Archives for category: Connecticut
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Good News! Connecticut Eliminates Religious Exemptions for Vaccines

By dianeravitch
May 6, 2024 //
20

In recent years, religious freedom has been used to undermine public schools and public health. This trend damages communities and endangers children. In the following post, an authority praises Connecticut for eliminating the religious exemption for vaccination.

Dr. Paul Offit is a pediatrician who specializes in infectious diseases and vaccines. He is currently  the Maurice R. Hilleman Professor of Vaccinology, professor of pediatrics at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. He writes a blog where he warns about the dangers of refusing to vaccinate against diseases.

He wrote:

On February 13, 2024, National Geographic published a book I wrote called, TELL ME WHEN IT’S OVER: AN INSIDER’S GUIDE TO DECIPHERING COVID MYTHS AND NAVIGATING OUR POST-PANDEMIC WORLD. For the past few months, I have been writing about various issues discussed in that book.

Between January 2020 and March 2024, the CDC reported 338 cases of measles in 30 US states and jurisdictions. These outbreaks were consistent with a CDC survey showing that more parents are choosing non-medical vaccine exemptions, such as religious or philosophical exemptions, for their school children. Connecticut, however, is standing up to those who, in the name of religious freedoms, are putting children at unnecessary risk.

In 2000, the United States eliminated measles, the most contagious of the vaccine-preventable diseases. Success centered on the enforcement of school vaccine mandates that have existed in all 50 states since 1981. Unfortunately, during the past few years, legislative efforts by anti-vaccine groups have made it easier to opt out of vaccines for non-medical reasons. As a consequence, immunization rates among school children have dropped and measles has come back.

In Connecticut, on the other hand, immunization rates have risen for two straight years, exceeding pre-pandemic levels. During the 2022-2023 school year, more than 97 percent of Connecticut kindergartners were vaccinated against measles, up from 95.7 percent the year before and 95.3 percent the year before that. Why? The answer can be found in a 2021 law that eliminated the state’s religious exemption to vaccination.

Immunization rates of 95 percent or higher are required to provide herd immunity against measles. When rates drop, which is true in many states that now offer either religious or philosophical exemptions, measles comes back. The most dramatic example being an outbreak in Philadelphia in 1991 that centered on two fundamentalist churches that refused vaccines. During a three-month period, measles virus infected 1,400 people in the city and killed nine. All the deaths were in young children.

On its face, the phrase “religious exemptions to vaccination” is a contradiction in terms. All religions teach us to care about our children and our families and our neighbors. Choosing to put our children and those with whom they come in contact at risk is the opposite of a religious act. Further, about 9 million people in the United States, because they are on immune suppressive therapies for their cancers or transplants or autoimmune diseases, can’t be vaccinated. They depend on those around them for protection. Do we have a responsibility to love our neighbor?

Amy Pisani, a Connecticut resident, and head of the national group Vaccinate Your Family, praised the hard work required to counter the efforts of anti-vaccine groups to overturn vaccine mandates. “From the top down, we have incredibly supportive legislators,” said Pisani. “And when you have government agencies that are supportive at that level, it allows our public health officials to do their job.” As measles cases rise this year, and will no doubt return next winter, parents in Connecticut can feel more comfortable that state health officials and legislators have their backs.

Standing in stark contrast to efforts to protect children in Connecticut are those in Mississippi. In July 2023, Mississippi, which had up to that point only offered medical exemptions, became the most recent state to offer a religious exemption to vaccination. More than 2,000 parents immediately chose to exempt their children. The effort was not spearheaded by a religious group, but rather a virulent anti-vaccine group called Informed Consent Action Network. The lawyer who headed that effort paradoxically declared, “Freedom wins again.” Freedom to catch and transmit potentially deadly infections. Hardly a victory for children.

Categories Accountability, Connecticut, Ethics, Health, Science

The Triibe: Reviewing Paul Vallas‘ Abysmal Record as a School Superintendent

By dianeravitch
March 28, 2023 //
0

The election for mayor in Chicago will be held on April 4. The final will be a runoff between Paul Vallas and Brandon Johnson. Vallas’s supporters point to his long career as a superintendent in various school districts (although he is not and was never an educator). Brandon Johnston was elected as a County Commissioner and worked for the Chicago Teachers Union as a community organizer.

