Tommy Chang was a top assistant to John Deasy in Los Angeles. After Deasy was pushed out in Los Angeles following a billion-dollar iPad bungle, Chang landed a job as superintendent of schools in Boston.
Things did not go well there, and Chang was abruptly pushed out by Mayor Walsh with two years left on his contract.
Now Chang has a job consulting for the New York City Department of Education, where he will be paid $10,000 “to produce a report on the ongoing reorganization of instructional divisions in the agency.”
Apparently there is no one in the vast New York City Department of Education who knows how to organize the instructional divisions.
Being a Broadie means having lifetime protection. When this gig runs out, Eli will find something else for him, maybe another district in need of transformation and closing the gap.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
You will recall, Diane, that when Chang was being interviewed for the Boston job, you referred a reporter from the Boston Globe to call me to discuss the LAUSD situation and his part in it. The man did call and we spent about an hour on the phone. I told him the whole LA story from my own, and most teachers, perspectives. All about Broad, Deasy, Villaraigosa, Jaime Aquino who was hoisted on his own petard, just about all that I knew. He took it all in…and then did NOT publish one word of what he learned. This was verified at the time by your Boston bloggers. I have long known that Eli’s hand and pocketbook are extended all over the US. His pseudo academic Academy has trained all these thugs…ooppss…business CEOs, to run public and private, meaning privatized, schools throughout the country. It is a corporate coup by the billionaire oligarchs…and they are not stopping. Yes, Chang might be hired by Broad to join Deasy and Ben Austin to lobby for Vergara lawsutis to get rid of due process and unions, though I read Austin now has a new job. Very frustrating indeed to see how managed our ‘free media’ is in Boston and in LA even under the new owner and new editor of the LA Times.
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The Vergara lawsuits have been a major flop. Dismissed in California, tossed out in Minnesota and New Jersey, the only ones still active is in NY, wher3 its chances are slim to none.
A massive waste of time and money.
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Diane…the point I was making is the power of Eli’s purse. Some years ago an assiduous teacher/researcher contacted me to see why Eli gave $8 K to Malloy of all people as a donation for his candidacy. He spreads his bribes all over the country. But he no longer seems to support Michelle Rhee who now owns a chain of charters with her crooked husband in Sacramento. She has dropped into public oblivion.
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Too many large-circulation city newspapers capture and kill stories for Wall Street profiteers and for villainthropists. And, the papers spin stories to favor the richest 0.1%, e.g. NYT’s David Leonhardt. IMO, the Boston Globe is an example of a paper that studiously avoids offending the wealthy.
The Detroit Free Press and Detroit News have provided good coverage of the charter system’s “brutality” to Black families.
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John Henry, publisher of the Globe, is also owner of the Boston Red Sox. He is also co-owner of Fenway Sports Group and his partner in that endeavor is Seth Klarman. Klarman, a billionaire hedge funder, also does business as the Baupost Group. Klarman holds $92 million of Puerto Rico’s debt and is pushing charter schools on the island.
As we say in Spanish:
Dime con quien andas y te digo quien eres.
(Tell me who your pals are and I’ll tell you who you are.)
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NYT’s David Leonhardt gets his talking points from the Center for American Progress. The charter-loving CAP (Gates-funded) selected a former employee of Kaplan and Aspira (Wikipedia lists a NLRB citation for anti-union activity against an Aspira branch) as its person to head CAP’s disaster capitalism in P.R.
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Linda, this is true. Reasoning with David Leonhardt about charter schools is impossible. He is a true believer.
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Spot on, Christine…happy holidays
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Thanks, Ellen.
Enjoy the season!
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Hmm. Tommy Chang was in Atlanta last Wednesday for a “A Conversation on the Promise of Black Liberatory and Diverse by Design Schools,” hosted by The Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation and RedefinED. Now I regret not attending.
Claiming to be “a Black woman from Selma, AL” helped Carstarphen hook the local NAACP President. Now “Black liberatory pedagogy” seems the latest surefire hook.
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Ed,
You remind me of a line from a song in “Gypsy.”
You gotta have a gimmick….
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And I would have done pro bono.. or, he can just read some of my blog posts and cut and paste …some of these vampires just never die
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The Koch’s Heritage Foundation was recently exposed as promising wealthy backers to
prospective law clerks who signed oaths of allegiance.
The rest of the richest 0.1% who fund education deform may have explicit (not yet exposed) or implicit guarantees for its cadre of salespeople who are delivered to non-profit payrolls.
The fault is with those who employ hired guns against American interests. The sell-outs themselves are irredeemable.
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Well said, Linda. Koch’s are particularly dangerous since they now own colleges to train students they want to place in government. They have a long range plan, and are working it.
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David’s longe range plan may be cut short if reports about his health are true. I won’t be crying a river. I’ll be cheering.
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