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Gail Collins on Betsy DeVos and Her Crusade to Save Predatory For-Profit “Colleges”

By dianeravitch
October 28, 2017 //
21

This column by Gail Collins is a Must Read.

The bad news from the U.S. Department of Education comes so frequently that it is hard to keep track of it.

DeVos is clear in her goals: roll back the federal role in protecting students and taxpayers’ money.

One egregious example: she is diluting, diminishing, removing federal efforts to rein in for-profit Colleges. In fact, she has hired former executives and lobbyists from the industry to write the regulations. Some of her many investments were in the industry, which she obviously sees as part of the future. And surely she has not forgotten Trump University, the fraud associated with the man who appointed her.

Collins writes:

“DeVos is the superrich Republican donor who once led a crusade to reform troubled Michigan public schools by turning them into truly terrible private ones. Now she’s in the Trump cabinet, and she seems to be dedicating a lot of her time to, um, lowering higher education.

“When no one was watching she hired a lot of people that come from the for-profit colleges,” complained Senator Patty Murray of Washington, who feels the additions are far more interested in protecting their old associates than in overseeing them. Murray is the top Democrat on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, otherwise known as HELP. These days it’s hard to tell whether that’s a promise of assistance or a cry of distress.

“To oversee the critical issue of fraud in higher education, DeVos picked Julian Schmoke Jr., whose former job was a dean of — yes! — a for-profit university. Specifically a school named DeVry. Last year, under fire from state prosecutors and the Federal Trade Commission, DeVry agreed to pay $100 million to students who complained that they had been misled by its recruitment pitch.

“That sort of thing is getting to be common in the darkest corners of the for-profit world. For instance, there’s a now-defunct “university” that promised to show students how to get rich quick in real estate and wound up paying $25 million to settle the case. …

“Back to the Department of Education. One of DeVos’s top advisers, Robert Eitel, is on a leave of absence from a company that operates for-profits and once paid more than $30 million to settle charges of deceiving students about the loans they were getting.

“Which is, again, even more than that real estate school, where some students claimed they were encouraged by instructors to increase the limits on their credit cards. …

“There are well over 3,000 for-profit colleges and universities in the country, everything from tiny schools that promise to set you off on a career in cosmetology to conglomerates with campuses all over the world. Some of them have names that might seem intended to be confused with somebody else’s. (Not necessarily thinking of you, Brown College, Berkeley College, Columbia Southern University or Northwestern College.)

“Experts say some for-profits are fine. However, there have been a ton of horror shows in which low-income men and women are promised a path to life-changing jobs but wind up with nothing to show except huge loan bills.”

Categories Betsy DeVos, For-Profit, Fraud, Higher Education

Susan Ochshorn Sends a Message to Billionaires: Little Children Are Not Investment Vehicles

By dianeravitch
October 22, 2017 //
10

Susan Ochshorn founded ECE PolicyWorks to advocate for high-quality education for young children.

In this post, she analyzes the pernicious influence of financiers and hedge fund managers on decisions about the fate of young children, as they figure out how to make a profit with “Social impact bonds.”

Everyone loves the idea of early childhoood education. But unfortunately the financiers have figured out how to make it pay—for them.

Ochshorn shows how Goldman Sachs and other investors saw a path to profit and how public officials fell in love with metrics. The children? Not so much.

She gives the background of the social impact bond.

And she concludes that commodifying children is a very bad idea:

“By last summer, the U.S. Department of Education had gotten on board. Under the aegis of John King, former education commissioner of New York, they launched a Pay for Success grant competition, $2.8 million available for state, local, and tribal governments interested in exploring the investment vehicle’s feasibility. Early this year, as Betsy DeVos replaced King in the top job, the department distributed funding ranging from $300 to $400 million to 8 recipients. Rigorous evaluation, as the Urban Institute’s “Pay for Success Early Childhood Education Toolkit,” makes clear, is the sine qua non of the transaction, precise metrics and data collection essential for determining the venture’s outcome.

“To quantify is to have the illusion of mastery over all that defies our control, yet the metrics fall short, the ends perverted: they cannot capture children’s unique capacities, or the uneven trajectory of their development—as messy and challenging as it gets.

“Three- and four-year-olds are not commodities. They have had the grave misfortune of entering the academic arena in a period of measurement gone berserk. What young children need most is time, and sustained support for experiences that nourish their bodies, minds, and spirits—their due, according to the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which the U.S has not yet ratified more than 25 years after the resolution was adopted by the U.N. General Assembly.

“The benchmarks and assessments of the Common Core violate this right—especially for our youngest students. So do social impact bonds. If the payback is contingent upon a particular timetable, and the desired outcomes are not forthcoming, where does that leave the kids?

