Archives for the month of: December, 2020
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Texas: Republicans Fighting to Defund Lobbying for Public Institutions, Including Public Schools

By dianeravitch
December 3, 2020 //
13

The big battle this coming year in the Texas Legislature is about whether public agencies will be allowed to lobby for their interests. No one argues that private interests should be banned from advocating for what they want. Only public agencies—like public schools—would be banned because they use public money.

You can see where this is going. Supporters of public institutions would be gagged and censored, but promoters of privatization would be free to wine and dine legislators.

The Dallas Morning News tells both sides of the story here.

The issue, which has been dubbed “taxpayer-funded lobbying” by supporters and “community censorship” by its detractors, is a major divider between traditional Republicans — particularly those in rural areas who support public schools and their local county governments — and hard-line conservatives who see it as wasteful spending by local officials.

Local officials and the organizations that represent them — like the Texas Association for Counties, the Texas Municipal League and the Texas Association of School Boards — say such a lobbying ban would hurt local jurisdictions and make it more expensive for them to advocate for their constituents. They say the ban is nothing more than an effort to silence the voices of local officials.

Democrats and some Republicans banded together to block the bill last year. That vote resulted in House Speaker Dennis Bonnen and one of his top lieutenants, Rep. Dustin Burrows of Lubbock, meeting with conservative activist Michael Quinn Sullivan to target several fellow Republicans who voted against the bill.

The scandal forced Bonnen into early retirement and Burrows had to resign as chairman of the House Republican Caucus. Nonetheless, the bill’s backers say it will return next session.

Arch conservatives claim that cities, counties, public schools, and other public agencies should not be allowed to use taxpayer money to defend the public interest. Profiteers, buccaneers, entrepreneurs, and raiders of the public treasury would be allowed to lobby with no restraints.

Just one more loathsome effort to cripple the public interest by Governor Abbott and his allies.



Categories Charter Schools, Democracy, Education Reform, Freedom of Speech, Privatization, Republicans, Texas

Trump Delivers 46-Minute Rant Against Election, Insists He Won All States

By dianeravitch
December 3, 2020 //
73

Our democracy is under attack by the man who took an oath to protect the Constitution. Donald Trump gave a 46-minute speech denouncing the outcome of the election, which he insists was fraudulent despite the fact that his own Attorney General concluded that the Department of Justice did not find evidence of widespread fraud that would change the outcome of the election. Trump’s legal team has filed dozens of lawsuits, almost all of which were rejected in court by judges of both parties, including judges appointed by Trump. The few cases that went in Trump’s favor were over minor issues that did not affect the outcome of the election in any state.

The Washington Post reported on Trump’s speech:

Escalating his attack on democracy from within the White House, President Trump on Wednesday distributed an astonishing 46-minute video rant filled with baseless allegations of voter fraud and outright falsehoods in which he declared the nation’s election system “under coordinated assault and siege” and argued that it was “statistically impossible” for him to have lost to President-elect Joe Biden.


Standing behind the presidential lectern in the Diplomatic Reception Room and flanked by the flags of his office and of the country whose Constitution he swore an oath to uphold, Trump tried to leverage the power of the presidency to subvert the vote and overturn the election results.


The rambling and bellicose monologue — which Trump said “may be the most important speech I’ve ever made” and was delivered direct-to-camera with no audience — underscored his desperation to reverse the outcome of his election loss after a month of failed legal challenges and as some key states already have certified Biden’s victory.


The president’s latest salvo came a day after his attorney general, William P. Barr, said the Justice Department had found no evidence of voting fraud that could have changed the outcome of the election.


Trump delivered in person many of the claims he previously has advanced on social media or that his lawyers have brought on his behalf in courts, which have been debunked or summarily dismissed because there is no evidence to support them.
Trump claimed in Wednesday’s video, again without evidence, that “corrupt forces” had stuffed ballot boxes with fraudulent votes. He claimed the fraud was “massive” and “on a scale never seen before.” He called on the Supreme Court to “do what’s right for our country,” which he suggested entailed terminating hundreds of thousands of votes so that “I very easily win in all states.”




Although Trump last week authorized his administration to cooperate with Biden’s transition, he still has refused to concede. With Wednesday’s remarks, the president intensified his protest of the results and threatened to disrupt the nation’s long history of a peaceful transfer of power.
“

This election was rigged. Everybody knows it,” Trump said. He added, “Our country needs somebody to say, ‘You’re right.’ . . . If we don’t root out the fraud, the tremendous and horrible fraud that’s taken place in our 2020 election, we don’t have a country anymore.”




Trump also claimed that Dominion Voting Systems, which manufactures voting machines used in many states, was “very suspect” and that many voters who pressed the button for “Trump” had their votes counted for Biden. There is no evidence that votes were in any way compromised, and Dominion has said there is no merit to Trump’s claims.


Biden decisively won the election with 306 electoral college votes to Trump’s 232. In the national popular vote, Biden leads with 80.9 million to Trump’s 74 million, a difference of 4.4 percentage points and nearly 7 million votes.


A majority of states already have certified their results ahead of the Dec. 14 meeting of the electoral college to finalize the national result. Those states include Georgia, which delivered Biden one of his narrowest victories and where officials conducted a hand recount that still had Biden winning by about 13,000 votes.
Trump’s video Wednesday represented his most comprehensive remarks yet about the election and came after he has spent the month since the election largely hidden from public view, save for a handful of official appearances and a call-in appearance on Fox News Channel.




Any hope that the president might be slowly coming to grips with his loss and accepting the fact that Biden will be sworn in as president on Jan. 20 was dashed by his combative and emphatic tone, which amounted to a call to arms to his supporters. The fight is paying dividends so far, with Trump’s political operation using a blizzard of misleading appeals to supporters to raise more than $170 million since Election Day on Nov. 3.


As he invariably has throughout his presidency, Trump spun an alternate reality. Although his words actually worked to undermine democracy, he cast himself as the protector of democracy, saying his single greatest achievement as president would be to restore “voter integrity for our nation.”


Trump released a two-minute edited version of the video on Twitter, which the social media company labeled as “disputed,” and included a link to the full 46-minute video on Facebook, where the company applied a label explaining that voting by mail has long been trustworthy and that voter fraud is “extremely rare.”





As Trump released his video, his personal attorney, Rudolph W. Giuliani, was in Michigan making a similar case to state legislators and citizens there. The former New York mayor alleged at a video news conference in Lansing that there were extensive voting irregularities in the state, largely in Detroit, a majority-Black city that voted heavily for Biden. Giuliani claimed a similar pattern of fraud emerged in several other large urban centers with municipal governments controlled by Democrats.




“It was a plan to steal this election,” Giuliani said.
There is no evidence to support this claim. Giuliani cited affidavits that had been used in lawsuits that have so far been rejected in the state.


Giuliani gave a pugilistic exhortation to Trump supporters at the late afternoon press conference.
“We have to fight. The president does not intend to give up,” he said, urging Michigan Republicans to put “pressure on state legislators” to uphold their constitutional obligation to decide state results in a disputed presidential election.


“You have to get them to remember that their oath to the constitution sometimes requires being criticized,” Giuliani added. “It sometimes even requires being threatened. But you don’t back off of an oath because a vote is too hard.”


