Archives for category: Democracy

This is an unusually good opinion piece that appeared in the New York Times a few days ago.

Think Gates, Zuckerberg, Walton, Hastings, Koch, and many more who use their wealth to impose their ideas on what they consider lesser lives.

The author is Anand Giridharadas.

Please note the mention of charter schools, a bone used by the elites to distract us from wealth inequality and the necessity of providing a better education for all.

It begins:

“Change the world” has long been the cry of the oppressed. But in recent years world-changing has been co-opted by the rich and the powerful.

“Change the world. Improve lives. Invent something new,” McKinsey & Company’s recruiting materials say. “Sit back, relax, and change the world,” tweets the World Economic Forum, host of the Davos conference. “Let’s raise the capital that builds the things that change the world,” a Morgan Stanley ad says. Walmart, recruiting a software engineer, seeks an “eagerness to change the world.” Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook says, “The best thing to do now, if you want to change the world, is to start a company.”

“At first, you think: Rich people making a difference — so generous! Until you consider that America might not be in the fix it’s in had we not fallen for the kind of change these winners have been selling: fake change.

“Fake change isn’t evil; it’s milquetoast. It is change the powerful can tolerate. It’s the shoes or socks or tote bag you bought which promised to change the world. It’s that one awesome charter school — not equally funded public schools for all. It is Lean In Circles to empower women — not universal preschool. It is impact investing — not the closing of the carried-interest loophole.

“Of course, world-changing initiatives funded by the winners of market capitalism do heal the sick, enrich the poor and save lives. But even as they give back, American elites generally seek to maintain the system that causes many of the problems they try to fix — and their helpfulness is part of how they pull it off. Thus their do-gooding is an accomplice to greater, if more invisible, harm.

“What their “change” leaves undisturbed is our winners-take-all economy, which siphons the gains from progress upward. The average pretax income of America’s top 1 percent has more than tripled since 1980, and that of the top 0.001 percent has risen more than sevenfold, even as the average income of the bottom half of Americans stagnated around $16,000, adjusted for inflation, according to a paper by the economists Thomas Piketty, Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman.

“American elites are monopolizing progress, and monopolies can be broken. Aggressive policies to protect workers, redistribute income, and make education and health affordable would bring real change. But such measures could also prove expensive for the winners. Which gives them a strong interest in convincing the public that they can help out within the system that so benefits the winners.”

There is more, if it is not behind a paywall.

Categories Billionaires, Broad Foundation, Charter Schools, Corporate Reform, Democracy, Disruption, Equity, Fake, Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, Hypocrisy, Inequality, Koch Brothers, Philanthropy, Privatization, Walton Foundation

Thomas Ultican: The Destroy Public Education Movement Creates a New Vehicle

By dianeravitch

August 21, 2018 //

Retired physics and math teacher Tom Ultican continues his investigation of the Destroy Public Education movement with this post about a new organization determined to extinguish public education by privatization.

He begins:

Billionaire Netflix CEO, Reed Hastings, has joined with billionaire former Enron executive, John Arnold, to launch an aggressive destroy public education (DPE) initiative. They claim to have invested $100 million each to start The City Fund. Neerav Kingsland declares he is the Fund’s Managing Partner and says the fund will help cities across America institute proven school reform successes such as increasing “the number of public schools that are governed by non-profit organizations.”

Ending local control of public schools through democratic means is a priority for DPE forces. In 2017, EdSource reported on Hastings campaign against democracy; writing, “His latest salvo against school boards that many regard as a bedrock of American democracy came last week in a speech he made to the annual conference of The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools in Washington D.C., attended by about 4,500 enthusiastic charter school advocates, teachers and administrators.”

When announcing the new fund, Kingsland listed fourteen founding members of The City Fund. There is little professional classroom teaching experience or training within the group. Chris Barbic was a Teach for America (TFA) teacher in Houston, Texas for two years. Similarly, Kevin Huffman was also a TFA teacher in Houston for three years. The only other member that may have some education experience is Kevin Shafer. His background is obscure.

The operating structure of the new fund is modeled after a law firm. Six of the fourteen founding members are lawyers: Gary Borden; David Harris; Kevin Huffman; Neerav Kingsland; Jessica Pena and Kameelah Shaheed-Diallo.

