Archives for category: Charter Schools
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

Texas: Disgusting State Pressure by Texas Education Agency on Schools Serving Black and Brown Students

By dianeravitch
April 23, 2018 //
34

Jullian Vasquez Heilig got the right terminology: The Texas Education Agency has pulled a “gangster move” on black and brown children in Houston public schools. TEA has warned the Houston Independent School Board that it must privatize the 10 lowest performing schools or face a state takeover.

Guess what? Every district has a bottom 1%, a bottom 5%, a bottom 10.

But only gangsters would threaten to shut down and takeover the whole district if the bottom 10 were not handed over for privatization.

Mike Morath, the state commissioner, failed to turn Dallas into an all-charter district, and now he is plotting to put more charters wherever he wants, whenever he wants.

Morath is a software developer who served on the Dallas school board, then was appointed state commissioner. He is not an educator. He is a vandal. He has no ideas about improving schools. His only ideas are how to privatize them and hand them off to the corporate sector that is hungry for more taxpayer dollars.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Privatization

Los Angeles Times Endorses Tony Thurmond for State Superintendent of Education

By dianeravitch
April 23, 2018 //
23

 

The Los Angeles Times endorses Tony Thurmond for State Superintendent. His opponent, Marshall Tuck, is closely aligned with the powerful charter lobby. But that’s not why the newspaper endorsed Thurmond. The editorial board was impressed by his proposals to help the neediest kids.

The Network for Public Education also endorsed Thurmond, so we are delighted to know that the Times evaluated both men and preferred Thurmond based on his ideas and his record.

 

Categories Accountability, Administrators, superintendents, California, Charter Schools

Matt Barnum: Part 2, Waltons’ Secret Memo: Why Charter Expansion Lost in Massachusetts

By dianeravitch
April 23, 2018 //
7

 

Matt Barnum of Chalkbeat obtained additional portions of the postmortem analysis of why the corporate reformers lost in a state referendum to expand charter schools in Massachusetts (here is his first report). It makes for fascinating reading, both his summary and the original document itself. The Walton family and their allies invested millions in the referendum, hoping to increase the number of privately-managed charter schools in the Bay State. The Walton Education Coalition funded the postmortem, hoping to learn from the resounding defeat of the “Yes on 2” campaign.

The referendum was held in November 2016. “Yes on 2” advocated for expanding the number of charters in the state by 12 per year, anywhere in the state, indefinitely. “No on 2” warned that charters took funding away from local public schools. The YES campaign was funded by the Waltons, out-of-state financiers and corporate interests, and the New York City-based Families for Excellent Schools (FES). The NO campaign was funded mostly by the unions (including the National AFT and NEA) and small individual contributions. The YES campaign spent about $25 Million, the NO campaign spent about $15 Million. The successful message of the NO campaign boiled down to: “Do you support public schools or school privatization?”

If you read the original memo, you will see that the consulting firm really doesn’t understand why voters supported their local public schools and trusted teachers rather than the governor. Massachusetts public schools are the best in the nation, which raises the question of why the Waltons and FES decided this state was ready for privatization. Maybe they thought that if they could win in Massachusetts, they could win anywhere.

The second memo paints Massachusetts Teachers Association President Barbara Madeloni as a radical villain, because she outsmarted the charter lobbyists. She mobilized teachers and parents and did not compromise, and her side won. The consultants don’t understand or sympathize with her point of view, so they call her an “ideologue,” who “vowed to stop the corporate takeover of the public schools.” She beat the privatizers, and she rallied the public to save their public schools. I’d call her a successful strategist.

Their recommendation to the Waltons and other charter friendly groups is that in the next battle, they must activate charter teachers to sell their message, to counter the messaging of public school teachers. In liberal states, they said, the charter advocates must pretend to be liberals:

” Consider specific Democratic messages, or at least targeted messages, particularly in liberal states. Advocates should test owning the progressive mantle on education reform and charters: this is about social justice, civil rights, and giving kids a chance. While this is a problematic frame for the electorate as a whole, it may speak to the values of a Democratic electorate. The initial message recommendations to refrain from splintering the electorate was not wrong; this messaging discussing achievement gaps or inequality have sunk in other case studies. However, it could be the right approach for liberals in this new Administration.”