“Those who have made their millions and billions in private equity, investment banking, and hedge funds see themselves as the saviors of our most vulnerable children. Yet their fancy models are putting our youngest learners at greater risk—along with democracy and the public good.”

Categories Bill de Blasio, Billionaires, Childhood, Pre-K, K, Corporate Reform, For-Profit

Laura Chapman on North Carolina’s “Innovation School District”

By dianeravitch
October 19, 2017 //
22

Laura Chapman writes:

This is the new “public policy.”

I see that the Oregon backers of Achievement For All Children in North Carolina paid state politicians for the right to substitute charter schools for low performing public schools in a new multi-count “Innovative School District.”

I looked at the website for the Achievement for All Children franchise (http://aac.school). I think the word franchise is correct because there is a one-size-fits all basic curriculum, with non-trivial online deliveryof content—a boon for cost cutting and really attractive to charters. What’s more, much of the curriculum is free or low cost, so reimbursements for managing schools and hiring paraprofessionals may well be where much of the public money goes.

I took some time to look at the curriculum, the partners, and the funders of this operation. North Carolina schools in this concocted “Innovative School District” will have tightly sequenced grade-by-grade lessons from a ready-to use curriculum. The curriculum has significant on-line components, and/or practice workbooks. These materials also offer teacher handholding materials–what to do, when, and how.

The main curriculum will be E. D. Hirsch’s Core Knowledge® program with grade-by-grade mastery of content beginning in Kindergarten. This content is also organized to fit the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). In 2011, Hirsch endorsed the Common Core State Standards and changed the rhetoric of Core Knowledge® to accommodate the CCSS aims of college and career readiness. Substantial portions of the Core Knowledge program are now available on line and “aligned” with the CCSS.

The Hirsch’s Core Knowledge® program has tapped online services “for building Common Core-aligned reading and language arts skills.” One example is “Quill.”

Quill, is a two-tier service, one free, the other premium. The premium service requires a fee, but that fee can be waived for low-income schools. The Quill curriculum requires the application of grammar, writing and proofreading skills to Core Knowledge content (from Core Knowledge Language Arts® and Core Knowledge History and GeographyTM.). The online assignments, each about 10-15 minutes, are organized by the Common Core standards.

Quill gathers data on student performance in real time then steers each student into an improvement program. The premium program adds data gathering suitable for tracking progress on “national writing standards,” especially “sentence combining” for a logical presentation of ideas.

A second online program has been tapped for use in the Core Knowledge® program. It is free, and offered by ReadWorks.org. According to the ReadWorks website, the service offers “the largest, highest-quality library of curated nonfiction and literary articles in the country, along with reading comprehension and vocabulary lessons, formative assessments, and teacher guidance.”

ReadWorks is incorporating content from the Core Knowledge® program into their “Article-A-DayTM” feature—brief nonfiction texts intended to build students’ “background knowledge, vocabulary, and reading stamina.”
These ReadWorks services are paid for by private and corporate “partners” as well as the generosity of specific content providers.

Here are the private and corporate supporters of the content: Brooke Astor Fund for New York City Education; Frances L. & Edwin L. Cummings Memorial Fund; Cleveland H. Dodge Foundation; Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; Imagine K12; Amherst Foundation; William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust; NewSchools Venture Fund; Smith Richardson Foundation; Spotlight Fund; Tsunami Foundation – Anson and Debra Beard, Jr. and Family; and Travelers. The “partners” with Imagine K12; are venture capitalists as are those with NewSchools Venture Fund.

Readworks also has partners who integrate their content into the ReadWorks on-line program, especially the “Article-A-DayTM” feature. These content providers include: The American Museum of Natural History; Museum of Modern Art, The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History; New York Historical Society and Museum; Philadelphia Museum of Art; New York Philharmonic; Audubon; Exploratorium; The Wall Street Journal; New York City Ballet; Civil War trust; Learning Ally (for students with dyslexia and visual impairments) and Wordsmyth. (dictionary, thesaurus)

Imagine K12 is of special interest. This is an “investment accelerator” for startups in the tech industry. Educators are enlisted to test and help promote the products through the Imagine K-12 network. Participants in the network–tech-loving educators–are eligible for special invitations to Silicon Valley to be in on and test products/services from the latest tech startups.

Since 2011, Imagine k12 has launched more than 75 apps, online programs and services. Many of these de-school education, and remove educators from decisions in favor of algorithms. The website lists 18 apps, services, products for classroom management, 19 for curriculum, 11 for feedback and assessment, 17 for student learning, 15 for school operations, and 14 for postsecondary education. (These categories are not mutually exclusive).

