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WARNING! Connecticut Considers Bill to Erode Local Control

By dianeravitch
March 7, 2016 //
12

Jonathan Pelto, a former legislator in Connecticut, warns about proposed legislation that would allow the state to take control of local schools, without regard to wishes of local school board.

 

He writes:

 

“A new piece of legislation before the Connecticut General Assembly (H.B. 5551) would be the most far-reaching power grab in state history – a direct attack local control of schools, our democracy and Connecticut’s students, parents, teachers, local school officials and public school.

 

“The legislation would enable Malloy’s political appointees on the State Board of Education to takeover individual schools in a district, remove the control of the elected board of education, “suspend laws” and eliminate the role of school governance councils which are the parent’s voice in school “turnaround plans.

 

“The bill is nothing short of an authoritarian maneuver by grossly expanding the Commissioner of Education’s powers under the Commissioner’s Network. The bill destroys the fundamental role of local control because it allows the state to indefinitely take over schools and even entire districts, without a vote of local citizens.

 

“The bill removes any time limit on Commissioner’s Network Schools. It removes the cap on how many Commissioner’s Network schools can be taken over by the state. It removes the right of the local community to appoint their own turnaround committee. It eliminates the requirement that local parents, through their school governance council are included in the process.”

 

Governor Dannell Malloy is chairman of the Democratic Governors’ Association, but the proposed legislation comes from the rightwing group ALEC.

 

 

Categories ALEC, Charter Schools, Connecticut, Corporate Reform, Education Reform

US Department of Education Announces Committee to Write ESSA Regulations

By dianeravitch
March 6, 2016 //
39

Here is the list of people chosen to write the regulations for the new federal law, Every Student Succeeds Act. The regulations are crucial for interpreting the law.

 

Not everyone is pleased. Some see the hand of the Gates Foundation in the choices. 

 

Interesting that Exxon Mobil gets a member of the committee, a Republican who served in the George W. Bush administration but is now education program director of Exxon Mobil. If you recall, the CEO of Exxon Mobil Rex Tillerson said that American schools were producing a “defective product” (our kids).

 

 

Categories Corporate Reform, Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA)

Oakland: Another Broad Superintendent Takes Charge of the District, Promising Transformation

By dianeravitch
March 5, 2016 //
20

The New York Times today has an article about the new Broad-trained superintendent in Oakland, California. Antwan Wilson was recruited from Denver, which has been under control by corporate reformers for over a decade. Oakland has been under control by Broad superintendents since 2003. The article describes Wilson’s plans to “transform” Oakland by merging the application process for charter schools and public schools. The Broad superintendents have been promising transformative results for more than a decade. Years ago, Oakland was seen as an ideal petri dish for corporate reform because it was under state control, with no meddlesome school board. Now it has a school board again, and the promises continue. There is always next year.

 

The article gives an overview of the trajectory of Broad-trained superintendents. It is not a pretty picture.

 

Broad-trained superintendents currently run districts in two dozen communities, including Boston, Broward County, Fla., and Philadelphia. They have lasted an average of four and three-quarter years, delivering incremental academic progress at best. Like others in the field, they have run up against the complexities of trying to improve schools bedeviled by poverty, racial disparities, unequal funding and contentious local politics.

 

Some prominent academy alumni have resigned after tumultuous terms. Mike Miles, the Dallas schools superintendent, quit last June after just three years, during which he battled teachers over new evaluation criteria and performance-based pay.

 

In Los Angeles, John Deasy stepped down as superintendent in the fall of 2014 after a turbulent tenure in which he testified against teachers’ unions during a landmark trial involving tenure and job protections, and presided over a botched rollout of a $1.3 billion plan to give all students iPads. That same year, John Covington abruptly resigned as chancellor of a state-operated district for the lowest performing schools in Detroit. Two years earlier, Jean-Claude Brizard resigned from the Chicago Public Schools after 17 months on the job and a bruising teachers’ strike.

 

Still, Mr. Broad said his money is well spent. “When I look at how many students are educated in public school systems where our alumni are and have worked,” he wrote in an email, “there is no question that this has been a worthwhile investment.”

 

Oakland is the kind of place where philanthropists hope to make a difference. Here, across the Bay Bridge from San Francisco, close to three-quarters of the 37,000 students in district-run schools come from low-income families. About 30 percent of the students are African-Americans, and more than 40 percent are Latino.

 

Why Mr. Broad is satisfied is not at all clear. There is an even longer list of failed superintendencies than is listed here, and in some cases Broadies were run out of town by the local citizenry. In Wake County, a Broadie was put in charge of resegregation the district after the Tea Party won control of the school board; when the majority was ousted in the next school board election, the superintendent left with them.

 

There is no doubt that Eli Broad “hopes to make a difference” in Oakland, as he does wherever he invests. But someone should remind him that Broad-trained superintendents have controlled the districts for more than a dozen years. When should we start seeing the “difference” that they have made?

