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Peter Greene Admires Andrea Gabor’s “After the Education Wars”

By dianeravitch
January 7, 2019 //
19

Peter Greene read and enjoyed Andrea Gabor’s book “After the Education Wars.”

Andrea Gabor is a business journalist by trade, and it’s our great good fortune that she followed the thread of business-style reform into the world of education. Her recent book, After the Education Wars: How Smart Schools Upend the Business of Reform, is an invaluable addition to the literature of ed reform– not the faux reform that has been foisted on us for the past decades, but actual improvement of schools and education. With a journalist’s keen eye for detail and gift for story-telling, Gabor delivers compact, fair and gripping tales of education reform in four cities, showing both what worked and what didn’t. The book combines thorough research with sharp insight and– well, there are plenty of books about ed reform that are “interesting if you’re into that sort of thing.” Gabor’s book is just plain interesting and hugely readable. If you’re afraid this review is too long to read, let me cut to the chase– read this book.

Gabor is a fan of W. Edwards Deming, the American engineer who helped Japan create their post-war industrial boom but who was long ignored in this country. The story she finds in business-driven ed reform is the story of businessmen who keep learning and applying the wrong lessons, and whose distrust of educators combine with their arrogance about their own expertise result in repeated versions of the same mistakes. They keep returning to a topdown, hierarchal, siloed organization driven with carrot-and-stick incentives “about as successful,” says Gabor, “as a Ford Pinto or a Deep Water Horizon drilling operation.” But the debates about industrial management in this country were largely won by the Taylorites, who put their faith in sort-of-scientific data and a view of workers as rats in a Skinner box. The Deming systems approach, valuing an atmosphere of trust and empowerment.

This may all seem very esoteric, but it shakes out in some important ways. To oversimplify– a Taylorite approach says that individuals mess up the system, and you make the system better by rooting out the “bad” individuals, while a Deming approach says that problem individuals are signs of flaws in your system. You can see the Taylorite approach manifest in the long-standing reformer emphasis on finding bad teachers and firing them as a ay to fix schools. My favorite Deming observation is about deadwood in an organization. Deming asked if it was dead when you hired it or did you hire a live tree and then kill it? Either way, it’s your system (and management) are to blame.

Gabor uses five big chapters to tell the stories of four big systems; each story is fascinating and instructive in its own way.

Greene describes the five big chapters that show education reform done wrong and education reform done right.

I love her chapter on New Orleans.

Categories Accountability, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, Privatization, Testing

Houston: Governor Wants to Take Over Houston Public Schools, Although No State Takeover Has Ever Succeeded

By dianeravitch
January 7, 2019 //
7

Governor Greg Abbott, not known for his educational credentials, tweeted insults at the school board of the Houston Independent School District. The privatization buzzards are circling. The governor wants to take over the entire district, even though no one at the state government or the Texas Education Agency knows how to turn around a district or even a school. As a graduate of the HISD, I take these insults personally. Since when did a Republican governor decide that local control was a terrible idea? Is Governor Abbott a socialist?

Thankfully, Jitu Brown of the Journey for Justice is in Houston, warning about what happened in Chicago and other cities.

Be it noted that no state takeover has ever succeeded. The bureaucrats know only one trick: give the public schools to charter operators, who kick out the kids with disabilities and English learners. Some reform.

The threat of a state takeover stems from a state law, known as HB 1842 and passed in 2015. It requires the state’s Education Commissioner to close schools or replace the entire elected school board if even one public school has failed state standards for five or more years. A separate law, known as SB 1882 and passed in 2017, gives a school board a two-year pause on those sanctions if they temporarily give financial and administrative control of the struggling schools to an outside group, such as a charter school network or nonprofit.

Last year, HISD had 10 schools that could trigger the state takeover. This year, four are on the watch list: Highland Heights Elementary School, Henry Middle School and Kashmere and Wheatley high schools.

In December, the Houston school board considered requesting proposals from outside groups to temporarily manage those schools. A nonprofit organized by Mayor Sylvester Turner’s office wanted to partner with the district and manage them, similar to a partnership model used in Los Angeles. The board decided 5-4 not to request any proposals — though it has until Feb. 4 to send any partnership proposal to the state.

That timeline was already creating pressure.

