As a rule, if a progressive shares any part of Betsy DeVos’s agenda, chances are he or she is not a progressive. Progressives usually support public schools governed by a democratic entity; progressives believe that teachers should have the right to bargain collectively and to seek better funding and better working conditions for the students and staff; progressives think that all teachers should be well educated and certified; progressives believe that educators, students, and families should be treated with respect; progressives believe that civil rights law should be enforced; progressives work towards a society that is fair and just to all its citizens. Progressives do not defend racial segregation.
That’s my peroration.
Now comes Peter Greene’s response to Conor Williams’s loopy claim that progressives should defend charter schools even though they are segregated and non-union. Peter notes that Conor’s teaching experience was limited to a couple of years at the “no-excuses” Achievement First Charter School in Brooklyn.
He adds:
“Williams shows his bias right off the bat, saying that Hiawatha runs “some of Minnesota’s best public schools for serving such students.” The link takes you to a six-year-old article, and as usual, “best” doesn’t mean anything except “high score on the Big Standardized Test.” And Hiawatha does not operate public schools– it runs a charter school chain, and charter schools are not public schools. Calling charters “public” schools continues to be a way to obscure the problems of a privatized education system while giving charters the gloss of public school values which they do not possess. If “financed by public tax dollars” is the definition of “public,” then Erik Prince operated a public security company and most defense contractors are public corporations. Charter schools are not public schools; their leadership is not publicly elected, their finances are not publicly transparent, and they do not take every child that shows up on their doorstep (which is one way they are able to achieve outstanding test results).”
He has many other sharp observations. I urge you to read his entire post.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
A segregated, privately operated school siphoning money from public schools. Segregation. Defunding public schools. Not progress. Not progressive. Not even conservative. It’s radical, right wing libertarian. Of course DeVos loves it.
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When the progressive party becomes hell-bent on being regressive
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“During the Obama administration, tensions over charter schools among progressives were manageable.”
Obama traded on his considerable political capital and personal popularity. The first term most progressives believed that Obama would support public schools, but Obama betrayed the trust that progressives had in him. When it became clear Obama chose to only offer public schools test and punish, fewer progressives actively supported him. Some opted to not vote or voted for the Green Party.
Progressives’ objection to charters go far beyond a dislike of Trump and DeVos. We have had nine years of charter promoting policy, and the results are dismal. Charters for the most part are not better, and many are far worse than public schools. Charters are funded by dark money that buy political support from representatives, and this puts public schools at an unfair disadvantage. Charters continue to harm and undermine public education.
Charters are not worth the disruption and loss of funding they cause. We are making ninety percent of the students to get less so that a few students can have a charter that may or may not be worth anything, and charters often enhance segregation. Why would anyone want to pay to dilute our resources or waste them in pursuit of privatization. Public schools offer a better return on investment.
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If one would like to understand what a progressive is may I suggest reading Paolo Freire’s “Pedagogy of the Heart”.
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Pedadodgy of the Mart
Pedadodgy of the Mart
Trumps the -gogy of the heart
Privatizing public school
Quite Rheegre$$ive, as a rule
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“Loopy” is perhaps too polite a term for someone who seems to think segregated charter schools are fine and collective bargaining is always a no-no.
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Reblogged this on Crazy Normal – the Classroom Exposé.
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Whenever I hear of a “progressive” defending/promoting charter schools, I think either they have been duped by the years long campaign to undermine public schools or they have some financial/political power interest in mind. Leaning toward the later in most occasions.
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Jennifer Berkshire highlighted something about Williams’ op-ed that Peter missed, or of which Peter was unaware.
At the same time that the good “progressive” Williams was denouncing Devos, spurning Betsy’s words of support for the Hiawatha Charter school (which Williams celebrated in the op-ed), or for the rest of charter schools, and, in general, trying to distance Hiawatha from Devos / Trump, and the extreme right-wing, denouncing Betsy/Donald, and renouncing any association with them …
Jennifer pointed out that Devos just wrote Hiawatha a check for $1.8 million.
Jennifer even linking to a chart of Hiawatha’s donors showing exactly that.
Apparently, Williams and Hiawatha posture publicly with their rejection of Betsy’s verbal expressions of support on the one hand — I mean we’re good “progressives,” after all and we just hate right-wingers like Betsy and Trump — …
… but on the other hand …
… they privately they have no problem cashing Betsy’s checks, while hoping no one ever catches on to, or points out the latter, and highlights the inherent hypocrisy in doing so.
Unfortunately for them, Jennifer did point this out.
Here’s Jennifer’s tweet:
Here’s the link to that chart:
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I posted this at Oped News with this comment, which has many embedded links a this address. https://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/Peter-Greene-Progressives-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Agenda_Diane-Ravitch_Funding_PUBLIC-EDUCATION-NETWORK-180603-804.html
This is long, but if you read it, you will hear HOW I, Susan Lee Schwartz, talk to the general public who reads at this progressive news site.
Take a minute, or go to the link and read it with the embedded links.
For those of you who trust my voice, and know that when I speak about education, I give you the real story” the truth.
I am adding this ‘peroration’, as Diane calls her explanation. You need someone whom you can trust for the real facts about what is happening to our public schools, and what needs to be done. I trust Diane Ravitch , as you all know, and so do the finest American educators. I give to you– at OPED. the most important posts fromher site.
Why trust what I write here?
