Archives for category: Corporate Reformers
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Mercedes Schneider on 50CAN

By dianeravitch
May 27, 2017 //
10

Mercedes Schneider wrote a post about 50CAN, which exists to spread the gospel of charter schools, state-run “Achievement school districts,” and high-stakes grading systems (unclear whether the high-stakes are only for public schools, as most states haven’t done much to identify or close failing charter schools).

Their agenda is a match with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and Betsy DeVos (who supports accountability for public schools only).

As Schneider points out, there is a lot of chatter on the website about “citizen advocates,” but it is clear from the membership on the board that 50CAN is run by the same wealthy magnates that finance other corporate reform, privatizing organizations. On the board, for example, is the Connecticut billionaire Jonathan Sackler, whose family became among the richest in America producing the highly addictive opioids OxyContin.

When you see the size of the staff, you realize that this is a very well funded organization with a multi-million dollar budget.

You will notice frequency of the phrase, “evidence-based,” but don’t be fooled. In almost every state, public schools outperform charter schools. And the only full-fledged Achievement School District is in Tennessee. It has been a dismal failure.

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

Laura Chapman on 50CAN

By dianeravitch
May 27, 2017 //
15

50CAN is a corporate reform organization that originated in Connecticut as ConnCAN. It was led by the billionaire Jonathan Sackler. Sackler owns Purdue Pharmaceuticals, which created the drug OxyContin, which is a highly addictive painkiller. The drug financing the expansion of charter schools made the Sackler family very wealthy (at last count, a net worth of $14 billion), but it is also implicated in the nation’s opioid crisis.

ConnCAN went national as 50CAN. (I learned from reading Elizabeth Young Bruelh’s book “Childism” that CAN is an acronym in the psychiatric literature that stands for “child abuse and neglect.”

Laura Chapman did some research and this is what she learned:

“According to Media Matters.org, 50CAN stands for the 50 State Campaign for Achievement Now. 50CAN is a network of state-level organizations pushing for pro-voucher and free-market education policies across the country. It has affiliates in Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island, and “fellowships “in California, Georgia, Indiana, Louisiana, and Wisconsin.

“The 2016 policy goals focused on passing state legislation in affiliate states to spur the rapid expansion of charter schools and to reduce state oversight of these schools.

“50CAN “partners” with many conservative and rightwing organizations that want to control school policy. Among these partners are the Commonwealth Foundation (a member of the State Policy Network) which, according to Politico includes these “associate members”: ALEC, David Koch’s Americans for Prosperity Foundation, FreedomWorks, Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, the Cato Institute and The Heritage Foundation. Add the Thomas B. Fordham Institute (see Wikipedia and board of directors); and Policy Innovators in Education Network (PIE) active in 34 states promoting market-based education.

“Each state in 50CAN has strategic partners and interlocking directorates among members. This inbreeding is planned and extensive. It is masked by the ambiguous language of “strategic partnerships” for policies and for advocacy, a relationship of “affiliate status,” and for “campaigns” (lobbying initiatives) with right wing organizations and projects. 50CAN state affiliates know how to find and to co-opt groups that should be defending public education. Go to jonathanpelto,com for a chilling report from early this year about the activities of ConnCAN.

“Here is another example. PIE (Policy Innovators in Education Network) is a sprawling network of deep-pocket and dark money power-brokers promoting market-based education in 34 states and Washington, DC. Members can be found here: http://pie-network.org/pie-network-members/

“Who finances PIE? Foundations set up by billionaires who have no respect for public education and othe institutions with democratic governance. PIE is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Walton Family Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation, Joyce Foundation, Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation, New Venture Fund, and McKnight Foundation.

“In March, 50CAN and Michelle Rhee”s StudentsFirst announced that they would merge and begin operating under the 50CAN name nationally, although state chapters of StudentsFirst will, for the most part, retain their “brands.”

“All of that is a a fraction of what’s going on, and with tax breaks for the “non-profits” who are working together for a “collective impact.”

https://www.mediamatters.org/research/2016/04/27/here-are-corporations-and-right-wing-funders-backing-education-reform-movement/210054#50can

My addendum: the PIE Network was launched by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.

