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Texas Requires Students to Take State Test in Person

By dianeravitch
January 31, 2021 //
15

While other states are requesting waivers from federally-mandated tests this spring, Texas is moving forward, requiring all students to take in-person tests.

Given the stress and dislocation caused by the pandemic, this is madness. State Commissioner Mike Morath was never an educator, and apparently he lacks common decency. Instruction has been uneven for almost a year, and many students have experienced the trauma of severe illness and death in their family. What is Morath thinking? He is certainly not thinking of the well-being of students.

Texas public school students must show up in person to take the STAAR test this spring, and districts can apply for waivers to socially distance test takers, according to recent guidance released by the Texas Education Agency.

The state is moving forward with the state standardized tests, taken in grades three through 12, this spring and summer during the pandemic and requiring students to take them at a “monitored” testing site. School districts can set up sites outside of their schools, including performing arts centers, hotels and recreation centers where they can “ensure equitable access and maintain test security.”

Texas is requiring all districts to allow in-person learning for all students who want it, with few exceptions. A state survey at the end of October showed 2.8 million of 5.5 million students were learning on campus, meaning millions were still learning remotely.

Although some may be reluctant to return in person during a pandemic, Texas high school students receiving remote instruction who do not show up to take the required standardized exams may not be able to graduate. Texas has already said students in younger grades who fail required STAAR exams can move up to the next grade. And as of December, school districts will not receive state ratings this year based on how their students perform on the exams.

Categories Cruelty, Education Industry, Standardized Testing, Texas

Mimi Swartz: Ted Cruz, Liar and Thug

By dianeravitch
January 19, 2021 //
30

Since his revolting performance at the failed revolt on January 6, Ted Cruz has emerged as leader of what is known as the #SeditionCaucus. Mimi Swartz, executive editor of the Texas Monthly and contributing opinion writer for the New York Times, recently called him out as a hypocrite and a phony who used his credentials to attack our democracy:

When I was growing up, I was often reminded that people with fancy educations and elite degrees “put their pants on one leg at a time just like the rest of us.” This was back in the early 1960s, before so many rich Texans started sending their kids to Ivy League schools, when mistrust of Eastern educated folks — or any highly educated folks — was part of the state’s deep rooted anti-intellectualism. Beware of those who lorded their smarts over you, was the warning. Don’t fall for their high-toned airs.

Since I’ve been lucky enough to get a fancy enough education, I’ve often found myself on the other side of that warning. But then came Jan. 6, when I watched my Ivy League-educated senator, Ted Cruz, try to pull yet another fast one on the American people as he fought — not long before the certification process was disrupted by a mob of Trump supporters storming the Capitol and forcing their way into the Senate chamber — to challenge the election results.

In the unctuous, patronizing style he is famous for, Mr. Cruz cited the aftermath of the 1876 presidential election between Rutherford Hayes and Samuel Tilden. It was contentious and involved actual disputes about voter fraud and electoral mayhem, and a committee was formed to sort it out. Mr. Cruz’s idea was to urge the creation of a committee to investigate invented claims of widespread voter fraud — figments of the imaginations of Mr. Trump and minions like Mr. Cruz — in the election of Joe Biden. It was, for Mr. Cruz, a typical, too-clever-by-half bit of nonsense, a cynical ploy to paper over the reality of his subversion on behalf of President Trump. (The horse trading after the 1876 election helped bring about the end of Reconstruction; maybe Mr. Cruz thought evoking that subject was a good idea, too.)

But this tidbit was just one of many hideous contributions from Mr. Cruz in recent weeks. It happened, for instance, after he supported a lawsuit from Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (under indictment since 2015 for securities fraud) in an attempt to overturn election results in critical states (it was supported by other Texan miscreants like Representative Louie Gohmert).

The esoteric exhortations of Jan. 6 from Mr. Cruz, supposedly in support of preserving democracy, also just happened to occur while a fund-raising message was dispatched in his name. (“Ted Cruz here. I’m leading the fight to reject electors from key states unless there is an emergency audit of the election results. Will you stand with me?”) The message went out around the time that the Capitol was breached by those who probably believed Mr. Cruz’s relentless, phony allegations.

Until last Wednesday, I wasn’t sure that anything or anyone could ever put an end to this man’s self-serving sins and long trail of deceptions and obfuscations. As we all know, they have left his wife, his father and numerous colleagues flattened under one bus or another in the service of his ambition. (History may note that Senator Lindsey Graham, himself a breathtaking hypocrite, once joked, “If you killed Ted Cruz on the floor of the Senate, and the trial was in the Senate, nobody would convict you.”)

