Jane Nylund, parent activist in Oakland, wrote the following warning after reading about the ouster of the Disrupters in Denver. Parents and activists and concerned citizens must organize and oust the agents of Disruption:
Oakland also must flip 4 board seats next year. The Walton-bought board has recently closed two schools, Roots and Kaiser Elementary, and there is talk of accelerating the “Blueprint process”, which is basically a plan to close and consolidate schools. Oakland’s portfolio model, which was only supposed to close “low performing” schools (nearly all of which were privatized into charters), has now morphed into the Citywide plan, in which no school is safe from the threat of closure. Kaiser was an exemplary model for a popular, well-supported, diverse neighborhood public school that attracted families both within and outside its boundaries. It also supported a significant number of LGBT families. It’s enrollment had been steady for years. Its closure (and planned consolidation with Sankofa, a struggling elementary school several miles away with a freeway in between) means that the beautiful piece of property where Kaiser is located (with SF bay views) will either be sold or handed over to a charter. Kaiser’s closure was a sacrifice, a political pawn in the school closure game, to show that the school board can be “bold” and not just close schools in high-needs neighborhoods. Look at us, we can close anything, and we will! This is the not-so-new normal for OUSD.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It sounds like they still believe that disruption is positive to public students’ education. I guess education is just like a business to these vulture capitalists….
disruption, however, appears to be positive to opportunistic pocketbooks
These privatizers are becoming bolder and less patient. With the pending elections they are concerned that a democrat may turn off their gravy spigot. They want to grab as much as they can before the public has time to fight back.
it’s up at Oped https://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/Oakland-Is-in-the-Sights-o-in-General_News-Diane-Ravitch_Education-Costs_Educational-Crisis_Educational-Facilities-191112-997.html#comment749777
with this comment:
In this post, https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2019/10/30/elizabeth-warren-made-charter-school-supporters-mighty-angry-now-they-are-targeting-her/#comments-wrapper which appeared on Valerie Strauss’s Answer Sheet blog at the Washington Post,Carol Burris describes the outraged reaction of the charter advocacy groups to Elizabeth Warren’s plan to end the federal CSP. She details that each of the major charter groups has received many millions of dollars from the federal government, in addition to the support they have received from billionaires, foundations, and Wall Street. They are angry that their federal money might be cut off.
Strauss invited charter advocates to respond, and she includes their responses in the post. They want the money, they all said, because it is all about the kids.
Yeah, and pigs fly
Carol Burris, a veteran educator and now executive director of the Network for Public Education, has conducted extensive research into the federal Charter Schools Program (CSP), which resulted in a report called Asleep at the Wheel. That report documented the waste of about $1 billion in federal funds spent on charters that either never opened or that opened and then closed in short order. At the time the CSP was created by the Clinton administration, there were fewer than 100 charters; the new program was supposed to help start-up charters. However, since Betsy DeVos became Secretary of Education, she has used the CSP as her personal slush fund, lavishing million on established corporate charter chains–especially IDEA and KIPP.
Every situation is different but I would be happy to talk to you if you wish. You can reach me at jskinden@aol.com
Not to long ago many were celebrating historic Brown vs. Board of Education legal ruling that lead to integration of schools–mainly in the Southern part of the Nation.
Many are not celebrating integration in Oakland because mostly Black and Brown segregated Oakland Unified School District’s School Board has voted to close double integrated Kaiser Elementary school at the end of the school year.
Kaiser had not just racial integrated enrollment, but “double” integrated enrollment,meaning also integration by economic class.
Kaiser elementary, located high in an Oakland hill, single family home tract, with view of San Francisco Bay’s sunrise and sunsets lighting the neighborhood’s $1.5 and $2.5 million dollar houses. The neighborhood houses, far too expensive for most families starting out to raise a family, means that neighborhood public school can’t be kept open without enrollment from outside the neighborhood. And, it is the need to fill the seats of Kaiser Elementary public school that results in an unplanned double racial/ethnic and economic class integration ever so rare for Nation’s public schools.
Here is 2018 data that tells the story of this double integration: 274 enrollment, White 34.3%, African American 21.9%, Hispanic 17.2%. and socioeconomic 25.2%, English Learners 5.8%.
Small Kaiser Elementary successfully attracts families from other neighborhoods of Oakland to drive their children to the school creating naturally this double integration enrollment structure. But, the fact Kaiser Elementary is attractive to families of the District, and the fact it is double integrated, did not save Kaiser Elementary from Oakland School Board voting to close it.
This is a land grab pure and simple. It has been disguised as a safe face measure by the board and super, but in reality it’s a way of selling public real estate, which will never happen and instead prop 39 will prevail well before any sell and the purported “savings and profit” ever will reach the district. The district staff never showed any concrete plans on how to go about a closure/merger of this sort despite months of repeated requests for details and specifics. They instigated a racial divide for the purpose of distraction and fomenting animosity among families. And now, in the face of continuous protests, they say they want to “talk with families”, but the directive to close the schools has been voted on by this run-away, out of control board. What a crock! They’re just buying time, and are redirecting attention. Classic reformer moves. What this board and super need is to be brought to court and made to pay for the pain and anguish they have inflicted on the schools’ communities, for advancing a plan with no substance, and for destroying a school and program that has done more to provide students and families within the district that have stuck with public schools for decades.