Archives for category: Arizona
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The Staff at Sunburst Elementary School: We Love Our School!

By dianeravitch
June 4, 2017 //
28

If you wonder why people become teachers and remain in the classroom, watch this video created by the teachers at Sunburst Elememtary School in Glendale, Arizona. They are having fun! They have a culture of happiness. Not every public school is happy. But those with a strong culture are like families. Watch this family of teachers cavorting for the joy of it.

By the way, I googled the school and saw that they had made many videos. I also saw that it was a diverse school, with small class size, all teachers certified, and no teacher with less than three years experience. Also, it closed the achievement gap between white and Hispanic children. Maybe the secret is joy.

Categories Arizona, Humor, Justice, Teachers

Gene V. Glass: An Ugly Look Inside a Charter School in Arizona

By dianeravitch
May 27, 2017 //
18

Gene V. Glass, one of the nation’s most distinguished education researchers, posted a blog about the experience of parents applying to a charter school in Arizona. Arizona is unusual in that it has no laws against nepotism or conflicts of interest. The Challenger Charter School is unusual in that it is owned by the former president of the State Board of Education and run by his wife and daughter. The family pays itself $400,000 a year for its services.

The post tells the story of parents who registered their child early for kindergarten in this school. They received a letter of acceptance. They had to fill out another form in March. On the second form, they noted that their daughter had had speech therapy, which they neglected to say in the first application. They were called into the school’s office where daughter and mother told them their child was unaccepted and would have to apply again through the open lottery. The administrators basically accused them of lying. Harsh words were exchanged. It was clear the school did not want their daughter.

Some of this interaction is captured in a video the family made during their interview.

The school’s message seems to be, children with any kind of disability, no matter how mild, are not wanted here. The IDEA laws don’t apply to charter schools in Arizona.

Categories Arizona, Charter Schools, Privatization, Special Education

Arizona: Vouchers Used by Students from Good Schools in Affluent Districts, Not Low-Income Students from Bad Schools

By dianeravitch
May 24, 2017 //
18

The Arizona Republic conducted an analysis to learn which students were using vouchers. Remember that vouchers are supposed to “save poor kids from failing schools.” But that is not what is happening in Arizona!

As Arizona’s school-voucher program has expanded rapidly in the past year, students using taxpayer aid to transfer from public to private schools are abandoning higher-performing districts in more-affluent areas, according to an Arizona Republic analysis.

This year, more than 75 percent of the money pulled out of public schools for the Empowerment Scholarship Account program came from districts with an “A” or “B” rating, the analysis showed. By contrast, only 4 percent of the money came from school districts rated “D” or lower.

The findings undercut a key contention of the lawmakers and advocacy groups pressing to expand the state’s ESA program: that financially disadvantaged families from struggling schools reap the benefit of expanded school choice.

Critics, meanwhile, argue the program is largely being used by more-affluent families to subsidize their private-school tuition bills. The ESA program allows parents to take 90 percent of the money that would have gone to their school district and put it toward private school, home schooling and other educational programs.

The Empowerment Scholarship Account program funding grew to approximately $49 million this year, from about $30 million last year, according to February data from the Arizona Department of Education, which oversees the program. Republicans in the Legislature are advancing bills that would expand the program from the 3,360 students currently using it to all 1.1 million Arizona public school students after four years.

http://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/arizona-education/2017/03/30/arizona-taxpayer-funded-vouchers-benefiting-students-more-affluent-areas/99707518/

The legislature pulled a fast one on taxpayers. Taxes are being used to subsidize students from affluent families at private schools, not poor kids from low-performing schools.

This is a hoax!

Hello, Arizona taxpayers! How do you feel about your taxes subsidizing the private school tuitions of rich kids?

Hello, retirees! Do you really want your taxes to be used to destroy the public education system that benefited you, your children, and your grandchildren?

Hat tip to Pat Hale for bringing this important article to my attention.

Categories Arizona, Hoax, Vouchers

Arizona: Governor Ducey’s Plan to Destroy Public Education

By dianeravitch
May 21, 2017 //
30

David Safier writes frequently about politics and education in Arizona.

In this post, he shows how Governor Doug Ducey’s education plan is moving step by step to create a three-tier system of schools, thus abandoning the Supreme Court’s mandate to provide equal educational opportunity.