I conclude that the Innovation School District will be a profit-centered operation with little school-level control of decisions by educators My guess is that parents will have marginal engagement of the school staff unless that is accomplished with the aid of a mobile app. There is no doubt about this: The students will be sources of massive amounts of data for exploitation by venture capitalists.

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

Michigan: State Senate Steals Money from Public Schools and Gives It to State’s Failing Charter Industry

By dianeravitch
October 19, 2017 //
17

If ever you want evidence that Betsy DeVos bought and paid for the legislature in Michigan, consider the decision just made by the State Senate to take money approved by voters for their public schools and give it to charter schools. More than 80% of the state’s charters operate for profit. They get worse results than the state’s public schools. The state has minimal expectations or accountability for charter schools. Why are they getting more money?

“The Michigan Senate passed a controversial bill Wednesday that will allow charter schools in the state to collect revenues from enhancement millages levied by intermediate school districts.

“Republicans said the bill would treat all students — whether they attend traditional public schools or charter schools — fairly, but Democrats said the legislation was stealing money that voters approved for traditional public schools and shifting those funds to charter schools.

“I introduced this bill because there are 14,000 … students in Kent County that aren’t being treated fairly,” said Sen. David Hildenbrand, R-Lowell. “And there are 56,000 students in Wayne County that aren’t being treated fairly either.”

“But Sen. Curtis Hertel, D-East Lansing, said voters approved the millages with the knowledge that the money would go to traditional public schools in their county.

“This bill takes school funding, which is already stretched to the max in the state, and tries to stretch it even further,” he said. “This is corporate welfare. It’s stealing.”

“Enhancement millages can be used for just about anything by a school district, including lowering class sizes, hiring teachers, upgrading technology or purchasing materials.

“The Wayne County school districts could be hit the hardest if the legislation receives final passage because the county has more than 100 charter schools. The county approved a 10-year enhancement millage in 2016 that is raising $80 million annually that is split among the county’s 33 public school districts.

“Hildenbrand said his intent with the bill is that it won’t affect existing millages, only when a renewal or new millage comes up before voters. But in its analysis of the bill, the Senate Fiscal Agency concluded it would apply to existing millages, too.

“And Senate Minority Leader Jim Ananich, D-Flint, said the language in the bill is so vague that charter schools — some of them for-profit operators from out-of-state — could claim the funding.

“The language matters and it was ambiguous at best and at the very least it’s showing that we’re putting profits before educating all of our students,” Ananich said.”

Why fund failure?

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, For-Profit, Funding, Michigan, Privatization

Denis Smith: Charter Abuses in Ohio Are Proliferating

By dianeravitch
October 16, 2017 //
5

Denis Smith worked in the charter office of the Ohio Department of Education until he retired in 2011. He continues to be amazed by the growth and scale of charter fraud, waste, and abuse, which the legislature ignores. Of course, the charter industry has been shielded because charter lobbyists wrote the law!

In this post, he describes some of the most flagrant abuses, several of which involve real estate and exorbitant rentals and leases that allow the charter company to pocket taxpayers’ dollars.

Here is one of the most flagrant abuses:

“The Columbus Primary Academy, part of the Imagine Schools charter chain, is saddled with a lease that requires exorbitant rent to Imagine’s for-profit real estate subsidiary. In two other states, federal courts deemed the leases “self-dealing’’ and ordered Imagine to pay $1 million fines. The latest state audit shows the academy’s current lease extends to 2033, while the latest state report cards shows the school continues to fail our kids.”

An inflated lease that runs through 2033 for a failing Charter School!

Why do Ohioans tolerate this misuse of taxpayer dollars?

How many more scandals will be exposed before the legislature stops waste, fraud, and abuse in the charter industry?

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Education Reform, Failure, For-Profit, Fraud, Ohio, Privatization

Cleveland Tries to Block Low-Performing Charter Authorizer: State Says No

By dianeravitch
October 15, 2017 //
14

Here’s a twist. The city of Cleveland wants to upgrade the quality of its charter schools by blocking a very poorly regarded charter authorized but the Ohio State Superintendent turned Cleveland down.

Bottom line: it is easy to close a public school, but very difficult to close down a low performing charter or authorizer.

“The first real test of whether city leaders can force higher standards for charter schools in the city – a power they fought for in the state legislature five years ago – has failed.

“Though Cleveland has some of the strongest charter schools in Ohio, it also has some of the weakest. So Mayor Frank Jackson and other city leaders have wanted to force some of the weakest operators and oversight organizations for the privately-run, tax-funded public schools to do a better job.

“Making that happen has been a challenge.

