Archives for the month of: December, 2018
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New York: SUNY Gives Charters to Faith-Based Schools, Despite State Constitution Ban

By dianeravitch
December 18, 2018 //
28

Hey, Yeshivas and Muslim religious schools. Stop struggling to raise money. Rename yourself and get a charter from the State University of New York Charter Committee. Then the public will pay for your religious activities. True, the state constitution bans public money for religious schools, but so what?

The SUNY charter board (appointed by Governor Cuomo) awarded charters to the Brilla Network, which teaches Catholic virtues and values. They call themselves “virtue-based” charter schoools. They are moving into the vacuum created by the closure of Catholic schools.

Here is the mission statement of Seton Partners:

Here is the charter chain they run. They plan to grow.

SETON EDUCATION PARTNERS is committed to expanding opportunities for underserved children in America to receive an academically excellent and vibrantly Catholic education. As a national non-profit and an instrument of the Church, Seton partners with (arch)dioceses and others across the country to implement innovative and sustainable new models that bridge the best of Catholic education’s rich tradition with new possibilities. Seton was born of the belief that a tremendous opportunity exists to revitalize urban Catholic schools in America and strengthen the education they provide. The challenges are significant, to be sure, but with an entrepreneurial and innovative spirit, much can and should be done, not only to preserve this national treasure but also to build on its foundation for the benefit of thousands of children in America’s most underserved neighborhoods.

Step right up and charter your religious school!

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, New York, Privatization, Religion, Separation of church and state

A Progress Report from the Network for Public Education

By dianeravitch
December 18, 2018 //
4

Please read this year-end report from the Network for Public Education. You will learn about an important addition to our staff and plans for the future.

2018 was a great year for Public Education, despite the fact that the U.S. Secretary of Education—for the first time in history—is a foe of public schools and a religious zealot.

Teachers in West Virginia, Oklahoma, Arizona, Colorado, and North Carolina heroically stood together and demanded fair funding for their schools and their students. They said “Enough is enough!” They changed the national narrative, restoring to public view the fact that 85-90% of American students attend public schools, not charter or religious schools. Most of our public schools are underfunded, and most of our teachers are underpaid. According to the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, 29 states were spending less in 2018 than they spent in 2008. “Choice” is NOT a substitute for funding. Choice takes money away from schools that are already underfunded and diverts it to privately managed schools that are unregulated and unaccountable.

In state after state, teachers and parents led the blue wave that elected new governors, broke Republican supermajorities, and flipped the House of Representatives.

In one of the biggest electoral victories for education of 2018, parents and teachers in Arizona beat the Koch brothers and squashed a vast expansion of vouchers. Another was the ouster of Scott Walker in Wisconsin by Tony Evers; the sour grapes Republican legislature just rushed through legislation to strip powers from the new governor, in a blatant rebuff of the voters’ choice.

In California, Tony Thurmond beat Marshall Tuck for State Superintendent of Instruction, even though the charter billionaires gave Tuck twice as much money as Thurmond, saturating airwaves across the state. Duncan, of course, endorsed Tuck. The charter billionaires placed their money on the wrong horse in the governor’s race, betting on former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who came in third.

Friends, everyone senses it. Despite their vast resources, the privatizers are losing. They know it. Some say “Don’t call me a Reformer.” Others, like Arne Duncan, insist loudly that “Reform is not dead,” a sure sign that he knows it’s dying. All they can do now is lash out, double down, and destroy whatever has escaped their grasp.

It’s not about the kids. It never was. It’s about their egos and/or their bank accounts.

We now know that “Reform” means Privatization, and maybe it’s time to call them what they are: Privatizers.

Categories Accountability, California, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, Joy, Justice, Network for Public Education, Privatization, Resistance

Carol Burris: Five Reasons Why Charter Schools Can Never Be Reformed

By dianeravitch
December 18, 2018 //
12

Carol Burris explains here why charter schools can never be reformed.

Here is reason number one.

1. Freedom from regulations and oversight through public governance has resulted in persistent and undeniable patterns of waste and fraud.

For the past year, the Network for Public Education, the nonprofit advocacy group of which I am executive director, has been tracking charter school scandals, posting news accounts here. Frankly, we have been shocked by the frequency and seriousness of scandals that are the result of greed, lack of oversight or incompetence. The independent California-based watchdog group, In the Public Interest, estimated alleged and confirmed fraud in California’s charter sector has topped $149 million, a figure it describes as “only the tip of the iceberg.”