But Abbott’s tweet has intensified the debate. The governor said that the board’s “self-centered ineptitude has failed the children they are supposed to educate. If ever there was a school board that needs to be taken over and reformed it’s HISD. Their students & parents deserve change.”

HISD board members have pushed back against that criticism.

Categories Education Reform, Houston

Alex Caputo-Pearl: Why LA Teachers May Be Forced to Strike

By dianeravitch
January 7, 2019 //
10

Alex Caputo-Pearl is president of the United Teachers of Los Angeles. He explains why teachers may strike.

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-caputo-pearl-teachers-strike-20190106-story.html

He writes:

Teachers in Los Angeles may be forced to strike on Jan. 10.

The Los Angeles Unified School District has a record-breaking reserve of nearly $2 billion that should be spent on its resource-starved students. Yet Supt. Austin Beutner, a multimillionaire with experience in corporate downsizing but none in education, argues that the reserve is already accounted for in future spending, and that cuts should be made. He simultaneously refuses to talk about charter school regulations, calling the issue a “shiny ball” that distracts from the real issues.

District officials have cast the impasse as a funding problem. But at its heart, the standoff between L.A. Unified and United Teachers Los Angeles is a struggle over the future of public education.

Consider the conditions within the district. Class sizes often exceed 45 students in secondary schools; 35 students in upper elementary grades; and 25 students in lower elementary grades.

The district does not have nearly enough counselors, psychologists or librarians to give students the support they need, and 80% of schools don’t even have full-time nurses. Unnecessary standardized testing is pushing the arts and ethnic studies out of the curriculum.

Parents have little say over how funding is spent at their schools. Charter schools, which are operated mostly by corporate chains, have expanded by 287% over the last 10 years, draining more than $600 million from non-charter schools every year. Salaries for educators are low compared to surrounding districts, a significant disadvantage as L.A. Unified tries to recruit and retain teachers during a national shortage.

With the vast majority of our students coming from low-income neighborhoods of color, there is no way to describe the persistence of such conditions other than racial discrimination.
Working together with parents, the teachers union has put forward proposals to address many of these issues. Over 20 months of negotiations, the district has responded with inadequate counter-proposals.

Meanwhile, Beutner has moved ahead with what we believe is his agenda to dismantle the district. Through an outside foundation, he has brought on firms that have led public school closures and charter expansion in some districts where they have worked, from New Orleans to Washington, D.C. This approach, drawn from Wall Street, is called the “portfolio” model, and it has been criticized for having a negative effect on student equity and parent inclusion.

It is for many of these reasons that 98% of L.A. Unified’s educators voted to authorize a strike. Parents are actively supporting the teachers. There were many parents among the estimated 50,000 people who attended the UTLA March for Public Education on Dec. 15.
Beutner has attempted to narrow the issues mainly to salary. Educators will not be bought off. We need a host of improvements for our students.

Beutner has also said that the district doesn’t have reserves that will last longer than two to three years. The reality is that L.A. Unified had a reserve of $1.86 billion at the end of the 2017-18 school year. Its latest budget documents show the reserve growing to $1.97 billion in the 2018-19 school year.
The district warns about a fiscal cliff, but its warnings ring hollow. Three years ago, district officials projected that the 2017-18 reserve would be $105 million. They were off by more than $1.7 billion.

L.A. Unified has also overestimated its spending on books and other supplies over the last five years to the tune of hundreds of millions, meaning more money is available. The district has also failed to collect the full amounts owed by charters that are located on its campuses.

My colleagues and I agree with Beutner on at least one thing: The real long-term solution is for Sacramento to increase statewide school funding. It is downright shameful that the richest state in the country ranks 43rd out of 50 when it comes to per-pupil spending.

We have been working to change this. Beutner should help by supporting legislation to close the carried interest loophole, which has allowed hedge fund managers to inappropriately classify income as capital gains. This could bring hundreds of millions to schools annually.

He should also build support among the wealthy for Schools and Communities First, which closes the corporate loophole in Proposition 13 and could bring up to $5 billion in new annual funding to public schools. This is on the 2020 ballot.

United Teachers Los Angeles’ struggle for a fair contract is just one part of a broader movement for students, families and schools. We will engage in whatever talks are possible before Jan. 10 to avert a strike. But for talks to be successful, the district needs to commit to improve public schools.