 

 

Categories Broad Foundation, California, Corporate Reform

Jeannie Kaplan: The Failure of Reform in Denver

By dianeravitch
March 4, 2016 //
8

Jeannie Kaplan served two terms as an elected member of the Denver school board. As a strong supporter of public schools, she has been critical of the “reforms” in her city. Denver has been controlled by “reformers” for a decade. Recently Jeannie was invited by the Boston Teachers Union to explain what has happened in Denver and to assess the “reforms.”

 

Her remarks appear in full on her blog. Here is an excerpt:

 

 

“Public education in Denver despite what you may have heard or read about in the press is a system in chaos. It is a system run by a cabal. It is a system where politics, pardon the expression, trumps good policy and the truth. But let us be very clear: the top reform goal is to undermine teachers’ unions and the education profession.

 

“I am going to highlight some of what Denverites have witnessed in the past 10 years in public education. I will cover a lot of territory quickly but can’t cover everything. If you want more information, please ask me questions. If any of what I am about to describe sounds familiar to you in Boston or Massachusetts, sound the alarm and organize the troops

 

“Words to worry about:

 

Charters, particularly the strict regimented, “no-excuses” kind

 

Choice

 

High Stakes Testing

 

Enrollment Zones

 

Longer school days

 

Longer school year

 

Innovation Schools

 

At Will Employees

 

Co-locations

 

Eliminating the achievement gap

 

Teacher evaluations based on high stake testing

 

Alternative Licensure

 

“And my all time favorite, human capital. Boston Public Schools already has an office of human capital so my sense is you are on the way to being reformed.

 

“These elements of reform are the building blocks of an overarching national education reform policy based on a common business practice referred to as a portfolio strategy. What are the most common features of portfolio strategies? Keeping winners, dropping losers which in turn produces constant churn and chaos. This strategy in education reform greatly is helped along the way by legislation which ultimately results in the unfettered expansion of charter schools, the use of high stakes testing to evaluate teachers and schools, the demise of neighborhood schools through choice and resource starvation, destroying of teachers’ unions by whatever means necessary, fear and bullying of workers, all of which have resulted in a reduction in actual learning.

 

“A portfolio strategy may be a great business strategy. I can tell you from experience it is an awful educational strategy. Students and teachers and parents and communities are neither commodities to be bought and sold nor should they ever be characterized as winners and losers.

 

“My real message today is this: when you hear any of the above reform words. SOUND THE ALARM: Parents, Teachers, Students, and Communities (PTSC) unite and fight. Organizing, uniting and fighting this “reform” at the outset is the only way to stop this failing model from infiltrating your state and your city. PTSC UNITE AND FIGHT!

 

“Once education reformers get a foothold in your system, they become like dogs with a bone. They don’t ever let go, and they continue to fight to undermine the cornerstone of our democracy, public education, through privatization and corporatization Give them an inch and they take the world. Our only hope is to be brave and work as a coalition. We can’t match their money; we can and must overmatch their commitment.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reform, Denver

Idaho: Hero Superintendents Say No to the Albertson Foundation

By dianeravitch
March 2, 2016 //
9

A few days ago, I added Boise superintendent Don Coberly to the blog’s honor roll because of his forthright opposition to a campaign intended to discredit public education. It turns out that the superintendent and every member of his school board signed on to a joint response to the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Foundation’s efforts to diminish public regard for public education.

 

Superintendent Coberly was not alone.

 

A long list of Idaho superintendents also spoke out and I now add them to this blog’s honor roll. They spoke out against a well-funded campaign to slander the public schools of the state and thereby to persuade the public to support privatization.

 

The Idaho-based Albertson Foundation has run a propaganda campaign called “Don’t Fail Idaho,” attacking the SAT scores of the public schools. The superintendents have issued statements supporting their schools against this campaign of misinformation.

 

Here is a great statement by Superintendent Wendy Johnson of the Kuna School District. It includes graphs that show the plans of the district’s graduates. (Added bonus: She quotes yours truly. Smart woman! Well-read, too!)

 

Here is another statement, signed by 13 superintendents.

 

They wrote:

 

In recent weeks, many of your readers may have seen an advertisement presented by the “Don’t Fail Idaho” campaign which dramatically drops four Idaho students in the middle of the desert and leaves them there with one student left on the bus, forlornly waving to those that were “left behind.” The claim of this advertisement is that four out of five students are not prepared for life after high school.

 

As superintendents of many schools in this area, we feel it is important to defend our districts against a blatant attempt to undermine support for the public school system that serves this area. The “Don’t Fail Idaho” campaign and its parent organization, the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Family Foundation, have based their claims on SAT data which is a predictor of a student’s performance in the first semester of their first year in a four-year institution. This data is tremendously narrow and does not reflect what is happening in our schools and with our students.

 

Our students leave our high school campuses and embark on multiple career and college paths. Some choose junior colleges. Some choose two-year technology programs. Some attend technical schools and academies. Some start their own businesses or attend management schools. The SAT has no predictive power for these viable avenues. Those that choose a four-year university may be subject to those national statistics, but we teach our students that they can beat those odds every day, and they do.

 

In just the first semester of the 2015-2016 school year, 10 of our high schools had 1,082 students enrolled in dual credit courses through Idaho State University earning 3,577 credits in that time. That is only a portion of what we offer our students. We also offer courses from CSI, CWI, BSU, and U of I, not to mention the AP and professional technical certificate bearing courses. In addition, according to the NAEP (the nation’s report card), Idaho ranks higher than 22 other states in math and reading for 2015.

