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Columbus Dispatch: Did Ohio Officials Lie to Win Charter Money?

By dianeravitch
October 13, 2015 //
11

Bill Bush and Catherine Candisky of the Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch raise important questions about whether Ohio Department of Education officials lied when preparing the state’s application for federal charter funds. For most of the previous years, the press across the state had been filled with stories about the charters’ poor performance, about financial scandals, about abrupt charter school closings, about the absence of transparency or accountability or oversight in this $1 billion sector. That $1 billion was siphoned away from public schools, and in far too many cases, went into the pocket of wealthy campaign contributors to the GOP.

Both federal and state officials failed in their duty to monitor the use of federal funds and to tell the truth. The federal government should have known, and the Ohio officials should have been honest. But the scandal-scarred charter sector of Ohio won the largest federal grant for charter schools: $71 million.

In applying for a federal grant, the Ohio Department of Education said it would close “ poor-performing” charter schools, touted an automatic-closure law that shuts them down, and promised that only the best-rated charter sponsors would create new schools.

But it also said that, in the 2012-13 school year, Ohio had no “poor-performing” charters, even though about a third of charters didn’t meet a single standard on their state report cards that year and 60 percent of them got D or F grades on the Performance Index, a measure of how students perform on state tests.

The grant application also failed to mention that the automatic-closure law is currently suspended and won’t return until at least the 2017-18 school year.

And those “best-rated” sponsors? Two days after filing the application, the man responsible for drafting it, David Hansen, resigned for having scrubbed data to make sponsors rate higher. All his sponsor ratings were subsequently rescinded. The grant application said that only sponsors “rated ‘ exemplary’ or ‘effective’ under the state’s quality evaluation criteria will be invited to participate.”

Troubling facts like these continue to place a cloud over Ohio’s successful bid for the $71 million, five-year federal grant. The Ohio Department of Education wants an aggressive expansion of charter schools across the state.

“The goal is for high-quality schools,” said Kim Norris, agency spokeswoman. “It will be a highly competitive process with schools applying for the grant dollars.”

The state will funnel almost all of the money to entities hoping to start new charters — including new for-profit online charters, which now rank as some of Ohio’s worst-performing schools.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Ohio, Privatization

Stephen Dyer: A Chance for Charter Reform in Ohio

By dianeravitch
October 10, 2015 //
14

Stephen Dyer of Innovation Ohio has been a thoughtful critic of charter schools in Ohio. He has written about, documented, and publicized their low performance and lack of transparency and accountability. He helped to create the informative website, KnowYourCharter.com, which allows citizens to compare charter performance to that of public schools.

In this post, he describes how he worked collaboratively with charter advocates to shape a bill to regulate charters.

“On Wednesday, everybody’s hard work paid off with the most sweeping, comprehensive and meaningful reform of Ohio’s charter school system since the program began in the late 1990s. It will keep track of Ohio’s operators, letting the public know where they operate and how they perform. It will force sponsors to do their job and hold schools to account, or else they won’t be able to sponsor schools. It will open up the mostly opaque world of charter schools so the public can better track the now $1 billion a year in state money that goes to charter schools.

“It is not perfect. It doesn’t directly close poor performing charters, choosing instead to force sponsors to do that. It doesn’t address the funding issues that force districts to have to backfill the lost state money with local money. And it relies on an Ohio Department of Education in disarray.

“But man, it does a lot. As a first step, this one is a Lulu (apologies to B. Bunny).”

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reform, Ohio

Ohio Legislature Passes Bipartisan Bill to Increase Accountability for Charter Schools

By dianeravitch
October 7, 2015 //
9

After a year or more of wrangling, the Ohio legislature finally approved a bill to reform their scandal-ridden charter schools.

The bill passed with bipartisan support. Even charter school critics endorsed the changes.

The report in Cleveland.com says:

As we reported yesterday, the bill makes several small changes that, as a whole, will tighten operations of the $1 billion charter school industry that lags behind traditional public schools and is the subject of national ridicule, even from charter school advocates.

Among items adjusted or added to the final version on Tuesday are a “White Hat rule” that prevents private charter operators from keeping equipment bought with state tax money; a cautious approach to study, not adopt, a new way of rating schools; and modest adjustments to how ratings of charter school oversight agencies are calculated.

Still intact, with only minor adjustments, are changes designed to distance the often-cozy relationships between for-profit charter school operating companies and the school boards that govern the schools.

