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Nancy Flanagan: One of the Very Best Books About Teaching!

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2023 //
6

Nancy Flanagan, now retired, taught music for many years. She is a keen observer of teaching and also of the pundits who regularly criticize teachers. She has been there, done that, and has no sympathy for armchair “experts.”

She recently reviewed a book that won her praise: Alexandra Robbins’s THE TEACHERS: A YEAR INSIDE AMERICA’S MOST VULNERABLE, IMPORTANT PROFESSION.

This book, Flanagan writes,

does what many other books about teaching are not able to do–take the reader right into the classroom, and describe what’s happening, with empathy and perception. There are lots of books about problems in American education, and lots of books that suggest solutions for those problems, but we seldom get to see examples, conversations and the people doing the work.

If you want a drone’s eye view of American public education—where it’s been, what bedevils the century-old movement to improve it—I would recommend Diane Ravitch’s trio of excellent books that follow education reform over the last couple of decades, or A Wolf at the Schoolhouse Door: The Dismantling of Public Education and the Future of School by Jack Schneider and Jennifer Berkshire.

But if you want to see what happens in the classroom and in the lives of teachers, Robbins accomplishes that better than any book I’ve read since Tracy Kidder’s Among Schoolchildren, written in 1989, which now feels like ancient history. The book is a tour de force—every teacher I know who’s read it agrees—unapologetically written from the POV of teachers without feeling the need to make excuses or backpedal.

I read an advance copy of the book and was similarly impressed. I felt that at this very moment, when teachers are being vilified by the likes of Betsy DeVos, Ron DeSantis, and other red state politicians, Alexandra Robbins’ book is a necessary antidote to scurrilous claims that teachers are “grooming” students for a life of perversity or training them to be Marxists. People who rain insults on teachers should be barred from public life.

Robbins follows three excellent teachers and describes their lives, their trials and successes.

Robbins highlights things that other education books don’t notice or can’t be bothered with–in-building teacher jealousies and vindictiveness, physical violence against teachers, the long-term effects of cuts to things once considered normal in every school, what it’s like to sit in an IEP meeting with a recalcitrant parent or clueless colleague.

Flanagan writes:

This book is also the first and best description I have read about the impact of the pandemic on teaching and learning. There have been endless articles and research on “learning loss”–all rife with meaningless data and numbers–but nobody talks about the impact of being expected to position family needs as secondary to students’ needs. Robbins gets this right–there is a line between acting morally vs. choosing school over family, a choice that teachers were urged to make, and reviled when they chose their own families and their own health. We have not yet reconciled that, here in America—but the book makes a good start on it.

Highly recommended for everyone, but especially teachers. It’s a fairly fast and facile read, although well-documented with endnotes, and should give teachers a lift, knowing that their work and their dilemmas have been acknowledged.

Categories Courage, Creativity, Teachers and Teaching

Llano County, Texas: How to Stop the Book Censors

By dianeravitch
April 18, 2023 //
23

Paul Waldman and Greg Sergeant of the Washington Post described the social pressure within the community that cause dthe book censors in the county to back off.

It isn’t every day that the ruminations of local bureaucrats in a small rural Texas county become national news. But when commissioners in Llano County — population 21,000 — voted Thursday to keep its three-branch library system open, the moment was closely monitored by the biggest news organizations in the country.

That’s because Llano County has become a national symbol of local right-wing censorship efforts after officials threatened to close its libraries entirely rather than allow offending materials to remain on shelves. Under intense scrutiny, the commission blinked. Its leader acknowledged feeling pressure from “social media” and “news media.”

The commissioners’ apparent reluctance for Llano to be seen as a locus of censorship points to an unexpected development: Skirmishes emanating from book bans at schools and libraries in red states and counties, once localized affairs, are becoming viral national sensations. And the American mainstream appears to be paying attention.

Like many other similar conflicts, this one was triggered by a single Llano resident, Bonnie Wallace, who objected in 2021 to library books she pronounced “pornographic filth.” A bunch were removed, including unobjectionable materials such as Maurice Sendak’s “In the Night Kitchen” and Isabel Wilkerson’s “Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents.”

The county also dissolved its libraries’ advisory board and reconstituted it with advocates of book removal, including Wallace herself. After other residents sued for the books’ return, a judge ordered the books placed back on the shelf, prompting the county to consider shutting the libraries pending the suit’s resolution.

At Thursday’s hearing, several of Llano’s self-designated commissars of book purging read explicit sex scenes from young adult books, but they went further, advocating for closure. One said: “I am for closing the library until we get this filth off the shelves.”

When the national media paid attention, other residents of Llano County realized that extremists were taking the lead and giving their community a bad name. Shame is a strong motivator.

But one of the big surprises of these sagas has been outbreaks of resistance to book purges in the reddest places, and here again, some locals dissented. One said: “We have to be a community that values knowledge.” Another fretted: “We are all over the media, and this is making us look pretty bad as a community.”

It turns out that even in an overwhelmingly conservative place (Donald Trump won nearly 80 percent of Llano’s votes in 2020), plenty of people value free expression. Many Republicans aren’t on board with the right’s censorship agenda. And these folks can organize.