Ready to Pilfer Community Schools and End School Boards

In a 2012 published debate about school reform, Kingsland justified his call for ending democratic control of public education writing,

“I believe that true autonomy can only be achieved by government relinquishing its power of school operation. I believe that well regulated charter and voucher markets – that provide educators with public funds to operate their own schools – will outperform all other vehicles of autonomy in the long-run. In short, autonomy must be real autonomy: government operated schools that allow “site level decision making” feels more Orwellian than empowering – if we believe educators should run schools, let’s let them run schools.”

This is a belief in “the invisible hand” of markets making superior judgements and private businesses always outperforming government administration. There may be some truth here, but it is certainly not an ironclad law.

Please open the post to read the rest of this shocking story of arrogance and contempt for democracy, as well as many links.

If we lived in a society that took democracy seriously, the perpetrators of the City Fund would be ridiculed as agents of plutocracy.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Closing schools, Democracy, Education Industry, Education Reform, Privatization

Louisville: Will Dark Money Suppress Democracy in the Fight Over a State Takeover?

By dianeravitch

August 17, 2018 //

Jeff Bryant has written a thorough investigative report of the attack on the public schools of Jefferson County (Louisville) in Kentucky. The report was funded partially by the Network for Public Education.

Louisville has one of the best integrated school districts in the nation. Its NAEP scores are better than those of other urban districts.

The only “crisis” in Louisville is caused by the election of Matt Bevin, a rabid Tea Party Governor who wants to seize control of the Louisville public schools and introduce charters.

A transplant from Connecticut, Bevin swept into the governor’s job despite the fact he had never held political office anywhere, running on a Tea Party inspired campaign was mostly self-funded with earnings from hedge funds he operates.

Bevin has taken unprecedented actions to remake the Kentucky Board of Education, stocking it with critics of public schools and Jefferson County Public Schools in particular. One Bevin appointee, Gary Houchens, an associate professor at Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green, is listed as a “policy scholar” for the Bluegrass Institute for Public Policy Solutions, a rightwing think tank. Another pick, Kathy Gornik, has served as board chair for the organization.

The Bluegrass Institute was founded with money from two libertarian networks, the American Legislative Exchange Council and the State Policy Network, and has benefited from a pipeline of dark money.

One of Bluegrass’s top issues is “education reform,” which it defines as “charter schools, tax credits, and vouchers”—all forms of “school choice” that divert taxpayer money from public schools to private entrepreneurs. The Bluegrass Institute’s staff education analyst, Richard G. Innes, has been attacking Jefferson County Public Schools for years. After the announcement of recommended takeover, he penned an op-ed endorsing it.

Fortunately, parents are organized and fighting back.

The parent leader is a public school parent, Gay Adelmann:

“Jefferson County Public Schools is a district of choice, [and] parents can look for schools and not houses,” says Gay Adelman, a white Jefferson County Public Schools parent with a student who attends The Academy at Shawnee, a magnet middle school and high school in the West End with a focus on aerospace. Shawnee has a student population that is 59 percent non-white and 79 percent on free and reduced price lunch, a typical measurement of poverty.

Adelman helped form the grassroots group Dear Jefferson County Public Schools that pushed to elect the current school board. She recently ran for State Senate in the Democratic party primary, campaigning on a platform supporting Jefferson County Public Schools and opposing state takeover. She lost but managed to garner 44 percent of the vote as a first-time candidate with little funding.

Bevin fired the state commissioner and hired one of his own choosing, Wayne Lewis, a charter zealot who is determined to grab control of the Louisville district.

But Bevin and Lewis face a community that supports its public schools. The recent school board elections saw public school supporters beat the Dark-Money candidates:

In the 2016 school board election, Kolb, a first-time candidate for the board, won an improbable upset victory against well-financed incumbent board chairman, David Jones Jr., the son of the co-founder of health insurance giant Humana. Kolb estimates he was outspent by up to fifteen-to-one, but he won because he and his volunteers knocked on over 13,000 doors.

Running as a one-term incumbent, current JCPS school board member Chris Brady was also targeted by big money for defeat, with over $350,000 from a local Super PAC that backed his opponent. He won anyway, he tells me, by “running on my record” of supporting the district and new leadership he helped put into place.

Jeff Bryant casts the battle for control of the public schools of Louisville as a battle for democracy:

But if the takeover of Jefferson County Public Schools is all about politics, it’s not a contest between “red vs. blue,” but whether democracy matters at all.

