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Los Angeles: Another LAUSD Board Member Dissents from Choice of Non-Educator

By dianeravitch
May 3, 2018 //
5

The Los Angeles Unified School District board voted to appoint a wealthy investment banker, Austin Beutner, as its superintendent by a vote of 4-3. The deciding vote was cast by Ref Rodriguez, a charter founder who is waiting to stand trial on multiple felony indictments  related to campaign finance. The initial vote was kept secret for more than a week. Then another vote to taken to offer a contract to Mr. Beutner, and that was approved 5-2.

After many years as an investment banker, Beutner served briefly as deputy mayor of Los Angeles and served briefly as publisher of the Los Angeles Times.  He has a close association with Eli Broad, the octogenarian billionaire who has declared his hope to put half the students in the nation’s second largest school district into privately managed charter schools.

The two career educators on the board were the dissenters. Scott Schmerelson released a statement decrying Beutner’s lack of any education experience.

George McKenna issued this statement today.

For Immediate Release May 2, 2018
Contact: Patrice Marshall McKenzie (213) 259-9763

STATEMENT FROM BOARD MEMBER DR. GEORGE J. MCKENNA III
REGARDING THE SELECTION OF LAUSD SUPERINTENDENT

As an experienced lifelong public-school educator, I feel compelled to voice my dissent regarding the selection of a non-educator to lead the second-largest school district in the nation.

In an abbreviated and rushed process without open community forums or input from school and District staff, parents and students, a majority of the Board of Education selected the new superintendent with a 5 to 2 vote. This choice of a person with no experience as an educator in K-12 school districts reflects the lack of concern for the continuity and stability of the District.

The premise that a non-educator is a better fit to lead a large educational organization because of limited managerial experience in outside business experiences is fundamentally flawed and politically motivated. To intentionally seek non-educators to serve as superintendents reflects a lack of respect for the professional educators who have demonstrated effective service and leadership within school systems, along with a denial of the Board’s ultimate responsibility to establish policies that govern the District and hold the Superintendent accountable.

The primary purpose of a school district is to establish and adequately resource effective schools, which are ultimately dependent on teachers, administrators and other school site staff. The dream of business-style governance being used in an urban school district to turnaround failing schools and/or lessen the achievement gap is a myth that has not materialized. This continued experiment on the neediest students and families is an injustice and an avoidance of the reality that our communities need the best educational leadership that be found.

Despite the enthusiasm by some for “outside” and “non-traditional” leadership for school districts, the reality is that this strategy never results in the reversal of underachievement in our neediest schools and communities. It is hard to believe that a governing board of a multi-billion dollar company would hire an inexperienced novice to lead their company in time of greatest need. This decision was predetermined by outside influences with a profit and political motive that will continue to expand without providing adequate resources to our neediest schools.

Although this decision was predictable and disappointing, I encourage our great team of employees and parents to continue communicating their needs and concerns to the superintendent, to me and the other Board Members.
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333 South Beaudry Avenue, 24th Floor / Los Angeles, California 90017 Telephone (213) 241-6382 Facsimile (213) 241-8441 E-Mail:George.mckenna@lausd.net

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Corporate Reformers, Hoax, Los Angeles

LAUSD Will Pay Zillionaire Banker $350,000 As Superintendent

By dianeravitch
May 2, 2018 //
59

Parent activists are still in a state of shock in Los Angeles in reaction to the board’s selection of the totally unqualified banker Austin Beutner as Superintendent. 

Reportedly a billionaire like his pal Eli Broad, although possibly only a multimillionaire, he will be paid $350,000 for his inexperience.

The first order of business will be downsizing the district, which has lost students to charter schools. Instead of fighting to regain students, Beutner will encourage the growth of privatization.

He is the quintessential corporate reformer who can be counted on to bring the mindset of a corporate raider: cut costs, cut staff, reorganize, downsize.

Beutner is everything that Broad loves in a Superintendent: a reformer dedicated to swing the axe, close schools, and fire educators.

Howard Blume writes:

””Beutner and members of the board majority seem unlikely to continue targeting charter schools as part of the problem. On the contrary, they are widely expected to take steps to encourage their growth in a range of schooling options for families, especially with academic performance lagging at many traditional campuses.

”That means the district has to look to other ways to increase revenue — a goal held in common with the prior board — and may try to reduce district spending by shrinking the traditional school system. Savings could come through employee layoffs, closing campuses and freezing or reducing salaries and benefits.”

 

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Los Angeles, Privatization

Tom Ultican: Will LAUSD Choose the Billionaire or the Educator as Superintendent?

By dianeravitch
April 25, 2018 //
3

 

Tom Ultican writes that the board of LAUSD is nearing the time of making a decision about who will be the next superintendent of the Los Angeles public schools.