To be fair to Llano County’s conservatives, many insist they don’t want to burn or censor books. As they told one of us (Paul Waldman) in interviews in Llano last fall, they only wanted material to be age-appropriate.

But that doesn’t explain opposition to books about racism. And even if some conservative voters are more measured, these efforts are open to abuse. In places such as Florida, they have allowed lone conservative activists to remove dozens of books from schools based on flimsy or absurd objections.

The book-banning impulse is taking on a crazed life of its own. At a Llano County tea party meeting in November, Waldman witnessed Wallace passionately pleading that “I need more conservative friends” to help get “pornography out of the library,” adding: “We must, must, must keep fighting.” It was obvious that, for people like Wallace, the prospect of controlling which books their community can access has been a thrill.

Such right-wing activists thought they had good reason for confidence. After Republican Glenn Youngkin was elected Virginia governor in 2021 on a dishonestly termed “parental rights” platform, some censorship-minded activists imagined they had a national mandate. But arguably only the GOP base was paying attention to that issue at the time (swing voters were focused on school closures).

Now, the national media — and perhaps the mainstream of the country — are watching these local abuses unfold. “Every day it seems there’s a new book banned, an art exhibit canceled, or a drag performance under threat,” Jonathan Friedman of PEN America told us. “People are waking up to the fact that state and local governments are running rampant.”

National opinion isn’t cooperating with the censors. In the 2022 elections, many prominent culture-warring GOP candidates lost. (Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is an exception.) Polls show large percentages of parents are concerned about schools banning books and that Americans overwhelmingly reject bans based on teachings about history and race.

Therein lies a trap for the GOP. The activist base is demanding increasingly reactionary censorship measures, and officials such as DeSantis are obliging for 2024 primary purposes. Yet as these local far-right lurches attract attention, they taint the national GOP as extreme.

Democrats should take heed. Some still appear skittish about culture-war issues, as evidenced when Education Secretary Miguel Cardona told TPM’s Hunter Walker that “we want to stay above” censorship controversies, as if ignoring them would make them go away or is good politics.

But when the national spotlight falls on censorship, the right is exposed, the left is energized and moderates balk at seeing their communities controlled by a small band of extremists.

Democrats must speak to those resisting these outbreaks of hysteria in deep-red places such as Llano. In some of them, fundamental liberal values still endure. The way to respond to this wave of censorship isn’t to hope it burns out, but to flush it into the light and confront it head on.

Overall, the story in Llano County is encouraging. It shows that civic leaders don’t want their community to be known for book banning.

But what’s really discouraging is the loud silence from the U.S. Department of Education. Why is Secretary Cardona silent? Why does he want to stay out of censorship controversies? Why isn’t he defending teachers and librarians? Why isn’t he standing up for the right to read?

This is a perilous time. American schools, teachers, and librarians need a champion not milquetoast. Teachers and librarians know that their jobs are at risk if they stand up to the vigilantes. What does Secretary Cardona have to lose? He should be speaking out against vouchers. He should be speaking out against censorship. He should be defending the accurate teaching of American history. He cannot float above the issues without appearing weak.

Democrats must speak out against censorship and privatization. That is a winning strategy.

Categories Cardona, Miguel, Censorship, Courage, Democracy, Extremism, Freedom to Read, Librarians, Libraries, Lies, Literacy, Literature, Texas

Peter Greene: Hurrah for Congressman Jamaal Bowman, Who Wants to End the Standardized Test Mandate!

By dianeravitch
April 10, 2023 //
51

Peter Greene has moved his wonderful blog Curmudgucation to Substack. Here is his first Substack submission. It describes the importance of Congressman Jamaal Bowman’s proposal to end the federal testing mandate, which was enacted 22 years ago. The tests have proved to be useless (the results come in after the students has moved to a different teacher); the ratings on the test are based on NAEP achievement levels, which is confusing and inaccurate. Most people think that most students should rank “proficient,” but NAEP Proficient is equivalent to an A. Most students are never at A performance unless standards are dumbed down.

Greene writes:

Categories Accountability, Courage, Education Industry, NCLB (No Child Left Behind), Race to the Top, Standardized Testing

Tennessee: GOP Expels 2 of 3 Democrats Who Spoke for Gun Control Without ”Permission”

By dianeravitch
April 6, 2023 //
27

Two of three rebellious Democratic legislators were expelled from the Tennessee legislature. The two who were expelled are Black. The third, who survived, is a white woman. This is an unprecedented sanction for defying the majority and speaking without permission, on behalf of gun control. Expulsion in the past was reserved for criminal behavior or sex scandals, not dissidence. The two legislators were expelled for breaking House rules of decorum.

It was an outrageous, undemocratic decision.

The vote to expel the second legislator, Gloria Johnson, a special education teacher, failed by one vote. When asked why Rep. Jones was expelled but she was not, she responded, “It might have something to do with the color of our skin.”

The Republican Party in Tennessee gerrymandered legislative districts to give themselves a supermajority. Democrats are powerless. Governor Bill Lee is a hard right ideologue.

