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Nevada Charter Schools: Lowest Graduation Rates in State

By dianeravitch
October 27, 2016 //
11

More on Nevada.

The list of high school graduation rates was posted yesterday. Charter schools had the lowest rates in the state.

The legislature and governor bestow billions on billionaires for stadiums and tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations. But public schools go without basic supplies.

To avoid paying for public schools, the legislature opens charter schools and offers vouchers.

But the vouchers explicitly violate the state constitution (which doesn’t necessarily mean the state courts will rule them unconstitutional since conservatives interpret state constitutions very loosely when vouchers are at issue).

And the charters include many of the lowest performing schools in the state (including the amply funded but highly disorganized Andre Agassi charter school) and have the lowest graduation rates.

Read this: http://m.lasvegassun.com/news/2016/oct/13/nevada-high-school-graduation-rates-continue-to-cl/

The school with the lowest graduation rate in the state is Silver State Charter School, where only 18% graduated. That’s even worse than ECOT (Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow) in Ohio, where the graduation rate is 20%.

Not to worry, reformers! There will be no accountability for charter schools! In fact, the state has hired a receiver to fix Silver State charter school at $25,000 a month…do what? Who knows? It’s Nevada, where kids don’t count, especially if they are poor and Hispanic.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Graduation rates, Privatization

David Sirota: Scandal in Massachusetts!

By dianeravitch
October 27, 2016 //
13

David Sirota and a team of investigative reporters have discovered that the pension funds of teachers in Massachusetts are being tapped by Wall Street financiers to underwrite Question 2, which will authorize an expansion of non-union charter schools. Unions are spending millions of dollars to defend the public schools of Massachusetts against privatization. Meanwhile, their own pension funds are financing the campaign to increase privatization.

“When Massachusetts public school teachers pay into their pension fund each month, they may not realize where the money goes. Wall Street titans are using some of the profits from managing that money to finance an education ballot initiative that many teachers say will harm traditional public schools.

“An International Business Times/MapLight investigation has found that executives at eight financial firms with contracts to manage Massachusetts state pension assets have bypassed anti-corruption rules and funneled at least $778,000 to groups backing Question 2, which would expand the number of charter schools in the state. Millions more dollars have flowed from the executives to nonprofit groups supporting the charter school movement in the lead-up to the November vote. Republican Gov. Charlie Baker, himself a former financial executive, is leading the fight to increase the number of publicly funded, privately run charter schools in Massachusetts — and he appoints trustees to the board that directs state pension investments….

“This report is the latest in an IBT/MapLight series examining how anti-corruption laws are circumvented or unenforced. The cash flowing to the Massachusetts school initiative spotlights more than just a fight over education policy: It exemplifies one of the ways in which the securities and investment industry can get around a federal rule that was designed to restrict financial executives from giving campaign cash to governors with the power to influence state pension business.

“In the case of Massachusetts, since the federal rule does not cover money donated to governors’ policy initiatives, executives banned from donating directly to Gov. Baker are able to give to a constellation of groups that are pushing his pet cause — and that in some cases are advised by Baker’s political associates. Meanwhile, Baker’s appointees at the state pension board are permitted to continue delivering investment deals and fees to those same donors’ firms.”

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Massachusetts, Pensions, Privatization, Unions

Robert Pondiscio Calls on White Reformers to Step Aside

By dianeravitch
October 27, 2016 //
58

The recent call for a moratorium on new charters by the NAACP, the Movement for Black Lives, and Journey for Justice has caused a crisis of confidence among corporate reformers. Suddenly they must confront the fact that they are leading “the civil rights issue of our time” by promoting school choice.

Robert Pondiscio of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute tackles the problem head on. Specifically he calls on Peter Cunningham to step down as editor of Education Post and give his job to a talented woman of color who is a charter school teacher and accomplished journalist. This would be very painful for Peter, who raised $12 million to start the blog from the Waltons, Eli Broad, and Michael Bloomberg.

