Archives for category: Privatization
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Do Affluent White Neighborhoods Need Charter Schools?

By dianeravitch
January 14, 2013 //
32

Jason Stanford lives in Austin, Texas, where he writes frequently about school issues. Here he gives us the latest in the school choice saga in Texas.

Texas is crazy for school choice. The state legislature is about to take up the question of vouchers, and the state board of education has approved many charters. The new state commissioner of education Michael Williams previously ran the State Railroad Commission, which regulates the energy industry (lightly), and he is a fan of school choice.

Now the state board has approved a charter called Great Hearts Academies for an affluent white neighborhood in San Antonio. Now there will be a charter for white kids, and other charters for black and brown kids. That is the new world of school choice.

There is a charter school for rich white kids in Los Altos (the Bullis Charter School), the Metro Nashville school board has been trying to stop the Great Hearts Academy of Arizona from opening a charter in an affluent white neighborhood, Eva Moskowitz has opened charters in affluent NYC communities on the Upper West Side of Manhattan and in Cobble Hill in Brooklyn (maybe that’s why she changed the name of her chain from “Harlem Success Academy” to “Success Academy”). New Jersey parents in middle-class towns have thus far repelled them.

The wave of the future, it seems, is that charters will expand into mostly affluent white districts. The kids are less challenging. Instead of “saving poor children from their failing public schools,” they will go where the pickings are easy.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Privatization, Texas

Equity Investors See Big Profit$$ in Education

By dianeravitch
January 13, 2013 //
14

This is the end game of the current reform movement: financializing public spending on education.

Education is now seen as an emerging market, ripe for the picking.

Time to get in on the ground floor.

You don’t need to know anything about education.

What an opportunity!

Categories Education Industry, For-Profit, Privatization

D.C. Teacher: The Return of a Dual School System in D.C.

By dianeravitch
January 13, 2013 //
6

Washington, D.C. has an articulate new education blogger. She knows more than the policy wonks at Brookings, AEI, Education Sector, Thomas B.Fordham Institute, the Center for American Progress, and the other guru shops. She teaches in the D.C. schools.

Florence realizes that the city now has a dual school system, one for the winners, another for the losers.

Some historians think that it is very hard, if not impossible, to break free of deeply ingrained patterns. Washington, D.C. seems to be reverting to a familiar format.

Categories Charter Schools, Privatization

Add Carnegie Corporation to Billionaire Boys Club

By dianeravitch
January 12, 2013 //
2

The Carnegie Corporation doesn’t have as much money to throw into the corporate reform movement as the Walton Foundation, the Broad Foundation, and the Gates Foundation but it is definitely on the same page as the big guys. Here is its report on 2011 spending. The education grants begin on p. 24. And there they are: charter schools, Jeb Bush’s favorite “digital learning,” Common Core, Race to the Top policies, and the usual reformy organizations.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Privatization, Teacher Evaluations, Testing

You Are the Leaders

By dianeravitch
January 12, 2013 //
48

Spring is coming.

People are standing up and speaking up.

Teachers at Garfield High in Seattle say “no more.”

Teachers at Ballard High School support their colleagues at Garfield.

The Seattle Education Association supports the Garfield and Ballard teachers.

Randi Weingarten tweeted her support.

Superintendents, one after another, are saying the testing obsession is out of control.

The principals of New York State stand together to demand professional evaluation, not trial by testing.

Parents are defending their children by supporting their teachers and their community schools.

The PTA of Niagara County in New York say hands off our public schools.

Communities are opposing school closings and corporate takeovers.

Students are speaking out because they know what is happening to them is not right.

Journalists are starting to recognize that the “reformers” are not real reformers but privatizers.

It is starting to happen.

We will put education back into the hands of educators and parents and communities.

We will work to make our schools better than ever, not by competition, but by collaboration.

Last year, someone emailed and asked me to create and lead the movement to stop the corporate reformers, and I said I couldn’t do it, that all I can do is write and speak.

That truly is all I can do, but when I started this blog in late April, it turned into a platform for the movement, and leaders are emerging all over the country, and learning about each other. They are communicating.

I am not the leader, I am the facilitator. You are the leaders.

