The Program on Education Policy and Governance at Harvard University has always been pro-school choice, pro-charters, pro-vouchers.
But now the PEPG–headed by the General of the School Choice Movement Paul Petersen–has outdone itself.
It is staging a two-day celebration of Betsy DeVos and the Trump agenda of public school-bashing, funded by the Koch Brothers and other rightwing foundations.
There is nary a critic of this radical rightwing agenda, not as a presenter or a panelist.
The conference is called “The Future of School Choice.”
The Charles Koch Foundation is a major funder, but after it became clear that his name was embarrassing, it was removed from the list of sponsors.
How shameful that Harvard would lend its name to a one-sided effort to cheer on the destruction of public education and would give a platform to a woman with no academic credentials.
As the writer for the New Republic, Graham Vyse, points out, the Harvard Institute of Politics invited Sean Spicer and Corey Lewandowski to accept fellowships, so the University apparently has low standards.
Apparently Jeff Sessions is about to give a speech about “free speech” in which he will decry “political correctness” on campus, meaning I assume the refusal to debate issues.
Do you think he will single out Harvard’s PEPG for refusing to hold a debate about the future of school choice and excluding those who recognize the civic importance of public education and the failure of charters and vouchers to live up to their claims?
I’m not holding my breath.
I am adding Harvard’s Program on Education Policy and Governance to this blog’s Wall of Shame for its failure to permit even the most minimal expectations of academic and scholarly fairness, and for turning itself into a propaganda mill for the privatization movement, at the behest of Big Money.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education.
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They have Schumpeter Peterson; Ladner (who writes with J P Greene at University of Walton; Martin West the famous author of the “Grit” study that David Driscoll’s board uses to justify testing our kids on “Grit”… etc.
Why did all of these get onto an agenda at the Kennedy? SCHOOL?
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Ladner and West, along with Greene, McShane, Hess, etc. . . were part of the Show Me Institute’s “Failure to Fixes” conference in May in KC, MO. Since they determined that the public schools were/are “failing” and their agenda hasn’t been properly implemented, they must come up with “fixes” (yes, like a drug pusher) now. Out of a panel of 12 or so there were a total of two who had K-12 teaching experience for a total of 7 1/2 years. The hubris and arrogance of these people is quite startling.
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It is a self-selecting process.
If you start with a group of people which includes some who consider evidence, eventually the group will naturally pare itself down to the purely deluded because the rational folks will give up and leave, figuring (rightly) that the Dunning Krugerites can’t be swayed by facts.
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In order to “shame” itself, Harvard would have to have shame in the first place. I’m not sure that’s true. Any university that can offer a fellowship to the likes of Sean Spicer is pretty shameless to begin with.
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Now, if they had called it a “shallowship”, it at least would have made sense.
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Or maybe smellofship ,(feel free to replace letters)
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Wow that is truly astonishing. And corrupt.
Sadly, even the richest universities can be corrupted because apparently money is something you can never have too much of.
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^^and deleting the Koch Brothers’ names from the funder list could not demonstrate more how corrupt this is.
Get the Washington Post’ Valerie Strauss on this! She does a great job embarrassing the people co-opted by right wing billionaire’s money. They should be outed and then they should make their claims that the Koch’s really, really care about the poorest kids’ education and that’s why they are funding this. And we are free to believe or disbelieve Harvard when they stake their word on their claim that the Koch Brothers just spending money to promote policies that help the poorest people.
I will choose to disbelieve.
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So much for scholarly disinterest at Harvard….
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Betsy and the Koch Brothers sounds like a old sixties soul group. Instead, they are a bunch of soulless dark money creatures that trade in propaganda from the billionaire bubble. Harvard’s involvement shows that celebrities are not the only ones that will “do anything for a buck.”
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Can’t be an old sixties soul group when there is no soul amongst them.
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David Koch funded Ken Burns’ Vietnam.
