As I reported earlier, I had a long conversation about education policy with top staff in the Bernie Sanders campaign. Among other things, I explained that charters are a first step on the privatization path that leads to vouchers and that charters cause deep cuts to public schools. I emphasized that charter schools are privately managed and areNOT public schools.
I could not have been clearer in warning that charters that get high scores “succeed” by screening out the kids they don’t want.
So Bernie’s campaign issued a statement on public schools this morning. The big message: Reinvest in public schools.
But this is point one:
- We must make sure that charter schools are truly serving the needs of disadvantaged children.
This ignores the fact that charter schools are not public schools. They are privately managed. They are free to choose their students and free to expel those they don’t want.
This ignores the fact that the NAACP called for a charter moratorium. The ACLU of Southern California criticized charters for discriminating against and excluding students with disabilities and ELLS. The Southern Poverty Law Center filed suit against charters in Mississippi for seeking to divert public funds from public schools, contrary to the state constitution.
How can the federal government “make sure” that charters are meeting the needs of disadvantaged students when they are free to exclude them and when charter lobbyists write the state laws?
Can Bernie learn?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It’s becoming obvious that Bernie is trying to thread the needle on charter schools. In 2016 it was that he was only supportive of “public” charter schools. Now this. I think we’re seeing willful ignorance. Very disappointing.
Anyone else we can turn to?
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The US dept of Education just gave eva moskowitch 10 million dollars to start new charters schools
1. no doubt that devos is responsible and why only success gets all this money
2. I thought there was a charter cap in NYC now?
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Some Eva Moskowitz tweets, quotes and writings:
“I believe Betsy DeVos has the talent, commitment and leadership capacity to revitalize our public schools and deliver the promise of opportunity that excellent education provides, and I support her nomination as U.S. Secretary of Education.”
“Thrilled to see such a passionate leader selected for such an important role. I know Betsy will continue to be an advocate for all children”
And Moskowitz even took time from her busy schedule to write her very own op ed excoriating the Democrats like Sen. Elizabeth Warren for not voting to confirm the woman that Moskowitz DEMANDED be confirmed.
https://nypost.com/2017/01/30/why-we-need-an-outsider-like-betsy-devos-as-education-secretary/
Oh yes, when DeVos turned out to be just as horrible as everyone knew she’d be, did Moskowitz apologize? Acknowledge her mistake? No, she is still a true believer!!!
Here is the “harshest” criticism Moskowitz has ever made about DeVos: ““I believe her heart is in the right place,” but “she’s not ready for prime time”.
How nice that Eva Moskowitz is still so certain that DeVos’ heart is in the right place! DeVos’ heart is in exactly the same “right place” as Eva Moskowitz’ heart is!
Ten million is such a small reward for such hard work. No doubt DeVos is pleased to give the grant to a “kindred spirit” like Eva Moskowitz.
Moskowitz and DeVos. Kindred spirits. Why shouldn’t they help one another?
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Careful. As Voltaire said, “The best is the enemy of the good.” And, Confucius followed (or actually led): “Better a diamond with a flaw than a pebble without.”
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Makes you wonder who the Ann O’Leary of the campaign is.
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https://www.cleveland.com/open/2012/05/ohio_sen_nina_turner_at_odds_w.html Nina Turner
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Interesting. I supported Turner and attended a couple of her intimate fundraisers when she ran for Ohio Sec. of State. I wrote her a while ago asking to meet with her to discuss how Bernie could build a public education constituency and specifically mentioned that she should get in touch with Diane. Crickets.
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The article referenced is from 2012. What has Turner said recently, after Ohio lost $1 bil. to charters and, after the recent frauds were uncovered in Dayton and elsewhere?
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Bernie is sold as a radical but in most of the world he’d be considered a moderate. That just goes to show you how far to the right this country has gone.
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Yes, I’ve been making this point for years. We have an unbalanced political spectrum that is disingenuously charactered as a “far left to far right” balanced line. Bernie is, by any fair, honest standard, center-left. I’ve said it before and I’ll write it again: we have no corresponding far left as compared to the very real far right we have in this nation. That’s why those on the right have to keep hammering the “socialism” lie.
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Bingo
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That makes it easy for me to unsubscribe from Bernie’s e-mail pleas for donations and to get rid of my Bernie paraphernalia.
When Diane lets us know who cares about America’s most important common good, I’ll get on that politician’s bandwagon as long as its not GOP.
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I wonder whether this is “not getting it” or rather a political judgment that many potential “progressive” voters still embrace the “opportunity to escape” mantra of charter advocates. Disappointing. Like everything with candidates, it will only change with political pressure. We need to keep mobilizing and pushing.
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Fully agree.
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In a debate with Hillary Clinton he was asked if there was any billionaire he respected. His answer was Bill Gates. He will go on about the Koch brothers. But maybe he is trying. Time will tell.
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I’ve been wrong before, most notably in 2008. That said, I think “We must make sure that charter schools are truly serving the needs of disadvantaged children” can be read as an acceptance of privatization or can be read as a well crafted political policy statement against the billionaires behind charters. It suggests that charters are not doing what they say they are intended to do, but without demonizing charter parents and teachers by (even though it would be rightly) blaming their schools for draining funds from public schools.
It understates the problem, but that might be wise for someone running for president. The federal government needs to stop funding charters. We here know this. This statement from Bernie 2020 instead perhaps suggests we need charter oversight and regulation, and certainly a re-thinking of any charter mystique. I hope regulation is the road to a moratorium and eventual cessation of federal support for privatization. I hope Bernie knows that charters are the darlings of billionaires. Something tells me he does.
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What tells you that Bernie does know this? Diane Ravitch spent a lot of time talking to his staff and Bernie’s response is no different than a DFER democrat would say.
I’m not condemning Bernie because he happens to be very wrong on this issue. No candidate is perfect. Let’s not confuse a candidate having a position that happens to align perfectly with DFER or CAP with them being the total tool of DFER and CAP.
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Follow the money.
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I am with LeftCoastTeacher on this one.
I think Bernie probably thought of charters in the last campaign as they were proposed by Albert Shanker. Public School teachers being given the freedom to experiment in Public Schools free of Central control. Of course, that is not now nor ever has been the reality.
So the simple statement :
“We must make sure that charter schools are truly serving the needs of disadvantaged children.”
Is an acknowledgment that they are not and never have been serving the goal of “truly serving the needs of disadvantaged children”
So as LeftCoast said, “follow the money”. Are Charter operators, their employees, the parents funnelling boatloads of money to Sanders in $27 donations.
But the Public Record is available.
I doubt that. So what is the motive of a strong labor supporter other than Left Coasts statement?
“a well crafted political policy statement against the billionaires behind charters. It suggests that charters are not doing what they say they are intended to do, but without demonizing charter parents and teachers by (even though it would be rightly) blaming their schools for draining funds from public schools.”
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Joel,
I think you are probably right about Bernie.
But I note that HRC was certainly never given that benefit of the doubt, and she actually made one of the strongest statements pointing out the problems with charters that I have ever heard by any politician. Bernie endorsed Tom Perriello, refused to endorse Cynthia Nixon against Cuomo, and despite his staff talking to Diane now goes on record as never ever once saying anything about what is wrong with charters. He says a lot about what’s wrong with the people who fund them but that can all be solved by simply directing more public money to charters, right?
It’s true that HRC did not continue to point out what was wrong with charters, but at least she said it once. People claim HRC didn’t keep saying it because she was afraid of the DFER money. Not because she didn’t want to make parents who chose charters feel bad.
I find that people bend over backward when Bernie does something wrong. His statement about how white people who refused to vote for an African-American candidate weren’t really racist was one of the most appallingly racist statements said by a major candidate. I get it — he didn’t mean it the way it sounded and we need to give him the benefit of the doubt.
I just find the hypocrisy to be interesting, especially when it is yet another white male who always gets a pass while a woman gets torn apart for doing the same thing. (Unless that woman is Betsy DeVos, in which case we must keep repeating the mantra that she’s better than the Democrat).
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NYC public school parent
It is tough to hear the poor Hillary rant once again. When you say people attacked her(in the primary). Start naming the people. Start with Elected Democrats then you can name Media outfits Print or Broadcast. Did WaPo run 21 negative articles about Hillary in one day?
Did the Dailly News hand the transcript to Bernie’s team before issuing
an endorsement of him and a takedown of Hillary?
Did Chris Mathews hold a Hillary Town Hall that looked like a Mixed Martial Arts match between the Host and the Candidate?
And we are seeing it again. The two candidates who have taken serious economic policy positions are being dismissed by the corporate media. While the “hope and change born to run” candidates that will do and have done no harm to the corporate bottom line are boosted.
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Joel, I agree.
Relative to Hillary- defense of an anointed candidate begins on shaky ground.
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Yes, poor Bernie, no other candidate in history has ever been the subject of negative media. Why the media could not have been nicer to Michael Dukakis, John Kerry, Al Gore, Howard Dean. They were always out to get Bernie but oh so nice to HRC, treated her with the kid gloves they treat Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar.
In fact, the media’s kindness to HRC was reflected in this poll (article written 11/2/2016:
http://time.com/4554576/donald-trump-trustworthy-hillary-clinton/
“More voters trust Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton, according to a new tracking poll released Wednesday.
The Republican presidential nominee leads his Democratic rival on honesty and trustworthiness by eight points in a Washington Post-ABC News poll, which found 46% of likely voters saying Trump is more honest and deserving of trust.”
The reason that voters didn’t trust HRC had nothing to do with how many times she visited Wisconsin.
Only one Democrat in recent history did not get the character attack treatment that seems to have already destroyed Elizabeth Warren. That candidate is Barack Obama. By election time, voters had not decided that Obama was a (insert “liar”, “exaggerator”, “crooked”, “crazy”, “mean to the nicer people who work for her”, etc.)
Voters may be racist, but they didn’t have doubts about Obama’s character. But voters did have doubts about the character of Kerry, Gore, HRC, Dean, Warren, Klobuchar, Dukakis. If Bernie wins and by Nov. 2020 voters have doubts about his character, too, who will you blame?
We can continue to blame Kerry, Gore, HRC, Dean, Warren, Klobuchar, Dukakis, etc and insist that they were all exactly as the media portrays them and they deserved to lose because they were imperfect. We can say that Obama never got portrayed by the media as the “liar, exaggerator, crooked”, etc. and that is because he achieved the perfection that other candidates need to meet. If a Democrat wants to win, their character must be perfect, like Obama’s, and if not it is their own fault when they lose. Does Bernie’s character meet that standard?
Or we can recognize the real problem and fight to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
Bernie doesn’t deserve it. But neither did Gore, Dukakis, Dean, Kerry, HRC, Warren, Klobuchar and all the other decent people whose character got destroyed — although certainly some people seem to still believe they all deserved it and that’s the only reason it happened. Just remember that if it happens to Bernie.
