Archives for category: Corporate Reformers
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Public Education Won Big Last Night!

By dianeravitch
November 6, 2019 //
15

Candidates for Public office endorsed by NPE Action won big. 

We didn’t give them money.

We gave them our valued Seal of Approval, demonstrating that they are the real deal, genuine supporters of public schools.

We also celebrate the apparent victory in Kentucky of Andy Bashear and the apparent defeat of Governor Matt Bevin, who mistreated teachers and sought Betsy DeVos’s approval. Kentucky has a charter law but no funding for charters.

And we congratulate the brave Democrats in Virginia, who won control of the legislature.

And salutations to the new school board members who won control of the Denver school board. Aloha   to Senator MIchael Bennett and other pseudo reformers.

November 5 was a great day for public schools and teachers!

Categories Corporate Reform, Corporate Reformers, Denver, Disruption, Kentucky, Network for Public Education, Networkfor Public Education Action Fund, Supporting public schools, Teachers, Virginia

Denver: Corporate Reform Candidates Lose in All Three Races for School Board CORRECTION!!!!

By dianeravitch
November 6, 2019 //
4

Denver is one of the jewels of the Corporate Reform/Disruption crowd where outside the state money has purchased board seats in the past.

This election, however, three seats were up for grabs and the corporate reformers were defeated in all three races.

In their place, candidates who are skeptical of charters, school closing, and high-stakes testing were elected with the support of the Denver Classroom Teachers Association.

Supporters of commonsense, real reform (not Corporate Reform) already held 2 seats on the seven-person board.

The anti-Corporate Reform, pro-Public School bloc now controls 5 of 7 seats on the Denver school board. (Time for DFER to panic!).

 

Candidates backed by the Denver teachers union held the lead in Tuesday’s election as of 10 p.m., making it appear likely that the largest school district in the state will take a new direction.

The Denver Classroom Teachers Association had endorsed Tay Anderson, Scott Baldermann and Brad Laurvick for three open seats on the seven-member board. No incumbents were running, as two reached term limits and one decided to bow out.

Currently, five members of the board generally support “reform” ideas, such as closing schools that underperformed on tests and graduation rates, and opening new options like charter schools. The Denver teachers union and allied groups saw an opportunity to “flip” the board’s majority by electing candidates who opposed closing schools and were more suspicious of charters.

In the first returns for the at-large seat, Anderson was leading with 48.8% of the vote. Alexis Menocal Harrigan was in second, with 38.2%. Natela Manuntseva was trailing, with 13.0%.

Anderson, a restorative justice coordinator at DPS’ North High School, previously ran unsuccessfully for the board in 2017, when he was 19. Harrigan works for Code.org, which focuses on technology education, and previously was a staff member for U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet, who helped launch DPS’s current reform agenda during his time as superintendent. Manuntseva works for a kombucha company.

In District 1, which encompasses southeast Denver, Baldermann led early with 49.7% of the vote, followed by Diana Romero Campbell, 31.2%, and Radhika Nath, 19.2%.

Baldermann is a stay-at-home father who previously owned an architecture business. Nath is a health policy researcher, and Romero Campbell is president of Scholars Unlimited, which offers tutoring and other services.

In District 5, which covers northwest Denver, Laurvick had a narrow lead, with 36.3% of the vote. Tony Curcio followed with 32.9%, and Julie Bañuelos brought up the rear with 30.9%.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Denver, Disruption, Education Industry, Privatization, Testing

Chicago: The Teachers’ Strike Brings a Sea-Change in Education Policy

By dianeravitch
November 6, 2019 //
7

Craig’s Chicago Business acknowledges that the children in Chicago public schools need what the Chicago Teachers Union won in their contract negotiations. But still, they wonder, are taxpayers willing to pay the price? 

Now that financial details of the pact are starting to trickle out, it’s clear that the mayor was telling the truth—that is, for the teachers. And that truth raises a very significant question of whether the unprecedented, potentially $1.5 billion mayoral bet will be worth the cost to already struggling Chicago taxpayers.

That $1.5 billion figure comes from the Chicago Public Schools’ budget office. It’s at the high range of what officials say the new CTU deal will cost over the next five years cumulatively…

“The union won the strike. They absolutely won,” says Paul Vallas, a former CPS CEO who was one of Lightfoot’s rivals in the February mayoral election. “It’s going to be impossible for them to come up with that much dough without major tax increases if (Gov. J.B.) Pritzker does not fully fund the state’s new school-aid formula.”

