Under Republican Governor Martinez, New Mexico was generous to charter schools. The state commissioner for most of her two terms was Hannah Skandera, previously worked for Jeb Bush. Charters got more funding than public schools.
Since the election of Democrat Michelle Lujan Grisham, the glory days ofprivatization are numbered.
The Democrats who control the legislature plan to cap charter growth and eliminate the funding that favors charters.
This is good news for the underfunded Public Schools, where the rate of poverty is nearly the lowest in the nation, close behind Mississippi.
Real Democrats support real public schools. Real Democrats don’t support privatization or any part of the DeVos agenda.
I hope the cap is hardwired, and that the laws bearing on charters are framed so that no out of state charters are permitted, and existing charters that fail to pass muster cannot operate with a new name.
Unfortunately, Ohio is still in thrall to the charter lobby:
“For-profit management companies are receiving rents from the Ohio charter schools they operate that are significantly higher than rents of comparable buildings in the same area, according to a report released by former state auditor Dave Yost in one of his last acts before becoming state attorney general.
Cincinnati charter school Orion Academy paid $867,000 more to lease its facilities in 2016 than what was paid for comparable buildings in the area, according to a recent state auditor’s report.
In 2015, Cleveland-based Harvard Avenue Performance Academy paid about $516,000 above market value for its facilities.”
Politicians slow-walked these investigations until after the election, and these belated “reports” are all we’ll ever get now that we rehired the exact same people.
They’re just now releasing the audits from 2015 and 2016. The former auditor who buried the charter school scandals? He’s now the attorney general.
They’re protected from oversight and accountability for another 4 years. They’ll be another ECOT-level scandal – it’s a matter of time. Same old, same old.
https://www.dispatch.com/news/20190121/are-charter-school-building-leases-fleecing-ohio-taxpayers
It is about time. There are 97 charter schools. Too many for a state this size. Under the previous Governor and Sec of Ed Skandera this would never ever happen. The Governor and Legislator should take another step and not allow any more virtual charter schools. We have too many now (K-12 Inc. and Connections). It is time to close virtual charter schools.
States that support publicly funded private sector charter schools are kleptocracies ruled by billionaire oligarchs.
States that support public schools with elected school boards are Constitutional Republics with democratic elements that are ruled by elected representatives that serve and answer to the people.
Hannah Skandera has a new ed reform lobbying group.
It’s exactly the same people who run everything else in ed reform- they give one another grants.
The Waltons give them a million and then they pass it out to the other club members, in smaller parcels. It’s a closed circle.
They seem to have finally figured out that they’re perceived as charter and voucher promoters (which is, in fact, what they are), so they added language that includes the word “agnostic”. That’s meant to be “inclusive” to public school families, students and teachers but none of the grants ever go to public schools. We just get the word “agnostic”
Every Democratic contender needs to state clearly where they stand on this issue. Are you with the public schools or continued charter expansion.