This article includes the tweets of many elected officials of both parties.
Worth perusing.
Archives for the month of: August, 2017
On Saturday, Trump said that the violence in Charlottesville was caused by “many sides.”
On Monday, in response to outrage from members of his own party, he finally spoke out against new-Nazis, white suptremacists, and the KKK.
However, today he forget what he said yesterday.
At a news conference, he went back to blaming “both sides.”
Trump doubles down on initial Charlottesville response, saying ‘there is blame on both sides’ for violence – The Washington Post
https://apple.news/A_4V3DRP1R566CzuVhzXdPA
Blame it on the Trump Effect.
Shavar Jeffries, executive director of the hedge fund managers’ Democrats for Education Reform, resigned from the board of Eva Moskowitz’s Success Academy charters.
Eva has been an outspoken supporter of Trump, DeVos and their pro-charter, pro-voucher agenda.
Jeffries quit.
He has not resigned, however, from DFER, which supports the charter part of he Trump agenda.
“Moskowitz, who has reprimanded reporters for what she called “a kind of rooting against” Trump, is on the other side of the spectrum.
“She has publicly welcomed Ivanka Trump and House Majority Leader Paul Ryan into her schools, and taken heat from her own staff for her slow response to a call to protect undocumented and transgender students in her schools. She has defended her ties to the White House and Republican leaders as an attempt to reach bipartisan consensus on education reform.
“Moskowitz’s praise for DeVos has been echoed by the leaders of the Center for Education Reform and National Alliance for Public Charter Schools.”
Th Center for Education Reform is led by Jeanne Allen, formerly of the far-right Heritage Foundation. The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools is led by Nina Rees, formerly chief education advisor to Vice President Dick Cheney. Why would anyone be surprised that these Republican-led, pro-privatization organizations support Trump?
I posted the Central findings of the EdNext survey this morning. I did not have a link. Here is an article that examines the poll numbers and includes a link to the survey.
Bottom line: the public is souring on charter schools as it learns more about them. The fact that Trump is a big fan of charters stripped away the claim that charters are “progressive.” They are a form of privatization.
Please join me at the Annual Conference of the Network for Public Education in Oakland, California, from October 13-15.
It is a chance to meet some of your favorite education warriors.
Make friends, make common cause.
Join us!
This is a visual treat that will help you coool off.
Enjoy!
A group of charter schools in New York State applied to the SUNY board for early renewal, but the New York Board of Regents slowed down the process, reports Lisa Egbert Litvin. They were right, she says, to insist on a careful review, not a rush to judgment.
Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post jeered at the Regents for insisting on due diligence, but what’s the rush?
Litvin writes:
“In a pointed response to NY’s Board of Regents, the NY Post recently wrote that “you’d have to be nuts” not to fast-track renewals of a number of charter schools. Actually, the opposite is true.
“As background, NY’s byzantine charter school rules authorize the SUNY Charter Schools Committee, a group of four men (3 lawyers and a businessman), to decide whether to renew many of NY’s charter schools. NY’s highest education body, the Board of Regents (a 17-member diverse group, including many life-long educators), is relegated to merely reviewing the SUNY Committee’s recommendations and giving feedback. Ultimately the SUNY Committee has final say.
“Over the past months, the SUNY Committee recommended that a total of 19 schools be pushed ahead for early renewal. The Board of Regents responded that these requests were premature, and that to ensure full accountability, a school’s renewal should be assessed in the year when its current term would expire, so that the most up-to-date data can be used.
“The Board of Regents was right to advise against the rush. In fact, the data submitted by the SUNY Committee shows problems so deep running through these schools that the discussion should turn to whether the model used by these charter networks is even sustainable.
“While the 19 schools are attaining high scores on the state’s standardized English and math tests, far too many of these schools are experiencing financial losses, negative assets, high suspension rates, and under enrollment.