He further suggests that other white reform leaders make way for people of color. Farewell, Wendy Kopp, Mike Petrilli, Michael Feinberg, David Levin, Richard Barth, the Kramers of Minneapolis, and dozens more who must give up their good jobs in education reform. Now, if only the billionaires would turn over their fortunes to people of color…

Categories Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Privatization

Carol Burris: Why the Shine is Fading from the Charter School Movement, Part 4

By dianeravitch
October 26, 2016 //
18

Carol Burris concludes here her fourth installment of the sad story of the charter school movement in California. What once was a movement intended to help and collaborate with public schools has been taken over by the power-hungry and the greedy, intent on displacing and destroying public education.

California is now the “wild west of charter schools” because of the state’s refusal to oversee the operations of these schools. Public money is handed out to almost anyone who wants it, and supervision is almost non-existent.

Burris writes:

The shine is off the charter school movement. Freedom from regulation, the sine qua non of the charter world, has resulted too often in troubled schools, taxpayer fleecing and outright fraud. Charters have become material for late-night comedians. That is never a good sign; just ask the proponents of the Common Core.

The greatest blow to charter momentum, however, was delivered by the NAACP. When delegates’ voted for a moratorium on new charters, it unleashed the fury of the charterphiles. A piece on the pro-reform website Education Post was titled, “The NAACP Was Founded by White People and It Still Isn’t Looking Out for Black Families,” accusing the premier civil rights organization of being “morally anemic.” And yet, despite the vitriol and critique, the NAACP board of directors stood fast, supported its delegates, and issued a strong statement calling for charter reform.

The passage of Question 2 on the November ballot in Massachusetts, which would lift the cap on charter schools, once seemed a sure thing. Now support has plummeted. The ballot measure is down by 11 points, having lost support among Democrats, especially from the progressive wing.

The problems with loosely regulated charters can no longer be brushed aside.

In the past three posts of my series on California charters (here, here and here), I highlighted some of the serious problems that exist in a state with weak governing laws, a powerful lobby propped up by billionaires, and a governor who consistently vetoes bills aimed at charter reform. California Gov. Jerry Brown, a Democrat who is usually progressive, has a blind spot when it comes to charters. The governor’s enthusiastic fundraising efforts on behalf of the two charters he started in Oakland came under scrutiny in the Los Angeles Times.

As a result, the problems with charters in the state bear an eerie resemblance to the those found in far more conservative states. As I spoke with Californians, I often felt quite depressed. The story line became clear—a state that generally holds progressive values financially abandoned its public schools with the passage of Proposition 13, thus crippling school funding. That was followed by a scramble to a charter solution to compensate for years of underfunding and neglect. That, in turn, opened the door to profit making schemes, corporate reformers hell-bent on destroying unions, and frankly, a lot of irresponsible educational models, such as storefront charters, boutique schools and “academies” linked to for-profits like K12.

There is hope, however, that California can alter its course. Despite all of the obstacles that stand in the way, there are Californians who want charter reform. They are exposing corruption, illegality, profit-making schemes and schools that are clearly not in the best interest of children. In this final piece, I will highlight some of their work.

Open the piece to see the links and to learn more about Burris’s reasons for optimism.

Categories Accountability, California, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Failure, For-Profit, Fraud, Privatization

Civil Rights Groups Sue to Block PARCC as a Graduation Requirement

By dianeravitch
October 26, 2016 //
9

Good news from the Education Law Center: Several civil rights groups in New Jersey are suing to stop the state from using PARCC as a high school graduation requirement.

Several New Jersey civil rights and parent advocacy organizations have filed a legal challenge to new high school graduation regulations recently adopted by the State Board of Education. The new rules make passing the controversial PARCC exams a requirement for a New Jersey high school diploma and will also prevent students who opt out from graduating.

The lawsuit was filed in New Jersey Superior Court, Appellate Division, on October 21st on behalf of the Latino Action Network (LAN), the Latino Coalition of New Jersey (LCNJ), the Paterson Education Fund (PEF) and the Education Law Center (ELC). ELC and the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey (ACLU-NJ) are co-counsel.

The lawsuit says the new regulations violate the NJ graduation statute and other applicable laws in several ways:

The state law requiring a graduation test, originally passed in 1979, explicitly requires an 11th grade test that assesses state standards in English Language Arts (ELA) and Math. Instead, the State Board designated the PARCC ELA10, a tenth grade exam, and the PARCC Algebra I test, which is given across a wide range of middle and high school grades, as the primary high school graduation tests.