He begins:

Are you outraged at Governor Ducey’s “education budget”? You should be. After Prop. 123 passed, he promised some “next steps” were coming soon, but all we got is an insulting 25-cents-an-hour raise for teachers and a little money sprinkled over a few high-profile programs to make it look like he’s doing something. Watching Ducey quacking and smiling as he dubs himself the “education governor” is infuriating. But push aside your anger over those outrages for a moment. Something far more important happened in the Legislature this year, something which could change the nature of Arizona education irrevocably. It’s the one-two-three punch of vouchers for everyone, results-based funding and lowering of teacher certification requirements. Over time, those changes will lead to an increasingly stratified education system, with more money flowing to education for children of higher income families and less going to everyone else.

If Ducey and the conservative majority in the legislature could speak freely, if they knew the voters couldn’t hear what they were saying, their vision for Arizona’s education would sound something like this.

“We should have a three tiered education system,” they’d say. “The top tier has to be the best schools money can buy to supply us with our future movers, shakers and innovators—our captains of industry and the geniuses who help them create better, more profitable products and services. The next tier should be good, but not overly expensive schools to teach children who will become our educated professionals—our doctors, lawyers, middle managers and such. Give those kids a K-12 education that’s good enough to get them into colleges where they can obtain the career training they need. As for the rest, they really don’t need much of an education to perform the tasks expected of them. Their schools should teach them to read, write and do math at a sixth grade level. That’s more than enough from them to wash our floors, change our oil and ask, ‘Do you want fries with that?'”

We’re closer to a codified version of this three-tiered educational scheme than we’ve ever been, thanks to the work of Ducey and his legislative majority.

At the top of the educational hierarchy are the most expensive private schools. Courtesy of the new vouchers-for-all law, taxpayers will be giving the wealthiest Arizonans $4,500 or more to help them pay for their children’s tuition. Call it financial aid for the rich. Even with vouchers, the rest of us won’t be able to afford those schools—they start at $10,000 a year—so the rich don’t have to worry about the riffraff showing up.

What? You don’t think the public should subsidize tuition at private schools for rich kids? That’s old thinking.

Categories Arizona, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Privatization, Vouchers

Arizona Acts on Teacher Appreciation Day

By dianeravitch
May 10, 2017 //
16

From a reader:

“The Arizona Legislature (Republican majority) just passed a bill to allow the hiring of uncertificated teachers. They also just opened up the voucher system to ALL students. Furthermore, they gave teachers a measly 1% raise. Arizona is 49th out of the 50 states in teacher pay and funding per pupil.”

Categories Arizona, Teachers

Mercedes Schneider: The Management Company That Owns the #1 High School in the Nation is in Deep Trouble

By dianeravitch
May 1, 2017 //
9

Mercedes Schneider has done a deep dive into the financials of the BASIS Schools. It is an eye-opener.

BASIS charter schools won the top spots in the U.S. News & World Report rankings of the nation’s high schools.

BASIS Scottsdale was rated number 1 in the nation.

If you were thinking of sending your son or daughter there, think twice.

This is not a typical American high school. It is focused to an extreme on AP exams.

Turns out that AP test scores matter much in the US News high-school-ranking system, and BASIS high schools require their students to take at least eight AP courses and six AP exams. In 2016, the average BASIS graduate took over 11 AP exams. BASIS contends that “AP exam scores are by no means the focus of our curriculum”; however, the same page boasts that “many BASIS.ed graduates take as many as 20 AP Exams.”

These are the demands that make BASIS #1, but these are clearly not models for other high schools. They are for students who are academically driven.

But what about those financials?

The owners of the BASIS chains pay themselves millions. Yet BASIS is in debt.

Schneider asks: “Which Is Higher at BASIS Schools: Its AP Scores, or Its Debt?”

Which Is Higher at BASIS Schools: Its AP Scores, or Its Debt?

Categories Arizona, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Privatization, Testing

DeVos’s American Federation for Children Runs TV Ads in Arizona, Thanking Governor for Voucher Expansion

By dianeravitch
April 27, 2017 //
20

When Betsy DeVos piously explains that she is wild for “great public schools,” please remember that she has spent most of her life advocating for alternatives to public schools. Can anyone recall her advocating for any public schools?

The group she founded and funded, American Federation for Children, just ran TV ads in Arizona thanking Governor Doug Ducey and his allies in the legislature for expanding the state’s voucher program, which will allow public funds to flow to religious and private schools.

AFC never loses an opportunity to support anything but public schools. It won’t be happy until every child in the nation attends a religious or private schools. It is never a friend of public education.