But maybe, just maybe, Mr. Cruz has finally overreached with this latest power grab, which is correctly seen as an attempt to corral Mr. Trump’s base for his own 2024 presidential ambitions. This time, however, Mr. Cruz was spinning, obfuscating and demagoguing to assist in efforts to overturn the will of the voters for his own ends.

Mr. Cruz has been able to use his pseudo-intellectualism and his Ivy League pedigree as a cudgel. He may be a snake, his supporters (might) admit, but he could go toe to toe with liberal elites because he, too, went to Princeton (cum laude), went to Harvard Law School (magna cum laude), was an editor of the Harvard Law Review and clerked for Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist. Mr. Cruz was not some seditionist in a MAGA hat (or a Viking costume); he styled himself as a deep thinker who could get the better of lefties from those pointy headed schools. He could straddle both worlds — ivory towers and Tea Party confabs — and exploit both to his advantage.

Today, though, his credentials aren’t just useless; they condemn him. Any decent soul might ask: If you are so smart, how come you are using that fancy education to subvert the Constitution you’ve long purported to love? Shouldn’t you have known better? But, of course, Mr. Cruz did know better; he just didn’t care. And he believed, wrongly I hope, that his supporters wouldn’t either.

I was heartened to see that our senior senator, John Cornyn, benched himself during this recent play by Team Crazy. So did seven of Texas’ over 20 Republican members of the House — including Chip Roy, a former chief of staff for Mr. Cruz. (Seven counts as good news in my book.)

I’m curious to see what happens with Mr. Cruz’s check-writing enablers in Texas’ wealthier Republican-leaning suburbs. Historically, they’ve stood by him. But will they want to ally themselves with the mob that vandalized our nation’s Capitol and embarrassed the United States before the world? Will they realize that Mr. Cruz, like President Trump and the mini-Cruz, Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri, would risk destroying the country in the hope of someday leading it?

Or maybe, just maybe, they will finally see — as I did growing up — that a thug in a sharp suit with an Ivy League degree is still a thug.

I have two questions for Cruz:

  1. How can someone born in Canada run for president of the United States?
  2. Cruz says we should believe Trump. Trump said Cruz’s father assassinated JFK. Did he?
Categories Accountability, Character, Lies, Texas, Trump

Ted Cruz: America’s #1 Hypocrite

By dianeravitch
January 11, 2021 //
59

The Houston Chronicle reported that Ted Cruz criticized Trump for the violent siege of the Capitol.

No kidding.

Even after the vandals stormed into the buildings, even after they spread feces on the floors and invaded private offices, even after five deaths, Cruz resumed his campaign to discredit Biden’s election victory. He persuaded a few other Senators and the majority of House Republicans to join him in claiming that an “audit” was needed in states that Biden won, even those states had already conducted recounts and audits.

There must be a metaphor for the role Cruz is playing: raising doubts about the elections, repeating them endlessly, stoking Trump’s claims that the election was stolen, despite ample evidence to the contrary.

“Shame on you,” Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo tweeted on Friday, saying to Cruz “You fanned the flames of mistrust and history will hold you accountable for the ensuing chaos. Outrageous!”

Cruz bears responsibility with Trump for the violence on January 6. He has blood on his hands.

Categories Education Reform, Hypocrisy, Texas, Trump

El Paso Teacher, 35, Dies of COVID-19

By dianeravitch
January 2, 2021 //
22

Zelene Blancas, who taught in the public schools of El Paso, died of COVID-19. She was 35.

She taught first grade, and she emphasized kindness. Her 2018 video of her children saying goodbye with a hug at the end of each day was viewed more than 22 million times.

Blancas tested positive for coronavirus October 20 and days later, she was hospitalized, her brother, Mario Blancas, told CNN. After weeks of showing signs of recovery and taking steps on her own, her oxygen levels dropped, and she was intubated November 22.

The otherwise healthy 35-year-old never came off the ventilator, her brother said. She spent two months in the hospital before dying of complications from Covid-19, her family said.

Categories Health, Teachers, Texas

Texas: Republicans Fighting to Defund Lobbying for Public Institutions, Including Public Schools

By dianeravitch
December 3, 2020 //
13

The big battle this coming year in the Texas Legislature is about whether public agencies will be allowed to lobby for their interests. No one argues that private interests should be banned from advocating for what they want. Only public agencies—like public schools—would be banned because they use public money.

You can see where this is going. Supporters of public institutions would be gagged and censored, but promoters of privatization would be free to wine and dine legislators.

The Dallas Morning News tells both sides of the story here.

