I just saw an article which purported to respond to my article in the Detroit News saying that charters were an abject failure in Detroit.
I wrote:
“The only way to improve education in Detroit and Michigan is to admit error and change course.
“Michiganders should acknowledge that competition has not produced better schools. Detroit needs a strong and unified public school system that has the support of the business and civic community. There should be a good public school in every neighborhood.
“Every school should be staffed with credentialed and well-qualified teachers. Class sizes should be no larger than 20 in elementary schools, no larger than 24 in middle and high schools. Every school should offer a full curriculum, including the arts, civics, history, and foreign languages. Every school should have a library and media center staffed by a qualified librarian. Every school should have fully equipped laboratories for science. Every school should have a nurse and a social worker. Every school should be in tip-top physical condition.
“Students should have a program that includes physical education and sports teams, dance, chorus, robotics, dramatics, videography, and other opportunities for intellectual and social development.
“That is what the best suburban communities want for their children. That’s what will work for the children of Detroit and the rest of Michigan.”
This is the response. https://www.michigancapitolconfidential.com/no-sports-at-charters-good-teams-cant-undo-a-poor-school
The writer of the response claims that I believe what public schools need is sports teams. Sports teams. What about the arts, a full curriculum, experienced teachers, small classes, a nurse and social worker, well-tended facilities, robotics, dramatics? Nope. Just “sports teams.”
What about “poor kids need what rich kids take for granted.” Nope.
He or she ignored everything I said to focus on what I mentioned in passing.
The writer is defending a failed status quo.
Time for fresh thinking, not the failed charter idea.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Capitalist Con is one of many house organs for the Mackinac Center
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Diane, I can tell you from over a decade in experience that is a typical ConnCan tactic.
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Yes. From a decade and more of experience with NCLB and each invasive testing law since, not only is the statement “He or she ignored everything I said” typical to one company’s defender, but typical to choice school proponents across the nation.
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The weirdest thing about Detroit ed reform is how ed reformers simply stop talking about one of their initiatives when it fails.
The EAA was huge. Eli Broad funded it and ran it. Arne Duncan and Michelle Rhee came out to cheerlead for it. It was to be ed reform’s greatest victory! The plan was to open charters and use a cheap garbage “blended learning” platform to get Boston-level results on the cheap- 7k a student.
http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article/20141019/NEWS/310199974/eli-broad-talks-to-crains-about-the-eaa-and-future-of-education-in
The plan wasn’t just Detroit either. Ed reformers planned on taking it state-wide. Broad specifically lobbied to take his experiment state-wide before he had a shred of evidence it would work in Detroit.
The EAA failed and ed reform pretended it had never happened. It was just never mentioned again. Absolutely amazing, how the echo chamber functions.
Cleveland has disappeared. They all promoted Cleveland as the next miracle. The Obama Administration did not give a speech without mentioning the “portfolio” district in Cleveland. Cleveland has disappeared because Cleveland’s results are unimpressive.
You know what they’re promoting now? Indianapolis. If Indianapolis scores don’t go up they’ll abandon them like they did Detroit and Cleveland and simply promote another city and another scheme. They bury failures.
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Indianapolis is undergoing a great deal of gentrification so score improvement may reflect a shift in demographics. http://kheprw.org/gentrifying-indy-a-close-look-at-the-numbers/
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UNDER THE RUG.
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At the bottom of this absurd article you will find the source.
It is The Mackinac Center for Public Policy a non-profit free market think tank headquartered in Midland, Michigan. It is the largest state-based free market think tank in the United States.The Center states that it is “dedicated to improving the quality of life for all Michigan residents by promoting sound solutions to state and local policy questions.” The quote is from Wickipedia.
The center is a well-known critic of public institutions, unions, and anything that is not clearly captured for profits. DIane’s article was clearly hitting some nerves, otherwise the misrepresentations and defense of charters would not be so calculated to ridicule what she actually wrote.
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The bloom is off the ed reform rose in the Great Lakes states. We have decades of experience with these folks now.
They know it too- that’s why they rebranded the Indianapolis and Cincinnati privatization efforts as “portfolio districts”.
They wash the big ed reform funder donations thru local orgs now, too. They have to slap a local name on the Walton money or they meet public pushback, so they run Walton donations thru hastily seated local boards.
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Genuine journalism i snot practiced these days.
Serious conversation is impossible in this day of ‘balanced’ news, where every opinion gets to be aired as if it truthful.
This is really a post-truth society, where propaganda is permitted to compete with facts inthe name of ‘free speech.’
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Since the author of this piece simply repeated that test scores show how successful the charters are, we can assume that the entire piece was not going to say anything. The really big omission was any reference to the scandals and cherry pickings which make charter scores look good.
Anyone who thinks that we came solve educational problems without causing a revolution in community life has never read any history. We have this long history of pushing against education in rural places where I live. It came from the continual moving away of anyone who got an education. Kids grew up, they received good schooling, they left to make money somewhere else. Rural communities came to depend on those who had not done so well. Antipathy arose toward the educated sons who would return from distant places in nice clothes.
But, now that children with a good education can stay here, we have a growing number of children whose parents have seen their education pay off with good local jobs. This has been the trend for 30 years, but there are still political forces based on the old antipathy towards education. No one even knows this is why. Like prejudice, hostility, and xenophobia, some attitudes continue way past the reasons for their existence.
This is why extra-curricular activities are so important to schools. They are by their nature, the intersection of the community and the school. Not to understand this is to demonstrate your failure to accept what schools are to community.
Someday, perhaps my rural south will grow away from the traditions that have always marginalized the educated. But revolutions take place gradually.
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The comments were fascinating with a few key people pointing out the absurdity of the article, accurately defying the pro charter rhetoric.
Still, people keep hearing these talking points and the idea of low scores, college readiness, and back to basics stick in their heads, in their minds justifying Charters in urban areas.
Then you have the white urban city dwellers who see charter schools with low minority populations as a “free” means of attending a “private” school. They don’t care about equity, they just want their kids away from the riff raft.
We have to keep fighting the anti public school message. It’s an uphill battle, but slowly the word is getting out. Thank you Diane for leading the charge.
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The article simply ignored what Diane wrote, that school choice has made Detroit education go from average to worst, insinuating instead that Detroit public schools have always been the worst. Okay, sports fans, let’s say the Yankees (pretty good team from NEW YORK) start experimenting with hiring untrained, inexperienced coaches and managers so they can pay less, and as a result, the team doesn’t have a winning season for a couple decades. I suppose the author of this article would claim the Yankees were always losers.
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“He or she ignored everything I said to focus on what I mentioned in passing.”
I feel your pain.
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