Gary Rubinstein thought that Ohio paid more money than any other state to Teach for America, at the rate of $20,000 per recruit.
Chicken feed!
One state paid TFA $90,000 for each recruit!
He writes:
A few days ago I wrote about how Texas pays TFA $5.5 million for 400 recruits, or about $15,000 per recruit. Yesterday I wroteabout how Ohio paid $2 million to TFA for 100 recruits, or about $20,000 per recruit. As TFA is in about 40 states, I wondered what state is paying the highest amount per recruit. I got a tip today for one that I think cannot be beat.
The state of Kansas paid TFA $270,000 for a total of 3 recruits. First they had a $520,000 contract for 12 recruits which would be about $40,000 per recruit. But when TFA only delivered 3 recruits, they had to give back $250,000. As a result, they ended up paying TFA a staggering $90,000 per recruit.
Under former Governor Brownback, Kansas cut taxes on the hope that low taxes would spur economic growth. It didn’t. It starved public services.
Kansans finally got fed up with the Republican strategy, and last November the voters elected Democratic state senator Laura Kelly, replacing the Trumpite Governor Kris Kobach.
Governor Kelly, cut this absurd expenditure for temp teachers and use the money to fund your public schools and your career teachers.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Teach For A-fee
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It’s worth pointing out that each of those three TFA teachers in Kansas actually cost about $90K PER YEAR for each of the two years because their salary is actually paid by the school district where they teach (not by TFA.)
Even if one disregards the minimal training TFA candidates get, TFA is a raw deal for states.
But of course, states are finding it increasingly hard to find teachers after the decimation of the teaching profession of the last 20 years by both Republicans and Democrats.
And even TFA is apparently feeling the effect.
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Hopefully they are also beginning to feel very, very exposed
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“Teach For A-fee”
Teach? Seriously? Watching a TFA howtoteach video at which point can anybody say “now this is more than training animals.”?
I think T stands for Training, A stands for Animals and I leave it up for the imagination what F should stand for.
Of course, it’s literally torture for these (often really lovable and smart) corpse members as well
At every level at TFA, I can find something to be angry about: the leadership at TFA influence education politics, corpse members are tortured during training, during their years of of teaching, and kids in the classroom are handled by untrained unprofessionals.
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This needs to be front page news, on every cable network, and sent to every state legislator in addition to members of congress.
This is a scandal not less important than the rip-offs on the student-loan servicing industry. TFA is a total ripoff. No state or district should be paying a premium for teaching temps.
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It should be front page news but won’t be.
The American tweetia are focussed on other things.
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TFA is a money making machine at tax payers’ expense. They pay themselves royally and use the rest to buy more political influence. TFA offers no long term public value.
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TFK
Teach for Kopp
For Wendy’s pay
Bumper crop
For TFA
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This is INSANITY.
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As Albert Einstein fanously said, “Insanity is giving money to TFA year after year and expecting different results”
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ALMAO. s Lincoln said, never give a sucker an even break.
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Oops. However, my typo was funnier than the joke!
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SDP,
I love the way your brain works!
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I concur with Diane, SomeDAM. Hilarious!!!
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Gee, how come Don the Con wasn’t in this business?
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This just in:
Comic Book Super Villain, former Reality TV Host, and Part-Time President of the United States Jabba the Mullet took paused today from bashing immigrants to take a moment to congratulate TFA on pulling off a scam more ingenious and lucrative than even Trump University was. “They do a great job, OK? Beautiful how it works. Yuge opportunity,” he said, pointing one tiny finger to the heavens.
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Propaganda Minister Miller added these comments, “It’s important to give these pimply kids a couple years of public service to put on their resumes before they go off to their real jobs in investment banking or working for one of the astroturf organizations funded by Gates or Walton. It’s a private service for a few individuals paid for by public funds. That’s why it’s important.” Press Secretary Sarah (Miss Communications) Huckster-bee added, “The President supports free enterprise. I’m not taking further questions on this topic.”
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Actually, the President’s big plan today is to attempt to put lipstick on the pig of his immigration policies, prior to the 2020 election, with a speech about his big new plan. It’s makeover time!
Politics in the age of tan in a can.
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This is outrageous, I hope NJ is not paying for these TFA teachers.