I have taught in Compton and at Crenshaw High School. I have been in my own children’s classrooms. And I have visited hundreds of other schools. There is wonderful promise in the students at all of our schools. But although they are surrounded by wealth, students across the city are not getting what they deserve

Enough is enough. Invest in our students now.

Categories Class size, Education Reform, Funding, Los Angeles, Teachers, Unions

John Thompson: The News from Oklahoma, Part 1

By dianeravitch
January 6, 2019 //
9

This is the first of a three-part series. Last spring, Oklahoma experiences a mass teacher walkout to protest underfunding of public schools.

John Thompson, historian and retired teacher, writes:

Oklahoma made national headlines in 2018 because of its teacher walkout; teachers running for the legislature; and a “Blue Wave” in Oklahoma City and the nation’s biggest congressional upset. But the election of a vocal Trump supporter as governor has emboldened privatizers. In some ways, the drama is more common in states, like Oklahoma, that have cut schools and public services in the most extreme manner. Mostly, however, the assault on the state’s schools and the teachers’ counter-attack is representative of national privatization campaign.

Test-driven, charter-driven reform failed, so now the Billionaires Boys Club is investing hundreds of millions of dollars in selling the “Portfolio Model.”

The Portfolio Model is new and different. Its strategy is the opposite: charter-driven, test-driven reform.

Seriously, the Oklahoma education crisis and teacher shortage has been extreme, but a large part of our ordeal was the predictable result of the corporate reform agenda. It was imposed on our schools just like it was across the nation. Oklahomans now need to ask what would have happened to our dramatically underfunded schools had a grassroots teachers’ revolt not rolled back the “reforms” of 2010 to 2014. We then need to ask what will happen to our still-weakened public education systems if we can’t fight off these new, supposedly kinder and gentler reforms, like the portfolio model.

Non-Oklahomans might not recognize the full, frightening message conveyed by the Oklahoman’s editorial entitled, “A Welcome Shift to Oklahoma Education Reform.” It was accompanied by a photograph of the conservative Speaker of the House Charles McCall, who now has a majority (if he doesn’t lose Republican legislators who were teachers) so large that it can’t be stalled by Democrats. McCall’s frightening glare previewed the message he conveyed to the extremely conservative newspaper editors: spending increases are needed but “We need to look at educational outcomes.” Sounding like he is oblivious to the fiasco which resulted from the accountability-driven, competition-driven experiments imposed at the beginning of the decade, the Speaker said we need to “look at both sides of the ledger.”

https://newsok.com/article/5617174/a-welcome-shift-to-oklahoma-education-reform

The editorial then quoted Senate Pro Tem Greg Treat, who leads an even more daunting Republican majority, who said that the Oklahoma City (OKCPS) and Tulsa districts (TPS) will be targeted. The Oklahoman then editorialized for Treat’s call for reforms in the urban districts, “That echoed comments Treat previously made to The Oklahoman editorial board, when he warned that continued struggles in the state’s two largest districts are ‘detrimental’ to the state’s economic future.”

For that reason, Oklahomans, as well as educators and school patrons across the nation, should review the last decade of corporate reforms. I’ll admit to being naively hopeful when the Gates Foundation announced its district-charter collaboration grants and I understood why Tulsa accepted the Gates teacher quality grant. But I had no way of knowing that the Gates Teacher Effectiveness Model (TLE) value-added teacher evaluations would become the model for the state’s dysfunctional TLE law. As the TPS leaders said at the beginning, before they fired or “exited” 260 teachers and 26 school leaders, the TLE wouldn’t become a “gotcha” system; they claimed to understand that Tulsa faced a teacher shortage, so the system would focus on improving teacher quality.

Even before the Chiefs for Change’s Deborah Gist staffed the TPS administration with nine Broad Academy graduates, Gates grants for charter/district partners required value-added school reports across district and district-authorized charters, and opening more “high-performing” charter schools in high-needs areas. Another grant funded “innovative professional development systems to create personalized learning systems for teachers;” and an “experiment with innovative modes of delivery.” After Gist took over, edu-philanthropists funded the salaries of three central office administrators, including a “director of portfolio management” to “absorb the duties of the director of partnership and charter schools.”
https://www.tulsaworld.com/news/education/tulsa-public-schools-teacher-evaluation-system-is-changing-culture-has/article_6be79be3-d934-5d4a-98ef-5ec90bcea9e9.html