Not even Massachusetts, which allegedly has the toughest supervision of the sector in the nation, is free of scandals. When public dollars freely flow without independent oversight, it is all too easy for dollars to find their way into employee pockets and bank accounts, for friends and relatives to get “sweetheart deals” and for school leaders to receive astronomical salaries that would be unheard of in public schools.

Although new regulations may decrease some abuse, private boards are insufficient to provide governance of the billions of taxpayer dollars that flow through the charter sector. Every serious legislative attempt to rein in abuse meets opposition from the charter lobby, which makes strategic donations to legislators to avoid accountability.

Read the article to learn the other four reasons.

I would add here that if freedom from regulation and oversight is the key to better schools, we should do it for ALL schools. But on its face, that’s a dumb idea, because the state needs to know how its money was spent. Except for charter qschools.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Education Reform, Fraud, Privatization

Secondary School Principals Blast DeVos “School Safety” Report, No Mention of Gun Control

By dianeravitch
December 18, 2018 //
18

Betsy DeVos and her commission of Cabinet members released their report on school safety, formed in the wake of the Majorie Stoneman Douglas Massacre in Florida. The students quite rightly demands strict limits on access to deadly weapons, especially military grade weapons. The commission decided to ignore this important issue, which the NAASP called “willful ignorance.” As expected, the commission recommended arming school personnel, a proposal strongly opposed by teachers, who fear collateral damage, the danger of guns left in the wrong places, and bullets flying from every direction.

The National Association of Secondary School Principals released this statement:


NASSP Statement on Final Report of Federal Commission on School Safety

Contact: Bob Farrace, NASSP, farraceb@nassp.org, 703-860-7252

Rezton, VA –NASSP Executive Director JoAnn Bartoletti issued the following statement on the final report of the Federal Commission on School Safety:

It is puzzling that the Federal Commission on School Safety would spend seven months and untold tax dollars on rediscovering well-known school safety strategies, in part a subset of the more comprehensive Framework for Safe and Successful Schools. In any case, we welcome the Commission’s voice to our common call for greater attention to the mental health both of our students and to those who might do them harm.
Yet the Commission compromises its own credibility by staying mute on the issue of firearm access and other prevention efforts that reduce the need to turn schools into fortresses. Guns in the wrong hands is a common element in school shootings. The Commission’s failure to address that element—with even the most sensible and noncontroversial recommendations–is nothing short of willful ignorance. Equally obtuse is the Commission’s guidance for arming school personnel–remarkably the only federal guidance this administration does not perceive as intrusive and burdensome, on a notion rejected by a consensus of education organizations and the educators, parents, and students they represent.

Rescinding Discipline Guidance

There is no disputing that racial disparities persist in suspensions and expulsions, and the evidence shows that schools that address the true causes of the gaps see a more positive culture and fewer violent incidents. In schools that adopt restorative practices in place of exclusionary practices, minority students see more time in school, resulting in higher achievement and fewer referrals to juvenile justice systems. The guidance encouraged many schools to find ways to help students succeed rather than react to behaviors that accelerate their failure, and therefore direct students on a path to prosperity rather than prison. There should be no argument that these effects are good things. But in strikingly convoluted and sadly predictable fashion, the Commission asserts without foundation that this non-binding guidance makes school less safe. The conclusion is offensive, it’s infuriating, it’s nonsensical, and it will assuredly lead to the result the administration wanted all along.

Secretary DeVos in particular has demonstrated time and again her dexterity in undoing efforts to enforce the rights of vulnerable student populations. Yet this discipline-disparity crisis is not one she can just kick to the states or private-school-voucher away. The secretary must now act with purpose to fulfill the Department’s expressed mission of “prohibiting discrimination and ensuring equal access to education.” Otherwise she cements her status as a champion among the defenders of the status quo she so often derides. Without the force of law, the guidance could quietly persist to exercise persuasive influence and provide principals cover as they do the right thing often against strong political headwinds. By proposing to rescind the guidance, this administration only intensifies the headwind, sending a clear and dismissive message to our most vulnerable students.

Categories Betsy DeVos, Guns, Guns in Schools

Trump Is Not a Legitimate President

By dianeravitch
December 17, 2018 //
147

Trump was elected by Vladimir Putin, with the unwitting aid of Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook.

Trump is an illegitimate president.

His appointments to the US Supreme Court and other federal courts should be nullified.

Unfortunately there is no provision in the US Constitution to recall and replace an illegitimate president.

Ideas?

