Stephen Singer has made a surprising observation: Public school students are being erased from TV, Movies, and Other Media. Why?
You will find his answer here.
Archives for category: Media
Leonie Haimson is one of the nation’s sharpest critic of scams, especially in the area of ed-tech and online learning.
She is outraged that Chalkbeat posted an uncritical article about the scams now sold to schools. He clearly wanted to lump together the critics of Common Core (those “right wingers” [like me]) and the critics of “personalized learning,” who have the retrograde belief that children should be taught by teachers, not computers.
Pay attention to the funders of Chalkbeat (Gates; Walton; Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, and others who are pushing online learning and “personalized learning.”) They are listed at the end of this post. Don’t overlook the Anschutz Foundation. He is an evangelical Christian who produced “Waiting for ‘Superman,'” that anti-public school, anti-union propaganda film.
She writes:
Matt Barnum has posted an article at Chalkbeat on the controversy over online learning. I spent nearly an hour talking to him about its myriad problems, including the negative experiences of parents and students in schools where online learning predominates, serious privacy concerns because of all the data-mining by vendors that is involved, and a serious lack of research evidence — but the only quote he used from our conversation is one sentence: that the Parent Coalition for Student Privacy which I co-chair. has worked with allies in right-wing groups on the privacy issue.
Instead, when I spoke to him about this, I emphasized that the concerns about the expansion of online learning and its impact on privacy was shared by groups and individuals of all political persuasion, left right and center, and many parents with little interest in politics at all. That’s why our campaign against inBloom was so successful, and that’s why in NY State and elsewhere, parents and teachers in all nine states and districts that were participating were able to force them from dropping out of the program to share their children’s personal data and make it more accessible to vendors without parental consent. But he left that part out of my quote and his story as a whole, because it did not fit into his pre-ordained narrative.
Indeed, Barnum seemed eager to mischaracterize the opposition to so-called personalized learning as led by conservatives. He is also quick to frame the pushback vs Common Core in a similar fashion –as driven by many of the same right-wing groups — when one of the most successful protests against the standards occurred here in NY state, led by NY State Allies for Public Education, a coalition of mostly left-wing and politically moderate parents and teachers who also oppose the expansion of ed tech.
Barnum didn’t mention any of the other progressive groups, medical associations, and researchers across the country who are very concerned about the expansion of online learning in schools, including Screens and Kids, Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood, the ACLU, Commonsense Media, National Education Policy Center, Parents Across America, the Badass Teachers Association and many others.
Nor did he bother to interview any of the many prominent progressive critics of ed tech like Diane Ravitch, Peter Greene or Audrey Watters. Nor did he acknowledge that Silicon Valley parents themselves are increasingly rejecting computerized learning, as reported in the terrific NY Times series by Nellie Bowles.
Instead, he quotes only one non-right wing critic of online learning by name– Merrie Najimy, the President of the Massachusetts teachers – while featuring many paragraphs of rosy spin from defenders of ed tech, like Diane Tavenner of Summit and Bethany Gross of CRPE, both funded by Gates and Zuckerberg.
Barnum cites a CRPE report also paid for by Gates that apparently says, oh yeah, teachers really like personalized learning – while ignoring the survey results in our Educator Toolkit for Teacher and Student Privacy, which showed widespread concern among teachers and administrators alike about the expansion of digital apps and online programs in our schools. He also quotes Randi Weingarten who, surprisingly, has nothing but kind words about the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, which has done absolutely nothing that I can think of to earn her confidence.
Amazingly, Barnum also manages to write an entire piece about edtech and personalized learning, Summit, Gates and Zuckerberg without once mentioning the issue of data privacy, the widespread occurrence of breaches, the potential misuse of algorithms, and the over-reach of student surveillance in schools. The only mention of the word “privacy” is in the one sentence that quotes me about working with conservative allies on the issue.
Quite an achievement and yet more evidence of a serious blind spot in Chalkbeat’s education coverage, reminiscent of their failure to cover the parent opposition against inBloom that started here in New York and led to such a firestorm across the country that more than 120 state student privacy laws have been passed as a result of the inBloom controversy since 2013.
There is more to read, and you should open the link to see her many links to other articles and reports.
Chalkbeat should be ashamed. Its sponsors are showing their hands.
Here is a list of Chalkbeat funders.
Ann & Hal Logan via The Denver Foundation*
Anna and John J. Sie Foundation*
Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Foundation
Awesome Without Borders
Azita Raji and Gary Syman
Ben & Lucy Ana Walton*
Better Education Institute, Inc.