The pro-public schools coalition is planning a big rally on October 18 in the afternoon. I will be there and so will my friend and civil rights leader Jitu Brown of the Journey for Justice. We will be there to support the students and parents of Jefferson County.

Categories Charter Schools, Dark Money, Democracy, Louisville

The Walton-Funded Hijacking of the Little Rock School District

By dianeravitch

August 14, 2018 //

It was inevitable that the Waltons would make their move to privatize the public schools of Little Rock, the largest city in Arkansas, which the Waltons consider their fiefdom. The Waltons have used their billions to leverage control of the State Education Department, the Legislature, and the State Education Board.

The Waltons have long coveted control of Little Rock’s public schools. Local citizens resisted, but David doesn’t usually defeat Goliath. For example, as the Arkansas Times reported earlier this year, the Legislature passed a law Legislation “requiring Arkansas school districts to turn over buildings constructed with local property taxes to be turned over to any charter school that wants them, no matter how unproven the charter operator, no matter how damaging the charter might be to existing — and successful — true public schools.”

When six of Little Rock’s 48 public schools were labeled “failing,” that was the pretext for the state to take control of the entire district, ending local control. Read that again. The low test scores of 6 of 48 schools were grounds for the dissolution of democratic control in the entire district. The goal, of course, was to enable the Walton puppets to introduce private charter schools, which are controlled by private boards.

The Waltons and other corporate reformers prey on black and brown communities, whose voices are easily ignored by the predominantly white male-controlled state legislatures that control their fates. State Commissioner Johnny Key was formerly a legislator and lobbyist for the University of Arkansas. He became state commissioner in 2015. The state law, which required that the person in that position have at least a masters’ degree and 10 years experience as a teacher, had to be changed to allow him to serve.

The following is an Open Letter to the State Commissioner and Governor. It was written by Rev. Anika Whitfield, a pastor in Little Rock who believes in democracy and public education.

Commissioner Key and Governor Hutchinson,

It is now more than apparent that you both are participating in the continual hijacking, undermining, and weakening of the LRSD, the largest public school district in our state.

What evidence do I have to support this assertion?

1) Since the hijacking of the LRSD (when 6 out of 48 schools failed to meet the raised student achievement standardized test scores from 25% for proficiency to 49.5% and the former AR Commissioner of Education and State Board of Education voted to take over the entire LRSD), on January 28, 2015, the overall student enrollment and teacher moral has shown a significant and devastating decline.

2) The AR State Board of Education, under your watch, has re-approved charter schools in the city of LR that as an entire school system/district, Covenant Keepers Charter School, for example, that has continued to fail to meet the academic achievement test score requirements that were legislated by the state. Yet, when three (half of the LRSS schools that were labeled distressed) have moved off the distressed list (one that came off as a result of actions of consecutive test score improvements that were evidenced in the 2012-2013 and 2013-2014 academic years), you have not shown the LRSD the same mercy and released us back to locally, elected representation by residents of Little Rock.

3) The LRSD students are suffering by the loss of their beloved teachers by the threat from your administration and your apparent support for hiring uncertified teachers, (persons not trained nor licensed to teach our children). This weakening of the quality of the LRSD has also continued to weaken its overall moral. And, unfortunately, these practices are consistent with other waivers (legal passes to avoid compliance with current laws) you have approved in academic administration positions such as hiring non-certified Prinicipals and Superintendents in the LRSD, and creating a law to exempt the AR State Education Commissioner to be a certified academic administrator.

When one doesn’t respect a profession enough to honor it’s process of licensure and certification, one suggests that it is not important. Is this your overall message and rationale for hijacking our beloved LRSD to show us that you don’t value our children? Let me assure you that if that is your aim, you are successfully achieving your goals.

4) The student enrollment of the LRSD has continued to decline under your watch, since 2015 when you both came into office. We have seen a rise in the numbers of charter schools approved under your leadership. We have witnessed the closure of four schools in the LRSD that were not suffering from academic distress, yet, many of the schools these students have been forced to attend are showing instability in staff retention and a decline in student academic achievement.

5) The processes you have approved to “more easily” register students in the LRSD has not only caused more confusion, found more students not currently enrolled, and unintentionally (perhaps) displaced students from their “assigned” schools, but they have exponentially worsened over the past three academic years.

There seems to be a disconnect and disregard between the administration and the parents/guardians of the LRSD. How many parents, guardians and school administrators were polled to determine whether or not there needed to be extensive training before implementing the Gateway registration process this academic year? What were the results of so? How did you address any push back or evidence of disapproval of this all electronic registration process?