On Wednesday evening, Giuliani and Trump campaign attorney Jenna Ellis made similar arguments before a Michigan House panel. In her opening statement, Ellis referred to Trump’s video message and said the state legislature has a constitutional mandate “not to allow a corrupt” election. She said the nation’s founders provided “a tool — state legislators — to combat corruption” in elections.


That interpretation of a constitutional mandate is disputed by many election experts, who nonetheless worry that it could lead some state legislators to attempt to overturn certified election results.


Norm Eisen, a former Obama appointee who serves as counsel to the bipartisan Voter Protection Program, called that interpretation “constitutional disinformation that has no basis in law.”




This activity comes as Trump prepares to visit Georgia on Saturday to hold a campaign rally for Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, both Republicans facing runoff elections on Jan. 5.


Trump’s baseless allegations of voter fraud in Georgia have roiled the race, with Republicans divided over whether to trust the election system or, as former Trump lawyer Sidney Powell argued, stay home in protest.


Powell led a rally in a northern Atlanta suburb Wednesday in which she exhorted hundreds of the president’s supporters not to participate in the Senate runoffs, in part because she said the state’s voting machines are not trustworthy.


“I would encourage all Georgians to make it known that you will not vote at all unless your vote is secure,” Powell said. “There should not be a runoff. Certainly not on Dominion machines.”




Powell claimed falsely that Dominion machines were rigged to weight Biden’s votes more heavily than Trump’s, that a hand recount was a sham, and that state and local election officials have been destroying ballots and other evidence of fraud. She has presented no proof of her claims.


L. Lin Wood, another Trump ally who helped lead Wednesday’s event, made similarly baseless claims.
“We’re not going to vote on your damn machines made in China,” Wood said. “We’re going to vote on machines made in the USA!”


Wood took aim at just about every state Republican leader in Georgia, including Perdue, Loeffler, Gov. Brian Kemp, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and the state party chair, David Shafer, even though some of them have stood by Trump and echoed his false claims of fraud.


“If they don’t fight for Donald Trump, including Loeffler and Perdue, send them all home!” Wood exclaimed to the crowd. “You are criminals!”

Categories Accountability, Democracy, Elections, Insane, Trump

News from the Network for Public Education

By dianeravitch
December 2, 2020 //
6

Thanks to the energetic leadership of Marla Kilfoyle, who is former executive director of the BATS, the Network for Public Education has developed a strong grassroots network. Here is her report:

The Network for Public Education 

Grassroots Education Network-November 2020 Newsletter

The NPE Grassroots Education Network is a network of over 155 grassroots organizations nationwide who have joined together to preserve, promote, improve, and strengthen our public schools. If you know of a group that would like to join this powerful network, please go here to sign on. 

If you have any questions about the NPE Grassroots Education Network, please contact Marla Kilfoyle, NPE Grassroots Education Network Liaison, at marlakilfoyle@networkforpubliceducation.org

Notes from Marla

November saw us on the precipice of a historic election.  With the incoming Biden/Harris administration, we hope that we can finally get someone in the USDOE that stands strong for our public schools, our public schools students, and our public school parents. We need a USDOE secretary rooted in equity and a vision that will get our public schools what they need to serve all of our children and families.  With that being said, NPE and our amazing partners launched the Keep Your Promises this month. We congratulate President-elect, Joe Biden, and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, on their historic victory. We look forward to working with them as they fulfill their promised commitment to our nation’s public schools. The promises made during the campaign drew support from public education advocates across the nation. With those promises in mind, we listed the top five K-12 priorities that they should keep at the forefront as they govern. In order to this, we need Pro-Public education leadership in the Department of Education. Let’s make sure that Joe Biden chooses a public education advocate for the next Secretary of Education. We need a leader who rejects corporate reforms, high-stakes testing, and school privatization. It is time to rebuild our public schools. We are encouraging people to please send an email to the Biden team. You can use our letter or create your own.  We make it easy and fast using Action Network.  Go here to send your email today, and please share. 

National Organizing

Network for Public Education President Diane Ravitch and Executive Director Carol Burris wrote a powerful piece in the Washington Post about who education advocates want to see as the next Education Secretary.  NPE also hosted another Conversation with Diane episode this month.  Diane hosted Kevin Welner on November 12th.  They had a great conversation about his new book Potential Grizzlies: Making the Nonsense Bearable and much more. To view that conversation, go here. Defending the Early Years proudly announced that Kisha Reid has joined their advisory board. Kisha has been an early childhood education advocate for years.  She is the founder and director of the Maryland-based Discovery Early Learning Center. Listen to In the Public Interest’s executive director Donald Cohen on Feet to the Fire podcast with James Lardner. Donald spoke about the importance of building trust in public institutions as the new administration ramps up its plans. The Journey for Justice Alliance podcast On The Ground, hosted by Jitu Brown, airs every Monday at 6 PM CST. J4J also released powerful videos from their Town Hall last month. You can see them here, here, and here. Fairtest publishes a newsletter each week about the misuses and flaws of standardized testing. They are a valuable resource and clearinghouse for everything testing and test reform. Fairtest has published a list of test-optional universities and colleges.  Head over to their open Facebook page for updates and their weekly newsletter. Rethinking Schools released the very powerful Teach the Struggle for Voting Rights this month. It is a must-read and share. The Parent Coalition for Student Privacy is a valuable resource for all that is student, parent, and educator privacy.  Check out their website for valuable toolkits on the topic. Parents for Public Schools published a fantastic new article on their blog this month. The article titled Family Involvement vs. Family Engagement: What’s the Difference? Is a must read and share. Parents Across America provides position papers and key documents on their website.  It is a great list to keep handy for advocacy work in your area. Congratulations to The Schott Foundation who received a $2.25 million grant from the Nellie Mae Foundation!  

The Badass Teachers Association (BATs) appears on The Rick Smith Show every Wednesday night.  Head over to this link to access show and date information. Trinational Coalition to Defend Public Education (USA) has a public Facebook group that features information from Canada, Mexico, and the U.S. about how communities are navigating the worldwide COVID crisis. The Ontario (Canada) Secondary School Teachers Federation released a statement on how the Ford government budget fails students, parents, education workers, and teachers. Wear Red for Ed has an active open Facebook page that tracks the Red for Ed movement nationwide. It is also tracking education issues that are surfacing due to the shutdown of our schools. Be sure to check out the Uniting to Save Our Schools (USOS) event tab on their website. This month they held a Zoom meeting on what it means to return safely to school. First Focus Campaign for Children wrote a letter this month to candidates and elected officials asking them to commit to kids. Kinderchat continues to host its popular Twitter chat every Monday night at 9 PM EST. The chats are informative and provide great resources for teaching kindergartners during school closures. Check them out on Twitter at #Kinderchat. Kinderchat also has a fantastic website full of resources. Instituto Nueva Escuela focused on their Montessori Public campaign this month. To learn more about this campaign, visit their Facebook page. Be sure to check out Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood blog Teach Over Tech. The blog features articles from educators, academics, parents, and students, Teach over Tech is a platform for sharing solutions to screen overuse in schools. Topics range from equitable access to high-quality learning, opting out of EdTech, outdoor teaching and learning, to parenting during distance learning, and more. Check it out here.  Equal Opportunity Schools shared and supported, the Coalition of Schools Educating Boys of Color 2020 Fall and Winter series. This month they hosted a Virtual Gathering of Leaders: It’s Time to use Your Influence for the Liberation of School Spaces. Dr. Angela M. Ward led this interactive session on personal and collective decision making. When Public Schools Reopen has launched its new website!  Uniting for Children and Youth (Canada)  hosted a Child Friend Community Conference this month. We will have updates on that in our next newsletter. National Educators United signed onto the network this month. We are honored to do this work with them. To learn more about their work, check out their Twitter feed and their page on Instagram.  If you are an educator, please ask to join their closed Facebook group to help with organizing.  