 

Is there room for improvement in our schools? Certainly. We embrace that challenge and continue in our commitment to improve our schools and the experience that our students gain while attending. While we recognize the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Family Foundation and its dedication to helping students in Idaho succeed, we ask that the foundation ceases this divisive campaign and support Idaho’s students in a way that does not cut down the very teachers, paraprofessionals and administrators who have dedicated their lives to improving the lives of the students in Idaho. Growth and economic development in Idaho is dependent upon all of us working together. We ask that the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Family Foundation work with us in our efforts to educate all students.

 

If the “Don’t Fail Idaho” organization continues to drop those students in the desert, rest assured that our districts will pick up those remaining students and place them at the doorstep of their pathway to a successful future.

 

 

Wayne Rush, another Idaho superintendent, released his own statement:

 

 

My first reaction when I saw the ad was to yell at the television. What would bring anyone to produce advertisements declaring that 80 percent of Idaho’s teens are not prepared for life after high school? If you have not seen the ad, it shows a school bus carrying five students, four are left at the side of the road somewhere in Idaho’s desert and one remains on the bus. The announcer says, “4 out of 5 Idaho teens aren’t prepared for life after high school. If we don’t work together to change education we are all going nowhere.” The logo “Don’t Fail Idaho” appears. When you go to their website, you find that the Idaho Business for Education (IBE) and the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Family Foundation (JKAF) are misusing SAT data and a State Board of Education goal to make this ridiculous claim.

 

It makes me very sad that the J. A. and Kathryn Albertson Family Foundation is undermining Idaho’s public education and the state as whole to promote its agenda. I worked for the JKAF for more than six years and know the love and commitment that Joe and Kathryn Albertson had for Idaho’s youth. They and their family have given so much to our state and I am forever grateful. However, this campaign leaves me perplexed as to why they would twist data to put Idaho, our schools, teachers, and our youth in the worst possible light.

 

The College Board (which produces the SAT) and universities that use these scores have never made the claim that not reaching a benchmark score on the SAT means you are not prepared for life after high school. The College Board states, “The SAT Benchmark score of 1550 is associated with a 65 percent probability of obtaining a first-year GPA of B minus or higher at a four-year college.” A test is one predictor of college success, but not the best. The courses our students take like dual credit and career and technical courses (such as auto, business, and engineering) are much better predictors of success after high school.

 

I am proud of our community, parents, students, teachers, and staff for the efforts each has made in providing a high quality education here in Gem County. Our staff works every day in preschool through high school to prepare our students for a successful future. They are continually improving teaching and learning for the advancement of our students.

 

These SAT scores come from a recent effort by Idaho and the Emmett School District to increase the number of students that are going on to some form of post-secondary education, whether trade school, two-year, or four-year college. The state now requires students to take a college entrance exam, like the SAT to graduate from high school. The state will pay for all juniors to take the SAT assessment and 88 percent of Idaho’s juniors are now taking this exam. Emmett School District has chosen to have the entire junior class take the exam. This is a great step to encourage students to attend postsecondary education and to help us align our curriculum to ensure students are college and career ready.

 

We gain a lot of good information from this assessment. This fall, our teachers dove deeply into the results to discover areas where we need to improve. It also allows our students to see how they perform compared to average scores from students enrolled in colleges and universities they are interested in attending.

 

It does make a difference when school districts and our state make bold moves to improve education. The College Board reported that in Idaho, “In 2013, 1,740 students met the benchmark. In 2015 that number of successful students more than doubled, with 4,250 meeting the benchmark.” We ought to be proud of the progress we are making not running advertisements saying we are failing.

 

To prepare students for life after high school, our teachers provide college-level, dual credit courses for our high school students. Just this fall, our students completed 168 courses earning 504 college credits through the University of Idaho, Boise State University, Northwest Nazarene University, and the College of Idaho. They were successful in courses such as college level math, chemistry, psychology, medical terminology, biology, history, and political science. We have had many students complete over 30 college credits before they graduate from Emmett High School. These students are clearly ready for college.

 

In addition, our students are participating in clubs, drama, music, sports, as well as many other community activities and events that help prepare them for life after high school. Our high school won first place in 3A State Football this fall and our girls just took 3rd place in the state basketball tournament. These students are learning what they can accomplish through grit and team work.

 

Idaho, our teachers and staff, and our students are not failing Idaho. We roll up our sleeves every day and work hard to prepare for a bright future.

 

Ironically, some of these statements were published in the Idaho Education News, which is funded by the Albertson Foundation.

 

Another irony, Joe Albertson, who founded the grocery store chain that is the basis of the family fortune, was a 1925 graduate of Caldwell High School in Caldwell, Idaho. A public school.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reform, Education Industry, Honor Roll, Idaho, Online Learning, Privatization, Testing, Virtual Charter Schools

Los Angeles: Get Ready for Another Attack on Public Education

By dianeravitch
March 1, 2016 //
19

In the past few years, the privatization movement has targeted Los Angeles as a ripe target, in part because billionaire Eli Broad wants to squash the public schools where he lives, and also because the state has exceedingly lax regulation of charters. The state laws were written during Arnold Schwarzenegger’s time as governor, when he packed the state board with charter advocates.