If the media spends the next year reminding voters about how many doubts so many Democrats have about how racist Bernie really is and if 80% of the voters decide Bernie is racist because the media keeps talking about how many voters have serious doubts about Bernie’s racist comments about white people not voting for African-American, will that be Bernie’s fault or the media’s?
See how easy it is to make any misstep into a character attack and blame the candidate?
I think it is short sighted to think that just whining that the media is unfair will change anything. That’s exactly what Kerry, Gore, Dukakis, HRC, Dean, etc. did. If Dems want to win, they need to address this ugly character assassination that happens to their candidates and bring it out into the open so that voters recognize it as the false propaganda it is. If all we do is say “yeah, the candidate did do that terrible thing and obviously I do have questions about their character and it’s their own fault that the voters don’t trust them”, then it will be near impossible for us to win.
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NYC public school parent
You are conflating two different issues. So how was the poll worded? Was there a follow-up question? Like: In spite of who you trust who are you voting for?
Aren’t those the critical questions you have to ask?
The poll was taken in Oct of 16. In the heat of the Comey letter.
On Nov 9 of 16; 3 million more Americans voted for Clinton. 40% didn’t vote.
Clintons untrustworthiness on the left was cemented long before the primaries and it had more to do with policy. The Left was sick of the NDC DLC wing of the Democratic Party who made pretty speeches and pursued Neo-Liberal corporate-friendly policies like Charter Schools. Yes, Michael Bloomberg on the stage of the Democratic Convention.
Being better than a Republican any Republican may get my vote. It won’t get my trust.
The fact that “Democrats fight with Pillows while Republicans take headshots” is a different issue. Clinton found to do the same things as Trump; would have been impeached in May of 17 if the Republicans were even in the Minority. And that was long before the Trump Tower meeting or any of the other nefarious information went public.
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Joel,
I’d believe you if what happened to HRC didn’t happen to Dukakis, Gore, Kerry, Dean, Warren and a host of other candidates.
What happened to HRC was a repeat — using different propaganda — of what happened to every Democrat that looked too dangerous. The so-called “liberal” media destroyed their character.
It didn’t happen to Obama. Obama made the same so-called “missteps” that every candidate has made, but he wasn’t mischaracterized for it.
It won’t surprise me if it happens to Bernie (although I expect we won’t know until after the primary because if he’s not the candidate the far right won’t bother). It depends whether Democrats decide to join in instead of strongly defend them.
It’s the difference between “questions are raised and even Democrats are extremely concerned about the candidate’s character and what that says about him/her” and saying “these are a bunch of lies and propaganda used to smear a great candidate fighting for policies that the greedy far right billionaires don’t want middle class and poor Americans to benefit from”.
It’s not as if what happened to HRC was unique. It happens all the time. It happened to Russ Feingold for goodness sake. Should I blame Russ? Is it all his fault that a far right wing Republican who never did anything for any working class person soundly defeated him? Is it because Russ was a terrible candidate who didn’t deserve to win and we need to get a real progressive who isn’t so corrupt like Russ is to run next time? Because otherwise working class voters will support the guy who makes their lives miserable, lowers the minimum wage, and takes away their health insurance?
Who gets the blame if Bernie wins the primary and loses the general election? I don’t want to say I told you so. Believe me, during the 2016 election when certain folks on here were posting the most reprehensibly dishonest character attacks on HRC and I begged them to stop repeating right wing propaganda, everyone thought I was worrying for nothing. I WANTED to be wrong. I would be happy to be proven wrong this time. I hope all those people smug enough to believe that Bernie is immune to character attacks because everyone who gets smeared with a character attack – Gore, Kerry, HRC — had no one but themselves to blame — are right. I will be happy to have whoever wins the primary escape unscathed to defeat Trump. I’ll be thrilled to have you say to me “I told you so”. I wish I had to eat my words in 2016. I’ve seen too many good Democratic candidates go down to character attacks against some truly reprehensible Republicans to believe it all just their own fault for being so awful.
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Does this mean that Bernie, like Cory Booker and Beto O’Rourke are not REAL Democrats? Even as an advocate for a certain type of charter school, I understand your displeasure with the charter school movement, Diane. There have been way too many bad stories. But I have also seen a great many good stories of charter schools being able to do great things because they were not constrained by district conformity.
I’m ready for a stream of invective from your followers, but it does not behoove us to take maximalist positions on this. There are good and bad district schools and there are good and bad charter schools some of which (many, in fact) are terrific examples of community-centric, democratic public education. We excoriate these politicians and, by extension the thousands of families who send their kids to charter schools, at the collective risk of becoming the circular firing squad that Republicans are drooling over.
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Steven,
You work for the charter industry. Charters by definition are privately managed. DeVos wants more.
Bernie should distinguish himself from Duncan and DeVos.
The only charters I would support are those that seek out the most troubled kids and use their freedom to help them while collaborating with the public schools. Instead we have a plethora of greedy, Test-score driven, no excuses boot camps called charters, owned and operated by entrepreneurs, amateurs, profiteers and grifters.
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This is disappointing. I hope Bernie and his staff are reading this blog.
I AGREE: “Bernie should distinguish himself from Duncan and DeVos..”
What can we do? This is still a democracy and teachers have voices and we vote.
Let’s make sure Bernie reads this post. Retweet this to Bernie with a note.
Write letters.
Call his office.
Act.
Contact your professional orgs. You are members.
Be proactive.
So much is at stake.
I still believe in democracy.
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I don’t work for the charter industry. I serve as the director of an organization that represents independent, self-managed charter schools. There are a great many schools in our organization that fit exactly the model you describe and no one is profiteering off of them. We have no use for no-excuses or test-prep factories. I have also founded two charter schools in Queens and I know what these schools mean to the community – because I hang out in the playgrounds and pubs with parents. One of the schools has a union contract and the other does not — both are delightful places. If I didn’t agree with a lot of what you have to say I wouldn’t bother writing. If the issue were as black-white as you say, more Democratic politicians would be taking the maximalist position you suggest. But they are not. And the reason is that they are aware of their constituents. The charter world needs reform — blowing it up is not the solution.
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Are you aware that 90% of all charters are nonunion?
Did you know that the anti-union Waltons funded one of every four charters in the US?
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“I don’t work for the charter industry. I serve as the director of an organization that represents independent, self-managed charter schools.”
Who pays your organization, the charter schools? Then you work for the charter industry.
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Steven Zimmerman,
I have read your op eds. You are terrified to write anything that won’t please the people who fund you. You sound a lot like Susan Collins pretending to be “independent” and saying “tut tut” while she enables the far right Republicans. You pretend to be “independent while you enable the worst practices of the worst of the charters.
So to you, Eva Moskowitz is just doing so many good things and is just misunderstood. You represent charters who refuse to be like Brooklyn New School or the Children’s School and respect children but instead insist on being “free” to do things like suspend as many 5 and 6 year olds as they want while Steve Zimmerman won’t say a word of criticism.
Because isn’t that what charters are all about! If they want to experiment with suspending children and humiliate them, you’ll be the Susan Collins who always supports them even if you claim you wouldn’t do such a thing yourself.
The worst of the charters need you to enable them. They know they own you. You’ll attack one of their “enemies” before you’ll offer a word of criticism toward a charter who might tell your funders and get you in trouble. Your loyalty is to your bank account. Seriously, I find that people like you who spew one line and enable exactly the opposite are the worst of the bunch.
If you really want to stand up for something, then criticize the charters that deserve criticism. Nothing is stopping you just like nothing is stopping Susan Collins from criticizing Trump except that both of you care much more about keeping your jobs than doing the right thing.
I suspect you have convinced yourself you are different than Eva Moskowitz. Just like Susan Collins believes she is different than Mitch McConnell. You are the Susan Collins of the charter movement.
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^^^upon re-reading my post, I want to apologize to Steven Zimmerman. I was wrong to take the bait when you posted “I’m ready for a stream of invective from your followers. So I’m sorry I can’t edit my post.
What I should have simply pointed out is that I have read things you have written and notice that you refrain from any criticism of powerful charters but you certainly don’t refrain from criticism of their critics. And you mischaracterize legitimate criticism of charters and their CEOs by equating it with “excoriation” of the parents who send their kids there.
You remind me of Susan Collins. It’s quite possible you don’t have the same issues with Sen. Collins as I do, so perhaps you can take that as a compliment.
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Steven Zimmerman
All 50 state boards of eduction have representatives “governing” an organization that ostensibly is theirs- the Gates-funded SETDA which additionally has “gold, silver, event and strategic partners”. An outsider can reasonably deduce that state employees are fronting for the tech industry. My state board identified organizations that they work with, CAST, CCSSO, NASBE, and Future Ready (an organization that asks superintendents to make a “pledge” to it’s goals). Those four groups are also funded by Gates.
Until the charter industry resoundingly rejects Bill Gates, education’s oligarch, you and it will never have credibility.
Diane Ravitch has stature because she is democracy’s hero protecting communities, educational integrity and the interests of students individually and as a whole.
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“(many, in fact)”
😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣
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pardon my excoriating, but I was faced with Rex Sinquefield lobbyist Laura Slay, (Her brother was the mayor who demanded a takeover of the public schools…12 years now…when the people voted for the wrong school board candidates. You look like a white guy administrator on your site. No law against that.
http://interact.stltoday.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=1313618
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There is no longer any such thing as a charter doing great things because charters are no longer small in number. Every charter now contributes to the charter chain funding drain on public schools. Any great things done are vastly outweighed by the inequities of having dual competing systems (one democratic, one antidemocratic (and anti-union)). It’s getting redundant having to explain that.
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LCT,
YOU HIT THE NAIL ON THE HEAD! What is the point of having two competing publicly funded school systems, one free to pick its students, makes its own rules, and the other required to take all who walk in the door?
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LCT,
Please tell that to Bernie. He obviously doesn’t care about Diane Ravitch’s opinion.
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Bernie,
There is no point having two competing publicly funded school systems.
LCT
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“There is no longer any such thing as a charter doing great things because charters are no longer small in number.” Yup. They played the odds for 20 yrs, then they hit TILT, the point at which the sand foundation is revealed (to mix metaphors). The national average only ticked from 5% to 6%. But charter-happy locales have reached anywhere from 15-50%. Just eyeballing it, 10% seems to be when the house starts listing enough to become evident to the public [OH, MI] . 14-15% & part of the house is in the basement [FL]. In the upper ranges [Detroit, DC, NOLA], pro-charter argument shifts to “Well the public schools were already terrible anyway.”
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I am not a single issue voter, nor think that anyone can afford to be.
LOOK at everything else Bernie is saying and wants to do. I beseech each and everyone of you here!
Redistribution of wealth as had been done in the 30s and 60s were major movements that changed our democracy and that are under siege right now. Bernie wants the same, and we desperately need it as a middle and working class.
Yes, I am against charter schools and school privatization also! But I ain’t throwing out the Bernie with the bath water!!! Nor should you.
Hey Diane, I hope you will support Sanders and AOC regardless of their paths. You seem to from what I can tell, but I find the posting today to imply some “ambivalence”. But that’s merely my perception, not a statement of fact or criticism.