The Chicago/based website The Triibe reviewed Vallas’s record as superintendent in several school districts.e The consistent themes of his time in office were privatization, charter schools, and specifically, military charter schools.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Chicago, Connecticut, Corporate Reform, Discipline, Disruption, Education Industry, Elections, New Orleans, Philadelphia, Privatization

Today is the 10th Anniversary of the Sandy Hook Massacre

By dianeravitch
December 14, 2022 //
16

Ten years ago, a deranged young man blasted his way into the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. He killed 20 first-grade children and six staff members, including the principal, who tried to stop him at the school’s door.

The nation was stunned. President Obama wept. There was a widespread sense that this heinous act would lead to decisive action by Congress. It didn’t. The gun violence against children continues.

Why? The Republican Party has sworn allegiance to an extreme interpretation of the Second Amendment in which every person has the unfettered right to own and carry guns. and the Supreme Court, now securely in the hands of hard-right conservatives after Trump added three justices, is overturning long-standing limits on gun ownership. There are more guns than people in the U.S., and so far as conservatives are concerned, there is no need to restrict their availability and use (except in the halls of Congress, the Supreme Court, and other special places.)

Among the weapons used at Sandy Hook were a Bushmaster XM15-E2S and a Glock 20SF handgun. The killer first murdered his mother, who bought the guns and took him to firing ranges. When fist responders arrived, he killed himself.

Not long after the massacre of babies at Sandy Hook, the professional liars entered the scene. They said that there was no massacre. Everything we saw on television was staged, they said. The “parents” who were mourning were actually “crisis actors.” Someone sent me a link to a video purporting to show that Sandy Hook never happened; it was a hoax created to promote gun control legislation.

Alex Jones leapt on the story and repeatedly broadcast it to his many followers. Some of them harassed the families who had lost a child or a mother or a sister, even sending them death threats.

Alex Jones has this year been convicted of defamation and ordered to pay fines exceeding $1 billion. He moved his assets and declared bankruptcy.

There have been so many mass murders in the past decade that it’s impossible to remember them all. We remember the massacre of 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, both because of the numbers and the heroic response of the survivors, who lobbied fiercely for gun control. Uvalde got our attention because of the number of children killed: 19, along with two teachers. And it got our attention because of the sheer incompetence of the law enforcement officers, who arrived on the scene by the hundreds and failed to enter the classrooms where the killer was for over an hour.

Of one thing we can be sure, there will be more mass killings of students. Uvalde will not be last. Schools now practice active shooter drills. Some teachers are armed. School security has been enhanced. Door locks are common.

But when the next killer pulls a gun out of his backpack or blasts through the entry with an assault weapon, children and staff will die. We will mourn them and their teachers as we have before. And then there will be another. And another.

Nothing will change until we enact strong gun control laws that limit access to guns. That won’t happen unless the voters elect people sworn to protect the lives of their children.

Categories Accountability, Connecticut, Cruelty, For-Profit, Fraud, Guns, Republicans

Connecticut: The Biggest Charter Scandal Of All Time

By dianeravitch
November 6, 2022 //
12

Back in 2014, a prominent charter school leader in Connecticut resigned after it was revealed that he had been convicted of felonies many years earlier, and that he did not have a doctorate, although he claimed he did. Michael Sharpe resigned as CEO of Jumoke Academy, which ran charter schools in Connecticut and planned to expand to Louisiana.

Sharpe was part of a management organization called Family Urban Schools of Excellence or FUSE, created in 2012. The state had given millions of dollars to Jumoke to take over low-performing schools and turn them around.

The controversy over Sharpe was embarrassing to Democratic Governor Dannell Malloy, who was a cheerleader for charter schools. Malloy chose Stefan Pryor to be the State Commissioner of Education. Pryor had no experience in the classroom but was a co-founder of the no-excuses charter chain Achievement First. Charter schools in the state were allowed to have only 30% of their staff with state certification. The charter industry was strong in Connecticut due to the financial power of hedge funders and the Sackler Family (of opioid fame), which launched Conn-CAN, a charter advocacy group, which became the national 50CAN.

But the biggest scandal of all came to light in the past week, when the same Michael Sharpe was convicted of breaking into the homes of four women in 1984, kidnapping them, threatening the women with a firearm, sexually assaulting them, then stealing money and valuables.