https://www.tulsaschools.org/our-schools/charterpartner

https://www.lighthouse-academies.org/news/item/tulsa-public-schools-gets-gates-grant-to-improve-charter-collaboration/

https://www.gatesfoundation.org/How-We-Work/Quick-Links/Grants-Database/Grants/2014/09/OPP1114657

https://www.tulsaworld.com/news/education/tulsa-public-schools-to-add-three-administrative-positions-paid-for/article_ca88f531-2f29-5232-88c1-0d6316957f1a.html
So, did the millions of dollars of money from Gates and other edu-philanthropists improve teaching and learning?
Because of Tulsa’s previous commitment to early education, students enter 3rd grade ahead of their peers in the OKCPS but TPS students’ progress from 3rd to 8th grade is the nation’s 7th slowest according to data from Stanford’s Center for Education Policy Analysis. Its student growth advances only 3.8 years over the next five. By contrast, OKCPS students progress 4.4 years from third to eighth grade. Despite – or because of – the district’s reforms, Tulsa has about 75 percent more inexperienced teachers than the even more challenged Oklahoma City schools.

A recent Tulsa World article praised the TPS Teacher Corp led by Quentin Liggins, the Broad-trained director of talent initiatives, calling it a success because it helped 74 emergency certified teachers secure jobs.
https://www.tulsaworld.com/news/education/tps-educators-discuss-benefits-of-tulsa-teacher-corps-as-program/article_bd9c898c-938e-512d-acb4-257ea9edba45.html?utm_source=Education+Watch&utm_campaign=ad277b68cb-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_12_17_02_25&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_0ec15fa3fb-ad277b68cb-101023449&mc_cid=ad277b68cb&mc_eid=05d2eb1443

But, that sidesteps the key question that the legislature and the governor should ask: Given all the money and effort invested in the Gates TLE, why the TPS can’t retain experienced teachers, resulting in 34 percent of TPS’s teachers being hired in the past two years?
The World enthusiastically praised the system where applicants spend “about 15 to 20 hours completing online coursework during the spring” and attend “the six-week program in June with in-classroom training.” It then quoted a Teacher Corp teacher who praised its classroom management training which “went a long way in helping Martin [the teacher] instill some order in her class of kindergartners.”

And that leads to the question that legislators should ask that will be explored in a subsequent post. Given the importance of teaching reading for comprehension, hopefully by 3rd grade, why are we dumping that responsibility on rookie, emergency certified teachers?

Could that help explain why Oklahoma is #2 in the nation in retaining k through 2nd graders?

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, Oklahoma, Privatization, Testing

Reed Hastings Should Watch “Orange Is the New Black”

By dianeravitch
January 5, 2019 //
50

I don’t like Reed Hastings. I don’t like that he hates public schools and wants to turn every one of them over to a private corporation. I would never subscribe to Netflix, because it would put money into his overflowing bank account. He is a billionaire.

However I do not live alone and the other adult member of my family subscribed to Netflix despite my protestations.

Then she started watching shows with language I found very offensive. And then, much against my will, I became addicted to that show, called ”Orange is the New Black.” I warn you that the language and the visuals are XXX rated. No, XXXXXXX rated. I got hooked by the story and the characters. It is a story about women in prison, and there is quite a bit of graphic and prurient stuff. You are warned.

The one redeeming feature, having just finished the sixth season, is that the series demonstrates how repulsive, how corrupt, how disgusting privatization is.

Do you think Reed Hastings noticed that the private prison corporation that took over “Litchfield Prison” cut corners at every chance, cutting education programs, cutting the budget for food, hiring inexperienced and brutal guards (Prison Guards for America), subjecting the inmates to even worse indignities than when the government ran the prison? The private corporation cares only about profits, not the lives of the prisoners. The corporation’s budget-cutting caused a riot (that is exactly what has happened in privatized prisons).

The program is a powerful indictment of privatizing public services. I hope Reed Hastings watches his own hit series and learns about the inevitable human costs of privatization.

He is a smart man. He is a billionaire. But can he learn?