Charter supporters realized that the outrageous profiteering of a few well-connected charter founders had created a massive embarrassment for all the charters. In addition, charters are among the lowest performing schools in the state.

The Fordham Institute was a major player in developing the law, partly through its sponsorship of two studies that informed the debate — analysis of the academic performance of Ohio charter schools by Stanford’s Center for Research of Education Outcomes (CREDO) and a separate study by Bellwether Education Partners of what gaps Ohio had in its charter laws and support system.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Ohio

Ohio Dems Complain about USDOE Grant of $71 Million to Their State’s Scandal-Ridden Charters

By dianeravitch
October 7, 2015 //
32

Ex-Governor Ted Strickland of Ohio wrote a blistering letter to Arne Duncan to complain about the $71 million awarded to Ohio’s floundering charter sector. Strickland is now running for the seat of Republican Senator Rob Portman. Strickland was joined by other high-ranking Democrats. Also joining in: U.S. Rep Tim Ryan, the Democratic caucus of the Ohio Senate, state school board member Mary Rose Oakar and State Rep. Teresa Fedor, the ranking democrat on the House Education Committee.

Duncan’s gift went to a sector that has been under fire in the Ohio media for scandals, corruption, and political payoffs.

Here is Ted Strickland’s letter:

The Honorable Ame Duncan

Secretary, U.S. Department of Education Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBJ) Department of Education Building

400 Maryland Ave, SW Washington, DC 20202

October 5, 2015

Dear Mr. Secretary,

I write to add my name to the growing chorus of disbelief and disappointment with your recent recommended award of $71 million for charter schools in Ohio. As we have discussed many times, I am not against all charter schools and am certainly not opposed to high quality, not-for­ profit school choice. But too many of Ohio’s charter schools are an embarrassment. Those who care about kids are ashamed that these failing schools are being funded by the taxpayers, and that Ohio is still allowing kids to be educated at these clearly ineffective institutions.

And it has only gotten worse. Less than a year ago, the very same organization whose research the Department cites in its press release (Stanford University’s Center for Research on Education Outcomes) found that, “On average, students in Ohio ‘s traditional public schools learned significantly more than students in charter schools in both reading and mathematics.” The Center also finds, “The disadvantage for charter students is 14 fewer days of learning in a school year in reading and 43 fewer days of learning in math for the same time period .”

Why is the Department rewarding this unacceptable behavior? Not only are these poor performing charter schools undeserving of millions of additional funds, this grant to charters comes at a time when many of Ohio’s traditional public schools are facing significant cuts and are being asked to do more with less. Surely this money could be better invested in public schools that have a proven track record of better serving Ohio students.

And if dismal charter school performance isn ‘t enough, we now know that Ohio’s State Department of Education was illegally propping them up. In July, Ohio’s chief charter school oversight officer-the very person who filled out Ohio ‘s application for your grant money-resigned when it was discovered that he deliberately tampered with charter school sponsor evaluations to mask just how horrible charter schools are actually performing. You just awarded $71 million in taxpayer dollars to a state department of education that has been rigging the books. The Department should go back over Ohio’s grant application and see whether it was rigged as well.

It’s not only me, or the Democrats in Ohio, or the editorial boards that are concerned about what is happening with charters. This charter situation in Ohio is so bad that even the Republican Auditor of State, a supporter of charter schools himself, said he was shocked to learn of your award. This is because in a recent audit he concluded that Ohio has a, “broken” system of charter schools.

Secretary Duncan, you need to be concerned when a state’s auditor and a supporter of charter schools has this type of reaction to your grant announcement.

All of these things have been widely publicized , and I cannot for the life of me understand why the Department awarded a state whose charter school office is riddled in scandal the largest sum of money of any state.

I fear ideology has clouded good judgement in this decision, and I urge to you go back and look at the hard data. If you do, I am confident you will reconsider. There is no way this award is justified , and what bothers me the most is that it is Ohio’s children that will suffer.

Sincerely,

Ted Strickland

Former Ohio Governor

Categories Charter Schools, Ohio

Ohio: Parents and Educators Join to Stop Corporate Reform on October 17

By dianeravitch
October 7, 2015 //
5

The latest from Ohio: parents and educators take a stand against the destruction of their public schools:

“Ohio now has Public Education Partners – a new 401(c)3 that aims to act as an “umbrella” advocacy group that unites all the many grassroots parent/teacher/community groups in Ohio that are fighting corporate “reform,” including charters. We don’t have the money that Lager, Brennan, et al have, but we do have the power of our voices & our votes. Our Board includes current & retired teachers, local school board members, and such notables as Bill Phillis – executive director of Ohio Coalition for Equity & Adequacy in Public Education Funding (Diane has posted his blog entries several times), among others.

