It’s about time. A story in the Los Angeles Times notes that those Democratic candidates who supported charters (and still do) are facing a backlash by their party’s voters. The wave of teachers’ strikes have brought into sharp relief the fact that most families enroll their children in public schools, not charter schools; that charter schools are a priority for Republicans, Wall Street, and far-right libertarians like Betsy DeVos; and that support for public schools is a bedrock principle of the Democratic Party.
The candidate who was most outspoken as a supporter of both charters and vouchers was Cory Booker. He worked in alliancewith anti-union Governor Chris Christie to bring chartersto Newark. He worked closely with Betsy Dezvos and gave a speech to her organization. He was honored by the rightwing Manhattan Institute for supporting school choice. He wanted to turn Newark into the New Orleans of the North, with no public schools and no teachers’ union. He still defends that record.
Michael Bloomberg was a big supporter of charters in New York City and favored them over the public schools he took control of. He’s now out of the race, so no need to worry other than that he will find a Democratic DeVos to fund. He despises public schools.
Michael Bennett of Colorado supported charters when he was superintendent of schools in Denver. Governor Hickenlooper appointed Bennett to the Senate.
Governor Jay Inslee of Washington State did not stand up to Bill Gates after the Washington State Supreme Court decided that charter schools and not entitled to receive public money. Gates persuaded his friends in the legislature to give lottery money to charters, and Gov. Inslee neither signed nor vetoed the law, allowing Gates to get state funding. Not a profilein courage.
The election of 2020 will be a deciding moment, when Democratic candidates are asked to declare whether they support the public schools, or the privately-managed, scandal-ridden charters that enroll 6% of the nation’s students.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Let us spread the word far and near about all these pro-charter 2020 Dem candidates. Let people know about enablers/supporters like Booker and weasels like Inslee.
We need people to stand up at rallies and campaign stops and speak truth to power: Those DINOS need to be told loudly and publicly that Arne Dun-can’t was the gateway drug that lead directly to DeVos being Sec. of Ed., that they are two peas in a pod, and that we the people know better and will not take it anymore.
support the public schools, or the privately-managed, scandal-ridden charters that enroll 6% of the nation’s students.
…
The distinction is important and it has not been made perfectly clear to many legislators who think choice is always wonderful and gov’ment schools are all alike. Many do not realize that charter schools choose their students and many are the real cookie cutter operations, run like a fast-food franchise seeking the easiest and lest expensive way to teach students.
It is difficult to do the right thing when you only listen to lobbyists and big campaign donors.
Unattributed from the internet, “Give us choice.” Then, we’ll take it away- billionaire boys cub.
I say, forget about charter schools. They represent the foot in the door. They are the temptation to do the wrong thing.
This is needed. Neo-liberal and sold out democrats are more harmful than conservatives for public schools. They toss a biscuit on social issues while lining their campaign funds with dirty money.
Dirty money fills all conservative coffers. Dirty money only fills the coffers of establishment Dems (DINO’s) like the Gates-funded Center for American Progress, not those of progressives like AOC and Bernie Sanders.
These DINO Dems also can easily turn a blind eye to all the waste, fraud, embezzling, segregation and dirty politics behind “reform.”
Agree, totally, kzahedi. “SOLD OUT” DEMS USED public education.
Now Chelsea is on the speaking circuit. She needs to go away.
The DFERS and DNC get to “own” 45, too.
DFER has been called the sister of the Center for American Progress.
Pres. Obama recently chided Trump, “Democracy is a garden that needs tending.” Is “garden tending” what Bill Gates was doing during Pres. Obama’s two terms?
Still, any Democrat is better than a Republican. But, the best Democrat is a true progressive like AOC.
What does Booker offer, besides baloney, that we should be excited about?
Any Democrats that do not support public education should be portrayed as anti-democratic. Public schools are democracy in action. They serve all students and no students can be denied access. Public education has served our nation well, and it has made considerable contribution to building our country into what it is today. Public schools are public assets that are democratically operated. Public schools are transparent and accountable to the community, and they often are the hub of life in any given community. Quality public schools often enhance property values for people live in the local area.
“Reformers” have tried to everything in their power to undermine this seminal public institution. Many states have severely under funded public education and have promoted failed market based options. “Reform” wants public schools to compete, and it has been a failed experiment. It is like offering to have a race, but you break the leg of an opponent before the race. So-called reform reduces funds and leaves public schools with stranded costs for fixed expenses. Public schools then lose options for programs and much needed services. “Reform” is backed by lots of dark money and billionaires that use their wealth to influence policy forcing public education into a defensive position of test and punish without any evidence that this plan makes sense. It has resulted in firing teachers, a narrowed curriculum and school closings. “Reform” has failed to deliver on its promises, and it is not worth the disruption it causes.
