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Jeff Bryant: Charter Schools Are an Existential Threat to the Survival of Public Schools

By dianeravitch
May 11, 2018 //
16

Readers of this blog will not be surprised to hear that charter schools create an enormous drain on public schools and cause damage to the great majority of children, who lose resources and teachers, so that a small number may attend an alternate school that is privately managed.

Jeff Bryant here points out that the proliferation of charter schools is more than a nuisance. It is an “existential threat” to public education.

New studies from California and North Carolina find charter schools extract millions from the public systems.

The California study, written by political economist and University of Oregon professor Gordon Lafer, looks at three large public-school systems in the Golden State and concludes the annual costs to the three districts run upwards of $142 million. The three districts in the study – Oakland Unified, San Diego Unified and East Side Union – struggle with annual deficits that have led to layoffs, class size increases, and program cuts.

The North Carolina study, written by Duke University economics professor Helen Ladd and University of Rochester professor John Singleton, finds evidence that charter schools come with “fiscal externalities,” or additional costs to the budgets of public schools. In their examination of urban and nonurban districts in the Tar Heel State, the researchers calculate an additional financial cost of about $3,500 per charter school enrollee to the Durham school district and “comparable or larger” costs to two non-urban districts.

Both studies note that additional costs imposed by charters are most apt to result in local schools cutting funding they need to maintain reasonable class sizes, well-rounded curriculums, and support staff including nurses, counselors, librarians, and special education…

As Lafer writes, “In every case [where charter schools have expanded], the revenue that school districts have lost is far greater than the expenses saved by students transferring to charter schools.”

Ladd and Singleton explain why: “If 10 percent of a district’s students shift to a charter school … the district cannot simply reduce its costs by 10 percent because some of its costs are fixed, especially in the short run.”

The NC researchers also point to costs that result from having parallel sectors of charter and public schools, which “implies duplication of functions and services (e.g., central office operations).” Also, the tendency of charter schools to open or close, often without warning, makes district budgeting uncertain and inefficient.

The costs school districts incur due to charter expansions are “unavoidable,” Lafer writes. “Because districts cannot turn students away, they must maintain a large enough school system to accommodate both long-term population growth and sudden influxes of unexpected students—as has happened when charter schools suddenly close down. The district’s responsibility for serving all students creates costs.”

Despite their protests, charter schools do not collaborate with public schools. They act more like parasites. In courts, they play both sides of the public-private issue. They are public when they demand more funding, but when sued, they are suddenly private, not “state actors.”

The attitude of the charter lobby is simple: “me-me-me.” The policy makers should not act as tools of the charter lobby. They should see the whole picture and ask whether it is wise to create a parallel school system, free to write its own rules and to drain resources from the public schools that open their doors to all students.

Despite what may have been the original intention of the charter school movement, these schools, as they are currently conceived and operate, now pose a severe financial risk to public education. Rather than operating as partners to public schools, they more so resemble parasites.

To address this growing calamity, Lafer recommends in his California study that each school district produce an annual Economic Impact report assessing the cost of charter expansion in its community, and local and state public officials take findings of these impact assessments into account when deciding whether to authorize additional charters.

Ladd and Singleton in their North Carolina study recommend states provide transitional aid to smooth or mitigate revenue losses charter school expansions impose on school districts. They point to examples of these policies in New York and Massachusetts, although they admit, “In neither case does the magnitude of the aid offset the full negative fiscal impacts of charters.”

Categories Accountability, Budget Cuts, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Funding, Privatization

Jesse Hagopian: Teachers and Parents in Puerto Rico Boycott Standardized Tests

By dianeravitch
May 10, 2018 //
2

As the jaws of destruction and disruption approach to privatize their schools, teachers and parents at many schools in Puerto Rico have organized to boycott the standardized tests that will be used to rationalize the closing of their schools.

Jesse Hagopian tells the story here, after interviewing Mercedes Martinez, president of the Teachers Federation of Puerto Rico.