“Jackson won limited power from Gov. John Kasich and the legislature in 2012 to let his school quality panel, the Transformation Alliance, recommend to the state who can create and oversee new charter schools in the city.

“That hard fought power was much less than what Jackson had initially sought – an ability for city leaders to approve or deny each new school directly.

“But when the panel tried to use that already-reduced power this year for the first time – asking the state to block controversial charter sponsor St. Aloysius Orphanage from starting new schools here – the Ohio Department of Education did not agree.

“Piet van Lier, executive director of the Alliance, shared this week a recent letter from State Superintendent Paolo DeMaria affirming that he will not grant the Alliance’s request and will let St. Aloysius add new schools here.

“DeMaria is instead forcing St. Aloysius to better communicate with the city over its educational goals.

“We are very disappointed by ODE’s decision,” van Lier said.”We reviewed St. Aloysius’s application thoroughly and found no evidence that the sponsor is focused on providing a quality education for all Cleveland children.”

“Dave Cash, head of Charter School Specialists, the for-profit company that oversees schools for the orphanage, did not reply to an e-mail seeking comment this week.”

Mr. Cash is the appropriately named head of The for-profit company that runs the low-performing authorized.

“Members of the Alliance – Cleveland school district, union, charter school, higher education, business and philanthropic leaders – believe that the Cincinnati orphanage, which now oversees 12 charter schools in Cleveland, creates mediocre or poor schools across the state, just to offer school choices for the sake of choice, not quality.

“Alliance members also question whether the orphanage and the for-profit company that creates schools for it are mainly trying to make money.”

The authorizer gets a cut of the funding no matter how poorly the school performs.

Categories Charter Schools, For-Profit, Ohio

Disgusting! Oregon Businessman Who Funded Charter District in North Carolina Plans to Go into Charter Industry

By dianeravitch
October 11, 2017 //
5

Earlier this morning, I posted about the wealthy businessman in Oregon who funded the North Carolina (not) Innovative School District, which will enable the state to take public schools away from local districts and give them to charter schools.

This strategy, as I pointed out, was tried and failed in Tennessee. The basic plan is to end local control and privatize the schools.

Now, we learn, the Oregon businessman was not just a philanthropist. He is going into the charter school business in North Carolina.

It’s a free-for-all, folks. Step right up and get your money, right from the taxpayers of North Carolina into your bank account!

“A company tied to a wealthy Libertarian donor who helped pass a state law allowing takeover of low-performing North Carolina schools is trying to win approval to operate those schools.

“Achievement For All Children was among the groups who applied for state approval to run struggling schools that will be chosen for the Innovative School District. Achievement For All Children is heavily connected to Oregon resident John Bryan, who is a generous contributor to political campaigns and school-choice causes in North Carolina.

“The company was formed in February and registered by Tony Helton, the chief executive officer of TeamCFA, a charter network that Bryan founded. The board of directors for Achievement for All Children includes former Rep. Rob Bryan, a Republican from Mecklenburg County who introduced the bill creating the new district, and Darrell Allison, who heads the pro-school choice group Parents For Educational Freedom in North Carolina.”

North Carolina is very easy-going about conflicts of interest. Note that the CEO of a charter chain just stepped down from the state’s Charter Schools Advisory Board.

“A spokeswoman for TeamCFA said she would provide comment when she could do so. Helton, who is chief executive officer of Achievement For All Children, did not immediately return a request for comment. Helton had cited an increased workload at TeamCFA for resigning this week from the state Charter Schools Advisory Board.

Advocates for public schools were outraged that Mr. Bryan of Oregon planned to make money by investing in NC charters:

“One wealthy Oregonian’s persistent lobbying resulting in the takeover of elementary schools in distressed North Carolina communities is disturbing enough, but to find out his organization may directly benefit makes the whole scheme even more questionable,” said Andrea Verykoukis, spokeswoman for Public Schools First NC.”

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/education/article178169451.html#storylink=cpy

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

Whatever Happened to the Public Audit of K-12 Inc. in California?

By dianeravitch
October 11, 2017 //
16

In June 2016, California State Superintendent Tom Torlakson called for an official audit of the for-profit K-12 Inc. virtual charter school after an expose of its shoddy results in the San Jose Mercury News by investigative reporter Jessica Calefati. See here for all her reports on K-12.

Where is that audit?

Did it happen? Does it exist?

The audit was supposed to be completed by March 2017.

“State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson announced Thursday that the California Department of Education has contracted with the State Controller’s Office to conduct an audit of California Virtual Academies (CAVA) and related charter schools because of serious questions raised about a number of their practices.