It is sad that some Democrats would join the radical right wing and lobbyists that support all the lies and false assumptions of so-called reform. Real Democrats support real public schools that provide access and opportunity for all.
We need people to stand up at rallies and campaign stops and speak truth to power: Those DINOS need to be told loudly and publicly that Arne Dun-can’t was the gateway drug that lead directly to DeVos being Sec. of Ed., that they are two peas in a pod, and that we the people know better and will not take it anymore.
It’s about time!
Democrats who support charter schools, bloated military budgets, endless wars, corporate welfare (Amazon), and oppose Medicare for All and the Green New Deal must be opposed and defeated.
Democrats really could have threaded the needle. They could have supported public schools AND charter schools. It seems like right around 2010 they were completely absorbed into the ed reform echo chamber and became as stridently anti-public school as any other ed reform lobbying group.
It was dumb, really. They should perhaps stop taking direction from Jeb Bush and Betsy DeVos and the billionaire ed reform donor class. They could try doing their own thinking.
What kind of nominally competent political party abandons the schools 90% of children attend? It was moronic. Even if none of them attended a public school and they have complete contempt for public school teachers and students, were they unaware that most people attend one? They thought we wouldn’t notice?
Unfortunately, money talks. It talks clearly to corporate democrats that do the bidding of billionaires and hedge fund managers. They can afford to hire a bunch of cheerleaders and lobbyists. These lobbyists and foundations have the ear of the representatives. Most voters value their public schools, but they don’t tell their representatives about it every day. Public education was designed to be a public service, not another market. It has few lobbyists or funds to promote itself. Privatization is designed to be a continuous downward spiral for public education. As Diane has said, it is “death by a thousand cuts.”
Establishment Dems (DINO’s) went to bed with hedge funds and tech monopolists.
It’s funny how they can’t break out of it once they’re thoroughly captured the echo chamber.
Booker spends all his time defending charters and vouchers. They really seem to feel they aren’t required to speak to public school teachers, students and families at all.
Even when we’re supposedly “debating” public schools our schools are never mentioned. It’s as if they’re fearful that if they offer any kind of support for public schools they’ll be shunned and kicked out of the club. Remarkable, that a group of professional politicians could settle on an approach that says “I might reluctantly allow your schools to continue to exist, but don’t expect any more than that”. That’s the ed reform “offer”- nothing. Take it or leave it.
“I might reluctantly allow your schools to continue to exist, but don’t expect any more than that”
Pretty much.
It’s why I always feel bad for the students when ed reformers in government visit public schools.
All these parents and teachers working as hard as we can to get them to engage and value their education, and we get “visitors” who present this droning recitation of how public schools are “monopolies” and a “factory model” full of drug addicts, bullies and delinquents. Actively working against us. And we pay them for this!
Do us a favor. Stay home. It’s hard enough.
Corporate Democrat from California, Susan Davis, 3rd ranking Democrat on the House Education committee, when’s she going to change her spots?
I have been following presidential politics for many decades. Notwithstanding, some of the “chicken little” talk I read here (and elsewhere). I cannot imagine K-12 educational policy having any major bearing on the 2020 presidential election.
North Korea is rebuilding a rocket launch facility. The middle class is getting a pounding. Oil prices could start climbing again. There are many more issues, that will be on the mind of the electorate, than school/education policy, at the federal level.
K-12 education can and should be a state/municipal affair, and the feds should just “butt out”.
Charles,
In case you hadn’t noticed, this is a blog about education, dedicated to “a better education for all.” That explains why I pay attention to K-12 education, not foreign affairs or the price of oil. If these matters concern you, you are in the wrong place.
What you pay attention to, is up to you, of course. The point of my post, is that I cannot imagine K-12 education policy having any serious impact on the 2020 Presidential election. Although the issue is important, it just does not develop any “traction” with the electorate, at the national level.
K-12 education can and should be handled at the level, that is closest to the people, who pay for it, and have their children enrolled in it. 90% of the funding is state/municipal.
People on the right and the left, seem to agree, that when the feds get involved in education policy (K-12), that they have an inordinate tendency to muck it up.
The litany of disasters, like Common Core, and NCLB, all carry the federal imprimatur.
The recent history of presidential campaigns, all show that issues that have national importance, hold more sway with the electorate, than what goes on in the local schoolhouse.
I see the exact same thing happening in this ongoing campaign. Education policy (K-12), is going to be ignored by most or all of the candidates.
Regardless of what you think, Charles, we will fight to make candidates’ views on K-12 education an important part of the campaign. Public schools are too important to ignore or relinquish to entrepreneurs. You may not recall that I am president of the Network for Public Education, which has 350,000 followers, and we will do our best to block privatization of public schools and present a clear road map to better schools.