After the murder of three children and three staff members at the Coventry School in Nashville, parents and students surrounded the Statehouse demanding gun control, which will never happen in this state so long as the state is solidly owned by the GOP.

Instead of enacting gun control, the legislators passed a law to arm teachers and “harden” schools.

NASHVILLE, Tennessee — Voting has begun in Nashville, where the Republican-controlled Tennessee state House of Representatives have already agreed to oust one of the three Democratic lawmakers in what marks the first partisan expulsion in the state’s modern history.

State Rep. Justin Jones, the first lawmaker expelled when lawmakers voted to adopt HR65, called the resolution “a spectacle” and “a lynch mob assembled to not lynch me, but our democratic process.”

“We called for you all to ban assault weapons and you respond with an assault on democracy,” Jones said during his 20-minute opening statement.

Earlier in the Thursday session, the legislature passed HB322, a bill that requires schools to implement a number of safety plans and security systems, over the objections of the three members who face expulsion.

“This bill is not about school safety that will not make our students safer,” Jones said, adding the move to “make our schools militarized zones” is borne out of refusal “to address the real issue, which is easy access to military grade weapons, which is easy access to weapons of war on our streets.”

State Rep. Gloria Johnson, a former teacher, decried the possibility of “gun battles at our schoolhouse door,” and state Rep. Justin Pearson, the last of the trio, argued that “the root cause that each of us have to address is this gun violence epidemic do the due to the proliferation of guns.”

“We don’t need a solution that says if you don’t lock a door or get someone with a gun, we need a solution that says people shouldn’t be going to schools and to houses and to neighborhoods with weapons of war,” Pearson added.Protesters gathered both inside — in the gallery, where they were told to remain silent — and in large groups outside, in apparent support of the three Democratic lawmakers.

Jones, Johnson and Pearson are facing expulsion resolutions for allegedly violating the chamber’s rules of decorum by participating in a gun control protest at the state Capitol last week. The demonstration came in the wake of the deadly Covenant School shooting in Nashville on March 27, where a former student fatally shot three children and three adults, police have said.

Republican leaders said that by siding with the large crowd of peaceful parents and students the three legislators had encouraged an “insurrection,” and some (the House Speaker) said it was even worse than the January 6 events when thousands of people broke into the Capitol and sent members of Congress hiding for their lives.

The courageous “Tennessee Three” were subject to expulsion for defending the lives of the innocent while the Republicans cower before the NRA.

The Tennessean reported:

Moments after voting to expel Jones, the House took up a resolution to expel Rep. Gloria Johnson.

Johnson brought two attorneys, former state Reps. John Mark Windle and Mike Stewart, to represent her. Windle spoke first on her behalf, pointing out specific accusations in the resolution of actions that Johnson specifically did not commit.

“It is an absolute falsehood that has been perpetuated on this body,” Windle said. “This woman did not shout – and that’s the first particular that they charged.” 

Windle noted that Johnson did not bang on the House podium or become disorderly.

“Do you know who Gloria Johnson is? Does anybody know her? Is she a boogie man?” Windle asked. “Gloria Johnson is a school teacher. A special education teacher.”

“Today is Maundy Thursday, the day of betrayal,” he said. “Isn’t it fitting these allegations are made during Holy Week?” 

During his remarks, Stewart argued that expulsion of a member for decorum violations is unprecedented in the House body.

“I haven’t heard anybody on this floor cite a single example of somebody being expelled from a legislative body based on these sort of flimsy charges,” Stewart said. “This is not just unprecedented in the state of Tennessee, and has no precedent in the United States of America.”

Rep. Gloria was not expelled, although she acted in concert with the other two legislators, both of whom are Black men, the youngest in the legislature at 27.

Then the legislature took up the case of the 3rd Democrat—Rep. Justin Pearson—who protested inaction on gun control. Like Rep. Jones, Rep. Pearson was expelled.

The two representatives can run for their seats again, but their districts will currently have no representation.

The GOP is a party that opposes democracy. In state after state, it is going full fascist.

Categories Accountability, Courage, Democracy, Democrats, Elections, Fascism, Guns, Guns in Schools, Nashville, Tennessee

Robert Hubbell: “They Will Lose; We Will Win”

By dianeravitch
April 6, 2023 //
9

Robert Hubbell is cheerful and optimistic in the aftermath of the huge win in Wisconsin for an open seat on the State Supreme Court. This outcome will have a profound effect on the state. He reviews the Republican threats to impeach the winner and sees them as a hollow, self-defeating strategy. He looks at the wave of handwringing articles that were published yesterday worrying about New York DA Alvin Bragg’s case against Trump and he sides with those who trust Bragg.

He writes:

Before all votes were counted in Justice Janet Protasiewicz’s commanding win in Wisconsin, Democrats began to worry that the GOP supermajority in the legislature would impeach and remove the newly elected justice from office. The panic was created by the election of a Republican to the Wisconsin senate on Tuesday, a victory that gives the GOP enough votes to convict Justice Janet Protasiewicz in an impeachment trial.