Pritzker is working on that. But as Vallas noted, doing so likely depends on voters next year enacting the governor’s proposed graduated income tax amendment, and that’s no sure thing.

Overall, there is little dissent that putting increased staff resources into particularly needy schools—as the contract requires—is the right thing to do. Eventually, that should result in higher graduation rates and kids better prepared to enter the job market.

It is always good to get Vallas’ views, since he privatized schools in Philadelphia and New Orleans as his budget solution and ran unsuccessfully for mayor, governor, and lieutenant governor.

Are the voters in Illinois willing to pay higher taxes to improve conditions of learning, to assure smaller class sizes, and to get better prepared youth?

The Chicago teachers’ strike represents a change in Chicago, for sure. The harsh policies of Daley, Duncan, and Emanuel are over. A new day has dawned, with national implications.

“It’s a definitive shift in the entire landscape, not just in Chicago, but throughout the U.S., away from privatization, school closures, charter schools, and the kind of Koch Brother-funding of private schools instead of public schools, a threat we’ve been fending off for the last 30 years,” said Jackson Potter, a high school teacher and union bargaining member in Chicago.

Potter continued, “This contract really represents advances—and not just trying to preserve what we had or prevent the annihilation of the public system—but how to expand it, fortify it, and have a considerable [investment] in low income students of color and their communities that starts to look more [like] what we see in wealthy white suburbs.”

The contract dealt a blow to the charter industry, with “hard caps on charter school expansion and enrollment growth.” The rightwing Heartland Institute called the settlement “a death blow to charter schools in the Windy City.”

Alas, the sustained efforts of the Disrupters foiled by one powerful teachers’ strike, joined by Chicago’s progressive new mayor!  Their policies of austerity and privatization undone. Calling the world’s smallest violin.

Thanks to the invaluable organization “In the Public Interest” for assembling these sources in one place.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Chicago, Corporate Reformers, Democracy, Disruption, Duncan, Arne, Education Industry, Education Reform, Emanuel, Rahm, Funding

Mercedes Schneider: The Failure of “Reform” In Louisiana

By dianeravitch
November 4, 2019 //
5

Mercedes Schneider teaches high school English in Louisiana. She has been a close observer of the corporate reforms (the Disruption movement) under State Superintendent John White. White has been in charge since 2012. He has had the authority to pursue his own agenda, with the unwavering support of a state board elected by out-of-state money.

Schneider lays out his record, based on NAEP scores and ACT scores. 

It is not a pretty picture.

Schneider is accustomed to John White’s cherry-picking of data. But she will not let him get away with it.

She writes:

On October 30, 2019, the 2019 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) scores were made public.

After seven years of John White as Louisiana’s state superintendent, the results were so unsavory White and his Louisiana Department of Education (LDOE) that his Louisiana 2019 NAEP Results Summary does not include a single actual NAEP scaled score.

Instead, the propagandistic flier advertises “change from 2017 to 2019” (differences in the actual scores that are intentionally excluded) and features “Louisiana ranks No. 1 in the nation for 2019 improvement in 8th grade math scale scores and
proficiency rates” and “Louisiana’s pace of improvement since 2009 in all subjects significantly exceeds national trends.”

So, let’s look at Louisiana’s NAEP average scaled scores across time– not just from 2017 to 2019.

She posts all the state’s NAEP scores from 2005-2019 (White has been superintendent since 2012)

But then there are the ACT scores.

She writes:

On the same day that 2019 NAEP scores were released, so were Louisiana’s Class of 2019 ACT scores.

Louisiana’s Class of 2019 composite was 18.9— the lowest since all Lousiana graduates began to be required to take the test, beginning with the Class of 2013. In that year, Louisiana’s baseline composite was 19.5 (or 19.1, depending which LDOE info one reads).

Louisiana’s ACT Composite Scores (2013 – 2019):

  • 2013: 19.5 (or 19.1)
  • 2014: 19.2
  • 2015: 19.4
  • 2016: 19.5
  • 2017: 19.6
  • 2018: 19.3
  • 2019: 18.9

Not so surprisingly, White has no press release for Louisiana’s 2019 ACT dive.

