Archives for category: Bush, Jeb
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Jeb Bush Salutes David Coleman and Common Core

By dianeravitch
April 21, 2013 //
34

The Republican Party is divided about the Common Core standards.

The Republican National Committee has come out in opposition to the Common Core, calling it “an inappropriate overreach to standardize and control” education. Senator Charles Grassley wants to defund the Common Core.

But Jeb Bush is one the loudest cheerleaders for the Common Core. When his sidekick Tony Bennett lost the state superintendent job in Indiana, In part because of Tea Party opposition to Common Core, Jeb Bush made sure he landed on his feet as state commissioner in Florida.

Now Jeb has declared in TIME that David Coleman, the architect of the Common Core, is one of the world’s 100 most influential people. Jeb adores the Common Core. So do the high-tech corporations that back Jeb’s Foundation for Educational Excellence.

The Republicans will have to duke this out over the next few years. Do they support federal control or local control? State standards or federal standards?

And we will all wait to see how the Common Core drama plays out? Will all children be college and career ready because of the Common Core? Will it close gaps or make them wider?

Categories Bush, Jeb, Common Core

Indiana: How Tony Bennett Conned The Public and Helped Corporations

By dianeravitch
April 21, 2013 //
18

Readers may recall that outgoing Indiana State Superintendent Tony Bennett left behind a videoconferencing system that cost $1.7 million and was utterly useless because it was incompatible with the department’s existing technology. The expensive technology was purchased from Cisco Systems, which by happy coincidence employs Bennett’s former chief of staff Todd Huston.

Karen Francisco of the Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette notes that the useless videoconferencing system is symptomatic of Bennett’s most important legacy: a full-bore assault on Indiana’s public school system.

She asks:

“Is the spin that is used to justify the questionable $1.7 million deal any different from the claims he used to expand charter schools, to shift tax dollars to private schools through voucher payments, to strip collective bargaining rights for teachers or require third-graders to pass a standardized reading test before moving on to fourth grade?

“Aside from his former chief of staff’s job with Cisco, Bennett’s ties to corporate interests have become increasingly clear. A nonprofit group in January released thousands of emails revealing the Foundation for Excellence in Education’s efforts in working with state officials, including Bennett, in writing education laws to benefit the foundation’s corporate supporters. The foundation, started by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, has received financial support from for-profit companies like McGraw Hill, Pearson and K12 and the nonprofit College Board, Huston’s current employer.

“The complex web of ties between corporate influences, Bennett’s administration and the raft of legislation should give lawmakers every reason to halt the continuing tide of education bills, including several sponsored by Huston. Demanding research-based evidence of the effectiveness of laws already passed and simply giving schools time to implement and evaluate them could save legislators some embarrassment later.”

Categories Bush, Jeb, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Indiana

The Missing Jeb Bush Link

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2013 //
11

Yesterday, I published a post about how critics were raising questions about Jeb Bush’s financial ties to certain corporations.

I linked to an article in the Tampa Tribune. However, the link was dead. The article had disappeared.

A reader found it. Not on the Tampa Tribune website but here, where it has been preserved for readers. A testament to a free society.

Categories Bush, Jeb, Education Industry, Florida, For-Profit

Critics Question Ethics of Jeb Bush Foundation

By dianeravitch
April 4, 2013 //
19

Recently, the Foundation for Educational Excellence (FEE), created by Jeb Bush, has come under fire for mixing its programming with the financial interests of its backers while serving as a vehicle for Bush’s 2016 presidential ambitions.

The Tampa Tribune ran a scathing article that pointed out problematic practices:

“Lobbyists are not allowed to finance perks like trips for state officials, but those at the Foundation for Excellence in Education get around that ban by being registered to another foundation run by Jeb Bush.