 

In Los Angeles, the privatizers face a stumbling block: an elected school board. Each election, they dump millions into campaigns for their allies.

 

This is year is crucial. The privatizers’ main target is Steve Zimmer, the board president. Steve began his career in TFA but didn’t move on to a lucrative career in high finance. He remained an LAUSD teacher for 17 years. When he ran for school board, the big names of corporate reform spent millions to defeat him, but he won. He was outspent 5-1, but he prevailed. Can he do it again?

 

Zimmer is known as a thoughtful, deluberate, and fair-minded leader. He is not a partisan. But the privatizers don’t want a fair-minded board president. They want someone to champion their cause. They want power. They want control.

 

Yet the privatizers are starting their campaign to unseat him. Expect more millions from a handful of the wealthy elite–none of whom have ever had children in the public schools of Los Angeles–to knock Zimmer off the board.

 

Here is a description of his challenger, written by Joshua Leibner, a National Board Certified teacher in LAUSD.

 

 

As you may know by now, Nick Melvoin is going to be running for LAUSD’ President Steve Zimmer’s seat on the School Board.

 

 

It’s important to know his biography which definitely influences his political orientation on education. Nick comes from a very well-to-do Hollywood family and spent his youth in private schools and then off to Harvard and later LMU (the incubator for LA’s Reform movement with John Deasy and Ref Rodriguez as star alumni). He taught for two years in Brooklyn after receiving his five week teacher training and considers his TFA experience important “to make young, promising people aware of the issues of education, so that when they ‘graduate’ from Teach for America and become important leaders in society, they will effect long term change in the education system.”

 

 

Melovin as director of policy, communications and associate counsel for former LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s Great Public Schools Los Angeles and is currently a consultant to the Charter and Reform advocates Educators4Excellence and Teach Plus.

 

 

Melvoin worked on the ACLU’s Reed v. California lawsuit, which challenged LA Unified’s seniority-based teacher layoff policies, by helping recruit former students and co-workers from Markham to join the lawsuit. He also testified in the Vergara v. California lawsuit where a group of students successfully argued that the state’s teacher employment laws are unconstitutional.

 
In LA only four months ago, he penned an article for Campbell Brown’s The Seventy Four where he says of Eli Broad’s plan to charterize LAUSD: “If I were a shareholder of LAUSD — and as a taxpayer, I guess we all are — I might welcome a hostile takeover. In fact, a hostile takeover might be precisely what our district needs.”

 
Now, I am no huge fan of Steve Zimmer because for too long, he was silent on what was happening in education reform in general and in LA in particular. When educators wanted strong leadership in decrying what was happening in our schools by the rich and powerful, Zimmer oftentimes gave comfort to the very enemies who today have set him in their sights.

 

There is no doubt this is going to be one of the most publicized races in the nation. With a year to go before the election, we can now see how great the nationwide stakes are in these “piddly” school board battles.

 

That’s a year of the tsunami of fundraising that is going to be going on on Melvoin’s behalf through dark money contributions. Every charter group, hedge fund and corporate entity is going to pour massive resources into this race.

 

LA’s District 4 School Board race will be the most expensive battle royale in the country’s history. LA’s UTLA will pour tremendous money into the campaign to back Zimmer but it certainly won’t be enough to compete with what he is going to be up against. Melvoin is a perfect Central Casting school board candidate to “speak” to LA’s more affluent, white and politically engaged West Side. The Reformers know what a great “fit” he is going to be.

 

 

The problem is that what Melvoin believes to be “Progressive Education” is radically at odds with mine and other public school advocates definition. His backers are of the same pedigree as those who give to the Jeb Bush campaign and understand completely both Donald Trump’s AND Eli Broad’s use of money to buy the public policy they want. In LA, he will sell himself as a liberal and I’m sure he believes it.

 

So here’s an opportunity.

 

 

This should be the race where the Democrats battle out what Progressive Education is. This is the fight that has been a long time coming between the Neo-liberal Democrats and the Social Justice Democrats. It is going to be an argument that will challenge notions of race and class and privilege. Each side is claiming that mantle and I love to finally have that debate in public.

 

 

Our side has got to be ready and smart. The potential pitfalls are numerous. It is very tricky navigating and we have to articulate forcefully why Melvoin’s notion of education is wrong for the MAJORITY of LA.

 

 

 

 

 

Categories Corporate Reform, Education Reform, Los Angeles

Alabama: Will Michigan Billionaires Buy a Seat on the State Board of Education

By dianeravitch
February 28, 2016 //
3

Larry Lee writes here about Matt Brown, a candidate for state board of education in Alabama who says he is proud to take money from the billionaire DeVos family of Michigan.

 

As Lee points out, the DeVos family is devoted to replacing public schools with vouchers and charters. Their organization, American Federation for Children, funds choice proponents across the country. They favorite cause is vouchers. A few years back, AFC honored Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker and Michelle Rhee for their efforts to push privatization of public schools.