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“Harvard Pee-er Review”
The Harvard Pee-er Review
Is really something new
Replacing edu journal
With Harvard edu urinal
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I don’t think I’ve said this recently enough: you really are good.
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Thanks but, as I have said before, this stuff really writes itself.
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Columbia University’s setup, “Institute for Social and Research Policy,” is a conduit for several Gates and Koch funded “research” projects which support charters and vouchers. What is a university at this point?
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“Reformers” are trying to buy authenticity by associating themselves with a respected university. A lot of uninformed people will fall for this ploy.
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“The Harvard/Reformer Love fest”
When Harvard mates Reform
The progeny is bound
To emulate the form
Of fungi on the ground
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What a powerful question, Benten. One could ask this question, as well, of public radio, of public television, and, increasingly, of “public” schools. The commons is not being eroded. It is being buried in an avalanche.
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It is amusingly ironic that this “conference” occurs during an endless stream of angst from conservatives about underrepresentation in academe and political correctness on American campuses. PEPG is nothing more than a highfalutin’ propaganda organization, governed by financial titans and advised by the likes of Michelle Rhee and Chris Serf.
All of the “debate” about free speech at colleges and universities is saturated with a fundamental misunderstanding. Academic freedom obligates colleges and universities to seek and advance the truth. It does not require them to entertain the crackpot, mean-spirited blathering of every person who seeks to gain credibility and attention by commanding the podium of a college or university.
It is the granddaddy of false equivalence to fail to engage in critical analysis when considering these matters.
Harvard should be ashamed to be “played” by the moneyed interests without insisting on intellectual balance. A conference like this, absent those of us who can rebut the propaganda, is a misuse of their institutional power.
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“Played or Player?”
Played or player?
Laid or layer
Maid or mayor?
Spayed or spayer
Paid or payer?
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How shameful that Harvard would lend its name to a one-sided effort to cheer on the destruction of public education and would give a platform to a woman with no academic credentials.
Agree. Harvard has long since lost any credibility as a center for learning. It is a propaganda vendor for the wealthiest donors, including Bill Gates.
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Diane–shameful is right; who at Harvard Ed Schl is in the opposition? Would they sponsor a parallel talk by you exposing the fraud of charters and privatization? It would be spectacular if you showed up and challenged them to a debate. They’re among the many feebles running away from you–catch up to them and let them have it….ira.
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This event is at the Kennedy School not the Ed School
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True, but Harvard’s Ed School has not been on our side either.
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“Change of Menu”
The change of venue
Was overdue
The Ed school menu
Was Fryered goo
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Now I have to find “Roland The Harvard EdLab Fryer”
DAM. This is a full time job.
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I posted that Warren Zevon parody at least a couple different times.
But Google appears to have deep-sixed it.
Can’t imagine why
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Found it
It was actually titled “Roland Nobel-less EdLab Fryer”
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The Harvard School of Education should be renamed The B. F. Skinner Center for Prole Control.
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Harvard is private, but what about the US Department of Education?
They’re a public entity. Shouldn’t they give equal time to public school supporters?
It’s one thing if a private school wants to exclude public schools- it’s another when a federally-funded public entity does.
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Harvard is private but they get about $600 million a year from the Federal government for research.
So much of what goes on in the Ed department and Kennedy School is funded at least partly by the American public.
They have no right to exclude us, not unless they want to forgo the Federal funds.
Which is it going to be?
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Panel IV. How Technology Can Create More Choice
Chair: Paul E. Peterson, Harvard University
Presenter:
Michael Horn, Christensen Institute
Discussants:
Diane Tavenner, Summit Public Schools
Steven Klinsky, Modern States Education Alliance
Susan Patrick, iNACOL
11:45 AM: Lunch
12:00 PM: Choice and Progress: The Newark Story
Keynote Address: Superintendent Chris Cerf, New Jersey Dept. of Education
You know, public schools can use the fact that they’re the major buyers of edtech.