Even our controversial friend Randi Weingarten is supporting him. Remember, all who read this blog, that there is NO perfect official. . . . . But some are superior to others.
Bernie is no more socialist than FDR, his wife Eleanor, and LBJ!! I am sick and tired of the Pelosi/Schumer corporate democrats, who may as well be liberal Republicans, for lack of a better label (I hate labels because they don’t work!).
I am sticking with Bernie and AOC . . . . Maybe even Warren. We don’t need moderates or centrists. We need a heathy dollop of leftism and European stye redistribution of wealth to pay for the public commons we so badly crave and need and that we are losing each year.
I don’t want to be a democracy in name only. Do you?
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Bernie should also consider that privatization contributes to income inequality. Charters for the most part are anti-union and many of the workers in the charter industry are uncertified and unqualified for the work they do. Charters pay their CEOs and CFOs six figure salaries and the assoicates that work with students are paid much less, often with fewer benefits and lower wages than teachers in public schools. If Bernie wants to see middle class jobs turn into deprofessionalized, low wage jobs, then he should support charters.
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Retired teacher,
You are so right on. Can you write to his office and point this out? Maybe a signed letter by many.
Would this be appropriate for NPE to write a letter%?
We have to do something. Sick of where we are and just so wrong.
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I agree, Retired Teacher!
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It’s a balancing act- how best to move Bernie’s position to protect America’s most important common good while also making it clear that concentrated wealth is the nation’s foremost, present danger. A promise of the votes of all of those who support public schools is no small bloc for Bernie.
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Perfectly put!
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Ms. Ravitch – Thank you for making the attempt with Senator Sanders.
With your connection to Bernie’s staffers, perhaps you can enlighten them about “Project Blitz” (there are a series of articles in the Guardian about it, but this one in particular hits home: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jan/14/christian-nationalists-bills-religious-freedom-project-blitz ) an attempt to “Christianize” the United States.
Thom Hartmann (https://www.thomhartmann.com) had a discussion about it in the first hour of his radio show yesterday (April 15 https://content.production.cdn.art19.com/episodes/d3159e52-26ef-42ea-95fe-833de1a26fff/b3f6f40ed187790c2575d99f6bae786939e17bfdfb26e074f6ea64125afc6e4dff0b3cd28dd539f74073008f72af4736fd0e40fb4d35b69df537c7b9b5c1e79e/THPP_OneHour-ads-2019_0416.mp3). One of the first battle grounds in the “blitz” is through the schools.
“Category 1: Legislation regarding our country’s religious heritage”:
National Motto Display Act: “An act providing for display of the National Motto, “In God We Trust,” in public buildings and on license plates.”
Civic Literacy Act: “An act providing for instruction in the content and meaning of the documents that form the foundation of our country’s Constitutional Republic.” Requires school boards to teach selected founding documents and to allow the posting of others in secondary schools.
Bible Literacy Act: Allows for the teaching of the Bible as an elective course in public schools.”
http://religiondispatches.org/project-blitz-seeks-to-do-for-christian-nationalism-what-alec-does-for-big-business/
Not to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but this is systematic and connected – DeVos, vouchers, billionaires pushing “education reform”, privatization to weaken public schools, the list goes on.
Perhaps connecting the dots for Bernie’s team will help them to understand that public schools need more than lip-service to stem the tide of charters, privatization and worse. Bernie is no stranger to the long-game being played here. Perhaps you can get past his staffers and talk with the man himself?
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Rob,
I will keep pushing for Bernie to take a strong stand. If he does, others will follow.
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Can’t argue with that. Go Diane!
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Many thanks for all you do for our schools, teachers and especially our children!
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I agree, Diane.
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Fear of black female votes who support charters is the reason. The only reason.
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Doug,
Rhetorically
(1) What is the number of Black women who vote in primaries based on their support for charter schools?
(2) Reportedly, 20% of AFT and 33% of NEA members voted for Trump.
Which of the two groups has a greater number of votes and which group is easier to sway?
(Shifts from one candidate within a party to another is easier to achieve than shifts to a different party.)
If Bernie is to be convinced to support public schools, the NPE, AFT and NEA should give him survey results showing the numbers that help his election.
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Anybody with a remote knowledge of the Democratic primary process understands that black women are absolutely critical to success and up to this point, still hopeful that charters an deliver what public schools have not to date.
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Doug,
My understanding is that Black Women belong to the NAACP. The national NAACP wrote a stinging critique of charters and passed a resolution calling for a moratorium on new charters until they stop taking money from public schools and stop excluding kids they don’t want.
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Your understanding is wrong. What NAACP does is only slightly connected to grassroots feelings. Black people have been sold a pack of BS that charters are the only way out of failing schools. They are desperate for a solution.
The analysts at NAACP get the problem but this has not made it to the grass roots. The issue was bitterly contested at the NAACP conventions.
Stop looking for excuses. When black women turn on charters, and they will, charters are finished.
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Have you read the NAACP report on charters that led to the passage of a national resolution calling for a moratorium on 2016? The Task Force on Quality Education held hearings in seven cities. Black women were involved in every step of the process—on the commission and at the hearings. They had a decisive impact on the outcome. Read the testimony, most of it from disappointed black women who tried charters and were disappointed or angry.
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Were all black women in America at the convention? There remains a total disconnect between NAACP and grassroot black support for charters. Why is that a difficult concept?
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No convention includes the entire population. Conventions are representative.
Does the Democratic or Republican convention bring together every Democrat or Republican in the nation?
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You are making my point Diane. The NAACP position as not filtered down to grassroots at this point.
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Oh, yes it has! The NAACP in California and Washington State came out against charters. They are grassroots.
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Wrong. I’m not talking about organized parents in any sense of the word. I WISH. they listened to NAACP. They dont. They listen to charter recruiters. At least for now. Look at Michigan and Detroit. It is as if nobody is listening to NAACP or even following the data.
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Charter enrollment declined in Michigan this year for the first time in 19 years.
My guess is that Detroit parents are getting wise to the charter scam. Too many unfulfilled promises.
When Gov. Snyder, no friend of people of color, created his Educational Achievement Authority, which replaced public schools with charter schools, it was a disaster.
The black children in the EAA were guinea pigs. Eventually the EAA collapsed and no one missed it.
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That is progress but some distance to go. We not only need to eliminate charters. We need to radically reduce poverty and fund schools in poor areas, at least as well as middle class areas.
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And we need to stop saying that a “school is failing” if its scores are low. Its scores reflect who is enrolled, not the quality of the teachers or the school.
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I agree with that.
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The Detroit News reported that charters were “brutal on Black families”.
DeVos doesn’t look (nor dress) like the rest of us. It’s easier to believe that she’s an exploiter than someone who seems like they might be a neighbor who is looking out for us when he sells charter schools and machine learning.
Hoping that exposure of the charter scams gains traction and further reduces enrollment in charters.
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All market based education policy creates winners and losers. Public money should not be used to support this exclusionary system. Charters have failed to deliver on superior academics unless they are highly selective. At the same time they undermine the work of public schools that most students attend. They then have larger classes and fewer resources. Due to the exclusionary practices in many charters, the public schools are left with the most challenging and expensive to educate. However, due to charter drain the public schools are less able to do their best work for all. All the selecting that charters do results in greater segregation.
I find it hard that Bernie would feel that the market based education is appropriate in a democracy. Instead of local control charters are managed by corporations, and people that pay taxes have no right to know where the money goes. I don’t know what the people of Vermont think of this scheme, but I call it “taxation without representation.”
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Well, one could read this charitably as meaning, “There is some question about this, and so we need to see if indeed it is true.”
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I agree.
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All pres. candidates should be pushed on ed policy, esp the private war on charter schls and the looting of the public sector via charters, period. I am going to a “Bernie 2020” mtg near me next wk and will explicitly raise this issue and Bernie’s failure to address it. Go find B20 mtgs near you and do the same thing. We need an uproar from us to get B and all the other candidates on this. This may be a ‘blue wall of silence’ b/c of the power of DFER and other DINO billionaire Dems with deep pockets who love charters; Dem Party has been full throttle behind charters since Sen. Kennedy signed on to NCLB with Bush Jr, since Obama put Duncan in charge of Ed Dept for yrs where he did grand havoc, where NY Gov Cuomo and Mayor DeBlasio among others bow to our local charter Queen Eva. Would Bernie become persona non grata in Dem camp if he opposed charters?
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The political winds are blowing strongly anti-charter. It’s not too late for Bernie to take a stronger stand.
The expose in LA, the expose in NJ, the outrage in Ohio. Even Melinda Gates admits they failed. People are standing up for their public schools.
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If Bernie believes the education he got in Brooklyn, the education Diane got in Houston, or the education I got in Philadelphia have value, then he should support quality public education. It is much harder to get a quality public education in these cities because they have been overrun by and oversaturated with privately managed charter companies that deplete the resources of the public schools. Charters have a parasitic relationship with public schools. As charters get stronger, the public schools get weaker. It is a zero- sum game.
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David Sirota works for the Bernie campaign. He and his wife are strong supporters of public education where David’s wife, Emily, won a school board election in CO running on a pro public ed agenda. Maybe Sirota could be persuaded to educate Bernie’s campaign about the effects of charters on the public system.
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I’m in touch with David Sirota.
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So true.
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“where NY Gov Cuomo and Mayor DeBlasio among others bow to our local charter Queen Eva.”
Ira Shor, how is it helpful not to distinguish between a politician who is rabidly pro-charter and one that has done almost everything he LEGALLY can to slow the pace of their expansion? One who has spent his entire mayoralty working hard for a more progressive Albany so that a few far right Democrats don’t caucus with the Republicans to make sure that Eva Moskowitz gets everything she wants.
Are you saying that Cuomo, Sanders, Warren among others bow to their DFER masters?
I do remember Bernie Sanders standing right next to Cuomo when he was losing popularity to make sure Cuomo got praised through the roof for his “free college”**
** well not really free but who cares if Bernie loved and it stood next to him on stage to praise him?
Look who Bernie chooses to endorse and not endorse:
https://www.politico.com/story/2017/04/bernie-sanders-endorses-tom-perriello-236858
There is an old saying:
When a man shows you who he is, believe him.
I used to think Bernie just didn’t know enough about K-12 education. But now that I know Diane spoke to his campaign officials, it just seems that when he said he supports “good public charters”, he meant it.
I really hope this will stop people from answering all criticism of Betsy DeVos and her harmful policies with the phrase “at least she’s better than Arne”. All she does it let DFER’s pretend to be progressive by opposing her.
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I think we are now supposed to rant and rail about how Bernie is just doing this to please his corporate masters who control him and he is a progressive in name only and plans to do whatever rich people tell him to do.
I think we are supposed to slime Bernie and say that it’s so good that Bernie didn’t win the nomination because at least Betsy DeVos is really “good” in making people realize how bad the education reformers are. Can we now stop saying that all the evils that DeVos is doing are something to think is “better”?