Categories Education Reform

Russians Targeted African Americans on Social Media in 2016 to Help Trump

By dianeravitch
December 17, 2018 //
14

Russian government operatives used social media in 2016 to help the Trump campaign.

A sophisticated effort targeted African Americans to suppress their enthusiasm for Hillary Clinton.

From the New York Times:

“The Russian influence campaign on social media in the 2016 election made an extraordinary effort to target African-Americans, used an array of tactics to try to suppress turnout among Democratic voters and unleashed a blizzard of activity on Instagram that rivaled or exceeded its posts on Facebook, according to a report produced for the Senate Intelligence Committee.

“The report adds new details to the portrait that has emerged over the last two years of the energy and imagination of the Russian effort to sway American opinion and divide the country, which the authors said continues to this day.

“Active and ongoing interference operations remain on several platforms,” says the report, produced by New Knowledge, a cybersecurity company based in Austin, Texas, along with researchers at Columbia University and Canfield Research LLC. One continuing Russian campaign, for instance, seeks to influence opinion on Syria by promoting Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president and a Russian ally in the brutal conflict there.

“The New Knowledge report, which was obtained by The New York Times in advance of its scheduled release on Monday, is one of two commissioned by the Senate committee on a bipartisan basis. They are based largely on data about the Russian operations provided to the Senate by Facebook, Twitter and the other companies whose platforms were used.”

From the Washington Post:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2018/12/17/daily-202-russian-efforts-to-manipulate-african-americans-show-sophistication-of-disinformation-campaign/5c1739291b326b2d6629d4c6/?utm_term=.a31b381ef19b

THE BIG IDEA: A new report prepared for the Senate Intelligence Committee reveals that the Russians, in their bid to boost President Trump, have been more fixated than previously understood on trying to dampen African American political engagement.

“Researchers at Oxford University’s Computational Propaganda Project and Graphika, a network analysis firm, spent seven months analyzing millions of social media posts that major technology firms turned over to congressional investigators. Their goal was to understand the inner workings of the Internet Research Agency, which the U.S. government has charged with criminal offenses for interfering in the 2016 election.

“It turns out that African Americans were targeted with more Facebook ads than any other group, including conservatives.

“Three of the four most-liked Facebook posts put up by the Russian influence effort came from an account called Blacktivist that urged the community to be more cynical about politics. African Americans were urged to vote for Green Party candidate Jill Stein throughout the month before the 2016 election. A post on Oct. 29 that year declared: “NO LIVES MATTER TO HILLARY CLINTON. ONLY VOTES MATTER TO HILLARY CLINTON.” A message on Nov. 3 added: “NOT VOTING is a way to exercise our rights.”

“On Twitter, four of the Russian agency’s five most‐retweeted accounts catered exclusively to African Americans.

“On Instagram, all five of the most-liked posts created by the Russians were aimed at African American women. They included the hashtags #blackpower, #blackpride, #unapologeticallyblack, #blacklivesmatter, #icantbreathe, #riot and #blackgirlskillingit.

“The influence operation – run out of St. Petersburg – was sophisticated, relentless and became more effective with time. Its goal was to manipulate identity politics to tear America apart. The Soviet Union had also tried to heighten racial divisions during the Cold War, but their operatives lacked access to the technology platforms that now make it so easy.

“Messaging to African Americans sought to divert their political energy away from established political institutions by preying on anger with structural inequalities … including police violence, poverty, and disproportionate levels of incarceration,” the report says. “These campaigns pushed a message that the best way to advance the cause of the African American community was to boycott the election and focus on other issues instead.”

Categories Education Reform

Linda Lyon: Arizona Legislator to Teachers: “Shut Up”

By dianeravitch
December 17, 2018 //
15

Linda Lyon was president of the Arizona School Boards Association for the past year of tumultuous action in the state. Her office required neutrality. Now that she has “passed the gavel,” she is again free to speak out and she blasts a legislator who has proposed a bill to silence teachers and strip away their First Amendment Rights.

“I just read Arizona Capitol Times reporting that AZ Representative Mark Finchem isn’t waiting for the start of the legislative session to exact retribution on educators who stood up for themselves and their students this year. To the teachers in his district (LD 11) who marched on the Capitol this year and saw him in action, this will not come as a surprise. After all, one teacher who visited him during the #RedForEd walkout told me that when they went to see him, he told them to “get their asses back to work”. I cannot verify this charge, but in my experience with Finchem, can say that I have found him to: 1) say what he thinks, 2) not be subtle and 3) not be supportive of public education.

