Archives for category: Education Industry
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Broad Foundation Molding the Syracuse School Board

By dianeravitch
April 3, 2013 //
10

This article shows how the Broad Foundation has shifted gears. It used to train school boards to its way of thinking (it trained the Atlanta school board, for example, to believe that metrics and data matter more than anything les).

Now it send school boards on tours to selected sites.

The Syracuse superintendent, a product of the unaccredited Broad Superintendents Academy, leads her school board to meetings around the nation to learn about the Broad style. In this case, they are in New Orleans, the Mecca of privatization. You can be sure that no one will tell them that at least two-thirds of the New Orleans charters are academically unacceptable, even in the reports of their supporters at the Cowen Institute at Tulane.

Categories Broad Foundation, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, New Orleans, New York

Where Does a School Chef Make More Than Teachers?

By dianeravitch
April 3, 2013 //
13

This is not a trick question.

It is a real question.

Jersey Jazzman has the answer right here.

Categories Charter Schools, Education Industry, New Jersey

Who Is Funding the Attack on Public Schools?

By dianeravitch
April 3, 2013 //
10

Jersey Jazzman has done some amazing research to uncover the source of the money that is flooding local school board races.

He has found a pattern. The same people are dropping thousands of dollars into key school board races around the country, into districts where they do not live. In Perth Amboy, NJ, school board candidates typically spend about $5,000-8,000, but in the last election one candidate had about ten times that much, almost all from big names in California.

Then he found the same people picking races in other states.

Who is coordinating this campaign?

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit

Why The Business Model Is Not Right for Children

By dianeravitch
April 2, 2013 //
17

A reader comments:

The profitization of public education on the backs of students, parents & teachers is obscene to the spirit of the human being business we call Education. Families raise the children, educators prepare them for the free world as American citizens armed with knowledge and compassion to contribute to the good of this planet.

No matter how critical the corporate deformers think testing should be to the rest of us, WE educators have something they do not…experience.

The business model just doesn’t work quite the way they think it should in education. We aren’t manufacturing widgets, cookies or engine parts that are built through exact science and physics…all ingredients are the same in measure and substance to the finished product that rolls out on the assembly line after rejects are tossed out for scrap materials.

We are grooming human beings who are uniquely individual and diverse in their abilities, culture & wiring. Last time I looked out into my classroom, there weren’t any robots looking back at me.

It may feel right to test the living hell out of kids for the sake of using the latest data analysis and pretend it’s important to the artful task of teaching, but coming from a Southern farm growing up, I may know a thing or two about how to produce a fine, marketable outcome.

“You can’t fatten a pig by weighing it!” Testing is NOT teaching.

The results can redirect teaching, suggest new methods, offer ideas and determine that more time is needed for a child to learn the material, but excessive amounts of testing will not create a learned student. It is a waste of time beyond the basic measurement of how “fattened” s/he is with the knowledge needed to become a great American citizen.

That time is better used to connect, welcome an abiding relationship and create a more humane environment in which a child can truly learn and grow into the kind of citizen we all want going out into the world.

Quit the bickering, ignore the foul pundits who seem to think it’s okay to make blood money from their pitiful displays of greed and start speaking out against it all. This meek & mild approach to our work has to end. Some will be sacrificed, but that’s what happens in great battles.

We have all the good stuff on our side. Without an uprising and demanding of the right change, we will continue to suffer. The administration has been put in the middle of this tirade, forced to succumb to irrational mandates funded by philanthropists and govt interventions that do not work and from the top down, the teachers carry all that angst, frustration and fear into the classrooms where it is dumped onto the hearts and minds of students.

Make no mistake about this truth folks…the conditions of education are the conditions in your childrens’ classrooms. Always has been, always will be. It’s a human being business and no amount of infiltration of corporate shenanigans will ever change that. Don’t mess with human nature, big boys. You will never be greater than that reality. I am one “Edgy-cator” these days!

Categories Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Teachers and Teaching, US Education

Virginia Launches Bold Attack on Public Education

By dianeravitch
April 2, 2013 //
3

The Virginia Legislature passed legislation proposed by the governor that opens the door to privatizing any school in the Commonwealth that is found to be “failing.”