Stop buying the products until they allow public school representatives at conferences.
It’s pretty silly that public schools are the largest buyers of ed tech and ed reform excludes them from discussions.
Stop buying product. Ed tech will collapse without public schools. You’re 90% of the market. Tell Google and Apple and all the rest that you’re not buying their products if you don’t get a seat at the table.
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I agree that schools should boycott tech companies.
You are right that the public schools have a great deal of power that they have not used, for whatever reason.
They could have these tech companies fighting over who is going to DONATE software and hardware.
Instead, they are paying shysters through the nose for outmoded software and hardware, as happened in LA with Apple ipads.
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Yes indeed, Poet.
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Sorry. Yes indeed, Chiara.
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Why can’t public schools band together and create their own tech? I’m sure the resources are all there.
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90% of US kids attend public schools and Harvard holds an education conference where public schools are deliberately excluded.
Ridiculous. They’re completely irrelevant to 90% of the people in the country.
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Exclusion it what Harvard does best.
It’s what the University has always been about.
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Harvard won’t even let the public use their library, not even for visitation or tours.
How’s that for exclusion?
Two can play that game.
If Harvard wants to exclude the public, then we the public
Should exclude them from ALL Federal funding.
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By the way, Harvard currently gets about $600 million A YEAR from the Federal government for research.
So, maybe they should open their library to me and other members of the public, eh.?
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MIT also won’t let the public use their libraries. And they also get hundreds of millions in research funding each year from the Federal government.
When I lived in the Boston area, I used the Tufts library whenever I had to research something because they let the public in, though I could not check out books. So not all private universities are exclusionary like Harvard and MIT.
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Incidentally, for a few years, i had a state university library card that i purchased for a small fee that allowed me to check books out of the library as well as make use of all their other services.
That’s what public is all about. Openness and inclusion.
Private is all about exclusion and is going to be the death of our country.
What gets me is the entitlement attitude of some of the private institutions like Harvard which have one hand out for public money and the other hand on our wrist, holding us back and preventing us from benefitting from any of what was funded with OUR money
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The newest fad in ed reform is to claim they want to “collaborate” with public schools.
I can tell they’re sincere- they “collaborate” by excluding public schools completely.
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Collaborate is Reformerspeak for co-opt, like Success Academy collaborates with public schools for space.
Someone needs to write a Dictionary of Reform
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Time to start looking beyond the Ivy League for national leadership – the Ivies are enthralled by the plutocrats. Those Ivy-league minted graduates are busy taking American down the path to third-world status.
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They are not only taking us down that path (and have been for a long time) but they are doing it on our dime.
With all the excellent state schools in the country, there is no reason the Federal government should be funding private schools with multi billion dollar endowments to the tune of hundreds of millions per year.
As I noted above, Harvard currently gets $600 million a year in federal research grants.
And to add insult to injury, they turn around and patent devices and processes that are a direct result of that publicly funded research and then proceed to gouge the public for drugs, devices etc that we the public paid for.
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Here is the link to enter the lottery for tickets: http://iop.harvard.edu/lottery/conversation-empowering-parents-secretary-betsy-devos Stack the audience??
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Should we be surprised? Harvard is part of what we once calledl The System. Our colleges and universities may teach about great ideas, ethics, exceptional, compassionate, important human beings. Too often both academic administrators and professors leave the high-minded lecture notes behind once they exit the classroom and enter the world of campus politics.
Doug Giebel, Big Sandy, Montana
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Adding Harvard to the Wall of Shame was just. That university of hot air has been publishing papers encouraging edupreneurship for decades. Decades. I would put Harvard right up there with Walmart and Pearson.
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Two Harvard researchers (Chetty and Friedman) were also largely responsible for the VAM debacle that swept the country.
Friedman said ” the message [of his and Chetty’s work] is to fire people sooner rather than later”
Both of them testified in the Vergara case, whose original verdict was later overturned.