The details of the threat are described by The Guardian, as follows:

[Dan Knodl] has said he would consider impeaching Protasiewicz, who is currently a circuit court judge in Milwaukee, if she remained on the bench there. He did not say whether he would consider impeaching Protasiewicz as a supreme court justice.

Should we take the threat seriously? Of course, we would be fools not to! Should we live in fear of that prospect? Absolutely not! In the immortal words of Brendan Sullivan, “We are not potted plants.” If the Wisconsin GOP decides to disenfranchise the one million plus citizens of Wisconsin who voted for Justice Janet Protasiewicz, those one million voters will have something to say about that development—and it will not be good for Republicans. Indeed, it would be electoral suicide for Wisconsin Republicans.

Justice Janet Protasiewicz’s election demonstrated that Republicans in Wisconsin are hemorrhaging support in major suburbs, a previous GOP stronghold. See this discussion by Steve Kornacki on MSNBC. Disenfranchising the voters in the suburbs of Madison and Milwaukee will do nothing to bolster GOP prospects in those former strongholds.

And then there is this: Imagine for a moment that the Wisconsin GOP decides to overturn the mandate of the people by removing Justice Janet Protasiewicz. Would those voters “go gently into that good night?” Or would they, for example, call for a general strike? Or walk out of state, county, and municipal offices to shut down the government? Or hold continuous massive demonstrations in front of the state Capitol? Or all the above?

(Hint to Wisconsin Republicans about your future if you remove Justice Janet Protasiewicz: Look at ongoing protests in Tennessee over the GOP legislature’s callous and underwhelming response to the mass shooting in Tallahassee last week.)

If Republicans in Wisconsin want to tell Democrats they have no voice in running the state in accordance with democratic rules, there is no reason for Democrats to support an institution that exists merely to oppress them. Do I think it will come to that? I don’t.

But it doesn’t matter what I believe about the likelihood that the threat will materialize. My point is that we cannot live in fear. We are not powerless, we are not potted plants, and Wisconsin Democrats are shifting the electoral landscape by championing reproductive liberty, protection from gun violence, and fair elections. That is a powerful combination of issues on which Democrats have the high ground—politically and morally.

We should resist every effort and all talk of impeaching Justice Janet Protasiewicz. But no one should live in fear of that development. Indeed, post-Dobbs, Democrats have been on a winning streak in which reproductive liberty has been front and center. See NYTimes, Wisconsin Rout Points to Democrats’ Enduring Post-Dobbs Strength.

But even if Republicans remove Justice Janet Protasiewicz, the Democratic Governor Tony Evers fills the vacancy by appointment. Article VII, Wisconsin Constitution – Ballotpedia(“The vacancy shall be filled by appointment by the governor, which shall continue until a successor is elected and qualified.”)

Details aside, if Republicans decide that we must have a political fight over whether elections matter in Wisconsin, then we must not shrink from that fight or live in fear. Indeed, if Republicans insist on forcing the issue, the sooner the better. They will lose; we will win.

And the same logic applies to the indictment of Donald Trump, where similar angst is driving public handwringing and second-guessing by commentators. Republican prosecutors in red-state counties across the nation are grumbling about indicting President Biden. Should we take the threat seriously? Of course! We would be fools not to. Should we live in fear of that happening? Absolutely not!

The lunatic conspiracy theories on which Biden might be indicted would be litigated through the US Supreme Court—which, as of this writing, still recognizes Article II of the Constitution. The theories being bandied about include a ludicrous allegation that Biden has “opened” the southern border when, in fact, he has (unfortunately) reimposed many of the Trump-era policies. See, e.g., Los Angeles Times, Biden’s new immigration strategy expands on Trump border policy and continues Title 42.

What about “Hunter Biden’s laptop? Be my guest! Or claims that Biden runs an international pedophilia ring? GOP prosecutors couldn’t do more to drive persuadable Independents away from their fringe political leader, Donald Trump. Or a claim that private citizen Joe Biden was (allegedly) on a single conference call with his son in 2017 that discussed a Chinese energy investment? Last time I checked, “conducting business” is not a crime.

So, we cannot permit ourselves to be dissuaded from upholding the law because Republicans threaten to break the law. This point is made in a brilliant essay by Josh Marshall in his Editor’s Blog,

But let’s address the argument head on. Will all future presidents now face a gauntlet of post-presidential judicial scrutiny?

It’s worth remembering that Donald Trump is the first and only president in American history to attempt a coup d’etat to remain in office illegally and that was before any history of presidential prosecutions. The problem isn’t incentives. It’s Donald Trump.

It amounts to the same specious argument . . . “Don’t follow the law because we’ll break the law”.

We have no choice but to enforce the law; indeed, it is our duty if we want to maintain a civilized society governed by laws rather than brute force. So, can we please stop the collective handwringing about prosecuting Trump for something that every other American would be prosecuted for if they engaged in the same conduct? I, too, regret that the Manhattan indictment was first, but that is not Alvin Bragg’s fault.

After the rash of articles on Tuesday explaining how weak the case against Donald Trump is, supporters of the case made strong arguments that it is no different than other cases successfully prosecuted by Bragg. And on the key question of whether state or federal election crimes can be used to leverage misdemeanors into felonies, commentators with extensive experience in New York responded, “Of course, they can!” SeeKaren Friedman Agnifilo and Norman Eisen op-ed in NYTimes, We Finally Know the Case Against Trump, and It Is Strong.