NPE Grassroots Education Network – State Organizations Support  Public Education

Please use this clearinghouse of information to inform people in the various states about the NPE Grassroots Education Network organizations.  Please encourage people to join them and support their work! Call on family, friends, and colleagues to join the fight to save public education. This section is also a place to get great ideas on organizing and actions. 

Alabama

SOS (Support our Students) was excited to announce that Little Free Libraries would be installed outside every school in Birmingham’s District 2. They asked the public to please help them build the book selection.  

Arizona 

Voices for Education shared information on why Prop 208 was a lifeline for public schools in Arizona. Arizonans for Charter School Accountability update their website frequently about charter corruption across the nation and in Arizona. Save our Schools Arizona hosted a talk this month called Addressing Education & Health Disparities in Latinx & Native American Communities. We will post the archived video in our next newsletter. Arizona Educators United, along with all of the organizations in Arizona, celebrated the passage of Prop 208.  

California

California Educators United shares how labor is rising up to meet the challenges we face in our communities and schools.  Check out all the news on their open Facebook page.The Public Core program, Between Two Teachers, is informative. To view all their archived programs, go here. If you live in the Los Angeles area, or know anyone who does, encourage them to connect with The Association of RAZA Educators.  They hold organizing meetings each month. Check out Bay Area Collective Keeping Privatizers Away from Community Schools (BACKPACS) on Facebook to keep up with all their movements in fighting back the charter lobby in the Bay Area. 

Colorado

Pueblo Education Coalition co-hosted a police-free schools Zoom event late last month with the National Education Policy Center and the CU Research Hub. They have been compiling Pueblo specific data to help guide a discussion on moving toward police-free schools. 

Connecticut

Children Are More Than Test Scores share, and discuss, information about testing in a public Facebook group of 3500 members.  Head over there and join the conversation. 

Re:public Ed informs Connecticut residents about the state, local, and federal education policies that impact teaching and learning. New London Parent Advocates updates their open Facebook page weekly with all that is happening in the New London Public Schools.

Florida

Please go to Facebook and follow  Fund Education NOW, Florida BATs, and Broward BATs to keep up with all that is happening in Florida education. Be sure to give Pastors for Florida Children a follow on Facebook and Twitter to keep up with all their actions and movements. Make sure to check in with the Florida Council of Churches Facebook event tab. They support, promote, and conduct powerful events in the state of Florida. Opt-Out Florida Network continues to fight the use of tests to rank and sort children, and schools. Pinellas Parents Advocating for School Improvements organizes on a private Facebook page. If you know of anyone in the Pinellas area, have them join to connect. Protect Our Public Schools, Manasota believes that free, quality public education is a right for all children and is necessary for the optimal functioning of a democratic society. To keep up with their movements during the COVID-19 crisis, go here. 

Georgia

If you live in Georgia, or know someone who does, make sure they connect with Public Education Matters Georgia.  Moms and Dads Now Enduring Surrealistic Stupidity (MADNESS) has a vibrant public Facebook group that discusses how education in Georgia is going during the COVID crisis. If you are interested, here is the link to that public group. Opt-Out Georgia organized the opt-out movement in Georgia via a closed Facebook group of over 8,000 members. If you live in Georgia or know someone who does, encourage them to connect with this group. The Georgia Chapter of the National Association for Multicultural Education (NAME) was founded in 1990 to bring together individuals from all academic levels and disciplines and from diverse educational institutions and other organizations, occupations, and communities who had an interest in multicultural education. NAME is committed to a philosophy of inclusion that embraces the basic tenets of democracy and cultural pluralism. To keep up with their movements visit their website. 

Hawaii

Parents for Public Schools Hawaii shared a powerful audio diary of how Hawaii’s children are weathering the pandemic. 

Illinois

Illinois Raise Your Hand sends brief email newsletters with updates and upcoming events. To read all the updates about LSC Elections and CPS Quarter 2 PreK & cluster programs go here. Illinois Families for Public Schools informed the public that when the amendment to the Illinois Student Online Personal Protection Act goes into effect next July, for the first time schools and ed tech companies will be legally required to notify families when student data is breached. 

Indiana

The Indiana Coalition for Public Education shared a summary of what the Indiana Governor promised public education. Indiana Coalition for Public Schools – Monroe County informed the public that the Indiana Department of Education is seeking public comment on its request to the US Department of Education to waive certain federal requirements pertaining to federal accountability for the 2020-2021 school year. This request is in response to the direct impact of COVID-19 on the ability to produce valid, reliable, and comparable accountability data and results for the 2020-2021 school year. Information on the request is available on IDOE’s website! Public comments should be submitted. The Northeast Indiana Friends of Public Education published a powerful essay by Stu Bloom on their open Facebook page. 2020 Medley #25 – It’s Always Been About Relationships is a must read! If you know anyone in Northwest Indiana, have them connect with Northwest Indiana Coalition for Public Education by sending them a message on Facebook. They hold monthly organizing meetings and so much for the children, and public schools, of NW Indiana. 

Iowa

Do you know anyone in Iowa?  If so, make sure they join Iowans for Public Education.  Send them here to join and connect. You can also follow their movements on their open Facebook page .

Kansas

Game On for Kansas Schools exposed dark money involved in their elections. 

Kentucky

Here is the latest Dear JCPS and Kentucky SOS podcast. They cover important topics such as local and statewide election results.  Be sure to give the Pastors for Kentucky Children a follow on Facebook and Twitter to keep up with all of their movements. 

Louisiana

Step Up Louisiana  continues their fight for living wage jobs, sustainable community schools, affordable housing, stopping city worker furloughs, and public defender equity. They are encouraging citizens to submit a public comment on the city budget. Also this month Step Up Louisiana had a Facebook live event called Is School Choice the Real Choice for Public Schools in New Orleans?  You can view that event here. 

Maryland 

The Baltimore Algebra Project signed onto a petition last month with the Baltimore Movement of Rank and File Educators for Police Free Schools.  

Massachusetts

Citizens for Public Schools continue to advocate for cancelling the MCAS.The New Bedford Coalition to Save our Schools shares a wide array of events happening in their area on their open Facebook page.  Be sure to check it out weekly for new updates. 

Michigan

The Michigan Network for Equity in Education shares up-to-date information about their State Board and local boards addressing COVID and safe workplaces. 

Save Michigan’s Public Schools notified their members who are educators and work in districts where students are virtual, but staff is still being required to report to the buildings to work that the Michigan Occupational Safety & Health Administration (MIOSHA) initiated a “statewide order calling for employers to allow workers to stay home whenever possible” as required by Emergency Rule 5(8). Michigan Parents for Schools discuss, and organize, in a public Facebook group.  If you are from Michigan, or know someone who is, head over there and join the discussion. MI Ed Justice hosted a meet and greet this month to share their goals, work, and upcoming events. Give Trusted Voices ED a follow on Twitter to keep up with their events and issues. 