Sharpe was convicted of kidnapping and faces a sentence of 25-100 years in prison. The statute of limitations had expired on the sexual assault charges. Sharpe’s DNA was found at the four scenes. The case was solved by the state’s cold case unit.

Back in the days of his charter fame, the Center for Education Reform identified him as a national leader.

Dr. Sharpe is president of the Connecticut Charter School Association and founding member of the Legacy Project and Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE). He also sits on the boards of the National Charter School Leadership Council, St. Agnes Home, Inc., the CT Chapter of Lupus Foundation of America and Connecticut Landmarks.

Dr. Sharpe began work at Jumoke Academy in 1998 and was appointed its CEO in 2003. Under his leadership, Jumoke Academy’s middle and elementary schools were cited for three consecutive years as one of the top ten performing urban schools in the State of Connecticut.

Jumoke Academy is committed to developing the whole child, and as such, offers programs that ensure our children become competent in the arts, humanities, civic and social responsibilities, and that they understand the value and importance of good character.

In 2015, after Sharpe had resigned, civil rights attorney Wendy Lecker wrote about the strange trajectory of Jumoke Academy, FUSE, and Michael Sharpe.

Earlier this month, the Connecticut Department of Education quietly distributed a scathing investigative report on the Jumoke/FUSE charter chain, conducted by a law firm the department retained. The report reads like a manual on how to break every rule of running a non-profit organization.

The investigators found that although FUSE and Jumoke were supposed to be two separate, tax-exempt organizations, both were run by Michael Sharpe alone. FUSE, formed in 2012, never held board of directors’ meetings until after the public revelations in the spring of 2014 of Michael Sharpe’s felony record for embezzlement and falsification of his academic credentials. FUSE entered into contracts with the state to run two public schools without approval by its board. In fact, it is unclear that FUSE even had a board of directors then. Jumoke, too, played fast and loose with board meetings. Jumoke’s board gave Sharpe “unfettered control” over every aspect of the organization. Even after he left Jumoke for FUSE, Sharpe still ran Jumoke, leaving day-to-day operations to his nephew, an intern there.

Hiring and background checks were in Sharpe’s sole discretion. He placed ex-convicts in the two public schools run by Jumoke, Hartford’s Milner and Bridgeport’s Dunbar. Dunbar’s principal, brought in by Sharpe, was recently arraigned on charges of stealing more than $10,000 from the school.

Nepotism was “rampant.” Sharpe’s mother founded Jumoke. Sharpe moved from paraprofessional to CEO in 2003, with no additional training. His unqualified daughter and nephew were hired, as well as his sister.

The investigation found extreme comingling of funds and of financial and accounting activities, noting that it “would be difficult to construct a less appropriate financial arrangement between two supposedly separate organizations.”

Jumoke/FUSE used state money to engage in aggressive real estate acquisition, some not even for educational purposes, and some inexplicably purchased above its appraised value. Properties were collateral and/or were mortgaged for one another. Loan rates were excessive. To date, loans are guaranteed by FUSE, which is not operational.

Jumoke leased Sharpe part of a building who, violating the lease, sublet it and collected rent. Sharpe hired Jumoke’s facilities director’s husband to perform costly renovations on the parts of the building, his bedroom and bathroom, paid by Jumoke.

These are just some of the misdeeds that occurred without oversight by the State Board of Education or the State Department of Education. The board approved contracts to run two public schools without verifying that FUSE had no board of directors. It approved millions to be paid to FUSE/Jumoke to buy non-educational buildings, charge excessive consulting fees to public schools and engage in possibly fraudulent activities. Worse still, the board allowed Jumoke/FUSE to run Milner schoolinto the ground, jeopardizing the education of Milner’s vulnerable students.

“Dr. Sharpe’s” Linked-In profile has not been updated. It’s very impressive.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Connecticut, Corporate Reformers, Corruption, Education Industry, Ethics, Failure, Scandals

Connecticut Jury Orders Alex Jones to Pay Nearly $1 Billion to People He Slandered

By dianeravitch
October 12, 2022 //
30

Alex Jones and his companies Infowars and Free Speech Systems were ordered by a jury in Connecticut to pay nearly $1 billion to some of the parents of victims murdered at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, as well as an FBI agent.

Jones falsely claimed that the massacre of children, teachers, and the principal at the school was faked and that the victims were “crisis actors.” He said repeatedly that the purpose of the hoax was to create political pressure for gun control.