“The goal of the audit is to make sure these schools are spending public education funds properly and serving their students well,” said Torlakson.

“In 2015, CAVA’s corporate parent K12 paid its CEO Nathaniel Davis $5.3 million and CFO James Rhyu was making $3.6 million. Their base salaries were $700,000 and $478,500, respectively, which were dwarfed by additional pay and stock for their “performance.”

“In all, K12’s five highest paid executives received a total of more than $12 million in compensation last year. That’s one of the reasons Center for Media and Democracy has called K12 Inc.’s former CEO, Ron Packard, the highest paid elementary and secondary school educator in the nation.

“Nearly 90% of K12’s revenues–and thus its huge pay for executives–comes from Americans’ state or federal tax dollars.”

Should California taxpayers shell out $12 Million for executive compensation in a low-performing charter school?

If anyone knows the whereabouts of the missing audit, please let me know.

There were also supposed to be two separate investigations of CAVA (K-12 Inc), one by the State Attorney General, the other by the Legislature. What happened to them?

Categories Accountability, California, Education Industry, Failure, For-Profit, K12 Inc., Virtual Charter Schools

Oregon: What Are “Social Impact Bonds”?

By dianeravitch
October 10, 2017 //
8

Deb Mayer of Parents Across America in Oregon has thoughtfully created a graphic to explain the meaning of “Social Impact Bonds.”

First, she shares the graphic explainer created by Goldman Sachs. Then she superimposes on the graphic the language that clarifies what’s really happening and how the investor makes money.

A helpful deconstruction.

Categories Corporate Reform, For-Profit, Funding

ProPublica: For-Profit Schools Offer Students Prizes to Recruit Other Students

By dianeravitch
October 9, 2017 //
9

Heather Vogell, an investigative reporter writing for ProPublica and USA Today, reports that for-profit schools are handing out rewards to students who recruit other students or post positive reviews on Facebook. This practice shows the difference between a business—where the bottom line is profit—and a school, which is dedicated to education and human development.

Vogell writes:

“Lyla Elkins transferred to North Nicholas High School in Cape Coral, Florida, in 2016 with hopes of sailing through its computer-based courses and graduating early. She didn’t realize the for-profit charter school would also be a source of income: a $25 gift card each time she persuaded a new student to enroll.

“I referred almost all of my friends,” said Elkins, 17, who earned three gift cards. She also won a Valentine’s Day teddy bear in a raffle for sharing one of the school’s Facebook posts.

“Such incentives are rampant among for-profit operators of public alternative high schools like North Nicholas, which serves students at risk of dropping out. These schools market aggressively to attract new students, especially during weeks when the state is tallying enrollment for funding purposes. They often turn their students into promoters, dangling rewards for plugs on social media, student referrals or online reviews, a ProPublica-USA Today investigation found. Some also offer valuable perks simply for enrolling.

“The schools’ reality is often less inspiring than their promotions. While they face a daunting mission of salvaging students who struggled elsewhere, they’re characterized by high absenteeism, low graduation rates, little instruction from teachers and few extracurricular activities or elective classes. Their intensive recruitment, when coupled with poor outcomes, “is wrong on so many levels,” said Samuel E. Abrams, a professor at Columbia Teachers College and author of a 2016 book on for-profit education. “It’s not addressing the pedagogical needs of these kids.”

“It’s legal for schools to provide gift cards to students for referrals, and free electronic devices, such as tablets or computers, to newcomers. And students are free to express their opinions on their schools. But advertisements have less protection under the First Amendment, and some for-profit school promotions involving online posts or reviews may violate federal consumer safeguards.

“According to the Federal Trade Commission, companies that use students and other groups as social media marketers should instruct them to disclose publicly that they expect to be paid. In settlements with the FTC, companies that failed to encourage such disclosures have agreed to follow the law — or face a potential penalty of up to $40,000 per transgression. Those instances didn’t involve students.”

For-profit companies have no shame in exploiting their students to lure more students.

“Refer-a-friend programs like the one at North Nicholas are common in the sector. “Bring a friend into Mavericks!” said one 2015 Facebook post for a Palm Springs school in the for-profit Florida charter chain. “They will get help getting their diploma and you will get a gift card.” The post promised a $5 gift card for each referral as part of the “Friends & Family Club,” as long as the recipient had acceptable attendance and no disciplinary problems.

“Mavericks’ new parent company, EdisonLearning, hands out Walmart gift cards for student referrals at its “Bridgescape” schools in Illinois and Ohio. It posted pictures on Facebook this past spring of students displaying their prizes. EdisonLearning officials said the gift cards enable low-income students to buy essentials.”

Shameless.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Florida, For-Profit, Fraud, Shame
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