“Our inaugural “Summit” is being held on 10/17 in Dublin, OH. Stephen Dyer of Innovation Ohio is our keynote – he has been relentless in writing about charter abuses. We will be having breakout sessions on Youngstown, Charters, Opt Outs, Parent Advocacy groups, etc. Tom Dunn, Superintendent of Miami County ESC is rounding out the day by helping us “connect the dots” and determine the next steps in our fight. It should be a great networking opportunity for those in Ohio who truly want to save our public schools. Cost is a modest $15 which includes lunch. Message me through this site if you would like registration information – I would love to meet you Chiara, Deb, drakestraw and other Ohio frequent commenters!! “

Categories Ohio, Parent Groups, Parents, Resistance

The Youngstown Story: An All Too Familiar Story of Urban Distress

By dianeravitch
October 7, 2015 //
16

Vince Guerrieri is a Youngstown native and a writer. He tells the history of Youngstown, Ohio, in this post. Governor John Kasich has targeted Youngstown as a school system that will be taken over by the state, with the assumption that its public schools will eventually be turned over to privately managed charters.

But as Guerrieri shows, the problems of Youngstown do not come from the schools. They are the problems of what was once a thriving city that lost industries, jobs, and population. As industries moved elsewhere, as jobs were outsourced, the population shrank and grew poorer.

He writes:

But the district – and the city – kept hemorrhaging people. The city population, which once peaked around 160,000 and was 100,000 as recently as 1980, is now down to 65,000. With a median household income around $25,000, the city is the poorest in the state and one of the poorest in the country. There are actually a higher percentage of adults in the city without a high school diploma (20 percent) than there are with at least a bachelor’s degree (16 percent). The problems in the city schools go deeper than the board and administration – although they don’t help.

The Youngstown story is a variation of the Detroit story, and a variation of the experience of many other American cities that experienced deindustrialization, loss of population, and a steady deterioration in the economy and in the quality of life.

Politicians think they can cure these deep social and economic problems by privatizing the schools. This is like putting a band-aid on cancer. It makes non sense but they will do it anyway. They will do it because they know how to open charter schools, but they don’t know how to revive cities that lack the resources to provide decent jobs. They will do it because it shows they are doing something. They will do it even though Ohio’s charter schools are among the worst in the nation. They will do it because they lack vision.

Categories Jobs, Ohio, Poverty

Ohio: Supporters of Public Schools Will Meet on October 17

By dianeravitch
October 4, 2015 //
7

If you live in Ohio, or nearby, you should attend this meeting and learn how to resist the political forces that are harming children and public education.

Whether you’re a veteran organizer, board member, educator, student, or community member who believes that PUBLIC EDUCATION MATTERS, Public Education Partners (PEP) is presenting a statewide summit that will have practical and informative sessions that provide opportunities to connect, engage, and collaborate.

If you haven’t signed up for the 2015 PEP summit, PUBLIC EDUCATION MATTERS, please register soon.

This pro-public education event will be on Saturday, October 17th from 9:30am-2:30pm at John Sells Middle School, 150 W. Bridge Street, Dublin, Ohio 43017.

Open to all, but space is limited. Registration costs $15 and includes lunch.

Register Here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/public-education-matters-tickets-18465904016?utm_source=eb_email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=new_event_email&utm_term=viewmyevent_buttonInline image 1

The format will include a keynote presentation by Innovation Ohio’s education policy fellow Stephen Dyer, choices for two breakout sessions, and closing remarks by Ohio school superintendent Tom Dunn.

Box lunches will be provided.

BREAKOUT SESSIONS

Breakout sessions will run twice, and registrants choose one before lunch and one after lunch.

• Parents’ Rights – Legislative Options for Testing
• How to Organize a Community Event – Engaging the Public
• BATs – Efforts for Positive Change in Education
• Speak Up! Speak Out – Building Coalitions of Public Ed Activists
• Parent Power – Advocating for Your Public Schools
• Know Your Charter – Understanding How Charter Schools Work
• The Youngstown Plan – It Could Happen to You!

