During the 2020 Presidential campaign, candidate Joe Biden pledged to educators that if elected, Betsy DeVos’s priorities, such as charter schools, would be gone. That’s what he said in a nationally televised forum in Pittsburgh for educators in December 2019 (start about 4:40). In Pittsburgh, he also promised to end the federal pressure for standardized testing. In his campaign documents, he promised that no federal funds would go to for-profit charter schools.
So far, his batting record is poor. The first consequential decision, made before the confirmation of Secretary Cardona, was to insist on the resumption of federal testing in the midst of the pandemic.
Now we know he backtracked on charter schools. The federal Charter Schools Program—though riddled with waste, fraud, and abuse, though used in North Carolina to fund segregation academies—will receive the same funding as under DeVos ($440 million a year).
Here comes the next insult to the nation’s public schools: Secretary Miguel Cardona will be the lead speaker at the National Charter Schools Conference. Contrary to President Biden’s statement in Pittsburgh, charter schools will not be gone.
Will Secretary Cardona tell the attendees that he is cutting off federal funding to charters that operate for profit? Will he tell them that the federal government will no longer fund charters operated by for-profit managers? Will he explain why he kept the wasteful federal Charter Schools Program at the same level as it was under Betsy DeVos?
Don’t count on it.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Reblogged this on dean ramser.
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No administration promoted and marketed charter schools like the Obama Administration did. They were really in a class by themselves as far as disdain for public schools and lockstep cheerleading for charter schools:
“The charter movement is absolutely one of the most profound changes in American education, bringing new options to underserved communities and introducing competition and innovation into the education system,” Education Secretary Arne Duncan told attendees at the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools’ annual conference last week.
With $100 billion in stimulus funding for education, including $4.35 billion in the competitive Race to the Top fund to improve education quality, Duncan has offered a stern warning to states: Embrace charters or risk losing stimulus dollars.
“States that don’t have charter laws or put artificial caps on the growth of charter schools will jeopardize their applications under the Race to the Top fund,” Duncan told reporters last month. “Simply put, they put themselves at a competitive disadvantage for the largest pool of discretionary dollars states have ever had access to.”
They made their support of public schools contingent on states expanding, promoting and investing in charter schools, using public school students as a “lever” to secure additional funding for charter schools. We’ve seen the ed reform “movement” follow this same playbook for vouchers. They hold public school funding hostage until they get their demands met on vouchers.
The common theme? No actual advocacy for or work performed on behalf of students in public schools. Our students are just a mechanism to be used to create their preferred privatized systems.
It’s a shame that Biden is sticking with the ed reform echo chamber and hiring the same people with the same lockstep agenda thru yet another 4 years, but the Obama Administration was a new low for Democrats re: support of public education. We didn’t have anywhere to go but up.
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Standing in the middle of nowhere,
Wondering how to begin.
Lost between tomorrow and yesterday,
Between now and then.
And now we’re back where we started,
Here we go round again.
Day after day I get up and I say
I better do it again.
Where are all the people going?
Round and round till we reach the end.
One day leading to another,
Get up, go out, do it again.
Then it’s back where you started,
Here we go round again.
Back where you started,
Come on do it again.
And you think today is going to be better,
Change the world and do it again.
Give it all up and start all over,
You say you will but you don’t know when.
Then it’s back where you started,
Here we go round again.
Day after day I get up and I say
Come on do it again.
The days go by and you wish you were a different guy,
Different friends and a new set of clothes.
You make alterations and affect a new pose,
A new house, a new car, a new job, a new nose.
But it’s superficial and it’s only skin deep,
Because the voices in your head keep shouting in your sleep.
Get back, get back.
Back where you started, here we go round again,
Back where you started, come on do it again.
Back where you started, here we go round again,
Day after day I get up and I say, do it again.
Do it again.
Day after day I get up and I say, come on do it again.
Ray Davies
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As we all know, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
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Expecting different results…
THIS time the candidate is telling the truth…
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The lockstep cheerleading for charter schools is mandated in ed reform circles.
They’ve now expanded that approach private school vouchers.
Go look at any ed reform site or org or university department right now. You will find ONLY criticism of public schools. They’re forbidden to criticize any charter school or any charter or voucher scheme.
Every privatization effort is a huge, overwhelming success and all public schools suck. That’s the requirement for employment in the echo chamber.