The former publisher of the Los Angeles Times, Austin Beutner, a billionaire and a buddy of Eli Broad, wants to be chosen. He has no education experience, although he does seem to have ties to Betsy DeVos.

The superintendent of the Indianapolis public schools, notorious as a fan of privatization, has taken his hat out of the ring.

That leaves Andres Alonso, who was superintendent in very low-performing Baltimore City, and veteran Los Angeles educator, Vivian Ekchian. The NAEP scores for Baltimore City are significantly below those of the Los Angeles district.

Ms. Ekchian has worked in the LAUSD for 32 years. She has had every possible role in the schools and is now acting superintendent. An Armenian-American who was born in Iran, she has natural empathy for the many immigrant students in the public schools.

The LAUSD board should choose a consensus candidate, not ram through a candidate chosen by a temporary majority.

If the swing vote, Ref Rodriguez, should be convicted of the felonies on which has has been indicted, the board will be 3-3. The superintendent must be in a position to work for and with the board, in the best interests of the students. That will be impossible if the next leader is chosen in a divisive 4-3 vote.

 

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Charter Schools, Los Angeles

LAUSD Board Makes No Decision, No Quorum

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2018 //
5

The Los Angeles Unified School District Board met today to select a new superintendent, but there was no quorum. They recessed until May 1. No Austin Beutner, the investment banker. Not yet.

The board is split 4-3, with charteristas in the slim majority. The swing vote is a Ref Rodriguez, who will soon be tried on several felony indictments.

The board would be wise to pick an experienced educator, a consensus candidate with the confidence of the full board.

If the current majority picks a hard-driving charter zealot, that person may soon be leading a 3-3 Board and unable to do anything at all.

Will the current majority put the well-bring of the children above their political agenda?

Categories Los Angeles

Los Angeles: Frontrunner for Superintendent is a Conservative Banker and Broad Buddy

By dianeravitch
April 19, 2018 //
22

 

The Los Angeles school board is split 4-3, with charter advocates holding the majority. The decisive vote belongs to Ref Rodriguez, who is currently awaiting trial on multiple felony indictments for campaign finance violations.

The board appears poised to select Austin Beutner as its new superintendent, despite the fact that he has no experience in education.

Beutner was an investment banker and managed a private equity firm. His firm, Evercore, financed the purchase of American Media, which publishes the “National Enquirer.” Beutner was a member of the board of that scandal sheet. He is a billionaire. He briefly served as publisher of the Los Angeles Times until he was ousted. He is close to Eli Broad.

Interestingly, as a side note, Beutner was born in Holland, Michigan, and his father was a top executive at Amway. That should give him easy access to Betsy DeVos and help speed the privatization of public schools in Los Angeles.

Thought: If Ref Rodriguez is convicted and has to leave the board, the superintendent will have to lead a 3-3 Board. Too bad the LAUSD is unwilling to select a consensus candidate. Very short-sightrd

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-edu-beutner-nonprofit-faulted-20180415-story.html

Categories Broad Foundation, Charter Schools, Fraud, Los Angeles

Why is the Los Angeles School Board Rushing to Name a New Superintendent?

By dianeravitch
April 3, 2018 //
10

 

The Los Angeles Unified School District school board is not unified at all. The charter industry managed to capture a slim majority in the last school board elections (in the most expensive local school board election in history), and it runs the board 4-3. Unfortunately for the charter industry, the man that was supposed to be president of the board was Ref Rodriguez, who faces multiple felony charges and is supposed to go on trial for various financial crimes. Ref stepped down as president but refuses to leave the board. The board is rushing to hire a new superintendent while Ref is still there. If he stepped aside, the board would be forced to negotiate with the other three members of the board.

John Rogers and Donald Cohen urge the board not to name a new superintendent until it can forge a bipartisan consensus.

That sounds like a reasonable course of action, but if the board took that advice, it wouldn’t be able to name an unalloyed charter advocate to run the schools.

There are many names in play. I have heard about a dozen names, some of whom currently run other school districts. The last name I heard was not an educator but Austin Buetner, who was publisher of the Los Angeles Times before he was fired. The Guardian says he was fired because he was in cahoots with Eli Broad, the master puppeteer of privatization.

I have also heard the names of superintendents who are known for closing public schools (as per Broad’s directions) and replacing them with privately managed charter schools.

 

Categories Accountability, Administrators, superintendents, Charter Schools, Los Angeles

Los Angeles: Should a Board Member Stay on the Board When He Been Charged with Commiting Felonies?

By dianeravitch
March 5, 2018 //
23

Sara Roos, blogger in Los Angeles, poses this question. Why should Ref Rodriguez keep his seat on the LAUSD school board when he has been charged with commiting involving financial fraud during his election campaign? But that’s not all. Ref founded a charter school chain, which complained to authorities about Ref’s misuse of its funding.