SCHEDULE
• 9:30 – 10:00am: Registration
• 10:00 – 11:00am: Introduction and Keynote with Stephen Dyer
• 11:10 – Noon: Breakout Session I
• 12:00 – 1:00pm: Lunch and Networking
• 1:00 – 1:50pm: Breakout Session II
• 2:00 – 2:30pm: “Connecting the Dots” with Tom Dunn

Please share the news about this upcoming event with others who also believe that PUBLIC EDUCATION MATTERS.

Hope to see you on October 17th!

Our mailing address is:

Public Education Partners
866 Beech Drive
Columbus, OH 43235

Categories Ohio, Resistance

You Can’t Make This Stuff Up! Manipulator of Charter Data Wins Big Federal Grants for Ohio

By dianeravitch
September 30, 2015 //
18

A reader in Ohio shared this unbelievable link.

You may recall that David Hansen was in charge of monitoring charter schools in Ohio. You may recall that his wife, who was John Kasich’s chief of staff, is now running his presidential campaign. You may recall that Hansen was compelled to resign when he was caught manipulating charter school test scores to protect some big Republican donors. Well, Hansen may be gone but his legacy lives on, thanks to the U.S. Department of Education, which ignores scandals if they involve charter schools.

A top Ohio Department of Education official who resigned in July after manipulating data to boost charter schools also participated in a successful effort to obtain $71 million in federal money that could allow the wholesale takeover of urban school districts.

The U.S. Department of Education this week announced that it is providing $249 million to six states and the District of Columbia over the next five years for the expansion of charter schools.

The single-largest grant of $71 million goes to Ohio, which ranks near the bottom nationally for charter-school academic performance and has a history of financial failures. [My emphasis].

Records show that David Hansen, a longtime advocate for charter schools hired by State Supt. Richard Ross to run his school-choice office, was involved in the grant application that will facilitate the takeover of Youngstown city schools and other targeted urban districts.

The takeover of so-called “recovery school districts” such as Youngstown was secretly negotiated by Ross, Kasich’s then chief of staff Beth Hansen and Youngstown business officials and approved by the legislature in June in a stunning last-minute maneuver.
David and Beth Hansen are husband and wife, and she left Kasich’s staff in July to run his presidential campaign.

Records released by the Ohio Department of Education Sept. 3 in response to newspaper investigations of Hansen’s role in the data manipulation also show that he assembled the supporting documents for the federal grant.
In those supporting documents, charter schools, charter-school advocates and members of the U.S. Congress painted a positive picture of Ohio.

This is an astonishing story. The charter school scandals run from the state departments of education, which have been caught playing games with data to bolster politically-connected charters, right to the U.S. Secretary of Education:

In those supporting documents, charter schools, charter-school advocates and members of the U.S. Congress painted a positive picture of Ohio.

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, in announcing the $71 million this week, cited a Stanford University report suggesting that charter schools nationwide are showing improvement.

He didn’t mention another Stanford report that says Ohio charter schools are among the lowest-performing in the country.

Instead, the federal officials gave the state a perfect score for “High-Quality Authorizing and Monitoring Processes” — or policing of charter schools — although it is the manipulation of that system that resulted in Hansen’s forced resignation.

He resigned two days after the filing deadline for the grant application. Duncan’s office reviewed the application and provided feedback on Sept. 4, months after the Ohio Department of Education rescinded the manipulated evaluations.

Kim Norris, a spokeswoman for ODE, said federal officials were notified of the flawed accountability formula. “They approved the grant with that knowledge,” she said.

The state application also lacked academic data to show whether Ohio’s charter schools, which cost taxpayers more than $1 billion annually, turn tax dollars into student success.

Education Week noted that Ohio’s charter sector was riddled with scandals and had lower performance than public schools:

Among the seven states and the District of Columbia to receive the grant money, Ohio is getting the largest grant. Charter school critics, and even some charter supporters, point to Ohio as an example of the kind of dysfunction that can arise from a lightly regulated charter sector.

The state has come under a lot of scruitiny lately following multiple federal, state, and press-led investigations into corruption among some Ohio schools and their CMOs over the last few years. And a December study by the Stanford University Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) found that Ohio charter school students on average learn less in a year than their district school peers.

So, yes, the U.S. Department of Education knew the Ohio charter data was phony but they gave Ohio $71 million anyway.

Why did ED decide to give the most money to the state with the most dysfunctional charters?

Categories Charter Schools, Ohio, Scandals Fraud and Hoaxes

Peter Greene: U.S. Department of Education Just Threw $157 Million at Charter Industry, and the Big Winner Is….

