Archives for the month of: June, 2017
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Ken Bernstein in Virginia Makes a Tough Choice in the Democratic Primary for Governor

By dianeravitch
June 8, 2017 //
5

I feel better about supporting Ralph Northam for Governor after reading the views of Ken Bernstein, a teacher advocate whose judgment I trust. Ken has spent time with both men. He will vote for the winner.

He is voting for Northam because of his commitment to public schools and his state and local experience. His wife, he adds, is voting for Periello.

Whoever wins, I hope he keeps the privatizers out of Virginia. And sends a message to the rest of the Democratic party that supporting charter schools is a liability.

Categories Education Reform

Karen Wolfe: Why the Billionaire Boys Club Won the Los Angeles Election

By dianeravitch
June 8, 2017 //
16

Karen Wolfe is a parent activist and blogger in Los Angeles. She interviewed several of the leading figures in the recent school board elections and shares her thoughts about why the board president Steve Zimmer lost and his billionaire-backed challenger Nick Melvoin won. [Sorry for original error; Freudian slip.]

Back in the distant past, a person could raise $30-50,000 and run for school board. This race cost millions of dollars. The billionaires spent four times as much money as the supporters of Zimmer. Zimmer was backed by UTLA (United Teachers of Los Angeles), Melvoin was backed by billionaires like Eli Broad, Michael Bloomberg, Alice Walton, Reed Hastings, and others with no connection to the schools other than their desire to put one of their own in control. It was the most expensive school board race in history (as the referendum last fall about the expansion of charter schools was the most expensive ballot question about schools in history–the billionaires hand over a million or two without thinking twice, when charters are involved.)

Melvoin had another advantage besides copious cash for TV and print advertising. He was able to spend full-time campaigning every day for the last 18 months, while Zimmer had a day job.

Melvoin and his campaign also lied shamelessly. They blamed Zimmer for John Deasy’s $1 billion iPad scandal. Deasy is now working for Eli Broad. Now, that’s chutzpah. Or a bald-faced lie.

Karen Wolfe is not as impressed by the power of the money and lies as I am. I think that Melvoin is a puppet of Broad, and his campaign excelled at mud-slinging and succeeded in depressing the vote.

My take: Steve Zimmer, an honorable and decent man, failed to present a sharp alternative to Melvoin. He was always on the defensive. He supported charter schools, but thought they should be held accountable. He did not make a compelling case for the importance of public education and the dangers of privatization. He had one foot in each camp. That’s not good enough. I wish he had come out against charter schools for draining hundreds of millions from the district and luring away the easiest to educate students. I wish he had called them parasites.

Now the new board president is likely to be run by Ref Rodriguez, who runs a charter chain that was recently under investigation. He has contracts with the board. He shouldn’t even be on the board. Doesn’t California have conflict of interest laws? Guess not.

What is the future of public education in Los Angeles? Ask Eli Broad. He considers privately managed and unaccountable charter schools to be “public schools.” There will be many more of them in the near future. That’s why the billionaires invested.

Categories Accountability, Billionaires, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Los Angeles, Privatization

On June 13, Virginia Will Pick a Democrat to Run as Governor: Public Schools Matter

By dianeravitch
June 8, 2017 //
16

Virginia is one of the few states that has held the line on charter schools. Governor Terry McAuliffe vetoed efforts to loosen restrictions on new charters. The state has only 9 charters, and new ones can’t open without the endorsement of the local school board.

Two Democrats will be in a run-off on June 13: Lt-Governor Ralph Northam and former Congressman Tom Periello.

Northam, a physician, has been endorsed by most of the state and local Democrats.

Periello is running as a progressive, with the endorsement of Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, and about 30 Obama Democrats. He is portraying himself as a man of the left.

But: Petriello worked for the Podesta Center for American Progress and he was selected as one of DFER’s favorite reformers in 2010. As a one-term Congressman, he voted to remove federal funding for abortion from the Obama healthcare bill. And he got an A from the NRA.

DFER, the lobbying group for hedge funders and charter schools, raised money for Periello in 2010, when he was running for re-election. It said, “Rep. Tom Perriello ‐ He represents a new generation of progressives in the U.S. Congress, the ones who understand education in the context of civil rights. He’s a critical supporter of President Obama’s education agenda but is facing a tough re‐election bid against a Republican state senator.” Worse, DFER chose Periello as its Reformer of the Month in June 2010.