 

As Larry Lee writes:

 

“Someone who wants a seat on the governing body that is supposed to advocate for public schools is proud to take money from folks who do not support public education. Just how does that work?

 

“(And the irony of his statement about having adequately-funded public schools is that just 12 months ago he was working hard to make sure a tax vote to fund Baldwin County schools was defeated.)

 

“Brown went on to say that he is not familiar with the DeVos family.

 

“OK, since he’s not done his homework, let’s help. Betsy DeVos has been called the “four-star general” of the effort to privatize public schools across the country. In the just-released best seller, Dark Money. The hidden history of the billionaires behind the rise of the radical right, author Jane Mayer links the DeVos family with the on-going efforts of Charles and David Koch to radicalize the United States.

 

“In 2006 Dick DeVos ran for governor of Michigan, and even though he spent $34 million of his own money, was unsuccessful. In 2000 the couple spent $2 million on a Michigan vote to approve vouchers. The vote was handily defeated. A PAC run by Betsy DeVos was fined $2.6 million by the Ohio Elections Commission for violating that state’s election laws.

 

“Of course, it is common for politicians to claim that where they get campaign contributions will have no bearing on how they vote. How honest is a statement like this? Betsy DeVos tells us on page 235 of Dark Money when she says, “I have decided, however, to stop taking offense at the suggestion that we are buying influence. Now I simply concede the point. They are right. We do expect some things in return.”

 

“Truer words were never spoken.

 

“And that’s why Matt Brown being proud of money from the DeVos family is a scary thought.”

 

Will the people of Alabama enable these billionaires from Michigsn to buy a seat on the state board of education? Or will they insist on someone who wants to improve the public schools and help the children of Alabama?

Categories Alabama, Billionaires, Corporate Reform, Education Reform, Privatization

John Kuhn: Corporate Reformers Try to Take Back Social Media from Supporters of Public Schools

By dianeravitch
February 28, 2016 //
23

John Kuhn is superintendent of the Perrin-Whitt school district in Texas. He first emerged as a national figure in the fight for better education for all children when he spoke at the national Save Our Schools march in 2011 and gave a rousing speech.

 

 

 

 

 

Education reformers have worked tirelessly for years to advance their preferred education policy ideas using a panoply of tactics, with mixed results.
As an example, reformers have steeped future big-city superintendents in #edreformthink through the (*cough-unaccredited-cough*) Broad Academy and then deployed them to try out their ideas in the real-life laboratory of various unlucky school districts. (Update: a refreshingly large number of these superintendents have gone on to transform urban education upend large school systems with no tangible positive results before being run out of town on a rail.)

 
Another effort aimed at advancing pro-reform policy has been the embedding of Teach for America alumni in congressional offices as staffers. Then again, there is the tried-and-true tactic of having a corporation-funded organization coordinate the development and introduction of model ed reform legislation nationwide. Or, if you’re a fan of the straightforward approach, you will appreciate efforts to just expend a ton of money to force the implementation of anointed ideas, ala Gates and Zuckerberg.

 
Back in the early years of the Education Wars (when Diane Ravitch was on Twitter and her blog didn’t exist yet) it became apparent that reformers—despite enjoying the generous fiscal backing of wealthy individuals and organizations and the political backing of influential officeholders from both parties—were losing the public relations battle, particularly on social media. Scrappy teacher-bloggers and Twitter-ers were running them ragged with asymmetrical PR warfare, and they knew it. So began in earnest the development of a Marvel Universe of pro-reform social media personalities and collectives.

 
In this short article, I will highlight a few of these actors—this is a back-of-an-envelope map of one corner of the reform echo chamber, if you will—and I will let you know what they’ve been up to this week. I will also let you know where each of these voices stands on a recent high-profile story, the infamous Success Academy video.

 
THE 74

 
Apparently named for the average IQ of its contributors (just kidding guys; I’m sure you’re all Ivy League), the 74 is the brainchild of Campbell Brown and hosts pro-reform Twitterfolk like Dmitri Mehlhorn and Chris Stewart. The 74 mixes pro-reform op-eds with a dab of more newsy education pieces (like one about a campaign to prevent student suicide, for example), apparently in an attempt to come across as neutral-ish. This is window-dressing, of course, as demonstrated by the fact that the top four articles on the page as of this writing are: Nevada parents hoping vouchers survive a court challenge; Chris Stewart trumpeting a slew of news stories about non-Success-Academy teachers being mean to students; a pretty balanced story on the effect of good teachers on students’ happiness; and a story about Trump University that spends one paragraph rapping the scourge of for-profit college scams before getting to “the real story” by indulging in a ten-paragraph call for the next President to “hold all colleges accountable.”

 
Position on the SA video: “but other schools do it too” and “stop hating”.