The new rules undermine important protections established by the Legislature, such as eliminating retesting opportunities required by the graduation statute.

The designation of a 10th grade graduation test deprives English Language Learners (ELLs) of an extra year to develop their language ability.

The use of fee-based tests like the SAT and ACT as “substitute competency tests” through 2020 will restrict low-income students’ access to diplomas. Because NJ’s at-risk students are more likely to be members of racial minority groups or ELLs, use of fee-based assessments will have a negative, disparate impact on these student groups, a violation of their civil rights.

The substitute assessments are also not 11th grade tests and, as the Department has acknowledged, are not aligned with state standards. The lawsuit alleges these provisions violate the state constitution’s Education Clause and state anti-discrimination law.

Under the new rules, the substitute assessments will be eliminated after 2020, and students who do not pass PARCC ELA10 and Algebra 1 will have only one other option to graduate: the NJ Department of Education’s time-consuming “portfolio appeals” process. Access to the portfolio appeal will be restricted to students who took all PARCC exams during their high school years.

If these new rules had been in effect for the class of 2016, more than half of the senior class—50-60,000 students—would have been at risk of not graduating. In 2015, the passing rate on the PARCC ELA10 was 37 percent and on the PARCC Algebra I it was 36 percent. In 2016, the rates were 44 percent and 41 percent, respectively. Passing rates on the previous graduation test, the High School Proficiency Assessment, were above 90 percent.

Preparing tens of thousands of portfolio appeals for seniors who do not pass PARCC would be a major new burden for staff and students, particularly in high needs districts. Last year, about 11,000 seniors needed portfolios to graduate. Students who needed portfolios after multiple rounds of testing faced more lost instructional time, increased stress and disrupted senior plans. Districts using the portfolio process incurred extra costs for staff time, additional test administrations, and after-school and Saturday sessions devoted to preparing portfolios for review.

“Setting high school graduation standards is an important public policy issue,” said Christian Estevez, President of the LAN. “It’s also important to protect the rights of students to the opportunities that a high school diploma represents.”

PEF’s Executive Director Rosie Grant added, “NJ has sustained one of the highest graduation rates in the country, in part because we’ve always had multiple ways for students to earn a high school diploma. We want to make sure students continue to have multiple opportunities to succeed.”

The decision to tie high school diplomas to specific test scores is a state policy decision, not a federal mandate. Currently, fewer than one-third of all states use high school exit tests, and several states have used the transition to new assessment systems to eliminate them. Many states continue to give tests for diagnostic and accountability purposes without using the scores to make graduation decisions for individual students. A bill now pending in the NJ Legislature (S2147/A3849) would allow for that alternative.

“The State Board of Education is going full-steam ahead with a plan that breaks New Jersey law and, more disturbingly, disproportionately harms the most vulnerable students,” said ACLU-NJ Legal Director Ed Barocas. “The state knows about the PARCC’s high failure rates, extreme racial disparities, and deep economic divisions in passing scores, and yet officials decided to use this test as a key criterion for graduation despite the glaring problems. The New Jersey Board of Education has put New Jersey students on the wrong course.”

PARCC, a federally-funded consortium that produced the new tests, once had 25 state members. But today only six remain, and just three use PARCC at the high school level. Only NJ and New Mexico currently use PARCC exams as a high school graduation requirement.

“Ultimately, the legislature needs to revisit NJ’s exit testing policies,” said Stan Karp, Director of ELC’s Secondary Reform Project. “Until then, this lawsuit seeks to safeguard the rights of students and families, particularly in high need districts and schools.”

Categories Accountability, Civil Rights, Education Industry, Equity, High School Graduation, New Jersey, Testing

Where Does Clinton Stand on Charter Schools?

By dianeravitch
October 25, 2016 //
80

At a policy forum in Miami before the Council of the Great City Schools, surrogates for Trump and Clinton clarified their views, sort of.

Carl Paladino, remembered in New York for his racist and sexist emails during his campaign against Cuomo, promised that Trump would not put an educator in charge of the Education Department. That’s no surprise. In other settings, both Trump and Paladino have promised to turn all federal funding over to charters and vouchers and to abandon public education.