I don’t believe that. There is still a good chance I will vote for Bernie. But if a supposed “non-progressive” who actually supports public schools like Tim Kaine throws his hat in the ring, or if a different candidate proves that he or she isn’t the tool or the privatizers, I will support that one.
Just remember that progressives give the benefit of the doubt to Bernie even if he mouths a position that is no different than DFER’s. Let’s do that with ALL the candidates running as a Democrat.
And if DeVos isn’t enough to show someone like Bernie that the education reform movement is bad, then let’s stop pretending that it’s “better” that she is in power to do the harm she is doing.
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NYC-
What is the source of Bernie’s campaign funds vs. the source of HRC’s?
What was the average or median size of the donations?
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Why does your question matter if Bernie and HRC take exactly the same positions on the issue?
I don’t think Trump’s terrible positions on issues are okay because he gets lots of small donations (as he claims he is getting).
Can we get back to talking about the candidates on the issues? Or is that only something that applies to Bernie?
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The number of Bernie’s small donations, each from a different individual, is one indicator of the number of people who support his positions.
If Trump receives a $100,000 donation re-routed from a foreign person/government/business, it shows nothing about his voting support. If he receives millions from a PAC representing a single entity, it reflects no indicator of his support at large other than the ability to do media buys.
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Additionally, small contributions usually reflect a sacrifice from a meager income which shows commitment to a candidate. The result is
greater likelihood to vote and to convince friends and family to vote for the candidate.
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I truly do not know what your point is. Are you suggesting that Bernie’s contributors like his DFER position on charters so critics should not talk about it?
Notice I am not attacking Bernie’s character. He took a position on charters that happens to please corporate Democrats but that doesn’t mean he embraces the entire corporate Democrat agenda. I will judge Bernie on the entirety of his platform – most of which I support even if – in my opinion — it isn’t nearly as well thought out as Elizabeth Warren’s platform and contains a lot more platitudes. If Bernie actually changes his mind and starts speaking honestly about charters instead of giving progressive credibility to them, I will not say that he can’t be trusted because he previously had a different position.
Is it okay with you if I do that? Bernie is allowed to take whatever position he wants and if it happens to align with corporate democrats then in that instance, let’s all agree that Bernie happens to believe the same thing they do about charters. It does’t warrant a character attack on Bernie, although I’m sure Trump’s Russia propaganda pals are working one up now so that they can mischaracterize Bernie as a tool of DFER. He is not.
All I ask is that we refrain from character attacks on all candidates. Bernie deserves the benefit of the doubt, but so did all the progressive candidates who got trashed by some (not all) of Bernie’s supporters who cherry picked one thing and pretended nothing else matter.
Character matters. And having a opinion about charters that happens to align with DFER does not warrant a character attack. It does warrant people pointing out that this person’s position on charters is not good and may warrant looking for a different progressive candidate whose position on K-12 education is better. But that is the choice of each primary voter. There may be no one running with a better position (which tells you the whole false meme about Betsy DeVos being “good” because now people would be turned off of ed reformers was wrong and merely helped to legitimize the DFERs). But if there is, then primary voters should be able to decide.
I just wish the character attacks would stop and we keep to issues. Connecting a contribution to a candidate as if that is the reason the candidate does what he does is just like saying that if a teachers’ union gives money to a candidate, that candidate is only taking a position because he does the bidding of the teachers union and all he cares about is making the teachers union richer at the expense of everyone else. That’s a character attack because anyone who said that wants voters to believe that this candidate is owned by the teachers’ union and not to be trusted because he or she will do anything no matter how corrupt that the union demands even if it hurts Americans.
Candidates take positions and they should be evaluated on those positions. Not based on a smear that the candidate you don’t like takes that position because a union or DFER contributes to their campaign and a candidate you do like takes that position because he just doesn’t know enough about the issue and we must excuse it when he takes a position that we don’t like.
I don’t care WHY a candidate takes a position. I just want to know when that position aligns with mine and when it aligns with policies that are very destructive to public education. And I will look for candidates whose positions reflect the vision I hope for this country on the issues I care the most about.
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I am hoping we will hear more from Bernie on charters.
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The Democratic nomination may come down to who gets a needed share of black female vote.
Black female vote wants charters because they believe it is their last hope for their children and grandchildren to have a chance.
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Documentation…? (non Trump variety, please—don’t just make things up)
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I do not have an exact reference but I have heard that the black female vote is very important because the influence that person has on those around her. That many times she is someone that family and friends listen to. I have no idea where to look this up but I have heard it.
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Yes because black females are a one-issue voting bloc? They’d sit home or vote Trump back in cuz, Dems don’t love charters anymore? Get some perspective.
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It is not about the general election. It is about the nomination. Get some perspective.
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Ridiculous. When HRC appeared at the South Carolina town hall, she got a lot of applause when she talked about what was wrong with charters.
“But the original idea, Roland, behind charter schools was to learn what worked and then apply them in the public schools. And here’s a couple of problems. Most charter schools — I don’t want to say every one — but most charter schools, they don’t take the hardest-to-teach kids, or, if they do, they don’t keep them. And so the public schools are often in a no-win situation, because they do, thankfully, take everybody, and then they don’t get the resources or the help and support that they need to be able to take care of every child’s education.
So I want parents to be able to exercise choice within the public school system — not outside of it — but within it because I am still a firm believer that the public school system is one of the real pillars of our democracy and it is a path for opportunity.
But I am also fully aware that there are a lot of substandard public schools. But part of the reason for that is that policymakers and local politicians will not fund schools in poor areas that take care of poor children to the level that they need to be. ”
HRC got a lot of applause for that line.
If Bernie Sanders said anything like that, I would believe he won’t sell out public schools. His repeating the same tired rhetoric that the DFERs say is not promising.
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Is there any way you could call them back to express how much they blew a golden opportunity to solidify the support of a committed, engaged constituency?
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I’m not giving up.
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Diane….have you nailed down anything about Kamala Harris and charter schools……..the media seems to have a palpable disdain for her.
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https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/29/opinions/kamala-harris-teacher-plan-good-politics-love/index.html
Write to Kamala, too.
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Joe, not yet. She did support Tony Thurmond, so that was a good sign.
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Actually, I am curious to know what that “point one” means, as it seems quite loaded with implications.
Point one: “We must make sure that charter schools are truly serving the needs of disadvantaged children.”
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Agree. In fact I read it as a sturdy first step in the right direction. Do we have anything as explicit from any other Dem contender? (Not counting wrong-direction Booker.)
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Charters serve chosen children. Many selective charters choose mostly white children. Some selective charters choose the most capable among minority children. There are very few that take problematic, expensive ELLs or classified students. Charters cherry pick the “best of the crop.”
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Ed, I don’t even know what this line means. How does anyone “make sure that charter schools are truly serving the needs of disadvantaged children.” Who will do that? Charters are governed by state laws. Don’t public schools meet the needs of disadvantaged children?
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The public schools get the most disadvantaged children with all kinds of social-emotional issues. These are the children that come from broken homes, or they are homeless and surrounded by dysfunction.
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Maybe Bernie needs to hear about putting existing charters under control of local boards of education in order to manage them. This is how they should have been presented in the first place. The profit motive needs to go! Instead of competing with public schools, they should be collaborating. Charters would be better if they operated like magnet schools under local control. Local boards know what the needs are. Charters never should have been a national plan to undermine public education.
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Right before the line you quoted about charters, this is what Bernie said, “With the vast challenges facing our education system, billionaire philanthropists, Wall Street bankers and hedge fund managers are attempting to privatize our education system under the banner of “school choice.” We must act to transform our education system into a high-quality public good.” I think that more telling. Why did you ignore that part of what he said?
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Excellent point, Ellen. I hope everyone reads it. Bernie’s words that you point out set the context for the statements that follow.
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I assume Bernie is talking about vouchers and for profit charters, which are opposed by DFERs.
Why don’t you think that Bernie’s vision of transformation includes the same “good public charters” he has talked about before?
FYI — every single charter CEO that DFER supports talks about “transforming education” and providing a “high quality public charters.”
Here is the kind of statement I expect to hear from Bernie:
“The original idea behind charter schools was to learn what worked and then apply them in the public schools. And here’s a couple of problems. Most charter schools — I don’t want to say every one — but most charter schools, they don’t take the hardest-to-teach kids, or, if they do, they don’t keep them. And so the public schools are often in a no-win situation, because they do, thankfully, take everybody, and then they don’t get the resources or the help and support that they need to be able to take care of every child’s education.
So I want parents to be able to exercise choice WITHIN the public school system — not outside of it — but within it because I am still a firm believer that the public school system is one of the real pillars of our democracy and it is a path for opportunity.
But I am also fully aware that there are a lot of substandard public schools. But part of the reason for that is that policymakers and local politicians will not fund schools in poor areas that take care of poor children to the level that they need to be.”
If Bernie said something like that, I’d know that he understood what is wrong with charters.
I can’t tell if he is referring to for-profit charters and vouchers in the statement you quoted.
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Right before the line you quoted about charters, this is what Bernie said, “With the vast challenges facing our education system, billionaire philanthropists, Wall Street bankers and hedge fund managers are attempting to privatize our education system under the banner of “school choice.” We must act to transform our education system into a high-quality public good.” I think that more telling. Why did you ignore that part of what he said?
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Bernie denounced “school choice” but still doesn’t understand the problem with charters. He doesn’t understand that charters are part of the privatization movement. He doesn’t understand that even when they are nonprofit, they take money away from the public schools. He doesn’t seem to know that many nonprofit charters are managed by for profit management corporations. In charter world, the distinction between for profit and nonprofit is not clear. We learned last year about an Arizona legislator who converted his for profit chain into a nonprofit and pocketed millionsof dollars, named the board of the nonprofit and won the contract to manage the nonprofit. Bernie’s statement about assuring that charters serve disadvantaged kids suggests hedoesnt have a clue about the fast deals that are ingrained in this industry.
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“…charters are part of the ptivitization movement.” He does not realize and many do not realize !
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Vermont has escaped most of the charter assault. Bernie has never needed to know much about them. On the national stage, it is a different story. So many states are suffering from charter drain, and their public schools are starving.
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Since so many of our public leaders (Senators, Representatives, governors, etc) most likely send their children to private schools, they most likely have no clue regarding the difference between true public schools and charter schools. I think it would take a major campaign to educate those who are running for President (if that is even possible),
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I hear this said often but I don’t buy it. Govt representatives make decisions for others on any number of things they never experienced personally; their job entails continual solicitation of input by stakeholders. I doubt if they consider ed policy based on what their kids said at the breakfast table, or vague memories of their own K12 experience. The politics of campaign funding, party ideology, and voter opinion—probably in that order—are their influences. What they need to be schooled by is public pressure that rises far enough above the first two to make them worry about being re-elected [or elected at all].
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“Can Bernie learn?”
Can any of the candidates learn?
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Good point.
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Yes, Bernie can learn!