Categories Billionaires, Charter Schools, ConnCAN, Connecticut, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Privatization

Jeff Bryant: DeVos’s “Transformation”=Public Theft

By dianeravitch
May 26, 2017 //
8

Jeff Bryant has read Betsy DeVos’s speeches slamming public schools and extolling the virtues of public subsidy for private and religious schools. She carefully selects an anecdote to make her case. But she is late to the party. There is now persuasive evidence that students in voucher schools get worse results than their peers in public schools. In addition, many of those who use vouchers are students from affluent families who are happy to have the pyvlid foot the bill for their private school tuition.

Betsy is shilling for her extremist allies at ALEC.

“Declaring “the time has expired for ‘reform,’” she called instead for a “transformation… that will open up America’s closed and antiquated education system.” Her plan also opens your wallet to new moochers of taxpayer dollars.

“By the way, AFC, according to SourceWatch, is a “conservative 501(c)(4) dark money group that promotes the school privatization agenda via the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and other avenues.” It also grew out of a defunct PAC connected to DeVos called “All Children Matter” that ran afoul legally in Ohio and Wisconsin and still owes Ohio $5.3 million for breaking election laws.”

Bryant concludes:

“In her efforts to create the education transformation she calls for, DeVos is supremely eager to “get Washington and the federal bureaucracy out of the way,” but still wants you to pay the cost of privatizing our schools. That’s not an agenda for better schools. It’s about stealing public money.”

Categories Accountability, ALEC, Betsy DeVos, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Fraud, Hoax, Privatization, School Choice

Who is Behind the Assault on Public Education?

By dianeravitch
May 25, 2017 //
23

Howard Ryan, writing in Monthly Review, analyzes the sources of support for corporate reform and privatization.

Ryan writes:

Over the past three decades, public schools have been the target of a systematic assault and takeover by corporations and private foundations. The endeavor is called “school reform” by its advocates, while critics call it corporate school reform. Finnish educator Pasi Sahlberg has given it the vivid acronym GERM—the global education reform movement. Its basic features are familiar: high-stakes testing; standardized curricula; privatization; and deskilled, high-turnover faculty. In the United States, public schools have become increasingly segregated, destabilized, and defunded, with the hardest hit in low-income communities of color.

Nevertheless, while the political conflicts and social ramifications of the school reform phenomenon are well known, basic questions about the movement remain underexamined. Who really leads it? What are their aims and motives? After briefly taking up the statements of the reformers themselves, I will turn to the views of their progressive opponents, and offer a critique of three influential interpretations of the school reform movement. Finally, I will present my own theory about this movement, its drivers, and its underlying aims…

A large body of research, however, challenges the merits of high-stakes testing and other elements of the corporate school reform package. It is also at least questionable whether the reformers really believe their own statements.

The reformers’ interest in school improvement appears, in a number of ways, to be less than genuine, to mask a different agenda. They prescribe models for mass education that they do not consider suitable for their own children. They sponsor think tanks to produce “junk research” praising their models, while ignoring studies that contradict their models. They insist that full resourcing of schools is unimportant or unrealistic, and that “great teachers” will succeed regardless of school conditions, class size, or professional training.”

You will find it interesting to see how he weaves together the various strands of the corporate reform movement.

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

Minnesota: Governor Dayton Blocks Reformers’ Efforts to Grant Licenses to Uncertified Teachers

By dianeravitch
May 25, 2017 //
14

Governor Mark Dayton of Minnesota has become a hero of public education.

Despite the pleas of the entire corporate reform movement in Minnesota, Dayton vetoed a bill that would have created a pathway into teaching for uncertified teachers, legislation needed to maintain a teaching force for charter schools.

Minnesota Governor “Disrupts” Right-Wing Education Reformers

Categories Accountability, ALEC, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Honor Roll, Minnesota, Teachers and Teaching

“Don’t Like Betsy DeVos? Blame the Democrats”

By dianeravitch
May 23, 2017 //
109

I wrote this article for The New Republic.

https://newrepublic.com/article/142364/dont-like-betsy-devos-blame-democrats

It explains how Democrats set the stage for DeVos’ anything-goes approach to school choice by their advocacy of charter schools. Charters are the gateway to vouchers. We have seen many groups like Democrats for Education Reform try to draw a sharp distinction between charters and vouchers. It doesn’t work. Once you begin defaming public schools and demanding choice, you abandon the central argument for public schools: they belong to the public.