NPE Action will rate and update candidates based on their education records. We will rely on our allies to ask questions at town halls and send us feedback.
I agree with both of you. Based on my personal experience of talking to people whenever I can about the importance of education issues and monitoring the comments of declared and undeclared candidates, nothing gives me confidence that education issues will be taken any more seriously this election than they have in any other. Remember, here in Ohio, EVERY candidate who was complicit in our education woes was promoted in the last election. Dems were 0 for 5. I am new to Twitter and amazed when public education advocates still pin their hopes on the state Democratic Party and its useless chair, David Pepper (how does he still have a job and why do people still take him seriously?). They retweet and copy the party and Pepper constantly. I wonder if the party is secretly on the payroll of the Republican Party. I can’t find any other explanation that makes sense. It is, in my opinion, a microcosm of what is going on nationally.
But I must agree with Diane that we have to keep raising awareness and fighting. I’ve written about this before here. Until Democratic candidates fear the education lobby as they do, for example, AIPAC and the pharma lobby, I am not hopeful. This doesn’t mean I’ve given up. I recently wrote a close advisor, who I have met at fundraisers in past years, of a major Democratic candidate, to request a meeting to discuss education issues and how it could become a core part of the platform. So far, crickets. I’ve done things to raise awareness of education issues—testing and charter funding—and not one parent has been willing to go public to support my positions. In private they all agree with me, even though most of them are Individual-1 supporters. The latter motivates them. The former, even when they have children in public schools, does not. So I’m down and pessimistic about success, but I will not give up.
I am not saying that education is not important. I am just saying that I do not see K-12 education policy, getting much “play” in the 2020 presidential election. If you have information to the contrary, I would like to see it.
That’s your opinion. Meanwhile, why don’t you go haunt blogs about foreign policy and the price of oil and other interests.
Since the article referenced Jay Inslee of Washington—he is strongly destesed by Republicans in this state. Bill Gates is a strong Democrat as well. Charter schools are not a big issue up here anymore (we have 12 soon to be 13). The heavily Democratic west side got charters in and are keeping them in. The money is on the west coast. Inslee doesn’t care one wit for how voters east of the Cascades want…and we (largely conservative) voted against charters!
Bill Gates meets regularly with Charles Koch, according to a recent article in Forbes. Party labels mean nothing to him. He toys with the lives of other people’s children.
Seattle didn’t want charters. Gates outspent the PYAs, educators and civil rights groups by 17-1 to push them over the line in a state referendum.
Charles:
Public education is the foundation of a democratic republic.
Without public education, there can be no democracy.
All of those concerns you mention: North Korea, oil prices, the economy and it’s effect on the middle class (if it still exists) and the poor are very important issues, and decisions about those issues will be decided by those who are elected by voters.
You’d better be concerned about public education!
In fact, we’d all better be concerned about public education!
The high school juniors and seniors sitting in classrooms right now will be your fellow voters in 2020! You’d better believe that you want them to be educated so that they make good decisions for our country and the future of, quite literally, every human being, every living thing, and every natural resource which exists on our planet.
Even our country’s founders recognized that public education was the foundation of democracy:
“I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education.”
-Thomas Jefferson
We don’t have a democracy because of our states; we have a democracy because we have a Federal Constitution which made it so.
With the quality of public education having such a complete and total impact on our democracy, and it’s continuance, it’s a wonder that more people running for office don’t discuss education. Education is literally the foundation of everything government has ever, can ever, and will ever do.
So Charles, that is why you want those candidates to discuss public education. Everything that you know and love about your life, and all our lives, could never exist without pubic education.
And as for how people like us make the discussion of education important in national elections? We demand it. We speak up. We write letters, make phone calls, attend public forums, and talk to every person we know, and every person we don’t know. We run for office and speak, speak, speak our truth.
Charles, this is your democracy, too.
If you want candidates to talk about education, if you think that it is an important issue, if you want our electeds to think long term, not just to their next election, but to the children who are born long after you and I perish from this earth, you can make it so.
BRK,
That’s an eloquent defense of the importance of public education but addressed to a person who wants government to fund charters, religious schools, even home schooling.
Gates and the Koch Bros. captured both parties to push the same oligarch agenda.
Gates funds the Center for American Progress and Fordham Institute.
He opposes raising minimum wage. He and his Microsoft co-founder spent $500,000 to defeat the re-election of judges who rendered verdicts favorable to public schools. His talking points about pensions echo those of John Arnold. (Gates and Arnold together are funding the Urban Institute’s pension papers.) Gates prefers regressive taxes that make the poor pay the cost of common goods that he uses. The minority community -NAACP, SPLC,BLM, etc. recognize ed deform by Gates, Koch, and Walton heirs is exploitation by corporate interests.