Minnesota 

Parents for St. Paul Schools continue to work hard to get a charter moratorium passed in their state and city.  Visit their open Facebook page for all the latest.  Minnesota Collective for Educational Equity published a report last month detailing how the overwhelming majority of learning disabilities in MN have been identified using discredited methods. This practice continues to this day and will persist until MN amends 3525.1341.  

Mississippi

Parents for Public Schools – Moss Point continues to support their community with information about storm resources, education, meals, and much more. Parents For 

Public Schools of Greenwood and Leflore County are still hosting Early Childhood Development programs for their community. They have been doing this since March. For more information on their programs, go here. Parents For Public Schools of Philadelphia advocates for children and schools in the Philadelphia Public School District. Make sure you give them a follow on Facebook. Parents For Public Schools of Starkville is a local organization working to strengthen public schools in Starkville. They promote the great work being done in the Starkville Oktibbeha Consolidated School District.

Missouri

Keep up with the Missouri BATs by giving them a follow on twitter. Columbia Parents for Public Schools promotes parent engagement to improve education and build public support for public schools in Columbia. 

Nebraska

Stand for Schools reported on the Nebraska Legislature Education Committee, which seems to be open to allowing privatizers in. Read more here.  Nebraska Loves Public Schools new film, Standing Up to Covid is out.  

Nevada

Educate Nevada NOW issued a public comment for the Commission On School Funding.

New Hampshire

Barrington Educators Association is the local chapter of the New Hampshire-NEA.  You can view updated work here.  To contact them about issues happening in NH, go here. 

New Jersey

Save our Schools NJ shared that the Education Law Center (ELC) and the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey (ACLU-NJ) are urging Governor Phil Murphy’s Administration to improve data collection and public reporting on the presence of police in New Jersey schools and the use of public school funding for such purposes.

Be sure to check out the The Newark Students Union events tab on their Facebook page. They post events that students can take part in to have their voices heard. 

Delran Education Association is a local organization committed to ensuring excellence in public education. Give them a follow on Facebook.  If you are a resident of Elizabeth, ask to join the Elizabeth Parents and Students Care closed Facebook group to connect. Montclair Cares About Schools uses its open Facebook page to inform the community about school openings and the COVID crisis. Give Our Children Our Schools a follow on Twitter to keep up with any future events. South Orange-Maplewood Cares About Schools organizes in its closed Facebook group. If you live in this area or know anyone who does, please ask to join the group here. Paterson Education Fund works hard to keep the community informed about Board of Education meetings and food distributions. Go here for more information and share it with anyone you know who lives in Paterson. 

New York

Class Size Matters, New York Allies for Public Education, and the Parent Coalition for Student Privacy are working together this month to survey parents about which online apps or programs are being employed by schools throughout New York state and whether they are sufficiently protective of children’s privacy. LI Opt-Out, the national leader in the Opt-Out movement, has a vibrant public Facebook page. There are important discussions going on about school reopening on Long Island. NYC Opt Out also has a public Facebook group that is currently having important conversations about the reopening of NYC schools. If you live in NYC, go here to connect. The Alliance for Quality Education launched a campaign to tell NYS legislators to support solutions not suspensions this month. Give Change the Stakes a follow on Facebook to keep up with what is happening in NYC education during the COVID crisis. Be sure to check out the NY BATs open Facebook page. They post upcoming events and actions. Keep up with FUSE (New Rochelle Federation of United School Employees) by checking out their news and views. MORE-UFT announced that in collaboration with union leadership and educators within the Movement of Rank and File Educators and Black Lives Matter at Schools NYC Group, the following resolution is being presented at the next UFT delegates assembly. Jackson Heights People for Public Schools supports, and shares, important events for their community and the surrounding area. Parents for Public Schools- Syracuse has been posting important information about special education events in their area. Croton Advocates for Public Education (CAPE) advocates for fair assessments, enrichment opportunities, and funding for their schools. The Port Washington Advocates for Public Education closed Facebook group is a place to connect and organize if you live in Port Washington, NY. North Country Alliance For Public Education works to end the reliance on high stakes testing and to stop the privatization that is taking over their schools. If you live in the North Country of New York, consider joining their closed Facebook group to connect. Visit the Rochester Coalition for Public Education website for all that is happening with Rochester education. 

North Carolina

Public Schools First NC and Wake County hosted a webinar called School Psychologists: Supporting Children In School, At Home, and In Life this month. We will have the archived video in our next newsletter. North Carolina Families for School Testing Reform launched a petition this month to keep High School students safe and waive the end of course (EOC) exams. Neighbors for Better Neighborhoods hosted a Organizers Circle this month with special guest Dr. Valerie Johnson, Dean of Arts, Sciences, and Humanities at Shaw University. Dr. Johnson, who also serves as a Professor of Sociology and as a fierce advocate for HBCUs, joined Neighbors for Better Neighborhoods to discuss how we can make the connection between hot topics in environmental justice and the community. Pastors for North Carolina Children joined the Moravian Board of Cooperative Ministries in a discussion about how churches can get involved in education.  Parents for Public Schools of Pitt County hosted an online chat with  Hope Middle School parents this month. PPS Pitt County continues to host community forums so that parents and the community can share their  experiences with Pitt County Schools. 

Ohio

Ohio BATs organize in a closed Facebook group of over 2000 members.  If you live in Ohio or know someone who does, send them this link to connect. It Takes A Village To Tackle HB70 and It Takes A Village hosted a statewide town hall on the future of public education this month.  Here is the archived video. Northwest Ohio Friends of Public Education shared a powerful piece by Sylvania teacher, Kelly Duwve, TPS Administrator Jim Gault, and Northwestern OEA Exec Director about educating students during the pandemic. Public Education Partners (PEP) are encouraging Ohio citizens to contact the Senate Finance Committee and tell them to bring the Fair School Funding Bill before the full Senate before the end of the year. Parents For Public Schools of Greater Cincinnati post upcoming events on their open Facebook page. 

Oklahoma

Pastors for Oklahoma Kids announced that Gov. Kevin Stitt removed the president of the Statewide Virtual Charter School Board who recently led the initiation of termination proceedings against Epic Charter Schools. To read more on that go here. 

The Oklahoma Parent Legislative Action Committee serves as an umbrella organization for local PLAC groups and affiliated organizations that advocate for a strong public education system in Oklahoma. If you know anyone who lives in Oklahoma please have them connect with OKPLAC. Oklahoma Parents and Educators for Public Education & Oklahomans for Public Education organize in a private group on Facebook.  If you live in Oklahoma or know someone who does, join up to connect. Oklahoma Teachers – The Time Is Now organizes in a private Facebook group of over 64,000 members. The purpose of the group is to unite all educators in the state of Oklahoma, so they can come together and educate, collaborate, and discuss what options they have moving forward to improve Public Education. If you know any Oklahoma educators, send them to this group to connect. 

Oregon

Community Alliance for Public Education (CAPE) shared a fantastic event in their area called Sacred Breath: Writing and Storytelling by UW Department of American Indian Studies. To learn more, and to keep up with their supported events, go here. 