Rachel Levy has the details here

Governor McDonnell’s “Opportunity Education Institution” is an ALEC-inspired dream.

It creates a governor appointed commission that will take over schools with low test scores.

Levy writes:

“The Institution will be run by a board of gubernatorial appointees, which includes the executive director. There is no guarantee that the board would include any people who know anything about education. The board would contract with non-profits, corporations, or education organizations to operate the schools. Funding for the new bureaucracy would be provided by federal, state, and local taxpayers. The “failing” schools’ local governing bodies would be represented on the board in some way, but they would lose decision-making power and would not be able to vote or, from what I can tell, have much meaningful input, besides providing the same share of local funding and being responsible for maintenance of the school building. As for staffing, current faculty at the schools being taken over could apply for a position as a new employee with the OEI or apply for a transfer.”

And more:

“…teachers at the OEI schools would not have to be licensed, so the students who need the most experienced teachers would be getting the least experienced. Nor would those OEI teachers be entitled to the benefits, pay, or job protections that other Virginia teachers are, even if they were employed by the school being taken over prior to takeover. Who will want to work at such schools, or schools that look likely to be taken over? Interestingly enough, the members of the new OEI bureaucracy would be eligible for VRS (Virginia Retirement System) and other benefits that the teachers would lose.”

Levy points out that the tests are supposed to get harder and more schools will fall into the hands of the OEI. The basic idea is to use New Orleans as a model for Virginia, ignoring the fact that most charters in New Orleans have been rated a D or F by the state, and even the reformy Cowen Institute at Tulane said recently that two-thirds of the NOLA charters are academically unacceptable.

And then there is this consideration:

“Finally, eliminating democratic institution and processes in a democratic society is not a cure for dysfunction or low test scores. Certainly, mass failure on the SOL tests signals a problem, but before the state blames and disenfranchises school communities, it really needs to figure out what that problem is and then target its resources accordingly. While many majority poor schools do just fine on standardized tests, I think we all know that the schools with low standardized test scores are often majority poor. Last I checked, being poor isn’t a reason to disenfranchise communities and hand their schools over to outsiders.”

Levy urges you to act now. If you live in Virginia, speak up. Join with your friends and neighbors to stop this raid on the public’s schools.

“So, I urge you to contact Governor McDonnell (804-786-2211) and your state legislators ASAP to state your opposition to the Opportunity Education Institution and to tell them to vote against SB1324S and amendment 12. This bill is likely unconstitutional and it’s bad for Virginia–bad for public education and bad for democracy.”

Categories ALEC, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Privatization, Teacher Tenure, Teachers and Teaching, Testing

How ALEC Is Changing the Face of Charters

By dianeravitch
April 2, 2013 //
33

When the charter school movement began in the early 1990s, the promise of advocates was that charters would be held accountable for results. There were two promises, really: one was that there would be accountability; the other was that there would be results. If the results didn’t happen, the schools would close.

Now there is a new approach to charters, sponsored by ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council). To learn more about ALEC and to see its model legislation for education and other issues, look here.

It is a tenet of ALEC that charter schools should be completely unregulated, unsupervised, and unaccountable. The goal is choice, not accountability or results.

ALEC pretends to be conservative but pushes model legislation to give the governor and sometimes his allies the power to appoint a commission to override local school boards.

You see, ALEC doesn’t like local school boards. It likes bigtime corporate power. It likes the free market. Those pesky local school boards are so close to the people in their district that sometimes they actually want to protect the local public schools and refuse to authorize more charters to take away students and funding.

I posted recently about radical ALEC legislation in North Carolina, which would not only create an ALEC-style state commission to override local school boards, but would exempt the charters from the necessity of having ANY certified teachers. They would also be exempt from criminal background checks. They would be exempt from conflict of interest laws. The members of the state charter commission would also be exempt from conflict of interest laws so they could vote themselves a few more charters if they choose.

If you read my post and the link therein, you will see that one of the strong supporters of the proposed law is currently collecting $3 million a year in management and rental fees from the charters he oversees. Why shouldn’t he want more? Maybe he will be appointed to serve on the state commission that authorizes and doesn’t regulate charters.

Valerie Strauss here reports that half the states have ALEC-style charter laws allowing the governor to override local control.

No accountability, no oversight, no transparency, no laws, no regulations. Just money for the taking.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, For-Profit, North Carolina, Privatization

Why Cities Should Not Close Schools

By dianeravitch
April 1, 2013 //
4

Jack Hassard explains here that public schools are part of the fabric of their communities. Closing them tears apart the fabric of their lives. It harms children, families, and communities. It does not save money.

He cites the advocacy of Edward Johnson in Atlanta, a follower of W. Edwards Deming, who has diligently explained the folly of closing schools based on some arbitrary goal set by people who are not educators.

As Hassard writes, “As Deming (1994a) points out, beware of common sense when we think about such issues as ranking children by grades, ranking schools and teachers by test scores, and rewards and punishments. Deming believes that grades should be abolished, and that the ranking of people and schools should not occur. And significant to the issue of school closure, Deming suggests that taking action (such as closing a school today) may produce more problems in the future, and that a better remedy would be investigate why children in poor neighborhoods are not doing well on state mandated tests, and then do something about it.”

Categories Chicago, Closing schools, Education Industry, New York City, Parents, Philadelphia, Privatization

David Sirota: Who Is Behind School “Reform”?

By dianeravitch
March 31, 2013 //
14

This video by David Sirota of Denver gives a clear and concise explanation of how school reform became big bu$ine$$.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Privatization

Superintendent: Make This the Year We Said No

By dianeravitch
March 31, 2013 //
23

Bedford Central Superintendent Jere Hochman poses the inevitable questions:

How did we let this happen?

Could we have stopped it?

What can we do now?

It must end. It will end. What is happening in education today is nothing less than educational malpractice. It is not education. It is bad for students.

Hochman writes:
Absolutely no excuse for cheating, threatening teachers, and the culture of lying.

But where were we in 2002 when NCLB was passed unnoticed under the shadow of 9/11? Why did those of us writing and criticizing the testing movement not press harder? Where were the professional organizations (NCTE, NCSS, NCTM …)? Why did we allow Mr. Obama to drink the Kool-aid left on the DOE table? Why didn’t we expose the Michelle Rhee’s, the quick fix reformers, and charter scammers when we saw what was happening Why did we allow our state legislators to fall into line so they could get re-elected based on test score results (or criticize the other guy for not getting them)?

Atrocities in history raise two questions: 1) How in the world could anyone be so evil, so toxic, so driven that such atrocities occurred? 2) Where were the bystanders and how could they let it occur?

Occupy DOE, keep writing, and then let us all make 2013-2014 be the year the professionals and parents took back public education.

Categories Accountability, Administrators, superintendents, Education Industry, Privatization, Teacher Evaluations, Testing

The New York City Way of Monetizing School Buildings

By dianeravitch
March 31, 2013 //
14

Jonathan Pelto reflects on the latest educational reform: Tearing down schools and replacing them with luxury apartment buildings.

He writes:

Closing in on Rahm Emanuel’s title as “Emperor” when it comes to closing public schools…

True, few, if any can compete with Chicago’s Rahm Emanuel when it comes to the unprecedented effort to destroy public education by closing public schools, New York’s Michael Bloomberg covets the title and is making a dash to catch up with Emanuel’s unholy track record.

Call it the New York City School Closing Scheme 2.0 – The Bloomberg Way

The notion is built on the concept that why should we simply close neighborhood public schools when private developers can makes tens of millions in the process.

Earlier today, the education blogger extraordinaire, EduShyster, ripped away the veil to reveal the harsh light of truth on the school closing scheme being led by Bloomberg and his corporate education reformers.

As EduShyster wrote, “When we last checked in with our rich friends, they were flush with cash and aflurry with many excellent ideas for saving our failed and failing public schools. Now, with the stock market ascendant and corporate profits at an all time high, these generous benefactors are themselves rising to new heights of generosity and excellence. Today’s outstanding idea is brought to us (and to our failing schools) by the rich of New York City who have come up with an idea so bold, so transformative, so disruptive that we have no choice but to raise our glasses to them.”

The details of the scheme can be found in the prospectus produced by the Bloomberg Administration’s “Global Leader in Real Estate” agent who begins by announcing, “On behalf of the New York City Educational Construction Fund CBRE is pleased to offer for your consideration three prime development sites, two of which are located on the upper West Side, and one on the Upper East Side. The three sites are truly special opportunities as the present sizable developments within submarkets having limited available land for any substantial development…They are among the few chances remaining to build large projects in their respective neighborhoods.”

Using the concept of a whole lot of pictures printed on high quality paper is worth a lot more than a thousand words; the “request for expressions of interest” is definitely worth a look.

Beyond their prime Manhattan locations, what makes these sites “special opportunities?”

Property number #1 is the site of PS 191, also known as the Museum Magnet School. Although traditionally a “low-performing school” educating mostly poor Black and Hispanic children, many of whom live in the Amsterdam Housing project across the street, a three-year, multi-million federal grant has been transform the school into an innovate educational institution that is working in tandem with Lincoln Center and more than 90 of New York’s museums and cultural institutions.

Property #2 is the mostly-white, traditionally high performing PS 199, which is located just a few blocks from PS 191. As one of the most highly regarded elementary schools in New York, the biggest problem facing PS 199 is the lack of sufficient space for all of the students who wish to attend.

And Property #3 now houses the School for Cooperative Technical Education, a first-rate institution that has been successfully providing a diverse population of 17-20 year olds with the career & technical education courses they need to pursue careers in 17 technical and trade fields.

While millions have been spent to renovate these three schools in recent years, the Bloomberg Administration quietly asked New York City’s finest developers whether they would be interested in tearing down these schools and building multi-million dollar, high-rise luxury towers. The only requirement is that the developers provide some space in the basement and/or lower floors for a school to move into space below the upscale residential buildings.

In the meantime, the public school students would be moved to temporary swing space and, depending on the type of schools developed at the old site, future students from the area might be able to attend the new, more upscale schools.

In response to the request, the Bloomberg Administration received at least 24 proposals and the word is that potential developers for a site or sites will be chosen by June.

The innovative luxury housing program is being run by the Educational Construction Fund, an entity that was created back in 1967, but hadn’t been used until Mayor Bloomberg showed up and began making public land available to private developers as a way to raise revenue for the City and create more luxury housing for the wealthy, all the while making developers rich.

One key provision of the Bloomberg program is that it appears to allow these private developers to build without having to go through the city’s cumbersome review process. Another interesting note is that while the City will be able to lease the space for the “new” schools for a period of no greater than 40 years, the developers will have control of the site and housing towers for a full 99 year lease.

Playing their role as one of the primary apologists for the Bloomberg Administration, the Daily News recently proclaimed the benefit of turning over public property to private developers writing, “Take a walk on 91st St. and First Ave. A 34-story tower catches your eye. Costing $165 million, the Azure towers over the neighborhood offering some of the best views on the Upper East Side. From either of the two $5.7 million penthouses, you can see Central Park, the East River, and midtown skyline.

It’s what you don’t see that’s most important here. Next door at Middle School 114, more than 530 students were accepted into the public school for strong academic performance. Every day, the students walk into the newly-constructed school. They learn from smart boards in a fully air-conditioned facility equipped with computer labs.”

Imagine the honor of being able to tell your parents that you attend a school below a building that has not one, but two, $5.7 million penthouse apartments.”

It is a corporate education reformer’s dream come true. Public land, hundreds of millions for private develops, even more luxury housing for Manhattan and some kids even get future access to smart boards.

We can just imagine what innovative ideas will blossom from this type of thinking.

Perhaps they can make Central Park the largest in-door park in the world providing acres and acres of high end housing with their own variety of amenities. Of perhaps a new set of private, multi-million dollar apartments suspended below the George Washington Bridge and New York’s other river crossings.

You can almost hear it now, a win-win situation thanks to an iPod for every child and river view apartments for those who support the corporate education reform movement.

Media coverage on the issue can be found in a paper called the West Side Rag here, http://www.westsiderag.com/2013/02/20/pta-tries-to-reassure-parents-about-possible-public-school-demolitions, and here http://www.westsiderag.com/2013/02/17/exclusive-the-city-is-planning-to-demolish-ps-199-and-ps-191 and here http://www.westsiderag.com/2013/03/04/opposition-builds-to-demolishing-local-public-schools-but-some-see-benefits

Categories Bloomberg, Michael, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry
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