Gates is a Koch brother, only with a false veneer.
brk, I agree strongly with everything you wrote. May I make a suggestion to everyone who agrees with you:
Pledge to have 5-10 extensive conversations a month until election day 20201 with different family members, friends, colleagues, strangers on planes, buses, and trains who do not understand why education is important as it is. Explain why public education matters, why it should be one of the top three domestic policy priorities (not just A priority—that leaves too much wiggle room), why it is essential to find out how candidates think about it, and what needs to be done to make it a priority.
I am concerned that too many of us think that venting here is enough. It is not. The key to grassroots advocacy is to engage people who do not understand your issues or source of your passion.
If we are having these same discussions a year from this October, we will have failed. We must mobilize. One person at a time. And when you hook someone to understand, preach this sermon to them.
If my comment above resonates, I have posted my stump speech below.
Q a person who wants government to fund charters, religious schools, even home schooling. END Q
I am a person who favors giving parents more choices, than the government-run public schools, at the K-12 level.
The government funds education at the university level, at private universities, and religious universities, and vocational/technical schools. The government even funds students at religious seminaries, to be Christian clergypersons.
NO one on this board, including yourself, has ever protested a university student getting a BEOG, and attending Southern Methodist University.
Why the double standard? Are not children at K-12, equal with university students?
Charles, you and Betsy DeVos have exactly the same views. She too prefers lots of choices including schools where teachers are not required to be college graduates. You andshe will turn us into a second rate nation where large numbers look to the Bible to understand science and history
“NO one on this board, including yourself, has ever protested a university student getting a BEOG, and attending Southern Methodist University.”
There, now you did it, Charles, so the statement above is invalid.
Robespierre said: “The secret of freedom lies in educating people, whereas the secret of tyranny is in keeping them ignorant.”
Well, we know Robespierre’s finished his career on this Earth early exactly because he couldn’t tell the difference between education and tyranny. He certainly could talk, but talking is not equal to understanding, as his example clearly shows.
It is high-lair-eee-us that Charles quotes one of the furthest left figures of history, so far left that he intersects with the most fascist of ideas of the right that a leftie like me would never even come close to consider a legitimate opinion. Thanks for the guffaw, Charles.
Yeah, so politics is not flat but circular or even spherical, like our Earth and Universe. You go too “far” left, and you arrive at “far” right.
In Budapest, Hungary, they have what they call the “House of Terror”. The place is a museum now but it used to be the headquarters of the Hungarian fascist secret police and then, after WW2, it became the HQ of the communist secret police. The basement of the building was a political prison where both regimes tortured and executed people. Even some of the guards were the same there. The hiring of the same people was done on purpose. The Communists declared that “The means of oppression are independent of ideology”, as can be read in one of the documents exhibited in the museum.
Mate, I was in Warsaw after the Solidarity government took charge, the very weekend the Berlin Wall came down. I was invited to speak about teaching democracy. The headquarters of the Ministry of Educatuon, they told me, had formerly been the Gestapo headquarters. Then it was the Communist Party headquarters. It was creepy.
It seems, the Ministry of Education is still there, in that building
http://www.polandwanderer.com/the-gestapo-headquarters-and-the-pawiak-prison-in-warsaw/
Here is an article about the house of terror in Budapest
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/terror-in-budapest/?utm_source=mandiner&utm_medium=link&utm_campaign=mandiner_201903
Here is a pic. Note the cross and the star next to each other, on top
http://www.terrorhaza.hu/en/news/annual-maintenance-in-january
The building is in a fancy area of Budapest, and less than a mile from where I used to live. My uncle tells me (who also lived there) that on his way to high school, in the 1950’s, he had to pass the building. He says he always crossed the street so he wouldn’t have to walk on the sidewalk in front of the building. He was afraid that he would hear something coming out of the basement.
I think what can certainly be concluded is that more advanced ideology doesn’t make more advanced politics and politicians. I think we always need to be suspicious of people in power and even those who want to be in power.
@brk: I think that you are missing the point. Try to focus. My assertion, is that in the current presidential campaign (2020), I just do not see federal education policy at the K-12 level, getting much “play”. I just tend to think, that the candidates are going to focus on other topics. Of course, I believe that education is important. I never said otherwise.
The past several election cycles, have focused on economic issues, and national security, and a host of other topics. I see no reason to believe, that this campaign is going to be much different (with respect to education policy).
If there can be a way, to encourage the upcoming campaign, to include education in the issues under consideration by the candidates and/or voters, I will be supportive. In fact, I am more in agreement than you realize. An educated populace, is a guarantor of democracy.
You need to get your historical facts right. Democracy and self-government pre-date government-funded public education.