That does not mean he has not been asked.

New Orleans Public Radio education reporter, Jess Clark, asked White to comment on Louisiana’s falling ACT score and received the following vague response, including NAEP-propaganda deflection:

Asked for comment on the latest ACT results, Louisiana State Superintendent John White sent an emailed statement pointing to progress the state made in 8th grade math on another national standardized test, the “Nation’s Report Card,” or NAEP.

“While the nation’s report card shows Louisiana tops the nation in 8th grade math progress, it’s important that we look at other indicators of our challenges,” he said.

John White wants to look at other indicators of “our” challenges.

I’ll bet he does.

.

 

 

Categories Accountability, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, Louisiana, Privatization, Testing, Vouchers

Gary Rubinstein: The Reformers’ Desperate Effort to Find Hope in the NAEP Scores

By dianeravitch
November 4, 2019 //
11

Gary Rubinstein, math teacher at Stuyvesant High School, is a skilled myth buster. He frequently unmasks “miracle” stories.

In this post, he demolishes the claim that Louisiana has improved faster in 8th grade math than other states.

This is the last gasp of the Disruption movement, which has controlled federal and state policy for 20 years but has little to show for it.

As Rubinstein shows, Arne Duncan and John White are leading the effort to find the “bright side” of the latest NAEP results, which were stagnant In 2019 and have been stagnant for a decade.

Duncan says the nation should look to Louisiana for inspiration. Louisiana ranked among the bottom  states on NAEP, 44th to 49th, depending on the grade and the subject. But how creative to point to one of the lowest performing states as a national model! Do what Louisiana did and your state too can rank among the bottom five states in the nation!

Gary points out that Louisiana has indeed improved, but its 2019 scores on 8th grade math were actually a point lower than its scores were in 2007! In other words, Louisiana hasn’t gained at all for the past dozen years!.

Wouldn’t it be refreshing if the leaders of the Disruption movement admitted that their 20-year-long policy of test-and-punish is both stale and failed?

Wouldn’t it be great if they said, “Whoa! We’re on the wrong track. We’ve inflicted nonstop testing on the nation’s children since 2002. We have spent billions on testing and test-prep. Scores went up for a few years but leveled off in 2007. Enough! Our answers are wrong. Time for fresh thinking.”

 

Categories Accountability, Common Core, Corporate Reformers, Disruption, Duncan, Arne, Education Industry, Education Reform, Failure, Louisiana, NCLB (No Child Left Behind), Race to the Top, Testing

Kentucky Parent: Why Voters Tomorrow Should Oust Privatizer Matt Bevin and Save Our Public Schools

By dianeravitch
November 4, 2019 //
2

Gay Adelmann, the mother of a recent graduate of the Jefferson County Public Schools, writes here to explain why voters in Kentucky should get rid of Matt Bevin and elect Andy Beshear as Governor.

She writes:

“During Kentucky’s past two legislative sessions, Gov. Matt Bevin lashed out at the record numbers of teachers descending upon Frankfort. But teachers are not the only ones who have been showing up in opposition to his attacks on public education. Many of us are also parents, retired teachers, students, business and community leaders, allied laborers and taxpayers. Our teachers are also taxpayers and often parents, after all. 

“We aren’t just standing up for teachers’ pay or pensions, either. We are also pushing back on Bevin’s draconian education policies, inspired by wealthy elites like the Koch Brothers and Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos. His solutions involve implementing the American Legislative Exchange Council’s carefully orchestrated schemes to underfund and undermine Kentucky’s public schools, turn our “persistently low-achieving” schools over to outside operators and drastically cut teacher compensation and benefits. This will not only destroy our public schools, it will further displace students (especially our “gap” students), and disenfranchise families across this commonwealth. Unfortunately, this austerity experiment comes at the expense of our community’s most vulnerable children and on Jefferson County taxpayers’ dime…

“Shortly after the 2015 election, Bevin declared, “We’re going to bring charter schools to Kentucky, and we’re going to start in west Louisville.” As a parent of a student in a “low-performing” West End school, this statement set off alarm bells for me. You see, my son’s school has long been the target of charter school wannabes. The entire time my son was in the aviation magnet at The Academy @ Shawnee, our building leaders and teachers lived under Jefferson County Public Schools’ former superintendent’s constant threat of “state takeover.” This often resulted in one failed change-for-the-sake-of-change maneuver after another, further making Shawnee a sitting duck for charter school sharpshooters…

”As a parent and taxpayer, I’m asking Jefferson County voters to stand with other public school parents, teachers and taxpayers and say “no” to four more years of out-of-touch, destructive education policy from the Bevin administration. Vote for Andy Beshear on Nov. 5.”

