Tom Ultican writes here about three major school board elections: Oakland, Los Angeles, and Indianapolis. These are districts that are in the crosshairs of the billionaire privatizers. No one can explain why billionaires want to privatize the public schools in these three districts (as well as dozens more). We now have nearly 30 years of evidence that neither charters nor vouchers produce educational miracles. New Orleans is not a national model: Last year, half the charter schools in this all-charter district were identified by the state as D or F-rated schools. Assignment to anyone: Why do the billionaires keep funding failure?
Ultican reports that the pro-privatization candidates vastly outspent the pro-public education candidates. In Oakland, the pro-public education slate won all but one seat (in that race, the pro-public education groups were divided, or they would have had a clean sweep).
In Los Angeles, the billionaires won one seat, enough to give them a single-seat majority of the school board.
In Indianapolis, the billionaires swamped the pro-public education candidates with their vast spending power.
It is an attack on democracy when billionaires from out-of-state (or from in-state) can drop a few million into a local school board race and make it impossible for ordinary citizens to compete. The individuals and the groups funding this assault on democracy–Michael Bloomberg, William Bloomfield, Stacey Schusterman, Arthur Rock, the Walton family, Reed Hastings, Doris Fisher, and other billionaires should hang their heads in shame. So should Stand for Children (which funnels billionaire money into races against public school advocates) and The Mind Trust.
For their ceaseless efforts to dismantle public schools and replace them with privately managed charters, I hereby place the following billionaires on this blog’s “Wall of Shame”: Michael Bloomberg, the Walton family, Reed Hastings, William Bloomfield, Doris Fisher, Arthur Rock, and Stacy Schusterman.
The same richly deserved dishonor goes to the infamous servant of the billionaires, Stand for Children.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“Why do the billionaires keep funding failure?”
That’s easy.
For every dollar they spend on “failure”, they save $100 in taxes that would otherwise be levied on them to properly address school funding inadequacies.
These people propose the “quick and dirty fix” because it saves them billions.
It’s nothing other than a diversionary tactic: get the public arguing ad nauseam about the efficacy of charter schools and vouchers and they will totally ignore the elephant in the room: massive school underfunding.
It also has the added advantage of making the billionaires look magnanimous.
I posted Tom’s article, at https://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/School-Board-Elections-202-in-General_News-Democracy_Funding_Schools-201113-84.html#comment779349
With this comment (which has links in the comment) Diane Ravitch says:”For their ceaseless efforts to dismantle public schools and replace them with privately managed charters, I hereby place the following billionaires on this blog’s “Wall of Shame”: Michael Bloomberg, the Walton family, Reed Hastings, William Bloomfield, Doris Fisher, Arthur Rock, and Stacy Schusterman.The same richly deserved dishonor goes to the infamous servant of the billionaires, Stand for Children.”
Dr. Ravitch was ass’t Secretary of Education in the Bush years, and is one of Politico’s 50 Most Important Americans.
She created the Network for Public Education (NPE) in recent years, to ensure the availability of THE TRUTH about what learning looks like and what genuine education requires in this age of disinformation. Her daily blog covers what is ongoing in the war on public education; there are 15,880 separate school districts in America… and the result is an ignorant citizenry.
This election shows us how important education is. The billionaires own the media and the politicians. Tell people about the Ravitch Blog and the NPE before genuine education disappears.
Billionaires have no need for strong public schools. They prefer to spend as little as possible on labor so they can lower their taxes. Their motives are mostly self interest. They despise the fact that unions attempt to provide workers with a living wage and benefits. Citizens United has equated money with free speech. As a result, the wealthy can use their money to defeat pro-public education candidates around the country. This process will continue unless there are ways to restrict funding of school board elections to those that live in the district. Such a move would make school board elections more democratic and reflective of the will of the community.
Joe Biden has publicly espoused support for labor unions. Biden should back up his support with more than lip service. To paraphrase a recent comment from Biden, he said that he is a labor guy from the soles of his feet to his belt buckle. I would like to see Biden put some of his rhetoric into action.
Here’s an interesting article that addresses the issues related to the privatization of Oakland’s public schools. It shows how money gives the wealthy an out-sized voice in school board elections. It is written by the Democratic Socialists of the East Bay. https://eastbaymajority.com/why-billionaires-love-charter-schools/
One commonly overlooked reason for Oakland’s charter grab over the years has been our rapidly gentrifying neighborhoods and increasingly valuable real estate. While Prop 39 has allowed charters to lease space in district-owned property, other charters such as Aspire have purchased private property for school expansion, and in one case attempted to circumvent the public process by buying a piece of public property owned by the city for a charter school expansion that had not even been approved by the board. Two decades ago, Jerry Brown planted the seeds for rapid gentrification with his two charter schools, Oakland School for the Arts (now one of the wealthiest schools in Oakland) and Oakland Military Academy. Along with Jerry’s 10K plan, to bring 10,000 residents to downtown Oakland, millions of dollars were diverted from affordable housing to build luxury apartments. OSA continues with its sweetheart deals to rent expensive space downtown near the redeveloped Fox Theater. In my opinion, all this has resulted in much of the homeless misery that we now see daily all over the city of Oakland.
Real estate grabs, gentrification and privatization often work in tandem where there are expensive property values. We have seen this same agenda play out in Miami, Chicago, Philadelphia to name a few.
Only in Hollywood movies, as in “John Wick,” are there anti-hero assassins that go after bad guys like these billionaires.
Billionaires bought my public school district. That is a sentence I never thought I would honestly write. It’s like writing that Coca-Cola Bottling Company bought the United States. Upside down and backwards.