Most of the framers of our constitution, were privately educated, none attended a government-supported institution of higher learning.
If you fail to credit the states, with our constitution, you are mistaken. Delegates from the several states, met in Philadelphia in 1787, to draft the constitution, which was submitted to the states for ratification, and the constitution was ratified in 1789. Without the states, sending their delegates to the constitutional convention, there would be no federal constitution.
@GregB: You say : Q nothing gives me confidence that education issues will be taken any more seriously this election than they have in any other. END Q
At least you are getting the point of my comments. I too, am not confident that education issues will be taken seriously, by the current crop of presidential candidates.
This sounds cynical, and I wish it were otherwise! All people, on all sides of the political spectrum, should be demanding that political candidates, treat education with the seriousness that the issue deserves!
Charles, you remind me of something that psychologist G. Stanley Hall wrote at the beginning of the 20th century (which I quote in my book “Left Back”). He maintained that learning to read and write were not all that important because, after all, no one ever taught Mary, the Mother of Jesus, how to read or write.
The Founding Fathers might have gone to one of our great universities, like Harvard, which long predated the Revolution; or they might have had tutors. They were not illiterate. When we speak of public education, we are not discussing elite education but education of 50 million students. They deserve an excellent education, not the drivel offered by low-cost voucher schools staffed by teachers who are neither certified nor college educated.
A few statewide marches and strikes since last time say differently.
‘Red for Ed’ 2020
Education is the issue neoliberals think can be swept under the rug during election season. The recent strikes have shown they cannot hide behind choice nowadays. No, the fact is that most voters are the family members, friends, or neighbors of public school teachers or students. They know about it, do care about it, and the wool has been pulled from over their eyes. (When we strike, we win.) This is a new day. The billionaires rightwingers worship are on the run. The backlash is here. And it is beautiful.
Fine, Charles. For us here, education is the single most important issue. That other people pay attention to isolated little countries like North Korea and its pitiful little puppy leader, or they deal with Biblical-time issues like gay marriage, is their problem.
Education decides where the country goes in the future. The way education is viewed and executed decides everything else.
As a consequence, education is more important than who is in the White House.
Cory Booker, you may be toast.
If he’s not, it will be a worrying sign for our issues.
“Teacher had students turn their phone volume up and create a running record of notifications they received in 1 class period.”
They get several a minute.
We are going to look back on how we let these snake oil salesmen jam these devices into schools and wonder what in the heck we were thinking.
Jeb Bush is running around the country promoting this. He wants MORE of this in schools. Several distractions a MINUTE as long as the device is turned on in school- and ed reformers seek this out- they harangue schools until they give in and adopt it.
Complete scam. And the entire echo chamber swallowed it whole. And who can blame them? They’re all funded by the same companies pushing the devices and programs.
The reform view on tech is unrealistic. Tech is not and never will be the ‘be all’ in education. It is an adjunct and can only be an adjunct.
Also I will say that back when, charters were ahead of public schools in introducing tech … but not now, public schools have all the tech and more as a charter school does.
Just to give you an idea how completely incoherent this “movement” is.
Here’s the US Department of Education:
“Mathematics has been called the “language” of #STEM — students need a strong #math foundation to succeed in STEM fields & to make sense of STEM-related topics. #Algebra1 is a key gateway course for STEM & at what grade students take it matters. ”
Directly beneath this they are pushing their new voucher program, which allocates school funding to hundreds or even thousands of different contractors, so students can “choose” a “playlist”.
You may not be be able to find a school with an Algebra I class with sufficient enrollment to justify it, let alone in a specific grade level once they fragment all the funding into personalized chunks. What if I live in an area where no one “chooses” Algebra I? I’m just out of luck. Or, I guess, I have to take some garbage Connections Academy product.
Just insanity. But the FEDERAL government is pushing this voucher scheme. Indeed, they do almost nothing else.
Since there are no qualified women for the democratic ticket…
The first platform for any man should be, time for a woman president. Do Bernie, Joe Biden, and the rest of these guys really think they are that much better?
I realize that this is a little simplistic, but I think there is some truth to it.
Inslee, Hickenlooper, and his friend Bennet don’t stand a chance anyway. They just rode a lucky wind in WA and CO with a big D next to their names. That said, nothing would please me more than to see education reform become the albatross around the necks of reformers, just like they made reform the albatross around the neck of public schools. Based on their abysmal record towards public schools, Booker, Bennet, and Mike Johnston should never be elected to public office again.
With justice, R.I. Gov. Gina Raimondo’s albatross will be pensions, charter schools and her alliance with Cory Booker.
She heads the Democratic Governors Association. If citizens want to fund a Democratic Governor’s campaign, they should do it directly. The candidate should be told the donation won’t be made through Act Blue. Act Blue allows DFER to raise money at the site.