No positive agenda of any kind for students who attend public schools, not even an effort to offer public school students and families any benefit at all. The entire focus is promoting and marketing charter and voucher systems and policing and punishing public schools.
Public schools should go their own way. This “movement” offers absolutely nothing of value to their students. it isn’t ABOUT public school students- other than as a lever our students are completely irrelevant to ed reformers. It’s about privatizing systems. Take whatever funding you can get from ed reformers in government and go your own way. These folks don’t work for students who attend public schools and hiring them isn’t in the interest of public school students.
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To add insult to injury, Biden also openly expressed support for “good paying union jobs.” He also pledged support for women. His continued support for mostly non-union charter schools is a contradiction in fact. Charter schools pay lower wages than most pubic schools, and they are largely non-union “sweat shops.” The teaching profession is about 76% women. Supporting privatized schools is an affront to both unions and women that work in a field where unionized women can collectively work for fairer wages and benefits.
Privatization of education continues to undermine middle class jobs for women. Privatization has resulted in a widespread disinvestment in public education and the erosion of teaching as a profession for women. In many states wages for teachers are stagnant or lower and benefits have been slashed in recent years, particularly in right-to-work states. In many states salaries are so low teachers are working two or three jobs just to be able to pay for necessities. Democrats should be supporting unions and middle class jobs for women instead of promoting the agenda of the charter school lobby.
Unless Biden keeps his promises to teachers, he runs the risk of losing their significant support in 2024. Unless Biden can deliver on a voting rights law, Democrats run the risk of losing the legislative advantage they currently have. Disillusioned voters are less likely to show up to vote. Biden needs to make good on his promises including the ones he made to public school teachers.
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The Democrats are a killing field for hope. Imagine if the 2 largest teachers unions decided to challenge the Democrats every time they went back on their promises. Imagine if the 2 largest teachers unions challenged Cardoza’s appointment & demanded they select someone who has a strong record of building up public education. What would that look like? How could the 2 largest unions in the country LEVERAGE their power for building up public schools? I know it couldn’t possibly look like our current situation. We’ve been through 21 years of being completely ignored by Democrats. What is it going to take?
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That would certainly be a refreshing change.
Inaction is complicity.
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If “inaction” is complicity, does that make Bernie Sanders complicit for not using his very loud bully pulpit to loudly condemn Biden for not cutting off all funding for charter schools right now? Is AOC complicit? Are all members of the squad complicit?
I want Bernie and AOC to speak out, but if they don’t, they aren’t complicit, they are just fighting battles that are more important to them. And while I would like AOC and Bernie to fight this battle, they aren’t complicit because they just don’t believe it is very important. Bernie would much rather fight for “free college” than demand that all charter school funding be immediately stopped. And that’s okay. It’s not good, but it doesn’t make Bernie a tool of corporate America, either.
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SICKENING!
.
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I was naive enough to think that once ed reformers privatized whole chunks of school systems we would see some actual analysis of their efforts – nope. Even in cities where 45% of students attend charter schools or use private school vouchers the echo chamber does only critical analysis of the public school portion of the system.
Now that they’re all promoting and marketing private school vouchers they’ve moved the goalposts yet again. Now they need 100% privatization to prove the theory.
They will blame public schools for all societal problems until they close the last public school. They double down on privatization every year and with each doubling down they do less and less work for public school students.
Ohio public schools are now either stagnant or declining. The schools that 90% of students in this state attend have been ignored and neglected in the zealous and single minded pursuit of expanding charters and vouchers. You can’t PAY them down in Columbus to expend any effort or productive work on behalf of public school students and we know because we ARE paying thousands of them. They simply aren’t interested.Our schools have been deemed unfashionable and destined to be privatized so why invest in them?
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There are limited options to get authentic information on privatization. NEPC, NPE, In the Public Interest and some other independent bloggers realistically look at privatization and its impact on public schools. Most of the “stink tanks” and billionaire funded foundations churn out pro privatization propaganda. They often cherry pick data the way charters cherry pick students.
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I kept trying to tell my progressive friends that “vote blue no matter who” and “choose the lesser of two evils” were both bad ideas.
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It is still better to vote blue than red or refusing to vote at all. I am tired of voting for dissembling Democrats, but to not vote would be a mistake. Look at what Trump did to this country! My hope is that young progressive Democrats will outnumber the old neo-liberal “dinos.” I hope I live long enough to see it happen.