Obama was wowed by their work which is undoubtedly why he pursued his misguided VAM policy.
But Chetty and Friedman’s work was seriously flawed, based on cherry picking, as pointed out by Moshe Adler.
Chetty was in the Harvard economics department at the time, which is also home to two other people (Reinhart and Rogoff) whose flawed work was used to justify misguided policy.
The Harvard econ department is also home to George W. Bush’s chief economist (Mankiew)
It’s an ongoing train wreck.
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“Obama was wowed by their work which is undoubtedly why he pursued his misguided VAM policy.”
Could it be that Harvard indoctrinated Obama to be wowed by the works of Chetty and Friedman?
“Friedman said ‘the message [of his and Chetty’s work] is to fire people sooner rather than later’.”
As offered early…
http://nepc.colorado.edu/blog/vergara-v-california-concerns
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…earlier…
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I think you are right Ed.
Harvard types often stick together.
And, by the way.
I was wrong about Friedman testifying in Vergara. Though Chetty did testify and cite his work with Friedman, Friedman did not testify.
I confused Friedman with another VAMbot: Thomas Kane, subject of “The Night They Drove Statricksy Down”.
In my defense, these people are easily confused — by me and reality.
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A little over one hundred years ago, Harvard disgraced itself by encouraging its students to work as strike-breakers and armed militia members during the great Lawrence/”Bread and Roses” textile strike. It was common for college students, especially at elite schools, to engage in strike-breaking and literal class warfare at the time.
Now, Harvard and other schools are still engaging in class warfare, this time under the guise of “education reform.”
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School Deform = Math/science/English/history class warfare
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Here’s a blog post I wrote a number of years ago on this topic:
nyceducator.com/010/09/ivy-league-union-busters-then-and-now.html
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thanks for posting ; the address I gave was wrong and I am glad you put the original here. In Lawrence we celebrate this every year at Labor Day …
There is a man at the Museum who gives a wonderful talk about the women who worked in those mills. And, of course the families that participated in the strike.
posting again hopefully this one will work…. http://nyceducator.com/2010/09/ivy-league-union-busters-then-and-now.html
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Michael shared this with us a couple of years back and I saved it… Thanks again Michael… I just love this and what you pointed out … file:///Users/jeansanders/Desktop/FSU/my%20favorite%20studies%20and%20reports/Bread%20and%20Roses.html
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Elites consolidating power in the hands of a few. No new tales to tell.
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Thank you, Jean.
I noticed the detail in Ralph Fasanella’s wonderful painting of the strike when visiting the textile Museum in Lawrence, Mass.
I already knew about college students being used as strikebreakers in that era, but the painting really brought it home, and made me want to point out the connection between what the Harvards of the world did back then, and what they’re doing today to scapegoat teachers and public schools
It’s been said that Harvard and Yale (another elite school with a disgraceful labor record) are in reality hedge funds with higher education subsidiaries (just as NYU, where I received my teaching license, is a real estate development company with a university subsidiary). If so, then it appears that they are looking to add the hostile takeover and privatization of the schools to their investment portfolio.
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Michael
Harvard is also into “investing” in (some say “grabbing”) land in developing countries ( in Africa, for example) which in many cases amounts to acquiring very valuable farm land
from destitute farmers and others at bargain basement prices.
The money is transacted (laundered?) through hedge funds to keep the University at arm’s length when it comes to responsibility, but it is really a distinction with no meaning in many cases.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jun/08/us-universities-africa-land-grab
And, of course, because Harvard is a non-profit, the money they make off such investments is a federal income tax-free addition to their already 37 billion dollar endowment.
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Yes, and because they are a “non-profit,” we the taxpayers get to subsidize their avarice and rapacity.
It’s a pretty neat racket these characters have going for themselves, and to make it worse, we have to endure their insufferable arrogance, as well.
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