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Brett Family Foundation
Brooke Brown via the Carson Foundation*
Buell Foundation
Carnegie Corporation of New York
Carson Foundation
Chan Zuckerberg Initiative
Charles H. Revson Foundation
Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation
Christopher Gabrieli
CME Group
COGEN Co-working
Community Foundation of Greater Memphis
Community Foundation of New Jersey
Democracy Fund
Donnell-Kay Foundation
Doug and Wendy Kreeger
EdChoice
EDU21C Foundation
Elaine Berman
Eli Lilly and Company Foundation, Inc.
Elizabeth Aybar Conti
Elizabeth Haas Edersheim (In Kind)
Emma Bloomberg
Ford Foundation
Fry Foundation
Fund for Nonprofit News at The Miami Foundation
Gail Klapper
Gates Family Foundation
GEM Foundation
George T. Cameron Education Foundation
Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation partnership with the Knight Foundation
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (In Kind)
J.R. Hyde III Family Foundation Donor Advised Fund of the Community Foundation of Greater Memphis
Jim and Marsha McCormick
Kate Kennedy Reinemund and Jim Kennedy
Ken Hirsh
Kresge Foundation
La Vida Feliz Foundation
Lenfest Community Listening and Engagement Fund
Lilly Endowment Inc.
Maher Foundation
Margulf Foundation
Mark Zurack
Memphis Education Fund
Naomi and Michael Rosenfeld
Overdeck Family Foundation
Debra and Paul Appelbaum
Peter and Carmen L. Buck Foundation
Polk Bros. Foundation
Quinn Family Foundation
Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation
Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation, Inc.
Rick Smith
Rob Gary and Chris Watney
Rob Gary via the Piton Foundation*
Robert J. Yamartino and Maxine Sclar
Robert R. McCormick Foundation
Rose Community Foundation
Scott Gleason of O’Melveny & Myers (In Kind)
Scott Pearl
Silicon Valley Community Foundation
Skift (In Kind)
Spencer Foundation
Steans Family Foundation
Sue Lehmann
Susan Sawyers
Thalla-Marie and Heeten Choxi
The Assisi Foundation
The Anschutz Foundation
The Barton Family Foundation, a donor-advised fund of The Denver Foundation*
The Caswell Jin Foundation
The Colorado Health Foundation
The Colorado Trust
The Crown Family
The Denver Foundation
The Durst Organization (In Kind)
The Glick Fund, a fund of the Central Indiana Community Foundation
The Indianapolis Foundation, a CICF affiliate
The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
The Joyce Foundation
The McGregor Fund
The Moriah Fund
The Skillman Foundation
The Walton Family Foundation
Victoria Foundation
Walentas Foundation Ltd.
Washington Square Legal Services/NYU Business Transactions Clinic (In Kind)
Wend Ventures
Widmeyer, A FinnPartners Company (In Kind)
Will and Christina McConathy*
W.K. Kellogg Foundation
Yoobi (In Kind)
Education Week posted an article by Madeline Will reporting that the National Education Association had lost 17,000 members since the Janus decision. The NEA has more than 3 million members. It had already reported that it immediately lost 88,000 members who were paying “agency fees,” paying dues reluctantly while collecting benefits negotiated by the union. The NEA has projected a possible loss of up to 300,000 members and planning to cut its budget.
Where does the report come from about the recent loss of 17,000 members? The 74, an anti-union, pro-privatization website funded by billionaires and founded by anti-union Campbell Brown. What was the source of The 74 report? Mike Antonucci, a writer who specializes in spying on unions and sending out any bad news he can find. Antonucci is probably the most virulently anti-union reporter in the nation. He calls his website the “education intelligence agency.” He won an award from the National Right to Work Committee in 2004. He writes for The 74 and also for the rightwing Center for Education Reform. Both organizations are allies of Betsy DeVos.
Wouldn’t you think that a responsible journalist would identify the biases of her sources? Might she at least identify them as “anti-union,” which is an accurate description?
Meanwhile, the Janus decision will allow non-dues-paying members to enjoy the benefits negotiated for them by the union to which they do not pay dues. They are called “free riders.”
Lucky you!
TulsaKids magazine is hosting a screening and panel discussion of Backpack Full of Cash on September 20th followed by a week long run of the film at the Circle Theater there.