The political side to this issue is that the Democratic Party sold out a significant part of its base–teachers, teachers unions, and minorities–by joining the same side as ALEC, the Walton family, and rightwing conservatives who never approved of public schools.

Their pursuit of Wall Street money in exchange for supporting charters helped to disintegrate their base. To build a viable coalition for the future, the Party must walk away from its flirtation with privatization and support the strengthening and improvement of our public schools.

Please share this article widely.

Categories Betsy DeVos, Billionaires, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Democrats, Democrats for Education Reform, Unions

Ohio: Major Newspaper Calls for Charter School Accountability and Transparency

By dianeravitch
May 23, 2017 //
8

One of the most heartening developments in recent years is the awakening of major newspapers in Ohio to the massive scandals surrounding their state’s charter industry. These scandals have come about because of the money nexus that connects charter operators and politicians. Charters in Ohio have a dismal academic record, and also a dismal financial record. This happens because the laws were written by charter lobbyists and protect the operators from full financial disclosure.

The Columbus Dispatch has had enough. In this editorial, it calls for legislation to compel charters to open their books for public inspection. Where public money goes, public accountability must follow.

No function of state government is more important than its constitutional obligation to “secure a thorough and efficient system of common schools throughout the state.” Education is the bedrock of democracy. That is why the Ohio Constitution, since 1851, has obligated the state to provide an education to each of its citizens.

How thoroughly and how efficiently the state fulfills this mandate should concern every Ohioan, every year, every generation.

But Ohioans’ ability to judge the state’s performance is threatened by state lawmakers’ willingness to hide from public view how the charter-school industry spends a sizable portion of taxpayer dollars.

In an era of privatization of much of primary and secondary education, taxpayers should insist that state lawmakers provide complete transparency of the expenditure of public funds for education.

State Rep. David J. Leland, D-Columbus, has introduced legislation to accomplish this goal. In fewer than 100 words, the bill declares “funds that the department of education pays to a community (charter) school or nonpublic school . . . are public funds and shall be subject to the same requirements related to permissible expenditures and audit by the auditor of state as public funds allocated to school districts.

“If a community school uses public funds to pay for services of an entity to manage the daily operations of that school or to provide programmatic oversight and support of that school, those funds maintain their status as public funds upon transfer.”

In recent years, Ohio earned an unwelcome reputation for having the nation’s worst oversight of the charter-school industry. No surprise, then, that Ohio has had some of the nation’s worst-performing charter schools.

The editorial goes on to detail the changes that are needed.

What this represents is a welcome recognition by the major media that charter schools cannot continue to operate as private schools with public money. A recent court decision in Ohio ruled, in accordance with the charter-friendly law, that anything purchased by the charter with public funds belongs to the charter operator, not the public. If the law is rewritten, that giveaway of public money must be ended.

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

Politico Reports on Expansion Plans of School Privatization Group

By dianeravitch
May 22, 2017 //
22

Politico’s Morning Edition posted this description of 50CAN, the pro-privatization organization that was started by hedge fund managers and big pharma in Connecticut:

FIRST IN MORNING EDUCATION: 50CAN’S GROWTH PLAN: The national education reform advocacy group, 50CAN, hopes to hire 1,000 new advocates by the year 2023. That’s a key part of the organization’s new growth plan, the first of its kind since 50CAN launched in 2011. The organization hopes those advocates will lead at least 250 policy campaigns across every single state to push on goals like more charter schools and holding schools and teachers accountable. At least two thirds of those policy pushes “will be at the neighborhood or regional level,” the plan says. 50CAN now cites 64 policy “wins” across 13 states, including a push for an A-F school grading system in Tennessee and a “more equitable public charter school funding in New Jersey.” To ensure future policy victories, 50CAN says that by 2023, its entire network of advocates “will be connected together through a best-in-class technology platform where they can plan campaigns, execute strategies and tactics, track and analyze campaign data in real time and gain key insights into how to increase their odds of success.”