In school systems like eStem, Covenant Keepers and other public-private charter schools, student registration processes are less likely to be as challenging since they only currently have one school for all grade levels or one school for elementary, middle, and high school students. It would not be chaotic nor frustrating for those parents to know which building or school their children are assigned. Again, it appears that your interest lies more in making sure charter school districts are appearing to operate with more ease than the LRSD, the district you have continued to hold hostage from parents and guardians in Little Rock.

6) You both have continued to refused, since February 2015, to hold a city wide meeting to dialogue and discuss with concerned parents, guardians, students, and community members of Little Rock, a way forward to return local representation to the residents of Little Rock.

We want our schools back.

As tax paying residents of Little Rock, we demand elected representation from our selected peers.

What is the ransom you require for Little Rock School District parents, guardians, students, and community supporters to pay for you to release our district back to us now?

Rev. Anika T. Whitfield

Categories Accountability, Arkansas, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Dark Money, Democracy, Education Industry, Privatization, Resistance, Walton Foundation

“Democracy”: The Attack on Our Democracy, Hidden in Plain Sight

By dianeravitch

July 15, 2018 //

A blogger who identifies as “democracy” posted this comment, with which I agree.

The bottom line is that Trump has lots and lots of Russian “mob” money, in Russia, the mob and the state are one and the same.

Trump has tapped tons of Russian moola, which is one reason he’s refused to release his tax returns, and in all likelihood, why Republicans in Congress refuse to force their release. Those returns would prove definitively the financial ties. But even without them, the ties have been well-established. The Financial Times did a deep look into the building of the Trump Tower in Toronto:

“Legal documents, signed statements and two dozen interviews with people with knowledge of the project and the money that flowed through it reveal that the venture connects the US president with a shadowy post-Soviet world where politics and personal enrichment merge…”

“it has become increasingly clear that many of the oligarchs who made their riches amid the downfall of the Soviet Union have protected their fortunes by advancing the interests of the ruling cliques at home. This wealth has been coursing through western markets, often disguised by shell companies. Trump’s sector, real estate, has long been susceptible to infusions of incognito money. A large proportion of sales of high-end US property takes place through companies whose true owners are hidden. A US Treasury investigation last year found that one in three cash buyers of top-end property was suspicious…”

“Trump has broken with presidential tradition by refusing to divest his holdings in the dozens of companies that comprise the Trump Organization or to release tax returns that might shine more light on what appear to be multitudinous conflicts of interest. In May last year, his decision to fire James Comey as head of the FBI triggered the appointment of Robert Mueller, himself a former FBI chief, as special counsel to investigate links between the Russian government and the Trump campaign.”

https://www.ft.com/trumptoronto

Look, it’s clear. This is not hard to figure out. There was a very genuine royal screwing of the American Republic in November of 2016. Trump and the Trump campaign engaged in behavior that has to be called what it really is: treason. There’s no way around it. And while Trump and his tops dogs are directly responsible, there’s lots of blame to pass around. Charlie Pierce at Esquire calls it perfectly:

“Goddamn them all.”

“Goddamn the hackers. Goddamn the journalists who laundered the pilfered material. Goddamn any of them who treated Roger Stone as a source, or as a cute prankster, instead of the nasty vandal he’s always been. Goddamn the pundits who chortled over the pilfered material. Goddamn the politicians who profited from the hacking. Goddamn the politicians who minimized the hacking. Goddamn the politicians who still stonewall about the hacking. Goddamn the ‘activists’ who ranted about ‘McCarthyism’ when anybody pointed out that the 2016 presidential election had been poisoned from afar. Goddamn them all as traitors, if not to the American nation, then to everything that ever made that nation worth the bother.”

“They conspired, wittingly or unwittingly. They colluded, wittingly or unwittingly. They are accessories, before and after the fact, to the hijacking of a democratic election. So, yes, goddamn them all.”

And you know what? There are still people out there – hell, there are still commenters on this bog – who pretend to be unaware of just how serious this is, or worse, who purposefully turn a blind eye to it.

It’s going to get worse – and much weirder – before it gets better.

Gee. Maybe we should give some serous thought – when this is mostly over, if it ever really is – to the notion that public education in a democratic republic ought to teach and model the core values and principles on which the republic is based.

Goddamn us if we don’t.