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What did Trump do that Biden is not continuing?
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Dienne 77
Biden selected Merrick Garland instead of William Barr. That single decision reflects enough of a change.
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Biden has not nominated Federalist Society judges.
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Renewed protection of national lands that Trump shrunk.
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Biden appointed an anti-trust expert to the FTC (Senate confirmed) unlike Trump’s choice, a tech industry shill.
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The worst Democrat is better than the best Republican. The GOP works (1) to make women 2nd class citizens (2) to grow the wealth divide (3) to eliminate unions which are necessary for a viable middle class (4) to destroy Social Security and Medicare (5) to put into the government offices e.g. the U.S. Atty General’s office, religious fanatics like William Barr who don’t believe in the rule of law and, (6) to deregulate corporations so that they can plunder the middle class and jeopardize the health and safety of workers.
If you tell your friends to vote red and they do it, you and they have as a priority protecting your wealth like Megan McCain does or, you and they prefer authoritarianism to democracy and/or, you and they are racist.
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I will no longer support this crappy system of “your only choice is between bad and worse.” I haven’t voted Republican in my life. But I won’t vote Dem any more either. Democracy is NOT a choice between two corrupt options. We lie to ourselves and our children every time we try to tell ourselves that “the lesser of two evils” is part of democracy.
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Another possibility is to actually work to elect progressive candidates in the Democratic primary who support public schools.
You could do what AOC and the squad did. And they didn’t treat any losses in the primary as proof that instead they should empower the far right to end the right of progressive voters to even vote. They worked harder to convince people and ran again.
Does anyone even believe you aren’t a troll advocating for empowering the Republican party’s desire to destroy democracy altogether?
If you can’t convince voters to support the progressive policies you want, you’d rather give up and end democracy altogether.
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momshieb (catfish photo?),
Pierre Trudeau said you don’t compare a candidate to God, you compare him/her to the opponent.
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momshieb,
Yep, progressives in Nazi Germany recommended that, too. “Don’t vote for the lesser of 2 evils”, that’s the way to a progressive nirvana.” And it was fine if you happened to be one of those Aryans who thought a few million non-Aryan lives was a small price to pay for their progressive nirvana.
I am sure that if you believe that Black Lives Matters protesters should be tear gassed, you might recommend your progressive friends refuse to vote for any Democrat because empowering the right wing Republicans won’t affect you much.
Your terrible advice to your progressive friends is certainly true if your goal is destroy democracy. But your advice is far more likely to lead to them being silenced or even locked up, which perhaps is your goal.
How did the Trump Administration affect you personally? Not at all? About as much as the Hitler regime affected those Aryans who told their progressive friends that “choosing the lesser of two evils” was a terrible idea.
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“What did Trump do that Biden is not continuing?”
Speaks to your lack of concern for anything Trump did that did not affect white people.
Two very different perspectives. There is the Diane Ravitch perspective, where she (and most of her readers) are concerned with Trump’s horrendous policies – from demonizing peaceful BLM protesters and using his bully pulpit to mislead white folks to be scared of them as violent thugs, to giving lifetime judicial appointments to some of the worst far right judges. In that perspective, they rightly criticize both Biden and Trump – as this very post harshly criticizing Biden exemplifies – but recognize the threat to our democracy that Trump causes. In that perspective — as explained by AOC – progressives have a chance to lobby to convince others to support others like her and policies they want.
Then there is the supposedly progressive folks who believe that Biden’s policies are Trump’s. They don’t fight for more progressive candidates. They devote their time to demonizing the democrats in a clearly nihilistic hope that if the right wing takes over this country and destroys it, they win. But I have noticed those who advocate for that are almost always in privileged positions where their whiteness or the fact that they aren’t Muslim or Jewish means they are not the target of the hatred and violence advocated by the people they are fine with empowering because “they are no different than Biden.”
It isn’t honest. Diane Ravitch rightly criticizes Biden. But she doesn’t try to convince people that it’s fine it the far right is empowered because letting the far right win will “show” those democrats and it won’t make a bit of difference. Just because it won’t make a difference to privileged folks doesn’t mean it won’t make a difference to others.
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Caitlin Johnstone’s “truth”:
“… it is considered unacceptable in mainstream politics to suggest that the US and Israel are anything other that beneficent powers who at worst make the occasional innocent oopsie.”
That outrageously false statement in which the entire Democratic party has one line only – Israel is perfect except for “oopsies” and so is the US – is truly disgusting. There is a difference between Caitlin Johnstone’s view that Israel and the US’s past mistakes justify wiping all Jews off the face of the earth, but that is too complex for people like Caitlin Johnstone who keep advocating wiping all Jews off the face of the earth to understand.
And if you don’t like what I conclude about Caitlin Johnstone demanding that all Jews be wiped off the face of the earth, I am just using the same logic that Caitlin Johnstone uses to characterize Democrats and Jews and Israel. I just find it odd that she never uses such heated rhetoric and hatred against Putin or Trump or the Republicans.
Here is a real truth:
“… it is considered unacceptable in REPUBLICAN politics to suggest that the US and Israel are anything other that beneficent powers who at worst make the occasional innocent oopsie.”
Netanyahu desperately wanted Trump and the Republicans to win. The Republicans speak with one voice on the Palestinian-Israel conflict, which is the voice that Caitlin Johnstone condemns, but as usual, professes that “both sides equally evil” when the Democrats speak with many voices.
Using dishonesty to demonize Jews, Israel, the US (except for Trump) and the Democrats. Isn’t Caitlin tired of that yet?
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Uh oh. Someone stepped out of the bounds of allowable discourse. Can’t have free speech. What do you think this is, a free country?
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Commenters at this blog are called out all of the time. I, for one, haven’t been immune to it.
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Linda,
It is right out of the Trump playbook to offer up nasty and ugly lies and then whine that they are being horribly victimized by evil people trying to take away their “free speech” when they simply respond to your lies with the truth. Poor snowflakes, they just want to lie and those who call out their lies are taking away their freedom of speech!
It is Orwellian.
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^^And Linda, while I don’t always agree with your points, you don’t make it a regular habit to respond to criticism of what you post by whining “you are taking away my free speech”.
I have noticed you want to continue the discussion. That is because you obviously believe that if you present facts to counter what people who reply say, your point is better made.
You could not be more different than those who like to post right wing talking points and whine about their own victimhood.
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NYC-
Your observations about victim cards played as false flags are dead-on. The pretense of victimhood used to manipulate others is morally objectionable. The tactic is noxious in comment threads about policy and reports about activities aimed at changing policy.
Dienne 77 must have been having a bad day. Her arguments and style are usually more sophisticated.
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NYC
A tactic of the right wing is to redirect, without alteration, the criticism leveled at them. Currently, a talking point of insult within and, at the right wing, is that dissent is being purged (if you’re not a Trumpster, you’re out). Lacking imagination and concern for truth, we hear from the right wing, that the left doesn’t allow dissent.
Off topic- it is difficult for some to separate what is prescriptive, what should be, from that which is descriptive, what is. Some people are heavily invested in what should be. On occasion, the dissonance results in rejection of info., not based on its merit but, on emotion.
I have seen it at this blog relative to religion. And, it is on display in the 1619 discussion.
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When Presidents tell lies to get elected, whether it is a GOP, Democratic, populist, libertarian,…politician, it undermines democracy.
Biden’s advisors like Obama’s (Podesto) behave in a way that indicates they think school- privatization goals of tech tyrants warrant accommodation. Presumably, they think acquiescence is necessary for Dems to stay in power. The theft of Main Street’s assets by the tech sector is the cost that communities are forced to pay. Communities are extorted more by Republicans and by the Koch’s ALEC.
While it is not unusual (Jefferson said religious leaders in all times, in all countries align with the despot), it’s a relatively recent phenomenon in the U.S.
A religious organization created for the sole purpose of influencing voting and government policy reported that 30,000 people contacted the Biden administration to oppose the teaching of CRT. Six thousand of those contacts were generated within 24 hrs. by the politicized religious group. (The religion is not the one that media covers, just as msm gives Charles Koch a wide berth)
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I was just thinking, teachers have the same problem as African-Americans — there is no other where to go and the institutional democrats take their votes for granted. The lesser of two evils problem will always exist until there are other viable political parties.
And beware asking to eliminate the filibuster rules. When the democratic party splits again (as it always does eventually), the Republicans will be able to do whatever they want.
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Interesting analogy. Trapped in a democracy without real choices. Perhaps Biden needs trump? The right certainly needs those who suggest equity in government. That way they can spin a request for tolerance as an attempt to subvert.
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Even though the right keeps scapegoating our feckless teacher unions, Black and brown folks as well as teachers have very little money to defend themselves against the corporate assault on democracy.
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feckless. the perfect place for using this word
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Ciedie, You took the word right out of my mouth. Feckless, indeed.
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People actually do have other choices. They just normally choose not to take them — and when they do take them, they get branded as traitors for aiding and abetting the enemy.
And as far as the filibuster goes, the Republicans are going to do whatever they want regardless of what the Democrats do. So it’s absurd for the Democrats to base their actions on such a concern.
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“when they do take them, they get branded as traitors for aiding and abetting the enemy”.
The people who use the word “traitor” are those on the right who want to lock up the “dangerous” people like Bernie and AOC.
But correctly pointing out that those who ignored what Bernie Sanders said and made their “choice” by refusing to vote for the Democrat and pushed and amplified the absolutely false narrative that the Democrat was no better than Trump, were aiding and abetting the enemy.
People who made choices to vote for a Democrat who might be able to change the composition of the Supreme Court were concerned with doing what was most likely to achieve a progressive future.
People who amplified the false narrative that “sending a message” was more important in 2016 got their wish. They sent a message.
What did that achieve except to hurt the progressive fight?
I have never heard AOC or Bernie talking about “sending a message” — they talk about doing the work to convince people that their ideas are better.
I don’t demonize the teachers’ union just because their leaders don’t support everything I want. If I were a teacher I would fight hard to elect better union officials. But if the current official was running against a candidate fighting to destroy the union altogether, I would not “send a message” by not voting for the current official and deluding myself that the issues I supported would be more likely to happen if the candidate who wants to destroy the union altogether was empowered.
I do agree with you that the Democrats are deluded not to end the filibuster. And most Democrats now agree. The fact that 100% of them do not agree and they need every one to agree is not justification for condemning the entire Democratic party and empowering the Republican party. It is justification for fighting hard for progressive candidates, especially against those who are deluded.
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Biden IS pushing a lot of education funding to public schools.
What if we gave up on changing or influencing this lockstep echo chamber that controls education policy and public schools took the funding and went in a different direction?
Stop hiring them as consultants. Stop taking directives from them. Search for and hire people who actually support the concept of public education and public schools. People who want our schools to succeed instead of people who work on engineering and promoting privatized replacements to public systems.
There’s no actual requirement in Biden’s funding that mandates taking orders from Ivy League economists or the folks who are employed by Broad or Walton or Koch or Gates. Public schools would just need the confidence and courage to go their own way.
Has any of this benefited your students or made your schools stronger? No? Then why are we still following along?
A charter chain would never take direction from groups who work against charter schools. Why are public schools taking direction from ed reform groups? They don’t support our schools. They don’t offer any benefit to our students. They lobby against our schools and students. Public schools have no duty to hire people who don’t support public schools and in fact they have a duty to public school students NOT to hire them.
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The goal of the echo chamber is to destroy unions. “Our biggest obstacle is the teachers unions.” The quote is from Ryan Girdinsky when he was interviewed about the 1776 Project PAC he formed to raise money for the election of school board members who oppose the teaching of CRT. Catholic Vote interviewed Girdinsky. He was asked, “Tell us …something that should motivate us to support this important effort”. In answer to this question and others, he said, “the primary authority in educating children are ordinary parents not government officials.” Girdinsky was asked, “(As a) Catholic do you have any thoughts on how the 1776 Project Pac could serve to reinforce that Catholic principle by empowering parents?”
Girdinsky talked about “shaping a civically patriotic curriculum.”
btw- Chip and Joanna Gaines gave $1000 to one of the board candidates who is running based on opposition to CRT. She happens to be Chip’s sister.
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I thought it was amusing (and typical) how the echo chamber buried this news:
“IDEA Public Schools, the largest charter school network in Texas, parted ways with its CEO and COO after an investigation into alleged misuse of funds, according to a letter sent to the school community Tuesday.”
They’re very, very committed to “transparency” and “accountability”, but ONLY for public schools.
