Archives for category: Betsy DeVos
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

This Is What Jeb Bush Believes In: “Total Voucherization”

By dianeravitch
August 29, 2017 //
19

Republicans like to say that Florida is their model of good education policy. Betsy DeVos said so. Not her own state, because Michigan voters rejected vouchers three times.

Florida also rejected vouchers in 2012, by a decisive vote of 55-44. They voted down the voucher proposal crafted by Jeb Bush even though it was deceptively called the “Religious Freedom Amendment.” How many people would vote against “religious freedom”? A majority, as it turned out. Had it been called “An Amendment to Permit School Vouchers,” it might have gone down 65-35% or more, as in other states. But privatization of public goods requires stealth and lying.

So Florida engaged in a workaround, led by Jeb Bush, to defy the voters’ wishes.

Because Jeb believes in “total voucherization.” He sees no role for public schools. He spends his waking hours figuring out new ways to privatize public schools and put state money into the pockets of profiteers.

He created a tax credit scheme so corporations and rich individuals could give money to a nonprofit (Step Up for Students) which then gave the money as “scholarships” to students to attend religious schools. Thus, despite the voters’ clear rejection of vouchers, Jeb ensured that Florida has them.

And of course, Florida has one of the most politically connected and corrupt charter industries in the nation. Members of the Legislature have ownership interests in charter schools and regularly vote themselves bigger tax subsidies.

Categories Betsy DeVos, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Privatization

Some of The Billionaires Behind Charters, Trump, and Success Academy

By dianeravitch
August 26, 2017 //
30

It may be hard to believe that billionaires are deeply concerned with the well-being of poor children of color. They fight any tax ibpncreases that might reduce income inequality and improve the quality of life for the families of these children. But they are more than willing to invest in charter schools.

In this article, teacher-writer Jake Jacobs explores the charter-love of the billionaires. Bear in mind that he has only scratched the surface, as there are billionaires in Idaho (the Albertson family), in Texas (Tim Dunn), in North Carolina (Art Pope), in Washington (Bill Gates), in California (Reed Hastings, Eli Broad, Doris Fischer, etc.), all of whom would rather pay to expand charters than to pay for a successful public sector.

Jacobs spreads the blame in a bipartisan manner. But behind it all is charters instead of taxes for the rich.

Jacobs writes:

“Trump went further than Hillary, promising a rapid expansion of charter schools – but this meant charter advocates were siding with both presidential candidates. After winning, Trump wasted no time seeking out the notorious charter maven Eva Moskowitz, CEO of the 41 school Success Academy network in New York City.

“Moskowitz had financial ties to the Trump campaign through Wall Street financier John Paulson. An $8.5 million donor to Success Academy who served as economic advisor to the Trump campaign. Billionaire investor Julian Robertson who gave Success a record-shattering $25 million gift is also a donor to a prominent pro-Trump PAC.

“After meeting Trump, Moskowitz pledged support for his plan to expand charters – as well as controversial private school vouchers – but she stopped short of joining Trump’s cabinet. Next, Moskowitz offered praise to Trump’s Education Secretary Betsy DeVos (whose foundation had previously donated $300,000 to Success Academy). Moskowitz then invited Ivanka Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan to tour Success charter schools in Harlem.

“Most people do not realize that PACs allied with Moskowitz also helped engineer a political coup in Albany. Her two charter school lobbying groups, Families for Excellent Schools and Great Public Schools PAC, an offshoot of Students First NY, spent over $10 million making pro-charter donors the biggest political manipulators in NY state.

“Another group of hedge funders called New Yorkers for a Balanced Albany financed a massive advertising campaign in 2014 to keep the NY State Senate in Republican hands and pro-charter. Success Academy mega-donor Daniel Loeb contributed $1 million to the group.

“Also pushing charter schools is Reclaim NY, a PAC disguised as a “charity” backed by reclusive billionaire Robert Mercer. When it’s founding VP Steve Bannon stepped down to work in Trump’s White House, it illustrated why The New Yorker’s Jane Mayer reported Mercer has “surrounded” Trump with “his people” by “paying for their seats.”

“MAYORAL CONTROL MATTERS

“As the plan to expand charter schools in NY starts with wealthy donors who in turn fund legislators, an important focus is wresting control from local stakeholders who might oppose charters opening in their neighborhood.

“Just as we see in charter-heavy Chicago, the key to this in NYC was mayoral control. In 2002, the NY legislature upstate first granted then-mayor Michael Bloomberg unilateral control of NYC schools for a term of seven years, dissolving locally-elected school boards. Because Bloomberg was an advocate for privatizing education and had successfully expanded charters, he was granted a six-year renewal in 2009.”