With the release of the indictment and accompanying statement of facts, we can now say that there’s nothing novel or weak about this case. The charge of creating false financial records is constantly brought by Mr. Bragg and other New York D.A.s. In particular, the creation of phony documentation to cover up campaign finance violations has been repeatedly prosecuted in New York. That is exactly what Mr. Trump stands accused of.

So, depending on which legal commentator you cite, the case is “novel” and “weak,” or “routine” and “strong.” Here’s my advice: Let Alvin Bragg do what prosecutors do and stop worrying about bad faith attacks on the prosecution. Will Kevin McCarthy succeed in forcing Alvin Bragg to appear before a House committee? Maybe, but I doubt it. If he does, my money is on Alvin Bragg being able to handle himself.

But, as in Wisconsin, if House Republicans believe their path to victory in 2024 involves “defunding the FBI and DOJ” to rescue an indicted, twice-impeached, failed coup plotter who is raging against the trial judge, his family, and the prosecutor, Republicans have made the wrong bet. We should be confident in that assessment. After all, Trump lost in 2018, 2020, and 2022 using the same grievance-based script he repeated at Mar-a-Lago after his indictment.

So, let’s not obsess over the bad-faith, self-defeating tactics Republicans are using. If Republicans decide that we must have a political fight over whether former presidents are above the law, then we must not shrink from that fight or live in fear. Indeed, if Republicans insist on forcing the issue, the sooner the better. They will lose; we will win.

Categories Accountability, Courage, Democrats, Education Industry, Elections, Extremism, Republicans, Wisconsin

Texas: Vouchers Will Soon Come to a Vote in Legislature: Write, Call, Speak Out!

By dianeravitch
April 4, 2023 //
2

Governor Gregg Abbott has pushed very hard for vouchers to fund religious schools, homeschooling, and anything else that calls itself a school. Texas has a state constitution that requires public schools, but voucher advocates abandon the language of state constitutions when they get in the way of their goal.

We know from experience that most vouchers will be used by students already enrolled in private or religious schools. We know that the cost of funding kids already in private schools will be enormous. More than 300,000 students attend private schools in Texas. Add in home schoolers, and you are looking at an annual cost of nearly $3 billion before any public school student has asked for a voucher.

We know from research studies that most of the public school kids who take vouchers will drop out of their religious school and return to their public school far behind their peers.

No group has been more effective in fighting to preserve public schools than Pastors for Texas Children. They have mobilized rural Republicans to stand strong for their public schools, which are the hub of their community.

PTC released the following report today:

Call and Write Your Senator and Representative TODAY!

The SB 8 education savings account voucher bill will likely pass out of the Senate Education Committee today or tomorrow, then go to the Senate floor for a vote. It’s been astonishing that the bill has been stalled in the Senate for the past week! As you know, the Texas Senate, under the leadership of Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, has long supported private school vouchers. Contact your State Senator anyway! Our job is to influence and educate them!

Vouchers stop and die in the Texas House of Representatives. They will vote on Thursday on an amendment to the budget bill preventing public money from funding private schools. Here it is:

Call and email your State Representative before Thursday and urge him or her to support the Herrero Amendment prohibiting private school voucher funding.

You can find their Austin office numbers here.

PTC pastor Rev. Julio Guarneri, the pastor of Calvary Baptist Church in McAllen, has written a powerful letter to his state senator. It gives us all a good, succinct script for our talking points as we contact our policymakers.

It’s our job before God to speak truth to power. God bless us all as we bear witness to God’s truth and justice this week!

 

Senator Hinojosa,

I hope you had a good weekend. I attempted to call you on the phone this morning but you were in a meeting and I know this is a busy week for you. I hope to still be able to talk to you over the phone but in the meantime, let me share with you what I am calling about.

I am the Lead Pastor at Calvary Baptist Church in McAllen. I am also currently serving as president of the Baptist General Convention of Texas (Texas Baptists), to whom the Christian Life Commission relates. And I am with Pastors for Texas Children as well.

I am writing you in regard to SB 8 (Education savings account/school voucher bill). As a Baptist, as a pastor, and as a religious leader, I am opposed to SB 8 for several reasons. My conviction is that church and state should be separate. A free church in a free state is our ideal. Thus, I do not believe tax dollars should be used to fund religious education. Public tax dollars should be used for public schools. Religious causes should be supported by donations from private individuals.

There are only two choices for religious schools who receive help from tax credits. They either receive oversight from the government, which violates the separation of church and state, or they receive the benefit without accountability, which is wrong.

Furthermore, this measure seems to mostly benefit middle to upper class families, leaving lower income families either without enough of a tax credit to afford a private school or with an underfunded public school system. We will do a disservice to Texas if we leave lower income families at an educational disadvantage.

I know you have historically opposed school vouchers and I am thankful for that. I respectfully ask you to hold your position. As a religious leader I believe it is the right thing.

Please do not hesitate to call me or email me.

