This article by Tom Ultican tells the sordid story of rich elites who have cynically decided to destroy public education in San Antonio.
They have cumulatively raised at least $200 million to attract charter operators to San Antonio, a figure which includes funding by the U.S. Department of Education and local plutocrats. The lead figure is a very wealthy woman named Victoria Rico, who sits on the boards of multiple charter chains. Rico and her friends have decided to re-engineer and privatize public education in San Antonio. Rico is working closely with Dan Patrick, the State’s lieutenant governor, who loves vouchers, hates public schools, and was the Rush Limbaugh of Texas before winning election to the State Senate.
Was there a vote taken in San Antonio? No. Was the public asked whether they wanted to abandon public education? Of course not. The titans don’t believe in democracy. They know what’s best for other people’s children.
They have hired a superintendent, Pedro Martinez, who was “trained” by the unaccredited Broad Superintendents Academy, which encourages school closures, privatization, and top-down management. Martinez has worked in school districts but was never a teacher or a principal and apparently knows nothing about pedagogy. Martinez is a member of Jeb Bush’s Chiefs for Change, which promotes privatization and technology in the classroom. He is also a big fan of the faux Relay “Graduate School of Education,” which specializes in charter teachers training new teachers for charter schools and has no professors or research programs.
As a native Texan, this whole deal made me physically ill. It stinks to high heaven. Everyone facilitating this private takeover of public schools should be ashamed of themselves.
They are not “doing it for the children.” They are doing it for their own egos. There are more failing charter schools than failing public schools. What right do they have to destroy the public schools of San Antonio? Who elected them? They have won plaudits from Betsy DeVos, the Koch brothers, and ALEC. They should be held accountable for their assault on democracy. I noticed that the Texas philanthropist Charles Butt refused to participate in this unholy cabal; he prefers to invest his fortune in supporting public schools.
I take this opportunity to name Victoria Rico, Pedro Martinez, and all their rightwing enablers to the Wall of Shame.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Tom Ultican’s post is a wonderful disclosure of the lies perpetuated by the 74million website, a propoganda organ for the charter industry touting the wonders of San Antonio ” reforms” — a takover of the schools by private interests–with the implication that some miracle is happening.
scariest part: year upon year upon year of the public being gullibly deceived that wherever school reform is implemented, “some miracle is happening…”
The “reforms” of the San Antonio Independent School District are not intended to benefit the majority of students in SAISD but to attract a wealthier families from neighboring districts and to boost the superintendent’s credentials among corporate privatizers. We are losing control of our democratic school system and there is no benefit for the majority of our students.
I hope the residents of San Antonio unite and resist the hostile takeover, and please urge others to vote for Beto. He is the best hope for the future of Texas.
Lots of cities are using charter expansion to gentrify neighborhoods. The politicians and developers often collude to use privatization as a means of creating schools with enhanced segregation to attract white families with money to certain areas.
I voted for Beto but please don’t put your hopes on him. Beto is very much in favor of charter schools. He has told me so to my face at an education townhall when I challenged his support of charters. If you go back and listen he says he fights for public ed and against vouchers- NEVER does he denounce or will denounce charter schools. His wife opened and ran one in El Paso and both he and his wife worked to bring the IDEA charter schools to El Paso.
I am aware that Beto’s wife was involved in a charter school.
I support him despite that because he is a million times better than Cruz on every other issue.
Cruz supports vouchers and charters.
“In other words, this article was a paid advertisement selling the privatization agenda. The George W. Brackenridge Foundation from San Antonio made a first time “contribution” to The 74 for this article to be published. An example of the author, Beth Hawkins, shading the facts reads”
The 74 is an ed reform industry mouthpiece. You won’t find anything negative about any ed reform privatization plan on that site, ever. If they printed one the billionaires would pull the funding.
I read it just to see what political narrative they’re pushing that week because whatever it is it will show up in your local public school system and be treated as “fact”.
As privatization gets bigger and bigger and more and more public funding is directed towards private companies you’ll see more and more industry publications and lobbyists, as more and more people are employed in the industry. It’s not just the charters, either. They all contract with private companies for school services- there are layers of contracts in Ohio, whole satellite industries.
For whatever reason, and their are some, charter schools are popping up in every corner of America. I am tired or reading this crap. The push is everywhere though. How is it that in just about every corner of America, whether its NYC or some hoop town in Texas, charter schools are becoming the school of choice.
Now, the critics myself included know the real story but it seems as though most Americans are not buying the idea that our public schools are the back bone of this country and the best education for our children.
The stories from NYC to Texas, from Oklahoma to California, human beings whether they are rich or not, seem to want to run with charter schools. The notion that the unions control public schools seems to stick to the people who are poor. The notion that billions can be made seems to be sticking with the rich. So, what you have here are lots of people trashing our public schools daily and stories such as this one surface every day.
What to do, what to say. Yes we fight and fight but which way will the wind blow with this? I mean how much longer can the question mark of public school survive our time? The relentless torment of trashing public schools is sickening but does not seem to end and yet quite possible is gaining momentum even though many negative stories surface every day such as corrupt charter school people stealing money, etc.
The charter schools of Michigan are the worst schools in the country yet Betsy Devos keeps pushing the charters down our throats and is sending federal monies everywhere around the country regardless of anyone says. The madness is deafening. The saga continues. Diane Ravitch is working hard to save our public schools and there are many like her out there but the ignorance of the American people and the unbelievable amounts of money some people have accumulated are forcing us all to listen to the crap coming out of DC regarding education. Who could have ever predicted that this wave of crap from charters to vouchers would be alive and well threatening our public schools and the stabilization of our communities. Where did it start? How did it start?