Here’s TulsaKids Magazine blurb about the event and the link to their page http://www.tulsakids.com/Web-2018/Backpack-Full-of-Cash-Screening-and-Panel-Discussion/
When: Thursday, Sept. 7, 7-9:30 p.m.
Where: Circle Cinema, 10 S. Lewis Ave.
What and Why:
With the expansion of charter schools in Tulsa and around the state, parents and others interested in public education have questions. What is a charter school? How are charter schools funded? Who controls charter schools? Last spring, Oklahoma teachers walked out to call attention to, not only low pay, but lack of resources in the schools. Are charter schools helping or hurting already strained resources?
To help you learn more, TulsaKids Media is sponsoring a screening of the documentary “Backpack Full of Cash” followed by a panel discussion on Thurs., Sept. 20, 7 p.m., at Circle Cinema.
Panelists include: Dr. John Cox, public school superintendent and candidate for Oklahoma State Superintendent; Eric Doss, director of quality charter services, Oklahoma Public School Resource Center (former administrator for Tulsa School of Arts & Sciences); Jennettie Marshall, Tulsa Public Schools Board member; Rob Miller, superintendent of Bixby Public Schools, Oklahoma Assistant Superintendent of the Year; Darryl Bright, Citizens United for a Better Education System.
Come join this important community dialogue.
Remember: Students and Teachers always get a discount at Circle Cinema! Tickets are $9.50 for adults, and $7.50 for students, teachers, military and seniors.
Learn more about the film at http://www.backpackfullofcash.com., and purchase tickets at http://www.circlecinema.com.
Pete Tucker, a freelance journalist in D.C., is puzzled by the Washington Post’s spin on the Maryland Governor’s Race.
He amply documents the Post’s friendly coverage of Republican Governor Larry Hogan, and its consistently unfriendly treatment of his Democratic opponent, Ben Jealous.
Hogan supports school choice. Hogan appointed Checker Finn and Andy Smarick, two hard-line advocates of school choice, to the State Board of Education. Ben Jealous supports public schools and was endorsed by the Network for Public Education Action Fund.
Tucker writes:
“In 1966 Ann Todd and Fred Jealous couldn’t get married in their home state of Maryland because they were an interracial couple. Five decades later their son Ben Jealous is the Democratic nominee for Maryland governor.
“If Jealous wins in November he will become Maryland’s first African-American governor, and the nation’s third-ever elected black governor. (Jealous hopes to share this latter distinction with two fellow Democrats also endorsed by Bernie Sanders: Andrew Gillum of Florida and Stacey Abrams of Georgia, who would also be the first-ever black woman governor.) There are presently no black governors in office.
“Jealous, the former and youngest-ever head of the NAACP, faces stiff competition, and not just from incumbent Republican Gov. Larry Hogan. The Washington Post – which dominates D.C.’s media landscape, including vote-rich Maryland suburbs in Montgomery and Prince George’s counties – has set its sights on defeating Jealous.
“This may seem bizarre. Why would the Post throw its weight behind a Republican instead of an historic candidate like Jealous? Especially when the Post’s aggressive reporting on President Trump has led to record-breaking readership and heaps of praise from Democrats.
“But the Post’s resistance to Trump is a mirage, and the paper’s politics remain far from progressive.
“Once Trump isn’t around, what will be left for the Post to resist? Surely not war, the Post supports all of them. Not climate change, where the paper’s record is mixed at best and includes support for both fracking and the Keystone XL pipeline. And not inequality, as the Post is owned by the richest man alive, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos. Like Amazon, the Post is anti-union – that is, against workers collectively organizing to improve their lot, an essential tool in addressing inequality.
“It’s these stances – along with the Post’s record of targeting candidates with strong African-American and progressive support – that help explain the paper’s backing of Hogan and over-the-top opposition to Jealous (who I am supporting). Still, the extent to which the Post is willing to go to sway the election is surprising.”
The Post coverage emphasizes how “popular” Hogan is.
Tucker says,
“Maryland has twice as many registered Democrats as Republicans, so Hogan needs strong Democratic support to win reelection; and the Post is determined to see that he gets it.
“Hogan, the Post explains, is widely admired for his “winning personality” and “personal appeal.” He’s just a regular guy who is “real down-to-earth,” “follows his gut” and “knows his way around a barroom.”
LWith fawning coverage like this it’s unsurprising that Hogan is “astonishingly,” “stunningly” and “hugely” popular, as the Post tells it. (The word “popular” is used so much one reader asked if the Post had exchanged it for Hogan’s first name.)”