There is something inherently ironic—if not comical—about the notion of the far-right anti-union Walton Family donning the garb of “social justice” and “civil rights” to sell their non-union charter chains.

After the Question 2 referendum was defeated by a large margin, the Massachusetts campaign finance board fined Families for Excellent Schools $426,000 dollars for failing to reveal the names of its donors (“Dark Money”) and banned it from operating in Massachusetts for five years. Soon after, FES closed its doors in reaction to a #MeToo scandal involving its CEO.

Supporters of public schools can learn about the thinking of the charter lobbyists by reading these memos and preparing for the battles ahead, if the charter lobbyists ever again dare to compete in a referendum instead of their customary practice of giving campaign contributions to legislators and governors.

Maurice Cunningham, the University of Massachusetts political science professor who tracks Dark Money, said this on Twitter about the secret memo:

“My initial reading reaction. 1. Without Walton and Strategic Grant Partners money, there is no Q2. 2. Voters hate Walton money and corporate education interests – the whole Financial Privatization Cabal. 3. @bmadeloni was absolutely right. #MaEdu #mapoli #bospoli”

 

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Dark Money, Education Industry, Education Reform, Privatization, Teachers, Unions, Walton Foundation

How Many D.C. Charter Schools Have Closed? Take a Guess.

By dianeravitch
April 23, 2018 //
13

 

Guy Brandenburg has compiled a list of D.C. charter schools that “never opened at all, even though they had raised funds, wrote curricula, were approved by the board, hired staff, began enrolling students, but never actually got their act together to hold classes and teach students. This list also leaves out several schools where the founders were found to be using their institution mostly to enrich themselves illegally, and the charter was transferred to another institution.”

He writes:

“Quick: How many “public” charter schools have closed in Washington, DC?

“Would you say five?

“A dozen?

“Maybe twenty?

“Guess what: According to the board in charge of these things, it’s forty-six. Yes: 46!”

Churn, disruption, chaos are not good in the lives of children.

 

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reform, Disruption, District of Columbia

On Campbell Brown’s Evolution from Scourge of Public Schools and Teachers to Becoming the Face of Facebook

By dianeravitch
April 21, 2018 //
52

 

Have you been missing Campbell Brown? There was a long period when she stepped forth to position herself as the symbol of the corporate reform movement, warning the world to be wary of public schools loaded with pedophile teachers who were protected by unions and tenure. As Michelle Rhee faded away, Campbell Brown’s star rose in the corporate reform firmament.

Her Partnership for Educational Justice launched lawsuits against tenure, none of which have been successful. She garnered millions from the usual billionaires to start a news site called The 74 Million, to sing the praises of charter schools and privatization.  She served on the board of Betsy DeVos’s American Federation for Children, which handed out millions of dollars to fund candidates who support charters and vouchers. Betsy, in turn, funded The 74 Million.

But now she has left us! She has joined the messaging team at Facebook, where she is smoothing ruffled feathers and soothing angry critics. In this long profile in the New York Times, Campbell’s role as the dragon slayer of public schools gets only a few paragraphs.

Here is what the New York Times says about Campbell’s foray into education as the new Michelle Rhee:

“But after leaving CNN, Ms. Brown did shed her journalistic skin, and turned herself into a political animal.

“Ms. Brown became an activist focused on education. She fought teachers’ unions, a tactic some friends think was meant to position her for a run for office. A New York Magazine profile once posed the question, “How did an ex-news anchor become the most controversial woman in school reform?”

“She was a celebrity in ed reform,” said Eva Moskowitz, the founder and chief executive of the Success Academy Charter Schools, where Ms. Brown is a board member. “We just didn’t have people of her prominence before.”