 

 

 

Categories Accountability, ALEC, Betsy DeVos, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Disruption, Education Industry, Education Reform, Kentucky, Koch Brothers, Privatization

G.F. Brandenburg Rebukes Betsy DeVos on NAEP

By dianeravitch
November 2, 2019 //
30

Former D.C. math teacher Guy Brandenburg attended the NAEP press conference in D.C. where Betsy DeVos explained what lessons the nation can lean from the NAEP results. 

DeVos thinks the rest of the nation should learn from D.C., which has the largest racial gaps of any urban district tested by NAEP; Or Florida, where test scores went down; or Mississippi, where scores rose even though it is at the very bottom of all stages tested by NAEP. When you are at the very bottom, it’s easier to “improve” your scores.

When Betsy DeVos is long forgotten, please do not forget that she held up Mississippi as a model for the nation!

Brandenburg wants the world to know that D.C. made its greatest gains before mayoral control.

I found that it is true that DC’s recent increases in scores on the NAEP for all students, and for black and Hispanic students, are higher than in other jurisdictions.

However, I also found that those increases were happening at a HIGHER rate BEFORE DC’s mayor was given total control of DC’s public schools; BEFORE the appointment of Michelle Rhee; and BEFORE the massive DC expansion of charter schools.

He has the data and graphs to prove it.

Categories Accountability, Corporate Reformers, District of Columbia, Education Reform, Lies, Michelle Rhee, NAEP

Mike Deshotels on John White’s Record as Louisiana’s State Superintendent and Education Reformer

By dianeravitch
November 1, 2019 //
23

Mike Deshotels is a retired educator in Louisiana who blogs as “Louisiana Educator.”

In this post, he appraises State Superintendent John White’s record as state superintendent. 

He characterizes that record as “pitiful.”

John White, you may recall, is a “reformer,” that is, a specialist in Disruption. He is formerly TFA, a graduate of the unaccredited Broad Academy, and before coming to Louisiana, worked for Joel Klein in New York City, preparing public schools for takeover by charter schools. He supports charters, vouchers, and high-stakes testing.

Deshotels writes:

After over 7 years of John White as Louisiana’s education reformer, Louisiana ranks 47th on national reading and math tests, and 49th on the ACT.

John White’s propaganda mill had the unmitigated gall to put out this press release Tuesday claiming that Louisiana was “number one in the country in 8th grade math improvement” as measured by The Nations Report Card. This tiny bit of data selection is insignificant compared to overall achievement of our students in reading, math and college readiness. The press release neglected to mention that despite all this “improvement” Louisiana still ranks third to last compared to the 50 states in 8th grade math. There is also no mention that Louisiana ranks 47th out of the 50 states in overall performance on all the latest NAEP tests. No mention was made that the latest ACT tests now rank Louisiana second to last in the country in college readiness! Our ACT test score averages have been declining significantly for the last 3 years. White’s press release trying to portray total stagnation in student performance as “nation leading outcomes” is pathetic.

Deshotels reviews the state’ low NAEP scores, then turns to the steadily falling ACT scores:

For ACT scores, there is no press release at all from the LDOE, probably because they have not yet found a way to spin three years in a row of declining ACT scores as some type of success. Average ACT scores in Louisiana was 19.6 in 2017, 19.2 in 2018, and 18.8 in 2019. This is a very significant drop in three years. Don’t just take my word for it that Louisiana is performing poorly in college readiness, just take a look at this article by Will Sentell in The Baton Rouge Advocate casually mentioning that Louisiana has now fallen to 49th in the nation on the ACT.

 

 

Categories Accountability, Administrators, superintendents, Corporate Reformers, Disruption, Education Industry, Education Reform, Louisiana, Privatization, Testing

Pennsylvania: Speaker of the House Who Hates Public Schools and Teachers Will Have Electoral Challenge

By dianeravitch
October 31, 2019 //
3

 

Remember Pennsylvania Speaker of the House Mike Turzai, who denounced public schools as a “monopoly, and expressed his contempt for public school teachers as a “special interest group”?