By dianeravitch
September 29, 2015 //
33

Peter Greene has just discovered the most amazing fact about the U.S. Department of Education’s award of $157 million to the charter industry. The state that won the most money for charters is OHIO! Ohio, where there have been more charter scandals in the past few years than in any other state!

He says in the title of his post: Accountability is for public schools only.

Arne Duncan today held a press chat to announce that USED would be throwing more money ($157 million) at charter schools.

Throwing money at public schools is, you may recall, anathema to reformsters, who are concerned that while money has been thrown higgledy piggledy at public schools, it appears that insufficient amounts of the money have struck students in the test-taking parts of their brains.

Throwing money at public schools is bad, because we are just certain that they are wasting it and that the taxpayers are not getting a sufficient bang-to-buckage ratio.

But throwing money at charter schools is awesome, because we have no idea where the hell it’s going.

The department’s inspector general issued a report in 2012 that Lyndsey Layton calls “scathing.” The report suggests that the feds have been throwing that money at charters with blindfolds on. The Center for Media and Democracy has a more recent, more scathing report on the vast piles of money that has been thrown into charter black holes. “Gosh,” say the feds. “That’s a state problem. It’s up to them to exercise oversight. Not our problem.” Although, just in case you think USED is providing no oversight at all, I am happy to report they did send states a strongly worded letter, exhorting them to be more oversighty.

With all that, you’ll be unsurprised to discover that the top winner in the charter change chunking festival is the state of Ohio. Yes, that Ohio. The Ohio where hundreds of charters have failed in just about every way a charter can fail, the Ohio where the husband of the governor’s campaign manager had to resign from his ed department job because he was caught cooking the books to make charters look better (including some belonging to some political money throwers, proving that throwing money at politicians can also work well). That Ohio gets another $32.5 million to throw at charters. Even the journalists listening to Duncan’s news apparently felt the urge to question that decision, but USED assistant deputy secretary Nadya Dabby responded:

“Ohio has a pretty good mechanism in place to improve overall quality and oversight,” said Dabby, although she could not provide details. “We believe Ohio has put practices in place, although there ‘s always room for them to grow.”

Room to grow? Well, that’s one way of putting it. Another way would be to mention that under the Ohio charter law, helpfully written by charter lobbyists, any equipment purchased by charter operators with taxpayer dollars belongs to the charter operator as private property. Ohio is the state where the charter monitor for the state was fired for rigging grades to help the especially low-performing online charters.

It appears that Arne will keep throwing money at the charters as long as he is in office, no matter how little supervision or oversight there is.

Categories Charter Schools, Duncan, Arne, Funding, Ohio

New For-Profit Charter Chain Expanding, Buying Two Ohio Charter Chains

By dianeravitch
September 23, 2015 //
14

A new, for-profit charter chain named Pansophic is planning to take over charter chain schools in Ohio. The linked story was published in June, but there have been no follow-ups since then. Either the deal was completed or is pending.

Pansophic is a new company founded by Ron Packard, formerly of McKinsey, Goldman Sachs, and the online giant K12. As CEO of K12, Packard was paid $5 million yearly.

The company also expects to acquire charters run by for-profit Mosaica in Ohio. Pansophic will become the biggest for-profit charter chain in Ohio.

“Akron-based White Hat Management reportedly sold off management of 12 elementary charter schools Friday to an out-of-state, for-profit company that could acquire a third charter school company, an attorney for the charter schools’ public boards said.

“The two deals would make Pansophic Learning the largest for-profit operator of Ohio charter schools, which has become a taxpayer-funded $1 billion private industry.”

White Hat has produced poor academic results for 20 years.

Now, Ohio’s for-profit charter schools will be outsourced to a Virginia corporation that also focuses on the bottom line: profit.

Are these for-profit schools really public schools or are they profit centers that hoodwink parents to enroll their children?

This is what Ohio’s charter law says (thanks to reader Bethree):

“Opening paras of Ohio charter school law: “3314.01 (A) (1) A board of education may permit all or part of any of the schools under its control, upon request of a proposing person or group and provided the person or group meets the requirements of this chapter, to become a community school… (B) A community school created under this chapter is a public school, independent of any school district, and is part of the state’s program of education…”

Is a school owned by a for-profit corporation in Virginia still a “community” school? Is it a “public” school?

How much more of this flimflam will the voters and taxpayers of Ohio tolerate? Do they care about the education of their children?

Categories Charter Schools, Education Industry, For-Profit, K12 Inc., Ohio
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