I know exactly what learning really looks like, and whatit does not resemble. I learned a great deal in public schools as I watched it as a participant, for the entire last half of the 20th century! NO charlatan can sell me magic elixirs https://www.opednews.com/articles/Magic-Elixir-No-Evidence-by-Susan-Lee-Schwartz-130312-433.html because I witnessed students learnfrom 1963 until I retired in 2000.Also, I went to public school in Brooklyn from 1946 until 1959 (when, FYI, Bernie Sanders was president of my HS graduating class. (LOL)
Then there is my own professional education over decades.
I know what learning looks like, and thus, I see what is being sold,–out there — is horse-manure.
Notice that I use the word LEARNING.
This is very, very important!
A real teacher enables and facilitates LEARNING. (I LEARNED to explain it that way, when, in 1995, I was the NYC cohort for the Real New Standards research on Harvard’s “Principles of Learning.)”
Enable & Facilitate. (Remember that!)
It is ALL about learning, my friends — which is why the fake news from DeVos or Arne is all about teaching. They do not a thing to support the teacher who endeavors to bring real learning to the kids.
Try as they may, the charlatans and liars, like Devos , that are destroying public education, cannot alter the fact that LEARNING –not ‘teaching’ –is the goal, the objective!
The end game is not passing a test, but USING a SKILL… and if any of you have ever tried to master an instrument or a golf club, then you know that it takes practice and experience and good advice.– which a good coach provides.
This is the reality–>> teachers only share what they know how to do, and they know how to use critical thinking skills.
(Trust me on this one) critical thinking is the key to learning anything. Test-prep does NOT show kids how to do anything but memorize.
Next: why the stuff Devos and friends are selling is a scam!
The ‘secret’ of getting kids to learn difficult skills, is to provide motivation. (Have you ever tried to get kids to do something thatthey do not wish to do?) Talented and experienced practitioners know how to make learning interesting… thus, they can convince children to do work, which in this case is the R&R — the repetition and review (i.e practice. ) Practicing critical analysis (comparison of what you see to prior knowledge) is what great teachers demonstrate.
And they assess and evaluate the kids all year! How else can the provide lessons so each kid in that room moves forward.
These standardized tests as assessments of the ability to do work or to use a skill, or to THINK CRITICALLY , are a great HOAX!
Of course, educated, experienced Professional teacher-practitioners are needed! They must be treated as the PROFESSIONAL PEDAGOGUE that they are, not as serfs!
The human mind in childhood, needs a dedicated, talented (with kids) teacher-practitioner — start using that term!
A trained civil servant- or an inexperienced, uncredentialized novice- or a computer with an online ‘course’- cannot provide what it takes for learning to occur in a child’s brain!. A professional is needed. All their chatter about bad teachers, led to the ‘mandated’ curriculahttps://www.opednews.com/articles/LEARN-WHAT-IS-A-CURRICULUM-by-Susan-Lee-Schwartz-Core-Curricula_FAILURE_LIES_Language-150828-728.html which only served to cause catastrophic failure because kids did not learn .!
‘They’ (the guys who run the show) https://greatschoolwars.files.wordpress.com/2015/10/eic-oct_11.pdf
evicted tens of thousands of the best educators from their professional practice.! Over 2 decades, they emptied the schools in 15,880 systems of the real professional, while the media sold fake news! Then, when the voice of the real professionals were silenced, they replaced authentic methods — that enable and promote REAL acquisition of skills– with snake-oil. DeVos is still selling this! Of course schools failed, so that they could replace the INSTITUTE of public education with their businesses…charter schools.
Bamboozle Them https://www.opednews.com/articles/BAMBOOZLE-THEM-where-tea-by-Susan-Lee-Schwartz-110524-511.html was another of my essays that bring us to this moment, when LIES have replaced truth, and no one know what to believe.
BTW:Diane Ravitch and top educators created an organization that offers you the real NEWS about education.
For the REAL News about schools–Go to theNetwork For Public Education!
And read my series here!
https://www.opednews.com/Series/15-880-Districts-in-50-Sta-by-Susan-Lee-Schwartz-140921-34.html?f=15-880-Districts-in-50-Sta-by-Susan-Lee-Schwartz-140921-34.html
All our citizens know is that the public schools are not working.The demolition of public education is CRUCIAL!
Ridding the schools of the genuine professional teacher-practitioner — WHO KNOW WHAT LEARNING LOOKS LIKE. allows the oligarchs to dumb the people down. A stressed , ignorant, population where most people need 2 jobs to put food on the table and still pay rent is what the the cabal of billionaires desire !
Utter contempt for the common good begins with the destruction of the path to income equality. Ending real education FOR EVERYONE…will “thrust our society deeper into peonage.”
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Charter supporters really shouldn’t be complaining. They have the entire federal government, 5 or 6 billionaires and some 30 state governments eagerly marketing them.
Do they really need every single person in the country to join in the constant, mindless cheerleading? They have all the powerful people.
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Wrong, Chiara, they have way more than 5 or 6 billionaires plugging charters. Supporting charters is the hobby of the plutocrats.
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Are there public schools in Minnesota worthy of support? Why don’t we see any ed reformers advocating for those schools?
You sure won’t see them featured in the NYTimes, that’s for sure. Nor will you encounter them on anything the US Department of Ed puts out, under either Obama or Trump.
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How “charter progressives” and privatizers not only take public money, but also deny evolution, teach human-dinosaur cohabitation, endorse slavery and indigenous genocide: https://boingboing.net/2018/06/02/idiocracy-prequel.html
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“human-dinosaur cohabitation”
That’s about as kinky as it gets, eh!
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At the “Creation Museum” in Kentucky. There is a plastic dinosaur with a saddle on it. Weird. see
https://creationmuseum.org/
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Ya know, it would almost be worth the cost of admission to see all of the insanities inside of that “museum”. Nah, those christianists already make too much money off of the gullible.
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