 
EDUCATION POST

 
Another slick effort to appear neutral and above the fray by offering a “better conversation” (for discriminating education connoisseurs, one would imagine), Education Post actually peddles orthodox ed reform ideas and is, per Mercedes Schneider, funded by Broad, Walton, and Bloomberg—not exactly the Triumvirate of Educational Neutrality. Contributors include Chris Stewart (again!), Eric Lerum, and Chris Barbic. Top articles today are one about a teacher acknowledging her own biases, one arguing that what TFA haters really hate are charter schools, one telling teachers to stop using lack of parent involvement as an excuse not to teach kids well, and a thoughtful article about the tensions of being in the education politics fight and having to choose where to send your own kids to school.

 
Position on the SA video: the video’s a bummer, but Success Academy is a target because it is so much better and everyone is jealous

 
EDUCATION NEXT and EDEXCELLENCE.NET

 
These are Fordham Institute/Michael Petrilli/Chester Finn vehicles. Instead of pretending to publish objective journalism ala The 74 and Education Post, these sites pretend to publish objective research. The duo are a vehicle for motivated scholarship, of the faux variety. Like the above online journals, they are really just political devices.

 
Top stories today at Education Next are: a story about how family background influences achievement and what schools can do about it, a story about how schools of choice expand opportunity for urban students, an article contending that teacher quality is the most important in-school factor, a paean to the Common Core arguing that it forced states that rejected CCSS to adopt tougher standards, a story on desegregation and a story about academic competitions. This carousel of stories—most of them related to the 50th anniversary of James Coleman’s report “Equality of Educational Opportunity” in an apparent effort to re-cast his report as a validation of reform orthodoxies rather than a call for equity—is followed by a reformer response to film critic David Denby’s New Yorker article calling out reformers for bashing teachers. Then comes an article by Petrilli arguing that NCLB spawned a bunch of smarter school policies. (Thanks, NCLB!) Oh, then there’s a call to end required union contributions.

 
Position on the SA video: conspicuously hard to find. A search of the site reveals the last mention of “Eva Moskowitz” to be in 2014, when the site chirped, “Talk about a ‘Tough Liberal!” and said charters like hers shouldn’t be criticized for lacking diversity. A search for “Success Academy” finally takes us to a 2/15/2016 post that summarizes a Vox.com article by Libby Nelson (with the telling quote “The video is undeniably upsetting. But…”) and then goes on to point to Education Post’s limp defense of poor wittle Success Academy.

 
THIS WEEK IN EDUCATION

 
Alexander Russo’s blog also pretends to be above the fray but really isn’t. However, unlike the others, Russo does directly criticize reformers on a fairly regular basis, probably because he fancies himself a gadfly with an independent streak. In reality, his pro-reform bias is evident to me, and maybe also to the casual reader. Where The 74 and Education Post dab on the makeup of objective reporting, Russo slathers it. He does a good enough job of posting too-numerous-to-count news pieces and fun/thought-provoking pieces that it effectively softens the blow of his bias and almost camouflages his running campaign to provide journalistic cover for the Broads and Waltons of the world. One blogger put it succinctly in saying that Russo “works the refs” for reform. He’s the guy in the bleachers who reliably highlights bad calls that go against his team and often ignores bad calls against the other team, unless they’re so painfully obvious that he feels he has to grudgingly acknowledge them. But at least he tells funny stories between being a total homer.
Top stories today are a video of Obama with Civil Rights leaders, a story on Detroit teachers trying to bring attention to their schools, a collection of news articles on various issues including how school safety issues are tracked and Common Core exam glitches. Where Russo shines as a reform ally is in his careful selection of others’ opinions that he broadcasts. The first quote one comes to today is from The 74, where Matt Barnum tries valiantly to jack the mojo of David Denby (the New Yorker film critic referred to above, who had the audacity to critique public school critics in his article called Stop Humiliating Teachers) by contending that what Denby wants is really the same thing as what the reformers want. (Really, Matt? Read the article again.) Russo earns a few objectivity points for the hilarious note from a CPS parent that says his sick daughter is feeling better and “eager to get back to school in hopes of achieving a high score on…Standardized Tests…given this year to insure that Private Corporations continue to receive huge and profitable contracts…” Russo has a soft spot for snark.

 
Position on the SA video: straddles the fence—SA didn’t respond well to the reporting and NYT didn’t report thoughtfully. Russo shared the video and followed up with SA’s response video and, later, a GIF of the original video.

 
DROPOUT NATION

 
RiShawn is a trench fighter for reform. Where Russo has snark, Biddle has meanness, and he has criticized people he calls “traditionalists” pretty relentlessly. If you think about the unending terrible treatment of poor American children of color, meanness is probably a proper response, though I almost always disagree with Biddle’s prescriptions for fixing the problem. I think it comes down to this: I believe we should force ourselves to fulfill the constitutional promises that we will provide a quality public education for all American children, and Biddle appears to believe that we never will fulfill that promise because we are helplessly racist, so we might as well give up on it and find salvation for poor city kids in school choice. It’s an honest disagreement—I personally think what Biddle and other reformers advocate is akin to the biblical tale of Esau trading his birthright for a bowl of soup. In this case, the birthright is the promise that the US and state governments will by constitutional obligation–prosecutable in court—ensure that all children are adequately educated; the bowl of soup is we can trust that chains of charters started by white-collar guys who want to make money will fill the void and educate everybody better than the government has or will.