Check out Oregon Save Our Schools on Facebook for all the latest in Oregon education. Oregon BATs organizes in a closed Facebook group.  If you are an Oregon teacher or community member, ask to join and connect.

Pennsylvania

The Keystone State Education Coalition publishes a daily PA education policy roundup.  Pennsylvania School Board Association video EDition Chief Advocacy Officer John Callahan and CEO Nathan Mains discussed surprises and implications of the 2020 election results this month. Talks turned to state budget possibilities and what to watch for in the coming weeks. The Pittsburgh Task Force on the Right to Education topic in this month’s webinar was Recommendations for Positive and Effective Parent-School Parenting During Covid 19. If you live in the Pittsburgh area, or know someone who does, share The Pittsburgh Task Force on the Right to Education Facebook link with them to connect. Education Voters PA co hosted 

a webinar this month with the Education Law Center of Pennsylvania and Public Interest Law Center about Pennsylvania’s school funding lawsuit. Alliance for Philadelphia Public Schools has been unbelievably busy this month. First they are staying on top of the situation with Renaissance charters schools. To read more about that go here and here. Second, they also have their eyes and ears on the Board of Education. To learn more about that go here. 

Rhode Island

The Providence Student Union is publishing a new monthly newsletter that is for  youth by youth. Check it out for upcoming programs, events, resources, and more! Want to contribute to the newsletter by sharing an art piece? Your project? Maybe even some free thought? Read on to see how you can share. To keep up with what is happening in Rhode Island, give the Parents Across Rhode Island Facebook page a follow. 

South Carolina

The Quality Education Project is a fantastic group doing great work in South Carolina.  If you know anyone in South Carolina please share this information about their monthly meetings so they can connect. 

Tennessee

The Momma Bears have a great blog full of information about the fight for public education in Tennessee. Check it out here. Make sure to give Tennesseans Reclaiming Educational Excellence (TREE) a follow on Twitter to keep up with all that is going on in Tennessee education. Pastor Ladd, who is a Board chair for Pastors for Tennessee Children, is doing amazing work in Chattanooga, where churches have come together to serve underprivileged children during the pandemic. To read more about Pastor Ladd’s work go here. Tennessee Strong administrator and journalist Andy Spears reported Gov. Bill Lee has selected former State Rep. Bill Dunn to serve in an advisory role to embattled Commissioner of Education Penny Schwinn. Dunn has been a long-time critic of public education and a full time cheerleader for Lee’s voucher scheme.  

Texas

Pastors for Texas Children hosted an election eve conversation on Facebook live. Go here to view that conversation. The Baptist News Global interviewed PTC Executive Director Rev. Charles Foster Johnson. In the interview Rev. Johnson reflected on what he anticipated could happen in a Biden administration. CFISD Community Leadership Committee is a volunteer group of parents, business people, and retirees who believe that having a strong independent school district is important to the economic well-being of the Cypress-Fairbanks community. To keep up with their actions and events, visit their website. The Coalition for Public Schools Texas will be hosting a conversation about Virtual Vouchers next month. To register for this free event, to be held on 12/3, go here. Texas Kids Can’t Wait are advocates for equitable and adequate funding for Texas public schools and for a sane assessment system.They strongly oppose the corporate takeover of public schools. To follow their movements go to their open Facebook page. RootEd publishes a monthly newsletter called The Branch. Go here to view their newsletter from last month. If you know of anyone in the Houston community, please have them connect with Parents For Public Schools of Houston. They post important activities for the Houston community on their open Facebook page. 

Community Voices For Public Education has an open discussion page on Facebook.  To keep up with all that is happening in Texas public education, go here to join in the discussion. Keep up with Our Schools San Antonio on their open Facebook page. 

The Coalition for Equity in Public Education shares information on the elimination of the STARR exam in Texas. Texas AFT reported that in  just over two months, educators, employees, parents, & community members have submitted more than 3,600 reports to their #StopTheSpreadTX COVID-19 tracker.Texas AFT will continue to use these reports and stories in statewide and local fights, and they noted that they appreciate all those who are speaking out and shining a light on the situations at their campuses.

Vermont

Keep up with the The Vermont Coalition for Equity in Education on their open Facebook page and on Twitter. They are a new group, so make sure you give them a follow on both platforms and share their work. 

Virginia

Virginia Educators United conducted a webinar this month on Virginia’s COVID OSHA rules. Virginia BATs took part in a rally this month to protect students and teachers from unsafe school openings. Support Our Schools-Shenandoah County organizes to fight for public education in that region. You can connect here. To learn more about the Virginia Public Education Partners visit their Facebook page or give them a follow on Twitter.  

Washington State

WA BATs has an active Twitter feed full of powerful graphics. Check it out here. 

Washington Paramount Duty celebrated good news for Washington state public schools. They continue to push the Governor and the state legislature to tax the rich to ensure that students and teachers can recover from this devastating pandemic.

Wisconsin

Wisconsin Public Education Network announced in a press release that the Department of Public Instruction budget proposal provides the support “our kids deserve.” Schools and Communities United are asking parents, guardians, and students to please take a few minutes to fill out a survey and let them know how remote learning is going.Survey results will be shared at a meeting and with Milwaukee Public Schools.Parents for Public Schools Milwaukee shared an article that Wisconsin lags the nation in education spending. To read that article go here. 

NPE Grassroots Education Network – Resources and Graphics

The NPE Grassroots Education Network has compiled a list of resources to help communities navigate the COVID pandemic.  We created a list of c3 organizations you can donate to help others in need. We have created a space for resources to help educators and parents trying to navigate remote learning. Finally, we are collecting stories highlighting how Public Schools are helping their communities. 

Here is a link to our resources page. It will help you navigate resources covering a variety of topics.  This is a live document and will be updated, so check back for new resources. 

Here is a link to our graphics page. It will provide powerful visuals for you to share on social media. This is a live document and will be updated, so check back for new graphics.

Categories Education Reform, Network for Public Education, Resistance, Supporting public schools

Growing Consensus that Young Children Can Safely Return to School

By dianeravitch
December 2, 2020 //
83

The New York Times reports that scientists are converging on a consensus that it is safe for young children to return to school.

After a summer of uncertainty and fear about how schools across the globe would operate in a pandemic, a consensus has emerged in recent months that is becoming policy in more and more districts: In-person teaching with young children is safer than with older ones, and particularly crucial for their development.

On Sunday, New York City, home to the country’s largest school system, became the most high-profile example of that trend, when Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that only elementary schools and some schools for children with complex disabilities would reopen after all city classrooms were briefly shuttered in November. There is no plan yet to bring middle and high school students back into city school buildings.

It was an abrupt about-face for the mayor, who had for months promised to welcome all of the city’s 1.1 million children — from 3-year-olds to high school seniors — back into classrooms this fall.

But the decision put New York in line with other cities around America and across the world, which have reopened classrooms first, and often exclusively, for young children, and in some cases kept them open even as they have confronted second waves of the virus.

In-person learning is particularly crucial for young children, who often need intensive parental supervision to even log on for the day, education experts say. And mounting evidence has shown that elementary school students in particular can be safe as long as districts adopt strict safety measures, though it’s an unsettled question for older students.