The issue, which has been dubbed “taxpayer-funded lobbying” by supporters and “community censorship” by its detractors, is a major divider between traditional Republicans — particularly those in rural areas who support public schools and their local county governments — and hard-line conservatives who see it as wasteful spending by local officials.

Local officials and the organizations that represent them — like the Texas Association for Counties, the Texas Municipal League and the Texas Association of School Boards — say such a lobbying ban would hurt local jurisdictions and make it more expensive for them to advocate for their constituents. They say the ban is nothing more than an effort to silence the voices of local officials.

Democrats and some Republicans banded together to block the bill last year. That vote resulted in House Speaker Dennis Bonnen and one of his top lieutenants, Rep. Dustin Burrows of Lubbock, meeting with conservative activist Michael Quinn Sullivan to target several fellow Republicans who voted against the bill.

The scandal forced Bonnen into early retirement and Burrows had to resign as chairman of the House Republican Caucus. Nonetheless, the bill’s backers say it will return next session.

Arch conservatives claim that cities, counties, public schools, and other public agencies should not be allowed to use taxpayer money to defend the public interest. Profiteers, buccaneers, entrepreneurs, and raiders of the public treasury would be allowed to lobby with no restraints.

Just one more loathsome effort to cripple the public interest by Governor Abbott and his allies.



Categories Charter Schools, Democracy, Education Reform, Freedom of Speech, Privatization, Republicans, Texas

Texas: What I Said to Public Education Advocates

By dianeravitch
November 8, 2020 //
9

The Pastors for Texas Children, great friends of public schools, invited me to come to Texas in April 2020. I was going to speak in Houston, Dallas, and Austin to activists for public schools. The events were organized by Charles Foster Johnson, the remarkable, wise, and tireless leader of PTC. He has launched similar groups in other states, including Oklahoma and Tennessee.

Then came COVID and my trip was scratched and replaced with a Zoom meeting in late October. I had a spirited conversation with Evan Smith of the Texas Tribune, a superb interviewer who had read my book Slaying Goliath carefully and asked incisive questions. This is the recording of the Zoom. I come in about minute 15 and the conversation is about 40 minutes.

I prepared for the day by studying up on what’s happening in my native state. Texas right now is ground zero for the hungry charter industry. The state commissioner, Mike Marath, who is not an educator, is gung-ho for more charters.

The public schools, which enroll more than five million students, have been underfunded since at least 2011, when the legislature cut the schools’ budget by more than $5 billion. That funding was never fully restored even though enrollment increased. The majority of the state’s public school students and Hispanic and African American. The majority of the legislators are white men.

Meanwhile, the rightwingers have been pushing for charters and vouchers. The Pastors for Texas Children and other civic groups repeatedly stopped the voucher bill by building a coalition of urban Democrats and rural Republicans. For now, vouchers are dead.

So, the privatizers have thrown their firepower into expanding charters. Betsy DeVos gave the state more than $200 million to open new charters. Texas is overrun with corporate chains. The public schools of Texas outperform charters by test scores. Public school students are better prepared for college than charter students. Charter graduates have lower earnings after they finish their schooling. Why, I wondered, do wealthy Texans continue to fund failure?

I hope you will take the time to watch.

https://www.google.com/url?q=https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/yLu6AVRUbArHLjQJWlZCgWgtQLtdu-FHuXqfhH8XHhYNt06RIGqMm5CltHDjZf9O.QYiv1OwkVQ3q0wjb&source=gmail-imap&ust=1604875762000000&usg=AOvVaw3UFd1ui77ZVk5YKI1LypON

Categories Betsy DeVos, Charter Schools, Education Reform, Funding, Resistance, Texas, Vouchers

Pastors for Texas Children on the Election Results

By dianeravitch
November 6, 2020 //
7

The Network for Public Education is allied with Pastors for Texas Children. PTC has been a courageous leader in the fight for our public schools and against privatization.

The leader of PTC wrote the following statement:

Statement from Reverend Charles Foster Johnson on the 2020 Elections
Pastors for Texas Children extends a hearty congratulations to all those elected and re-elected to serve our children in the 87th Texas Legislature! Both incumbents and challengers fought hard and often confrontational, contentious campaigns that produced untold stress on them and their families. This is the messy price we pay for open and free elections, and we honor all candidates for serving the public in this important and sacrificial way. We have held every candidate in our prayers, and will continue to do so. We note with profound gratification the emphasis on public education in this electoral cycle. Virtually every incumbent and challenger ran on a strong public education platform. It is clear that the people of Texas want their House of Representatives to be fully affirming of great public schools for all 5.4 million Texas children, promote policies that protect and provide for them, and oppose policies that harm them.  It is crystal clear what public education support means:

*Opposition to any voucher proposal, regardless of its name, that diverts funding away from our neighborhood public schools to underwrite private and home schools.