May you have a blessed Holy Week and a Happy Easter!

For our Texas children and our Texas future,

Julio S. Guarneri, Ph.D.

Calvary Baptist Church

McAllen, Texas

Pastors at the Capitol

DONATE TO PTC

 

PO Box 471155, Fort Worth, Texas, 76147

Check out our website  

 

Categories Accountability, Courage, Education Industry, Equity, Funding, Separation of church and state, Texas, Vouchers

Tennessee: GOP Threatens to Expel 3 Democratic Legislators Who Joined Anti-Gun Protest

By dianeravitch
April 3, 2023 //
17

The statehouse in Nashville, Tennessee, was surrounded by parents and students demonstrating in favor of gun control and against the GOP-controlled legislature’s protection of guns. The protest follows the murder of three children and three staff members at the Coventry School in Nashville.

Three Democratic members of the legislature joined the protest, chanting with the protestors.

The GOP leadership threatened to expel the Democrats. The speaker of the House absurdly claimed that the three Democrats were encouraging an insurrection.

Parents and children held signs and shouted chants during a large protest at the Tennessee capitol last week following a deadly school shooting. And while no one was arrested or injured, Republican House Speaker Cameron Sexton is comparing the demonstration to the Jan. 6 insurrection.

During the House Floor session on Thursday — days after the Covenant School shooting — Reps. Gloria Johnson, D-Knox, Justin Pearson, D-Memphis, and Justin Jones, D-Nashville, stood up and chanted with protestors in the gallery.

Pearson and other Democrats attempted to acknowledge the large group of protesters during session, but were told to stick to the subject of the bill by Speaker Cameron.

“We listened to them and helped to elevate the issue that they are demanding justice for,” said Pearson.

House Speaker Cameron Sexton said their actions were more than a breach of decorum, comparing it to the January 6th insurrection in remarks to outlets.

“Two of the members; Representative Jones and Representative Johnson, have been very vocal about Jan. 6 and Washington, D.C., about what that was,” said Sexton. “What they did today was equivalent, at least equivalent, maybe worse depending on how you look at it, to doing an insurrection in the State Capitol.”

Sexton warned that there will likely be consequences for the trio.

“It could be removal of committees; it could be censorship; it could be expulsion from the General Assembly. Anywhere in between,” said Sexton.

Leaders in the Democratic caucus are defending their colleagues. Nashville Democrat John Ray Clemmons says he believes Speaker Sexton is exaggerating.

“You show me the broken windows, you show me anyone who went into the speaker’s office and put their chair up on his desk and trashed his office, you show me where a noose was hanging anywhere on the legislative plaza,” said Clemmons, citing damage committed during the Capitol riot, which resulted in five deaths before and after the event.

The three rebellious Democrats were stripped of their committee assignments. Their member badges were deactivated. Their telephones were disconnected.

In a press conference Monday, Jones says Sexton is more focused on politics than addressing last week’s mass shooting.

“We are members, who are standing in the well, telling our speakers and our colleagues that kids should not be murdered in school,” Jones said, “and rather than address that issue, the speaker has spent more time on Twitter this weekend talking about a fake insurrection than he did about the deaths of six people including 9-year-old children.”

It is not yet clear if the lawmakers will face expulsion. Sexton has not commented on whether they will face further discipline.

A tweet:

Three Tennessee Democrats have been stripped of their committee and subcommittee assignments by the Republican dominated legislature for speaking out against gun violence in the wake of the Nashville shooting that killed three children.

Democracy is dead in Tennessee.

@Sethaweitz

Rep. Gloria Johnson, one of the three Democrats, tweeted:

Categories Accountability, Censorship, Civil Rights, Courage, Democracy, Freedom of Speech, Guns, Guns in Schools, Nashville, Parents, Republicans, Resistance, Safety, Tennessee

Chicago: Vote for Brandon Johnson for Mayor

By dianeravitch
April 2, 2023 //
3

Julie Vassilatos, a parent activist and blogger in Chicago, writes here about the case for Brandon Johnson. She and others have written passionately against Paul Vallas, but here she explains why Brandon Johnson is well prepared to serve as Mayor. Because of his knowledge and experience, he not only knows the city’s budgetary issues well, but he is able to address the root causes of crime and the real needs of students.

She writes:

Friends, so many of us have been carrying on about the dangers of Paul Vallas so incessantly, you’d be forgiven for thinking that he’s running for mayor of Chicago unopposed.

But Vallas does have an opponent—one who is talented, thoughtful, experienced, and a real true Chicagoan raising his family on the west side: Brandon Johnson.

Johnson is getting a lot of heat from Vallas and his supporters right now. No lesser a personage than Darren Bailey, defeated far-right candidate for IL governor and unofficial endorser of Vallas, has announced that if Johnson is elected, it will be a “dark day” for Chicago. Yes. A dark day indeed. Get it?

I’m pretty sure Darren Bailey fans get it.

Then there’s FOP president/disgraced cop John Catanzara, who foresees that 1000 cops will walk off the job if Johnson wins, and there will be blood in the streets.

