Imagine this scenario: the hard-right president of the country warns that his upcoming re-election campaign will be rigged against him. He loses the election. He refuses to concede. He rallies his followers against the election, insisting it was stolen. His followers storm government offices in protest. His attempted coup fails. He was just arrested along with his top aides.
But it’s not Donald Trump. It’s Jair Bolsonaro, who looked up to Trump as his model.
Former President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil oversaw a broad conspiracy to hold on to power regardless of the results of the 2022 election, including personally editing a proposed order to arrest a Supreme Court justice and call new elections after he lost, according to new accusations by Brazilian federal police unveiled on Thursday.
Mr. Bolsonaro and dozens of top aides, ministers and military leaders coordinated to undermine the Brazilian public’s faith in the election and set the stage for a potential coup, the federal police said.
Their efforts included spreading information about voter fraud, drafting legal arguments for new elections, recruiting military personnel to support a coup, surveilling judges and encouraging and guiding protesters who eventually raided government buildings, police said.
Apparently justice is swifter in Brazil than in the United States.
I received a fundraising letter for a teacher who is running for the Legislature. It was forwarded to me by a friend who lives in the district. I read his letter and immediately sent Derek Reich a donation to his campaign.
Dear Friend,
I’m Derek Reich, a local high school government teacher here in Sarasota. I’m now the Democrat running to be your state representative in District 73 so I can fully fund our children’s public schools, lower homeowner’s insurance, and restore a woman’s freedom to control her body.
I was born and raised in Sarasota County, and never envisioned myself running for office. But when Fiona McFarLand, our current representative, voted to cut $12 million in funding from our public schools, I was outraged. What representative would go to Tallahassee to cut funding from their own community’s children? She also voted for no exceptions for rape or incest in Florida’s new abortion law. Enough is enough. I will fight for my hometown and for all of my neighbors in Sarasota County who are being ignored by Tallahassee politicians.
This is the most competitive state house race in Florida. In 2020, Biden and Trump practically tied it at 49% each. I am going to flip this seat, and I hope to earn your support to do it. If you want to learn more about my campaign and the issues I’m fighting for, you can visit my website: https://derekforflorida.com/.
We’re working to build the campaign needed to get our message out by the voters, and any support you can give would help us knock doors and let voters know what our opponent is doing in Tallahassee. If you’re able to help, you can donate securely online at this link.
Let’s send this #TeacherToTallahassee
Sincerely, Derek Reich Teacher, Candidate for State Representative
The supermajority of Republicans in the Tennessee legislature are driving fast and hard to enact universal vouchers, which means the state will subsidize the tuition of students in private and religious schools, regardless of family income. In every other state that has adopted universal vouchers, most of the students who sought them had never attended public schools. The voucher was used by families who could afford to pay tuition. The voucher was a nice plum for families that didn’t need it. And many of the voucher/receiving schools were openly discriminatory—against students not of their own religion, against LGBT students, against students with disabilities.
Cc: Unity Group of Chattanooga Opposition to Universal School Voucher Program
This week, the Tennessee General Assembly is expected to begin the process of crafting legislation that would permanently affix universal school vouchers throughout the State.
On the surface, this would appear to be a worthwhile and noble goal. We hear numerous romanticized soliloquies to describe why this is justified, such as providing expanded access, flexibility, choice, and opportunity. The glossy and rosy pictures they paint would have one to believe that universal vouchers were the best thing for schools and students since assorted Crayola boxes, number two pencils, and Mr. Rodgers and Sesame Street starting on PBS.
Yet, the research and data paint a starkly different picture. In fact, at a budget hearing held in November 2023, the State’s own Department of Education had to concede that 63 of the 75 schools that received funding from the State’s budget program, well over 80%, were “private “religious “schools in nature. Even more shocking is that last week, a report from the Education Trust concluded that 39% of TN school districts receive less in per-student funding than students that used private school vouchers.
Also last week, a draft plan of the proposed legislation was leaked that illustrated that the expanded voucher program would have no accountability measures, no anti-discrimination provisions, and no safeguards for students with disabilities. It is no wonder that there was consideration to forgo federal education funding because not only does this proposal not pass the smell test, but it very well could be in violation of federal law under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.
As a matter of record, there have already been multiple lawsuits launched that have challenged the constitutionality of the State’s voucher program, and in fact in January the Tennessee Court of Appeals ruled that Davidson and Shelby County families could go forward with a potential suit.