Categories Arizona, Betsy DeVos, Vouchers

Gene V. Glass: Scams and Lies in Arizona

By dianeravitch
April 18, 2017 //
12

Gene V. Glass, one of our nation’s most eminent education researchers, writes here about the Big Lie embedded in Arizona’s voucher program.

http://ed2worlds.blogspot.com/2017/04/what-goes-around-comes-around-voucher.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed:+EducationInTwoWorlds+(Education+in+Two+Worlds)&m=1

The program began as vouchers for students with special needs (although we now know that students with disabilities abandon their rights when they leave the public system).

Glass writes:

“Originally intended only for special needs students, it was broadened to include children of military serving in Iraq & Afghanistan, and then children living on Indian reservations. The cynical intent is obvious.

“The latest incarnation of the program will expand the program by 5,000 students per year until a cap of 30,000 is reached.

“Even Republicans were reluctant to support the expansion, probably because of persistent non-support of vouchers among the voting public. The latest PDK Gallup poll continues to show more than 60% of parents opposed.

“Big lobby pressure to expand the program came from the local Goldwater Institute. When a compromise on the 5,000 per year expansion was reached, the reluctant Republicans fell in line.”

And then the scammers at the Goldwater Institute scammed their dupes in the Legislature. They immediately boasted that the cap would soon be abolished altogether, and everyone could get a voucher.

The Legislature proved itself to be lap dogs of the Goldwater Institute and Betsy DeVos. They betrayed public schools and their constituents by extending the privatization of a democratic institution.

Arizona is in a Race to the Bottom.

I am way too late in starting this new feature of the blog. It is called the Wall of Shame. The Arizona Legislature and Governor Ducey will be the first to receive this Badge of Shame.

Categories Arizona, Hoax, Vouchers, Wall of Shame

Which Religious Schools Are Allowed to Participate in the Arizona Voucher Program? Not All

By dianeravitch
April 8, 2017 //
47

A reader posted a comment yesterday asking why I had a problem with religious schools receiving public funding. Aren’t there good religious schools. I pointed out that most of the religious schools that are funded by vouchers are not very good schools. The very good religious schools don’t have many seats available. The ones that do have seats available and need the money tend to be a certain type of Christian school that teaches creationism and uses textbooks that do not teach modern science, math, or history.

Then another comment arrived, this one from a man who is writing a book about education in Arizona.

I post this quote from a work in progress for the nice lady who wrote about Diane’s piece and asked whether there are good religious schools. Diane used a quote from me in the blog today.

Here are the Organizations already providing “scholarships” on the “tax credit” dime here in AZ. I am a proud Catholic School Graduate and I have grandchildren in Catholic Schools in New Hampshire.

Those choices were my parents and my children’s RELIGIOUS choice. They wanted their children indoctrinated into the Catholic Faith.

Catholic schools have their history in anti-Catholic sentiments going back to the KNOW NOTHING PARTY and anti-immigrant attitudes in the 1840s. There was a time when it was a “mortal sin” for Catholics to attend public school if a Catholic School was available..

We in AZ live in a state that allows a “Christian Scholarship” fund that doesn’t include any Catholic, or for that matter Mormon schools, that is a RED FLAG.

I ask the following.

How is it that the Senate president of the Arizona State Senate, can simultaneously be the executive director of a $17,064,168 organization, The Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization Inc., while having control over all of the bills that come up for voting in the Senate including those that benefit his organization?

o This while collecting a salary and other compensation of $145,705 per annum in 2014-2015 for directing the ACSTO.
 Source IRS Form 990 FY 2013: http://www.guidestar.org/FinDocuments/2014/860/931/2014-860931047-0b056c5d-9.pdf

o Again the question is asked, “Politically would this be considered “permissible” if the organization was dedicated to promoting Catholic Schools and run by the Senate President who happened to be the Bishop of the Diocese of Phoenix?

o Researching the Organization in question one finds a list of the “participating schools”. That list which is provided below is devoid of any Catholic or Mormon Schools. Do they not fit the organization’s definition of Christian Schools? Would having a Muslim or Hindu Tax Credit group be okay with the legislature? How about an ATHEIST School?

 Bethany Christian School
 Christian Academy of Prescott
 Flagstaff Community Christian School
 Joy Christian School
 North Valley Christian Academy
 Northwest Christian School
 Paradise Valley Christian Prep
 Scottsdale Christian Academy
 Trinity Christian School (Prescott)

I am sure these are good programs but I have met some of their leadership and a lot of them ascribe to the philosophy that the world is 6000 years old.