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Corporate Reformers, Parent Groups, Principals, Privatization, Students, Support for public schools, Teachers and Teaching, Testing, Unions

EduShyster: The Secret Ingredient in the Secret Sauce (Link Fixed!!)

By dianeravitch
January 12, 2013 //
12

Mayor Rahm Emanuel memorably said on video that the Noble Street charters in Chicago have a “secret sauce” that makes them successful. They have high test scores and high graduation rates. They are each named for rich and powerful sponsors.

Count on EduShyster to discover the secret in the secret sauce..

She gets many tips, which enables her to scoop many reporters. The secret of her success is two-fold: one, she has a wicked sense of wit, and two, she protects her anonymity, so she doesn’t have to worry about reprisals. And I should add a third very important part of her success: she documents what she writes, as in this post.

Categories Charter Schools, Chicago, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Emanuel, Rahm, Privatization

N.C. State Board Caves to Online Lobbyists, with Restrictions

By dianeravitch
January 10, 2013 //
1

North Carolina is a plum market for the online for-profit charter industry.

Today, the state board of education agreed to allow them to open in the state but set some limits.

Here is a link to a report on the decision by North Carolina Policy Watch:

“Virtual charter schools will face restrictions if they want to open up in North Carolina.
The N.C. State Board of Education voted today to adopt a policy that would require the online-based schools to adhere to a significantly lower funding formula ($3504 per student) than brick-and-mortar charter schools, maintain high graduation rates and low withdrawal rates of students. Schools will also need to keep a ratio of one teacher for every 50 students and keep graduation rates within 10 percent of the state average (80 percent), and can’t have withdrawal rates higher than 15 percent in two out of three years.”
Some legislators were unhappy that the state board of education imposed restrictions on the industry. Online charters get dismal results, but they are heavily favored by Jeb Bush and Bob Wise, and of course, the technology industry. They are also a favorite cause of the far-right organization ALEC, which counts some N.C. legislators among its members.
Two for-profit online corporations have already sent letters of intent to the state board of education: Connections, which is owned by Pearson; and K12, which is owned by the Milken brothers and listed on the New York Stock Exchange. Both have hired lobbyists to help them in the legislature, which may eliminate the restrictions imposed by the state board of education.
The bottom line: ALEC and for-profit corporations win, kids in N.C. lose.
Categories Corporate Reformers, For-Profit, North Carolina, On-Line Education, Privatization

The Key to Understanding Corporate Reform

By dianeravitch
January 10, 2013 //
3

If you want to understand what is happening in state after state, district after district, read Lee Fang’s article here. I have read it again and again, and every time I read it, I see something I didn’t see before and understand the national picture better than I did before. I have published this before. I may publish it every few months to make sure that everyone sees it. Or has a reminder to read it again.

Categories ALEC, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, For-Profit, Privatization

Is Corporate Reform Like Vietnam?

By dianeravitch
January 10, 2013 //
14

I hesitated to post this because it refers to me.

But I decided to post it because the author, Mark Naison, makes a powerful point about the present moment.

What is happening in education today is ignorant, willful, and dangerous.

Thoughtless politicians and self-seeking entrepreneurs are hurting children, damaging public education, and demeaning the teaching profession with their misguided policies. They welcome for-profit schooling, they are closing down urban education in city after city, and they want a “free market” in schooling. At the same time, they acquiesce to deep budget cuts in essential services for children. Is there a parallel with Vietnam in the 1960s? Naison thinks so.

Categories Budget Cuts, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Privatization

Will Massachusetts Open a Charter to Skim $$ from a Great Public School?

By dianeravitch
January 9, 2013 //
15

Brockton High School has been hailed as one of the best high schools in the nation, celebrated for its excellent programs and high test scores. What makes its success especially impressive is that the school has 4,100 students and a large immigrant population.

Now enters the SABIS for-profit charter chain, seeking to compete with Brockton High School. In this report, EduShyster has a guest blogger explain.

Clearly, SABIS won’t be “saving poor kids from a failing public school,” because Brockton High is one one the best high schools in the state.

So why would the state allow the charter to open and lure students and resources away from a fine public school?

Categories Charter Schools, Education Reform, For-Profit, Massachusetts, Privatization
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