In announcing that honor, DFER’s Whitney Tilson wrote: “Perriello was a strong supporter of Rep. Jared Polis’ All-STAR Act, which helps to replicate high-performing charter schools that serve at-risk students. The bill establishes new thresholds for data-driven accountability and transparency, helping to ensure that new charter schools maintain the high level of performance that today’s most trusted ones achieve.”

Periello has said his votes against gun control and against abortion funding were mistakes. But what about charters and high-stakes testing? Is he really changed? I’m not sure.

Northam, on the other hand, voted twice for George W. Bush.

Neither of these candidates is perfect.

But one of them, Ralph Northam, has made support for public schools a central pillar in his campaign. I have not found anything on the web about Periello’s views on privatization and school choice and charters.

Here is Ralph Northam’s commentary on the importance of public schools.

He writes here:

“I grew up on the Eastern Shore during desegregation. A lot of white parents chose to send their kids to private schools rather than integrate — but not mine. My brother and I both attended and graduated from public schools. It’s one of the best things that happened to me.

“After high school, I attended the Virginia Military Institute and then Eastern Virginia Medical School — both great public schools that prepared me well for my career as a physician and didn’t saddle me with a load of debt.

“My wife Pam taught elementary science, and both my kids are Virginia public school graduates, too. My son Wes graduated from the College of William & Mary, and my daughter Aubrey graduated from the University of Virginia. With all the bumper stickers we’ve collected over the years, you should see the back of my Prius!

“Public schools have given so much to our family — I’ve been proud to fight for them as a state senator and lieutenant governor. Some of the highlights of my political career include working with Governor McAuliffe to invest a record $1 billion in our K-12 public schools and leading the effort to win a federal grant that opened up 13,000 new spaces for our youngest Virginians to attend quality early childhood education programs.”

Given a choice between the two, I support Dr. Ralph Northam. In this crucial time for public schools, when the Trump administration is committed to privatization, the nation and Virginia need a governor who is able to stand up for public schools, with no ambivalence. I hope Northam wins the primary and goes on to become governor of Virginia. That should gladden the hearts of public school parents and teachers across the country.

And Senators Warren and Sanders should check into public education issues when deciding who gets their endorsement.

Categories Supporting public schools, Virginia

California Legislator: For-Profit Charters Are Ripping Off Taxpayers

By dianeravitch
June 8, 2017 //
11

Kevin McCarthy, State Assemblyman from Sacramento, published a terrific article in the Sacramento Bee with Joshua Pechthalt, president of the California Federation of Teachers, explaining what a rip-off for-profit charters are.

The last time the Legislature tried to prohibit for-profit charters, Governor Jerry Brown vetoed it. Let’s hope that as more legislators understand the frauds in both for-profit and non-profit charters, the Legislature will bar for-profits and regulate non-profits.

They write:

“Across California and the country, corporations are expanding their ownership and operation of charter schools and their profits, subsidized by taxpayers.

“In California, 34 charter schools operated by five for-profit education management organizations enroll about 25,000 students. These for-profit charter schools siphon hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money away from students to generate massive corporate profits, and in many cases provide an inferior education.

“They exploit loopholes in California’s charter school law allowing them to cheat our students and reap huge profits at taxpayer expense.

“We have a long way to go before California’s public education system is adequately funded and cannot afford to line shareholder pockets with scarce state revenues.

“The Legislature has the opportunity to fix this flaw in state law. Assembly Bill 406, authored by Assemblyman Kevin McCarty and sponsored by the California Federation of Teachers, would prohibit for-profit corporations from operating public charter schools. The bill was approved by the Assembly on Wednesday and now heads to the state Senate.

“It is estimated that California taxpayers provide these companies with more than $225 million a year with little public transparency or accountability.

“K12 Inc., the state’s largest for-profit education management organization, received $310 million in state funding over the past dozen years. In 2016, it reported revenue of $872 million, including $89 million paid to its Wall Street investors.

“It pays millions to top executives while its average teacher salary is $36,000, thanks to heavy recruitment among young, inexperienced teachers, plus burnout and turnover.

“K12 Inc. operates 16 schools in California with about 13,000 students. The average graduation rate of its charter schools is 40 percent, while the statewide rate is 83 percent.

“Like many of these for-profit companies, K12 also overstates student performance and attendance data. Students who logged onto their computers for one minute per day were reportedly counted as full-time students, giving the corporation full average daily attendance funding from the state.”