But when the Post covers Jealous, it paints him as a leftist who wants to “soak the rich” to pay for his expensive ideas.
Tucker writes:
“Ben Jealous’s platform – which includes a $15 an hour minimum wage, single-payer health care and free state college tuition – is liked by Marylanders. So the Post downplays these policies (which it opposes), and paints Jealous as a “coup leader” who is too radical to vote for.
“Jealous’s “left-wing advance” is “irresponsible” and “anything but… centrist,” the Post tells readers. His “craven,” “reckless” “left-wing platform” will “blow a Chesapeake Bay-sized hole in the state budget.””
All the more reason for the voters of Maryland to ignore the Post and vote for Ben Jealous and begin to repair the state.
Facebook hired Campbell Brown–notorious for her hatred of unions and public schools and for her close friendship with Betsy DeVos–to represent the tech giant with news organization.
Recently, she convened a behind-closed-doors meeting with news executives and warned them that if they didn’t cooperate with Facebook, they would be dying “like in a hospice.”
During a closed-door and off-the-record meeting last week, top Facebook executive Campbell Brown reportedly warned news publishers that refusal to cooperate with the tech behemoth’s efforts to “revitalize journalism” will leave media outlets dying “like in a hospice.”
Reported first by The Australian under a headline which read “Work With Facebook or Die: Zuckerberg,” the social media giant has insisted the comments were taken out of context, even as five individuals who attended the four-hour meeting corroborated what Brown had stated.
“Mark doesn’t care about publishers but is giving me a lot of leeway and concessions to make these changes,” Brown reportedly said, referring to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. “We will help you revitalize journalism… in a few years the reverse looks like I’ll be holding hands with your dying business like in a hospice….”
Brown’s warning about the dire prospects for news outlets that don’t get on board with a future in which corporate giants like Facebook are the arbiters of what is and isn’t trustworthy news comes as progressives are raising alarm that Facebook’s entrance into the world of journalism poses a major threat to non-corporate and left-wing news outlets.
YouTube, Facebook, and Apple have agreed to remove the pernicious, fake content produced by Alex Jones of Infowars.
This is good news. Jones has created a brand based on lies, hoaxes, and fear-mongering. His most disgusting conspiracy theory was his claim that the Sandy Hook massacre was fake, a stage production with child actors, stage managed by the Obama administration to advance the war against guns. Jones is being sued for defamation by parents who lost children at the Sandy Hook massacre. Some have been pursued by stalkers and received death threats.
In its daily news brief, CNN summarized the story:
“Some of the web’s top gatekeepers have unleashed a serious crackdown on content from Infowars and its founder, Alex Jones. Infowars is the site (and Jones the man) that pushes baseless conspiracy theories that often create real-life damage (like the Sandy Hook hoax over which several more families this week sued Jones for defamation). YouTube, Facebook and Apple yesterday removed content from Infowars, claiming it violates their policies, such as YouTube’s barring “hate speech and harassment.” YouTube’s actions probably most damage the brand, which had multiple channels with millions of subscribers and more than a billion views.”
To learn more about Alex Jones, watch John Oliver.
In a provocative and insightful article, Alan Singer wonders why Chalkbeat did not cover the student unrest at Eva Moskowitz’s Success Academy?
He follows the money and sees who is funding Chalkbeat. How can Chalkbeat be independent when it is funded by reformers and its editor-in-chief thinks that SA is the best education she has ever seen?
And then there is this: SA is flooded with more money than any school in America:
Since January 2018, Chalkbeat New York has posted eight articles on New York’s Success Academy Charter School Network. The most recent article covered the graduation ceremony held for the network high schools SIXTEEN graduating seniors at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall. An April article featured the Success Academy’s “Slam the Exam” test rally at the 19,000 seat Barclay’s Arena in Brooklyn. The bill for a 2013 high school graduation held at Barclay Center was $60,000.
According to its webpage, “Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news organization committed to covering one of America’s most important stories: the effort to improve schools for all children, especially those who have historically lacked access to a quality education. We are mission-driven, in that we believe that every child deserves an excellent education, and that a strong press is vital to making that happen. Yet we are also fiercely independent, in that we do not take a position on the best path for achieving equity.” The webpage also stresses Chalkbeat’s commitment to local news coverage.
