Like Jan Resseger, Wendy Lecker paid tribute to the political philosopher Benjamin Barber. She acknowledged his work on behalf of democracy and the public good, which is currently under attack by a bipartisan coalition of corporate reformers.
She writes:
Political theorist Benjamin Barber, who died April 24, wrote about the importance of education as a public good. “Education not only speaks to the public, it is the means by which a public is forged.”
As he noted, education transforms individuals into responsible community members, first in their classrooms and ultimately in our democracy. Local school districts are also the basic units of democratic government.
Michigan professor Marina Whitman recently noted that the essence of a public good is that it is non-excludable; i.e. all can partake, and non-rivalrous; i.e. giving one person the good does not diminish its availability to another.
Some school reforms strengthen education as a public good; such as school finance reform, which seeks to ensure that all children have adequate educational resources.
Unfortunately, the reforms pushed in the Bush, Obama and Trump administrations attack education as a public good. For example, choice — charters and vouchers — is a favorite policy of all three administrations. Choice operates on the excludable premise of “saving a few.”
In operation, choice makes education rivalrous. As a New York appellate court observed, diverting funds from public schools to charters ‘benefit a select few at the expense of the ‘common schools, wherein all the children of this State may be educated….’”
Across this country, public money is diverted from public schools to charters with no consideration of need, quality or the impact on the majority of public school students. The result is invariably the creation of exclusive schools, out of the reach of voter oversight, at the expense of public schools that serve everyone.
Charter advocates claimed charters would be superior without the constraints faced by local districts. However, after more than 20 years, charters are no better than public schools.
Moreover, they leave public schools without resources to serve the most vulnerable and communities disenfranchised by unelected school boards.
As Barber predicted, “What begins as an assault on bureaucratic rigidity becomes an assault on government and all things public … (destroying) a people’s right to govern themselves publicly … (and) to establish the conditions for the development of public citizens.” Reforms that gut public education attack democracy.
You will enjoy reading the full article, which appeared in the Stamford Advocate. Lecker goes into detail about the ways that charter schools are draining resources from public schools and causing fiscal distress to schools that accept all students.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
On the issue of charters and vouchers, I’d like to bring to your readers’ attention that in Fall 2017, Virginia is electing a new governor. For the past 5 years, Governor Terri McAulliffe, through the use of his pen, has vetoed every piece of charter schools/vouchers legislation the Republican-controlled legislature has passed. In Virginia, we regularly receive “F” grades by the pro-privatizer groups because we have so few charters or vouchers in our state. We would like to keep it this way.
Pro-voucher/charter/corporate education Republican candidate Ed Gillespie is certain to win his party’s nomination on primary day, June 13th. The Democrats have a tight race for its nominee. The choice is between our current Lt. Governor, Dr. Ralph Northam, a pediatric neurologist, and former Member of Congress (2008-2010), Tom Perriello. Both candidates are anti-voucher/charters. This is good. However, what’s worrisome is that Mr. Perriello recently changed his position on charters. He has a past affiliation with DFER (Democrats for Education Reform) and was recognized as DFER of the Month in June 2010, along with voting for and co-sponsoring charter school legislation while in Congress. Recently at a town hall, I questioned him in regard to his past DFER ties and he tried to distance himself & in my opinion, attempted to obfuscate the issue. During our exchange when I commented about the negatives of data-driven education, he lodged into a vigorous defense of the data. He asserted that without data, we wouldn’t know that charters are failing (an experiment he was willing to try, according to him). He also incorrectly asserted that “even Finland” is a system with standardized testing. I then had to explain to him the difference between the triennial PISA tests given to a random sample of 15 year olds versus standardized testing as it exists in the U.S., in particular the SOLs (Standards of Learning) that we have in Virginia (28 SOLs from grades 3-12 in order to graduate; this is a decrease from 34 thanks to Governor McAuliffe).
I might add that I met Mr. Perriello earlier in the year at an education round table he held in our county where approx. 20 teachers and a few parents (I’m a parent). During our 1-1/2 hour dinner we talked exclusively about education. Not once did Mr. Perriello disclose his past DFER ties or charter school support. (At the time we didn’t know about his past…it’s something we learned months later.). I also gave him a copy of Pasi Sahlberg’s Finnish Lessons to read. It’s pretty obvious that despite long road trips traveling across Virginia to campaign, he didn’t take that opportunity to read the book.
Contrast Mr. Perriello with Dr. Northam. Not only is Dr. Northam anti-charters/vouchers, promising to continue Gov McAuliffe’s use of the veto pen, but wants to further eliminate SOLs, add wrap-around services, expand pre-K, redesign high school to increase vocational opportunities, and give teachers a seat at the policy-making table.
I’ve also met Dr. Northam twice in person, most recently at an Education Townhall this past weekend in our county. He is a breath of fresh air. As a pediatric neurologist, he understands how children learn best and as he said, it isn’t through sitting down to take standardized tests! When he was a state senator he sponsored legislation to increase PE for school children which passed the legislature but was vetoed by then-Governor Bob Mc Donnell (yes, that guy….the transvaginal ultrasound guy!). Luckily Gov McAuliffe signed this bill into law later on.
Dr. Northam entered politics in 2008 because he was fed up with our health care system & wanted to help change it. At the time he was actually a registered Republucan & apolitical but became a Democrat to join in the health care fight!). He has been endorsed by the VEA. You can read more here:
View at Medium.com
I am a Virginian, Fairfax county. I am 1000% in favor of school choice. Do not speak for me. School choice is coming to the Old Dominion. Wait and see.
When people pay their public taxes, they assume the money will serve the common good. They don’t expect that the fire department or police will provide top drawer service to some, and limited service to others. While the democratic ideal of the common good may not always be perfect, it aspires to serve all members of the community fairly. With education promoting choice systems to the detriment of common schools increases discrimination and segregation in privatized schools while students in public schools get essential services cut. Corporate schools purport to be “public schools,” but they are not. What is public is the funding, and little else is subject to serving the needs of all students. Once we allow “exclusion” policies with public funds, we create a system that is inherently unfair and undemocratic. Rather than trying to establish a set of competing schools, it makes for sense in a democracy to invest in authentic public schools that serve the common good, build upon what currently exists, commit to fair funding, and investigate innovative ways to promote integration.
AMEN to this: … education transforms individuals into responsible community members, first in their classrooms and ultimately in our democracy. Local school districts are also the basic units of democratic government.
Q Local school districts are also the basic units of democratic government. END Q
Where did you come up with that? Where in the federal constitution, or in any state constitution, is the local school district mentioned as a basic unit of democratic government?