Vallas himself, who routinely speaks of Johnson in kind of Godzilla terms, has called him and the CTU a destructive force wreaking devastation on the city.

In addition to its coded race language, this election has rather inflated rhetoric.

I’m trying to keep mine toned down, or at least backed up by evidence. While it’s hard to pin “generational” devastation on Johnson or the CTU, it’s actually possible to do this for Vallas. He has set many destructive policies in motion in urban areas globally that have left decades of harm in their wake. Also financial calamity. But I and many others have told you all this over and over again. And this post is not about that guy.

This post is about Brandon Johnson.


Truth to tell, at the outset of the race I was slow to warm up to Johnson the candidate. But then I remembered that he was at the front lines of a struggle I will never forget—the 2013 mass school closures. So many folks did all we could do to try and stop that, well, generationally damaging policy. And those who led the way in that effort? I’d probably follow them into a fire.

But what about Brandon Johnson now? What are his credentials? Haven’t you, like me, read all that stuff about how he has no experience? How he’s never managed a budget? How he seems (unfathomably) to like crime and together with CTU wants our city to be unsafe, because….because….well, because reasons?

Well, maybe we need to look a little deeper than the media/social media blah blah blah.

In a recent mayoral forum Vallas asserted that “Brandon has run nothing.” Since Vallas hasn’t really lived here much I guess he may not know that Johnson has served on the Cook County Board of Commissioners since 2018 and has managed a great deal, including the $8.75B Cook County budget. The Cook County Board has wide ranging responsibilities, and if you’ve always wondered but never known what the Board does, you should take this time to educate yourself, starting at the Cook County Board website. Here’s a basic summary:

The Cook County Board of Commissioners oversees County operations and approves the budget of elected County officials including the Assessor, Board of Review Commissioners, County Clerk, Clerk of the Circuit Court, Recorder of Deeds, Sheriff, States Attorney and Treasurer.

The Commissioners also serve as the Board of the Cook County Forest Preserve District, a special purpose taxing district. The Board also sets policy, levies taxes, passes ordinances, approves all county purchases over $10,000, and adopts the annual budget for the entire county government.

That 2023 Cook County Budget was praised by the Civic Federation:

The Civic Federation supports the Cook County FY2023 Executive Budget Recommendation of $8.75 billion because it reflects strong financial management and puts the County in a good position moving forward post-pandemic. The County’s FY2023 proposed budget includes a strong level of reserves and positive revenue projections, without any increases in taxes or fees.

The budget gap is smaller than it’s been in years, supplemental payments to the pension fund have been made for the eighth year in a row, and the County’s fiscal position is “strong…following robust revenue performance and built-up reserves.” And observe that there are in this budget, no tax increases. (Here I note we can be grateful to Board President Toni Preckwinkle who has shepherded this budget for 13 years. And I note further, she has endorsed Johnson.)

Now let’s review the budgets Vallas has overseen.

In Philadelphia, Vallas managed a $2B budget and left a surprise $73M deficit on his way out the door. In the Louisiana Recovery District his budget was $176M. He got an extra $1.8B to work with from FEMA, and before he was done with the NOLA job he wandered repeatedly over to Haiti, missing weeks at a time of work in New Orleans (that’s beside the point, but I just thought you should know). And in Bridgeport CT, his budget was $232M. Of course he was pushed out of that job before he could really do much financial damage there.

For those of you keeping score, Vallas hasn’t ever drafted, managed, or implemented a budget even close to the size that Brandon Johnson has worked with as a member of the Cook County Board.

Before his County Board days, Johnson was a teacher. He taught middle school social studies at Jenner from 2007 to 2010 (years when most of his students were able to watch, right from school windows, wrecking balls demolishing their homes as the city brought down public housing), and then at Westinghouse for a year. He then became a CTU organizer and the leader of its Black Caucus. In those years he had a front row view on lots of turmoil in the district: school closures and turnarounds via the failed Renaissance 2010 initiative, the loss of Black teachers in the classroom as a result of closures and CPS policy choices, the 2012 teacher strike, the 2013 mass school closures, a churn of district CEOs, some of whom ended up in prison, illegal special education cuts, and rapid charter expansion.

While Johnson was organizing teachers and collaborating with parents in response to district policies that were crushing schools and services (and I do mean that literally, with at least one occasion of bulldozers bringing down a school library on a day when parents were instead expecting a meeting), he lived the experience of the folks who’ve been at the mercy of “education reform” for decades. He saw first hand what disinvestment has done to CPS students—resulting in teacher cuts, special ed cuts, after-school cuts, nursing cuts, and the whittling away of libraries, down to only 90 remaining in a total of 513 schools. He’s seen the violent legacy of closing the community anchor that is a public school. He’s watched, along with all of us, poor choices at the top—everything from grifting, self-dealing, and bribery, to no-bid contracts and cronyism—and how those things bust budgets and destroy trust. He stood with community members on a hunger strike to save a school, then joined in it himself. He’s seen the negative academic and social impacts of excessive testing, privatization, and vouchers. He’s seen these things from the perspective of 25,000 teachers and hundreds of thousands of public school families.