Teachers in Puerto Rico, she told him, were inspired by the historic strike against MAP testing at Garfield High School in Seattle, which Jesse helped organize.

“Another part of the disaster capitalist approach to schooling has been to impose the same high-stakes standardized testing regime that we have in the mainland U.S. on the Puerto Rican education system. High-stakes testing is being used to punish schools, students, and teachers. With teachers living in fear of the consequences low scores, they are forced to teach to the test, not the student, and it is causing a narrowing of the curriculum to what the corporate test makers believe is important to learn (For example, I don’t think the lessons of how to organize your community against corporate education reform will be on the next test). These tests are used as exit exams in high school and are denying thousands of students the chance to graduate. Perhaps worst of all, the testocracy has trained people to believe that wisdom is the ability to eliminate wrong answer choices on a multiple choice exam, rather than to be creative, empathize, or solve real life problems.

“But a mighty movement of parents, students, and teachers has risen up to boycott and opt out of these tests as a way to reclaim public education and fight for authentic forms of assessment.”

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Education Reform, Privatization, Testing

Arizona Voters: Did You Pay for the $8.4 Million NYC Condo for BASIS Charter Founders?

By dianeravitch
May 9, 2018 //
86

Columnist E.J. Montini of the Arizona Republic is all over the charter scams that are common in his state.

One of his favorite subjects is the BASIS charter chain, which is regularly lauded by the national media as sponsor of the number one high schooling the nation, because of the AP courses that its students pass. Montini knows that BASIS regularly weeds out the students it doesn’t want by setting expectations higher than most students can meet.

He also knows that BASIS is a honeypot for its founders.

Look at the folks who founded Basis Charter Schools, Michael and Olga Block.

These are public schools.

They’re funded with tax dollars. Your money.

In fact, as The Arizona Republic’s Craig Harris pointed out in a May 7 article, Basis receives more in basic per-pupil funding than traditional public schools.

At the same time, Basis asks parents to “donate” at least $1,500 per child each year, which it says is used to improve teacher pay.

Sort of a de facto tuition that is way, way cheaper than private school (because taxpayers are funding the rest.)

Essentially, Basis Charter Schools, a tax-exempt non-profit corporation, gets to operate like a private company while using the public’s money. And the founders — among others affiliated with the operation — have done very well.

As Harris so succinctly pointed out:

As Scottsdale parents were receiving yet another solicitation for donations to pay teachers, the Blocks made a $1.68 million down payment on an $8.4 million condominium in New York City, property records show.

Their Manhattan home is in a 60-story building with “breathtaking panoramas” of the city, an infinity pool, and an indoor/outdoor theater, according to a sales brochure. It is located near two private Basis schools controlled by the Blocks. Tuition at those schools is more than $30,000 a year

.

Arizona has little to no accountability for charter schools. They can use public money to build new buildings, which then are private property. They can use public money to pay their family members or themselves. No one cares. The state makes rules, but if no one follows them, that’s okay. The audits are a joke or don’t happen. It’s a scam, Montini writes.

The owners get to pay themselves with your money, hire their relatives, avoid the bidding process for work and make very little of their financial practice available for you to see.

It’s the opposite of regular public schools

It’s a perfect scam. The opposite of regular public schools. Lawmakers and politicians like Gov. Doug Ducey go along with it because they hate teacher unions and because charter owners are big supporters of their careers.

But ask yourself this:

Who was the last person working in a regular public school who could afford a house in Tucson, a house in Scottsdale and an $8.4 million condo in New York City with “breathtaking panoramas?”

As long as their schools produce high test scores, who cares about the money, right?

Categories Accountability, Arizona, Charter Schools, Education Industry, For-Profit, Privatization

Los Angeles: Teachers at Three Charter Schools Begin Process to Unionize

By dianeravitch
May 8, 2018 //
17

 

As the Walton Family Foundation, ALEC, and Betsy DeVos would agree, the point of charter schools is to eliminate teachers’ unions.