Former Gov. Jeb Bush’s nonprofit, education reform foundation is taking heat for using donations from for-profit companies to lobby for state education laws that could benefit those companies.
Among the activities of Bush’s Foundation for Excellence in Education that have come in for criticism: It pays for state officials and legislators to go to conferences where they meet with the company’s donors, including officials of corporations who stand to gain from the policymakers’ decisions.”
The article points out that:
“Normally, it’s illegal for lobbyists or lobbying organizations to provide benefits such as free trips to Florida legislators or top executive branch officials. But the Foundation for Excellence in Education escapes that prohibition because lobbyists on its staff are registered to another, closely related Bush foundation – even though the two share key staff members and even their Tallahassee address.”
Among the corporate sponsors of the FEE, the article says:
  • Pearson, a $9 billion-a-year media conglomerate which has a $250 million, four-year contract to administer the Florida Comprehensive Achievement Test. In the last few years, the company has been fined $14 million by the state for delayed test score results and criticized for its grading of writing tests.
  • Amplify, the education division of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., which sells classroom and curriculum software.
  • Charter Schools USA, a Fort Lauderdale-based for-profit company that manages charter schools under contract.
  • IQity, which sells online learning materials.

The foundation sponsors conferences where the top stars of the corporate reform movement appear to praise the virtues of vouchers, charters, and online learning. For example, last years’ summit in Washington, D.C.”

“….included “strategy sessions” on such topics as “Reaching more students with vouchers and tax-credit scholarships” and banquets with speeches by Bush, Condoleeza Rice and U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan.

“The 2011 conference at the historic Palace Hotel in San Francisco – one of the city’s most luxurious, with rooms starting at $350 per night –featured a speech by Murdoch.
It also included a fundraiser hosted by Bush for Tony Bennett, then running for re-election as Indiana education superintendent and a champion of the kind of conservative education reform advocated by the foundation – more charter schools, tax-paid tuition vouchers, more emphasis on testing, mandatory on-line courses and “virtual schools.”
Please read the article. It raises so many important questions about the push for privatization, the blend of philanthropy and profit-making, and one other important question: Why was Arne Duncan addressing a summit of rightwing cheerleaders for privatization and profit?
Categories Bush, Jeb, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Duncan, Arne, Education Industry, Florida, For-Profit, Pearson, Privatization

SC: Just Say No to Florida “Miracle”

By dianeravitch
April 1, 2013 //
16

As Jeb Bush’s claims of miraculous powers of education reform spread across the land, South Carolina is considering legislation to flunk third-graders who don’t pass the state’s standardized test.

The legislation, introduced by State Senate Majority Leader Harvey Peeler, would cause about 3,000 children to be held back. Research is clear that grade retention is highly associated with dropping out in later grades. Low test scores are highly correlated with high poverty.

But South Carolina prefers to go in search of the “Florida miracle.”

How many young lives will be blighted before the Florida miracle is as discredited as the earlier Bush’s “Texas miracle”?

Categories Bush, Jeb, Florida

Schneider Checks Out Chiefs for Change

By dianeravitch
March 27, 2013 //
1

Mercedes Schneider, one of Louisiana’s fearless and intrepid bloggers, has been conducting research into the groups that together propel the corporate reform movement.

In this post, she examines “Chiefs for Change.”

This organization consists of several state superintendents who are aligned with Jeb Bush and his ideas.

Who are these “chiefs”? What is their connection to Jeb?

Read on.

Categories Bush, Jeb, Chiefs for Change, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry

Jeb Bush Will Bring Tale of “Florida Miracle” to Maine

By dianeravitch
March 18, 2013 //
4

On March 22, Governor Paul LePage will host an event for Jeb Bush and his merry team of market-model crusaders in Augusta, Maine.

Bush will present the full range of ALEC-inspired “reforms” guaranteed to bring privatization and for-profit entrepreneurs to Maine, while demoralizing Maine’s teachers and principals.

How clever to present the rightwing agenda as “reform,” and at the same time advertising Jeb’s Presidential run in 2016.

Categories ALEC, Bush, Jeb, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Florida, For-Profit, Testing, Vouchers

Who Is Behind the Corporate Smear Machine?

By dianeravitch
March 13, 2013 //
21

I posted earlier about a web attack on the integrity of the distinguished scholar Gene Glass. Dr. Glass had the nerve to write a critical review of virtual charter schools, based on research and evidence. Observant readers discovered who created the domain name of the attack website. First, Sherman Dorn tracked down the domain owner. Then another reader added this comment:

Here’s the link to the information Sherman Dorn identified:
http://whois.domaintools.com/geneglass.org

Domain Name:GENEGLASS.ORG
Created On:22-Jan-2013
Registrant Name:Steve Grubbs
Registrant Organization:Victory Enterprises, Inc.