This charter chain isn’t going to release anything to the public on the financial fraud they announced. It’s absolutely outrageous that they get away with this and no public school in the country would be permitted to announce they were firing the top leaders for financial fraud and then release NOTHING further.
They promoted and marketed IDEA charter schools for years. Now they’re all silent on the financial fraud? What a joke. 100% lockstep charter cheerleading or they revoke your echo chamber membership card.
We have hundreds of full time, paid, professional public school critics working in ed reform but mysteriously they never turn their investigatory work to the charters they’re all selling to the public. Could that bias possibly be because they’re all paid by the same 5 billionaires?
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When Vice President Harris told aspiring immigrants to stay away from the U.S., she faced a backlash from progressives in her party. It’s important to hold the Biden administration accountable when they break from shared values. When Secretary Cardona tells the charter school investment sector he love love loves them, he should face a backlash from progressives in his party. It’s important to hold the Biden administration accountable when they break from shared values
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Our leaders are more concerned with $hare value$ than with shared values.
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The progressives pushed back loudly against VP Harris with regards to immigration.
Did you hear those progressives pushing back on education policies?
Me, neither. I think it is important to note that very few of the progressives in Congress care about this.
When the progressives start caring a lot about funding private charters with money from public school budgets, things will start changing. But I truly think many of them do not really understand why it is such a problem. They have bought into the propaganda that the non-profit so-called “public” charter movement is supported by poor and disadvantaged parents and it has provided good schools for them.
I hate to say it, but what you need to stop the privatization of charters is a movement led by poor and disadvantaged parents instead of teachers. And the evil genius of the whole privatization of public schools movement is that by offering well-funded privately operated schools to the parents who are most likely to be actively involved in their children’s education and most likely to advocate for good schools, it appears to be something that an important democratic constituency wants. I can’t really blame the motivated and committed parents who get better schools for liking them. I would like them, too, if my other choice was an underfunded public school where many of the students came from severely at risk families and needed far more expenditure of teacher time and school funding then my kid needed.
The parameters of the debate are so limited, which serves the purpose of the privatizers. Are poor kids helped? Of course some are helped, so what’s wrong with them having the school they want? Are Democrats in the pockets of privatizers? Of course some are, but there are also many who don’t understand why they are being attacked by teachers when the only thing they want to do is actually serve their constituency of poor families, and some teachers keep yelling at them that they only want to serve billionaires. Even the progressives who understand that charters are not idea, do not think that they are dangerous, and therefore they are much more concerned with issues that they do think are much more important than whether there are more public charters that their constituency of underserved families like, or not. Calling them names for not fighting for better K-12 public school and charter policies is not going to get them on our side.
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The nature of national politics is a devious and ponderous road. No one knows this better than Joe Biden, certainly more so than Diane Ravitch or myself. Rather than complaining or arousing the ire of the masses (me), perhaps a campaign to bring the interests to the President and to the Congress is more apropos.
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Let’s not kid ourselves.
“A campaign to bring the President and Congress to the Interests” is what it’s actually all about.
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Teachers and parents may not have a lot of money or political clout, but we still can voice our dissatisfaction and frustration. Citizens can always write to the White House. If they get lots of negative comments from Democratic voters, it may get the attention from the President. A widespread campaign of dissatisfaction with Biden’s education policy and his flip flopping from what he promised to public school educators might raise concerns for the Biden administration. At the very least overwhelming copying and pasting today’s post from the Ravitch blog may be enough to raise the level of concern in the White House. A second approach to urge teachers and parents to contact the Congressional Progressive Caucus and encourage them to meet with the President and voice their objections to Biden’s support for corporate education. Some action is better than none, and it would inform the Democratic Party of widespread objection to continuing test and punish and using federal funds to expand charter schools while simultaneously threatening public education. We need to pressure the Biden administration to do the right thing and let them know we are watching. Public schools need more than money; they need the President to keep his promises.
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Point of information- Catholic Vote reported that 30,000 people wrote to the Biden Administration to oppose Critical Race Theory/1619 project. Catholic Vote takes credit for getting 6,000 of them in a 24 hr. period.
The founder of the 1776 Project PAC, which funds school board members who run on a platform against the 1619 project, is Ryan Girdinsky. He was interviewed at Catholic Vote. He said, “Our biggest obstacle is teachers unions.”