 
It wouldn’t do me any good to argue with RiShawn because he’s as convinced that public schools are hopeless for minority children as I am convinced that charter schools are designed from the outset to keep most of those kids out. To use Michael Petrilli’s eternally useful phrase, they are meant to help the “strivers”. Of course, that leaves the non-strivers somewhere. Probably concentrated in whatever remains of the public school system.
Look, I understand “educate all children” is idealistic, and I understand that we are a nation that has never gotten past racial prejudice. I also understand that giving up the hill here—abandoning the notion that “educating all children” is what we SHOULD BE ABOUT and COULD BE ABOUT IF WE HAD THE COURAGE TO DO SO—giving up that fight ensures that we will never come back to the audacious promise of public education as the protector and perfecter of a diverse democracy. We will settle for less. Exponentially less. Bowl of soup instead of birthright less. We will settle for Taco Bell as a schooling model, we will give up courts for choice, and it won’t be any better—it will be the same or worse, but the upside of it—the maximum best it could ever be—won’t even PRETEND to be that it offers a quality education for ALL kids. We will forever abandon the notion that that was even ever possible in the United States of America, and that to me is intolerably depressing. The open arms concept of free and equal education for all will be lost to the archives and we will be stuck with a few lifeboat schools and a bunch of bobbing heads in the water.

 
But today I agree with RiShawn Biddle, because he has broken with Peter Cunningham from Education Post and Campbell Brown from The 74, in that he won’t countenance the notion that Success Academy merits a defense. In fact, his lead articles today are “Success Academy Merits No Defense” and “No Excuses for Moskowitz”. Biddle’s condemnation of Success Academy practices like the one captured in the video have resulted in harsh name-calling and criticism from fellow reformers like Michael Petrilli. And Biddle didn’t come late to the party. He wrote “The Hole Eva Moskowitz Keeps Digging” long before the video emerged, after John Merrow’s piece on disciplinary practices at SA emerged months ago.

 
I’m not naïve enough to think that RiShawn Biddle and I agree on much besides the fact that SA is wrong when it comes to its disciplinary treatment of children. Our views on equitable school funding are probably aligned, and maybe some other tangential issues too. But when it comes to the speculative promise of school choice versus the literal promise of school constitutional guarantees, there is a stark difference in where we two find hope for the nation’s future. Nevertheless, I have to pause and recognize that among all the reformers, Biddle is apparently the only one brave enough to call out what Success Academy and its defenders are doing wrong. How can we expect Success Academy to change its ways when its defenders rush forth with enabling op-eds? Where other reformers are scrambling to defend a model, Biddle is stepping up to defend children. If Eva Moskowitz is Ethan Couch, then Campbell Brown and Peter Cunningham are his mother taking him to Mexico to avoid punishment. I’m glad RiShawn Biddle is clearly saying this isn’t okay.

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

Checker Finn Outraged by David Denby’s Admiration for Teachers

By dianeravitch
February 26, 2016 //
137

This is a sad story. From 1981 to 2009, nearly 30 years, Checker Finn was one of my closest friends. He was like a brother. Our families were close, and we almost telecommunicated about issues. We wrote article and reports together. we wrote a book together. We cofounded the Educational Excellence Network, and I was a founding member of Checker’s Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, as well as a colleague on the Koret Task Force of the Hoover Foundation.

 

But when I turned against testing and choice, our friendship deteriorated. I asked him if he would write a blurb for my book “The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Undermines Education,” but he said it was impossible. That book announced my break with the corporate reform movement. Or as I now know it, the privatization movement. He never forgave me for breaking ranks.

 

Readers of this blog have never read criticism of Checker here. I could not bring myself to speak personally against those who were once close friends, even though our disagreements are philosophically and politically profound.

 

 

Checker, however, has finally expressed his anger towards me in print. He slammed David Denby, who has written for the New Yorker for many years, for having written a tribute to teachers. He thinks Denby has turned into a defender of the status quo, which is apparently the worst insult a “reformer” can imagine.

 

 

But the privatizers ARE the status quo. How else to describe a “movement” that includes the President of the US, the Department of Education, the Council of Chief State School Officers, ALEC (which Fordham joined), all the red-state governors plus Governor Cuomo of New York, and Governor Malloy of Connecticut, the Gates Foundation, the Broad Foundation, the Walton Family Foundation, the Bloomberg Foundation, about a score of other foundations, and dozens of hedge fund managers who can raise a million dollars in a few hours. If this is not the status quo, I don’t know what is. They are actually quite few in number, but their wealth and political power are immense.

 

 

Checker trashed David Denby’s paean to teachers because Checker holds teachers in low regard, especially if they belong to a union and work on a public school.

 

 

I suspect this is the paragraph that Denby wrote that most angered Checker:

 

 

““A necessary commonplace: Almost everyone we know has been turned around, or at least seriously shaken, by a teacher—in college, maybe, but often in high school, often by a man or a woman who drove home a point or two about physics, literature, or ethics, and looked at us sternly and said, in effect, You could be more than what you are. At their best, teachers are everyday gods, standing at the entryway to the world. If they are fair and good, they are possibly the most morally impressive adults that their students will ever know. For a while, they are the law, they are knowledge, they are justice….”