“With younger kids, we see this pleasant confluence of two facts: science tells us that younger children are less likely to contract, and seemingly less likely to transmit, the virus,” said Elliot Haspel, the author of Crawling Behind: America’s Child Care Crisis and How to Fix It. “And younger children are the ones that most need in-person schooling, and in-person interactions.”

Districts including Chicago, Washington D.C. and Philadelphia have either begun to bring back only young children or have plans to do so whenever they eventually reopen classrooms.

In Rhode Island, Gov. Gina Raimondo, a strong proponent of keeping schools open, recently asked colleges to shift to all-remote learning after Thanksgiving, and gave districts the option of reducing the number of high school students attending in person. But she asserted that middle and elementary schools were not sources of community spread.

That model of giving priority to younger students has been pioneered in Europe, where many countries have kept primary schools open even as most other parts of public life have shuttered during the continent’s second wave.

Italy has kept its primary schools open but kept teaching remote for middle and high schools. All schools in Germany are open, and discussions about possible closures have focused mainly on high schools.

And in America, more and more districts have begun to prioritize elementary school students for in-person learning.

In urban districts that have been slow to reopen, that has meant making plans to bring back the youngest students. In parts of the Midwest where school districts were more aggressive about reopening, and where there has been a huge rise in cases in recent weeks, public health officials have prioritized keeping elementary schools open even as they have closed high schools and in some cases middle schools.

“The data is becoming more compelling that there is very limited transmission in day care and grade schools,” said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota and a member of President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s coronavirus task force, in a recent interview.

“I keep telling people, ‘Stop talking about kids — talk about those younger than 10,’” he added. “We’re seeing a very different epidemiology in that group than we’re seeing, for example, in high school students.”

Categories Health, Science

Grantland Rice: Advice to Trump

By dianeravitch
December 2, 2020 //
61

I learned the famous saying by Grantland Rice, probably in junior high school: “It matters not whether you won or lost, but how you played the game.” That was a lesson for life. Donald Trump never learned it. He’s a sore loser.

Hillary Clinton lost a far closer race than Trump. She collected three million votes more than Trump. She lost the electoral college because of razor-thin wins by Trump in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. She didn’t stamp her feet and whine, as Trump is doing now. She didn’t demand a recount in the states she lost. She conceded graciously. She called Trump and congratulated him on election night. She said in her concession speech the next day that one of the hallmarks of American democracy is the peaceful transfer of power. That’s class.

Many years ago, I took my young children to Constitution Hall in Philadelphia. The young Park Ranger who was our guide said, “The most remarkable event in American history happened here. George Washington relinquished his power at the end of his second term and turned the Presidency over to his successor. The world had never seen the leader of a nation step aside without being forced out. That was the true beginning of American democracy. The peaceful transfer of power.”

The transition has begun. Biden is choosing his cabinet. Trump has not conceded, despite the fact that he clearly lost the electoral college and the popular vote. He is still sending Rudy Guiliani out to make ludicrous claims about fraud. Trump’s lawsuits have been laughed out of federal and state courts over 30 times.

Trump and his personal lawyers are a national disgrace, as Chris Christie said. They not only are pursuing baseless claims, they are undermining our democracy and making us an international laughing stock. So are the leaders of the Republican Party, who have encouraged Trump in his efforts to undermine the 2020 election. Nothing shames the Republican sycophants, not even when the federal government’s cyber security administrator was fired by Trump for telling a simple truth: the 2020 election was the most secure, free, and fair election in history.

Categories Education Reform

QAnon Conspiracists Target Georgia

By dianeravitch
December 2, 2020 //
20

Led by Trump and his base, QAnon conspiracy theorists are targeting Georgia in their effort to overturn the 2020 election. We are heading into Cloud CuckooLand in American politics.

This story by Drew Harrell explains why Georgia election official was so angry. Read it to the end. It appeared in the Washington Post:

In her legal quest to reverse the reality of last month’s election, President Trump’s recently disavowed attorney Sidney Powell has gained a strange new ally: the longtime administrator of the message board 8kun, the QAnon conspiracy theory’s Internet home.
Powell on Tuesday filed an affidavit from Ron Watkins, the son of 8kun’s owner Jim Watkins, in a Georgia lawsuit alleging that Dominion Voting Systems machines used in the election had been corrupted as part of a sprawling voter-fraud conspiracy.
Powell has claimed that a diabolical scheme backed by global communists had invisibly shifted votes with help from a mysterious computer algorithm pioneered by the long-dead Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chávez — a wild story debunked by fact-checkers as a “fantasy parade” and devoid of proof.
No real evidence was included in Watkins’s affidavit, either. But Watkins, who said in the affidavit that he lives in Japan, nevertheless speculated that — based on his recent reading of the Dominion software’s online user guide — it may be “within the realm of possibility” for a biased poll worker to fraudulently switch votes.

Watkins’s affidavit marks one of the first official connections between a notable player in the QAnon conspiracy universe and Trump’s muddled multistate legal campaign, which some of the president’s allies have labeled, in the words of Chris Christie, a “national embarrassment.”
Many similar Trump-QAnon overtures have already played out on TV and social media since the election nearly one month ago. Watkins made similar allegations in an unchallenged segment on the far-right One America News network, which Trump retweeted to his 88 million followers last month.

Powell and her client Michael Flynn, Trump’s former national security adviser, are effectively celebrities to QAnon loyalists, who posit online that both will soon help “release the Kraken” and expose a bombshell that could salvage a Trump second term, vanquish his enemies and unveil the hidden machinations of a communist conspiracy.
Since claiming to have resigned last month from 8kun, Watkins has devoted much of his online activity to claims about unfounded suspicions regarding Dominion, an 18-year-old voting-technology company whose computer programs, ballot printers and other products are used by elections officials in 28 states. Trump and his supporters have loudly attacked the Denver-based company as having contributed in some unproved way to steal the vote.

In a lengthy rebuttal last week, Dominion said that Powell’s claims were nonsensical: Manual recounts, machine tests and independent audits had reaffirmed that the voting systems had given accurate, undistorted results. Her “wild and reckless allegations,” the company added, were “not only demonstrably false” but had “led to stalking, harassment, and death threats to Dominion employees.”


In his affidavit, Watkins called himself an information security expert with nine years of experience as a “network and information defense analyst” and security engineer. But he did not mention that his experience had come largely through 8kun, the site once called 8chan that was knocked offline for nearly three months last year.

The message board is infamous for its anonymous threads of racist bile and extremist threats, and the site was used by gunmen to announce and celebrate three fatal attacks last year — at an El Paso Walmart, a San Diego-area synagogue and a New Zealand mosque.

Major web-services providers that form the Internet’s backbone have refused to work with the site, with one executive telling The Washington Post last year that Watkins’s site had facilitated “mass shootings and extreme hate speech with intolerable consequences.”


Ron Watkins holds an exalted role in QAnon’s online sphere of influence: He and his father are among the few people who can verify posts from Q, the conspiracy theory’s unnamed prophet (and a self-proclaimed government agent with top-secret clearance) who claims to post solely on 8kun. (The strange arrangement has fueled unproved theories that the Watkinses have helped write Q’s posts, or are Q themselves, which both men deny.)