Categories Accountability, Billionaires, Charter Schools, Education Reform, Privatization

Peter Greene: Another Venture Capitalist from TFA Enters MarketWorld

By dianeravitch
January 5, 2019 //
18

I am reading a wonderful book right now by Anand Giridharadas called “Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World.” He explains a phenomenon that most of us know all too well. The big philanthropists offer gazillions to “save” education, but only if they control how it works. The bright young people coming out of college and graduate school have been indoctrinated into what he calls “MarketWorld.” They want to “change the world,” but they have learned that the best way to change the world is a “win-win.” The haves keep their money and status (and make more money) by “helping” the have-nots. The end result of the win-win market strategy is that the elites pat themselves on the back for their world-changing ideas, make a lot of money, and take control of the lives of the have-nots. Those of us in the education world have seen this scenario play out again and again. Bill Gates, Eli Broad, the Walton family, Betsy Devos, the Koch brothers, Reed Hastings, etc., all have plans to “save poor kids from failing schools,” which end up harming public schools and placing the “poor kids” at the mercy of the market, where they might or might not get into a desirable charter school, which might or might not last more than a year, and probably has no unions. End result: no change, other than the destruction of public schools and unions.

Peter Greene has an apt example of a new entrant into the MarketWorld space.

It is called Camelback Ventures. Lots of bright young people figuring out how to save the world and make money. A win-win.

Categories Education Industry, Education Reform, Philanthropy, Privatization

Federal Court Blocks Beutner Effort to Stop Special Ed Teachers from Striking

By dianeravitch
January 5, 2019 //
9

From UTLA:

Federal Court throws out LAUSD’s request for strike injunction against special education teachers; desperate legal games continue

Today, less than 24 hours after it was filed, a federal court denied LAUSD’s request to stop special education teachers from joining their colleagues on strike.

“The court’s swift and decisive action shows just how desperate a move this was,” said UTLA President Alex Caputo-Pearl. “Austin Beutner knew he didn’t have a legal leg to stand on but he went ahead anyway, spreading fear and confusion among the public, our members, special education students and families. The scare tactics must end now.”

On Thursday, LAUSD filed a claim in federal court to prevent UTLA special education teachers from striking. The threatened teachers immediately took to social media to vent their anger at LAUSD’s attempt to prevent them from exercising their right. This sneaky maneuver —especially coming from a district that has repeatedly ignored UTLA’s contract demands for special education class-size caps to relieve the burden of overcrowded special education classrooms – is beyond cynical and counterproductive. (Read the conversations on numerous posts on our Facebook page here.)

In two days, Beutner has used his high-priced lawyers to initiate two frivolous legal actions against UTLA and is now threatening a third. These tactics smack of disdain for the very school district he is meant to serve and protect.

On Wednesday, LAUSD officials went to PERB to seek an injunction based on unsubstantiated claims that UTLA has been preparing for a strike since 2016. Then today, the district threatened another lawsuit claiming UTLA did not give sufficient notice of our intent to strike, despite multiple notifications, including a Jan. 10 strike date announced on Dec. 19.

“Beutner is using his background as a corporate profiteer and downsizer. He has hired well-known privatizers and anti-union lawyers in an attempt to dismantle the school district as well as the solidarity of our union brothers and sisters. But we see right through this, and we will fight it every step of the way,” said Caputo-Pearl. “Rich people don’t like to lose, and having money allows you to shift the playing field. But public education belongs to the people of Los Angeles, not the super rich.”

It’s clear Beutner fears the collective power of educators, parents, students and the community coming together. We must stay united and focused on the goal: a contract that reinvests in our schools and improves our working and learning conditions.

We can expect to see more desperate actions by Beutner as our strike date nears. We are disappointed, but after 20 months of bad faith bargaining and disrespect, it is what we have come to expect from Beutner and LAUSD officials.

Regardless of this, we will sit down with LAUSD officials on Monday and expect them to provide a clear and legitimate proposal for us to consider, and that we can move toward an agreement.

Categories Education Reform

Angie Sullivan: Nevada Needs a Charter Moratorium

By dianeravitch
January 4, 2019 //
7

Question of the Day, Week, Year, Decade:

In the face of so many scandals and failures, why do eduvillainthropists continue to throw good money after bad?

Angie Sullivan, a teacher in Clark County, Nevada, poses this question in a recent letter.


Thank you National Public Education Activists for your work which I follow on a regular basis.

Thank you for your work.

I believe our Nevada legislators should notice:

– Nevada Education Leadership in the NVDOE have failed to prove Nevada Charters are a remedy. Yet our current legislation allows charter takeover of CCSD schools.

