Tim Slekar regularly posts podcasts of high value to the resistance, to those fighting privatization and high stakes testing.
This episode features an interview with Sarah Mondale and Vera Aronow, the veteran filmmakers whose new documentary tells the story of the organized assault on public education. Please take the time to listen.
In 2001, Sarah Mondale and Sarah Patton made a four-part documentary called “School,” which ran on PBS and was turned into a book.
The new film is titled “Backpack Full of Cash,” the term corporate reformers use to describe their goal: every child with a backpack full of cash, taking it anywhere he or she chooses.
It is narrated by Matt Damon.
We should all call PBS, which recently ran a series opposing public schools and touting the glories of the free market, and urge them to give airtime to this documentary. PBS is probably trying to curry favor with the Trump administration to stop the defunding of public television. It is sad, don’t you think, that public television gives airtime to a show attacking public education?
Send emails to: http://www.pbs.org/ombudsman/feedback/
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Sad, yes. Unexpected, no!
Contact PBS feedback and demand equal time for “Backpack Full of Cash” or some other opposing view.
Feedback line: 703.998.2138.
Email Ombudsman Michael Getler at http://www.pbs.org/ombudsman/feedback/
I would like to hear the interview, please show the link, I can’t find it (It’s probably right there, but I can’t find it)
It’s tough because I don’t even think policymakers see the bias. It’s an echo chamber. A lot of them truly believe this “movement’ isn’t anti-public schools.
I read a lot of them and there’s no recognition of how consistently negatively they portray public schools OR how consistently positively they portray charter and private schools.
Pick any random “national” ed reformer and look at their Twitter feed. They’re ALL positive for charter and voucher schools and all negative for public schools.
Massie Ritsch is yet another Obama Administration alum who is now a professional charter promoter. Even he picks up the bias. He was commenting on some ed reform think tank event and he noticed that “80%” of it was about charters. They billed this event as “about” public education and then omitted 90% of public school students. These are people in government! They consistently omit/ignore/denigrate the schools the vast majority of their constituents attend.
It’s kind of wacky, really, when you think about it. How did this happen? How did 90% of students end up with no advocates in their own government?
If you think that the 90% of students who attend public/government schools have no advocates, you are mistaken. The teachers who work in these schools, and the administrators are all advocating for the status quo. There is a minister’s group in Texas, which is fighting to stop school choice/vouchers. See
http://www.pressreader.com/usa/the-dallas-morning-news/20161226/281848643262632
The Texas legislature just killed a proposal to bring school choice/vouchers to the Lone State State. See
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/texas/articles/2017-04-06/texas-house-votes-to-nix-vouchers-maybe-dooming-senate-bill
Several groups: Teachers, Administrators, non-teaching employees of government school systems, (some) Teacher’s unions, (some) Pastors, (some) politicians, etc. all of these share a “commonality of interest” in derailing school choice/vouchers, and keeping the money and jobs flowing to the public/government school sector.
Only a very tiny minority of parents in the USA are able to obtain vouchers. See
http://www.ncsl.org/research/education/voucher-law-comparison.aspx
Many, many groups and individuals are working together to stop school choice/vouchers. I live in Virginia, and vouchers are all but dead in this Commonwealth.
To answer your last two questions, Chiara:
Massive amounts of money move the minions to do their bidding!
Remember what Diane has said all along on this blog: They have the money and media and we have the numbers of true educators and parents.
This is the message I sent to the PBS ombudsman:
I am disappointed that you offered a biased documentary (School Inc) presenting the rightwing case for a free market and defaming public schools. You have a right, of course, to offer a biased view, but I hope you will balance it by presenting the documentary “Backpack Full of Cash” produced by professional documentarians Stone Lantern Films. PBS ran their 4-part series, “School” in 2001.
Please provide balance.
At this difficult time for all public institutions, it is odd to see public television running an attack on public education.
So sadly and astonishingly true: too many professed-progressive voices simply don’t see the bias. Even among fully left and very “liberal” friends and family members who say that they absolutely support public education, I continue to hear how concerned and generous Gates is, and how important it is to keep on “fixing” schools.
cross posted at OPED NEWS https://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/Busted-Pencils-on-the-New-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Children_Choice_Corporate_Corporate-Fraud-170422-687.html
WI cross posted at OPED NEWS https://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/Busted-Pencils-on-the-New-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Children_Choice_Corporate_Corporate-Fraud-170422-687.html
WITH THIS COMMENT which has embedded links at Oped.
I listened to that podcast and also Slaker’s podcast Episode 31: The “Choice” is Clear: It’s A Backpack Full of Cash! | BustED Pencils. http://bustedpencils.com/episode/episode-31-choice-clear-backpack-full-cash/
It breaks my heart to know how they neglected our wonderful public schools, because after a wonderful education that began in NYC public schools in the fifties and ended in 1959,, when Bernie Sanders and I were classmates at James Madison HS.
My sons received outstanding public school education in the seventies in a school district that had 70, thousand kids, and was third in the state, and went on to great colleges and careers (one is a cardiologist, the other CEO of an internet security firm that the created. Now the high school thye attendee has failed 4 years in a row… as Bush intended.
The EDUCATIONAL INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX targeted public education with the goal of doing what the corporations had done to health care…creating a market place for something that was for THE COMMON GOOD.
IN came the ‘reform narrative’ sold by Bush, then Obama’s Ed Secretary Duncan,HOW HARD IS IT TO REALIZE that Duncan, Gates, Rhee and the rest of them, told the MEDIA and their Sillyanne Conjobs, repeated the alternative facts about reform, and the tale of terrible teachers — just as Spicer repeated the Trump false narratives.
There been NO DISCUSSION BY THE CANDIDATES OR THE MEDIA, OR ANYONE about the legislative take-over of the public school systems, that Diane Ravitch covers at her site and by the NPE — the privatization of our public education by the state legislatures which my series here, https://www.opednews.com/Series/PRIVITIZATION-by-Susan-Lee-Schwartz-150925-546.html?f=PRIVITIZATION-by-Susan-Lee-Schwartz-150925-546.html
with commentary that ties it all together.
Not unusual behavior by CEO Paula Kerger. She quashed a Frontline expose on the Koch brothers in 2015, because of their contributions to PBS. Chris Dlugokenski
Who at PBS should we call?
Who at PBS should we call?
http://www.pbs.org/ombudsman/feedback/
Who knows what PBS will do?
I know that you and me (we) have the power to also choose alternatives. Support the blogs and podcasts featured by Diane relentlessly. What PBS, CBS, MSNBC, ABC, CNN and other refuse to cover is their choice. We can choose to go where the information we want already exists.
Check out the 32 episodes of BustED Pencils if you want killer content in support of public schools! http://bustedpencils.com/episode/
I used to work for a PBS station (engineering, not policy). If you wish to influence your local stations and/or the network, please write to them (both email and postal mail). I promise you, that the stations read the mail, and pay close attention to it.
Local stations rely (to some extent) on viewer contributions. If you enclose a donation, it is appreciated.
Have you seen any of Eddie B’s you tube comedy clips?
(about 1 min. long)