There’s a comment form at DGA. Submit the message, Raimondo is a DINO who hurts the party.
YES. “nothing would please me more than to see education reform become the albatross around the necks of reformers, just like they made reform the albatross around the neck of public schools.” May these self-absorbed “school saviors” find out that there are literally thousands and thousands of voices now just waiting for them to get up on stage and take questions…
Can’t forget that CO’s governor Polis (DFER) owns two charter schools.
Polis is a charter zealot. He shares that with DeVos
To Charles, up there:
Have you been on another planet for the last several decades? OF COURSE it matters who’s in the White House RE: the survival of public K-12 ed! First we had NCLB &, when Obama was elected, we were a bunch of happy campers. Then, he chooses Arne as his Ed. Secy., & we had RT3–NCLB on steroids, as some have said. Complete destruction of public schools in N.O.L.A., a plethora of “standardized” testing the likes of which we’d never seen & the proliferation of charters & vouchers, TFA & the loss of experienced, certified, qualified teachers (not to mention the humiliation of the latter–remember Obama & Arne & Central Falls, R.I.?)
All of this equates to $$$$ & power (Booker, who thinks he’s hot stuff–yeah–to the charter indu$try, Big Pharm & whoever else has been making him a rich powerbroker).
Of course, I am a big believer in “think globally, act locally,” but, again, the proliferation of a good education for ALL our kids (NOT the garbage pushed on “other people’s children”) depends on each & every level of government &, I would say, especially federal (because federal law precludes state law–delve into the history of special education & P.L. 94-142).
&… amen to your last sentence, Ted.
It cannot possibly be that the issue of education will be totally ignored in this next election cycle. Education is far too much a part of the immigration issue, of the health care issue, and of the constitutional issues surrounding states rights and individual freedoms to be ignored.
The real question is how the issues will be framed. Will the candidates for the democrats find it advantages to couch the issue in terms of the individual’s right to a free and appropriate education? Will they stick their neck out and advocate for the parts of the country that are ignored and have been ignored for so long? Will they feel that they can get votes by asking the wealthy to pay up?
Roy, picking up on my comments above, besides you, me and our friends who comment here, who links education with immigration, health care, states rights, or individual freedoms? Certainly no one in the Democratic Party. No need to ask about Republicans and so-called independents.
Hard to argue, unfortunately. Still, the support garnered by the teacher strikes is a window in to the public mind about education issues. Makes you wonder.
I hope that Teachers, grandparents, parents and students will UNITE TO SAY “NO” and TO VOTE “NO” TO ALL “BAD POLITICIANS who”:
1) HARM the American PUBLIC EDUCATION System,
2) BULLY TEACHERS and WORKERS OF ALL TRADES.
3) GIVE bad countries – corporate, communist, or dictatorial – like Russia and China the opportunity to INVADE the American ECONOMY and to invade North America’s DEMOCRACY.
In short, immigrants or “poor uneducated” voters or irresponsible CITIZENS like Senators or House of Representatives who are easily bought off by the crooked, corrupted CORPORATE need TO BE PUBLICLY EXPOSED by conscientious citizens who are responsible to society and their own country’s welfare, like all conscientious veteran teachers and readers in this specific EDUCATIONAL BLOG from Dr. Ravitch.
Please positively and SERIOUSLY say NO and vote NO to all BAD RECORD POLITICIANS in this Presidential Election in 2020 = all citizens from POOR to WELL TO DO classes who can prove that AMERICANS are truly conscientious citizens who are responsible to society and their own American Welfare.
Yes, American CITIZENS are willing to have all BAD POLITICIANS to taste their own failure = VOTE NO to “BAD RECORD” presidential candidate who belongs to any parties whether he/she is representative of Red, Blue or Green Party. Back2basic
I can’t support any DFER.
I have never really understood the choice mantra. My taxes were not tuition for my children, and they certainly are not intended for someone’s individual use now that I have no children in the system. They were and are meant to support the education of every child in my community. Parents are not entitled to a chunk of that money to be used how they see fit. That money is for the common good. For me, I don’t even have to get into the discussion of charter machinations. They are beside the point.
“My taxes were not tuition for my children…They were and are meant to support the education of every child in my community.”
Very, very well said!
Well put…
Are there any candidates who explicitly do not support charters?
AOC said Justice Democrats had plans to primary Hakeem Jeffries over the charter school issue.
I do not understand. Does this mean, Jeffries doesn’t support charters?
AOC and Justice Democrats will back Jeffries’s opponent in a primary. They are going try to find a strong Democratic candidate who supports public schools to run against Jeffries.
The AFT should have done the same against Susan Davis of California.
Big $$$$$.
I do not understand. People with big $$$$ do support charters.