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I am not close enough to the energy fields in campaigns and the understanding of how candidates get time to really think/inquire versus trusting staff to get it right.
I hope Diane will find another time to get to the staff in the Bernie campaign whom she tried to educate and give it another shot–better yet Bernie.
There is an outside chance that he has acquired TFAs as staff and others who are determined to leave the door open and recommending this wrong-headed path to him.
Also note that the Center for American Progress has been pushing against Bernie.CAP has both teacher unions as donors. Have they ducked out of defending public schools and the rest, condemed the corruption in charter schools? They should not be supporting this CAP.
CAP is not clearly a supporter of collective bargaining. It has multi-year big time donors who are undermining public education, including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and for multiple years the Walton Family Foundation, both at the top tier of $ 1million or more.
In addition I am finding that the articles about education written by staff at CAP are showing too much uncritical enthusiasm for the Common Core and explicitly accept one-application choice environments as if perfectly normal as a way to accomodate charter applications.
More will be forthcoming as I move along with some research. Hunch: Bernie, like most candidates, has too many issues. K-12 education ls not clearly “hot.”
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As usual, you make good points, Laura. Having volunteered for Bernie’s campaign in IL, it was always about dealing w/the hired, paid campaign people–of course, one is not ever speaking directly with the candidate. Therefore, even though you spoke w/this woman, Diane, it’s hard to tell from the “message Bernie’s campaign* delivered this morning,” the operative words being, here, “Bernie’s campaign.”
*In other words, this message came from Bernie’s CAMPAIGN
NOT directly from Bernie, himself.
Bernie, himself, needs to have a one-on-one with you, Diane, & then he^^ needs to make a statement–a direct quote from Bernie.
If he then makes the same statement quoted from “Bernie’s campaign,” then we know that, as per this crucial issue, he is **not, in fact, on the side of right here.
And then–& only then–will he be disappointing you, me & all of your readers.
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Oh, that he would see the logic in this: meeting directly with people who KNOW what the teacher outcry is all about
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This is what Bernie should be saying:
“The original idea behind charter schools was to learn what worked and then apply them in the public schools. And here’s a couple of problems. Most charter schools — I don’t want to say every one — but most charter schools, they don’t take the hardest-to-teach kids, or, if they do, they don’t keep them. And so the public schools are often in a no-win situation, because they do, thankfully, take everybody, and then they don’t get the resources or the help and support that they need to be able to take care of every child’s education.
So I want parents to be able to exercise choice WITHIN the public school system — not outside of it — but within it because I am still a firm believer that the public school system is one of the real pillars of our democracy and it is a path for opportunity.
But I am also fully aware that there are a lot of substandard public schools. But part of the reason for that is that policymakers and local politicians will not fund schools in poor areas that take care of poor children to the level that they need to be.”
Why isn’t the above Bernie’s position on charters? Is there even one candidate running among all those who have declared who will say the above?
I don’t care if they don’t want to say they are “anti-charter”, if they will speak honestly on the issue instead of mouthing the DFER propaganda.
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Your write-up is perfect! I’d vote for you in a heartbeat 😉
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I’m quoting HRC!
She was the only politician who has ever clearly explained what it wrong with charters. I hate the mealy mouthed support of charters from progressives that completely legitimatizes charters as long as they call themselves “non-profits”. I honestly do not understand why Bernie or Elizabeth Warren can’t speak about charters like the above. It would go a long way to changing the debate.
I have high hopes for AOC. Her statements on public education are not helping to legitimize and enable the privatization effort. She can point to WHY parents choose charters without demonizing those parents. But in the same breath, AOC also points to why it is the abandonment of public schools by the very same people who support these charters that is the problem, and creating charters while abandoning public schools is not a valid choice.
I wish AOC’s elders in the progressive movement were as wise as she is. I really find her ability to be critical of policies without demonizing other democrats to be amazing. If she were old enough to run for President, I’d vote for her. I’m hope I’m around when she does, and that the media that loves to destroy women doesn’t destroy her.
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HRC gave a succinct statement about charters’ big flaw: their unwillingness to take on all kinds of students. But no sooner did she make that statement in SC that her chief education advisor Ann O’Leary wrote an article in “Medium” walking back what HRC said and assuring the big funders that she really didn’t mean it. And that was the last we heard from HRC about charter schools.
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and so importantly, as AOC now communicates often and directly with her fan base through social media, may those who wish to stand with her start hearing and echoing her thoughts on education
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Diane,
I agree, but at least HRC said it once. She did her homework or wasn’t so cowed by the DFERs that she would only spout the pro-charter line. After she made that statement, the rest of the campaign HRC just sounded exactly like Bernie. I used to blame Ann O’Leary but now I see that Bernie says the same thing so obviously it is what progressives now embrace and HRC was trying to be more progressive like Bernie.
What HRC said is what Bernie should be saying. Unless Ann O’Leary is now controlling Bernie, too.
Bernie’s staff reached out to you and you spent your time explaining the issues to them. And then they showed you how little credibility you have with them. Apparently just being a long-time scholar doesn’t cut it with Bernie. Why? Given that you have the facts on your side, what possible explanation can there be for them to decide that nothing you said to them was important? Who are they listening to? Bernie’s new BFF Corey Booker? Booker has more credibility to them than you?
I think Bernie and his staff insulted you. They decided that despite your credibility that you had nothing of value to say. I think a lot of the DNC hatred was about the fact that older women were in charge. Bernie defended Corey Booker from CAP in a way he never defended HRC from the very similar unwarranted character attacks of his supporters. Maybe Bernie believes Booker has a lot more to teach him about charters and K-12 than you do.
There is one lesson that we all learned from this. Having Betsy DeVos as Secretary of State was not “a good thing” and having Betsy DeVos did not make people aware of how bad the ed reform movement is. All it did is allow progressives to embrace “public charters” and look “progressive” because they were fighting DeVos on the issues that DFER doesn’t care about like vouchers.
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NYCPSP,
Your thinking is very well thought out! You are good at analyzing many situations. Thank you for your comment!
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Robert,
That is incredibly kind of you to say. I know my comments are frequently much too long and annoying and I really do try to check myself (my critics won’t believe that) but I often fail and repeat my mistakes. Anyway, it’s extremely nice of you to tell me that at least once in a while I write something other people don’t mind reading. I really do care about public education. Thank you so much.
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I do not think Bernie Sanders can win even against Trump. His age will be the cause of his defeat. I looked it up and his birthdate is 9-8-41. In 2020, he will be 79.
Trump and the GOP will hammer that fact and scare enough people to not vote for him. In fact, I think it will drive Trump haters to vote for a 3rd party candidate or not vote at all.
The country needs someone younger like between 40 and 60. Ronald Reagon was 69 when he was sworn in for his first term and 73 for his second.
Berne would be 83 at the end of his first term and 87 at the end of his second term.
Elizabeth Warren will be 69 in 2020
Kamala Harris will be 54.
Bernie’s only shot to win will be if his VP running mate is either Elizabeth or Kamala and then there will be enough confidence that the country would still be in good hands if Bernie doesn’t live out his first term.
Why did Trump pick Pince to be his running mate? Simple, Trump wanted someone a heartbeat away from the White House to have a reputation worse than he already had. Trump did not care if his VP pick would make a good president or not.
But Bernie has to care if he wants to win.
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You could say the same for Joe Biden, who’s only one year younger. I think he has a better chance of beating Trump that Sanders does, but he too would have to be paired with a strong candidate 10-30 years younger– preferably someone left of middle who could bring in Bernie fans.
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The constitution has a minimum age requirement for President. It needs a maximum age requirement, as well. The age of the candidate is a fair issue, as well as the overall physical health of the candidate.
“Politicians live in a fishbowl” – Richard M. Nixon
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Agree. No one should be eligible to run for President past the age of 70. Could we apply that before the 2020 election? That gets rid of the Orange Menace.
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I would like to see a constitutional amendment, stating that no person shall be able to serve as president/vice-president, if the person shall be 70 (seventy) years of age, on inauguration as president/vice-president.
A constitutional amendment, has never been applied retroactively.
It takes 2/3 of both houses of congress to consent to amendment, before it is sent to the states. Since the average of congress is up there, somewhat, the chances of such an amendment getting ratified by congress is infinitesimal.
About 11,000 amendments have been proposed. 27 have passed.
Until then, the responsibility to monitor and control who serves as president/VP, lies with the electorate.
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I would not support such an amendment unless it applied to Trump.
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That’s ridiculous. As long as the person is in sound physical and mental heath, they should be able to run. I think both of you are being very ageist, ironically.
Should there be a maximum age for experts who speak out on behalf of public education? On bloggers?
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Blogging does not carry the same responsibility and burden of being President, responsible for war and peace, the economy, and the nuclear codes.
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I must agree with Diane. How are the American people going to know if a presidential candidate is of sound mind and body? In 1932, most people were unaware that FDR was in a wheelchair. (There was a lot of prejudice against handicapped people then. His political handlers kept his polio very tightly held. That is why there are over 110,000 still photos of FDR, and only three(3) of him in the wheelchair.)
And the mental state and condition of presidential candidates is not always broadcast to the people. In 1972, McGovern was unaware that his VP selection, Thomas Eagleton, had been under psychiatric care for depression. The electorate did not know.
The presidency is a man-killing job, and the job requires a person with mental and physical strength. It is not a job for the old and the infirm.
The comparison of the presidency to bloggers and commentators is a false comparison. I do not carry the nuclear codes.
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China has that. “The retirement age in China currently is 60 for men and 55 for female civil servants and 50 for female workers. By 2038 there will be an equal age for women and men set at 67. (Women’s age will reach 65 in 2030 and 67 in 2038).”
From what I’ve heard and read, this applies to the CCP’s leadership too.
However, China made an exception recently by allowing Xi Jinping to stay president for as long as he’s doing the job he’s been doing and he will be allowed to keep working even past the mandatory retirement age.
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You are correct, that BSanders cannot and will not win the presidency in 2020. He is too old, too leftist, too socialist. No chance, no way, no how.
I think that even he knows this.
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HCharles for hypocrite.
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If Charles is correct, it means Americans want their fellow citizens to be one medical emergency away from bankruptcy, they want accelerated concentration of wealth because 6 Walton heirs with wealth equivalent to 40% of Americans combined is not great enough, they want a DeVos/Gates’ oligarchy in education, they want Americans to be the most incarcerated population in the world, they want a mercenary army run by Erik Prince and, they prefer the model of colonialism to the model of a developed nation.
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B. Sanders age is the ONLY actor, not his progressive-liberal social democratic values and thinking. If he ends up being the candidate that runs against Donald Trump in 2020, I will vote for Bernie and not a 3rd Party Candidate but there are just enough STUPID voters that will vote for a younger 3rd Party Candidate because of Bernie’s age.
In fact, I think the majority of the population supports the U.S., becoming more of a social democracy with health care for all and free education through college supported by a HEFTY tax on the wealthy and corporations instead of being the inhuman, cruel corporate kleptocracy the country has been becoming for years.
