William Lager, the entrepreneur who invented The Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow, had a brilliant political strategy. He has collected nearly $2 billion since the school opened in 2000, and he gave a few million each year in campaign contributions to politicians. No public school could do that. Top state officials spoke at ECOT’s graduation ceremonies, as did Jeb Bush, who is fanatically devoted to digital learning. ECOT was lucrative but had the highest dropout rate of any high school in the nation.
When the State auditor Dave Yost (a recipient of Lager funding) audited ECOT, he discovered that enrollment was inflated and reached a settlement for the mega-school to repay the state on a monthly basis. Rather than give up money to which it was not entitled, the school closed.
One of the most persistent and well-informed critics of ECOT is Bill Phillis, former Deputy Superintendent of Education for Ohio, now retired.
He asks a question: why not hold Lager personally responsible for the hundreds of millions diverted from real public schools?
He writes:
“State probably won’t be able to recover all of the over-payments to ECOT in face of its closure: but continuation of payments is not the solution
“The chairman of the House Education and Career Readiness Committee is in a tizzy because the ECOT closure stops the clawback of $4 million per month. (The chairman, a leading benefactor of ECOT campaign donations, is a consummate defender.)
“ECOT’s average monthly payment for the students “enrolled” thus far this school year is $7.7 million. $4 million per month is being held back to repay the previous fraudulent claims. Therefore the state is spending $7.7 million to get $4 million back. The $7.7 million monthly payment will stop because ECOT, at least temporarily, is out of business; hence, ECOT allegedly will no money to pay back the ill-gained money. But ECOT and the ECOT Man have assets that should be tapped.
“The two ECOT for-profit companies, the real estate and facilities and the personal real estate holdings and other assets might accrue to the amount ECOT owes. The ECOT Man has accumulated vast holdings with money that should have been spent on educating children.
“All the powers of the state should be unleashed to recover the money ECOT owes. School districts have lost hundreds of millions from ECOT’s claims for students not served. The Governor, Attorney General, Auditor, State Superintendent, State Board of Education and the sponsor should join efforts to develop a strategy for recovering every dime possible.
“The chairman and his legislative colleagues should learn from the ECOT fiasco and either eliminate charters or put the entire charter industry under the sponsorship of elected school district boards of education. The for-profit concept must be eliminated.”
William L. Phillis | Ohio Coalition for Equity & Adequacy of School Funding | 614.228.6540 | ohioeanda@sbcglobal.net| http://www.ohiocoalition.org
PS: When I looked up ECOT in Wikipedia to check the founding date, I note that the only critic quoted works for the pro-choice Thomas B. Fordham Institute, not the knowledgeable Bill Phillis, who has tracked Lager’s misdeeds for years.
“Brilliant Political Strategy” = Bribery
Recoup the money, and then put this parasite’s head on a stick (metaphorically speaking) as an object lesson for other so-called reformer crooks…
Here is ECOT writ large in Britain in the form of “outsourcing,” another form of privatizing public resources for the profit of the few.
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2018/02/crash-outsourcing-giant-capita-70000-employees-globally-sparks-new-panic.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+NakedCapitalism+%28naked+capitalism%29
Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow,
….and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps [like Lager] in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a [Deformers] tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing. — Macbeth
Ed reformers are still relentlessly cheerleading online ed, and jamming it into public schools:
“1. Expand access to more choice and charters. Whether through greater access to online course content, creating new schools or simply giving existing school leaders greater autonomy and freedom in exchange for outcomes, families in rural America need access to better schools and high-quality content. Economic competition requires this more than ever before. While talk of closing borders and building walls may sound appealing when economic prospects are dim, rural families most want to know that their children will have a chance in the modern economy.”
Please don’t fall for this, public schools. These exact same people endorsed and promoted ECOT.
If Betsy DeVos and the charter cheerleading team are pushing online ed into public schools that ALONE is a reason to be skeptical.
Do not buy what they’re selling. Don’t make the mistake Ohio made. They are selling public schools cheap, garbage ed tech simply because public schools are a huge market. They don’t value your students or your schools- in fact, they all lobby AGAINST public schools.
Don’t buy.
https://www.usnews.com/opinion/knowledge-bank/articles/2018-01-26/rural-students-deserve-education-reform-and-school-choice-too
If William Lager wants to avoid paying any of that money back, all he has to do is borrow a page from Trump’s business playbook and file bankruptcy.
Trump Taj Mahal – the casino was in debt to the tune of $3 billion
Trump’s Castle and Trump Plaza Casinos – almost $900 million in debt
Trump’s Plaza Hotel – more than $550 in debt
Trump’s Hotels and Casinos Resorts – about $1.8 billion in debt
Trump’s Entertainmnet Resorts – $1.2 billion in debt
Those were not Trump’s only failures.
Other Trump Business Failures
As well, Donald Trump has undertaken a number of business projects that ultimately failed (or failed to live up to his lofty projections) without resulting in bankrupcties, including:
Trump Steaks
GoTrump (online travel site)
Trump Airlines
Trump Vodka
Trump Mortgage
Trump: The Game
Trump Magazine
Trump University
Trump Ice (bottled water)
The New Jersey Generals (pro football team)
Tour de Trump (bicycle race)
Trump Network (nutritional supplements)
Trumped! (syndicated radio spot)
And yet, each time Trump walked away from those failures and/or bankruptcies, he had increased his personal wealth through his CEO pay. Even in failure and bankruptcy, Trump types win.
https://www.snopes.com/2016/08/01/donald-trumps-bankruptcies/
From Mother Jones, March-April 2018, ‘Least Likely to Succeed‘ by James Pogue on ECOT in Ohio