“Specifically, over 40% of the fast-tracked schools are unable to cover their expenses, and are operating at a loss. In addition, over a quarter of the schools have been managed in a such a way that they report having negative net assets. Rather than pushing fast-track renewals of these financially stumbling schools, the SUNY Committee should be assessing whether these schools are financially viable and are worthy of taxpayer funding.
“Further, despite the claim of extensive wait lists, every one of the 19 recommended schools has failed to meet its target enrollments for struggling children, i.e. children with disabilities, English Language Learners, and economically disadvantaged children. This dereliction should be challenged, not rewarded with early renewal.
“Making matters even more profound, the suspension numbers are strikingly high, and against the trend in education to reduce suspensions and end the “suspension-to-prison” pipeline. The average suspension rate of these schools — none of which includes high school students — is a stunning 10%, with some schools as high as 20%, and even k-3 schools with rates of 12% and 14%….”
Almost all of the charters are Success Academy.
Emily Talmage writes here about the introduction of “social impact bonds,” an ingenious way devised by Wall Street to make money on kids.
In 2006, in a presentation to ReadyNation marked “Strictly Private and Confidential,” Paul Sheldon of Citigroup proposed a new way to finance preschool: early childhood student loans.
Non-profit organizations could borrow from banks or student loan companies, said Sheldon, and then offer loans to government organizations or individuals. Then, the loans could be pooled and turned into asset-backed securities, and – voila! – an early childhood education market would be created, worth as much as 10 billion dollars.
The idea of preschoolers saddled with debt, however, was clearly going to be too controversial.
Over time, Citigroup’s model was reworked into the more palatable “social impact bond,” which are now proliferating across the country.
These bonds, which are really private loans made to government or non-profit agencies with repayment contingent upon pre-determined “outcomes,” are sold under the premise that they can help tax-payers save money in the long-run by preventing the need for remedial services.
A clever and rather unscrupulous way to monetize early childhood education without providing any services.
Andre Perry wrote in The Hechinger Report about Betsy DeVos’s refusal to name the perpetrators of the evil in Charlottesville. She tweeted twice to express her disapproval of what happened but tiptoed around the central and alarming fact that the city was invaded by a gang of neo-Nazis, KKK, and white supremacists, prepared to fight.
“DeVos wrote a two-tweet response to the violence that read, “I’m disgusted by the behavior and hate-filled rhetoric displayed near the University of Virginia in #Charlottesville (1/2). It is every American’s right to speak their mind, but there is no room for violence or hatred. (2/2).” Her generic and woefully insufficient statement effectively sanitized the hate that Nazis, Klan members and so called “alt-right” demonstrators put on full display as they shouted Nazi slogans such as “Sieg Heil” and waved Confederate flags, while carrying military gear. DeVos, the nation’s top teacher (clearly symbolic), failed the basic test of providing leadership to teachers, education officials, as well as counselors on how educate students out of bigotry, white supremacy and violence.”
Sad. Weak. Vacuous. Empty. Dispassionate. Disengaged.
Education Next is a publication funded by conservative foundations and staffed by conservative editors and writers. It supports charters, vouchers, school choice, high-stakes testing, the commodification of education, and the education industry.
Here are the results of its latest poll:
“The 2017 Education Next annual survey of American public opinion on education shows public support for charter schools has dropped, even as opposition to school vouchers and tax credits for private-school scholarships has declined. Opposition to the Common Core State Standards seems to have finally leveled off. When the “Common Core” name is not mentioned, support for the same standards across states rises among both Democrats and Republicans. Meanwhile, support for the federal role in education policy has waned. This year’s poll also finds that President Trump’s policy preferences widen the partisan divide on issues such as charter schools, Common Core, tax credits, and merit pay for teachers.
“Among the key findings:
“Charter school support drops. In a dramatic change of opinion over the past year, support for charter schools has declined by 12 percentage points, from 51% last year to only 39% this year (36% opposed). Support has fallen by 13 percentage points among Republicans and by 11 percentage points among Democrats, to 47% and 34% support respectively, leaving the partisan gap on the issue largely unchanged. Support for charters among blacks has dropped from 46% to 37% and among Hispanics from 44% to 39%.