He will have a Democratic challenger in the next election. Emily Skopov is the daughter of a public school teacher and an activist. Read her biography and learn about her project called “No Crayon Left Behind.”

Emily Skopov will challenge Pa. House Speaker Mike Turzai again in 2020

PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE localnews@post-gazette.com AUG 1, 2019

After losing by almost 9 percentage points in 2018, Marshall Democrat Emily Skopov said today that she will again challenge Pennsylvania State House Speaker Mike Turzai for the 28th Legislative District seat. Mr. Turzai, a Republican, has held the seat since 2001 and been the House speaker since 2015. Democrats have challenged him six times, but Ms. Skopov, riding a wave of Democratic energy following President Donald Trump’s election in 2016, was the first to get within 10 points. The 28th District is located entirely within Allegheny County, and includes Pine, Bradford Woods, McCandless, Franklin Park and Marshall. In a press release announcing her run, Ms. Skopov argued she could win because of “demographic and ideological shifts” in the district. “This district is one of the few in Pennsylvania to be currently experiencing unprecedented growth. Mr. Turzai has demonstrated an inability to recognize, let alone understand, these changes and the changing needs and priorities of the residents that he purports to represent,” she said.

https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-local/2019/08/01/Emily-Skopov-mike-turzai-pennsylvania-house-2020-election/stories/201908010125

Everyone who loves their public schools and respects teachers as dedicated professionals should support Emily Skopov. Every parent of public school children in the 28th District should support her. Turzai will be funded by Betsy DeVos. Emily Skopov needs our help.

District 28 needs a leader, not a DeVos puppet.

 

Categories Accountability, Betsy DeVos, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, For-Profit, Privatization, Vouchers

Matt Barnum at Chalkbeat: Betsy DeVos Uses Disappointing NAEP Scores to Call for More Charters and Vouchers

By dianeravitch
October 30, 2019 //
12

In a thoughtful article, Matt Barnum writes in Chalkbeat that Betsy DeVos used the disappointing results of the NAEP 2019 national tests to call for her “Education Freedom” plan, which would further disinvest in public schools and divert funding from the federal government, states, and local school districts to charters and vouchers.

Barnum writes:

But the call for more school choice — which, alongside deregulation of education at the federal level, DeVos has rebranded as “education freedom” — in response to stagnant test scores is certain to spur debate.

Research has generally found that charter schools perform comparably to district schools on state exams, with those in cities performing better and online charters performing worse. There is some evidence linking the growth of charter schools in cities to rising test scores across the board.

But recent studies on three voucher programs that subsidize private school tuition have shown that they reduce test scores in math. (DeVos has previously blamed over-regulation for Louisiana’s results.) In D.C., voucher recipients did about the same as public school students test-score wise, according to a recent study.

He added:

A number of studies have found that tougher test-based accountability rules, including No Child Left Behind, raised NAEP scores in math. Another recent studyfound evidence that the introduction of the Common Core standards reduced NAEP achievement.

Two studies have also linked more resources for schools to higher NAEP scores — though DeVos suggested otherwise Wednesday.

“Over the past 30 years, per-pupil spending has skyrocketed,” she said. “A massive increase in spending to buy flatlined achievement.”

One study showed that school finance reforms that resulted in more money boosted scores, and another found that education cuts in the wake of the Great Recession led to lower scores.

One undeniable fact is that the two lowest-scoring cities in the nation on the NAEP–Detroit and Milwaukee–have extensive choice. Detroit has loads of charter schools, and Milwaukee has charter schools and vouchers. If choice is the answer, as DeVos claims, it certainly has not helped these two cities.

To someone who has a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. Despite any evidence to the contrary, Betsy DeVos will push the same agenda that she has pushed for the past thirty years: school choice. It doesn’t raise test scores, it intensifies segregation, it defunds the community’s public schools, but DeVos doesn’t care. She wants public money to go to religious schools, corporate charter chains, for-profit schools, online schools, homeschooling. That’s her agenda, and nothing will persuade her otherwise.

 

Categories Accountability, Betsy DeVos, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, NAEP, Privatization, Testing, Vouchers
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