Parents and relatives of those who were murdered were harassed and received death threats.

The money will not replace those they lost. The,parents will never hold their babies again. But Jones’ cruel campaign to deny that the massacre ever happened deserved punishment.

This is the second of three trials. Jones has no defense. He maligned the families to make money. Hopefully he will be bankrupted for his sins.

Categories Connecticut, Cruelty, Evil, Extremism, Hoax, Lies

Jury Fines Alex Jones $45 Million in Punitive Damages for Lying about Sandy Hook Massacre

By dianeravitch
August 5, 2022 //
16

There will never be justice for the families who lost loved ones at the Sandy Hook (Ct) massacre.

But Alex Jones will pay for his lies, his claims that the massacre of children and educators was a hoax staged by “crisis actors” to build support for gun control.

A jury in Texas awarded one set of parents $45 in punitive damages in addition to $4 million in compensatory damages for the pain and anguished he inflicted on the survivors.

This is the first trial. There are more to come.

Others will have to explain why Jones shamelessly exploited the suffering of Sandy Hook families. If it was greed, then it is just that he lose his ill-gotten gains.

What a vile, evil man.

Categories Accountability, Connecticut, Evil, Justice, Lies

Who Is Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro?

By dianeravitch
April 18, 2022 //
13

Have you lost faith in our elected officials? Let me introduce you to my personal hero. Rosa DeLauro. I have met with her several times, and she was always attentive and thoughtful. I love her values, and I love her too. It’s a very small tribute to this great woman, but I take this opportunity to add her to the blog’s honor roll for standing up forcefully to the bullying of the charter lobby.

Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro is one of the most powerful members of Congress. She is a Democrat from Connecticut. She is an outstanding liberal who fights for children and working people.

Please read her bio.

Rosa DeLauro is the Congresswoman from Connecticut’s Third Congressional District, which stretches from the Long Island Sound and New Haven, to the Naugatuck Valley and Waterbury. Rosa serves as the Chair of the House Appropriations Committee and sits on the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee, and she is the Chair of the Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Appropriations Subcommittee, where she oversees our nation’s investments in education, health, and employment.

At the core of Rosa’s work is her fight for America’s working families. Rosa believes that we must raise the nation’s minimum wage, give all employees access to paid sick days, allow employees to take paid family and medical leave, and ensure equal pay for equal work. Every day, Rosa fights for legislation that would give all working families an opportunity to succeed.

Rosa believes that our first priority must be to strengthen the economy and create good middle class jobs. She supports tax cuts for working and middle class families, fought to expand the Child Tax Credit to provide tax relief to millions of families, and introduced the Young Child Tax Credit to give families with young children an economic lift.

Rosa has also fought to stop trade agreements that lower wages and ships jobs overseas, while also protecting the rights of employees and unions. She believes that we need to grow our economy by making smart innovative investments in our infrastructure, which is why she introduced legislation to create a National Infrastructure bank.

Rosa is a leader in fighting to improve and expand federal support for child nutrition and for modernizing our food safety system. She believes that the U.S. should have one agency assigned the responsibility for food safety, rather than the 15 different agencies that lay claim to different parts of our food system. Rosa fights against special interests, like tobacco and e-cigarettes, which seek to skirt our public health and safety rules.

As the Chair dealing with appropriations for Labor, Health, Human Services, and Education, Rosa is determined to increase support for education and make college more affordable for more American students and their families. She is also fighting to protect the Affordable Care Act so that all Americans have access to affordable care. Rosa strongly believes in the power of biomedical research and she is working to increase funding so that we can make lifesaving breakthroughs in science and medicine.

Rosa believes that we have a moral obligation to our nation’s veterans and their families, and her concern for these heroes extends to both their physical and mental well-being. Rosa supports a transformation in how the Department of Veterans Affairs is funded, including advanced appropriations for health services, to ensure its fiscal soundness; and she successfully championed legislation to guarantee that troops deploying to combat theaters get the mental health screening they need both before and after deployment, as well as championed legislation that now provides assistance to today’s Post-9/11 veterans choosing to pursue on-the-job training and apprenticeship programs.

Rosa belongs to 62 House caucus groups and is the co-chair of the Baby Caucus, the Long Island Sound Caucus, and the Food Safety Caucus.