Categories Betsy DeVos, Bill de Blasio, Billionaires, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Failure, Inequality, Privatization

Betsy DeVos and Her Family Are Funding the Republican Candidate for Governor in Virginia

By dianeravitch
August 23, 2017 //
21

Politico reports that the DeVos family is funding the campaign of the Republican candidate for Governor in Virginia.

According to Politico:

TEACHERS UNIONS TARGET GILLESPIE IN VA GOVERNOR’S RACE: Teachers unions are stepping up their opposition to Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Ed Gillespie – and they’re using an emerging tactic on the left: linking him to Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. National and local union leaders said on Tuesday that they would be mobilizing against Gillespie by highlighting his ties to DeVos, as they back his Democratic opponent Ralph Northam. Gillespie has accepted more than $100,000 in campaign contributions from the DeVos family. “Ed Gillespie can dress it up in any which way he wishes to, but the bottom line is he is a clone of Betsy DeVos. The agenda that Gillespie is pushing for is an agenda that hurts kids,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers.

– Gillespie campaign spokesman David Abrams told Morning Education: “Ed appreciates his support from members of the DeVos family, and is laser-focused on policies that ensure every child in Virginia has access to a high quality, safe and student-focused education. National teachers unions oppose innovative reforms that empower parents like Ed’s plan does, and want a governor who will maintain the education status quo like Lt. Governor Northam would.”

It is startling to see a member of the Cabinet spending money freely on state political campaigns.

Is DeVos violating the Hatch Act?

It was clear that her nomination for Secretary of Education was approved by Republicans who had received large donations from her and her family. But will she now hand out hundreds of thousands of dollars to determine races for governor, for Congress, for state and local school boards, even as she serves as Secretary of Education?

In another era (like a year ago), this behavior would have been roundly condemned as unseemly and inappropriate. In the Trump era, anything goes.

Categories Betsy DeVos, Virginia

Great News from Arizona! Supporters of Public Schools Collect Enough Signatures to Put Vouchers to a Referendum

By dianeravitch
August 21, 2017 //
15

Arizona is the poster state for the ALEC plan to replace public schools with vouchers and charter schools.

The Republican dominated Legislature first passed a plan to offer vouchers for students with disabilities (the camel’s nose in the tent); then expanded it for a variety of other groups: foster children, children living on reservations, children in schools rated D or F. At its last session, the Legislature passed a bill to remove any limits on vouchers, other than an artificial cap of 30,000, which can be removed at any time.

Parents and educators united to initiate a referendum on this vast expansion of vouchers. They needed to collect 75,000 signatures to call for a referendum in 2018. They collected 110,000. Lawyers for voucher supporters challenged many of the signatures, but the public school supporters ended up with 108,000 valid signatures. There will still be challenges and legal battles, but for now Arizona is heading for a referendum.

The next job for public school advocates is to demonstrate to the taxpayers in Arizona that the voucher program is a huge waste of their money and that students in voucher schools do not benefit. They must also remind them of the importance of public education as a public responsibility, since even the retirees are overwhelmingly graduates of public schools. They still have their work cut out for them, but they have cleared the first step.

And it should hearten them to know that the public has been asked in 19 different state referenda to approve vouchers for religious schools, and has rejected them every single time. (Three of the 19 referenda were in Betsy DeVos’s home state of Michigan, rejected overwhelmingly.)

Categories Arizona, Betsy DeVos, Vouchers

Borowitz: Betsy Googles the Civil War

By dianeravitch
August 18, 2017 //
6

Andy Borowitz is a humorist for the New Yorker.

Today, he said that Betsy DeVos googled the Civil War and found it extremely fascinating.

Will she share what she learned with Trump?

Categories Betsy DeVos, Humor, Trump

News Flash: DeVos Denounces KKK, White Supremacists

By dianeravitch
August 18, 2017 //
45

Betsy DeVos released a letter denouncing the KKK and white supremacists. Only in this administration would Cabinet members feel compelled to make such a statement.

Some of her allies called on her to prove her sincerity by resigning but that’s not gonna happen. She will continue to serve a man who believes that the KKK and white supremacists are his base.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/education/wp/2017/08/17/devos-on-charlottesville-the-views-of-neo-nazis-and-white-nationalists-are-cowardly-hateful-and-just-plain-wrong/

Anyone who serves in the Trump administration will emerge with their reputation in tatters. By remaining in his retinue, they demonstrate that their love of power exceeds their integrity.