I do not understand why Chalkbeat did not cover student protests at the Success Academy Charter School Network’s high schools during the 2017-2018 academic year, especially since the protests were covered in New York’s regular press and in other web news magazines. Complaints about the cost of a new dress code and January 2018 protests against an oppressive disciplinary code were covered by the political website Politico. The Wall Street Journal had a feature on “growing pains” at the Network’s two high schools in March 2018. Student protests about unfair summer homework assignments were reported on in the Daily News. None of these issues were covered by Chalkbeat.
How many public schools can rent a stadium for $60,000 for a test-prep rally? 0.
Last year, SA rented Radio City Music Hall. No word on the cost of that very expensive venue.
Next year, maybe Madison Square Garden or Yankee Stadium.
How many schools can hold a graduation ceremony for 16 students in one of NYC’s most significant concert halls? Singer should find out how much that ceremony cost. It may have been almost as much as the Barclay’s Center and so much more prestigious.
P.S. We still don’t know what happened to the “lone scholar” who was on the senior class rolls until just a few weeks before graduation. Did his shirt tail hang out? Did she forget to walk in a straight line? Did she fail to “track” the teacher?
Jeanne Allen, CEO of the pro-choice, Pro-DeVos Center for Education Reform, does not want you to watch an NBC special tonight on charter schools. Allen’s CER is an outspoken supporter of privatization of public funding and a hyperactive opponent of public schools.
In the following letter, she reports that she warned NBC that its show was based on an article in The Hechinger Report,” which she says is biased against charter schools. Really? It’s been my observation that The Hechinger Report is completely nonpartisan and unbiased on every contentious issue.
Here is the letter that Jeanne (former education analyst for the fringe-right Heritage Foundation), sent to NBC and to her mailing list of thousands.
The Center for Education Reform
RE: NBC’s Charter School Mistake
Dear Friends:
Sunday night, June 17th, NBC News is airing a charter school story that argues charters are increasingly geared to support “white flight.” If the claims weren’t so outlandish and unfounded, it would be laughable.
The producer, who was incredibly open to receiving information countering these allegations, based his report on an analysis performed by the Hechinger Report. In one of the documents CER supplied, we demonstrated Hechinger’s bias against charter schools, as well as the folly of the argument.
Indeed, Hechinger claims to have used NCES data to calculate racial balance in charter schools across the country that justify erroneous claims that increasingly charter schools do not reflect the racial balance of surrounding schools. However, as we pointed out, no researcher can make such statements based on NCES data. One needs at least 4 data points (see link for explanation) and further review, analysis and study, to make any legitimate comparisons.
In the case of the school they use as their prime example, George’s Lake Onocee Academy, originally boundaries were drawn around the school based on a development that was responsible for its existence. The other public schools in the district were failing, and developers wanted to offer a better school to the community. The district was opposed to the creation of the school. And while the boundary no longer exists around that school, local leaders have still fanned the flames of bigotry that Hechinger seized to market the sizzling story to its media partner NBC.
The Hechinger Report journalist then called numerous other states and asked about racial composition of their schools. One might ask why they’d have to call states if they thought they had irrefutable data.
We don’t fault NBC for viewing Hechinger’s work as legitimate or being misled by their data. The thousands of policies, laws and data points that apply to charter school everywhere are complex and require a trained eye and understanding. However, if one is disposed against charters as Hechinger is because they give parents freedom to make choices rather mandate assignment based on artificial factors, then one will make any conclusion that justified their narrative.
Such is the case in this piece which some charter advocates argue is balanced. Regardless of what is said tomorrow night, there is no balance in any piece which starts with the premise that the very reform that created opportunities for millions of children who were failed by the traditional system, and which serve a higher percentage of at risk and minority children, is creating racial imbalance. Indeed, if mandatory assignment by zip code and busing were the answer, we would not have failed students for 3 generations.
All children deserve the education they need to become exceptional adults. The freedom to make that choice is fundamental, as charter schools have shown consistently since 1992.
We hope NBC and other news media will find ways to help the public understand that fact, as well as the enormous need that still exists to bring innovation and opportunity to millions more students trapped in failing schools that Hechinger and its friends in the teachers unions irresponsibility seem determined to defend at all costs, including mis-use of data.
If you’d like to discuss this or any other issue, please call us at 202-750-0012 or drop us a note here.
– Jeanne Allen, Founder & CEO
Please, if you have HBO, watch the VICE documentary on Friday. I don’t know the time. I was interviewed. I have no idea what direction it will take, but VICE always has an interesting take on whatever it does.
Let me know how it goes. I never watch myself on TV.
Diane Ravitch's blog 