Clinton’s surrogate said that she is a “big backer” of charter schools, but not for-profit schools. That is not at all reassuring, since some of the most rapacious charter schools are technically non-profit but are managed by for-profit EMOs. And some rapacious charter chains are non-profit but pay their executives obscene salaries. And some non-profits are agents of privatization, even when the profit motive is absent.

The article also said:

During her 2016 campaign, Clinton’s position on charters became a bit less clear. During her time as a U.S. senator from New York, for example, Clinton was a supporter of charters. She’s even taken some grief from the teachers’ unions for that stance. But during this White House run, she also criticized charters for not necessarily accepting all the same students that traditional public schools do. And she’s said charters should supplement what public schools do and not replace them.

She was right. Charter schools do not accept the same students that real public schools do. They can admit those they want and kick out those they don’t want. And while it is admirable to say that charters should not replace public schools, the reality is that charters drain both resources and students from public schools, causing public schools to cut their programs and staff and to have even less capacity to serve the overwhelming majority of students.

The United States simply cannot afford to have a dual school system: one that chooses the students it wants, and the other required to accept all who apply. No high-performing nation in the world operates a dual school system.

If Clinton is to have an intelligent policy about public and charter schools, she must be better informed than she is now, and she can’t rely solely on charter advocates for her information about the way charters are systematically eroding public education in America. She need only look at what is happening in Pennsylvania, Ohio, California, Arizona, Nevada, Florida, and a dozen or more other states.

She might learn that more than 90% of charters are non-union. She might bear in mind that her strongest supporters have been the NEA and the AFT, whose jobs will be lost as charters expand.

Profit is not the only issue, though it is one. The central issue is privatization and the danger to America’s historic commitment to universal public education, doors open to all, not to some.

The good news is that one of the Podesta emails leaked by Wikileaks said that a group of billionaire reformers organized by Laurene Powell Jobs wanted to meet with Hillary but she couldn’t make time for them, and Podesta responded:

Probably worth the time. Not sure we can reassure them. Want to discuss by phone?

Note bene: she didn’t make time to meet with them, and the staff was not sure it could reassure them. That’s a good sign. Take that, reformers!

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Clinton, Corporate Reformers, Democracy, Democrats, Education Industry, Privatization, Trump

Carl Petersen: The Shocking Decision by the LAUSD Not to Renew Five Charter Schools

By dianeravitch
October 25, 2016 //
13

Carl Petersen is a candidate for the Los Angeles Unified School Board in 2017. He is also a close observer of school board meetings and a strong supporter of public schools.

In this post, he describes the last school board meeting, where five charters were not renewed. Three of them were part of the Fethullah Gulen charter chain called Magnolia (in Los Angeles), and the two others were Celerity charters. This was quite a shocker for the charters involved because the LAUSD has a long record of nearly automatic renewal of all charters (according to the article, 155 of 159 charters have been renewed).

Carl notes that despite the fact that most students in Los Angeles attend public schools, not charter schools, the agenda of every meeting is dominated by charter schools. It is as though the public schools disappeared and no one noticed.

He writes:

Last year, the charter industry invested “nearly $2.3 million” in “the nation’s most expensive school board elections” to ensure that they were free from the inconvenience of oversight. While the California Charter School Association (CCSA) has stated that they “are deeply concerned that this month District staff have recommended more charter renewal [denials] and material revision denials than they have in the last five years combined”, the recommendations against Magnolia and Celerity should not have been a surprise or seen as a change in policy. In 2014, the Board voted against two other Magnolia campuses “for fiscal mismanagement and a slew of other accounting irregularities.” Celerity had two charter renewal petitions rejected last November. The Board’s interest in the “financial shenanigans” at ECRCHS is a little more surprising, especially since their charter was renewed last year with at least two Notices to Cure outstanding. However, the publicity provided by the Los Angeles Daily News investigative reports most likely made the irregularities more difficult to ignore.