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/op-ed/soapbox/article154084079.html#storylink=cpy

Categories Accountability, California, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Fraud, Privatization

BREAKING: New Mexico Commissioner Skandera Resigns

By dianeravitch
June 8, 2017 //
6

Mercedes Schneider has the story. Slanders is stepping down.

BREAKING: NM Ed Comm. Hanna Skandera Gives Her Two-Weeks Notice

Will she join Betsy DeVos in D.C.?

Skanndera is close to Jeb Bush and akin to DeVos in ideology.

Categories Betsy DeVos, Bush, Jeb

Mike Petrilli and I Find Common Ground: Depersonalized Learning is Neither Nutritious nor Genuinely Educational

By dianeravitch
June 8, 2017 //
27

After Mike Petrilli of the conservative Thomas B. Fordham Institute read my post yesterday, he wrote to say that it appears we have some common ground. He wonders whether the contrast between real teaching and machine teaching is comparable to organic food vs. processed food. Yes!

Fortunately, Mike has two sons the same age as my grandsons, so children are not a theoretical construct to him.

Personally, I think conservatives (and all parents, whatever their politics) should be leading the charge against robot “teachers.” Genuine education will never emanate from programmed machines.

And they will never be “personalized.”

That’s why I hope Mike will adopt the term “depersonalized learning” to describe computer-based instruction. There may be times when it is useful. But computers can never replace human interaction, a kind look, a stern look, a loving word, a caring and committed person with a heart, a brain, and a soul.

Categories Education Reform

How the Trump Family Used a Fundraiser for Children with Cancer to Enrich Themselves

By dianeravitch
June 8, 2017 //
11

Bill Moyers’ website pointed me to this shocking story by Dan Alexander in Forbes. As Moyers’ website asked, how low can you go?

LIKE AUTUMN LEAVES, sponsored Cadillacs, Ferraris and Maseratis descend on the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester County, New York, in September for the Eric Trump Foundation golf invitational. Year after year, the formula is consistent: 18 holes of perfectly trimmed fairways with a dose of Trumpian tackiness, including Hooters waitresses and cigar spreads, followed by a clubhouse dinner, dates encouraged. The crowd leans toward real estate insiders, family friends and C-list celebrities, such as former baseball slugger Darryl Strawberry and reality housewife (and bankruptcy-fraud felon) Teresa Giudice.

The real star of the day is Eric Trump, the president’s second son and now the co-head of the Trump Organization, who has hosted this event for ten years on behalf of the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis. He’s done a ton of good: To date, he’s directed more than $11 million there, the vast majority of it via this annual golf event. He has also helped raise another $5 million through events with other organizations.

The best part about all this, according to Eric Trump, is the charity’s efficiency: Because he can get his family’s golf course for free and have most of the other costs donated, virtually all the money contributed will go toward helping kids with cancer. “We get to use our assets 100% free of charge,” Trump tells Forbes.

That’s not the case. In reviewing filings from the Eric Trump Foundation and other charities, it’s clear that the course wasn’t free–that the Trump Organization received payments for its use, part of more than $1.2 million that has no documented recipients past the Trump Organization. Golf charity experts say the listed expenses defy any reasonable cost justification for a one-day golf tournament.

Additionally, the Donald J. Trump Foundation, which has come under previous scrutiny for self-dealing and advancing the interests of its namesake rather than those of charity, apparently used the Eric Trump Foundation to funnel $100,000 in donations into revenue for the Trump Organization.

And while donors to the Eric Trump Foundation were told their money was going to help sick kids, more than $500,000 was re-donated to other charities, many of which were connected to Trump family members or interests, including at least four groups that subsequently paid to hold golf tournaments at Trump courses.

Categories Fraud, Trump

Leonie Haimson: Why New York’s ESSA Plan is a Nightmare for the Neediest Students

By dianeravitch
June 7, 2017 //
12

Please read Leonie Haimson’s description of student testimony against New York state’s ESSA plan.

Commissioner of Elia represents the old discredited model of NCLB, RTTT, and Test-based accountability. Isn’t 17 years of failure enough?

Categories Accountability, New York, Students, Testing

Valerie Strauss Recaps Betsy DeVos’s Testimony about the Budget and Civil Rights

By dianeravitch
June 7, 2017 //
17

I confess. I didn’t watch Betsy DeVos testify. I didn’t want to. No one pays me to blog every day, so I have some discretion in how I use my time. What I did instead, which was very taxing, was to watch preview DVDs on the PBS special “School Inc.,” because I have been invited to tape a response for Channel 13, New York City’s PBS station. It is worse than anything you anticipated in terms of distortion, inaccuracies, slander of public schools, and adulation of the free market. Maybe I should have watched DeVos.

