Missouri legislators are gearing up for a renewed battle to expand charters, despite a lackluster record of existing charters.
When there was a Democratic governor, charter expansion went nowhere.
Now with a Republican governor, the pro-charter forces are ready to push for more.
One of the major out-of-state lobbying groups is Betsy DeVos’s American Federatiob for Children, which has hired a herd of lobbyists to replace public schools with charters and tax credits for vouchers.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
So another legislative session where public school families will be ignored?
Why does ed reform take public school families for granted? Why are 90% of families consistently ignored and excluded from consideration or work effort by these public employees?
I get that they’re opposed to our schools but that doesn’t excuse them from doing any work on behalf of the 90% of families in the unfashionable public schools.
They should do their whole job instead of 10% of it.
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If ed reformers are serving only charter and private school families (and they are) when 90% of families are in public schools, that’s the textbook definition of capture by a “special interest”.
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GOOD GRIEF. USING our young again and again for PROFITS.
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Did you read today’s Wall Street Journal. Lost of miss info on “Charter Success”
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These charter/voucher supporters are worse than a Hydra.
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Thomas Jefferson knew what we have to do to end this.
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There seemed to be less attention paid to Jeff Bryant’s masterpiece about the Sad Story of St. Louis education in Missouri than in any other state. The Post Dispatch does sort of an impression of Sanders Huckabee covering for Trump when the subject of chartet schools comes up. They have simply barred me from making comments except their all purpose current affairs forum….so I managed to get some discussion of the piece from the Washington post….and he had a link to his charter school black box article…I posted it and suggested the Post DIspatch add it to their giant parents guide to education….where they feature the salary of every teacher in Missouri…..The Post Dispatch is covered by freedom of the press….which is a good thing..they have become a disgrace.
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Reformers’ “success” is measured in dollars taken from the middle class, in the destruction of democracy and common goods, and in elimination of dignity for workers, kids of the 99%, and the communities in which they live.
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Since when does a government program need to be successful, to obtain more money. Example: AMTRAK
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Charles,
Profit isn’t everything. Some public services are public because there are people that use them – for instance, metro buses run by cities. If for-profit companies ran them, they would cost too much for most of the working class to use.
Back in the early 20th century, Southern California had a public transportation rail service that ran from Palm Springs to Los Angeles from the mountains to the beaches. It cost maybe a quarter to ride it to wherever you wanted to go. People used it.
California’s Little Red Car public rail transit system never operated in the red. People used it. And then Standard Oil and America’s auto manufacturers did what the corporations are doing to the public schools to get rid of this public transit system so people would be FORCED to buy cars and burn gasoline or diesel to get around.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy
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