Vallas, meanwhile, has been the man who set those policies. He set them in motion right here in Chicago in 1995, and traveled the country and globe continuing to implement them from then until now.

He may talk a good game about Doing It All For The Children, but the fact of the matter is, Vallas has never had to stick around and watch the long term impacts of his policy decisions on The Children. Those impacts have caused years of student protests in Chile. Have kept special ed kids struggling for spots in schools in New Orleans. Have left Philadelphia in “constant crisis mode.” Led directly to our own CPS budget crisis.

Brandon Johnson has large scale urban management experience with a Board that’s closing budget gaps and overseeing a vast array of county services. He manages a bigger budget right now than Vallas ever has. And Johnson has face-to-face, personal experience with the folks who live and work and raise their children in Chicago. His years as a teacher and with CTU have given him the perspective of individuals and families on a hyper-local basis. His work has encompassed both the broad span of countywide planning and management, and the particular lens on particular people and particular struggles.

Brandon Johnson is obviously qualified for the job.

You can check out how his qualifications and vision work themselves into a platform on his website. It’s practical and passionate and outlines a vision for the city that benefits everyone, even those struggling folks who never seem to catch a break from city leaders.

Johnson understands we cannot solve violence without dealing with its root causes; more policing, surveilling, and arresting alone won’t do the trick. We can’t fix the schools without listening to communities, parents, and educators; we must reject the failed status quo of Vallas’s “education reform.” And we can’t expect our teachers and police to solve poverty and homelessness all on their own.

The choice we have before us, it seems to me, is whether we’re going to listen to the incessant hype about a “fix-it man”—who has never fixed anything. Or dig a little deeper ourselves and see that the mayor we need has been here all along, working to make our city better for his entire career, with poise and passion.

Are we going to listen to voices that allude to “dark days” and blood baths in the streets? Or are we going to listen to a man who has a vision for his city rooted in love and practical experience?

You pick, Chicago.

Categories Accountability, Character, Charter Schools, Chicago, Closing schools, Community Schools, Courage, Creativity, Democracy, Education Reform, Elections, Funding, Supporting public schools, Vallas, Paul

Omaha: High School Students Walk Out to Protest Hate Laws

By dianeravitch
April 1, 2023 //
32

Yesterday, hundreds of Omaha high school students walked out to protest the anti-trans legislation moving through the Nebraska legislature. The youth are our hope for a better future, one where hate is stigmatized.

As many as several hundred students at Omaha’s Central High School braved dropping temperatures Friday and walked out of class to protest two pending bills in the Nebraska Legislature.

Armed with bright, colorful signs and a microphone, students used speeches and poetry to protest Legislative Bills 574 and 575, which focus on transgender youths. Both bills were introduced by State Sen. Kathleen Kauth of Omaha.

The Central students were joined by others, including parents, young children and community members, to hear a number of student activists talk about the potential impact of the bills.

Several students said the legislation would prevent transgender youths from accessing lifesaving medical care and limit how they participate in sports or the bathrooms they can use.

“I am a human being. I am not defined by my gender,” said Harley Lawton, a junior at Central High. “They are trying to take away our rights. They are trying to define us as what they first saw us as, not what we became, not what we decide to be.”

Categories Courage, Cruelty, Disruption, Gender, Nebraska, Students

Speak Out in Support of #AbbottElementary

By dianeravitch
March 19, 2023 //
3

Carol Burris, executive director of the Network for Public Education, asks you to show your support for #AbbottElementary, the delightful weekly show that favorably portrays the real life of teachers, students, and public schools. The show was written, produced by, and stars the amazingly talented @QuintaBrunson.

Carol writes:

ABC’s award-winning sitcom Abbott Elementary is the story of a wonderful group of teachers who stick with a challenging Philadelphia public school because they love teaching and kids. In recent episodes, it has been critical of the effects of charter schools.

It seems hard to believe it, but “Ed Reformers” are attacking its creator, Quinta Brunson, on Twitter.

Please stand up for Abbott Elementary & Ms Brunson by copying and tweeting the Tweets below. The show and its producers need to know you stand for truth-telling and for public schools.

Thank you @AbbottElemABC & @quintabrunson for yr amazing show that dares to tell truth abt how charters hurt public schools. Love the show. Keep up the great work! I love #AbbottElementary https://abc.com/shows/abbott-elementary

How small @JeanneAllen & @edreform look trying to suppress @AbbottElemABC from criticizing the charter system by lying about @quintabrunson. https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/quinta-brunson-shuts-down-critic-151809283.html I love #AbbottElementary

When @AbbottElemABC critiques Pa billionaire trying to undermine public schools w/charters, @edreform goes on the attack. Pathetic to go after a beloved show & its beloved creator/star @quintabrunson. Gotta say it. I love #AbbottElementary. https://abc.com/shows/abbott-elementary

You can read about the show’s critique of charters here and the Jeanne Allen controversy here including the Tweets in which Brunson pushes back.

Thanks for all you do,Image

Carol Burris

Network for Public Education

Executive Director

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reform, Courage, Creativity, Democracy, Disruption, Education Industry, Ethics, Humor, Media, Students, Supporting public schools, Teachers
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