– Nevada Charters are segregating. In Nevada, charters segregate by race, money, and religion. Each Nevada charter campus has an obvious identity and group it serves.

– Eduphilantrophists financially propping up or expanding Nevada for-profit charters is not good business practice. This is not competition. Nor is it a good return on investment. It is forced. It is also throwing good money after bad.

– Authentic Education Innovation has been replaced by for-profit corporations creating hedgefund or leasing opportunities. 80% of Nevada Charters are for-profit.

– There is significant and severe lack of financial or academic accountability for Nevada Charters. This is very costly to the Nevada Tax Payer as many charters flounder for years in receivership/ bankruptcy. Or national charter chain corporations sue Nevada draining resources rather than educating students.

– Nevada Charter student enrollment practices and student expulsion need to be examined. Authentic reliable and viable research is noticeably non-existent or extremely limited on Nevada Charters. A simple persual of Nevada charter websites which allow racial slur posting and derogatory statements against some students enrolling can be used as evidence to take action.

– CCSD student population is 20% white. Nevada charters reflect nearly the opposite. “Choice” is white flight. IEP and Free-Reduced lunch numbers also show significant under-service in charters.

– CCSD Schools threatened with charter takeover serve communities which are brown. These schools are NOT the lowest performers in the state. There is something racially unfair about charter takeover selection. It is not “choice” if you have to force brown kids into a disfunctional charter district. Folks would go willingly if the charter district was successful in serving communities of color. Frankly some communities are tired of their children being used in education experiments or being used to meet a quota.

Nevada Education Leadership and the Nevada Legislature need to acknowledge that our education money is limited. Nevada Charters are not authentically successful. Public Relations Spin does not make a student graduate. Billions are spent to promote this failed scam. Continuing to spend tax payer money in a segregating and business manipulated manner is harmful to our communities in significantly distructive ways.

In summary, Nevada Charters are not graduating students.

$350 million and growing. 30 years and zero accountability. This mess needs to be cleaned up.

The Nevada Charter Authority needs the ability to close down national charter corporations.

Nevada needs a charter moratorium.

The nation needs a moratorium.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our public schools are worth the effort. Our students need us to speak up. May God hold us in His Hands.

The Teacher,
Angie Sullivan

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Education Reform, Nevada, Philanthropy, Privatization

And Then There Were Almost None: New Mexico Abandons PARCC Tests

By dianeravitch
January 3, 2019 //
40

The newly elected Governor of New Mexico, Michelle Lujan Grisham, signed an executive order withdrawing from PARCC, the Common Core test funded by Arne Duncan in 2010 (PARCC and SBAC together got $360 Million in federal funding.)

“Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham on Wednesday ordered the state’s Public Education Department to immediately take the steps necessary to terminate New Mexico’s use of the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers standardized test, commonly known as PARCC.

“Lujan Grisham, in an executive order, called on the department to immediately begin working with key stakeholders to identify and implement a more effective, more appropriate and less intrusive method for assessing school performance that is compliant with the federal Every Student Succeeds Act.

The development of this alternative approach, intended to deliver a sounder methodology for the rating and assessments of New Mexico schools, will include teachers, administrators, parents, students and recognized professionals and experts in the field of student assessments.”

Some 25 states signed up for PARCC. Very few remain. A judge in New Jersey just ruled it could not be used as a graduation requirement.

PARCC took pride in having the highest standards and failing the most students.

Slowly but surely, Common Core and the testing that went with it, which once claimed alliances with nearly all 50 states and DC, are disappearing.

Sad. Not really.

Categories Common Core, Education Reform, New Mexico, Testing

Los Angeles: Charter Billionaires Will Stay Out of Primary for Board Seat

By dianeravitch
January 3, 2019 //
16

There is an open seat on the Los Angeles school board, because convicted felon Ref Rodriguez stepped down. He was a darling of the charter billionaires, who spent lavishly to elect him. He founded a charter chain. The leading candidate for his seat is Jackie Goldberg, a dynamic and articulate voice for public schools, where she wasa teacher, then became a board member and a state legislator.

The charter lobby has decided not to endorse in the March primary, but will probably throw their weight and dollars into a runoff to beat Jackie, if there is one.

Jackie Goldberg needs to win a majority of the votes to avoid a runoff. She is uniquely qualified. Even with her vote, the billionaires will have a majority, but only by one vote, not two. And she has a powerful voice, which would change the tenor of the board and keep Austin Beutner on the hot seat.