“His new bill, H2002 (educators; ethics professional responsibility), would require the State Board of Education to adopt uniform rules for all certified teachers in “taxpayer supported schools” to bar them from political activities. Funny thing is, Arizona Revised Statue (ARS) 15.511 already forbids the use of public school resources to influence elections and, levies a fine of $5,000 per violation. And, as Chris Kotterman, ASBA’s legislative Liaison said, “everyone who works in public schools is keenly aware that they’re under a microscope in regard to political activity.”

“True to form though, Finchem wants to not only drive the point home (just in case educators are too stupid to understand it), but also lock them in a box and throw away the key. According to AZ Capitol Times, he proposes a prohibition on “the endorsement or opposition of any candidate or elected or appointed official; any pending or enacted legislation, rule or regulation; pending, proposed or decided court case; or pending, proposed or executed executive action.”

So, this is the response to #RedForEd: punish teachers who dare to speak.

Categories Accountability, Arizona, Freedom of Speech, Teachers

North Carolina: General Assembly Allows School to Drop Out of Its “Innovative School District”

By dianeravitch
December 17, 2018 //
3

New Orleans set a new model for privatization by creating the Recovery School District, which turned almost every public school in the city into a charter school. Tennessee copied the model in part by creating the Achievement School District, which gathered the state’s lowest performing schools, almost all in Memphis, and putting them into the ASD to be turned into charters. The ASD made bold promises but flopped. Of course, North Carolina had to copy the idea, so beloved in red states, so it created an Innovative School District. The legislation was funded by an Oregon tycoon, who surprisingly won the bid to run the new district. Sadly, no one wanted to join the ISD. Finally the state managed to corral one school into giving up its status as a public school, and the ISD was launched, with one school, a principal and a superintendent.

Then the state added another school. But the district, Wayne County, fought back, probably through its member of the General Assembly, and it has dropped out.

Stuart Egan tells the story of the escape of Carver Heights Elementary here.

Categories New Orleans, North Carolina, Privatization, Tennessee

Fred Smith: The Testing Expert Who Fights the Testing Combine

By dianeravitch
December 17, 2018 //
7

Fred Smith is a genuine Testing Expert. He has the technical expertise to dig deep into the numbers and understand what they mean and what they don’t mean. He spent most of his career at the New York City Board of Education. Now he is a valued consultant to the Opt Out Movement in New York. He knows fraud in testing and he’s not afraid to call it out.

Fred Smith is a hero of American education, and he here joins the honor roll.

Read this article about him, which contains links to his latest work.

Categories Accountability, Common Core, Education Industry, Education Reform, For-Profit, Fraud, Honor Roll, New York, Opt Out, Parent Groups, Standardized Testing, Testing

Danielle Holly: Billionaires are Undermining Democracy By Their “Investments” in Education

By dianeravitch
December 17, 2018 //
24

Danielle Holly writes in the NonProfit Quarterly that billionaires who put their philanthropic dollars into education are benefiting themselves, not children. How do they benefit? Their donations put them in control of what is supposed to be a democratic institution. Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and dozens of other “philanthropists” have decided on the basis of their whims that schools need the change that their money buys or imposes.

Perhaps Holly would not be so blunt, but that is what her article says.

Two philosophical challenges have arisen with the nature of these investments. The first, which NPQ has discussed at length, is that it limits democratic control over the nation’s public education system. In effect, education philanthropy puts education program design in a few hands who are, by definition, outsiders, and often less expert and less informed than those who are doing the work. In the case of CZI, which was established as a limited liability corporation instead of a philanthropic foundation, there are also related issues of transparency.

“Philanthropy is the least democratic institution on earth,” says Professor David Nasaw, a historian who has researched Carnegie’s philanthropic focus on education. “It’s rich men deciding what to do.”

She puts Andrew Carnegie’s gift of free public libraries on the same plane as the gifts of Gates, Zuckerberg, and Bezos, but I disagree. Carnegie did not tell any library he funded what books to buy nor did he tell patrons what books to read. Carnegie’s gift of public libraries were good charity that did not detract from democracy. By contrast, our billionaires today have invested heavily in privatization of public schools, which is a direct attack on democracy. They buy compliance with large gifts. When they can’t buy compliance, they buy local and state school board election. That should be illegal. They should be prosecuted for attacking democracy. Their in-the-daylight efforts to buy control of state and local school boards should be seen as akin to the Russian efforts to manipulate the 2016 elections. Both illegitimate.

Categories Accountability, Billionaires, Charter Schools, Democracy, Education Industry, Philanthropy, Privatization
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