The Los Angeles Times reported: 

Rodriguez, 46, faces three felony charges for conspiracy, perjury and procuring and offering a false or forged instrument, as well as 25 misdemeanor counts related to the alleged campaign money laundering.

At a preliminary hearing, prosecutors lay out their case before a judge, who must decide whether there is enough evidence for the defendant to stand trial. In court Wednesday, Judge Deborah S. Brazile, drawing on prosecutors’ estimates, said that the hearing in this case could last up to six days,

Unless there is a postponement, Brazile on May 9 will assign the case to a trial judge, who would have two days to begin the hearing.

Prosecutors say Rodriguez carried out a scheme in which friends and relativesdonated more than $24,000 to his campaign, with the understanding that Rodriguez would reimburse them fully. He could have donated the money legally to his own campaign, but Rodriguez allegedly broke the law by concealing the true source of the contributions — denying voters accurate information about support for his campaign, according to the L.A. County district attorney’s office and the Los Angeles Ethics Commission.

His cousin, Elizabeth Tinajero Melendrez, faces related misdemeanor charges. Prosecutors contend that she helped Rodriguez solicit and illegally reimburse the donors. She also has pleaded not guilty.

The case is complicated by separate conflict-of-interest allegations, first reported in the Los Angeles Times, that have to do with Rodriguez’s former role as a senior executive at a local charter school group.

Officials at the charter group, Partnerships to Uplift Communities, recently alleged that in 2014, Rodriguez signed or co-signed $265,000 in checks drawn on PUC accounts that were payable to a separate nonprofit under his control. That same year, they allege, Rodriguez authorized payments of $20,400 to a private company called Better 4 You Fundraising, in which he may have owned a stake at the time.

At a previous court appearance, Deputy Dist. Atty. Susan Ser said her team was examining whether to charge Rodriguez in the alleged conflicts of interest.

If he were a teacher, he would be fired.

If he were a principal, he would be fired.

If he were a superintendent, he would be fired.

But he stays on as a member because the charter school lobby spent millions to buy control of the board, and they can’t risk losing his seat in a new election. His vote may be decisive in choosing a new superintendent for the district.

Does California have ethics laws for public officials? Can they retain their position after indictment? If he is not guilty, he can run again. But it sets a terrible example for students to pretend that an indictment on felony offenses is a trivial matter.

Sara has a petition on her post. Please consider signing it.

 

Categories Accountability, California, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Los Angeles, Privatization

Donald Cohen: Will the Los Angeles School Board Grant Charters Freedom from Accountability?

By dianeravitch
November 6, 2017 //
10

Tomorrow is the day when we find out whether the millions invested by Dark Money in electing a majority of the school board pays off for charter operators.

The charters want public money without public accountability. They don’t want to be pestered by Investigations of waste, fraud, and abuse. And the LAUSD board decides tomorrow. They want to be called “public schools” when it’s time to get public money, but private schools when it’s time to be accountable.

Donald Cohen writes here about what’s at stake.

“A number of Los Angeles charter schools up for renewal this week are throwing a tantrum if they don’t get their way. Charter school operators have refused to comply with Los Angeles Unified School District’s (LAUSD) charter school policies and say they won’t include some district standard requirements they don’t like in their charter application. For example, they are refusing to comply with special education rules and the ability of the district to pursue investigations of fraud and other illegal practices.

“They say they should not be subject to basic transparency, accountability and oversight requirements. California charter school operators have plenty of autonomy as the state law grants them. But that doesn’t mean they get to do things that harm education, that allow fraud to go undetected and uninvestigated and allow them to set their own rules on basic educational policies and programs such as school discipline and special education.

“And today in Los Angeles, given the very public problems and investigations related to charter school operators at LAUSD it couldn’t be a worse time to reduce oversight and accountability mechanisms. One recently elected school board member and founder of Partnerships to Uplift Communities (PUC), a charter school network in the region, has been charged with three felonies for campaign finance violations and the school district is asking the PUC’s operators about potential conflicts of interest and delayed reporting of financial transaction.

“Charter operators are objecting to the ability of the district’s inspector general to investigate all possible malfeasance and to limit the scope of investigations they do conduct. The District should be able to pursue any possible violation of the law in the quickest and most effective way. The Office of the Inspector General, upon initial investigation, can determine the full scope needed. But failing to treat allegations as seriously as they could potentially be will inevitably allow problems to go unaddressed.

