Leonie Haimson reports that Success Academy is dropping plans to open three new high schools because it doesn’t have enough students.

Parent activist Brooke Parker wrote the report as a guest blogger.

No waiting lists. Not enough students.

Categories Accountability, Harlem Success Academy, Privatization

12 Comments Post your own or leave a trackback: Trackback URL

FREELULAINNOCENT says:

September 27, 2020 at 11:33 am

Once again, I show comparatives of the articles exposed here with the “nightmare of Brazil”. This (counter) current government destroyed with all the resources of academic research. / In the last month, dictatorially, it is interfering in the appointments of the Rectories of the Federal Public Universities./ This will make it much easier to continue with your project of PRIVATIZATION (or MILITARIZATION) of public education. /
Let us pray to God that Paulo Freire is always inspiring us!

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Lloyd Lofthouse says:

September 27, 2020 at 12:17 pm

Allegedly Abraham Lincoln said, “You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.”

I added “allegedly” because of this fact check site that investigates the source of quotes like this one. It seems that the evidence that Lincoln said it is questionable.

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/12/11/cannot-fool/

Well, whoever said it was right.

Eva’s narcissism and abuse of children are catching up with her as word of mouth spreads the truth and cancels out her lying, manipulating expense advertising propaganda campaigns.

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- ciedie aech says:
  
  September 27, 2020 at 2:51 pm
  
  you do have to wonder in these newly trying economic times if charter “wonder” schools will shrivel up due to a lack of funding for their endless snow-job advertising: many are popular due to the everlastingly shiny front they present, not for the reality of what actually occurs inside the schools
  
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- retiredbutmissthekids says:
  
  September 27, 2020 at 7:06 pm
  
  Be careful, Lloyd–if it45 sees this, it may claim the quote & use it against Biden in the debates!
  
  (I’m certain that it45 regularly reads this blog.)
  
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Laura H. Chapman says:

September 27, 2020 at 1:39 pm

This is the most comprehensive report on Eva’s Evil Empire that I have seen. Thank you for the excellent documentation of this scandal-ridden business.

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Chiara says:

September 27, 2020 at 2:09 pm

I think it was inevitable. It’s a selective school, it’s just that the selection process operates by attrition rather than by entry.
I know why ed reformers won’t admit this- it gets in the way of the political narrative and goals- but I feel not admitting it goes to their credibility.
They could have just said “this is a charter magnet school with a back end selection process” but beating up public schools was too important to do that. They needed a apples to apples comparison of charter v public where the charter was better so they just invented one.
I mean, obviously if Eva had really cracked the code on the “secret sauce” the other charters in NYC would all adopt it and have her scores. They haven’t because they’re less selective.
A genuinely interesting study for an ed reform org or university department might be “what happens to the Success students who wash out?” but we don’t get those kinds of studies. Some questions are off limits in the echo chamber.
It’s like how we never get a number for per pupil charter funding. We get the PUBLIC share of funding, but the private subsidies are not included. You don’t know what it costs. All you know is what the public paid. Those are two different numbers.

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- dianeravitch says:
  
  September 27, 2020 at 2:12 pm
  
  Very good point. I had an email debate with a financial supporter of Success Academy, and he insisted that Eva accepts the same students as nearby public schools. I could not dissuade him. He is convinced that SA is a model for all public schools. Nothing I said changed his mind. The source of his information was the SA publicity office.
  
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  - Chiara says:
    
    September 27, 2020 at 2:16 pm
    
    I can’t find it now but Eva herself said this in an interview- she said she hoped to make the schools self supporting- in other words, she hopes to get the cost to equal the public subsidy. Maybe she has done so- I don’t know- these are the kinds of financial analysis ed reform researchers simply don’t do.
    The echo chamber doesn’t operate using censorship- echo chambers almost never do- they operate by limiting the kinds of questions they allow. The gatekeeping comes in at the outset. If you never ask the question, you never have to bury the answer.
  - retired teacher says:
    
    September 27, 2020 at 3:17 pm
    
    It would be very difficult for any school that unloads more than 80% of its students to be considered a success. It is not scalable or sustainable. If Eva hadn’t received so much money from billionaires and hedge funds, she would not have been able to expand. Maybe some of the wealthy donors do not feel they are getting much ROI for their investment. Perhaps some of the hedge funds aren’t so solvent in the pandemic.
Chiara says:

September 27, 2020 at 2:30 pm

My maternal grandmother is a nurse. Back in the day hospitals trained “practical nurses” and you would apply and the entrance requirements were very low and 3/4 of your class would wash out. My sister is also a nurse but she did the modern route where they test for entry and require prerequisites and so have a much lower attrition rate.

They both went to selective schools. One selected after admission through attrition and the other before admission with testing and prerequisites and a GPA, but they both ended up at the same place. Maybe Eva’s selection process is a little more egalitarian but the downside of that it’s also harder on students who try and fail.

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Eddie says:

September 27, 2020 at 6:51 pm

I hope this isn’t Eva Braun. 😐

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retiredbutmissthekids says:

September 27, 2020 at 7:10 pm

To Chiara, at 2:16 up there: Perhaps Teacher Economist can enlighten us here, financials being something he should be qualified to address.

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