This from the TFA web site: quote – “Disrupt. Imagine. Rebuild. Teach For America New Jersey works in partnership with communities to create an equitable education system that prepares 50,000 New Jersey students each day for success in life.”
Disrupt!? What absolute puking chutzpah. Just what we don’t need, disruption of a functioning public school system. TFA needs to be disrupted out of existence.
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From the Devil’s Dictionary of Reformish:
creative disruption. Any untested but novel mechanism (the wilder the better) for turning tax dollars into private profits for a peddler of products ancillary to DEFORMY MAGIC. See “siphoning” and “boiled frog phenomenon, or engineering the slow death of the public good.”
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I tried to find out more about this (also from NJ). Can’t figure out how to research it—would love to find something like the TX appropriations doct Rubinstein got a hold of. We definitely have TFA’s; wish I knew how many. Assuming they’re mostly in Newark & Camden but who knows.
I did see an article on a [very admirable] org called South Ward Childrens Alliance (Newark), which mostly concentrates on providing community wrap-around services – their “BRICK” wing (building responsible creative intelligent kids) focuses on school-turnarounds [> charters]; they “partner” w/TFA. Just speculating: perhaps TFA-NJ is primarily involved w/charter schools?
Among my friends are a few highly-qualified now-retired teachers who spent their whole careers teaching math, ESL et al in poor Newark public schools. All this charterization going on in Newark & Camden means a churn of low-qual newbies for poor kids. What a rip-off if we’re not only lowering the bar but paying huge TFA fees: that means the well-pd Newark pubsch teacher is being replaced by low-pd charter teachers w/all the extra going to TFA.
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There are plenty of TFAs at Newark Public Schools.
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Another example of building a Kleptocracy from the top down.
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Ohioans deserve to know how many TFA recruits, if any, are in the 12 charter schools (5400 students) that Fordham sponsors in Ohio. They also deserve to know the length of time the TFA’ers remain in teaching for the $20,000 premium taxpayers are charged.
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Linda, thank you and Laura Chapman for sponsoring four young journalists from Paul Laurence Dunbar High School to attend yesterday’s event in Columbus, Ohio. They came with their teacher Wendy Turner. Ms. Turner presented me with a “Lamplighter” T-shirt, Which I will wear with pride.
I will post about the event tomorrow
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Look forward to your report. Sorry I could not attend.
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Diane,
The event was superb in every way.
It was Ohio’s honor to have you, democracy’s hero, at the occasion.
In every group I talked with, praise for you was abundant. It was my pleasure to contribute so that the Lamplighter staff could be there and give a well received speech.
Laura,
I hope we’ll meet at an event in the future. The information you provide at the blog is of immense value.
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Thank you, Linda. I had a great time! I hope someone made a video other than the kids from Kentucky.
Bill Phillis is a national treasure!
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It was moving to hear Bill describe your impact. And then for you, to recognize his contribution while his grandchildren, children, their spouses and his wife were there as a surprise for him.
I was struck by both your and Bill’s humility, a throwback to the respect which at one time characterized American leadership before Kasich, Trump, the Koch’s, Fox, ALEC,….
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Linda, were you there? And you did not introduce yourself?
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You were surrounded by people anxious to talk to you and have photos taken. Without a doubt, there was optimism and high expectation in the air. I’ll look forward to the next event when, with luck, I’ll get an opportunity to greet you.
I was able to thank Jan Ressenger for her blog after you identified her at the gathering. Again thank you for coming to Ohio, the 7th largest state, Fordham’s original home and, one of the states most bilked by charter schools.
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These numbers from Texas, Kansas, Ohio are supposed to cheer me up, but they don’t. Just think about it: in the whole state of Kansas they hired only 2 TFA teachers. In Memphis alone, we hire 100 each year, and we have been doing this for at least 6 years. Compare this with the number of hires in Texas and Ohio, and you see the reason for tears.
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I wrote to my state Board of Education representative and suggested Ohio save money by cutting out the middleman, TFA. Mercedes Schneider researched TFA nationally and reported length of time in the classroom jobs was short. As a cheaper alternative to TFA, temporary worker inducements could be paid directly to the hires.
I presumed Ohio’s involvement with TFA was politically motivated. But, I hoped that “fiscally responsible” Republican politicians like Peggy Lehman wouldn’t want to be hypocrites (although hypocrisy is synonymous with the GOP).
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