This is the review I wrote for myself after reading the revised edition of Diane’s “The Death and Life of…” I come back to it often to refresh my talking points when I discuss public education with anyone who will listen:
Some things you read make you want grab the shoulders of anyone within reach and yell, “Dammit, pay attention to this!” This is one of those times. Diane Ravitch may well be America’s preeminent civic educator; her prism is education, but her writing exposes seminal truths about the U.S. She explains the history and politics of public education during the past few decades and how the issue has been one of the few areas of bipartisan agreement over that span—to the detriment of the nation. Americans and readers around the world trying to make sense of contemporary U.S. politics should consider picking up this masterful analysis and call to action. This edition is substantially revised and updated from the 2009 edition; so if you read that one, get this too.
In the Reagan years, the education report “A Nation at Risk” created a false narrative that public schools were experiencing systemic failure. In 2002, the Bush “No Child Left Behind” (NCLB) codified these fictions and put the federal government in the driver’s seat to dictate K-12 curriculum which, throughout American history, was locally controlled. Even though federal funding is only about ten percent of all local education funding, NCLB provided incentives that cash-strapped states and school districts found hard to resist.
NCLB promoted a “measure and punish” ideology that made standardized tests on literacy and math the center of the education universe and gave birth to a “teaching to the test” mentality. It applied to all grades, crowding out many subjects and creative time that couldn’t be measured. It demoralized and denigrated the teaching profession by distilling their worth and value into meaningless standardized test scores. Their job security—or lack of it—was linked to these numbers. NCLB also opened the door for business interests with no experience in classrooms to impose their market-driven ideas of “disruption” in everything from curriculum development to school management. But as Ravitch repeats many times, children don’t thrive in times of disruption. They need stability like neighborhood schools that serve as social anchors in their communities.
Critics of NCLB who hoped for relief were in for a rude awakening when the Obama administration created “Race to the Top” (RTTT). It was “NCLB on steroids.” It further marginalized teachers and local school boards by dangling $4-5 billion in competitive funds to states to adopt its mandated approaches to education that favored “school choice” and vouchers over traditional public schools. Choice was sold as a way to allow parents to choose different schools for their children if their local schools were “failing.” Vouchers extract public funds to benefit charter, private and religious schools. Together, choice and vouchers opened funding spigots for unproven schemes like charters and scams like electronic distance learning with little to no oversight or accountability by non- or for-profit operators.
Ravitch describes how billionaires like Bill and Melinda Gates, Eli Broad, the Walton family, hedge fund entrepreneurs, and others usurped local control with unaccountable, ideologically driven consultants. These “reformers” promoted free-market ideas. Their money created and accelerated acceptance of Common Core, an ill-conceived, top-down, homogenous national curriculum. Adoption of it was a prerequisite to access their funds. They drove the wholesale expansion of charter schools and privatization of public school infrastructure. They used their money to dictate to educators what and how to teach, even though they had no experience in classrooms or educational administration. Ravitch details how they spent vast sums on advocacy to buy off virtually every think tank, education organization, and governmental association to bypass democratic control of education and force their ideas on school systems throughout the nation. For example, Betsy DeVos, Trump’s billionaire Secretary of Education nominee, is one of the most fanatical, consistent advocates of voucher policies to divert public funds to charter and religious schools. Her efforts in her home state of Michigan have created the educational equivalent of the Flint water crisis.
According to Ravitch, “the root causes of poor achievement are…in the social and economic conditions in which children live.” Schools in more affluent districts have higher scores, making them more likely to succeed; those in areas with higher poverty have lower test scores, making them more prone to “fail” because of unrealistic standards and conditions. She exposes the myopic fallacies of NCLB, RTTT, and the billionaires, including goals to have all students achieve unattainable levels of “proficiency” of testable, approved subject matter. Under this mindset, all students were somehow supposed to reach the upper quartile of achievement, a mirage that Ravitch quashes with a bit of reality: “common sense suggests that any system of measurement that produces a top quartile will also produce three other quartiles.” RTTT’s unattainable standards wrongly stigmatized schools and teachers as “failing” and, as a result, “public confidence in public education and in the education profession declined.”
She exposes school choice as a ruse that, far from giving parents options, actually allows charter and voucher schools to cherry pick students to raise their cumulative test scores. As these schools rob money and resources from public schools, they are left with the task of educating children with developmental and learning disabilities as well as poorer and lower achieving students who, ironically, require more resources and nurturing, not less. Yet, the U.S. is “one of the few nations in the world that spend more on affluent students than on poor students.” These policies also create de facto segregation. “Yet,” as Ravitch concludes, “‘reformers’ choose to ignore poverty and segregation and pretend they don’t matter.” Indeed, choice policies are “no substitute for medical care, good jobs, adequate nutrition, sound housing, and safe communities” which impact every student’s potential.