Categories Betsy DeVos

DFER Exec Shavar Jeffries Quits Board of Success Academy Charters

By dianeravitch
August 15, 2017 //
20

Blame it on the Trump Effect.

Shavar Jeffries, executive director of the hedge fund managers’ Democrats for Education Reform, resigned from the board of Eva Moskowitz’s Success Academy charters.

Eva has been an outspoken supporter of Trump, DeVos and their pro-charter, pro-voucher agenda.

Jeffries quit.

He has not resigned, however, from DFER, which supports the charter part of he Trump agenda.

“Moskowitz, who has reprimanded reporters for what she called “a kind of rooting against” Trump, is on the other side of the spectrum.

“She has publicly welcomed Ivanka Trump and House Majority Leader Paul Ryan into her schools, and taken heat from her own staff for her slow response to a call to protect undocumented and transgender students in her schools. She has defended her ties to the White House and Republican leaders as an attempt to reach bipartisan consensus on education reform.

“Moskowitz’s praise for DeVos has been echoed by the leaders of the Center for Education Reform and National Alliance for Public Charter Schools.”

Th Center for Education Reform is led by Jeanne Allen, formerly of the far-right Heritage Foundation. The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools is led by Nina Rees, formerly chief education advisor to Vice President Dick Cheney. Why would anyone be surprised that these Republican-led, pro-privatization organizations support Trump?

Categories Betsy DeVos, Charter Schools, Democrats for Education Reform, Privatization

Betsy DeVos Refuses to Name the Perpetrators of Evil

By dianeravitch
August 15, 2017 //
67

Andre Perry wrote in The Hechinger Report about Betsy DeVos’s refusal to name the perpetrators of the evil in Charlottesville. She tweeted twice to express her disapproval of what happened but tiptoed around the central and alarming fact that the city was invaded by a gang of neo-Nazis, KKK, and white supremacists, prepared to fight.

“DeVos wrote a two-tweet response to the violence that read, “I’m disgusted by the behavior and hate-filled rhetoric displayed near the University of Virginia in #Charlottesville (1/2). It is every American’s right to speak their mind, but there is no room for violence or hatred. (2/2).” Her generic and woefully insufficient statement effectively sanitized the hate that Nazis, Klan members and so called “alt-right” demonstrators put on full display as they shouted Nazi slogans such as “Sieg Heil” and waved Confederate flags, while carrying military gear. DeVos, the nation’s top teacher (clearly symbolic), failed the basic test of providing leadership to teachers, education officials, as well as counselors on how educate students out of bigotry, white supremacy and violence.”

Sad. Weak. Vacuous. Empty. Dispassionate. Disengaged.

Categories Betsy DeVos, Bias, Bigotry, Racism

Jeff Bryant: When Betsy DeVos Says “School Choice,” Think Crony Capitalism

By dianeravitch
August 13, 2017 //
20

Jeff Bryant warns journalists and the public to look behind Betsy DeVos’s words and watch her deeds.

She lauds the importance of supporting teachers at the same time that she endorses Trump’s proposed $2.4 billion cuts for teacher training. She speaks honeyed words about STEM education as that same proposal slashes funding for STEM. And bear in mind, when hearing her praise for science, that she works in the most anti-science administration in history. Besides, her family foundations have supported creationist and other religion-based curricula.

Bryant reviews her recent visit to Michigan, her home state, and notes that she showered attention on private institutions, including one directly connected to the DeVos family.

She may be the only Secretary of Education in memory who was allowed to hold investments that directly conflict with her official duties and is allowed to continue to make new investments as she serves. She recently increased her holding in Neurocore, a quack corporation that claims to cure autism and other disabilities with biofeedback. She and her husband are the company’s biggest stakeholders. When I worked st the U.S. Department of Education, even the appearance of conflict of interest was strictly prohibited. The ethics officer must be asleep or reassigned to other duties.

Categories Betsy DeVos, Funding

How to Survive an Encounter with a Bear

By dianeravitch
August 12, 2017 //
23

Betsy DeVos warned us.

Bears, especially grizzlies, are very dangerous. Black bears too.

That’s why the federal government spends more than $1 million a month to protect her.

You never know when you might encounter a Bear.

If you are like me, you don’t own a gun.

If you plan to visit a national park, this is information you can use.

Here is advice posted by The Washington Post on how to Survive an Encounter with a Bear.

Don’t run. Don’t climb a tree.

Categories Betsy DeVos
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »