Archives for category: Charter Schools
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Despite Stacked Panels, DeVos Gets a Cold Reception at Harvard–from Students and Protestors

By dianeravitch
September 28, 2017 //
20

The Harvard Program on Education Policy and Governance did everything possible to make Betsy DeVos feel comfortable, surrounding her with allies in the fight for school choice, but it wasn’t enough.

Protestors outside complained, and students in the audience asked unsympathetic questions about her enthusiasm for school choice, her admiration for for-profit charters, and her determination to roll back the Obama era regulations protecting civil rights. Not even her fellow panelists could save her.

When she was asked why she opposed accountability for charters in Michigan, she answered with a non sequitur. She said that the families with means had already abandoned Detroit, and the charters were a haven for those who remained behind. She forgot about the kids still enrolled in public schools, who are apparently non-persons. And her explanation made no sense.

As she left the stage, some students in the room called out, “What does white supremacy look like? That’s what white supremacy looks like.”

Meanwhile, the Department of Education awarded more than $250 million to states and charter chains to open new charters and expand existing ones.

In her statement accompanying the grants, DeVos said:

“These grants will help supplement state-based efforts to give students access to more options for their education, What started as a handful of schools in Minnesota has blossomed into nearly 7,000 charter schools across the country.”

“Charter schools are now part of the fabric of American education, and I look forward to seeing how we can continue to work with states to help ensure more students can learn in an environment that works for them.”

Shame on any Democrat who supports the DeVos agenda of charter schools and school choice. This is a flimsy, hard-hearted response to income inequality, poverty, and underfunding of schools that enroll students with high needs.

She is a one-woman wrecking crew, intent on destroying the legacy of Horace Mann and other genuine pioneers and reformers in the struggle for public education. Her legacy will be one of wreckage and destruction, untempered by any compassion for those in need. She should ask herself why she generates such antipathy.

Categories Accountability, Betsy DeVos, Charter Schools, Civil Rights, Education Industry, Education Reform, Privatization

Whitney Tilson Closes Down His Hedge Fund, After Sustained Losses

By dianeravitch
September 28, 2017 //
21

Bloomberg News reports that Whitney Tilson, founder of DFER and advocate for TFA and other corporate reforms, has announced that he is closing down his hedge fund.

I do not repeat this news with any pleasure, as I grew to like Whitney Tilson even though I disagreed with him strongly about charter schools, KIPP, public schools, privatization, teacher tenure, and other issues. We never met, but we exchanged letters that he and I simultaneously posted. (See here and here and here.) I wanted to change the arrangement and ask him questions, so I wrote my questions but he never had time to answer back. By the way, all the links are included in the last post.

At one point, before we started our conversation we exchanged emails in which we wrote each other about our personal histories. Whitney comes from good people. I couldn’t feel anything negative about him once I got to know him by email, even though we still disagreed.

Whitney has a history of social activism. Maybe he will reconsider and join us in our fight to preserve the public sector against corporate raiders. I wish him well as he straightens out his business and his future.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Democrats for Education Reform, Education Industry, Education Reform, Privatization

Mayor of Allentown Helps Real Estate Developer Make Huge Profit by Converting Empty Building to Charter School

By dianeravitch
September 28, 2017 //
7

The mayor of Allentown, Pennsylvania, Ed Pawlowski, helped out a generous campaign contributor named Ramzi Haddad.

Haddad had purchased an industrial building that was vacant. He wanted to convert it to a charter school.

He asked the mayor to expedite zoning hearings. The mayor did. The mayor got a campaign contribution.

Haddad gave $15,000 to Pawlowski over the course of three years, according to campaign finance records. The indictment against Pawlowski alleges that Haddad also caused several associates, two of whom were identified in court documents only by initials, to give an additional $25,000 to the mayor.

After Pawlowski expedited the zoning hearing, emails show, Haddad asked for three other favors to get the proposed Executive Education Academy Charter School off the ground. Haddad asked Pawlowski for a letter of support to the Zoning Hearing Board for his proposed tenant, an appearance by a city employee at the zoning meeting and to hurry up the city permitting process for the school. Emails show Pawlowski complied with at least two of those requests.

At the meeting, Haddad secured the variance needed to move a charter school to the industrial property, giving him the go-ahead to rent most of the Union Boulevard building to the charter school.

In August, an investment group led by Haddad netted a handsome payout after selling the property to a foundation formed by the Executive Education Academy Charter for $32.5 million, according to bond documents. Haddad and his business partner bought the land for $850,000, property records show.

None of this was criminal, it seems.

Pawlowski’s efforts to help Haddad with the building were not part of a 54-count criminal indictment filed in federal court against the mayor in July, nor a guilty plea entered by Haddad in 2015. The interactions were the first of many between Haddad and the mayor detailed in the city emails that show an established relationship between the pair.

It was just part of the ordinary pay-to-play that we have come to expect in politics.

As for the property, think of it: Haddad and his partner paid $850,000 and sold it for $32.5 million.

The question is, why did he give so little to the mayor? Why did the mayor sell out the public trust for only a few bucks when the developer was getting ready to pocket millions?

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, For-Profit, Privatization

Harvard Program on Choice: Protest Expected, Funders Hide Their Names

By dianeravitch
September 28, 2017 //
56

Betsy DeVos is the keynote speaker today at a conference on “The Future of School Choice,” sponsored by Paul Petersen’s Program on Education Policy and Governance at the Kennedy School at Harvard.

Might as well be called “The Glorious and Lucrative Future of School Choice” because there are no critics invited, no supporters of the public schools attended by 85-90% of American students. She will be surrounded by adoring fans, which may help her forget that she is the most unpopular member of the Trump cabinet.

DeVos will be introduced by the dean of the Kennedy School, who is not at all embarrassed to host a conference utterly lacking in balance or fairness. Apparently, he is hoping the students ask questions, since the panelists won’t.

Curiously, the names of the funders–which originally included the foundations of Charles Koch and Bill Gates–have been scrubbed from the program. The only named sponsor is EdChoice.

Click to access future-of-school-choice-agenda.pdf

Hundreds of protestors are anticipated.

https://m.facebook.com/events/131082490873746/

DeVos has devoted her life’s work to privatization of education. Her own state of Michigan has been her plaything, since she has funded so many politicians. Thanks to her intervention, education in Michigan is a hot political mess, and the state’s standing on NAEP has fallen substantially.

She owes her home state an apology.

Categories Betsy DeVos, Billionaires, Charter Schools, Education Reform, Privatization, School Choice, Vouchers

Steve Lopez of LA Times: No, Ref Rodriguez Did Not Make a “Rookie Mistake”

By dianeravitch
September 28, 2017 //
9

A few days ago, Peter Cunningham of Education Post (and former communications director for Arne Duncan and reliable critic of public schools and unions) wrote an article defending Ref Rodriguez, the then-president of the Los Angeles Unified School District Board, who has been indicted on multiple counts for money laundering and campaign finance fraud. Cunningham said that Ref was being treated harshly because of his prominence and that he had simply made “a rookie mistake.”

Steve Lopez, a regular columnist for the Los Angeles Times, refutes Cunningham’s claims in this article.

He also answers a question that bothered me about Ref’s indictment. Why is it illegal to give money to your own campaign? As Lopez explains it, it is not illegal to give money to your own campaign, but it is illegal to pretend that you received that money from other people and then repay them for pretending to give you money.

Lopez writes:

The chief of a nonprofit that advocates for charter schools — which Rodriguez has championed — argued in a Times op-ed that the charges against Rodriguez are overblown and he should stay on the board.

“If the allegations are true, Rodriguez clearly made a rookie mistake,” said the op-ed, which called Rodriguez a humble, sincere and polite political novice who should pay fines if he broke the law but not lose his job.

A rookie mistake? Here’s my take:

If you field a double off the wall in the right field corner, wildly fling the ball over the head of the cutoff man and give up an extra base, that’s a rookie mistake.

If you pull someone over on your first night as a cop, forget to put your patrol car in park and then watch it roll over your foot as you’re writing a ticket, that’s a rookie mistake.

Rodriguez is charged with taking $26,000 of his own money and redistributing it through an intermediary to 25 people, mostly friends and relatives — who donated $24,250 to his 2015 campaign for school board.

What’s that smell like to you?

A rookie mistake, or a premeditated strategy to work around campaign law?

The L.A. district attorney’s office, which has filed 25 misdemeanor charges along with the three felonies, seems to think Rodriguez pulled off a money-laundering scheme.

And here’s the most interesting thing about the case:

If Rodriguez had donated the $26,000 to himself, that would have been legal because there’s no limit on how much you can dump into your own campaign.

So this leaves the jaded among us to wonder if Rodriguez —who has admitted to nothing, and whose lawyer did not return my call — wanted it to appear as if he had support from ordinary people, rather than just the charter-advocating high-rollers who bankrolled his campaign.

If so, here are some pointers for future reference:

Tip 1: If you want to make it look as if you’re a strong enough candidate to attract donations from working people, try to find more working stiffs who aren’t relatives or employees at the charter school organization you founded.

Tip 2. Janitors and tutors do not typically donate between $775 and $1,100 to school board candidates, and when they do, it raises suspicion.

Tip 3. Never, ever, drag your own mother into a harebrained, bone-head scheme, even if your name is Soprano. There is no way to reverse that kind of bad karma.

As prosecutors lay it out, Rodriguez cashed out a business investment and wrote the $26,000 check to a female cousin, who has also been criminally charged. The cousin — an administrator at the charter school Rodriguez started — is suspected of depositing the money into a bank account under the names of Rodriguez’s parents. Prosecutors say Rodriguez’s mother then signed 16 checks for friends and family members who were listed as donors to her son’s campaign.

I know, innocent until proven guilty. But this sounds like one hell of a rookie “mistake.” And if you’re someone who frets about awkward conversation at family gatherings during the holidays, just thank the holy gobbler you’re not spending Thanksgiving with the Rodriguez clan this year.

This was a fairly sophisticated strategy on Ref’s part, and he faces a criminal indictment.

He stepped aside as board president, but did not leave the board. So many millions were spent to get him elected, and he does not want to disappoint his backers, who funded one of the dirtiest campaigns ever seen in Los Angeles (his ads mocked his highly qualified opponent, Bennett Kayser, for his age and disability). He wanted to make sure the pro-charter majority maintained its control. He knew for two years that he was under criminal investigation, but kept this to himself.

Now, investigators and journalists will look closer at Ref’s finances. Where did the $26,000 come from? It is not only “the union” that wants to know. It is anyone who cares about ethics in government.

Stepping aside and keeping his seat is wrong. He should resign from his position from the board at once.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corruption, Ethics, Los Angeles

Andrea Gabor: The Dark Money That Underwrote the Charter Campaign in Massachusetts

By dianeravitch
September 28, 2017 //
13

Andrea Gabor writes here about the dark money campaign to persuade voters in Massachusetts to lift the cap on charter schools last November. The dark money came pouring in, but suffered a crushing defeat when voters weighed in. Andrea worked closely with Peggy Wiesenberg, a Massachusetts attorney and parent of three public-school graduates. Peggy wrote to tell me that KIPP is planning to open two new charters in Lynn, Massachusetts, despite the fact that the people of Lynn don’t want more charter schools. Governor Baker, a Republican, has added two new charter supporters to the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education; one is a board member of KIPP, the other is a Harvard scholar funded by the Walton Family Foundation:

KIPP plans to expand in Massachusetts by adding two schools in Lynn per a pending request to increase enrollment by 1,014 seats (up from 1,586 in Lynn). The Mass. Board of Elementary and Secondary Education will take up that request in Feb 2018.
See”Charter Amendment Requests Pending BESE Action (Grades, or Maximum Enrollment, or Change to Charter Region)” http://www.doe.mass.edu/news/news.aspx?id=24563

One of the two new BESE members appointed by Gov Baker is on the Board of Trustees of KIPP MA; the other Martin West whose scholarly work has been funded by the Walton Family Foundation.

But, back to the new post by Andrea Gabor:

The New York-based Families for Excellent Schools added about a third of the $45 million spent to push charter schools. Pro-public education advocates spent nearly $16 million.

“Voters defeated Question 2 by a stunning 62-to-38 margin–an endorsement of Massachusetts public schools, which are rated number one in the nation. But not for lack of efforts by organizations like FESA, which allowed a slew of wealthy contributors to hide their identities and their sizeable contributions in support of the referendum. In some cases individuals contributed twice: Once through a ballot committee that was required, by law, to publish names of contributors, and a second substantially greater contribution, in some cases millions more, via FESA.

“At the top of the list of FESA’s secret donors were public officials in the Massachusetts government. Governor Charlie Baker was a leading proponent of Question 2 and backed efforts to impose charter schools in towns, like Brockton, where there was widespread local opposition.

“Normally, nonprofits organized under IRS Code 501(3), such as Families for Excellent Schools (FES), don’t have to reveal the names of donors so long as they are not engaging in political activity. And ordinarily, their affiliated social-welfare nonprofits, organized under IRS Code 501(c)(4), such as FESA, can have some political involvement in electoral politics and keep donors secret, so long as this is not their primary activity. However, if the organization is a vehicle for receiving contributions for a ballot campaign, then the voting public is entitled to know the names of each contributor and the amount donated before the election.”

FES was fined more than $400,000, the largest fine ever imposed by the state for a campaign finance violation.

Here are some of the big donors:

“The campaign-finance disposition agreement has revealed other backers of Question 2 who used FESA contributions to hide the full value of their donations in support of the charter-school referendum including:

“Paul Sagan, Chair of the Massachusetts Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, who contributed $496,000 on August 4 and 5 in addition to his previously disclosed contribution of $100,000 on August 10, 2016.

“Seth Klarman, Investment Manager of the Baupost Group LLC, contributed $3 million within six months of the election in addition to his previously disclosed contribution of $40,000 in September 2015.

“Jonathan Jacobson, Managing Director Highfields Capital Management LP, contributed $2 million in August and October. That’s in addition to the previously disclosed contribution of $40,000 in September 2015 by his wife Joanna, Managing Partner of Strategic Grant Partners, another dark money vehicle, according to Professor Maurice Cunningham of UMass Boston…

“Josh Bekenstein, a Bain Capital investor, and his wife Anita, a private philanthropist, each contributed $750,000 in August and $500,000 on October 2016 for a combined total of $1.5 million, in addition to Josh’s previously disclosed contribution of $40,000 in September 2015.

“Chuck L. Longfield, Founder of Target Analytics and Chief Scientist at Blackbaud, funneled $650,000 to FESA under the name “Chuck Longfield,” in addition to a previously disclosed contribution of $100,000 under the name “Charles Longfield” on August 2016 and $1,000 in November 2015. [The OCPF filings have a discrepancy in the house number associated with Longfield’s contributions—in all likelihood a typographical error.] Longfield went on WBUR radio on October 31, 2016 to explain why he gave $100,000 in support of raising the cap on charter schools, never mentioning the exponentially larger contribution that he made through FESA to lift the cap.

“Martin Mannion, Managing Director of Summit Partners, contributed $100,000 to FESA between August and October 2016 in addition to a disclosed campaign contribution of $30,000 in October 2016.

“Alice Walton contributed $750,000 to FESA on November 2016 in addition to her previously disclosed contribution of $710,000 to Yes On 2, another campaign committee, in July.

“The Boston Globe reports that in addition to paying the fine, and revealing its donors, the group also “agreed with the IRS to dissolve itself, and Families for Excellent Schools, its umbrella group, agreed not to fund-raise or engage in any election-related activity in Massachusetts for four years.”

Gabor says that New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman may look into the “Families for Excellent Schools,” a political group of millionaires and billionaires with no purpose other than to destroy and privatize public schools.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Dark Money, Massachusetts

Ohio: ECOT, the Nation’s Biggest Dropout Factory, Designated as a Dropout Prevention and Recovery Center

By dianeravitch
September 27, 2017 //
15

Are the legislators of Ohio insane? Is the Ohio Department of Education totally corrupt?

