Archives for category: Pennsylvania
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This Is Unbelievable

By dianeravitch
July 10, 2012 //
60

Pennsylvania just approved the operation of four new cyber-charter schools, bringing the number of online charter schools in the state to 17.

This is literally unbelievable.

We constantly hear lectures from “reformers” about data-driven decision-making and focusing only on results.

They like to say “it’s for the children.” “Children first.” “Students first.”

The existing cyber-charters in Pennsylvania have been evaluated and found to have disastrous results. The data say they are failures.

Of 105,000 charter students in the state, 32,000 are in cyber-charters. Here is the State Education Department release about its decision.

Citing the Stanford CREDO study of cyber-charters in Pennsylvania, the Keystone State Education Coalition writes:

“In an April 2011 study (PDF), the Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford University reviewed the academic performance in Pennsylvania’s charter schools.  Virtual-school operators have been aggressively expanding in the state for more than a decade, making it a good place for a study; around 18,700 of the state’s 61,770 charter school students were enrolled in online schools. The results weren’t promising.

The virtual-school students started out with higher test scores than their counterparts in regular charters. But according to the study, they ended up with learning gains that were “significantly worse” than kids in traditional charters and public schools. Says CREDO research manager Devora Davis, “What we can say right now is that whatever they’re doing in Pennsylvania is definitely not working and should not be replicated.”

Further, of 12 cyber-charters, only 2 made AYP. Eight were in “corrective action status.”

Would “reformers” please spare us the empty rhetoric about “it’s for the children”?

And would they stop prattling about “data-driven decision making?”

When we see what is happening in Pennsylvania, Louisiana, and other “reform” states, anyone can see that “the children” will certainly not be the beneficiaries of these decisions. The data are clear. It’s all about the profits.

Categories Charter Schools, Education Reform, On-Line Education, Pennsylvania

No More Kindergarten?

By dianeravitch
June 25, 2012 //
21

A reader writes:

One of the most shocking pieces of news out of the Pennsylvania school funding crisis created by Gov. Corbett was the cost-cutting plan by many districts to ELIMINATE KINDERGARTEN. What an incredibly stupid and short-sighted idea. It would take decades to recover from such a decision.

The kindergarten idea was introduced to the United States in the 1870s, an import from Germany.

It was first established in St. Louis, which was in the forefront of educational innovation in those times due mainly to a far-sighted educator named William Torrey Harris. Harris believed in the importance of a sound public education. He believed in teaching the classics. He believed that maintaining good public schools was a public responsibility.

Now, in Pennsylvania, due to relentless budget-cutting, many districts are planning to eliminate kindergarten. Thus, what is called “reform” today brings us back almost to where we started. We are turning back the clock, privatizing schools (it’s the civil rights issue of our time, remember?), increasing class size (to close the achievement gap?), cutting the arts and physical education (frills?), and now districts find that the public doesn’t want to pay for kindergarten. I can’t remember which part of the reform agenda that is. Can you?

Diane

Categories Budget Cuts, Education Reform, Pennsylvania

Tax Cuts for Business, Austerity for Public Schools

By dianeravitch
June 23, 2012 //
12

Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett has preached a formula that warms the hearts of the far-right base of his party: Tax cuts for the big corporations, budget cuts for public schools and social services. Some districts in Pennsylvania are planning to eliminate kindergarten, and some are teetering into bankruptcy.

The only positive outcome is that Corbett’s poll numbers have dropped to 36% approval, and there is a chance that his party will lose its control of the Legislature.

Are voters in Pennsylvania beginning to understand the harm done to their children and communities by the policies of politicians like Corbett?

Our society cannot continue to fatten the fat calves while starving the herd.

We can’t continue to promulgate policies that benefit the wealthiest while impoverishing our essential public services or giving them away to profiteers.

Diane

Categories Budget Cuts, Education Reform, Pennsylvania

A Sickening Feeling in Philadelphia

By dianeravitch
June 19, 2012 //
1

I wrote a blog about the press for privatization in Philadelphia, and someone sent me the following email. For a minute, I felt as helpless as he does, then I took a deep breath, redoubled my resolve, and determined to fight back. We can’t let the elites take away what belongs to all of us.

He wrote:

I read your recent article about privatization in Philly.  Thanks for the support.  We need it.  You likened it to the nineteenth century when we were dependent on the largesse of the wealthy.  The current threat is even worse.  Organized money is picking over the carcass of public education.  Taxpayers pay taxes to enrich the already wealthy who have bought lobbyists and politicians.  Even the robber barons didn’t do that nearly as blatantly.  Sadly, we are losing ground and the end could come this summer.  As a “little person” I’ve done what little people can do.

Categories Education Reform, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Privatization

Profits, Not Better Education

By dianeravitch
May 25, 2012 //
3

An article in a publication called “The Financial Investigator” took a close look at K12, the for-profit online “education” corporation whose growth had made it a darling of Wall Street. The article paid particular attention to the “churn rate” at K12 online schools. That is, how many students left in a given year. In the Ohio Virtual Academy of K12, a staggering 51% of students turned over in a single year. That helps to explain why the name of the game for the for-profit online academies is recruitment. So long as the corporations can keep their numbers up, they will collect tuition money from the state, usually double their real costs.

The more the for-profit academies churn, the more they earn. And every dollar they collect comes right out of the public school budget. In Pennsylvania, where nearly half the school districts are in financial distress, the diversion of dollars to for-profit academies is harming the great majority of children who attend regular brick-and-mortar schools. And bear in mind that the online charters–whether they are for-profit or not–get terrible results.

Last week, I had a debate about education entrepreneurs on Twitter with Justin Hamilton, the press secretary for Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. I made clear that I was referring to for-profit schemes like online academies. I am very dubious, no, actually, I am opposed to spending taxpayers’ money on for-profit education management organizations or for-profit charter schools. I kept pushing Justin to say that he agreed, or the U.S. Department of Education agreed. He would not. They choose to stand silently by while corporate suits target children as profit opportunities.

It seems to me that the U.S. Secretary of Education should denounce for-profit education. It wastes money; it supplies bad education; it gets terrible results. But as we have seen in relation to for-profit higher education, high-priced lobbyists work Congress and state legislatures to protect their industry. For-profit higher education is a $30 billion industry, and it has the wherewithal to call off the regulators.

As the expose of K12 in the New York Times reminds us, the highest goal of for-profit corporations is profit. Not education. Not the development of young people. Not character. Not the good of society. Profit.

Diane

Categories Education Industry, K12 Inc., On-Line Education, Pennsylvania
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