“Charter operators also want to be allowed to become part of a Special Education Local Plan Area (SELPA) that may be hundreds of miles away and that have far less ability to oversee the schools. Several small districts in rural areas of the state welcome distant charters into their SELPA and the fees that come with it. Los Angeles is correct to require local charters to be part of the local SELPA so that special education students and programs in individual schools are tightly integrated into the local school district. Special education students need to be able to access and rely on services and programs that are available district wide. Special education students often change schools as they encounter challenges and seek the best situation for their education; somtimes back and forth between both charter and district schools.

“The charter operators also object to using the district’s student disciplinary processes. We have seen, in California and across the nation, that independent charter schools have used expulsions and suspensions as a way to “push out” under-performing students who may reduce an individual school’s testing averages or require additional resources. To prevent this, disciplinary procedures, including whether to use restorative justice methods, must be fair, transparent and equally established and implemented in all schools. Allowing charter operators to define their own processes is an invitation to discriminate and unfairly treat some students and families.”

Will the board give the charters what they want? Will they split the difference, to avoid the appearance of being the billionaires’ puppets, or will they insist that charter schools accept the accountability that accompanies public money?

Categories Accountability, Education Industry, Education Reform, Los Angeles, Privatization

Rochester, New York: L.A.-Based Charter School in Financial Trouble

By dianeravitch
November 3, 2017 //
4

Ref Rodriguez founded a charter chain. Most of the charters are in Los Angeles. One is in Rochester, New York.

Ref is in trouble with the law. Until recently, he was president of the LAUSD school board. Faced with felony indictments, he stepped down as chair, but remained on the board. More indictments came, but he refuses to leave the board. The salary for board members was recently raised and is substantial.

Joy Resmovits of the L.A. Times reports that the charter school in Rochester that is part of Ref’s former chain is in trouble.

Unlike Arizona, New York state officials don’t like conflicts of interest.

When the New York state comptroller’s office recently audited a charter school in Rochester, N.Y., investigators found a number of troubling financial practices, including inadequate oversight.

One issue auditors noted was that the local school contracted out its financial management to the national charter network it was part of — and membership on the Rochester school’s board and the school network’s board overlapped.

Rochester’s PUC Achieve is the only school outside California in the 18-school Partnership to Uplift Communities charter school network co-founded by L.A. school board member Ref Rodriguez. Rodriguez and his PUC Schools co-founder Jacqueline Elliot were flagged for being on both of the boards.

“While not prohibited by law, these situations create a conflict of interest,” Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli wrote when the audit was released in May.

Rodriguez has more pressing concerns in Los Angeles, where he faces three felony and 25 misdemeanor charges for alleged campaign money laundering.

But problems in Rochester broadly echo some questions recently raised in L.A. about Rodriguez’s conduct and PUC’s management practices.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Los Angeles, New York, Privatization

Los Angeles: Will Pro-Charter School Board Dare to Hold Charters Accountable?

By dianeravitch
November 3, 2017 //
5

When charter schools were first launched in the late 1980s-early 1990s, it was taken as a given that charters would gain autonomy in exchange for accountability. The promise at the time was that they would save public dollars by having no bureaucracy. So they would cost less, get better results, and be held to high standards of fiscal and academic accountability. As the charters have grown into a politically powerful industry supported by deep-pocketed entrepreneurs, they have increasingly demanded more autonomy, more public money, and less accountability.

The Showdown will come at the next meeting of the Los Angeles Unified School District Board. Billionaires and Dark money have spent many millions to elect a pro-charter majority. That majority hangs by a slender thread since one of its members, Ref Rodriguez, clings to his seat despite being under indictment on multiple charges of campaign finance violations.

At its next meeting, the board will decide what to do about a recommendation by district officials to close 10 charters.

“Charter school leaders, who say they are standing up against regulations they find onerous, won’t back down and will leave it to board members to decide their schools’ fates Tuesday.

“They may get a sympathetic ear because the board majority is the first to be elected with major financial support from charter backers.

The futures of six other charter schools also are at risk over the same issues. All told, there have never been as many L.A. charter schools facing potential closure at one time — certainly never over conflicts they instigated.

If the charters don’t prevail, they still could appeal any denials to the county or state education boards.

Both the district and charter operators say they are looking out for students.

A key point of dispute is the authority of the district’s inspector general to conduct long-running investigations of charter schools. Charter operators want to narrow this power and say state law supports such limits…

The district’s charter division recommended denying renewed authorization to eight Alliance College-Ready Public Schools campuses and two Magnolia Public Schools campuses. Six KIPP (Knowledge is Power Program) schools may be reauthorized on the condition that they demonstrate compliance with district rules in the near future. KIPP administrators have not agreed to that condition.

Three proposed charters, which hope to open in the future, also are at risk in this dispute: one each from KIPP, Equitas Academy Charter Schools and STEM Preparatory Schools.”

The public will soon learn whether the school boards works for the public or for the billionaires who funded their campaigns.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Los Angeles, Privatization
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