Those are some of the questions that come to mind on reading that the state has agreed to designate the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow as a recipient of funding for dropout prevention and recovery center.

ECOT certainly knows a lot about dropouts.

It produces more dropouts than any other “school” in the state of Ohio, more than any other school in the nation.

As Stephen Dyer shows, ECOT performs worse than any other district in the state:

Now that it appears the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow — the state’s largest online school and the nation’s largest producer of high school dropouts — will be classified as a dropout recovery and prevention school (without a hint of irony) by the Ohio Department of Education, it is useful to look at just how dreadful ECOT’s performance has been.

In the 2016-2017 school year, ECOT received $103 million in state money meant for kids in Ohio school districts, but which went instead to ECOT. Not a single penny came from a district that performed worse in more report card categories than ECOT. Only $2,204 of the $103 million came from a district whose performance was the same.

But here’s the amazing stat: More than $25 million of that $103 million came from districts that outperformed ECOT in EVERY SINGLE COMPARABLE REPORT CARD CATEGORY!

That’s right. One out of every 4 dollars going to ECOT comes from a district that in every way outperforms ECOT — the largest single chunk of state funding transfers to the school.

Naturally, the inquiring mind wonders who made this decision. It didn’t just happen. Someone or several someones just sat down and said, how can we shovel more millions of taxpayer dollars to the worst performing virtual charter school in the state? in the nation?

Were they incompetent or corrupt? I leave that to you to decide.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corruption, Education Industry, Privatization, Stupid, Virtual Charter Schools

New Mexico Attorney General Demands Charter Founder Step Down at Once Due to Charges of Fraud; She Refuses

By dianeravitch
September 27, 2017 //
9

The New Mexico Attorney General demanded that a charter founder resign, but she refuses to do so.

You think taxpayers just don’t care what happens to their money? You think taxpayers think that anyone should step up and claim public money and do with it as they please?

New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas is demanding the immediate resignation of Analee Maestas from the Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education after fraud and embezzlement allegations involving the charter school she founded and managed.

“School board members have a duty to treat their position as a public trust and at all times act in a manner that justifies the public’s confidence in them,” Balderas said in a statement.

Balderas emailed a letter to Maestas on Monday saying “it is clear that you are no longer qualified to hold your position as a board member” and that if she did not immediately resign, “my office will take all appropriate legal actions.”

Maestas’ attorney, Marc M. Lowry, said she has no plans to step down.

“The Attorney General’s letter is more concerned with capturing a headline than it is with the pursuit of the truth,” Lowry said in an emailed statement.

“Dr. Maestas has not engaged in any conduct that violated her oath of office with the APS Board, or any other law. Dr. Maestas has brought over 45 years of experience and commitment to childhood education to uphold her oath to APS and maintain the public’s trust, and used her APS office only to advance the public benefit. The Attorney General is wrong to suggest otherwise.”

Balderas’ letter mentions two reviews by state Auditor Tim Keller that found serious problems with apparent misuse of funds regarding La Promesa Early Learning Center, the charter school Maestas started in 2008.

This month, Keller released a report that said it appeared Maestas’ daugther, the school’s then-assistant business manager, had embezzled nearly $500,000 under the watch of Maestas. And an earlier report in February 2016 showed that the school submitted a suspicious receipt to the New Mexico Public Education Department for reimbursement when Maestas claimed the $342.40 invoice was for carpet cleaning at the school. However, it appeared the receipt had been written over and the cleaning company reported that it actually worked on ducts at her home.

In his letter, Balderas wrote that “those investigations appear to implicate potential violations of numerous criminal and civil statutes.”

“While those matters are pending, the New Mexico Constitution does not require that you be found guilty of any conduct related to them to be declared unfit to hold your office, and your oath to uphold the very same Constitution now demands your resignation,” he wrote to Maestas.

But Lowry said that “if the Attorney General had read the State Auditor’s report, he would understand that Dr. Maestas is innocent, and that the State Auditor did not make a single finding suggesting that Dr. Maestas participated in that report’s allegations of embezzlement or fraud.”

