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NPE: Charter Lobby Wants Your School!

By dianeravitch
August 4, 2023 //
11

The Network for Public Education sent out the following notice to its 350,000 members. Join NPE so you can be on our mailing list (no cost to join). The charter lobby wants your public school.

Dear Diane,In a rare moment of candor, Nina Rees, the President and CEO of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, said that her organization’s “personal goal” is to make all public schools “like charter schools” that would be “schools of choice.”

If Ms. Rees and her charter trade organization have their way:

  • Children would enter a lottery to attend their neighborhood school.
  • There would be an appointed private board, not an elected school board.
  • Teacher tenure and bargaining rights in most states would disappear.
  • The school could shut down based on test scores, enrollment, or even the private board’s whim. 25% of all charters shut down in their first 5 years. 
  • In most states, the school could be managed by a for-profit corporation.

All of the above are the characteristics of charter schools. Every district in the nation would be a New Orleans–where schools open and close, and citizens have no voice in school governance.

That is why NPE fights so hard each year to ensure that the National Alliance does not get the funding increases it lobbies for from the federal Charter School Programs (CSP). We are so pleased to share the good news below.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reform, Disruption, Education Industry, Extremism, Network for Public Education

EdNext: Republicans Debate If Accountability Should Be Required for Vouchers

By dianeravitch
August 4, 2023 //
20

Caroline Hendrie, a veteran journalist who wrote for many years at EdWeek, wrote an overview of the implementation of vouchers (or “Education Savings Accounts“) in states that have endorsed “universal” access, removing almost all limits on access to them. Vouchers for rich and poor alike. As Josh Cowen has written in many articles, most students who use vouchers never attended public schools. And those from public schools who use vouchers are likely to do less well academically than the peers they left behind. No longer do you hear that vouchers will “save poor kids from failing public schools” because they don’t. In red states, they are a gift of public funds to families who happy to collect $6,000-$10,000 to underwrite their private school tuition.

Hendrie explains that voucher fans fall into two camps: On one side are those who want voucher families to restrict their use of public funds only to authorized expenditures, like tuition, tutoring, computers, school supplies. On the others are parents who say they want no restriction on what they purchase.

Like Florida, the states of Arkansas, Iowa, and Utah have all enacted laws this year that would open ESAs—sometimes after a multiyear phase-in—to most if not all school-age children in their states. Those four followed Arizona and West Virginia, which started implementing similar universal programs in 2022.

That wave plus other legislative action in 2023 brought to 13 the number of states with one or more education savings account programs funded directly from state revenues. In addition, Missouri has an operating ESA program paid for through tax credits.

Amid this growth, controversies have flared over ESA implementation—most notably but not exclusively in Arizona.

Critics complain that voucher money has been spent on non-education expenses, like swimming pools, kayaks, bbq grills, greenhouses, chicken coops, pianos, pizza ovens, and trampolines.

But parent groups have advocated for maximum flexibility, in which parents get a debit card and are free to purchase whatever they want, with no oversight.

Of course, vouchers create new for-profit opportunities. A company named ClassWallet has emerged to provide financial services to voucher states.

In 2019, Arizona contracted with the company ClassWallet to facilitate ESA transactions on its online spending-management portal. ClassWallet is also used by ESA programs in Indiana, Missouri, New Hampshire, and North Carolina.

On its website, the Florida-based ClassWallet lists its offerings:

ClassWallet is a digital wallet with an integrated eCommerce marketplace, automated ACH direct deposit, and reloadable debit card with pre-approval workflows and audit-ready transaction reporting. ClassWallet reduces overhead costs, saves valuable time, and better visibility and control for decentralized purchases.

Save Our Schools Arizona, which led the campaign to stop voucher expansion in 2018, is convinced that the state’s new commitment to universal vouchers will prove harmful to public schools, where most students are enrolled.