 

 

But there was something else that unsettled Checker. He suspected that Denby had turned against “reform,” and it was my fault!

 

 

He writes:

 

 

“If he had stuck with his abiding affection for great literature and his analysis of the difficulties of teaching it to contemporary young people, I’d have nothing but positive feelings. But along the way, besides deploring kids’ addiction to video games, cell phones, television, and ear-bud music, he’s turned into an anti-reformer. This turned up first (to my knowledge) in his loving word portrait of (the new) Diane Ravitch, published in the New Yorker in 2012. Now he’s back in the same publication with a denunciation of what he sees as the teacher-bashing ways, false allegations, and misguided ideas of education reformers. Here’s a sample:

 

 

[Denby writes]:

 

 

“Our view of American public education in general has been warped by our knowledge of these failing kids in inner-city and rural schools. In particular, the system as a whole has been described by “reformers” as approaching breakdown. But this is nonsense. There are actually many good schools in the United States—in cities, in suburbs, in rural areas. Pathologizing the system as a whole, reformers insist on drastic reorganization, on drastic methods of teacher accountability. In the past dozen or so years, we’ve seen the efforts, often led by billionaires and hedge fund managers and supported by elected officials, to infuse K–12 education with models and methods derived from the business world—for instance, the drive to privatize education as much as possible with charter schools, which receive public money but are independently run and often financed by entrepreneurs. This drive is accompanied by a stream of venom aimed at unions, as if they were the problem in American education.”

 

 

Finn resumes:

 

 

“On reading this, a colleague speculated that perhaps Ravitch had written it for him as a kind of reward for his earlier tribute to her. The more important point is that he has now lent his talented pen to the anti-reform movement, which (of course) it took Ravitch just minutes to note: “David Denby,” she blogged on Valentine’s Day, “has joined our movement to restore common sense to education.”

 

 

“And a movement of sorts it has become, including not just teacher unions, polemicists, and high-powered (if, in my view, sorely misguided) intellectuals, but also opting-out parents, unrelenting education progressivists, and a bunch of folks whose latest cause célèbre is that kids are under too much stress.”

 

 

A quick rebuttal:

 

 

No, I did not ghostwrite David Denby’s tribute to teachers. He did it all by himself. He is quite a prolific writer, and he doesn’t need my help to think or write.

 

 

Yes, Denby does admire teachers. Many people-including those at the Fordham Institute, ALEC, and other outposts of corporate reform—don’t. They think they are lazy and self-serving. They can’t understand why anyone would want to be a teacher when they don’t make much money, ever.

 

 

Yes, as Denby writes, there are many good schools in America. There are many excellent public schools in America. The privatizers and public school bashers seem to have mostly gone to Exeter (like Checker) or Lakeside Academy or Andover or some other elite private school. They feel sorry for those of us who had to go to public schools.

 

 

Although I am now diametrically opposed to everything Checker believes about education, teachers, and children, I have an abiding fondness for him and his family.

 

 

I will continue fighting the terrible policies that he espouses because I know they have proven to be failures. He was and is a promoter of every imaginable alternative to public schools. So far, none of those alternatives has been successful. There comes a time to recognize that the theories you have been promoting since the early 1980s have been tried and have failed. I had that realization about 2005 or 2006 as I saw the damage done by NCLB.

 

 

I don’t think Checker will ever admit that he was wrong. But some day, maybe after we are gone, wiser heads will review this era and judge us all. I am glad I shook myself free of the delusion that schools could operate in a free market, that teachers could be treated as interchangeable widgets, and that students learn best in a culture of fear of failure. I will continue to hope that someday Checker and Mike Petrilli will see the light.

Categories ALEC, Charter Schools, Corporate Reform

BREAKING: Corporate Reformers Defeat Effort to Scale Back VAM in Colorado

By dianeravitch
February 23, 2016 //
17

The Democratic-controlled House Education Committe in Colorado rejected a bill that would have modified the state’s draconian and pointless teacher evaluation system.

Key testimony against the bill was provided by leaders of the privatization movement who masquerade as reformers.

“Lobbyists from three education advocacy groups — the Colorado Children’s Campaign, Colorado Succeeds and Stand for Children — testified strongly against the bill. Another major reform group, Democrats for Education Reform, was neutral, Arndt said.

“But other witnesses from the Poudre school district — as well as board certified teachers and representatives of the Colorado Education Association, the state’s largest teachers union — urged the committee to pass the bill.
In closing statements before the vote, some committee members clearly were torn.
“I’m really struggling with this one,” said Rep. Dominick Moreno, D-Commerce City.

“With the defeat of the House bill, no other pending bills would alter the state system, which requires that principals and teachers be evaluated half on their professional practice and half on student academic growth.”

FYI, from a Denver source:

“The founder of the Colorado Children’s Campaign is a current Denver Public Schools’ board of Ed member, former lieutenant governor, current CEO of the non-Union schools’ principal training program Catapult. President of Colorado Succeeds is former leg aide to Johnston and helped write SB-191.”

Categories Colorado, Corporate Reform, Hoax, Teacher Evaluations
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