 Support for budget plans that adequately fund our children’s public education, for a comprehensive study that determines what that education actually costs in current dollars, and for new sources of state revenue to sustain HB3.  

Opposition to charter school expansion that drains money away from public schools.

Support for charter school transparency and accountability.

Opposition to burdensome standardized testing that teachers and parents clearly abhor.

Support for teacher authority and compensation.  

We will be working closely with all 150 House members and 31 Senate members to make sure these promises are put into action in the 87th Legislature. 

Universal education, provided and protected by the public, is an expression of God’s Common Good as well as a Texas constitutional mandate.  Our children are counting on us all to advocate for it.
Categories Charter Schools, Education Reform, Funding, Teachers and Teaching, Testing, Texas, Vouchers

ACLU Sues to Block Voter Suppression in Houston

By dianeravitch
November 2, 2020 //
22

Republican activists have been trying to invalidate 127,000 votes cast in Harris County (Houston). Their case failed in the state courts. They are now in federal courts, arguing that votes cast at a drive-in location are invalid, even though the sites were approved by the Secretary of State of Texas.

ACLU Challenges Effort to Invalidate Nearly 127,000 Drive-Thru Votes Cast in Harris County, Texas

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 1, 2020

CONTACT:
Imelda Mejia, ACLU of Texas, 602–510-4534, imejia@aclutx.org
Inga Sarda-Sorensen, ACLU National, 347-514-3984, isarda-sorensen@aclu.org

HOUSTON — The American Civil Liberties Union and ACLU of Texas moved to intervene tonight in a lawsuit that seeks to invalidate nearly 127,000 early votes cast via drive-thru voting in Harris County, the state’s largest county and the third largest county in the country. This is the third such attempt to discard these validly-cast ballots.

“The push to toss the ballots of nearly 127,000 Texans in Harris County is unconscionable and illegal,” said Sophia Lin Lakin, deputy director of the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project. “It appears to be an attempt to undermine a true and accurate vote count and improperly influence the outcome of the election.”

Tonight’s ACLU challenge was filed on behalf of the League of Women Voters of Texas and several individuals who voted using the drive-thru option, including:

  • Michelle Colvard, a 45-year-old registered voter who lives in Houston. She has both spina bifida and monoclonal gammopathy. Because of these conditions, she uses a wheelchair and is more susceptible to severe illness from COVID-19. She chose to drive-thru vote as the option that would minimize her risk of COVID-19 exposure.
  • Karen “Kim” Vidor, a 64-year-old registered voter living in Houston. She has been a registered voter in Harris County since she was approximately 18. She suffers from hypertension, cardiac issues, asthma, and rheumatoid arthritis, all of which heighten her risk from COVID-19. If her vote is at risk of not being counted, she fears she will be totally disenfranchised. For Vidor, a Republican, this is “not a partisan issue,” but rather an issue of having her vote counted.
  • Joy Davis-Harasemay, a 44-year-old registered voter who lives in Houston. She has both asthma and spondylitis, a degenerative spine disease that makes her unable to stand for long periods of time. She used drive-thru voting, and if her vote is not counted, she will be heartbroken and disenfranchised. As a Black woman, she likely will not vote again in this election for fear of breaking election rules and being accused of voting twice.
  • Diana Untermeyer, a 58-year-old registered voter who lives in Houston. She routinely votes for Republican candidates during general elections, including voting for Sharon Hemphill — a plaintiff in the lawsuit seeking to invalidate the drive-thru votes in Harris County — over her opponent in the 2020 general election. 

“This lawsuit is another desperate and ludicrous attempt by extremists to block the will of the people and disrupt democracy,” said Andre Segura, legal director for the ACLU of Texas. “Throwing out these votes would be patently unlawful and unprecedented. Texans have shown up in record numbers to make their voices heard, and we will fight to ensure that these votes are counted.”

“The attempt to disenfranchise more than 120,000 voters who lawfully cast their ballots during early voting is disgraceful and un-American,” said Grace Chimene, president of League of Women Voters of Texas.“Drive-thru voting was established as a safe early voting option for individuals, including many disabled voters who did not want to enter a polling site during this pandemic. It was tested with great success during the Texas run-off and special election in July. This last-minute attack on voters demonstrates a desire by some to silence Texas voters and we will not stand for it.”

A hearing is slated for Monday morning in Houston in front of U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen.