The 1619 project today, tomorrow another attack. The goal is destruction of public education and unions.
An unwillingness to identify and fight the enemy doesn’t bode well.
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Relative clout?
“The ire of the masses (excluding those who send their kids to private and religious schools)” or, tech tyrants? evidently, the latter
An idea unpopular at this site- make it known to the public that the two major U.S. religions successfully politicked and got tax dollars for their schools and, an exemption from civil rights employment law.
The worldwide campaign against public schools is spelled out, including the tactics the conservative religious are using in, “The new official contents of sex education in Mexico: laicism in the crosshairs”, by Armando Javier Diaz Camarena, Epub 3-3-2021 at the Scielo site. The article is far broader in scope than the title suggests.
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“Secretary Miguel Cardona will be the lead speaker at the National Charter Schools Conference.”
Sounds like he’s Betsy DeVos’ personal secretary
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“Miguel, get me a covfefe!”
“Be glad to Madame Secretary”
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Much has been written about the financial games that can be played under the guise of non-profit. Who gets to take a cut from the revenue? Is there a journalist asking Pres. Biden, Dr. Cardona and Melinda Gates what their opinions are about taxpayers forced to fund Catholic schools? Biden (Archmere Academy) and Melinda attended Catholic schools. Cardona’s childhood friend described, “spending countless Sundays alongside him when they were altar boys in outsize white robes.”
National Catholic Reporter didn’t consider it a taboo topic when it posted, “Catholic schools deserve Pres. Biden’s support”.
When proponents of school choice don’t draw lines between privatizers, neither should the defenders of public education.
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Our decline in education funding has been a bipartisan effort. The problem comes from a political class that too often chooses to send their progeny to independent schools over public institutions. What puzzles me is that President Biden has not done this exclusively and he is married to an educator who at least talks a good game about what public schools should be about. The investment and hi-tech communities have a profound hold on politicians.
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It’s unfortunate that teachers aren’t like Mr. Biden’s well-heeled donors, who were promised that “nothing would fundamentally change.”
I’m just going to be blunt and say it: Joe Biden lied. Again.
How many times are we going to play Charlie Brown while Corporate Democrats act like Lucy pulling the football away … again?
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What are you suggesting?
You aren’t getting what you want from the Democrats, so vote against Democrats no matter what?
You aren’t getting what you want from the union, so vote against having a union no matter what?
Not sure why you think empowering Republicans as you keep advocating we do is going to help public schools.
What is your other suggestion besides defeating the Democrats, including those who support public education, and empowering Republicans who support the wholesale privatization of public schools?
I can’t say I agree with you that having Trump and DeVos made public education great again.
Those of us who actually care say “vote in the Democratic primary and do everything you can to help elect pro-public school progressive Democrats to Congress”.
Others want to drown out that message and insist that it is impossible to work for a pro-public school candidate in the primary because you just can’t convince voters not to vote for the sitting primary candidate who hates public schools. That was proven wrong in NY when a slew of anti-public school Democrats in the state legislature were defeated in the primary by progressives.
But hey, I’m sure New York state residents should have listened to the people who said “just defeat every single Democrat no matter what because the Republicans are no worse”.
Would that be your advice? If only AOC had decided not to run in the primary but to work harder to defeat the Democrat in the general election so the right wing Republican won, it would be better for the progressive movement?
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The DNC does its best to stop progressives from winning, whether it is for Senate or President.
https://prospect.org/politics/will-senate-leadership-allow-local-democrats-to-choose-candidates/
And if Biden continues his prevarications, a disillusioned electorate is the result. We’ve had 40 years of Democrats’ embrace of neoliberalism.
The Corporate Democrats take advantage of the fact that we have no other options. Their cavalier attitude toward the electorate – lie to us again and again – will eventually come back to bite them where they sit.
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Well, since the DNC is trying to stop progressives from winning, how DARE the squad and AOC run in the primary. Eleanor told them to give up and just help empower Republicans because “the DNC” won’t let them win, anyway and they have mind control power over all primary voters.
Eleanor did not explain why she believes the progressives would have a better chance of winning if the Republicans are empowered to disenfranchise traditional Democratic voters and run elections the way Putin does. But then again, I am not sure Eleanor really has the best interests of progressives in mind.
“we have no other options” but to allow the right wing Republicans to take over America is definitely a message that Mitch McConnell and Trump are pushing.