Q has posted more than 4,000 times since 2017, but only three times since the election, sparking a mix of anxiety and faith-based recommitment among QAnon believers.


Attorney General William P. Barr said on Tuesday that investigators with the FBI and Justice Department hadn’t “seen anything to substantiate” the claims of mass voter fraud.


But Watkins and his supporters have continued to hunt for clues to support the unproven claims of a secret Dominion scheme.

Shortly after midnight Tuesday, Watkins posted what he called “a smoking-gun video” of a Dominion worker manipulating Georgia voting data by “plugging an elections USB drive into an external laptop … then suspiciously walking away.”


The undated video — which was recorded at a distance and includes a man and woman offering ongoing commentary of the “nerd boy” as he works inside an election office — shows nothing even remotely conclusive of voter fraud: The man uses a computer and a thumb drive, all of it very obviously caught on camera.

But Watkins’s messages nevertheless kicked QAnon-echoing accounts and online Trump supporters into conspiracy-theory overdrive. Many began sharing the name of a Georgia man they believed had been captured on the video, after they’d zoomed in on the man’s identification badge. A number of accounts on Twitter, 8kun and other pro-Trump websites shared links to the man’s possible LinkedIn profile, phone numbers, home address and personal details, including a photo of him as a groomsman in a friend’s wedding in 2018.

A Dominion representative said the company wouldn’t comment on alleged employee matters or safety issues, but that it was working to report all threats to law enforcement.


Watkins did not respond to questions, and a woman he had thanked on Twitter for sharing the original video said she had “no comment about anything.”

The man’s name and identifying information is still bouncing around the Web, with some people calling for his imprisonment, torture or execution. For several hours on Tuesday, just typing in the first two letters of his name into Twitter would automatically complete the rest of his name. One tweet includes his name and said he is “guilty of treason” and added, alongside an animated image of a hanging noose: “May God have mercy on your soul.”


Gabriel Sterling, a top official with the Georgia Secretary of State’s office, addressed the threat in a fiery news conference Tuesday afternoon and called out Trump and Republican senators for not condemning the violent language. Sterling said the man caught on camera had been transferring a report to a county computer so he could read it.

“It’s all gone too far. All of it,” he said. “This 20-year-old contractor for a voting system company [was] just trying to do this job,” he added. “His family is getting harassed now. There’s a noose out there with his name on it. And it’s not right. … This kid took a job. He just took a job, and it’s just wrong.”

Categories Elections, Georgia, Insane

Georgia: Election Official Condemns Trump’s Attacks on Election: “This Has to Stop”

By dianeravitch
December 2, 2020 //
13

Georgia has a Republican Governor and Republican state officials. The presidential election was conducted under the auspices of Republicans. Biden won the election by a small margin. Trump insisted on a hand recount, and it confirmed that Biden won. Trump has demanded another recount.

Trump has taken to Twitter to excoriate Governor Kemp for refusing to change the results. He and his proxies have attacked the state’s election officials. The Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger condemned the conspiracy theories and groundless attacks on the election. Another state election official spoke out and said, “This has to stop.” He warned that someone could be killed because of the violence unleashed by Trump.

This story appeared in the New York Times:

ATLANTA — In one of the most striking rebukes to President Trump since he launched his baseless attacks on the American electoral process, a top-ranking Georgia election official lashed out at the president on Tuesday for failing to condemn threats of violence against people overseeing the voting system in his state.

“It has to stop,” Gabriel Sterling, a Republican and Georgia’s voting system implementation manager, said at an afternoon news conference at the state Capitol, his voice shaking with emotion. “Mr. President, you have not condemned these actions or this language.”

He added: “This is elections. This is the backbone of democracy, and all of you who have not said a damn word are complicit in this. It’s too much.”

Mr. Sterling’s outburst of anger and frustration came amid a sustained assault on Georgia’s election process by Mr. Trump as he seeks to reverse his loss to his Democratic rival, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. Mr. Sterling, who previously said he had received threats himself, said that threats had also been made against the wife of his superior, Brad Raffensperger, the Republican secretary of state.

“Mr. President, it looks like you likely lost the state of Georgia,” Mr. Sterling said. He added that the president needed to “step up” and say, “Stop inspiring people to commit potential acts of violence. Someone is going to get hurt, someone is going to get shot, someone is going to get killed. And it’s not right.”

Mr. Sterling also called on the state’s two Republican senators, David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, to condemn the rhetoric that he said was getting dangerously out of hand. The two senators, both Trump loyalists, have called for Mr. Raffensperger to resign.

As Mr. Trump hurls false claims of fraud in Georgia, a number of lawsuits filed by conservatives in state and federal courts are seeking to decertify the results. The second of two recounts requested by the Trump campaign is in progress and is expected to wind up Wednesday. And the Georgia Republican Party has descended into a state of virtual civil war as some of its most powerful players maneuver and malign their rivals, seeking advantage, or at least survival.

In the meantime, Mr. Trump continues to lash out at Gov. Brian Kemp and Mr. Raffensperger, both staunch Republicans and Trump supporters, over the fact that he lost Georgia, saying they have not sufficiently rooted out fraud.

As late as Tuesday morning, Mr. Trump made the latest in a series of unsubstantiated claims about the Georgia election, writing on Twitter that the state had been “scammed” and urging Mr. Kemp to “call off” the election.

Some of Mr. Trump’s supporters have taken to the streets and the Capitol building in downtown Atlanta, where the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones of Infowars recently joined them. In other cases, Trump supporters have harassed or threatened Mr. Sterling, Mr. Raffensperger and others.

In a statement Tuesday evening, Tim Murtaugh, a spokesman for the Trump campaign, said: “The campaign is focused on ensuring that all legal votes are counted and all illegal votes are not. No one should engage in threats or violence, and if that has happened, we condemn that fully.”

Amid all of this, Mr. Sterling, a detail-oriented former city councilman from the Atlanta suburb of Sandy Springs, has taken on a prominent role in the state as it conducted its recounts. Along with Mr. Raffensperger, he has often been the main speaker in numerous news conferences in which he has explained the complexities of Georgia’s election and recount systems and has argued that the results, which currently show Mr. Biden winning by about 12,700 votes, are trustworthy.

Ari Schaffer, press secretary for the secretary of state’s office, did not answer directly when asked Tuesday whether Mr. Raffensperger had given Mr. Sterling his blessing to speak out so forcefully against the president. But he noted that the deputy secretary of state, Jordan Fuchs, had been standing near Mr. Sterling when he made his statements.

“Gabriel has my support,” Ms. Fuchs said independently in a text message.

Late Tuesday, representatives for Ms. Loeffler and Mr. Perdue said they condemned violence of any kind but also said they would not apologize for seeking accountability and accuracy in the state’s elections. 

In the second of two news conferences called by the secretary of state’s office on Tuesday, Mr. Sterling, speaking loudly, emotionally and deliberately, said that people had intruded on Mr. Raffensperger’s personal property. He said that Mr. Raffensperger’s wife “is getting sexualized threats through her cellphone.” He mentioned that he had police protection outside his own house, a topic he had also broached in a Nov. 21 tweet.

“So this is fun … multiple attempted hacks of my emails, police protection around my home, the threats,” Mr. Sterling wrote then. “But all is well … following the law, following the process … doing our jobs.”