Last week, Maestas denied any knowledge of the financial mismanagement at her school and blamed her daughter’s substance abuse problems.

Julieanne Maestas diverted about half a million dollars from the charter school into her personal bank account from June 2010 to July 2016, according to Keller’s investigation. In addition, she deposited about $177,000 worth of checks that were payable to the former executive director – her mother – as well as to her boyfriend, who was a school vendor.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Fraud, New Mexico, Privatization

Walton Family Foundation Planning to Move into Middle-Income Districts in New York City

By dianeravitch
September 27, 2017 //
17

Time for a friendly puff piece from Inside Philanthropy about one of the nation’s most malevolent foundations: The Walton Family Foundation.

Walton has two goals: privatizing education and eliminating teachers’ unions.

It pledged to spend $1 billion to achieve those aims.

It subsidizes many mainstream media, even NPR and Education Week, to make sure that it gets favorable coverage for its nefarious goals.

And now, Inside Philanthropy reports that the Waltons have decided to plunk a couple of million dollars down in New York City and spread the wealth so that some of it goes to traditional antagonists, like Teachers College, Columbia University.

Who funds Inside Philanthropy? I can’t tell from its website. I did notice an earlier article about the Waltons, which claimed that individual members of the Walton family were reaching out to what appear to be liberal organizations, like the Center for American Progress. The writer didn’t even think to ask whether the Walton family members were purchasing the voices and independence of those groups they subsidize.

The Waltons noticed the research about the importance of economic and social integration so they have decided to open seven new charter schools in New York City that will lure in middle-class kids. Thus, in the name of integration, they can both promote privatization of public dollars and do their union-busting at the same time. Why should only poor kids go to charters? Think of the possibilities as Walton millions open charters for middle-class kids too!

Give them points for cleverness.

The Waltons earned their place on this blog’s Wall of Shame, and there is no reason to see anything coming from a family of billionaires that fights unions in their own stores and fights paying a minimum wage and subsidizes the evil American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which is devoted to destroying democracy.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, New York City, Privatization, Wall of Shame, Walton Foundation

Stephen Dyer: Comparing Charter Schools to Public Schools in Ohio

By dianeravitch
September 27, 2017 //
10

Stephen Dyer, former legislator and current Fellow at Innovation Ohio, writes:

As you know, I’ve contended for years that if charters receive money and kids from all over the state, their overall performance should be compared with the overall performance of all Ohio school districts.

However, as an exercise, I decided to look at Ohio’s urban building performance versus that of charters. And despite the fact that Ohio’s urban buildings typically have 24% higher rates of disabled students and nearly 25% higher rates of minority students, Ohio urban buildings perform about the same as charters. And this is despite the fact that the 90 lowest performing charters aren’t included because they’ve been carved out of these comparisons by the Ohio General Assembly. http://bit.ly/2hw3fhB

In the report that is linked, he expands:

Ohio’s urban buildings perform just about the same as Ohio’s charter schools.

Here’s the issue though:

Ohio’s urban buildings typically (my short hand for median) have a 26 percent higher rate of disabled children and a 23 percent higher rate of minority children than charter schools.

A remarkable 94 percent of all major urban buildings have more than 95 percent of their students classified as economically disadvantaged. Meanwhile, 65 percent of charters fit that bill.

Yet despite these greater challenges, Ohio’s major urban buildings typically have nearly identical attendance rates, slightly less chronic absenteeism and just about equal report card performance, looking at percentages of A, B, C, D, and F grades. Charters have slightly higher percentages of As, Bs and Cs, and lower percentages of Ds and Fs, but the difference is statistically insignificant.

So despite the fact charters have fewer demographic barriers to success on our test-based report card and about half of their kids don’t even come from the urban districts, charters are still unable to perform significantly better than their major urban counterparts — the most challenged group of schools in the traditional public school system.

Only about 260 of Ohio’s 370 charters are included in this comparison. It’s clear that the other 90 — mostly dropout recovery schools located in urban districts — are among the worst-performing schools in the entire country. So the percentage of poor charter grades is likely far higher than the comparison I’m currently making.

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