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@Linda: I am not a hypocrite. Why do you assert that?
I can predict with certainty, that the American people will not elect a septuagenarian socialist to the presidency. BSanders is running for president so that he can articulate his socialist agenda. He is intelligent enough to know that he cannot win.
The American people are more centrist, than the pundits realize. Many Americans want the feds to get out of K-12 education entirely, and “devolve” education policy and funding back to the states/municipalities where it belongs.
NO one wants for people to be one medical emergency away from bankruptcy. Most people want to be safe from crime, and so we must have a prison system to incarcerate the criminals.
Most of the Democratic party leadership, and most of the membership would like to win the presidency, keep their majority in the House of Representatives, and perhaps retake the Senate. ALL of the ideas and proposals put up by BSanders and the more extreme wing of the dem party are only crack-pipe dreams, if the dems do not control the legislature and the presidency.
That is why the only chance the dems have of winning anything, will lie in their nominating more centrist candidates, and assembling a platform that will appeal to the interior states, and assemble an electoral vote majority.
“The important thing is to win” – Richard M. Nixon
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Charles,
I have not seen one single head to head poll of Sanders vs Trump since 2016 that has Trump ahead. Independents are not the same thing as centrists as David Frum points out, today most independents are left of the Ds or right of the Rs.
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There are a number of polls out there. Here is one
https://thehill.com/hilltv/what-americas-thinking/422735-trump-beats-beto-nearly-ties-bernie-but-loses-to-biden-in
I am old enough to remember 1972, when Nixon beat McGovern, by 49 states to one.
If the dems nominate B.Sanders to run against Trump in 2020, Trump will beat him so bad, that there will be nothing left of B.Sanders except a greasy spot on the carpet.
Pres. Trump has a habit of getting what he wants. He wants a second term.
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Charles, I know of two sources that report polling data, all the polls averaged.
Real Clear Poltiics.com has Sanders beating Trump 47 to 44.3 but they average ALL the polls. They don’t focus on just one poll. One poll is never enough to come up with a more accurate prediction.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/us/general_election_trump_vs_sanders-6250.html
And then there is FiveThirtyEight that does something similar with all the polls. But right now, it seems 538 is focusing on the Democratic Primaries instead of a Democrat vs Trump but Trump also fails there. His disapproval Percentage is 53 percent (updated 3 hours ago from me posting this comment) and MAGA Man’s approval rating was 41 percent.
https://fivethirtyeight.com/politics/
While I think Sanders age will be a burden, it isn’t a deal breaker because if Sanders picks wisely and runs with a powerful and popular running mate as his VP, that VP choice could well land him the White House.
And if Sanders lives to finish one or two terms, his VP could well be the president when Sanders leaves the White House helping to keep the GOP out of the White House for 8 to 16 years.
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I suspect so-called “reformers” have their “foot in the door” of Bernie’s campaign
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I agree, but it goes deeper than that. I think the oligarchs are having their paid shills and minions infiltrating every campaign.
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Peter,
I don’t think reformers have infiltrated Bernie’s campaign. I think he hasn’t thought much about charters and he should.
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Diane, I agree, & he must talk to you, as I’d written before.
He is so intent on sticking to his Medicare for all, combating climate change (which he called the #1 most urgent issue–survival of the planet), free college & the 1% vs. the 99% (& it’s great that he does stay on these messages–he’s changed the Dem platform & given us more progressives (AOC being the outstanding one), emboldening more to pound the pavements, work on progressive issues, protest & to run for office {& win!}) that he hasn’t covered charters.
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Agreed and part of the reason may be; I don’t believe that charters are an issue in Vermont.
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One of Bernie’s 4 campaign chairs is San Juan’s mayor. She has strongly opposed charter schools.
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And this is why Trump will win again. The democrats have completely lost their way.
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In what sense have the Dims completely lost their way?
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If Bernie is pragmatic, the number of votes he can get from the position will convince him to support pubic schools. If they haven’t already done so, the NPE should give him surveys identifying the votes linked to the public school issue.
If the only voting bloc of consequence is a segment of Black female voters who like charter schools (as commenter, Doug, suggests,) the quantification and comparison should be easy.
The AFT and NEA owe it to their members to prepare a document for Democratic candidates that promises how many among the one-fifth of AFT Trump voters and one-third NEA Trump voters, they can deliver to Dems in 2020. It gives the unions a target goal and a start in a plan of action to deliver.
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Amen to your last paragraph, Linda! But…they won’t. They are, I believe, in large part responsible for the debacle that was 2016; their top leadership is largely misguided & their impetus stymied by outside
(think Gates–NEA has taken $$$ from them) influences. It was not only that they backed the wrong horse, they did so early on, & without input from their members.So–just as with legislators & candidates, all NEA & AFT leaders–state & national–absolutely must have their feet held to the fire, step up & be accountable to their rank-&-file.
&–Joel–thanks–you said what I’d been meaning to say–charters are just not an issue in Vermont. Still–he serves in D.C., (& was/is on the Education Committee–? {& voted for the renewed/new ESSEA!!})–&, so, should know about charters & publics–“ignorance of the law is no excuse,” so to speak. Being a Vermont resident, that was his argument for having much earlier voted for some gun rights–because hunting is big-time in Vermont. Still…that came back to bite him in the butt. While he is responsible to his Vermont constituents, when he is running for president of the U.S., there is no alternative other than to look at, consider & analyze the big picture.
Finally, I worked as a Bernie 2016 volunteer early on, & I continue to be a big fan. But his paid campaign staff better wise up & wise him up on the charter issue.
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Bernie has Silicon Valley’s Rep. Ro Khanna as a campaign co-chair.
(Talking Points Memo 4-17-2019)
My prediction- Bernie’s talking points on education will not interfere with the tech industry’s goal to profit from digital education.
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Duane…I have been thinking about that….and my answer would seem to contradict my position on the political spectrum. I have always been liberal, but was jolted into suspicion of the centrist democrats in 1968, when they nominated Joe Biden, escuse me, Hubert Humphrey—leading to the Nixon-wallace victory, followed by Nixon carrying almost every state in 1972 when he could still claim not to be a crook. Centrist domination of presidential races have led to an underlying collapse of much of the rest of the tickets….loss of state representatives, school board members, and control of congress nationwide. Democrats try to be careful not to stand for much of anything…..republicans c quote deuteronomy about sin—if they were not so scared of Trump. 2020 is not a year to retreat from standing for policies offensive to the media warning them about all the white guys in the midwest……they should be leading and explaining to the nation and winning with huge turnouts……Biden could probably beat Trump 51-49, without the electoral college distorting the results..with a disappointing turnout of minorities—who will sense how unimportant they are to the powers that be in the democrat party. …but they would do better with someone like Kamala Harris, stating bluntly just how serious the state of public education is becoming with the silent no cost is too much oligarchs. Instead…..we are being handed a chance to feel noble as we applaud mayor Pete for telling us what a great father his husband will be. The nominee is not going to be chosen in Iowa and New Hampshire………things move on to South Carolina, Texas and California. It is easy for Bernie and Pete now……wait until they have to face a cross section of the actual electorate. The people who could start the much needed rebuilding of the democrats as a genuine political party—–the kind of party which could deliver medicare, full rights for people to vote, and face punishment for letting us get involved in idiotic wars.
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“silent no cost is too much oligarchs”. Unfortunate phrasing…..I meant they have plenty of money to spend without feeling any loss……so long as it buys them the influence they desire. They anticipate being repaid unless the evil power of democracy stops them.
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John,
Bernie is not winning me. Not yet.
Jim
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Bernie had me at democratic socialism.
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Bernie needs improvement on some issues, and I don’t want to discourage criticism that could help him do that; however he’s far better than the other leading candidates the media is willing to cover especially Beto and Biden who both directly supported Charters.
Other establishment candidates have also supported Charters, it’s a rare one that doesn’t. As you pointed out to me previously Elizabeth Warren came out against it, but only after pressure from the grassroots; at one point she supported them more than Bernie did, when she wrote the Two Income Trap.
Bernie has done better addressing grassroots concerns like the Black Lives movement, so I would trust him more to learn from this than Warren.
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Actually Bernie is only barely beginning to respond to the grassroots concerns of minority communities.
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So this is from Bernie’s Twitter, just one year ago: https://twitter.com/sensanders/status/969609364544909315?s=21
Ms. Ravitch, I have great respect for you, but it seems you are pulling a very ambiguous line from a mass email and assuming this now someone means Bernie Sanders supports charter schools over public schools. That would be a mistake.
I’ve been following Bernie’s work for over a decade and this is definitely not the case. What’s really sad is the people in the comments section announcing they’ll no longer support Bernie’s historically pro-public and anti-charter school platform because of one person’s awkward misinterpretation of a campaign email. Talk about overreacting.
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I didn’t say that Bernie supports charters. I think his views are evolving. During the 2016 election campaign, he said that he supports “public charter schools” not “private charter schools.” That is a distinction without a difference because charters are all managed by private boards. I am in conversation with the campaign and hope he will provide a stronger, clearer statement in the future. Real Democrats support public schools subject to democratic governance, not private management.
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I also follow Bernie and have worked in campaigns with him. He does not understand the effects of the businessification of our education system. Diane Ravitch would never selectively post one comment to disparage someone.
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I will continue in conversation. He has a terrific staff.
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Note: This post is not about HRC. Her time has passed. I repeat, her time has passed. The ONLY purpose of this post is to show readers here how very easy it is for a progressive candidate for President to say the right things about K-12 education and public and charter schools instead of spouting platitudes that the DFER folks love.
I’m just tired of excuses. This clip proves that it can be done.
I absolutely implore everyone to watch this clip of HRC talking about the problems of charters in South Carolina, to an audience that included many African-American voters. Please don’t fall for the propaganda that you can’t talk this way because African-American voters won’t like it. Listen to the applause! Listen to the passion!
The clips start at 36:09, beginning with interviewer and pro-charter advocate Roland Martin repeating the DFER talking points about how charters are popular in the African-American community. Listen to HRC to see how very easy it is for a candidate to address this false propaganda and get applause from the audience. Please take a few minutes to watch the clip through 39:21, all the way to the end, because just when you think it is done, HRC comes up with another passionate defense of public schools.
I have posted some words from the transcript of this, but the transcript is NOTHING compared to the tone and passion of the video. THIS is the defense of public schools and answering to the ed reformers that needs to be made by progressives. Instead the entire progressive movement now seems to have been completely taken over by ed reformers.
I realize that some Bernie campaign people might be predisposed to despise anything that comes out of HRC’s mouth, but if Bernie or other progressives were to watch these 3 minutes it’s possible they might grow a backbone instead of continuing to give progressive credibility to the entire DFER movement.
It takes three minutes to watch it. This is what it looks like when you REALLY believe in public education.
This isn’t about the past. HRC’s time has passed. Repeat, this is NOT about HRC. It is about why no progressives will say anything like this and never have. This is the model response that they should all be saying. Let’s stop making excuses for them and enabling them. Let’s start demanding they sound like this:
https://www.c-span.org/video/?400357-1/hillary-clinton-town-hall-meeting-orangeburg-south-carolina&desktop=&start=2219
Three minutes from 36:09 to 39:21 is the discussion that should be happening in the 2020 primary. Not mealy mouthed support for “good public charters”. A real effort to educate folks. Not pablum about “billionaire philanthropists, Wall Street bankers and hedge fund managers” but a real discussion to educate the voters about why directing money from public schools to charters is a problem.
At 38:30 it seems as if the discussion is over, but please keep watching all the way to 39:21. Listen how the voters are applauding while ed reformer mouthpiece Roland Martin gets very uncomfortable. Please watch all the way to 39:21, when Roland Martin rushes to have someone ask a question so he can change the subject.
This is how you make the education reformers uncomfortable. You don’t throw out terms like “good public charters”. You explain to voters and if you make good points the voters agree.
Three minutes. I’m not posting this to defend HRC because her time is past.
I’m posting this video to prove how easy it is to make the progressive argument for public schools. We need to quit making excuses for why none of the progressives running for President are making this argument. Presumably it is because they don’t care and it is up to us to make them care. Let’s stop enabling them because they believe they can ignore voters who care about public education as easily as they ignore Diane Ravitch’s attempt to educate them on the issue.
This video shows just how easy it is. If no progressives are making this case, that is a deliberate choice.
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He’s playing politically safe on this. He should push for Shanker’s vision of freeing public schools to try flexible approaches to serving traditionally underserved populations while still under the oversight and control of the public. Otherwise you leave the door open for elite so-called reformers to describe selective schools that allow parents to separate their children from others as some sort of innovation
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Disappointing but not surprising. Bernie does not do his homework but likes easy solutions — Medicare for all, free colleges for all – sound bites. In particular he is deaf to policies like charter schools that adversely affect minority communities and increase racial disparities. He does not even know that the NAACP has called for a moratorium on charter schools.
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I think the words to the wise & the warning of your earlier Newark/Bob Braun post (Mayor Raj Baraka, the ultimate traitor) stand well. (I’m not stating this in reference to Bernie–he is, indeed, a Dem Socialist/Independent/Progressive–& he would never back down on all he has said, but in what way can the other {some very much “so-called”–Cory Booker, for one} candidates who proclaim to be Progressives prove it? Beto O’Rourke–w/his charter-lovin’ wife–is another one.)
Also a big fan of Warren, but she should have ignored the Pochahontis baiting.
&, yet, she persisted (gotta love THAT!).
Would love a Sanders/Warren ticket–as someone has previously stated, for those worried about his age, we’d have someone who would hit the ground running on Day One.
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Read about who Bernie selected as his co-chair (Talking Points Memo 4-17-2019)
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Okay, I worked most of my public school teaching career in a “charter” school…we had the same requirements as we had before we “went charter”, no discrimination allowed, we did have a public lottery when we had space…so is this type of charter school different from the ones mentioned above? I do not support charter schools, I voted against supporting our switch (I reminded the rest of my union members that for every student we gained, some other teacher’s job was in jeopardy…the choice was made so we could maintain our enrollment as our student population shrunk with our district’s aging population) but I realized nothing, absolutely nothing, changed curriculum wise. Other than some small timing changes with regard to financials, NO extra monies came our way because we were a charter school, other than the ADA that came with students who could transfer in without their home district’s permission. This was in California.
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Bernie’s not clueless. He’s cozied up to the dark side and selected Silicon Valley’s favorite son to be his campaign co-chair. Rep. Ro Khanna is friends with John Arnold and is backed by Peter Thiel, Sheryl Sandberg, Eric Schmidt and Sean Parker among others.
The article at Talking Points Memo lays it out. 4-17-2019.
I’ve written Bernie off. As they say, “Fool me once….”
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I will wait until we see who the choices are during the primaries before I write anyone off.
Even if Bernie doesn’t stand up and support the public schools and still offers some sort of support for the crooked, interior, corporate charter/voucher school industry, if he ends up running against Donald Trump in the 2020 general election, he will be the only choice to save the country from a want-to-be tyrant who is already dismantling the federal government. Then I will vote for Bernie.
I will vote for Bernie because saving the country is more important than saving the public schools. Country first. Public schools second.
We who support the public schools will have a better chance to convince Bernie of what is happening to public education than another four years with Donald Trump and Betsy the brainless or somebody worse he fills that spot with once he fires her.
If Bernie becomes the next president and he takes that oath of office, he will mean what he says.
Trump lied when he took the Oath of Office the first time, and he will lie again if he takes it the second time.
If it is a choice between Bernie and Trump only an emotional and ignorant person or a minion of the GOP will write Bernie off and let MAGA Man win another term.
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The assumption underlying my statement was the primary vote.
Since I have written countless times that the worst Democrat is better than the best Republican, I, like all other voters, will once again be forced to abandon the hope of democracy if Ro Khanna succeeds. Gates, Thiel, Arnold, Charles and David Koch, Sandberg, and Schmidt aren’t benign- not one of them is.
Until Khanna was selected, I would have agreed with you that Bernie means what he says. CAP became a toxic brand for Silicon Valley so, Ro Khanna shows where the tech monopolists are hedging their bets. Shame on Bernie.
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Linda,
I don’t know anything about Rep Ro Khanna. I just read his bio on Wikipedia and it’s impressive. Why are you opposed to him?
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Who is Ro Khanna? Never heard of this person. Not even listed on the Latest Polls for the President: Democratic Primary that Sanders is now leading.
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-primary-d/
I had to run a Google search to learn about Ro Khanna and found out that Ro Khanna has endorsed Sanders.
“Rohit Khanna (/ˈroʊ ˈkɑːnə/; born September 13, 1976) is an American academic, lawyer, and politician serving as the U.S. Representative from California’s 17th congressional district, since 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he defeated eight-term incumbent Democratic Representative Mike Honda in the general election on November 8, 2016, after first running for the same seat in 2014. Khanna also served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary in the United States Department of Commerce under President Barack Obama from August 8, 2009, to August 2011.
“Khanna accepts donations only from individuals and is one of only six members of the U.S. House of Representatives, and ten total members of Congress, who do not take campaign contributions from political action committees (PACs) or corporations.[1][2][3][4]
“On February 21, 2019, Khanna was named a national co-chair of Bernie Sanders’s 2020 presidential campaign.[5] He is considered to be a potential member of the Cabinet should Sanders win the presidency.[6]”
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“…more important than saving public education”
Lloyd,
Don’t you and I both know that the public education fight is global oligarchy vs. survival of local democracy? Bernie may have decided greater wealth for the 99% is of greater value than the loss of schools and citizens’ education to big business. And, he may have made his transaction while recognizing it is the death knell for community survival but, I am unwilling to turn a blind eye to it.
Obama thought he made a transaction for ACA but, that turned south with the election of Republicans.
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I disagree with you, Linda. The U.S. Constitution is more important to protect than the public schools. Without the U.S. Constitution, the United States as we know it would cease to exist (becoming a total corporate kleptocracy) and the public schools would be turned into brainwashing machines to raise a docile and obedient populace.
Defending the U.S. Constitution against MAGA Man and the GOP is important because, with the U.S. Constitution (as we know it), the public schools stand a better chance to survive and prevail over the vampire, greed is their blood, driven coproate charter school/voucher industry.
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Read about Ro Khanna at Talking Points Memo, 4-17-2019.
My prediction- Bernie’s talking points on education will not interfere with the tech industry’s plan to profit from digital learning.
Ro Khanna is friends with John Arnold. Khanna is backed by Marissa Mayer, Peter Thiel, Eric Schmidt, Sheryl Sandberg- a Who’s Who of tech monopolists. He defeated a liberal to win his position. He introduces weak solutions to counter the power of the tech industry, proposals that all of us know will be furthered watered down in Congress. Khanna’s talking points pivot to get him elected.
Bernie does not lack awareness about education issues. Bernie’s rhetoric tells us Ro Khanna won against the input from another of his campaign co-chairs, San Juan’s mayor who is anti-charter.
For Bernie, the significant issue is not charters, it is digital replacement of teachers and bricks and mortar schools. That’s what his equivocation tells me.
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Your guesses, theories, and hunches are noted. We will have to wait and see what really happens, won’t we?
And if it comes down to Bernie vs Trump, I will still vote for Bernie regardless of your guesses, theories, and hunches just like I voted for Hillary vs Trump.
I’d vote for a rattlesnake if it ended up running against Trump and if the rattler won, I’d hope it would bite Trump during the inauguration ceremony. I won’t mention where I’d want President Rattler to bite him.
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Diane, sometime after Trump was elected, I had a sit down with a director for a Dem candidate incubation organization who recruits and supports candidates and trains campaign staff. He was a former charter school operator down south, so I was concerned.
Our talk turned out to be very interesting – I learned a lot about the divide between “ma and pa” charters, aka small networks and the big billionaire-funded chains like Success.
He told me his tiny charter network had a mission to support the district by recruiting and oversubscribing high needs students, and exporting curriculum to interested public schools.
He felt that the ma and pa charters who focus on at-risk students get unfairly lumped in with the big chains, and described this as an ongoing undercurrent in the sector. The big, well-connected chains had ways of making others toe the line. Ultimately, he sought another line of work and the incubator was pretty successful in 2018, backing anti-charter candidates in states like NY.
Following our talk, I did not change my anti-charter position, rather my tactic. Now instead of criticizing all charters, I prioritize the NAACP moratorium, asking politicians whether or not they support it.
This is particularly important in NY, where the existing 1998 charter law allows charters but seems to prohibit cherrypicking.
So is your position full and total elimination of all charters nationwide, or more in line with the NAACP moratorium that opposes charters who cannibalize public school resources but might be ok with charters that support districts by serving high-need populations? Or something else? Asking because I very often take my lead from you!
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The idea of funding two publicly funded schools systems, one democratically governed and the other not, one based on market competition for students and the other not, one based on what’s good for all and the other focused on individuals, and one draining funds from other, is fundamentally flawed. I say, just stop it, while recognizing that reintegration of the students will be challenging but not impossible.
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Arthur, I agree. I cannot understand the rationale for two separate publicly funded school systems in competition for students and resources.
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I understand it and I know you do too. Too many people have accepted the ideas that systemic change is impossible, scarcity and inequality are inalterable, and therefore, if you can’t save everyone, you mights as well save yourself.
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Diane and Arthur, I agree that two systems competing for resources, one unaccountable is not the way to go. But in the game of politics, I don’t see public ed advocates going for the “whole enchilada” – the NAACP takes the same position Randi fought for at the 2016 platform committee, that new charters should not drain resources and be more accountable.
This seems to match Bernie’s new statement, and is also what NYS Senator John Liu, chair of the NYC Education subcommittee just announced in response to Gov. Cuomo’s call last week to lift the cap on charters.