The is no way that the allegations against any of these charters could be considered nit-picking. Neither the LAUSD Charter School Division (CSD) nor the Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team (FCMAT) felt that Magnolia was providing all of the information that was requested of them. It is important to note that Magnolia had agreed to let FCMAT audit their operations to settle a previous dispute with the LAUSD over the renewal of some of their other charters. The organization holding the charter for Celerity was accused of being a shell. According to CSD testimony at the Board meeting, the Governing Board is controlled by a third party which refuses to cooperate in any way with LAUSD’s oversight. Up until reaching a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the District just prior to the meeting, ECRCHS had refused to terminate their principal after he was caught charging expensive meals, $95 bottles of wine, first class airfare and personal charges on the school’s credit card. Interestingly, the Governing Board was also accused of violating California’s Brown Act, which they appear to have done again when they appointed a team to negotiate the MOU at their meeting on Monday night even though this issue did not appear on their published agenda.

Here is the Board’s complaint about the Magnolia (Gulen) charter schools: http://www.slideshare.net/GulenCemaat/magnolia-science-academy-denial-and-statement-of-facts

If the charter schools had their way, there would be no oversight at all, no supervision, and no accountability for anything they do.

Under Governor Jerry Brown and the state school board, that has the common practice. The California Charter Schools Association is shocked when any school board has the temerity to exercise any oversight, fiscal or academic.

Categories Accountability, California, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Privatization

A Parent in Tennessee Warns Parents in Georgia: Vote NO on Amendment 1

By dianeravitch
October 25, 2016 //
5

T.C. Weber, a public school parent in Nashville, can’t understand why voters in Georgia would vote to create a state takeover of low-scoring schools to turn them over to charter operators. It hasn’t worked in Tennessee, despite the propaganda, and there’s no reason to believe that it will work anywhere else. What’s worse, it defunds public schools so that the charters get whatever they want.

“On November 8, Georgia residents will head to the polls, and, along with their presidential vote, will decide on whether or not to give the state the power to take over so-called failing schools. As a parent of two children who attend a school that sits right outside the periphery of the priority school list, I urge you reject this idea. No matter what they try to tell you, the Achievement School District in Tennessee has been an unmitigated failure. The only thing the ASD has been successful at is creating another government entity rife with financial mismanagement and becoming an endless source of debate as they constantly change goals.

“As I said earlier, I’ve got two children in a school that for all intents and purposes is a “priority school,” and I hate that term. First of all, I believe all schools should be “Priority Schools,” meaning that we should make it a priority that all schools have the resources they need. Taking schools and ranking them while ignoring their resource shortfalls gives us an inaccurate portrait of our educational system and allows us to ignore societal issues that need addressing. The focus becomes not on actual learning, but rather on standardized test results. I know the two should be the same, but unfortunately we all know they are not. Ranking schools in this manner further exacerbates an inequitable education experience for children because the emphasis becomes getting off the list versus providing the best possible well-rounded educational experience for all children.

“Let’s look at Nashville, for example. Currently, we have 11 schools on the state’s priority list. At a recent school board meeting, the newest plan was unveiled to rescue these priority schools. One of the elements of the plan was that we were no longer going to call underperforming schools “priority schools.” We were now going to refer to them as “innovation schools” because “priority” conveyed a sense of failure and punishment. That’s fine, you can change the language – something the reform movement is particularly adept at – but the state will still refer to these schools as priority schools. And if they fail to improve, the state will reassign them to the state’s innovation zone, the Achievement School District, which has proven to be not so innovative after all. Their idea of innovation has more to do with growing the charter sector than with their stated goal of moving the bottom 5% of schools to the top 25%. Any local action is potentially neutered by the vulture on its perch waiting to pounce.

“So if an ASD-type program gets approved in your state, what follows is a plan of action that focuses on getting these schools to show growth in the only measurement that matters to the state, the standardized test. Want to take a class on a field trip to the state museum? Well, that’s great, but how’s that going to improve literacy scores? Want to teach a novel to your class? Yeah, that’s nice, but we have other strategies that’ll have a bigger impact on test scores and we’d prefer you utilize that time for them. Thank God there are still teachers willing to buck the system or it would be test prep all the time, which is basically already happening in a lot of places.”

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, Georgia, Tennessee, Testing

Laura Chapman: Who Protested at the NAACP Meeting?

By dianeravitch
October 25, 2016 //
14

Laura Chapman lives in Cincinnati, Ohio, where the national board of the NAACP held its annual meeting and approved a resolution calling for a moratorium on new charter schools. The resolution was first proposed by the annual national convention of NAACP members from across the nation. Protestors arrived from Memphis to protest any moratorium on new charters.

Laura, a retired arts educators and an inveterate researcher, wrote about why people came from Memphis to Cincinnati:

“Cincinnati was the site of protests against the NAACP resolution to put a moratorium on charter schools. About 150 protesters, who wore coordinated t-shirts, were bussed to Cincinnati from the infamous “Achievement School District” (ASD) in Memphis, TN, specifically by a group called Memphis Lift. http://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2016/10/15/protesters-interrupt-naacp-board-meeting-here/92144796/

“Who actually paid for the trip and why did protesters against the NAACP resolution come to Cincinnati from Memphis? I do not final have answers, but there can be no doubt that the charter industry is organized to protest against any cuts in charter expansion. Here are some things worth noting.

“Three persons from Memphis are on NAACP’s 63-member national board: Jesse H. Turner Jr., the organization’s treasurer and the president of Tri-State Bank of Memphis; Rabbi Micah Greenstein of Temple Israel of Memphis; and Bishop William Graves of Christian Methodist Episcopal Church.
No doubt the pro-charter group, Memphis Lift, hoped to influence their vote.

“Memphis Lift was created in 2015 in order to organize black parents as vocal supporters of school choice. Memphis Lift has close ties to the wife of Chris Barbic, the founding superintendent of the scandalous Memphis “Achievement School District (ASD)”

“Why scandalous? An August 2016 audit of the ASD indicated that for school year 2016-2017, ASD added 4 more charter schools to its Memphis portfolio, for a total of 33 under the charter management organizations (CMOs) in charge of running day-to-day operations. This first ever audit revealed frauds on a grand scale in just one year. Among them, the liberal issuance of purchasing cards combined with records of purchases totaling $14,895 for which the cardholders did not obtain advanced approval as required by ASD policy. (p. 44). Six transactions were for a dental insurance premium, donation, coffee supplies, and “accrual calculations” totaling $131,637. Three travel claims were for one flight and CMO expenses, totaling $4,734 with no supporting documentation (p. 43). For more examples of this free spending, including luxury transportation and the bar charges at parties, see the report. http://www.comptroller.tn.gov/repository/SA/pa16128.pdf

“Participants in Memphis Lift are not grassroots volunteers. They are employed-parents who received paid training channeled through Education Reform Now. Education Reform Now is supported by Democrats for Education Reform’s Political Action Committee. Chris Barbic’s wife, Natasha Kamrani, works as the Director of Democrats for Education Reform in Tennessee. She would certainly know about the training program and the political action funding channeled to it.

“How was the training financed? Memphis Lift is a fairly expensive operation. Initially, it was organized around 19 parent-employees who received $1800 for attending a 10-week training program. The training included help on public speaking, canvassing parents, and the use of a laptop, a perk given to participants in the program. The parent-employees, paid $12 to $15/hour, worked for about 25 hours per week. They were sent to canvas parents in Memphis neighborhoods where the public schools had been given the lowest performance rating by the state. In addition to providing these parents with information about the low performance of these schools, they discussed charters as an option for the parents. This paid “voice group” for parents successfully canvassed about 1,100 parents, and simultaneously created a roster of prospective contacts for marketing charter schools.
Who provided the training? The Parent Leadership and Advocacy Institute (PLAI). PLAI, the local affiliate of Democrats for Education Reform. Successive cohorts of participants in Memphis Lift were trained by Dr. Ian P. Buchanan, Deputy Director of the Parent Leadership Advocacy Institute/Democrats for Education Reform in Memphis TN.

“Dr. Buchanan’s work for Memphis Lift was aided by co-director Johnnie M. Hatten, a conspicuous supporter of charter expansion and member of the ASD Advisory Council, who ran for the state legislature in 2016 (as a Democrat), but lost the contest to Antonio Parkinson, a vocal critic of the state-run school turnaround district. Hatten’s campaign coffers were filled by charter-supporting groups: Tennessee Federation for Children PAC ($11, 501), along with Education Reform Now, Students First Tennessee, and Campaign for School Equity (each contributing $5,000). Support for charters in Memphis is clearly threatened, another reason for hoping to get help from the NAACP.

“Political connections still supply money to Memphis Lift. In January 2016, Memphis Lift sent 21 members to Washington, D.C. for Teach For America’s 25th anniversary celebration. “Natasha Kamrani, director of Tennessee’s branch of Democrats For Education Reform and wife of founding ASD superintendent Chris Barbic, introduced the group to attendees of the TFA reunion, stating she was lucky to work with them.” http://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/tn/2016/02/18/memphis-lift-expands-presence-in-nashville-washington-d-c/

“Follow the money to Teach for America and Democrats for Education Reform and to the many states across the country where “voice groups” like the parents in Memphis are paid for recruiting other parents to charter schools while carefully avoiding the truths about the rip-offs from charter operators.

“For a really eye-opening and well-documented report on Democrats for Education Reform and who is guiding its activities, go to this website

“And do look for the quote from one of the founders of DER, hedge fund manager, Whitney Tilson

The deets on DFER, Democrats for Education Reform

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

Pennsylvania: Charter Sharks Zooming in for the Kill with HB530

By dianeravitch
October 25, 2016 //
9

Pennsylvania became an ATM for the charter industry under Republican Governor Tom Corbett. He is gone now, but the legislature remains indebted to the fat, happy charter owners. Many public school districts are on the brink of bankruptcy due to the rapacious charters that snare their students with deceptive advertising. Pennsylvania has more virtual charter schools than any other state, despite the fact that study after study (including one by CREDO, funded by the Daltons) has shown that virtual charters are educational disaster zones. Students who enroll in them don’t learn anything, but the virtual charter industry is rolling in dough. Two different virtual charter leaders have been indicted for theft in Pennsylvania; one admitted stealing millions of dollars, the other saw her trial dismissed because of age and infirmity but was indicted for theft of millions.

Into this land of struggling public schools and thriving charters comes a new legislative plot to privatize and monetize public school funding. It is called HB530. Under the (usual) guise of “reform,” the bill would open the door to the vaults that hold taxpayer money meant for children and welcome the charters to help themselves.

HB530 is a blank check for a rapacious, greedy industry.

Lawrence Feinberg of the Keystone State Education Coalition wrote this post, “20 Reasons to Vote No on PA HB530.”

Here are a few of his reasons:


Pennsylvania taxpayers now spend more than $1.4 billion on charter and cyber charter schools annually, in addition to funding the state’s traditional public schools. The current “rob from public school Peter to pay charter school Paul” system drains money from traditional public schools, forcing districts to cut programs and services for the students who remain. In 2011, the charter reimbursement line was eliminated from the state budget. It provided state funding to districts for the costs and financial exposure resulting from the addition of charter schools.

Legislators are now considering House Bill 530, which would bring much-needed reform to the charter school law that was written in 1997. The bill has several helpful provisions, but the harm that it does far outweighs the good. Here are 20 reasons that the legislature should vote against this measure.

#HB530 does not provide significant accountability to taxpayers for payments made to charter school entities.

#HB530 would create a Charter School Funding Commission that would consider establishing an independent state-level board to authorize charter school entities, bypassing any local decision-making by school boards and their communities.

#HB530 further limits the ability of communities to negotiate the role of charters locally. The decisions about how, when, and where to expand them should be made by those who have the information and expertise to do so in ways that improve education.

#HB530 is an entirely unwarranted intervention in the local governance of school districts. It would remove local control of tax dollars from Pennsylvania taxpayers and their elected school directors.

#HB530 sets no limits to money that charters can drain from local school districts, eliminating districts’ capability to plan and budget.

#HB530 is a vehicle for the Pennsylvania legislature to have local taxpayers pay for unlimited charter expansion.

#HB530 would let charter operators expand and add grades without any local input or authorization, regardless of performance.

#HB530 would let charters expand by enrolling students from outside of the district in which it is located.

If you want to save public education in Pennsylvania, contact your legislators now.

Categories Accountability, Budget Cuts, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Fraud, Funding, Pennsylvania, Privatization
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