The article says that 89% of charters are non-union, by design. (I think the percentage is even higher, possibly 95%.)

But in Los Angeles, three charters in the city’s largest charter chain are starting the process to unionize. 

This is a very small drop in a lake of charters.

Is it good or bad? It is good that teachers are seeking to have a voice in their workplace. It is good that they can join together to improve working conditions. It is good that they are defeating the billionaires who want to bust unions and privatize public schools.

But…when charter teachers join the NEA and AFT, will those two unions no longer oppose the charter openings? Will they stand back as the Waltons, Koch’s, and DeVos spend hundreds of millions every year to open more non-union schools?

A paradox. I hope to hear what you think.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Privatization

Reformers Fearful of Unions’ Efforts to Organize Teachers in Charters

By dianeravitch
May 8, 2018 //
15

If you want to read a real tear-jerker, read this story written for the conservative Philanthropy Roundtable, about whether philanthropists should worry about the inroads that unions are making into the charter sector.

Romy Drucker begins with a story about one of the conservatives’ favorite charter chains, the Noble Network in Chicago. This is the same charter chain that some teachers complained about to NPR, saying it has a “dehumanizing culture,” the same charter chain where teenage girls are told to sit still and bleed through their clothes rather than go to the bathroom without an escort. It is a leader nationally in the “no excuses” charter world, where intensive test prep, strict discipline, and high suspension rates produce results for those willing to accept the demands.

Drucker begins:

“Michael and Tonya Milkie decided to start a charter public high school in Chicago in 1999. They drew on their experience teaching in the city’s toughest public schools, and borrowed bright ideas from America’s top charter-school founders and other savvy managers of social enterprises. As both educators and entrepreneurs, they knew that their autonomy, and ability to make tough decisions flexibly, without bureaucracy or inertia, would be essential to their success.

“They wanted a school where “classrooms are sacred.” They wanted to put their full, unhedged support behind instructors “focused on teaching, and getting better at teaching and reaching the kids who are struggling.” Administrators would be “available and resourceful,” says Tonya, and focused on helping the teachers on the front line solve classroom problems.

“In Noble Street College Prep, they set out to create a school culture centered on student results—not the adult preferences, employee desires, neighborhood issues, political burdens, and other subjects that distract administrators of many public schools. Their expectations were high. “We’re constantly saying, ‘How can we have better outcomes for our students?’ ” states Michael. “We have to have great results.”

“With nine out of ten of its disadvantaged students graduating and going to college, and the original school having grown into 17 campuses scattered across Chicago, the Noble Network has hit its high targets. The Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation named it the top charter network in America in 2015. Noble now educates around 12,000 students annually—89 percent low-income, 98 percent minorities.

“But the more Noble succeeded, the more it sparked consternation at the Chicago Teachers Union—one of America’s most powerful and militant labor groups. The CTU has gone out on strike twice in recent years, shutting down the nation’s third-largest school district for seven days in 2012 and then again for one day in 2016.

“Increasingly, the union drew a bead on the Noble Network. Each new school opening was met with protests. Those Noble could mostly ignore. But then the CTU set out to unionize the charter schools’ teachers.

“In March 2017, a hundred Noble employees organized by activists delivered an open letter to Michael Milkie and the network’s board of directors, expressing an interest in unionizing all 800 of Noble’s educators. “We must be trusted to have a collective voice,” the letter read. Local Democratic politicians endorsed the organizing effort. The campaign was billed in news reports as an attempt to form “the nation’s largest charter teachers union.”

“It’s definitely a big deal,” says Chicago native Peter Cunningham, who worked in the U.S. Department of Education during the Obama administration. “Noble unequivocally has a culture of super hard work and high expectations. It’s hard to establish that culture when you don’t fully control the teachers and the schools.”

Drucker reviews the efforts to unionize and warns:

“Given the vigor with which unions are currently campaigning against Noble, Alliance, and other charter schools, though, it’s hard to imagine a ceasefire. The prudent path for all charter-school leaders and supporters is to prepare for a storm.”

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Privatization

Jan Resseger Explains How Charter School Expansion Ruins School District Budgets

By dianeravitch
May 8, 2018 //
24

In case you don’t have time to read the full report released by “In the Public Interest” about the real costs of charter schools, Jan Resseger has done it for you.

Legislators pretend that charters are simply a “choice,” and pay no attention to the fiscal damage they impose on the public schools that educate the majority of children and lose revenue. Thus, the decision to have more charters reduces the quality of education for the majority of children in the district or the state.

She writes:

“What stands out in this report is the perfectly lucid explanation about exactly how charter school funding depletes the budgets of local school districts and what it means for the students left in the traditional public schools when some students carry their per-pupil funding away to a charter school: “To the casual observer, it may not be obvious why charter schools should create any net costs at all for their home districts. To grasp why they do, it is necessary to understand the structural differences between the challenge of operating a single school—or even a local chain of schools—and that of a district-wide system operating tens or hundreds of schools and charged with the legal responsibility to serve all students in the community. When a new charter school opens, it typically fills its classrooms by drawing students away from existing schools in the district. By California state law, school funding is based on student attendance; when a student moves from a traditional public school to a charter school, her pro-rated share of school funding follows her to the new school. Thus, the expansion of charter schools necessarily entails lost funding for traditional public schools and school districts. If schools and district offices could simply reduce their own expenses in proportion to the lost revenue, there would be no fiscal shortfall. Unfortunately this is not the case.”

“The report continues: “If, for instance, a given school loses five percent of its student body—and that loss is spread across multiple grade levels, the school may be unable to lay off even a single teacher… Plus, the costs of maintaining school buildings cannot be reduced…. Unless the enrollment falloff is so steep as to force school closures, the expense of heating and cooling schools, running cafeterias, maintaining digital and wireless technologies, and paving parking lots—all of this is unchanged by modest declines in enrollment. In addition, both individual schools and school districts bear significant administrative responsibilities that cannot be cut in response to falling enrollment. These include planning bus routes and operating transportation systems; developing and auditing budgets; managing teacher training and employee benefits; applying for grants and certifying compliance with federal and state regulations; and the everyday work of principals, librarians and guidance counselors.” As other studies have shown, the greatest fiscal burden for local school districts is for special education, because traditional public schools continue to serve the children with the most serious disabilities, the children who require expensive services most charters elect not to provide.

“What about the problems in school districts where the school population is already shrinking? In recent years charters have somehow been prescribed in places like Chicago and Detroit and Cleveland as a way to attract families to the district. But ITPI’s report explains why such thinking is flawed: “It is true that shrinking student populations cause a fiscal crisis for school districts. However, charter schools exacerbate this problem in unique ways. First, charter schools make it extremely difficult for districts to consolidate schools in the face of falling enrollment… When the creation of new schools is no longer tied to student population growth but rather is open to any number of entrepreneurs aimed at competing for market share, the inevitable result is an increased number of schools for the same population of students. In Albany, New York, over the course of a decade the district went from serving 10,380 students in 17 schools to serving just slightly more students—10,568—but in 24 schools…. And the New York Times reported that in the city of Detroit, ‘the unchecked growth of charters has created a glut of schools competing for some of the nation’s poorest students, enticing them to enroll with cash bonuses, laptops, raffle tickets for iPads and bicycles…’ The problem is particularly destructive in communities whose total school population is already shrinking…. In such districts school systems already struggling to meet student needs with diminishing resources are faced with additional dramatic cuts in funding.”

It makes perfect sense to everyone other than legislators and charter lobbyists.

Categories Accountability, California, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Funding, Privatization

New Report: How Much Do Charter Schools Cost Public Schools? Plenty!

By dianeravitch
May 8, 2018 //
6

“In the Public Interest” released a new report about the cost of charter schools, and the money they drain from public schools that educate most students.