So is this a question of incrementalism versus doing the right thing? I like the idea of highlighting the billionaire backing and campaign finance pay-for-play aspect of charter schools, but this is will not sway the corporate media, overlappping anti-union interests or the folks in the pro-charter “pipeline” that recruits and trains pro-charter voices, or the lobbying firms that use the revolving door to reward former officials.
I keep thinking the way to garner more attention to the issue is to try to corner all these pro-charter voices to confront and defend the practice of cherrypicking students, it seems like the most obvious avenue because it appears to be illegal….
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Jake, the charters have hoaxed the public by pretending to be all about “saving poor kids.” The NAACP resolution strips that veneer, as does the charter support of DeVos and billionaires. There is no charter movement. There are just billionaires.
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Bernie needs to be held accountable just like all the other candidates. We would be hard pressed to find another candidate who has fought for the PUBLIC good and will continue to fight for the public good. He has always stood in solidarity with striking public school teachers, he highlights the problems of for-profit higher ed, for example…to answer your question “can Bernie learn?” My answer would be of course he can. I’m curious if you have been meeting with all the other candidates and asking the good and important questions. I don’t doubt you have or will be; you seem to be a wise voice in the fight to protect our public schools.
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Sheila,
As I told Sanders’ staff, I am available to advise any candidate who wants to be advised. I am not committed to any one as yet.
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I’m a close media and politics watcher, and I noticed the timing of Bernie’s education statement. He met with Randi and Diane within days of eachother and then issued his bullet list of education priorities, including his usual, but adding:
“We must put an end to high-stakes testing and “teaching to the test”
and
We must make sure that charter schools are truly serving the needs of disadvantaged children.”
He did say that he was against bubble tests on his 2016 website, but the “teaching to the test” is new.
Bernie is my first choice as of now, Warren second, but I have no hesitation admitting that Bernie has been terribly unconnected with education activists, especially as a member of the Senate HELP committee. But he also has done a lot that went under the radar.
Diane mentioned recently that Bernie, Warren and every other Democrat supported high stakes testing amendment in the 2015 ESSA bill. After he was hounded by activist NY teacher Arthur Goldstein, Bernie’s 2016 campaign spokesman finally gave up some inside information:
“He has made clear to Chairman Alexander, Ranking Member Murray, and Senate Leadership that his vote was not an endorsement of the accountability mechanism included in the amendment, but rather as a statement of his intent that other measures must be put in place to protect low-income, minority and disabled students.”
Bernie then sponsored a bipartisan amendment that lets states pilot and demonstrate alternatives to standardized tests, it’s now part of ESSA (but NY has refused to join the pilot). To me, it seems Bernie has always been willing to take “half a sandwich” in his relationships with Mitch McConnell, Lamar Alexander, Patty Murray, Nancy Pelosi and others to whom wealthy donors are influential.
Bernie keeps quiet about these tough negotiations, but we know he traded Obama his ACA vote for $10B in funding for community health centers and traded Hillary his endorsement for his college tuition plan (and more funding for community health centers).
Bernie is a guy who sticks to the script, but I see some movement here, while no others even are talking about tests or charters. I hope he stays in touch with Diane, and she gives him what-for, but the real goal here is make sure EVERY candidate comes around.
Bernie always says, no matter who is elected, nothing can actually get done without millions of people clamoring about the issue.
I don’t think the camps are too far off here. Diane wrote that Bernie’s new statement:
“ignores the fact that charter schools are not public schools. They are privately managed. They are free to choose their students and free to expel those they don’t want.
This ignores the fact that the NAACP called for a charter moratorium. The ACLU of Southern California criticized charters for discriminating against and excluding students with disabilities and ELLS. The Southern Poverty Law Center filed suit against charters in Mississippi for seeking to divert public funds from public schools, contrary to the state constitution.
How can the federal government “make sure” that charters are meeting the needs of disadvantaged students when they are free to exclude them and when charter lobbyists write the state laws? Can Bernie learn?”
It sounds to me like making sure charters ‘serve the disadvantaged’ inherently includes enrolling and retaining them, specializing on them and significantly recalibrating their missions. But what is the ask on the federal level anyway? Is it the NAACP moratorium, or something else?
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Jake–nice to hear your voice on the blog–welcome! Very appreciative of all the information you have provided above.
Good to know that NYC Educator was able to “hound” Bernie (meaning he actually talked to the man himself & not his campaign staffers–?). You go, Arthur!!!
& Jake–keep commenting here.
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Once again, distraction is the path to a win.
The founder of 4 Gates-funded ed organizations, Pahara, Bellwether, TFA and New Schools Venture Fund stated the goal of charters- “…brands on a large scale”. Ed. brands make money if designed as digital replacement for teachers and bricks and mortar schools, which are the life blood of Main Street. Gates and Z-berg are investors in the largest for-profit seller of schools-in-a-box.
Those who minimize the significance of Rep. Ro Khanna in Bernie’s tent, shouldn’t.
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I repeat, since I’ve said this before to you in a comment: If it comes down to Bernie vs Trump, my vote goes to Bernie and not a third party candidate.
And although I think Bernie’s age is a burden, he still has a good chance to win the 2020 election and be a much better president than Trump will ever been in 1,000 lifetimes.
On that note, according to an average of many polls, Real Clear Poltiics shows Bernie leading in a contest between him and Trump 47 to 44.3 for Trump.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/us/general_election_trump_vs_sanders-6250.html
Trump’s voter base is pretty much set in concrete – most of the undecides will either vote for any Democrat or not vote at all. The only way Trump can win in 2020 is to get the voters that will never vote for him to not vote AGAIN, or vote for a 3rd party candidate. That is how he won in 2016 thanks to Russia’s meddling. Russia focused on getting enough black voters not to vote so Hillary would lose and it worked. For the first time in decades, the Black vote dropped instead of grew.
Bernie’s best chance to win regardless of his age will depend on his VP pick. A strong and popular bulletproof (the metaphor) candidate for VP means many voters will vote for Bernie because they will think if Bernie doesn’t make it through his first term and/or through his second term, his VP will make a good president
Trump, on the other hand, is burdened by the worst possible VP ever, Pence. If Trump has one cell in his brain that can actually reason, he will dump Pence and select another VP running mate that is popular enough to carry Trump across the line to win a 2nd term … and then a lot of people will start praying that Trump croaks and that VP becomes president. I don’t know if the GOP has anyone that fits that profile.
In fact, Trump should be disqualified to run for office again since he had clearly:
“Under Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment, no person who has sworn an oath to support the Constitution, who has later has gone to war against the United States, or given aid and comfort to the nation’s enemies can serve in a state or federal office – including as vice president. This disqualification, originally aimed at former supporters of the Confederacy, may be removed by a two-thirds vote of each house of the Congress”
Through his tweets and at his rallies, Trump has repeatedly given verbal aid to dictators and America’s greatest enemy, Russia. When Trump ignored all of America’s intelligence agencies and took sides by supporting Putin, he violated section 3 of the 14th Amendment.
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Jake,
I’m still talking to the Bernie campaign, and will keep pushing for him to speak out about charters. It’s an issue perfect for him. Funded by Wall Street and billionaires to replace a public good with private ownership. If he comes out strongly, it makes it harder for the other candidates to duck and bob and weave.
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Jake Jacobs,
Please let’s have an honest discussion on here.
It would not have been hard for Bernie Sanders to take a clear stand against charters or even be the least bit critical.
Here is how foolish your defense is. Imagine I said this:
“We must make sure that PUBLIC schools are truly serving the needs of disadvantaged children.”
Wow, wasn’t that a strong criticism of public schools! I must really hate public schools. I must really want them to close down because it’s clear I know the damage the public schools do based on that sentence.
People who BELIEVE in public schools and want them to continue to proliferate and grow say the following:
“We must make sure that PUBLIC schools are truly serving the needs of disadvantaged children.”
To pretend that is something other than what a booster of public schools would say is outrageously misleading. So why would you pretend that Bernie making that statement about charters isn’t just what a charter booster would say?
Come on, let’s have an honest discussion. Bernie is pro-charter and will continue to be pro-charter. If another candidate comes along who isn’t in the tank for charters, then anyone who cares about public education should vote for them because Bernie is going to continue the exact same policies as reformers. Maybe you will get lucky and every progressive will be just as pro-charter as Bernie. And none will say anything critical of charters, just like Bernie.
When a man shows you who he is, believe him.
The disingenuousness of anyone who claims that ridiculously pandering statement demonstrates anything but major support for charters would be funny if it wasn’t so sad.
“We must make sure that public schools are truly serving the needs of disadvantaged students.” Wow, that makes me really skeptical of public schools, according to you.
Let’s see do teachers unions say “we must make sure that public schools are truly serving the needs of disadvantaged students”?
Wow, teachers are anti-public school too! Look they are just like Bernie so we should all know that the union is very critical of public schools and wants to limit them because of that statement, right?
Please. Don’t treat us like idiots.
Anyone who makes that statement after Diane Ravitch educated his staff about charters is making it clear that he thinks Diane is not worth listening to. And that is worrisome. Who IS Bernie listening to with those pro-charter remarks?
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Again, I remind people that campaign staffers are but the layers of an onion, & oftentimes MANY layers removed from a candidate; I know that from up close & personal experience.
I’ll elaborate on one such dire experience I had in a later comment. Have to rush off to a meeting (as usual) now.
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Where in distance from the candidate, is a campaign co-chair who is the favorite son of Silicon Valley? (Ro Khanna and Bernie)
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My suggestion is to give Bernie a well-thought out ‘attack’ so that he ‘gets’ it. You spoke with a person, God knows how far down the ladder. What got lost in translation? It takes YEARS of reading this blog to remotely understand the nuance of this privatized system. She didn’t have years. She took cliff notes. And she probably blew it.
You have enough dedicated people who can research, and more importantly, pull this into the debate.
You have an idea of which organizations carry clout and more importantly, voters.
For example, who do you know at the NAACP? Who do you know that knows a ‘friend of a friend’? How about journalists?
Who do you know that knows Nina Turner? Arrange a meeting with BOTH Nina and the NAACP and you.
Who do you know in teacher unions in states that rebuked Red States. Get them together, have them continue to reach out to Bernie. Let him know that voters care, in all the strikes this last year, and that if he loses the unions, he’s losing a TON of voters.
That Nurses union in LA…contact them.
Send your books to Jane.
Send people who are going to his rallies carrying signs that say ‘ripping off taxpayers’ and ‘charters aren’t public schools’ and ‘billionaires stealing’ or what have you.
The list is endless.
This takes planning…you and your peeps can do this because NOT ONE of the other candidates will remotely move over to the side of public schools. YOU have the power to drag this into the limelight.
Have many people tweet Bernie.
Don’t let this go down without a fight!
Pip
PS – find those kids running Mike Gravel’s campaign. They are FAR to the left of Bernie. Keep tweeting them. If Gravel pulls off the DNC debate stage, as Zang did, then if he’s informed, he will be able to to bring this up on national television. #gravelanch
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