Soon after earning degrees from Marymount College and Columbia University, Rosa followed her parents’ footsteps into public service, serving as the first Executive Director of EMILY’s List, a national organization dedicated to increasing the number of women in elected office; Executive Director of Countdown ’87, the national campaign that successfully stopped U.S. military aid to the Nicaraguan Contras; and as Chief of Staff to U.S. Senator Christopher Dodd. In 1990, Rosa was elected to the House of Representatives, and she has served as the Congresswoman from Connecticut’s Third Congressional District ever since.

Rosa is married to Stanley Greenberg. Their children—Anna, Kathryn, and Jonathan Greenberg—all are grown and pursuing careers. Rosa and Stan have six grandchildren, Rigby, Teo, Sadie, Jasper, Paola and Gus.

Download Congresswoman DeLauro’s Biography

Download Congresswoman DeLauro’s Official Photo

Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro and I in 2018: My hero.

Categories Connecticut, Education Industry, Equity, Funding, Honor Roll, Justice, Supporting public schools, Unions

Ban Guns, Not Books

By dianeravitch
March 4, 2022 //
25

After the massacre of children and educators at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut in December 2014, there seemed to be an unstoppable public demand for federal gun control legislation. After the massacre of high school students and teachers at Marjory Stoneman Davis High School in Parkland, Florida, in 2018, the demand for gun control seemed unstoppable, led by students from the school.

Nothing happened. Now American students and teachers learn to protect themselves in “active shooter” drills. The opponents of gun control count on potential victims to protect themselves, instead of enacting restrictions on gun owners to protect children.

The same politicians who fight for the rights of gun owners are busily banning books, which they consider dangerous. Book banning is cancel culture at its worst.

Categories Censorship, Connecticut, Failure, Florida, Guns, Guns in Schools

Remember Sandy Hook.

By dianeravitch
December 14, 2021 //
22

Nine years ago, a deranged gunman blasted his way into Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. He murdered 20 children and six educators, including the principal, Dawn Hochsprung. The children were all 6- and 7-year-olds. Teachers shielded their children as best they could, and some died while protecting the children.

Many thought this slaughter of babies and educators would compel Congress to enact meaningful gun control. It didn’t. It even inspired a ruthless radio host to claim that the massacre never happened. Many grieving parents received death threats, due to the radio host’s lies. A court has held him liable for his cruel campaign. Meanwhile the murders continue, and Congress does nothing.

I received this message from Sandy Hook Promise, which continues to advocate for gun control:

Nine years ago today, our children and loved ones were murdered at Sandy Hook Elementary.

There are no words to describe how deeply we miss them, or how agonizing it is to mark another year since the last hug, smile or laugh we shared with them.

It’d bring such comfort to know you’re standing with us today. Will you sign our remembrance card to honor the precious lives taken from us? http://lil.ms/cydj/8zthf9

-Sandy Hook Promise

Since December 14 also is the date on which my beloved two-year-old died of leukemia many, many years ago, I grieve with and for with the parents of Sandy Hook, and with all families who have lost a child. You never forget.

Categories Connecticut, Guns, Massachusetts, Parents

Sandy Hook Parents Win Defamation Suit Against Conspiracy Theorist Alex Jones

By dianeravitch
October 2, 2021 //
10

Sandy Hook parents won a defamation lawsuit against rightwing media figure Alex Jones. Their children were murdered on December 14, 2012, in a massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. A total of 20 children between the ages of six and seven were killed, along with six staff members, including the principal.

For years, Alex Jones has asserted that the massacre was staged and that the film footage showed child actors. His repeated slanders were deeply hurtful to the families who lost children and adult relations.

The parents of two first-graders slain in the Sandy Hook massacre have won a defamation lawsuit in Texas against conspiracy extremist and Infowars host Alex Jones.

Scarlett Lewis, the mother of Jesse Lewis, and Lenny Pozner and Veronique De La Rosa, the parents of Noah Pozner, will have their cases heard by a jury to determine damages…

The parents, who each sued Jones for more than $1 million for claiming, among other things, that the 2012 slaying of 26 first-graders and educators at Sandy Hook Elementary School was “staged,” “synthetic,” “manufactured,” “a giant hoax” and “completely fake with actors,” had been battling with Jones in Travis County District Court for pretrial documents he had been ordered to turn over to them.

Categories Connecticut, Evil, Guns, Lies
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