“Opposition to private school choice declines despite partisan differences. Opposition to universal vouchers, which give all families a wider choice, has declined from 44% to 37%, while support for vouchers targeted to low-income parents has increased by six percentage points (43% in 2017 up from 37% in 2016). However, an analysis of individuals by political party reveals that support for universal vouchers has increased by 13 percentage points among Republicans (to 54%) but fallen by 9 percentage points (to 40%) among Democrats, whereas in 2016, Democrats were more supportive than Republicans of universal vouchers by an 8-percentage point margin. Opposition to tax-credit funded scholarships has declined from 29% to 24%.
“Support for national standards rises while opposition to Common Core levels off. Though support for Common Core plummeted between 2013 and 2016, the downward trend has leveled off, with support standing at 41% (38% opposed) in 2017, virtually the same as in 2016. Support for standards that are the same in all states is, at 61%, 20 percentage points higher when the name is not mentioned (6 percentage points higher than in 2016). While there remains a partisan divide in support for Common Core (32% in favor among Republicans and 49% among Democrats), support rises to 64% and 61%, respectively, when the name is not mentioned, eliminating the partisan gap.
“Support for local control of schools is on the rise. Although a plurality of the public continues to think accountability policy should mostly be a state responsibility, the latest poll numbers show that the public has shifted away from federal towards local control of schools. Only 36% of the public think the federal government should play the largest role in setting standards, down 5 percentage points from 2015; only 13% think it should identify failing schools, also down 5 percentage points; and only 16% think the federal government should be responsible for fixing schools, down 4 percentage points. Democratic support for federal decision-making has dropped by 8, 6, and 7 percentage points, respectively. The share of the public thinking these policies should be a local responsibility has risen by 4, 6, and 7 percentage points, respectively, for the three areas.
“Information about cost and earnings has little impact on college-going preferences–except among Hispanics. The latest poll shows that two-thirds of the public want their child to pursue a 4-year degree, while only 22% prefer a 2-year degree. Among white respondents with a 4-year college degree, 88% want their child to pursue a 4-year degree, compared to 57% of white respondents without a 4-year college degree. Most respondents, when they are informed as to the average costs and earnings associated with 2-year versus 4-year degrees, do not change their preferences. For Hispanics, however, providing both types of information shifts their preference for a 4-year degree to 72%, from 61% when no information is provided. This shift reverses the white-Hispanic gap in preferences for a 4-year degree. These findings emerge from an experiment where a randomly chosen group within the sample receives financial information while another group does not.
“The Trump Effect. On four issues—Common Core, charter schools, tax credits, and merit pay for teachers—the poll examines whether President Trump’s endorsement of a policy has a polarizing effect on public opinion by telling half of the sample the president’s position while not supplying this information to the other. EdNext conducted similar experiments in 2009 and 2010 during President Obama’s first two years in office. In 2009, Obama enjoyed a period of bipartisan support during which he moved public opinion toward his position, though the effect waned in 2010. Trump has not enjoyed such a “honeymoon” period (see figure). When informed of Trump’s position, Republicans move toward it on three of the four issues, including a 15 percentage-point increase in support for charter schools. However, Trump fails to persuade Democrats, who move away from the president’s position on two of the four issues, including a 14 percentage-point decrease in support for merit pay. These offsetting effects leave overall public opinion on these issues largely unchanged.”
One can draw different conclusions from this poll, but I am impressed by the stunning drop in public support for privately managed charter schools. As the public learns more about them, it likes them less. The steady drumbeat of charter scandals is getting through to the public. The scandals in Ohio, Michigan, Florida, Arizona, California, and elsewhere may be taking a toll on public estimation of charters. There is a glimmering of understanding that charters are unaccountable and that every dollar for a charter is taken away from public schools. The public is beginning to wonder about the value of funding two systems, one selective, the other open to all. One subject to democratic governance, the other controlled by private, self-selected boards.
Diane Ravitch's blog 