This is not fun. This is no joke. Trump is sowing distrust in democracy and endangering the lives of election officials who refuse to rig the results for him.

Categories Accountability, Elections, Georgia, Lies, Trump

Bill Barr: No Widespread Fraud in 2020 Election

By dianeravitch
December 1, 2020 //
45

The Boston Globe reports that Attorney General Bill Barr said that the Department of Justice has not discovered any widespread fraud. Whatever they have found has not been enough to change the outcome of the election.

Attorney General William Barr said Tuesday the Justice Department has not uncovered evidence of widespread voter fraud that would change the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.

His comments come despite President Donald Trump’s repeated claims that the election was stolen, and his refusal to concede his loss to President-Elect Joe Biden.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Barr said U.S. attorneys and FBI agents have been working to follow up specific complaints and information they’ve received, but they’ve uncovered no evidence that would change the outcome of the election.

“To date, we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have affected a different outcome in the election,” Barr told the AP.

When will Trump stop claiming that the election was “stolen”? When will he stop undermining our democracy?

Categories Elections, Fraud, Trump

Andrea Gabor: We Need Civics Education!

By dianeravitch
December 1, 2020 //
74

Andrea Gabor, the Bloomberg Professor of Business Journalism at Baruch College of the City University of New York, writes here about the importance of civics education, especially in a time when democracy is under attack by a defeated president and the leadership of the Republican Party.

Put Civics Back in the Classroom, Right Now

Has there ever been a better time to resume lapsed efforts to teach young Americans the structure and purpose of U.S. democracy?


By Andrea Gabor

The presidential election seemed to mark a revival in American civic engagement. A record two-thirds of the electorate voted. Candidates raised at least $3 billion in small-dollar donations, and historic get-out-the-vote efforts had an impact in Nevada, Georgia and elsewhere.


Yet large numbers of Americans appear to believe President Donald Trump’s baseless charges of election fraud. Civic life and discourse have been eroded by the normalization of lying by elected leaders, the dissemination of disinformation via social media and the attempted weaponization of the courts to undermine confidence in voting.
Has there ever been a better time for a revival of civics education? Not your father’s bland civics, with its how-a-bill-becomes-law tedium, but a vigorous set of lessons about American society and government that encourages fact-based exchanges of views and civil debate about controversial topics without taking sides in contemporary disputes about such issues as abortion or immigration policy.

Civics should begin with a common narrative that Americans can agree on, beginning with what the Declaration of Independence and Constitution say about the role and structure of U.S. government. It should explore the definition of citizenship and how it has evolved over the course of 250 years via such documents as the Emancipation Proclamation, the Gettysburg Address, the Seneca Falls Declaration on women’s rights, and the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech. It should address the role of the electoral college, how it works, and how votes are counted. And it should examine the prerogatives of state and local governments and their relationship to the federal government.
A foundational civics course must include uncomfortable truths. That would mean delving into the three-fifths compromise of the constitutional convention, which made slaves count toward the congressional representation of slave states without granting them any political rights, along with the Indian Removal Act of 1830 and the Supreme Court’s sanction of Japanese internment during World War II and its 2018 decisionto overturn that precedent. But divisive and complex debatesabout the degree to which slavery shaped American society should be left to more advanced classes.


Civics should also make room for local variations in content and execution. For example, the terms on which Southern states were readmitted to the union following the Civil War might receive more emphasis in the South, and the role of the 1787 Northwest Ordinances in expanding statehood could be stressed in the West.


The refreshing of civics curricula in Illinois and Florida provide a roadmap for how states should approach the topic today. Illinois’s civics mandate, especially a requirement that classes discuss “current and controversial issues,” is especially important. The law passed overwhelmingly in 2015 with bipartisan support — Illinois was among 11 states that previously had no civics mandate — and was signed by former Governor Bruce Rauner, a Republican. (While Illinois had long required high schools to teach two years of social studies, including one year of American history, the law now requires that at least one semester be devoted to civics.)


Facilitating constructive discussions of controversial topics requires special teacher training. Illinois offered all civics teachers professional development courses over a three-year period, and created a mentoring program for civics teachers, especially in schools with no previous civics course — as many as 13 percent of the total. The problem is that the state didn’t set aside money for the training, relying instead on philanthropies; a subject as important as civics should have a dedicated funding stream for educators and schools.Nor should the introduction of civics concepts wait until high school. Last year, Illinois added middle school to the grades that must provide civics instruction. Similarly, Florida’s decade-old civics law makes passing a middle-school civics course a requirement for high 
school matriculation.


A well designed middle-school civics test could support fact-based debate and is arguably less onerous than a high-school graduation requirement; students who fail the class (in Florida the test accounts for just 30 percent of the middle-school civics grade) could retake the test and go on to high school. When the coronavirus pandemic recedes, states should consider eliminating all middle-school testing in lieu of a single meaty civics test that might include geography and some economics.


When it comes to civics, states have a lot of ground to make up. For decades, government policies, including state testing mandates and federal initiatives like President George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind program and President Barack Obama’s support for Common Core, have focused on college and workplace readiness. Civics instruction got short shrift and was often abandoned.

As attacks on democratic institutions picked up steam during the Trump presidency, civics remained an afterthought. As of 2018, only eight states required students to take a yearlong civics and government class. The National Assessment of Educational Progress, which is considered the nation’s report card, dropped its 4th- and 12th-grade civics and American history exam in 2014.

Few recent state civics efforts succeeded.
Now, as a few states begin to pursue a civics revival, one concern is political interference from the left and right. California Governor Gavin Newsom just vetoed an ethnic studies law that threatened to erode time and effort spent on other subjects, including civics. Last year, Florida’s legislature passed a bill requiring the state to review civics materials, a concern at a time when Republican lawmakers and Governor Ron DeSantis have promoted Trump’s baseless claims of election fraud.


But civics instruction needn’t take sides to promote democratic involvement. Last year, Massachusetts became the first state to require schools to coordinate nonpartisan student-led civics projects. The redesigned Advanced Placement U.S. government and politics course taken by many college-bound students also requires students to work on a civics project, either partisan or not.
States should borrow good ideas from each other, including Florida’s emphasis on middle-school civics and Illinois’s focus on constructive debate. A shared narrative will be stronger if buttressed by productive argument and brought to life by civic action.


Andrea Gabor
Bloomberg Chair of Business Journalism 
Baruch College/CUNY
After the Education Wars (The New Press, June 2018)
www.andreagabor.com

Categories Citizenship, Civics, Curriculum, Democracy, Education Reform

ProPublica: Trump and Barr Want to Restore Death by Firing Squad

By dianeravitch
December 1, 2020 //
41

ProPublica has been collecting evidence of Trump’s “midnight regulations,” the last-minute rule changes he and his cruel administration want to impose before they leave office.

https://projects.propublica.org/trump-midnight-regulations

Most egregious perhaps is the rule change that brings back execution of prisoners by firing squad or execution. This from an administration that claims to be pro-life.

There have been no federal executions of prisoners for 17 years. Attorney General Bill Barr revived the death penalty in 2019. Eight Federal prisoners have been killed this year. Five more are scheduled to be put to death before Biden takes office.

Biden opposes the death penalty and is sure to reverse this cruel revival of barbaric practices.

Categories Justice, Trump
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