Recent races for the Los Angeles Board of Education have been the most expensive school board contests in the nation’s history — and charter school supporters spent millions more than anyone else. But a key charter group announced Friday it will sit out a March special election to fill an empty and potentially pivotal seat.

The political arm of the California Charter Schools Assn. is not endorsing any of the 10 candidates for the seat left vacant in July, when Ref Rodriguez resigned after pleading guilty to one felony and three misdemeanors for campaign fundraising violations.

The hopefuls are vying to represent the oddly shaped District 5, which covers some neighborhoods north of downtown L.A. as well as the cities of southeast Los Angeles County. The Board of Education, currently with six members, is split on key issues, including how to interact with privately operated charter schools, which compete with district-operated schools for students.

A spokeswoman for the charter group spoke of the many strong options for the board seat.
“There are a number of highly qualified, inspiring candidates in this race,” said Brittany Chord Parmley of CCSA Advocates. “Given the diversity, strength and depth of the field, we have decided not to endorse. … This election is an opportunity for the entire community to engage in a dialogue about what it will take to provide an outstanding public education to all Los Angeles students.”
Close observers have described this race as especially tricky for the charter group. District 5’s boundaries were carved to elect a Latino. And in the previous election, charter backers had a strong Latino candidate in Rodriguez, the co-founder of a charter-school organization.

One obvious option, charter group executive Allison Greenwood Bajracharya, is not a Latina. Nor is Heather Repenning, a city commissioner backed by Mayor Eric Garcetti, another power player. Nor is Jackie Goldberg, the pick of the teachers union, which has been the second-biggest spender in board races and has called for halting the growth of charter schools.

Backing a Latino in this district has mattered to United Teachers Los Angeles in the past, but after recent elections losses, union leaders think they have a winner in Goldberg, who has alliances within the Latino community. Goldberg previously served on the school board and the L.A. City Council as well as in the state Legislature. A wildcard for UTLA is the effect of a teachers strike planned for Jan. 10, which could work for or against the union’s endorsed candidate.

The ideal candidate in this race would be a Latina, according to some consultants.

Three Latinos in the race would be hard sells for charter supporters: School counselor Graciela Ortiz is active in UTLA. Cynthia Gonzalez works as a principal at a district-run school. Activist Rocio Rivas led protests calling for Rodriguez to resign.

The other Latino candidates are: Salvador “Chamba” Sanchez, a community college instructor; David Valdez, an L.A. County arts commissioner; Nestor Enrique Valencia, a Bell City Council member; and Ana Cubas, a community college instructor and former L.A. City Council aide who ran unsuccessfully for the council in 2013.

For the charter group, no one stood out.

Four of the Latino candidates banded together to urge UTLA and the charter group to endorse one or more Latinos.

“As the ‘Charter School vs. Public School’ debate rages on and political heavyweights attempt to bully their way into installing their own,” Cubas, Sanchez, Valencia and Gonzalez said in a joint statement, “this is a familiar scenario for the Latino candidates in this race. The district has long left its Latino students behind in academic achievement and access to public education.”

Other candidates, including a couple who dropped out of the race, originally endorsed the one-and-a-half-page statement, but disagreements developed among the group.

The charter group’s neutral stance may not carry over to a likely May runoff between the top two primary finishers, regardless of their ethnicity.

“It is naive to think this is a retreat or respite on their part,” said Juan Flecha, president of the union that represents school administrators. His union, which lacks big-money resources, has endorsed both Goldberg and Gonzalez.

Even in the primary, a pro-charter mega-donor could step in to fund a campaign. That could work better for charter supporters because the official charter group has the baggage of past ties to Rodriguez, said one political consultant, who requested anonymity because of connections to more than one candidate.

Another consultant, Mike Trujillo, who has worked mostly against UTLA-backed candidates, agreed: “It only takes some limited paperwork and a check to become a player in the primary.”

But it might make sense, he said, for the charter group to bide its time while teachers union president Alex Caputo-Pearl spends a lot on the teachers strike and on Goldberg in the primary.
“I suspect CCSA is gonna just get out of Alex’s way and let him spend away,” Trujillo said.

Categories Accountability, Billionaires, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, Los Angeles, Privatization
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