The ‘About’ page of Victory Enterprises:
http://www.victoryenterprises.com/about_us.htm

On its website: “GeneGlass.org is a project of the Center for School Options.”

Only two individuals are named on the website for the Center for School Options.
http://centerforschooloptions.org/about/leadership/

1. Jim Horne (Chairman) who was appointed by Governor Jeb Bush as the first appointed Commissioner of Education for the state of Florida.
2. Rose Fernandez, “Executive Director for the National Parent Network for Online Learning… the founding President of the Wisconsin Coalition of Virtual School Families, and has served on the Board of the National Coalition for Public School Options and School Choice Wisconsin.”

Categories Bush, Jeb, Corporate Reformers, On-Line Education

Did Skandera’s All-Expense Paid Travel Break New Mexico Law?

By dianeravitch
March 6, 2013 //
11

According to a report in the Santa Fe Reporter, Hanna Skandera has taken numerous trips to conferences and meetings, with travel expenses paid by organizations that do business with the state.

The story says, “… over the past two years, various PED [Public Education Department] contractors have paid for Skandera’s flights and hotel rooms. For instance, in 2011, PED paid the Minnesota-based Summit Education Associates, LLC, more than $96,000 for “professional services,” according to the state’s Sunshine Portal.

“The company lists as its manager FEE [Jeb Bush’s Foundation for Educational Excellence] Senior Policy Fellow Christy Hovanetz, who helped advise Skandera on legislation [news, Feb. 19: “Business School”]. Then, in June 2012, FEE paid nearly $3,000 to fly Skandera—who is a member of Chiefs for Change, a FEE-operated group of public officials who support the nonprofit’s reform agenda—to a Chiefs meeting in Washington, DC, followed by FEE’s “Festival of Education” in London.

Skandera also serves on the board of the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, a consortium of 22 states “working together to develop a common set of K-12 assessments in English and math”—online evaluations Skandera plans to implement in New Mexico in 2015. Travel vouchers show PARCC paid a total of more than $2,000 for Skandera to attend board meetings in Washington, DC, and Alexandria, Va.

PARCC, too, has ties to state money: It’s run by Washington, DC-based nonprofit Achieve, Inc., which last year landed a $39,660 contract with PED, according to the Sunshine Portal.”

A spokesman for the PEDRO said, “Over two days of the hearing, supporters for Secretary Skandera and reform for our students outnumbered those who stand for the status quo. As far as responding to the presentation, it is beyond disappointing that a political operative funded by special interests is given more time before this committee than the citizens of New Mexico who traveled hundreds of miles to testify.”

Categories Bush, Jeb, Charter Schools, Chiefs for Change

Florida Newspaper: What Miracle?

By dianeravitch
March 5, 2013 //
8

Former Governor Jeb Bush traverses the nation, especially the red states, bringing news of the Florida miracle. After the debacle of the “Texas miracle,” which thrust NCLB on the nation, Mr. Bush would be well-advised to pick another issue.

The Palm Beach Post wrote a scathing editorial taking down the myth of the Florida miracle (which Bush’s former deputy Hannah Skandera is now selling in New Mexico).

The editorial says:

“Former Gov. Jeb Bush has an undeserved reputation as an education reformer. Florida’s recent education progress has come not from implementing Mr. Bush’s policies but from cleaning up after them.

“Mr. Bush has been visiting legislators in Tallahassee to talk about education policy. Get out the mops and buckets. Taxpayers also should reach for their wallets, since the former governor’s new big ideas involve transferring more public dollars to the for-profit companies behind him.”

And the editorial goes into detail on the disaster of Florida’s testing and accountability system.

It concludes:

“Now Mr. Bush heads several foundations pushing for a rapid expansion of charter schools and virtual schools. His Foundation for Excellence in Education accepts donations from private companies that would profit from lax new laws that Florida and other states are rushing to enact. The sort of careless “reform” Jeb Bush advocates will end up with taxpayers fleeced and students and parents cheated. He has a reputation for reform. He has a record of making messes.”

Categories Bush, Jeb, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Privatization, Vouchers
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