“Ms. Brown also started an education news site called The 74 Million, which often reports on issues around teachers’ unions, and an advocacy group called The Partnership for Educational Justice, which funded a lawsuit against teacher tenure. She served on the board of Betsy DeVos’s American Federation for Children. (Ms. Devos has funded The 74 Million.) When President Trump nominated Ms. DeVos to be Secretary of Education last year, Ms. Brown wrote an op-ed in her defense, calling Ms. DeVos a “friend.”

“By then, Facebook was in crisis mode over how it handled news.”

Her career as the nation’s leader in the fight to crush teachers, unions, and public schools has receded into the background, perhaps ended.

Who will be the new face of corporate reform? Who will be the next bold reformer to grace the cover of TIME magazine, broom in hand, as Rhee once did?

Campbell Brown, we hardly knew ye.

 

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Privatization

My Speech in New Mexico, with Jesse Hagopian as Interlocutor

By dianeravitch
April 21, 2018 //
11

If you have nothing better to do today or tonight, you might enjoy watching my presentation to a lively audience at the Lensic Center in Santa  Fe, where I spoke about the negative result of eight years of “reform” based on the Florida model.

Since I will soon turn 80 and am ending my lecture career to turn to writing a new book (my last, I assume), I didn’t hold back. The warmth of the audience unleashed me to say what was in my mind and in my heart about the fraud that is now called “reform” (but is really privatization).

New Mexico has the highest rate of child poverty (under the age of 5) in the nation at 36.2%,  five points higher than Mississippi, which is in second place. It also has one of the nation’s highest rates of adult poverty. But the education leaders in New Mexico thought they could cure poverty with testing and teacher evaluation. All of it failed. New Mexico, with all its beauty and splendor, has made no education progress during these past eight years of “reform.”

Jesse Hagopian, teacher and author at Garfield High School in Seattle, who led a strike against mandated standardized testing at that school, introduced me and joined in conversation after I spoke.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Common Core, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, New Mexico, Poverty, Privatization, Testing

SomeDAM Poet: Lewis Carroll on Reformers and Testing

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2018 //
22

 

Our very own blog poet has written a wonderful new poem.

“Jabbertalky” (after Jabberwocky, by Lewis Carroll, of course)

“Twas brillig, and the billionaires
Did lie and dissemble in the press
All flimsy were Deformer wares
And the charter rats did nest

“Beware the Jabbertalk my son!
The Cores that bite, the tests that catch!
Beware the Coleman bird, and shun
Felonius charters, natch!”

“He took his opt-out sword in hand:
Long time Deformer foe he sought —
So rested he by the Knowledge tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

”And, as in peaceful thought he stood,
The Jabbertalk, with eyes of flame,
Came bumbling through the teaching wood,
And burbled as it came!

“One, two! One, two! And through and through
The opt-out blade went snicker-snack!
He left test dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

“And, has thou slain the Jabbertalk?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!’
He chortled in his joy.

“Twas brillig, and the billionaires
Did lie and dissemble in the press
All flimsy were Deformer wares
And the charter rats did nest”

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Common Core, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Humor, Privatization, Testing

Indiana: Students Who Transfer from Public Schools to Charters Lose Ground Academically

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2018 //
24

 

Researchers at Indiana University reviewed state test scores and found that students who transferred from public schools to charter schools lost ground academically for the first few years. Eventually, if they remained in the charter school, they caught up to their public school peers, but nearly half transferred back to their public school. It may be, as in the case of voucher studies in I Diana, that the weakest students were likeliest to leave the charters.

”Researchers from the Indiana University School of Education-Indianapolis examined four years of English and math ISTEP scores for 1,609 Indiana elementary and middle school students who were in a traditional public school in 2011 and transferred to a charter school in 2012. The main findings were that students who transferred had lower math and English score gains during the first year or two in their new school than if they had stayed in a district school.

“The researchers were able to draw the conclusion by using a type of statistical analysis that enabled them to compare students’ actual score gains at the charter school to potential gains had they not transferred from a traditional school.

“But for the students who stayed in charter schools for three years or more, some of those gaps disappeared, and students caught up with where they would have been if they hadn’t transferred. Both of these results — the dip in score gains after transferring and the increase over time — are consistent with other studies, researchers said.