Categories Accountability, Democracy, Fraud

Dana Milbank: The Fight Against Trump is a Fight for Freedom

By dianeravitch

July 4, 2018 //

Dana Milbank of the Washington Post is one of my favorite columnists. My only disagreement with this column is that he thinks we are not threatened by fascism. I have concluded that Trump’s racist, corporatist ideology, meshed with his demogogic rhetoric, looks, sounds, and feels like fascism.

He wrote this great column.

In case it is behind a paywall:

Every 75 years or so in our history, Americans have renewed their commitment to freedom. 

Divide our history into thirds, and you can see, at regular intervals, a rededication to our founding doctrine. In 1789, the framers drafted the Bill of Rights. Seventy-four years later, at the turning point in the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln called for “a new birth of freedom” to honor those who died.
Seventy-eight years after that, on the eve of U.S. entry into world war in 1941, Franklin D. Roosevelt declared the “four freedoms.” 

That was 77 years ago, and we are due for another renewal. Neither fascism nor civil war threatens us, but Americans are united in fear. Much of the country fears the loss of basic freedoms under President Trump: free speech, press and religion, due process and control over their bodies. Trump, meanwhile, foments fears among his followers of crime, gangs, immigrants and civil servants. And Americans of all beliefs fear they are losing the American Dream and its promise of economic mobility. 

Trump’s opponents are seemingly confused about how to respond in this election year. Do they appeal to whites or nonwhites, progressives or moderates, move to the left to rally the “base” or hew to the center to capture the swing voters? Should they make an economic argument or a social argument, target those concerned about jobs or those angry about the president? 

These are false choices, though, because our salvation will be what it always has been. On this 242nd birthday of the United States, let’s rededicate ourselves to freedom: 

Freedom from Trump’s constant attacks on women, immigrants, people of color, gay people and Muslims. 

Freedom to work and live without discrimination, harassment and violence because of your gender, race or religion. 

Freedom to get medical care when you or your children are sick. 

Freedom to earn a living wage, to attend college or get job training, and to retire in security. 

Freedom from a rigged economy in which the top 1 percent own more than the bottom 90 percent combined.  Freedom to marry whom you choose. 

Freedom to make decisions about your own body. 

Freedom to send your kids to school without fear for their safety. 

Freedom to breathe clean air, to drink clean water, to live on a habitable planet. 

Freedom to elect your leaders without the rich, or foreign governments, choosing them for you. 

And freedom to speak, to protest and to publish without the threat of violence. 

Not only do such ideas unify the left (far more than quibbling about, say, which form of universal health care is best or what exactly should be done with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement), but freedom appeals broadly to Americans regardless of politics. Ask us what it means to be American, and you will get one answer above all others: “to be free.” 

Conservatives long claimed ownership of it. (Remember Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation Enduring Freedom and freedom fries?) But Trump has essentially ceded the freedom agenda to his opponents. One measure, using a database of his speeches, tweets and Q&As, finds that he has used the word “freedom” 72 times this year (often dismissively, as in “we need freedom of the press, but . . .”). That’s far less than he has used, say, “respect” (252), “strong” (502), “win” (306), “border” (617), “taxes” (158), “Democrat” (560), “kill” (159), “country” (1,288), “illegal” (127), “crime” (250) and “great” (2,826). 

IThis isn’t just a linguistic de-emphasis of freedom; Trump has made common cause with dictators and played down human rights abroad while starting a trade war with democratic allies. At home he has questioned due process for refugees, taken immigrant children from their parents, imposed a travel ban on several Muslim-majority nations and declared the media the enemy of the American people. He is now poised to shift the balance on the Supreme Court away from abortion rights and gay rights. 

In a very real sense, the fight against Trump is a battle for freedom. 

He hopes to make the midterm elections about sanctuary cities, MS-13, a socialist takeover, the “deep state,” a corrupt justice system and immigrants “invading and infesting’’ America. Rather than join him in the fear chamber, progressives and Democrats ought to respond with a variation of what FDR proposed for the world in a very different context in 1941, “freedom of speech and expression,” “freedom of every person to worship God in his own way,” “freedom from want” and — of new significance now — “freedom from fear.” 

“This nation has placed its destiny in the hands and heads and hearts of its millions of free men and women,” Roosevelt said, “and its faith in freedom under the guidance of God.” This faith sustained America through those dark times. It will not fail us in our 243rd year. “

Categories Democracy, Freedom of Speech, Freedom of the Press