“we have no other options” but to allow the right wing Republicans to take over America is the OPPOSITE of what AOC, the squad, and Bernie Sanders have said.
Who do I trust more, Bernie Sanders and AOC, or an anonymous self-described progressive who says AOC is a corporate Democrat who shouldn’t be trusted and we need to vote against all Democrats no matter what?
Everyone who thinks AOC is a liar should refuse to vote for any
Democrat ever to “show those corporate Democrats”.
Don’t listen to AOC, listen to an anonymous self-described progressive who tells you that it is better to empower Republicans than let any Democrat win an election.
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You are making assumptions about me, and about what I am thinking.
Party insiders do not like Progressives. Full stop.
I’d suggest you read a couple of Thomas Frank’s books, Listen, Liberal and The People, No.
I’d also suggest you drop into prospect.org and Jacobinmag.com to help shed some light on why the Democrats just can’t seem to win over America’s heart anymore.
It might have something to do with their embrace of neoliberalism at the expense of the working class.
Mr. Biden’s coattails were short enough to tuck into a pair of shorts.
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You will make matters worse by not voting.
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Eleanor,
Like I say, I put my trust in AOC and Bernie and you put your trust in the same people who urged you not to vote for the Democrat in 2016 because having Trump appoint 3 right wing Supreme Court Justices and give hundreds of federal judges lifetime appointments would help bring about the progressive future sooner.
Bernie and AOC and I were right and the people at Jacobin who you trust were wrong.
Thomas Frank never said that Democrats would only become more progressive if the far right Republican party was empowered to pass any law restricting voting that they chose to pass.
If you want to argue, start writing to AOC and Bernie and telling them how you know they aren’t trustworthy and they are too stupid to know what you know because the folks at jacobin tell you so.
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NYC, I’m not telling people to stay home and not vote. But the fact is that when people continue to get their hopes up with a candidate, who then lets them down when in office, they lose their motivation to vote and stay home. It becomes more difficult to convince people to go out there and vote, especially when they see politicians deferring to the wants and wishes of the powerful, whether it is the charter school industry of Big PharMa.
I have never missed an election since 1976, even the low-turnout municipal races. If they want more people to vote, it’s on the politicians to make their case.
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Eleanor,
If you believe our country is no better off today than it was when Trump was president, then you have a point.
But those of us who see that we are going to get some progressive achievements don’t understand the people who said what you did in 2016 and set the entire progressive agenda back at least 10 or 15 years. It seems rather hypocritical to then complain that because Biden isn’t ending funding for charter schools right away, you should have done what you did in 2016 and make sure the Democrats lost again so that progressive agenda would be set back another 10 or 15 years.
You have every right to criticize Biden. You SHOULD be fighting to elect more progressive Democrats. The Working Families Party in NYC did that, but if their chosen candidate didn’t win, they didn’t try to undermine the Democrat who did because they didn’t care if a far right Republican was empowered. They cared.
Your advocacy to refuse to vote for all Democrats because the DNC is evil and corrupt and works only in service for corporate interests is dishonest right wing rhetoric. The DNC isn’t progressive. It doesn’t take to change but it also doesn’t prevent change from happening IF you can convince enough voters to vote for you. But convincing voters means running candidates who go out and convince people to vote for them. If they fail because voters don’t agree with their positions or want slower change, blaming “the DNC” in the hopes that if the Republicans win it will be great for progressives, was proven wrong in 2016 and repeating it yet again is mystifying unless you are really a right wing troll and empowering the far right is your real agenda.
That’s why I cited AOC who is very critical of Democrats when they deserve it. But she doesn’t falsely demonize them to help push the dishonest right wing narrative that some progressives less intelligent than AOC seem to believe – that the way to progressive nirvana is to have another 4 years like we did from 2016-2020. It’s the way to end democracy.
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The politician’s Song (parody of song by Tompall Glaser)
Put a campaign promise on the fire.
Cook me up some bullshit for the Greens
And mislead the public like a liar
Let me just describe the ways and means
Come on, baby, you can sell them tripe
And then go fetch my fibbers
And boil up another pot of pee
Then put another pledge on the fire, babe,
And come and tell me why they’ll vote for me.
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Approach life
Biden Breaks Another Promise to Educators and Parents | Diane Ravitch's blog
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