• Catholic Education Arizona is an IRS 501(c) (3) nonprofit charitable organization and has never accepted gifts designated for individuals. Per state law, a school tuition organization cannot award, restrict or reserve scholarships solely on the basis of donor recommendation. A taxpayer may not claim a tax credit if the taxpayer agrees to swap donations with another taxpayer to benefit either taxpayer’s own dependent. This new law changes that.

o The rules for donating to a Catholic Educational Program speak volumes to the previous complaint regarding what is a Christian School. It required separate rules to “allow” the donations to go to Catholic Schools. The restrictions make it impossible for one to donate for their own child’s (or grandchildren’s) tuition.

 This is a taxpayer funded way to provide the scholarships that Catholics used to provide in their donations to the church of their choice.

 The leadership at this charity received compensation of $131,115 in 2013-2014. This was on revenue of $16,269,022.
 Source: IRS FORM 990 See: http://www.guidestar.org/FinDocuments/2014/860/937/2014-860937587-0b8e0571-9.pdf

“Freedom to choose” for religious purposes has always been an option in this country. Catholics chose to create Catholic Schools. Jewish parents chose schools based at their Synagogues. There are Hindu Schools and Muslim Schools. These faiths funded this choice with sacrifice and tuitions that were subsidized by their church, synagogue or mosque, not by diverting funds meant to support the public schools to their religion.

• Jewish Tuition Organization is another 501 C specifically to provide Scholarship or Grants to Attend Jewish Primary and Secondary Schools. http://www.jtophoenix.org/take-the-credit/

o The Executive Director at the Jewish Tuition Organization has a salary of $70.000 as of the 2013-2014 Fiscal Year. This is on Revenue of $2,922,316.

o Form 990 FY 2013 JTO: http://www.guidestar.org/FinDocuments/2014/860/970/2014-860970081-0b26cdec-9.pdf

Categories Arizona, Religion, School Choice, Separation of church and state, Vouchers

Law Professor: Arizona’s New Voucher Program is a Farce

By dianeravitch
April 8, 2017 //
22

Derek Black, law professor, writes that Arizona is a state that funds its schools poorly and inequitably. It is one of the lowest-spending states in the nation on education. Worse, the kids who need the most get the least. So, instead of fixing its funding system, it has passed an expansive voucher system, which will be most helpful to students in the most affluent districts to underwrite the cost of their private and religious schools. Once again, Arizona stabs its neediest students in the back with underfunded schools. Think Arizona: Think white retirees who don’t want to pay to educate poor Latino and Native American children. Vouchers are the fix for white retirees. But not for the kids.

He writes:

The “program allows parents to take between 90 percent and 100 percent of the state money a local public school would receive to pay for private or religious education. The average student who isn’t disabled will get about $4,400 a year, but some get much more.” The funding mechanism and its expected cost to the state is murky. “The original Arizona plan was estimated to cost the state general fund at least $24 million.” Now, a revised plan and estimate are supposed to save the state $3.4 million by 2022.

What is clear, however, is that Arizona’s per pupil funding for public schools currently ranks 47 out of 50 states. To make matters worse, it distributes those meager funds unequally. The Education Law Center’s 2017 School Funding Fairness Report grades Arizona’s funding distribution as an “F.” Schools with moderate levels of student poverty receive only 88 cents on the dollar in comparison to schools with no student poverty. The comparison is even worse between high poverty school districts and low poverty school districts. In other words, Arizona spends the least on students who need the most.

That same report also shows that Arizona is doing almost nothing to fix its low funding levels or unequal distribution. Arizona ranks 49th in the nation in terms of the level of fiscal effort it exerts to fund its schools.

These background facts place Arizona’s new voucher program in a troubling light. These cold hard facts show that the state is not really interested in supporting adequate and equal education for its students. Thus, it is no surprise the state would double down and make matters worse. If gross inequity and inadequacy in public schools does not bother the state as a general principle, why would robbing those schools of more money be a problem? Why not just cap the state investment in a students’ education, send that student to private school, and tell the family and or the private school that they need to make up the difference? If things do not work out in the future, that is on the family and the private school.

These background facts also mean that the rhetoric of political leaders lacks credibility. Speaking of the voucher program, the Governor tweeted: “When parents have more choices, kids win.” If one understands the facts, one understands that this voucher program is not about helping kids in Arizona “win.” It is about raw politics and continuing the longstanding trend of depriving public schools of the resources they need to succeed. If parents in Arizona want vouchers (or charters), it is not because those policies are normatively appealing. It is because the state has been robbing them of the public education they deserve. Many families now surely believe they have no other realistic option. In short, the state has created the factual predicate of failing public schools to create the justification for its own pet project of privatizing education. The kids caught up in the mess simply do not matter.

Categories Arizona, Funding, Hoax, Vouchers
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