50CAN will be pushing the DeVos-Jeb Bush agenda in every state. Charters and A-F ratings, which set up public schools for takeover to charter chains.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Privatization

Education Week: Marketing the Charter School Market

By dianeravitch
May 22, 2017 //
12

Education Week is a paradox. On one hand, it has many excellent reporters who check facts and write lucidly without partisanship. On the other, the corporate entity has become a selling platform for technology and charter schools.

I used to blog regularly at EdWeek, in a column called “Bridging Differences,” with Deborah Meier. No one ever changed what I wrote. I know that editorial independence is central to a journal’s integrity.

But since I departed (and even before), Education Week needed advertising from the industry on which it was reporting, and it began to turn into a platform for the industry. EdWeek also receives funding from the Gates Foundation and the Walton Foundation, each of which has its own agenda.

And so I regularly open my email box to find advertisements from EdWeek for tech products, webinars, seminars, panels, events, etc.

The latest was a solicitation for a webinar about “Mastering the Charter School Market.” Part of the pitch was that charters would capture 20-40% of the “market” by 2035.

Where did they get that figure? I thought about it. Then I discovered the source: The projection was made by Bellwether Partners, a consulting firm founded by reformer Andrew Rotherham, a leader in the charter school movement who represents charter corporations and advocates. This 2015 report (slide 60) says that the charter schools will have 22-38% of the “market” by 2035. That assumes that the numerous scandals associated with deregulation and the resistance of parents and educators to privatization have not slowed the movement long before then.

I am posting this after the event, because this is not an advertisement but rather a post expressing my concern about Edweek’s descent into marketing for the edBiz, whether it is technology or charters.

The registration form can be found here.

Screen Shot 2017-05-16 at 7.14.34 AMScreen Shot 2017-05-16 at 7.14.54 AM

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

Florida: Public School Parents Plead with Gov. Scott to Veto Disastrous Bill, Charter Schools Offer Incentives to Parents Who Write in Support

By dianeravitch
May 21, 2017 //
6

Here is a new charter school trick. The Florida legislature, which has an unseemly number of members who are directly connected to the charter industry, passed legislation that will benefit charters and harm public schools. Parents of public school students have been writing Governor Rick Scott and urging him to veto the bill. The public school parents are acting on their own. It would be unethical for their schools to encourage political activity. The two charter schools involved are part of the politically powerful for-profit Academica chain.

Some charter schools are offering parents an incentive to write the governor and urge him to sign the bill. At least two charter schools in Hialeah, Florida, are urging parents and students to contact the governor in support of the bill, which will help them and hurt public schools.

Some school choice advocates in South Florida are going so far as to offer incentives to parents in order to amplify the perception of public support for a controversial K-12 public schools bill that many are urging Gov. Rick Scott to veto.

At least two privately managed charter schools in Hialeah — Mater Academy Lakes High School and City of Hialeah Educational Academy — publicly advertised this week that they would give parents five hours’ credit toward their “encouraged” volunteer hours at the school, so long as they wrote a letter or otherwise urged Gov. Rick Scott to sign HB 7069.

“It is IMPERATIVE that the Governor, and the rest of the State of Florida, see what a POSITIVE DEMAND there is for this education bill,” read an alert on the homepage of Mater Academy Lakes’ website Thursday evening. “This is the strongest legislation supporting the charter school movement since charters were first established in Florida 20 years ago.”

“We need all of our Bear Family to show their support for HB 7069 and encourage your friends, family and children to get involved as well,” the message continued…

The two Hialeah charter schools’ advocacy and other promotional efforts by influential school choice organizations come in the wake of a groundswell of opposition from traditional public school supporters since lawmakers passed HB 7069 on May 8.

The nearly 10,000 phone calls, emails, letters and individual petition signatures received by Gov. Rick Scott were 3-to-1 against the bill, as of information provided Thursday evening. In contrast to the charters, there is no evidence that traditional public school advocates have offered incentives to boost support for their veto campaign.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article151507657.html#storylink=cpy

Public school advocates are pinning their hopes for a veto on a Republican governor who looks to Jeb Bush for guidance. Will he listen to public school parents? We will watch.

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