As Ravitch makes clear throughout this book, American public education is arguably the most important institution that has sustained the U.S. throughout its history. Public schools are much more than centers of learning. “The basic responsibility of public education is to develop a sense of citizenship, an understanding of democracy, and a readiness to help improve one’s community and society.” Healthy communities are built around healthy public schools. Yet, for many policymakers and profiteers, schools and students have become commodities to reap short term economic profit. “No other high performing nation in the world” does the things that are being done to public education in the U.S. Rather than use education policy to value children as investments in our nation’s future, policy in the U.S. has put public education’s very existence at stake. And to make it even worse, the nation has now elected a president, Congress, state legislatures, and local governments who might destroy it. That is why Ravitch’s explanations and arguments are more important than ever. Dammit, pay attention to this!
Greg
Your “conversations” idea is imperative. The talking points have to be short. And IMO, they need to start and build from the billionaires’ takeover of community schools. It should resonate with friends and family that they will no longer have a say in how their taxes are spent, how much money leaves the community and goes to Silicon Valley, what the community loses socially when students have one public option, buying branded schools-in-a box at Walmart.
I have found that just one discussion session fails to convince. I’m unclear about the resistance but, I think it’s related to two things. People believe they should already be aware of it if its a big deal. That’s where Gates’ reputation, dollars and takeover of Democratic messaging about education has had profound effect. Secondly, the PR messaging from the right wing which includes Gates, is crafted very well e.g. falsely labeling charter schools as “public”, Black leaders receiving grants to sell the idea to the public that people of color want choice, that opposition is limited to unionized teachers, etc.
The most damning, easily understood evidence to cite against Bill Gates, is the millions he spent to defeat judges who rendered verdicts favorable to public schools.
I agree with you wholeheartedly, Linda. We all need to find our own voices and we have to make an effort to educate and convert those who don’t get it, especially when they are open to our arguments. I’m also going to steal the quote I cited above from speduktr, it says a whole lot in few words.
Yes, that was a great quote.
Thank you, Diane.
I deeply and wholeheartedly appreciate Dr. Ravitch who unconditionally cares about American Public Education.
Thanks to Dr. Ravitch’s Educational Blog, I have learned many valuable ideas not only from Dr. Ravitch. the BEST America’s preeminent civic educator (according to Greg B and to many other readers) but also from many Guru Master Veteran Teachers and all conscientious readers in this educational blog.
First of all, English is not my first language so I do my best to articulate whatever I endure from both Capitalism (from VN until I left in 1978) and Communism (April, 30th,1975 – 1978) plus observing and watching documentary films about Fascism in the Second World War and Holocausts (gas chambers) from Germany, Czechoslovakia, Auschwitz-Birkenau and many more in history.)
From what I have read today, I am extremely disturbed by the naivety and ignorance from all greedy corporate, new-young-inexperienced with cruelty immigrants, materialistic both colored and white House Representatives, and Senators who are easily bought off by corrupted, greedy corporate.
If commoners cannot understand academic language, then all veteran teachers should create certain SIMPLE strategy to cultivate and educate students from Middle schools and High schools at grade levels 8 – 12 = age 13 – 18 including all new teachers at age 23 – 43
IMHO, there are THREE BASIC questions needed to ask and to have a debate in all classrooms.
1) Have all of you acknowledged that any FASCIST and COMMUNIST countries in the world allow “commoners” citizens (NOT communist official above average ranking) to have the VERY BASIC NECESSARY compassionate HUMANITY rights, SUCH AS:
a) To learn as much as they have a potential?
b) To do business within its country?
c) To freely travel within its country?
d) To have a decent living lifestyle?
e) To have ENOUGH foods and clothes to live on daily living?
2) Why many talented people in all over the world try to emigrate from where they were born in order to immigrate to more humanitarian countries in the world?
3) Can you justify WHY you maintain your SAVAGE TRADITIONAL CULTURE from a country where you cannot tolerate the ruler and decide to emigrate from? For instance, in Muslim culture, men have Honor killing right against women like wife and daughters according to its Islam’s Sharia law (=savage laws.)
In this Western World, humanity for JUSTICE SYSTEM should be educated and cultivated to all young and old CITIZENS of both colored and white whether they are immigrants, or born from a mixed raced marriage
.
One positive and serious PUNISHMENT to all killers like a stiff fine then a jail term and finally expel them back to where they believe to live in WITHOUT KILLING or feeding them in a long term jail to all killers who use their own excuses about their original religious BELIEF in order to VIOLATE the Western Humanitarian LOVE and RESPECT for all living SENTIENT BEINGS including domestic animals like dogs and cats. Back2basic.