Here is the press release, with a link to the full report by Gordon Lafer, author of The One Percent Solution.

Report: Charter Schools Remove Tens of Millions in Funding from
Neighborhood School Students in Three California Districts

$142.6 Million Net Loss in School Districts in San Diego, Oakland, and San Jose,
While Student Needs Go Unmet

WASHINGTON – In a first of its kind analysis of three California school districts, researchers found that public school students are bearing the cost of charter schools’ rapid expansion. The report calculates the net fiscal impact of charter schools on three representative California school districts: San Diego, Oakland, and San Jose’s East Side Union High School District.

The analysis, Breaking Point: The Cost of Charter Schools for Public School Districts, conducted by In the Public Interest, a California-based think tank, with Dr. Gordon Lafer, examines the cumulative effect of charter schools on California school districts, which rank 42nd nationwide in per pupil spending. The number of California charter schools increased by more than 900 percent to more than 1,200 schools over the last two decades.

“Our analysis shows that the continued expansion of charter schools has steadily drained money away from school districts and concentrated high needs students in neighborhood public schools,” said Dr. Gordon Lafer, political scientist and professor at the University of Oregon. “The high costs of charter schools have led to decreases in neighborhood public schools in counseling, libraries, music and art programs, lab sciences, field trips, reading tutors, special education funding, and even the most basic supplies like toilet paper.”

The California Charter Schools Act does not allow school boards to consider how a charter school may impact a district’s educational programs or fiscal health when weighing new charter applications. However, when a student leaves a neighborhood public school for a charter school, all the funding for that student leaves with them, while all of the costs do not. This leads to cuts in core services like counseling, libraries, and special education and increased class sizes at neighborhood public schools.

San Diego Unified is the second-largest district in the state, with a combined enrollment of more than 128,000 students, and a total of 51 charter schools. Oakland Unified has 50,000 students and has the highest concentration of charter schools in the state. East Side Union High School District has a total enrollment of 27,000 and is comprised solely of high schools. Although the districts face unique challenges and student populations, they share similar financial challenges from charter school expansion.

“Unlimited charter school expansion is pushing some of California’s school districts toward a financial tipping point, from which they will be unable to return,” Dr. Lafer said.

The report recommends that each school district create an annual economic impact report to assess the cost of charter school expansion in its community. With consideration of economic impact, school districts could more effectively balance the value of a new charter school with the needs of neighborhood public school students.

Key findings from the report include:

• Oakland Unified loses $5,643 a year per charter school student while San Diego Unified loses $4,913 a year and East Side Unified loses $6,000 a year.

● Charter schools cost Oakland Unified $57.3 million per year, a sum several times larger than the forced drastic cuts to Oakland’s neighborhood school system this year.

● In East Side Union High School District, the net impact of charter schools amount to a loss of $19.3 million per year.

● Charter schools cost the San Diego Unified $65.9 million in 2016-17, $6 million more than the most recent round of budget cuts in early 2018.

● In Oakland, nearly 78 percent of students come from low-income families, are English language learners, or are foster youth, while 63 percent of students in San Diego Unified and 52.7 percent of students in East Side High School Unified share those backgrounds.

The report builds on previous studies that used different methodologies but came to similar conclusions. In the smaller cities of Buffalo, New York, and Durham, North Carolina, the net impact of charter schools was estimated as a loss of $25 million per year to the school district. In Nashville, Tennessee, the loss is approaching $50 million per year. And in Los Angeles—the nation’s second-largest school district—the net loss is estimated at over $500 million per year.

In the Public Interest is a nonprofit resource center that studies public goods and services.

###

Read the report here.

Categories Accountability, California, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Funding, Privatization

California: Board Member Sued by Charter School Leader Responds

By dianeravitch
May 7, 2018 //
7

I posted earlier today that the ACLU was defending a school board member against intimidation tactics by a charter school leader, who threatened to sue her for doing her job and asking questions.