Save Our Schools Arizona, which advocates for public schools and opposes the 2022 ESA program expansion, argues that ongoing disputes over implementing the broader program prove it has become, as the organization’s executive director, Beth Lewis, puts it, “too big to succeed.”

Lewis said that the program is “wide open” for fraud. “It is interesting to watch my taxpayer dollars be used to build a garden in everybody’s backyard, when my public school can’t afford one,” she said. “It’s just this unspoken rule of, if you see it in a public school, then it’s approvable.”

Other states should view Arizona’s move to universal eligibility not as a model but as a cautionary tale, Lewis argues. She sees evidence of that happening in states such as Arkansas and Iowa, where newly passed laws call for incremental, multiyear expansions before getting to universal eligibility.

“I think they looked at Arizona and saw that this is a complete disaster and is not serving families well,” Lewis said. “There’s no way to ensure transparency. And they said, ‘Well, at the very least, we need to phase this in.’”

School-choice advocates tend to defend Arizona and see its uneven expansion process as par for the course when states try something different to promote educational freedom.

The last thing the choice lobby worries about (if ever) is the well-being of public schools, even though they enroll the vast majority of students in the state.

Categories Accountability, Deregulation, Disruption, Education Industry, Extremism, Scandals Fraud and Hoaxes, School Choice, Vouchers

Florida Bans AP Psychology Course Because of Gender Issue

By dianeravitch
August 3, 2023 //
39

Leslie Postal of the Orlando Sentinel reports that the Florida Depatment of Education has banned the College Board’s AP Psychology course because it includes the study of gender and sexual identity. In Florida, these topics are not permitted in the state’s schools and colleges. Florida believes that if no one teaches gender or sexual identity, students will agree they don’t exist, and eventually they will disappear.

Postal writes:

Florida will not allow public school students to take Advanced Placement psychology because the course includes lessons on sexual orientation and gender identity, topics forbidden by the state, the College Board said Thursday.

If so, that would mean that a week before school starts in many districts, about 5,000 Central Florida students and about 27,000 statewide may not be able to take a class they signed up to tackle in the 2023-24 school year.

“We are sad to have learned that today the Florida Department of Education has effectively banned AP Psychology in the state by instructing Florida superintendents that teaching foundational content on sexual orientation and gender identity is illegal under state law,” the College Board said in a statement.

The organization runs the 40-course AP program, which aims to offer high school students introductory college courses. Last school year, nearly 27,000 Florida students took AP psychology, which has been offered in the state since 1993.

“This element of the framework is not new: gender and sexual orientation have been part of AP Psychology since the course launched 30 years ago. As we shared in June, we cannot modify AP Psychology in response to regulations that would censor college-level standards for credit, placement, and career readiness.”

In May, Florida asked the College Board to review all its courses to make sure they comply with Florida law, which because of new laws and rules, prohibits teaching about sexual orientation and gender identity as well as certain race-related topics.

According to the College Board, the Florida Department of Education told school superintendents they could offer AP psychology only if lessons on sexual orientation and gender identity were omitted. But the College Board said those are part of the class and, if deleted, the course will not be able to carry the AP designation.

In June, the College Board told the state it would not alter the AP psychology course, which had been taught at 562 Florida high schools.

Categories Bigotry, Censorship, DeSantis, Education Industry, Extremism, Florida, Gender

Houston: Miles Seeks Approval to Hire Uncertified Principals and Teachers

By dianeravitch
August 3, 2023 //
15

Mike Miles is asking the Texas Education Agency to allow him to recruit uncertified teachers, principals, and deans. This move follows the Broadie playbook that education experience doesn’t matter. Broadies are known for their love of TFA. Miles may be reaching even lower since uncertified teachers do not require a college degree.

Houston ISD is seeking board approval this month for a waiver from the Texas Education Agency to hire uncertified deans and assistant principals for the next three years.

This follows the district asking for state approval to have an uncertified superintendent and uncertified teachers.

HIRING HUNDREDS HISD to seek TEA approval to hire uncertified teachers to fill classroom vacancies

The HISD Board of Managers is set to meet Thursday evening for a work session, where they’ll discuss the agenda for the board’s regular Aug. 10 meeting. Next week, the board is expected to vote on whether to approve an application for a certification waiver to employ assistant principals and deans without a certification through the 2025-2026 school year.

To be an assistant principal in Texas, an educator must have a certificate as an administrator, assistant principal, mid-management administrator, principal or superintendent.

Texas no longer issues an assistant principal certification, but the requirements for a principal certification in Texas include a master’s degree, a valid classroom teaching certificate, two years of teaching experience, and completion of a principal educator preparation program and two principal certification exams.

According to the TEA, districts can request a teacher certification waiver for someone to serve as a principal or assistant principal if an education does not currently hold a state certification. The request needs board approval before it is submitted to TEA for review and approval.

The board’s Thursday agenda also includes the topics of teacher vacancies and teacher certification waivers. In addition to a waiver for principals and deans, the district is seeking to waive Texas certification requirements for teachers to reduce vacancies on campuses before the school year begins.

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Deregulation, Education Industry, Houston, Principals, Teacher Shortage, Teachers, Texas

Charles Pierce: Mike Miles Brings Chaos to Houston

By dianeravitch
August 2, 2023 //
54

There is one good reason to subscribe to Esquire: to read Charles Pierce, one of the most perceptive writers of our time. Pierce writes about education on occasion, and he’s always on target. In this column, he skewers the casual cruelty of Texas Governor Greg Abbott , who seized control of the Houston public schools on the flimsiest of pretexts, and Houston’s new superintendent Mike Miles, who’s pushing his top-down ideas without regard to anyone else’s views. Miles is a military man who learned about education at the Broad Academy, where one of the central teachings was to ignore public opinion, as well as the views of local teachers.

Pierce writes:

This week, something altogether remarkable, and not in a good way, happened in the city of Houston in the state of Texas. On June 1, the state of Texas, which is wholly governed by Greg Abbott and a compliant, and heavily gerrymandered state legislature, took over the Houston Independent School District. The pretext was flimsy, as so many of Abbott’s pretexts are, where he even bothers to provide them. (That legislature again.) The decision was, well, unpopular. From Texas Monthly:

Mike Miles, the state-appointed superintendent of the Houston Independent School District, might be the most hated person in Harris County. At last week’s school board meeting—the first since Miles was officially hired—residents crowded HISD headquarters, in northwest Houston, to oppose the state’s takeover of the school district. One speaker compared Miles, who is the son of a Black father and a Japanese mother, to a Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. Another described the state’s recent seizure of HISD, which serves a student population that is 62 percent Hispanic and 22 percent Black—as an “act of racial violence.” Larry McKinzie, an educator and former State Board of Education candidate, appeared to make a physical threat against Miles: “Realize this: you’re safe at forty-four-hundred West Eighteenth”—the location of the board meeting—“but you’ll have to go back [home].” Not one of the 33 attendees who gave public comments had anything good to say about their new superintendent.  It was hard to gauge Miles’s reaction to the criticism, because he spent the entire public-comment period in a back room, watching the meeting on TV.

A meeting the night before this one had dissolved into chaos, so the new HISB rescheduled the meeting for the next night, using a plan that had the lovely tang of East Germany to it.

 In an apparent effort to keep order, the board allowed only 35 members of the public into last week’s meeting room, which can accommodate more than 300. The remaining 100 or so attendees were relegated to an overflow room. Several attempted to force their way into the main room, only to be turned back by armed police officers. One teacher who had registered to speak at the meeting was arrested for criminal trespassing and spent the night in jail. 

Houston officials tried to fight the takeover, and they even got it stalled for four years. But the puppet show that is the government of Texas has many fail-safe devices and they all work.

Houston leaders overwhelmingly opposed the takeover, citing HISD’s overall B rating from the state and strong financial position. In 2019 the district sued the state, delaying the takeover for four years. The legal battle ended in January, when the Texas Supreme Court—whose nine members are all Republicans—sided with the TEA. 

Miles beta-tested his sophisticatedly named New Education System in Dallas, where it proved to be a matter of long-term pain for short-term gain. This week, its implementation in Houston was widely interpreted as equally ominous. From Texas Public Media:

Librarian and media specialist positions are being eliminated at 28 campuses designated to be part of Miles’ New Education System (NES), which entails premade lesson plans for teachers, classroom cameras for disciplinary purposes and a greater emphasis on testing-based performance evaluations, among other initiatives. The libraries at those schools will continue to include books that can be read or checked out by students but are otherwise being reimagined as “team centers” where special programming will be held and disruptive students will be sent so as not to interfere with their classmates’ learning, according to HISD spokesperson Joseph Sam. The library-related changes also could be coming to the 57 schools where principals elected to be NES-aligned campuses, with Sam saying that would be determined on a campus-by-campus basis.

If this seems extreme, that’s only because it is — homogenized lesson plans, surveillance in the classroom, “special programs” for “disruptive students.” And libraries turned into “discipline centers,” which, truth be told, are not as dungeon-adjacent as their name might imply, although their name so clearly implies it that the NES folks like to call them “team centers.”

That most of the affected students will be from low-income communities of color should be obvious from jump, which means god alone knows what the NES definition of “disruptive” in practice is going to be. (In some places, “disruptive” students have drawn the attention of the local police. So maybe things are looking up.) What is also obvious is that any complaints will go into a political meat-grinder that is rigged in such an ironclad fashion that an fair outcome is nearly impossible. And around and around it goes.

Categories Accountability, Discipline, Education Industry, Extremism, Houston, Libraries, Texas

Arizona: New Private Schools Open to Take Advantage of Universal Vouchers

By dianeravitch
August 2, 2023 //
8

The Arizona Republic reported an increase in new private schools that opened in response to the state’s expanded voucher program. All children, regardless of family income, can now get vouchers to spend for religious schools, private schools, online schools, or home schooling. The voucher funding will decrease funding for public schools, which enroll the vast majority of students in the state. The voucher program in Arizona was expanded despite a state referendum in 2018 in which 65% of voters opposed voucher expansion.

The story focuses on Majestic Grace Christian Academy, which opened with an enrollment of 10 or 12 students. It hopes to double its enrollment next year. Christian values infuse the teaching in every subject.

As a small private school that sprang up just this past school year, Majestic Grace exemplifies the private school revolution stemming from the universal expansion of school vouchers. It is one of many recently launched private schools taking advantage of newly available public money. But while Majestic Grace and other private schools accept public funds in the form of school vouchers, there is little public oversight of what students are learning, whether they are achieving at their grade level and the training their instructors receive…

All the students attending Majestic Grace last year were school voucher recipients, said school founder Jed Harris, the retired banker. Majestic Grace is not the first school Harris has helped open in Arizona. He also worked to launch Tipping Point Academy, a private school in Scottsdale that promises to integrate a Biblical worldview into every lesson….

Grand Canyon Private Academy, an online school for students in grades K-10 that opened this past school year, notes prominently on its website that the Arizona school voucher program will cover all of the school’s tuition, which is up to $6,500 for the full year. …

Before the 2022-23 school year began, the Empowerment Scholarship Account program served about 12,000 students. Now, more than 60,000 students receive funding through the program for private school tuition, tutors or educational materials.

While it is unclear how many of those students receive funding for private school tuition rather than special therapies or at-home learning supplies, the voucher vendor list includes many private schools.

As the school voucher program has grown so have concerns about public money supporting private schools that are poorly understood beyond their physical or virtual walls. Gov. Katie Hobbs’ office released a memo in July estimating the school voucher program will cost more than $950 million in the current budget year, leading to a budget shortfall of nearly $320 million.

Voucher opponent Beth Lewis, who heads the public school advocacy group Save Our Schools, wonders whether private schools serve students better or are just shielded from the scrutiny of public schools, which are legally bound to provide information for accountability’s sake.

“Arizona’s ESA program is the least accountable in the entire country,” said Lewis. “Public dollars are going to strip mall private schools, popping up with zero accreditation and no requirements that they adhere to curriculum or state standards. In a public school, you need to have all of those things.”

State law requires the Arizona Department of Education to give every public school — district and charter — an A through F letter grade. It is based on factors including statewide assessment tests and graduation rate.

In contrast, Arizona law’s academic requirement for a family’s acceptance of a school voucher is that “a portion of the ESA must be used in at least the subjects of reading, grammar, mathematics, social studies and science,” according to the 2023-24 school voucher parent handbook. Those subjects must also be taught in private schools under Arizona law.

Those demands do little to alleviate Lewis’ concerns about academic accountability for private schools accepting taxpayer dollars.

“If you spend five minutes writing a sentence about grammar, that is not putting together a robust education,” Lewis said.

Furthermore, students lose legal protections when they leave public schools to accept a school voucher. For instance, private school students are not protected under a federal law that governs special education, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, like public school students.

Private schools also have less rigorous legal requirements for staff.

Most public school employees are required by law to undergo a form of background check to ensure they don’t have a criminal history that would disqualify them from working with children. That’s not required for private schools or vendors accepting voucher dollars.

In addition, full-time, permanent classroom teachers in public schools must have at least a bachelor’s degree. There’s no similar requirement for private schools, and the voucher program only requires vendors, like tutors, to have a high school diploma when it’s related to the service they’re providing.

With school vouchers, private schools and other educational vendors are answerable to the parents, according to the head of the program, who recently resigned. While the state provides a list of vendors and schools approved to receive voucher money, it is the parent’s responsibility to ensure a provider has satisfactory credentials and provides adequate services.

The voucher schools are exempt from state testing requirements. They are not accountable to the state.

Categories Accountability, Arizona, Education Industry, Privatization, Religion, Separation of church and state

“School Choice”: Who Chooses? The School or the Family?

By dianeravitch
August 1, 2023 //
2

Teachers College Press released this description of recent research on school choice.

Does School Choice Mean Parents or Schools Do the Choosing?

Dr. Barbara Ferguson
Research on Reforms, Inc.


In their book on school choice, the authors ponder the question: “Does School Choice Mean Parents or Schools Do the Choosing?”

The book is published by Teachers College Press at Columbia University* and its authors, Wagma Mommandi and Kevin Welner, begin by citing the driving force behind school choice, which is to remove the “government monopoly on schools and let families choose the school for their children.”

But, through their decades of research, the authors conclude that “charter schools often play an outsize role in shaping enrollment.” They cite an assortment of practices that charter schools have implemented to deter the enrollment of certain groups of students. And they conclude, “even when parents are able to enroll their child in their preferred school of choice, academic requirements and disciplinary policies may prevent enrollment in subsequent years.”

These same conclusions were reached by Dr. Barbara Ferguson and published in her book: “Outcomes of the State Takeover of the New Orleans Schools” (2018). Dr. Ferguson uses the term “selective admission” for charter schools with enrollment practices that deter the enrollment of certain groups of students. The term “selective retention” is used for charter schools that have policies that prevent continued enrollment.

Charter schools are public schools, and they are supposed to be distinguished from the traditional public schools only by the governance structure. Charter schools are governed by private boards and traditional schools are governed by public boards. Yet, in New Orleans, the charter schools are allowed to enact admission and retention rules like those enacted by private schools..

“Selective Admission” allows charter schools to select the best and the brightest, and the wealthiest. Lycée Français charter school, in 2011-12, had a paid preschool program with a tuition of $4,570 and those preschool students gained automatic entry into the elementary charter school. They bypassed the lottery, which is required by federal law to be used when there are more applicants than spaces available in the school.

Benjamin Franklin, Lusher and Warren Easton were three successful magnet high schools that became charter schools and were allowed to keep their selective criteria for admission.“Selective Retention” allows charter schools to selectively remove underachieving and disruptive students:
• To continue their enrollment at Franklin and Lusher, students had to earn an overall 2.0 grade point average, and at Warren Easton an overall 1.5.

• At Hynes charter school: “Students with chronic attendance/tardy issues or with three or more suspensions will be ineligible to re-register.”

• At Mays charter school: “A student who misses ten or more consecutive days of school without notifying Mays Prep …is subject to being unenrolled at Mays Prep.”

• At Priestley charter school: “Students must maintain a 2.5 grade point average during the school year. Failure to do so will result in academic probation…and/or an invitation not to return the following year.”


• At Lake Forest Elementary charter school: “Failure to complete volunteer hours or participate in the mandatory fund raisers may result in loss of placement for your child.”This list can go on and on. The above information is taken from each school’s handbook and cited in Dr. Ferguson’s book.Perhaps the most egregious “Selective Retention” charter school scheme is expelling students for offenses for which they previously could not be expelled. Charter schools are allowed to develop their own rules for expulsion.


• At Miller-McCoy charter school, students can be expelled for “not attending tutoring, homework center…, misbehaving on the school bus, disrupting class….”


• At Arise Academy charter school, students can be expelled for “offenses, such as, disrespect, out of uniform, chewing gum…”


• At New Orleans College Prep charter school, students can be expelled “for repeated and fundamental disregard of school policies and procedures.”


• At Lafayette Academy charter school, students can be expelled for “unexcused or excessive absenteeism; cheating; failure to report to detention.”The list can go on and on. The above information is taken from each school’s handbook and cited in Dr. Ferguson’s book.

Charter schools not only developed their own rules for expulsion, but they could expel directly from the site level. Thus, a more tragic outcome was the aftermath of the expulsion. Previously, schools had to make a recommendation for expulsion to the district level. If the district office expelled the student, the district was then required to reassign the expelled student to another school. But charter schools were allowed to expel directly from the site level with no obligation to ensure that the student was re-enrolled in another school. Thus, the parents of the expelled student had to find another school which was almost impossible since charter schools can cap enrollment.

Constitutionally, each state has an obligation to educate all students to a given age which is established by the state. But that obligation is circumvented when no entity has the responsibility to ensure that a student expelled from a charter school is re-enrolled into another school. When the New Orleans School Board regained some control of the charter schools, they reversed the charter school site-level expulsion mandate, now requiring charter schools to recommend students for expulsion to the district office. If expelled, the district office then places the student into another school. However, two New Orleans high schools still retain language in their handbooks which state that they expel from the site level.

“Does school choice mean parents or schools do the choosing?” The Louisiana charter school law was intended for parents, especially parents of “at-risk” children and youth, to remove their students from “failing” schools and to choose a school with a higher rating. But the written law has not become the implemented law. New Orleans “at-risk” children and youth remain in the poorest performing schools.


________________________________Endnote:


*School’s Choice: How Charter Schools Control Access and Shape Their Enrollment (Teachers College Press, 2021) Authors: Wagma Mommandi and Kevin Welner.

Comments to bferguson@researchonreforms.orgResearch On Reforms Website

Categories Accountability, Bigotry, Charter Schools, Disruption, Education Industry, Parents, Privatization, School Choice, Students

Florida Adopts Curriculum to Indoctrinate Students in Rightwing Views

By dianeravitch
August 1, 2023 //
46

Ana Cenallos of The Orlando Sentinel reports that the state of Florida adopted curriculum materials created by rightwing talk show host Dennis Prager with the explicit purpose of indoctrinating students to accept rightwing views of controversial topics.

Gov. Ron DeSantis repeatedly says he opposes indoctrination in schools. Yet his administration in early July approved materials from a conservative group that says it’s all about indoctrination and “changing minds.”

The Florida Department of Education determined that educational materials geared toward young children and high school students created by PragerU, a nonprofit co-founded by conservative radio host Dennis Prager, were in alignment with the state’s standards on how to teach civics and government to K-12 students.

The content, some of which is narrated by conservative personalities such as Tucker Carlson and Candance Owens, features cartoons, five-minute video history lessons and story-time shows for young children. It is part of a brand called PragerU Kids. And the lessons share a common message: Being pro-American means aligning oneself to mainstream conservative talking points.

“We are in the mind-changing business and few groups can say that,” Prager says in a promotional video for PragerU. He reiterated this sentiment this summer at a conference for the conservative group Moms for Liberty in Philadelphia, saying it is “fair” to say PragerU indoctrinates children.

“It’s true we bring doctrines to children,” Prager told the group. “But what is the bad about our indoctrination?”

The bottom line message: The US is the best place ever. Its history is unblemished by any troubling episodes. Slavery was practiced in many societies, and white people should be credited with ending it.

PragerU is not an accredited university and it publicly says the group is a “force of good” against the left. It’s a nonprofit organization based in Los Angeles that produces videos that touch on a range of themes, including climate policies (specifically how “energy poverty, not climate change” is the real crisis), the flaws of Canada’s government-run healthcare system (and how the American privatized system is better), and broad support for law enforcement (and rejection of Black Lives Matter).

In some cases, the videos tell kids that their teachers are “misinformed” or “lying.”

Categories Academic Freedom, Accountability, Bigotry, Censorship, Civics, Curriculum, Education Industry, Extremism, Fake, Florida, History, Lies, Propaganda

Arizona: Expanded Voucher Program Blows a Hole in State Budget

By dianeravitch
July 31, 2023 //
10

Despite the public’s overwhelming rejection of vouchers in a state referendum in 2018 (by a margin of 65-35%), the Republican Legislature and then-Governor Doug Ducey ignored the vote and passed a program of universal vouchers. This meant that the state would pay for every student, regardless of family income, to attend a private or religious school or homeschool or whatever the family considered an educational expense.

The claim that vouchers would “save poor kids from failing public schools” was exposed as phony, since most students who claimed vouchers never attended public schools. Quite simply, the voucher program was a transfer of public money from public schools to students in non-public schools.

The cost of the voucher program soared to nearly $1 billion. It’s two top administrators resigned. The new Governor Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, said that the voucher program was unsustainable.

Two of the top administrators in charge of a controversial school program in Arizona that has seen cost estimates swell to well beyond expectations have abruptly resigned, leading to more questions about the program and how it is being operated.

The program, known at the ESA Program, was expanded last year by the Republican-backed legislature and has seen its costs swell to enormous heights as students around the state quickly applied for the $7,000 vouchers made available by the program.

ESA Leaders Abruptly Resign

Two of the top administrators with the Empowerment Scholarship Accounts program in Arizona abruptly resigned on Monday, with the remaining members of the program giving few details as to why the two may have left.

An Arizona Department of Education spokesman acknowledged Tuesday that Empowerment Scholarship Account Director Christine Accurso and operations director Linda Rizzo had resigned from the ESA program, according to KPNX-TV.

“Christine Accurso has explained to the department that she took the ESA position to clean up the program and having successfully done that she has chosen to move on,” according to the statement…

ESA Causing Huge Deficit to State Budget

The ESA program has now cost the State of Arizona approximately $943 million, prompting what Governor Katie Hobbs says will be a $319 million budget deficit for the state, largely caused by the bloated spending of the program.

Categories Arizona, Education Industry, Funding, Privatization, Vouchers

The Big Lie About America’s Public Schools and the Scheme to Privatize Them

By dianeravitch
July 30, 2023 //
49

America’s public schools were one of the glories of the nation until recently. Politicians hailed them as a symbol of democracy, a public institution open to all, supported by taxpayers, and controlled by elected local boards.

Local business leaders frequently served on local school boards. Americans broadly understood that the schools prepared the rising generation to be good citizens and to sustain our democracy. Certain principles were taken for granted: public funds were never used to fund religious schools; teachers and principals were career professionals, often the most educated members of their community, and were respected.

This is not to say that everything was rosy. I have written several books about the controversies that rocked the schools, especially over desegregation, which encountered vehement resistance in both the South and the North.

But despite the battles over race, curriculum, and other matters, the public schools garnered high praise from the public and elected officials.

However, this iconic symbol began to take a drubbing in 1983, when the Reagan-era National Commission on Excellence in Education released its harshly negative report called “A Nation at Risk.” The commission claimed that the nation’s schools were mired in a sea of mediocrity, that test scores were on a downward spiral, and that the nation’s public schools were responsible for the loss of major industries to other nations.

The reaction to the report was immediate: states set up task forces and commissions to find solutions to the schools’ crisis. Higher standards for students and teachers, more time in school, tougher curricula, etc.

The one refrain that became the legacy of “A Nation at Risk” was: Our schools are failing.

But we now know that the report was a hoax. James Harvey, who worked on the commission’s staff, explained that the books were cooked to produce a negative result. The data were cherry-picked to paint the schools in the worst possible light. The conclusions were a lie. The report ignored positive findings and chose to ignore the students living in poverty, the students with disabilities, and the other socioeconomic challenges facing the nation’s schools.

So today, relying on the Big Lie of 1983 (“our schools are failing”), ideologues, grifters, tax-cutters, religious interests, and others have joined forces to grab the money now devoted to public schools.

To the original Big Lie have been added new Big Lies to advance the cause of privatization and profits:

Big Lie number one: Test scores are reliable indicators of school and teacher quality. This simple but wrong idea was the basis for No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top. It overlooks the well-known fact that test scores are highly correlated with family income and are influenced more by home conditions than by teachers or schools. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of public schools were closed because of their inability to meet high test score goals. All of the closed schools were in impoverished communities. Thousands of teachers were penalized or fired because they taught the children with the biggest challenges, those who didn’t speak English, those with severe disabilities, those whose lives were in turmoil due to extreme poverty.

Big Lie number two: Teachers need not be professional to get good results. Inexperienced teachers with high expectations and a few weeks of training will get better results than career professionals. This lie undercut the profession, undermined respect for teachers, and was the founding myth of Teach for America.

Big Lie number three: the private sector will run schools more effectively than local government, therefore we need more charter schools. BUT: The charter sector has spawned scandals, with private entrepreneurs embezzling millions of dollars for themselves. Some charters get high test scores by excluding weak students, some get high scores by attrition of weak students. Many charter schools close every year due to academic or financial problems. On average, charter schools do not get better results than public schools.

Big Lie number four: vouchers will produce higher test scores. BUT: Voucher schools, funded with taxpayer dollars, are usually exempt from state testing and are not accountable as public schools are. Where voucher students do take state tests, they fall farther and farther behind their peers in public schools. Now that it’s well-known that voucher schools are academically behind public schools, their proponents have moved the goalposts to say: Parents should choose, no matter what the studies show about test scores.

The Republican Party, with few exceptions, has swallowed the Big Lies and is intent on giving every student—regardless of income—a voucher to attend a religious school, private school, or home school.

For the first time in two centuries, the very concept of public schools is in jeopardy.

Ninety percent of Americans were educated in public schools. That ninety percent made America a successful nation by most measures. Public schools built bridges among diverse communities.

What will the new paradigm contribute to our nation?

Categories Accountability, Corporate Reform, Education Industry, Fake, Fraud, History, Hoax
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