Many people blame the recession of 2008 when many people were laid off from their jobs and started to look at education as an alternative to their careers. Now today we have a crap load of neophytes in education and everyone seems to know how to educate our kids except for the educators with masters in education. No, those people do not know anything about education according to the “refomers”. The billionaires know whats good for our kids. This is the current state of education in the US and its quite sad.
Charter schools are very far from taking over. 85-90% of US students choose public schools.
Yeah but Diane, what will the percentage be 10 years from now?
85-90%.
This is the figure even in states where there are many charters and vouchers.
As parents begin to understand the sham and the scam behind choice, their numbers will stagnate, perhaps decline.
Do you want your child taught by an uncertified teacher? Would you send your child to a school that treats its students like prisoners? Would you send your child to a school that used the Old Testament as a science book?
All they did was rebrand privatization as “portfolio districts”. Instead of closing all the public schools and re-opening them as charters, they simply have charter companies take over every public school.
There won’t be a public school left in these cities in a decade.
They all say they want New Orleans all over the country. They’ve never hidden that the goal is 100% privatization.
It’s a really radical experiment, and we won’t be able to undo it once it’s done. Not that they care- none of them attended public schools and their kids and grandkids don’t either- it’s a “movement” run by private school graduates.
Charters are the Teapot Dome of our era.
All scams eventually are exposed.
I won’t blame the parents for all switching to charters. Ed reformer are deliberately disinvesting in public schools. You’d be crazy to stay in a public school. They political leaders have all but announced your school is being abandoned.
You feel bad for the kids who have the misfortune to attend one of the unfashionable public schools while they transition to a privatized system. The herd will be all be stampeding towards all that billionaire money, and it ain’t going to any public school, ever.
Charters open and close like day lilies.
Hi Chiara:
I appreciate your mocking writing style. However, to the population like parents and young students, your words will become confused and probably become misunderstood due to no free time to digest by read quickly from them.
I would suggest you that please try to repeat after Dr. Ravitch’s words as often and loudly clear as possible, as follows:
“As parents begin to understand the sham and the scam behind choice, their numbers will stagnate, perhaps decline.
Do you want your child taught by an uncertified teacher? Would you send your child to a school that treats its students like prisoners? Would you send your child to a school that used the Old Testament as a science book?”
Hopefully, new and young parents will absorb and understand the robbery from corrupted leaders and authorities in their own community and national-wide. Back2basic
A real reason for the anti public school in many places is not so much that the public schools have inferior systems or teachers, no that is not what bothers parents so much. It seems as though many parents are concerned with the other kids in the public schools “infecting” their kids.
Wait a minute, I can related to that. So, i do not want to send my kid to a public school not because of the school itself but rather the other kids that attend the school. Public schools take in everyone. Charter schools take in select few.
Here is the catch though. If and when most charters and vouchers begin to pick up steam leaving behind our public schools, now you will have all the students now sitting in all these charter schools and private voucher schools. That is the equation. The answer is that the new system will ultimately become our public school system again as many of these new charter schools will be housing ALL the students now. Get it people. There really is no solution but wait….poverty….oh yeah we forgot about poverty.
If we as a nation fix the real problem and that is a huge poverty class of people, then our schools will improve. Simple solution and everyone knows this is the real solution and that is poverty. Study after study demonstrate this…Affluent neighborhoods have schools whose students perform wonderfully. Yes people, poverty is the problem not our public schools
The best way to reduce poverty is to pay working people a living wage. For anyone that believes in standardized tests, it would also cause test scores to rise, not that scores really matter anyway.
If Walmart paid its one million workers $15 an hour, and gave them full time jobs, that would have a major impact on poverty. The Walton Family is worth $40-50 billion. With the GOP tax cuts, they may be worth much more.
When will they have enough?
Where Ignorant Armies Clash by Night by Joanne Yatvin
https://joanneyatvin.org/2018/10/22/where-ignorant-armies-clash-by-night/
Charles Butt is a billionaire “philanthropist” who is actually a philanthropist? He donated money to help real public school teachers get the real professional training they need? He did NOT invest in predatory charter propagation? Wait a minute. There are good billionaires?!?What a hero is this Charles Butt! He should be a role model for the rest of the billionaire class. Three cheers for him!
Charles Butt is in his 80s. He has no children. He invests in public schools because he actually wants to help children, not control them.
Voter Suppression by the GOP, too.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/gop-voter-suppression-is-the-countrys-greatest-scandal
Thank you so much for noting what is happening in San Antonio. We have felt like maybe nobody knew what was going on. For those of us who are fighting the good fight, it is heartening to see your coverage of our situation.
Jay Bean, what is happening in San Antonio is outrageous. These elites have decided to destroy public education. No one elected them to do this.
I noticed a few misconceptions in the above…Charter school teachers have to be certified just like public school teachers and Charter schools have to follow all the same guidelines as a public school. That means follow the same curriculum, take the same state tests and meet the same school grading system as the public school. The Charter schools are subject to being closed, just like the public schools, if the students don’t demonstrate adequate progress on grade level skills.
Elle,
Unfortunately, that is not true. The rules for charters vary from state to state. In some states, charter teachers–or some of them–do NOT need certification. In some states, charters do not use the same curriculum, do not take the same tests, have no rules barring nepotism or conflicts of interest. Charter schools, in some states, fail without any accountability.