The board member, Claudia Rossi, posted this comment on the blog:

“I am a Latina who won a seat on the Santa Clara County Board of Education despite the over 200k the California Charter School Association spent against my campaign. I will continue to fight for our children using my vote and my voice to protect them from profiteering CMOS. Children are not commodities! This threat to sue me and other tactics only expose the true motives of the privatization jaugernaut. Mi voz y mi voto no se venden! My voice and my vote are not for sale! Nuestros hijos tampoco! Neither are our children!”

Categories Accountability, California, Charter Schools, Courage, Education Industry, Education Reform, Privatization

California: ACLU Rebukes Charter Leader Who Threatens to Sue School Board Member

By dianeravitch
May 7, 2018 //
23

 

A school board member in the Bay Area asked questions about the operations of a private charter school that was up for renewal. The charter CEO didn’t like her questions, and he threatened to sue her for defamation. She took his threats to the American Civil Liberties Union, and it agreed to defend her.

“The ACLU Foundation of Northern California is committed to fighting against spurious legal claims that threaten free speech. Especially when corporations and other powerful entities attempt to strong-arm people who have less resources at their disposal.

“This is exactly what happened to Claudia Rossi, a Bay Area school-board member and trustee, when she raised concerns about a private charter school at a public meeting during which board members were considering renewal of the school’s charter.

“Ms. Rossi’s inquiries were well within the scope of her official duties as a board member and trustee representing the public interest.

“Unfortunately, the charter school’s CEO responded to public criticism by threatening her with a lawsuit. In a threatening letter sent to Ms. Rossi, the CEO claimed her statements were defamatory and demanded she retract them and apologize publicly and in writing.

“This tactic—alleging defamation because one does not appreciate a comment, opinion, or line of questioning—is as prevalent as it is problematic. And it threatens our country’s commitment to open discourse. “

Unfortunately the charter industry tends to resort to bullying tactics to get more public money and have their wishes prevail. For example, when they close their schools and bus their students, staff, and even parents to political rallies, all dressed in matching T-shirts, carrying posters expressing their demands for more money, more autonomy, faster closings of public schools. Any public school that did that would be immediately investigated, and the principal would be fired for engaging in political activities.

 

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Privatization

Sacramento Bee Endorses Newsom and Chiang, Warns Against Charter Expansion

By dianeravitch
May 7, 2018 //
22

In an editorial about the gubernatorial race in California, the Sacramento Bee endorsed former San Francisco MayorG avin Newsom and State Treasurer John Chiang. It specifically rejected former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa because of his alliance with the charter school industry.

What was crucial in its decision, says the editorial, was the charter school issue.

Gov. Jerry Brown is a hard act to follow. No California governor has served longer, or more consequentially.

In the past eight years alone – his second stint in the office – the state has gone from a $27 billion budget deficit to a $6 billion surplus. Unemployment has fallen from 12.2 percent to 4.3 percent, a record. Along the way, Brown has realigned the state’s criminal justice system, overhauled public school finance, licensed more than a million undocumented drivers, put the state at the forefront of addressing climate change and taught Californians a little Latin.

Whoever succeeds him will not only have to pick up where he left off on those issues, but also maintain his defense of California against Trump administration assaults on our environment, trade, diversity and tolerant values. Not to mention our many in-state challenges – affordable housing, health care, underfunded public employee pensions, higher education, water policy and so on. Oh, and the near-term likelihood of a downturn in the state economy.

So voters have their work cut out on June 5 in culling two candidates from a field of more than two dozen contenders. A few prospects are prepared, but let us stipulate: None are Jerry Brown.

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Gavin Newsom sat down with the Sacramento Bee Editorial Board to discuss affordable housing, the California economic divide and other key election issues ahead of the June 5 primary. Emily ZentnerSacramento Bee Editorial Board

The best-equipped candidate for the economy to come – state Treasurer John Chiang – is running an anemic campaign and is probably terminally underfunded. The best-financed and most experienced candidates – former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom – have, in their personal lives, made unnerving and public errors in judgment.

