives, when the richest 0.1% declared war against the public schools of the middle class and poor, for their own economic/ideological-driven gain.
Brown could show respect for John Glenn, who attended public schools, by steering the board of the John Glenn School of Public Affairs at OSU, where he is a board member, to stop deceit, in calling charter schools, “public” and, to invite anti-privatization representatives to college “leadership conferences”, instead of just charter cheerleaders.
Brown is one of my greatest disillusionments. When I contributed to his campaign, I didn’t know better.
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