Prior to the federal court lawsuit seeking to invalidate the nearly 127,000 votes, some of the same plaintiffs filed a similar suit with the Texas Supreme Court. Earlier today, the Texas Supreme Court denied the request without an order or opinion. In late October, the Texas Supreme Court refused litigation attempting to shut down drive-thru voting in Harris County altogether.

Legal filings: https://www.aclu.org/legal-document/motion-intervene-0 and https://www.aclu.org/legal-document/opp-pi

Statement: https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/aclu-challenges-effort-invalidate-127000-drive-thru-votes-cast-harris-county-texas

Categories Elections, Houston, Texas

Texas Parent PAC: A Model of Action for Every State

By dianeravitch
October 31, 2020 //
6

Parents in Texas got disgusted 15 years ago when the Legislature almost passed a voucher law. They organized the Texas Parent PAC, which is a highly effective voice on behalf of public schools and more than five million students.

The website of Texas Parent PAC has a list of the endorsed candidates, both Democrats and Republicans.

Their guiding principles are a model for parents, grandparents, and civic activists in other states.

I recently heard from Dinah Miller, co-founder and co-chair, who explained the PAC’s origins. She wrote:

Texas Parent PAC formed in 2005 after taxpayer-funded private school vouchers failed to pass the Texas House by only one vote. Five PTA moms called a press conference during PTA Summer Seminar in Austin and announced we were forming a political action committee to elect better talent to the Texas House who would oppose vouchers and support public schools. We recruited Diane Patrick from Arlington who had local and state school board experience to run against hostile Texas House Public Education Committee Chair Kent Grusendorf who had been in office 20 years. We beat Grusendorf in the primary along with others and then knocked off another hostile education committee member in the general election. Those races put us on the map.

From our website: Texas Parent PAC is a bipartisan political action committee for parents, grandparents, parents-to-be, and anyone who supports high quality public education. The PAC has a track record of success, helping to elect over 63 current members of the Texas Legislature, and defeat 23 incumbents who were hostile to public education.

Endorsed candidates reflect traditional mainstream American values that honor and support children and their families, quality public education, strong communities, unlimited opportunities, and maximum citizen participation in our democracy. All endorsed candidates support the Texas Parent PAC Guiding Principles.

Fifteen years later, our volunteers are still fundraising for our endorsed bipartisan candidates for the November 3, 2020 election. Our website is www.txparentpac.com

Sincerely, Your Fan,

Dinah Miller

Co-chair and Co-founder

Texas Parent PAC

Categories Charter Schools, Education Industry, Education Reform, Funding, Parent Groups, Resistance, Texas, Vouchers

Do Communities Need Competing Police and Fire Departments?

By dianeravitch
October 24, 2020 //
27

A few days ago, I spoke to a statewide group of public education advocates in Texas, brought together by my friends at Pastors for Texas Children.

For some reason, Texas is ground-zero for the charter industry right now. Betsy DeVos has given over $250 million to the IDEA charter chain (the one that wanted to lease a private jet for its executives, and she recently gave $100 million to the State Commissioner Mike Morath to expand charter schools. Morath was in business; he was never an educator. Businessmen like competition; educators know that competition belongs on the sports field and is not a way to improve schools.

I did my due diligence comparing charter schools to public schools in Texas and this is what I found: charter schools have lower test scores than public schools; charter schools have lower graduation rates than public schools; charter school graduates enter college with lower GPAs than public schools; charters have no effect on test scores and a negative effect on earnings after school. All of these articles and studies were published on my blog.

So, why, I wondered are billionaires like John Walton, Tim Dunn, the Waltons, and DeVos expanding this low-performing sector? What smart businessman would continue to pour money into a failing enterprise?

Public schools are better than charter schools by every measure, but they are underfunded. The Legislature cut the school budget by $5.4 billion in 2011 and has still not restored that funding, even though enrollment has grown.

If competition worked, Milwaukee and Detroit would be the best districts in the nation. Milwaukee has had vouchers and charters for more than 20 years. Sadly, all three sectors perform about the same, and Milwaukee is one of the lowest performing districts in the nation.

I asked the Texas audience whether it would make sense to fund two or three different police or fire departments in the same community. Would that improve their performance? Of course not! It would be a duplication and triplication and would be wasteful. I remembered that in the early 19th century, New York City had multiple fire departments. They would race to the scene of the fire, then fight each other for the right to fight the fire while the buildings burned down.

The Pastors for Texas Children turned these thoughts into a delightful article.

Public schools are a public service. They should be properly funded because they are creating the future. The teachers of Texas and every other state are developing their future leaders and citizens. They are heroes and should be respected and professionally compensated.

Categories Betsy DeVos, Billionaires, Charter Schools, Education Reform, Supporting public schools, Texas
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