More immediately, there are the great gobs of money from billionaire charter school advocates going to independent expenditure campaigns backing Villaraigosa. Though Newsom, too, has his billionaires – hello, Silicon Valley – the charter movement has direct implications for public schools in California.

It is largely because of this latter development that our top two endorsements go to Newsom and Chiang.

Newsom, the 50-year-old frontrunner in the polls, has been running for governor for so long, and has put so much thought into the matter, that when he speaks, his positions manage to sound both glib and over-detailed. That’s too bad: His principles, hedged though they often seem, generally channel the liberal majority of this blue state.

Like Brown, he’s for strong climate policy, locally focused school finance and aggressive use of the courts to beat back the overreaches of the Trump administration. But he departs from the governor on some other popular but expensive points. He says higher education should get more state funding, as should universal preschool, and he advocates – rashly, given the cost – single-payer health care, a position that has endeared him to California progressives.

If he gets elected and the state economy dips, as experts expect, he will surely disappoint them.

Chiang, 55, may not have Newsom’s San Francisco charisma, but he does know economics. Call him a wonk, but so is Brown, and like Brown, he knows the value of deliberation and frugality.

Since his 1997 appointment to the state Board of Equalization, Chiang, a child of Taiwanese immigrants and a graduate of Georgetown law school, has served in a series of statewide offices with, as he puts it, “no drama.”

That hasn’t meant no guts: As controller, he withheld legislators’ paychecks after they blew a voter-approved deadline for passing the budget; some still haven’t forgiven him. During the recession, he also refused an order from then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to slash state workers’ pay.

He downplays his personal story, though it is compelling; his sister was brutally murdered when he was a young man, and his family encountered blistering racism during his childhood in suburban Chicago. Like Newsom, he champions public schools, and his ideas to address the state housing crisis with a big housing bond have been both sensible and aggressive. It’s too bad his campaign is such a dud; he’s the best choice for fiscally conscious Californians – and for Republicans who might want to vote strategically and try to get a moderate in the November general election in this heavily Democratic state.

Villaraigosa, 65, would give Newsom the toughest runoff in November. He was Assembly Speaker and ran California’s largest and most complicated city during the worst of the recession; once an up-from-the-streets labor organizer, he has become more pragmatic with age.

But his alliance with rich charter school advocates in Los Angeles could backfire at the state level. Privately operated public charter schools have been an important alternative in low-income districts, but they also have pulled students – and enrollment-based state and federal funds – out of the regular school system.

In the L.A. schools, where the charter billionaires and Villaraigosa worked together with the best intentions, that trend, combined with soaring pension obligations, has spawned a financial disaster. Now comes a $12.5 million independent expenditure for Villaraigosa from charter philanthropists Eli Broad, Reed Hastings of Netflix and former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

The charter school issue is as important to get right as it is divisive. California has challenges enough without letting its factions hijack the governor’s race.

This is a remarkable turnaround for the Bee, because in the past it was an unabashed cheerleader for charter schools. When I visited Sacramento several years back, I met with the editorial board. It was cool to the point of being hostile because of my criticism of charters. At that time, Michelle Rhee was a star who had recently married the mayor of Sacramento. So, either the internal dynamics of the Bee editorial has changed, or the membership of the board changed, or the board learned more about the charter industry. Whatever the reason, this endorsement is great news. It demonstrates that the bloom is off the rose for charter schools, and the billionaires who back them.

The Network for Public Education Action Fund endorsed John Chiang because of his clarity about the negative fiscal impact on the state’s public schools. Hopefully, Gavin Newson will learn from the Bee editorial that it is safe to support traditional public schools, which enroll the vast majority of the students in California, instead of an aggressive industry that promises more than it delivers. At least, do no harm.

The times, they are a’ changing.

Categories Accountability, California, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Privatization
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