“Overall, these results indicate that the promise of charter schools as a vehicle for school improvement should be viewed with some skepticism,” said study co-author Gary R. Pike, a professor of education at Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis. “Our results suggest that charter school experience for most students does not measure up to expectations, at least for the first two years of enrollment.”

“The researchers also found that of the original number of students who transferred to a charter school in 2012, 47 percent returned to a traditional public school by 2016. Only about a third of students remained enrolled in charter schools long enough to see their scores catch back up. The study called the mobility “problematic,” and suggested other researchers look into it further.”

The study contradicts an earlier CREDO study of Indiana charters.

However, the researchers cautioned not to draw national generalizations from the study of one state.

Categories Charter Schools, Education Industry, Indiana, Privatization, Testing

Massachusetts: Charter Advocates Review Why They Lost State Referendum

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2018 //
11

 

A secret memo commissioned by the Walton Education Coalition sought to analyze why the well-funded charter advocates were beaten handily in a Massachusetts referendum in 2016 on expanding charter schools.

The memo says the opposition trusted teachers more than the governor. The opposition had a simple message: charters are funded at the expense of the local public schoools. The charter lobbyists thought they could threaten a referendum, and the legislature would cave and lift the charter cap to avoid a referendum. But the anti-charter forces refused to compromise and took it to the public.

Families for Excellent Schools, the hedge funders group, thought that the aggressive tactics they had used successfully in New York would work in Massachusetts. They didn’t, and FES was fined nearly half a million dollars for campaign finance violations (concealing the names of its donors) and banned from the Bay State for five years (FES disbanded soon afterwards).

What the analysis doesn’t acknowledge is that Massachusetts was a terrible choice to launch a charter campaign. On NAEP, it is the most successful state in the nation. It has a strong tradition of local control. Families are very attached to their town schools. Threaten the funding of the local public school, and you hit a hornets’ nest.

The pro-charter campaign was hurt too by the public recognition that it was fueled by out-of-state funding.

The opposition to charter expansion was well-organized and grassroots. The two national teachers unions spent millions, enough to stay competitive, but we’re outspent by the charter supporters by many more millions. Without their financial help (no dark money!), the charter industry would have owned the airwaves.

The Massachusetts Teachers Association, led by Barbara Madeloni, organized teachers and collaborated with school committees to fight off the charter invasion. Almost every school committee in the state opposed Question 2.

Volunteers, parents, and activists turned out to defend public schools.

The only towns that voted to expand charters were affluent communities that expected they would never get a charter. Where charters already existed, the opposition ran strong because they knew there was less money for their town schools.

The defeat of Question 2 in Massachusetts was a very important milestone in the fight against privatization.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Dark Money, Education Industry, Education Reform, Funding, Massachusetts, Privatization, Resistance, Walton Foundation

Los Angeles: Frontrunner for Superintendent is a Conservative Banker and Broad Buddy

By dianeravitch
April 19, 2018 //
22

 

The Los Angeles school board is split 4-3, with charter advocates holding the majority. The decisive vote belongs to Ref Rodriguez, who is currently awaiting trial on multiple felony indictments for campaign finance violations.

The board appears poised to select Austin Beutner as its new superintendent, despite the fact that he has no experience in education.

Beutner was an investment banker and managed a private equity firm. His firm, Evercore, financed the purchase of American Media, which publishes the “National Enquirer.” Beutner was a member of the board of that scandal sheet. He is a billionaire. He briefly served as publisher of the Los Angeles Times until he was ousted. He is close to Eli Broad.

Interestingly, as a side note, Beutner was born in Holland, Michigan, and his father was a top executive at Amway. That should give him easy access to Betsy DeVos and help speed the privatization of public schools in Los Angeles.

Thought: If Ref Rodriguez is convicted and has to leave the board, the superintendent will have to lead a 3-3 Board. Too bad the LAUSD is unwilling to select a consensus candidate. Very short-sightrd

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-edu-beutner-nonprofit-faulted-20180415-story.html

Categories Broad Foundation, Charter Schools, Fraud, Los Angeles
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »