Archives for category: Education Reform

A Brief History of Anti-Government Rhetoric

May 6, 2020 //

Donald Cohen of the nonpartisan “In the Public Interest” has assembled a brief history of anti-government rhetoric.

He has assembled quotations from the anti-government crowd. It is only 12 pages and a quick, enlightening read.

It is called The Anti-Government Echo Chamber.

Here is the introduction on the ITPI website:

“They play to your fear, government plays to your fear.”

“Will you resist the temptation to get a government handout for your community?”

“Most businesses would tell you that they presently take care of their employees. They don’t need government telling them how to do it.”

“Government is a dangerous thing.”

No, these quotes aren’t from a recent Fox News broadcast about the coronavirus crisis. They’re examples from a decades-long, relentless attack on government by corporations, conservative politicians, and right wing think tanks.

Over the past few months we’ve been collecting anti-government rhetoric from Ronald Reagan to the Cato Institute to the mid-20th-century white supremacist Sen. James Eastland. We’ve dubbed it “The Anti-Government Echo Chamber.”

What stands out is that anti-government rhetoric has gotten clearer and more consistent over time. It’s come from diverse right-wing voices, from white supremacists to the religious right. It’s been weaponized to oppose a wide range of policies and programs, from education to ensuring civil rights. Of course, it’s been selective—focused on the safety net and public services we all rely on but silent about tax cuts, subsidies, and other benefits for corporations.

And it’s been effective—dramatically so. Taxes on corporations and the wealthy have been slashed. Public budgets have been cut. Public goods and services have been privatized, from highways to education. Nearly every state’s tax code is regressive, meaning they collect more taxes from low-income people than high-income people as a share of their income. At the federal level, spending on public health, education, and other nondefense discretionary programs is at a historic low.

Despite what these voices have said, government is the only institution capable of ensuring that things like quality health care, clean water, a good education, well-paid work, and equal voice are available to all. There are just some things that private markets can’t do.

We published “The Anti-Government Echo Chamber” also as a call to action to progressive leaders, thinkers, strategists, organizations, organizers, and activists.

Virtually every policy, program, and issue we focus on relies on using public power to create a fairer, healthier, and safer country and world. Yet, progressives rarely talk about government successes and progress except when under attack. The language we use is often tinged with anti-government attitudes.

Conservatives have long been clear about what they want—less government, a weaker democracy, and more power for corporations, the bigger the better. Progressives have focused on specific issues and campaigns and remained silent on the ideas that unite those issues.

The coronavirus crisis is revealing the dire need for effective, democratic, adequately funded public institutions. We must create our own “Pro-Public Echo Chamber” until our ideas become the new popular conventional wisdom and a governing reality. Are you with us?

The Anti-Government Echo Chamber begins like this:

“The emancipation of belief is the most formidable tasks of reform and the one on which all else depends.”
– John Kenneth Galbraith

“The power of the [corporation] depends on instilling the belief that any public or private action that serves its purposes also serves the purpose of the public at large.”
– John Kenneth Galbraith

“The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the Government, and I’m here to help.”
– President Ronald Reagan

“The folks who run Koch [Industries] are very clear. They would love to have government just get out of the way and allow companies to compete, whether in their particular sectors or other sectors. They are true believers in small government.”
– Congressional candidate Mike Pompeo when asked if he was influenced by Koch Industries, his largest donor.

“Expansive government undermines the moral character that is necessary to civil society.”
– Cato Institute 2017 Handbook for Policymakers

Anti-government sentiment by corporations and conservative intellectuals isn’t new. In 1914, three years after the Triangle Shirtwaist Company Fire killed 145 women and girls, real estate interests lobbied against new building safety codes.“The experience of the past proves conclusively that the best government is the least possible government, that the unfettered initiative of the individual is the force that makes a country great,” said Laurence McGuire, chairman of the Real Estate Board of New York.

But since the 1960’s (particularly after Barry Goldwater’s presidential campaign), anti-government rhetoric has gotten clearer, more consistent, and has come from diverse right-wing voices, from white supremacists to the religious right. It’s been weaponized to oppose a wide range of policies and programs, from education to ensuring civil rights. The attack on government is often selective—focused on the safety net and public services we all rely upon but silent on tax cuts, subsidies and other benefits for industry.

I think you will want to read it all.

Categories Charter Schools, Education Industry, Education Reform, For-Profit, Privatization, Vouchers

Steven Singer: Save Our Schools from the Biggest Budget Cuts in History

By dianeravitch

May 6, 2020 //

Steven Singer warns that public schools are facing deep cuts in state funding due to revenue losses caused by the pandemic.

Hey, it’s Teacher Appreciation Week, just the time to start mobilizing against cuts that could cause the layoff of nearly 300,000 teachers.

That means larger class sizes, fewer electives, cuts to the arts, to everything that is not tested.

Don’t expect Trump to stand up for teachers. He said famously in 2016 that he “loves the uneducated.” He wants more of them. They are the ones who march around with their weapons demanding freedom from public health measures to protect lives.

A society that is unwilling to invest in its children is sacrificing its future.

Categories Accountability, Budget Cuts, Cruelty, Education Reform, Funding, Ignorance, Students, Teachers

“The Economist” Says Schools Should Reopen Immediately

By dianeravitch

May 5, 2020 //

The Economist is an influential publication based in London. It writes, as its name suggests, about world economic affairs. In its current issue, the publication makes the case that the schools must quickly reopen in order to restart the economy.

The Economist contends governments across the world should open schools as soon as possible. It argues that so long as schools are closed, the achievement gap between affluent and working-class children will grow. Its editors suggest that the reopening of schools should be done in stages, with the youngest children returning first, since they seem to be the least at risk.

This is the “short-read” version of their argument.

Covid-19 has shut the world’s schools. Three in four children live in countries where all classrooms are closed. The disruption is unprecedented. Unless it ends soon, its effect on young minds could be devastating…

During some epidemics keeping children at home is wise; they are efficient spreaders of diseases such as seasonal flu. However, they appear to be less prone to catching and passing on covid-19. Closing schools may bring some benefit in slowing the spread of the disease, but less than other measures. Against this are stacked the heavy costs to children’s development, to their parents and to the economy.

A few countries, such as Denmark, are gradually reopening schools. Others, including Italy, say they will not do so until the autumn. In America, despite recent calls from President Donald Trump for schools to open, most states plan to keep their classrooms closed for the rest of the academic year—and possibly longer. That is a mistake. As countries ease social distancing, schools should be among the first places to unlock.

Consider the costs of barring children from the classroom. No amount of helicopter parenting or videoconferencing can replace real-life teachers, or the social skills acquired in the playground. Even in the countries best prepared for e-learning, such as South Korea, virtual school is less good than the real thing.

Poorer children suffer most. Zoom lessons are little use if your home lacks good Wi-Fi, or if you have to fight with three siblings over a single phone. And whereas richer families often include well-educated parents who prod their offspring to do their homework and help when they get stuck, poorer families may not.

In normal times school helps level the playing field. Without it, the achievement gap between affluent and working-class children will grow. By one estimate, American eight-year-olds whose learning stopped altogether with the lockdown could lose nearly a year’s maths by autumn, as they fail to learn new material and forget much of what they already knew.

School matters for parents, too, especially those with young children. Those who work at home are less productive if distracted by loud wails and the eerie silence that portends jam being spread on the sofa. Those who work outside the home cannot do so unless someone minds their offspring. And since most child care is carried out by mothers, they will lose ground in the workplace while schools remain shut.

In poor countries the costs are even greater. Schools there often provide free lunches, staving off malnutrition, and serve as hubs for vaccinating children against other diseases. Pupils who stay at home now may never return. If the lockdown pushes their families into penury, they may have to go out to work. Better to re-open schools, so that parents can earn and children can study.

The obvious rejoinder is that shutting schools brings benefits. Covid-19 can be deadly. Parents do not want their children to catch it or to give it to grandma.

In a longer article, the Economist expands on its view that keeping schools closed will repress learning and widen inequality.

Schools have striven to remain open during wars, famines and even storms. The extent and length of school closures now happening in the rich world are unprecedented. The costs are horrifying. Most immediately, having to take care of children limits the productivity of parents. But in the long run that will be dwarfed by the amount of lost learning. Those costs will fall most heavily on those children who are most in need of education. Without interventions the effects could last a lifetime.

For these reasons Singapore in 2003 cut its month-long June holiday by two weeks to make up for a fortnight of school closures during the sars epidemic. Closing schools even briefly hurts children’s prospects. In America third-graders (seven-year-olds) affected by weather-related closures do less well in state exams. French-speaking Belgian students hit by a two-month teachers’ strike in 1990 were more likely to repeat a grade, and less likely to complete higher education, than similar Flemish-speaking students not affected by the strike. According to some studies, over the long summer break young children in America lose between 20% and 50% of the skills they gained over the school year.

Closures will hurt the youngest schoolchildren most. “You can make up for lost maths with summer school. But you can’t easily do that with the stuff kids learn very young,” says Matthias Doepke of Northwestern University. Social and emotional skills such as critical thinking, perseverance and self-control are predictors of many things, from academic success and employment to good health and the likelihood of going to jail. Whereas older children can be plonked in front of a computer, younger ones learn far more when digital study is supervised by an adult…

Of course schooling has not stopped completely, as it does during holidays. Nearly nine in ten affected rich countries are providing some form of distance-learning (compared with fewer than one in four poor countries). But video-conferencing has its limits. For poorer children, internet connections may be ropey. Devices may have to be shared and homes may be overcrowded or noisy. Of the poorest quarter of American children, one in four does not have access to a computer at home.

Less well-off children everywhere are less likely to have well-educated parents who coax them to attend remote lessons and help them with their work. In Britain more than half of pupils in private schools are taking part in daily online classes, compared with just one in five of their peers in state schools, according to the Sutton Trust, a charity (private schools are more likely to offer such lessons). In the first weeks of the lockdown some American schools reported that over a third of their students had not even logged in to the school system, let alone attended classes. Meanwhile, elite schools report nearly full attendance and the rich have hired teachers as full-time tutors….

Closures in Britain could increase the gap in school performance between children on school meals (a proxy for economic disadvantage) and those not on school meals, fears Becky Francis of the Education Endowment Foundation, another charity. Over the past decade the gap, measured by grades in tests, has narrowed by roughly 10%, but she thinks school closures could, at the very least, reverse this progress. At least over summer, teachers are not on tap for anyone. In the current lockdown some students can still quench their thirst for education not just with highly educated parents but also with teachers; others will have access to neither.

The journal also ran a story on how young people may be less likely to catch or pass on covid-19.

The three articles left out one very important group that is necessary for the reopening of schools: the adults who staff schools. Teachers, principals, and support staff. Unlike little children, the adults are vulnerable to COVID-19. How strange not to consider their safety. How bizarre to ignore the well-being of the adults who must be present for schools to reopen.

What would be the value of reopening the schools if the teachers and staff are not safe? One case of COVID among the teachers or staff, and the schools would quickly close again, causing even greater disruption.

The view of The Economist appears to be shaped by its eagerness to restart the economy. Everyone is eager to restart the economy and to end the prolonged period of shutdown that threatens financial catastrophe. But wouldn’t it be best to wait until the risks are lower?

It is worth noting that the U.K. has an even higher death rate than the U.S. In fact, the U.K. death rate is double the U.S. death rate. Boris Johnson was as skeptical at the beginning of the pandemic as Trump. Then he got the virus and was in intensive care. I think he takes the threat seriously now. I doubt that teachers in the U.K. or the U.S. or the rest of the world are ready to put their lives at risk to restart the economy, especially when the infection rate and the death rate continues to rise in both countries.

Categories Education Reform

Mercedes Schneider: Why is Eva Moskowitz Laying Off Staff While Hiring New Staff?

By dianeravitch

May 5, 2020 //

Mercedes Schneider describes a great puzzle at Eva Moskowitz’s celebrated Success Academy charter chain.

Moskowitz laid off staff, allegedly because of state budget cuts, which cost her chain $60 million.

At the same time, she is hiring new staff.

And the chain has $60 million in reserves.

And if it is austerity time, why didn’t Eva cut her own compensation of $889,000 a year? You know, as a gesture while firing people.

Another tour de force of forensic investigation by Schneider.

Categories Education Reform

BREAKING NEWS: Tennessee Judge Declares Voucher Law Unconstitutional

By dianeravitch

May 4, 2020 //

The Education Law Center, a legal group that litigates on behalf of civil rights, just tweeted this:

@EdLawCenter: Breaking: Judge declares Tennessee voucher law unconstitutional, enjoins State from implementing program @pfpsorg @splcenter

The tweet was copied by ELC to Public Funds Public Schools and the Southern Poverty Law Center.

As soon as I learn more about this decision, I will post it.

Categories Education Reform, Tennessee, Vouchers

John Ewing: We Should Listen to the Real Education Experts: Teachers

By dianeravitch

May 4, 2020 //

John Ewing, a mathematician and president of Math for America, wrote in Forbes about a conference he recently attended about education. He noticed that none of the experts at the conference were teachers. When he asked the conference leader, his question was dismissed.

He remembered that Mike Rose had done a check of articles in the “New Yorker.” Most of the articles about medicine were written by doctors. None of the articles about education were.

Ewing maintains that teachers should make major policy decisions, not politicians. I say, “Hurray for John Ewing!” (By the way, he wrote one of the best takedown of value-added assessment of teachers published anywhere, in 2011, called “Mathematical Intimidation: Driven by the Data.”)

Ewing writes:

Teachers are the ones who drive reform forward, not policy makers. Should teachers weigh in on issues that affect their students? It seems absurd to even ask such a question. Good teachers know their students best. When we ignore this, we make colossal mistakes, like creating bizarre testing regimes or proposing misaligned curricula.

Education suffers when we don’t value teacher expertise, but the worst consequence is something more lasting: The teaching profession becomes less attractive. The best eventually leave, fewer of the best enter, and over time teacher expertise declines, creating a downward spiral.

Yes, I know, not every teacher is an accomplished expert, just as not every doctor is. But many are, and they are the ones we need most. Instead, they leave. Worse, they tell brilliant young people who think about teaching as a career: “You can do better.” A 2019 PDK survey asked teachers whether they would advise their own children to follow in their footsteps; less than half (45 percent) said they would.

The week of May 4 is Teacher Appreciation Week in the United States. This year, instead of giving teachers a plant or a letter or a video (all suggestions from the internet), why not give them something they can use? Give them respect—the kind that recognizes their expertise. Otherwise, we might all soon be asking … “Where are the teachers?”

Categories Education Reform, Funding, Harlem Success Academy

Stephanie Jones: Which Part of the Pandemic is a Real Crisis?

By dianeravitch

May 3, 2020 //

In this excellent article, Stephanie Jones, Distinguished Teaching Professor at the University of Georgia, draws a contrast between a real crisis–the pandemic–and the scare rhetoric of children “falling behind” in some mythical race. The only beneficiaries of the fake crisis are the testing corporations.

Jones writes:

Some crises are real and extremely difficult to prevent and respond to, like a highly contagious virus that is easily spread throughout communities. Other crises are human-created, easily preventable and also easily eliminated, like worrying about what students’ test scores in reading and math will be when they return to school.

Almost any teacher will tell you that the current tool of choice to attempt to measure student learning and teacher effectiveness – high-stakes testing – has distorted the purposes and possibilities of public education beyond recognition. Decades of research on assessment and testing back-up and validate their perceptions of tests, painting a very clear picture that high-stakes testing does extensive damage and provides very little helpful information.

This is critical for all of us (parents, community members, educators, leaders) to remember in this moment because we are hearing more crisis language about students “falling behind” during the pandemic school closures. But this particular “crisis” is only possible in a world of high-stakes testing. In other words, the tool that humans have created and continue to use to try to measure student learning created this crisis of falling behind.

Take for example the alarmist tone and language of the recent editorial essay in The New York Times “The Coronavirus’s Lost Generation of Children” (the original headline on Twitter) and similar pieces that weaponize the very language and metaphors tied to testing and have been used to dehumanize education for 20 years. Words they use — setbacks, losses, grim, disastrous, catastrophic, “hobble an entire generation,” aggressive remedial plans — are irresponsible and panic-inducing during our country’s biggest health, economic, and social crisis in a lifetime. These words also spin the ideological web that education is a race. One obvious problem with a race metaphor is that some people win races and some people lose races, which also means that some people are “ahead” in the race and some people will always be “behind.”

Please open the link and read the piece in its entirety.

Bear in mind that standardized tests are normed on a bell curve and the bell curve never closes. The gap is a social construction that guarantees there will always be a top half and a bottom half.

Categories Accountability, Competition, Education Industry, Education Reform, Testing

Gary Rubinstein: What Percent of Success Academy’s Students Graduated?

By dianeravitch

May 3, 2020 //

Gary Rubinstein saw an article in Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post claiming that 100% of the 98 students in the graduating class of Success Academy’s high school had been accepted into college.

Based on Success Academy’s long history of high attrition, he knew this claim was likely false.

So he checked and his hunch was right.

He asked:

Is 98 really all the students in the class of 2020?

The answer, of course is, ‘no.’ What the actual number is depends on how you define the class of 2020.

If you go back to a New York Post editorial from just six months ago, it begins with the sentence “Seniors at the Success Academy HS of the Liberal Arts just got their SAT scores — and all 114 did great, with an average score of 1268, 200 points above the national average.” So six months ago there were 114 seniors, which is 16 more than the 98 that are now called the ‘entire’ senior class. For Success Academy to lose roughly one-seventh of the students who were in the senior class just six months ago is stunning. These 16 students had been at the school since at least 3rd grade. Where did those 16 students go?

But if you look further back to the state data, you will find that the class of 2020 had 146 eleventh graders for the 2018-2019 school year. This means that they lost about 1/3 of the class of 2020 between then and now….

If you go back two more years to see where the class of 2020 was when they were in 9th grade you find that there were 191 students in the cohort back then. Also notice that when they were in 9th grade the boy/girl split of the 191 was about 50%/50% while when they were in 11th grade the boy/girl split of the 146 was 44%/56% in favor of the girls. We will have to wait until the official data comes out next year to see what the split was for the ‘entire’ 98 who graduated.

Rubinstein looks at the numbers all the way back to kindergarten and finds that only 28% of those who started Eva Moskowitz’s celebrated Success Academy made it to high school graduation. Way different than 100%.

Another great “success” for skimming, exclusion, and attrition.

Another landmark in the history of charter hype.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Reform, Harlem Success Academy, High School Graduation, Privatization