Valerie Strauss did watch DeVos. Here is her report.

She made clear that she would not put any limits on for-profit education companies. She recommended virtual charters to an Alabama senator, although even the charter industry has called out online schools for their poor academic results.

And here is a key quote:

“She was asked repeatedly whether private schools that would be part of the administration’s proposed program to fund and study a new voucher program would be subject to federal discrimination and special education laws, and she repeatedly said, “Schools that receive federal funds must follow federal law.””

As our reader Laura Chapman pointed out in a comment, voucher funds are always defended by the assertion that the public money goes to the family, not the school. Tax credits for vouchers go to corporations who pay for vouchers. Every voucher program operates under the fiction that the public money does not go to the school.

The money is laundered through the family or third parties.

So DeVos is cleverly masking the fact that federal law will not apply to schools that receive federal funds.

It is a three-card Monte game.

Categories Accountability, Betsy DeVos, Budget Cuts, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Fraud, Funding, Hoax, Privatization, Vouchers

An Open Letter to the Education Minister of Liberia

By dianeravitch
June 7, 2017 //
8

Education International, which represents teachers unions around the world, issued a bulletin about disturbing developments in Liberia, which threaten freedom of research about the performance of corporate outsourced schools.

EI wrote in a letter I received:

“As you would be aware, just over 12 months ago, in an unprecedented move, the Government of Liberia announced its intention to out-source its entire primary and pre-primary school system to Bridge International Academies in 5 tranches.

“As a result of considerable opposition to the announcement, the Government announced a one year pilot program called Partnership Schools Liberia (PSL) involving 8 actors operating 93 schools.

“At the time of the announcement, the Government gave a number of assurances, including that the pilot would be subject to a rigorous evaluation.

“Approximately 6 weeks ago, less than 6 months into the “trial”, the Minister announced that he was preparing to announce a scale-up of the PSL without waiting for the outcome of the evaluation.

“On 18 May, in a further disturbing move, the Minister blocked an independent research team from the University of Wisconsin from conducting qualitative research into the PSL by denying them access to schools.”

Here is the letter:

AN OPEN LETTER TO GEORGE WERNER, MINISTER OF EDUCATION, LIBERIA

We are writing to express deep concern about both your reluctance to permit independent research of the Partnership Schools for Liberia pilot programme and your rush to expand the pilot before evidence is available.

Education International, with support from ActionAid, commissioned an independent research team from the University of Wisconsin to conduct qualitative research which was designed to complement the Randomised Control Trial evaluation that is already underway in Liberia with the Center for Global Development (CGD) in partnership with Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA). We understand that, having indicated your support for this complementary research, you withdrew that support at the last moment (just as the researchers were due to fly to Liberia) and will not now permit the researchers to access the pilot schools.

The Partnership Schools for Liberia pilot has a very high profile internationally and warrants detailed study. We understand that a lot has been invested in the RCT evaluation, but no single evaluation, however well-designed, will ever provide a comprehensive picture of a pilot programme as complex as the one you have initiated. By blocking independent research you are depriving the academic and policy community important opportunities to fully understand this pilot.

It is our view that permitting and facilitating independent academic inquiry is a precondition for transparency and good governance, particularly when you are seeking to challenge established practices and norms.

You will be aware of the widespread concerns about how Bridge International Academies blocked independent research in Uganda and have failed to allow external evaluation of their schools whilst making bold claims for their success based on their own internal data. This is very poor practice and we would be very concerned if the Ministry of Education in Liberia played a role in extending such practices.

Our second major area of concern relates to your plans to scale up the initial pilot programme even before findings from the evaluation and research come through. You have previously gone on record stressing that any scaling up would be subject to the findings from the initial pilot programme (over three years) but from the latest reports it seems you are now planning a significant expansion from September 2017, without any of those findings being ready. This flies in the face of evidence-based policy making and suggests that you are only paying lip-service to the importance of research and evaluation. Such a move makes the pilot programme appear to be one driven largely by ideology. Indeed it undermines the RCT evaluation as well as the value of any complementary research.

We urge you to move away from this present damaging path, to reassert the importance of using evidence to inform your policy choices and to commit publically to supporting and facilitating independent research at the start of the new school year in September.

Yours sincerely

Categories Academic Freedom, Accountability, Corporate Reformers, International, Privatization
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