From a fiscal management sense, the projected amount universal vouchers will cost Tennessee taxpayers is murky at best. If the budget shortfalls we have seen occur in other States are any indicator, then we can expect major cost overruns that will go down the well so deep it will eventually run dry.
A 2023 report from the Southern Poverty Law Center and Education Law Center provides a good analysis on this. In The Fiscal Consequences of Private School Vouchers, it was found that between 2008-2019, voucher disbursements in at least 7 states doubled in contrast to initial budgetary projections.
In Arizona alone, voucher spending for the current academic year is more than 300 million over initial estimates; it is expected that the State may spend close to 1 billion dollars for their voucher program. In North Carolina, there were reports where some schools received more vouchers than they had students. There are also numerous reports that voucher recipients from states across the country have made highly questionable purchases like theme park tickets, kayaks, trampolines and yes, in one instance a chicken coop.
It does beg the question, will one able to use universal voucher funds to build a chicken coop in Tennessee as we have witnessed in other states.
Perhaps most profoundly, the process in which the universal voucher program is being crafted is both procedurally and fundamentally flawed. While there has been a basic framework “leaked” to the public, there remains critical questions about transparency, accountability, and oversight. The general publichas received little to no official details on this plan, only that the voucher program is being filed as a caption bill which, if we can borrow from a metaphor taught to our youngest students, lacks the “who, what, when, where, why, and how.”
In a perfect world, legislation of such consequence would merit a public hearing where experts on all sides would gather to provide analysis, evaluation, insights, and recommendations. The directly impacted people such as your local school boards and local education agencies would be invited to detail if the proposed legislation would have a positive or negative effect on them. The people of Tennessee, the taxpayers who would ultimately have to foot the bill, would be allowed to give sworn testimonies like they do in their city councils, county commissions and school boards.
Without such a process along these lines, can the legislators in Nashville really be able to measure the temperature across the State? Will they truly be able to establish public faith, confidence or trust if a potentially harmful program is simply ramrodded down the taxpayer’s proverbial throats?
The Economic Policy Institute released a rather frank and somber assessment on the growing school voucher moment in 2023 entitled, “State and local experience proves school vouchers are a failed policy that must be opposed.” They noted that at least 23 voucher bills were introduced in state houses last year, with universal bills passing. They noted that there is, “growing evidence that voucher programs do not serve students and may deepen educational and economic inequality.”
Further assessments found within the report are: (1) Evidence and research suggests vouchers do not improve academic achievement or education outcomes; (2) Vouchers represented a redistribution of school funding; (3) Vouchers benefited more wealthy and affluent areas over low income and rural. Amongst other major points of contention, one of the more profound conclusions of this analysis is that universal vouchers are, “Ineffective, inefficient, and inequitable.”
A decision that will affect schools and districts throughout the State, rural and urban, merits greater public discourse, fiscal analysis, and research-based evidence. The lack of this type of transparency will truly make the universal voucher program, “Ineffective, inefficient, and inequitable.” For these reasons, the Unity Group of Chattanooga must be adamantly opposed because this program will not solely be about autonomy, school choice or expanded options, rather, it will be ushering in a new era of Separate but Equal; and for the sake of our children, we must be better than that.
The latest jobs report was released a few days ago, and economists were astonished. The economy added 353,000 jobs in the past month, and unemployment remained low at 3.7%. This should be good news for Biden, But consumers are still concerned about inflation, which hits them in their pocketbook.
President Biden came into office in the midst of a global pandemic. Supply chains were disrupted, and prices were soaring in response. After the chaos of the Trump years, Biden set about hiring seasoned Cabinet officers and a strong economic team. Although the experts predicted that the instability of the COVID years would be followed by a deep recession, that’s not what happened. Throughout Biden’s term, unemployment remained low; the stock market reached historic records; manufacturing revived; and the U.S. economy outperformed nations in Europe and Asia. Yet public opinion polls showed a different picture: Consumers knew that the price of gasoline and grocery store staples went up and didn’t go down. Biden got no credit for the healthy economy because of the price of eggs, cereal, and other staples.
Joe Biden’s opponents focus on his age as something that makes him doddering, confused and ultimately unfit for office. So the great paradox of the 81-year-old’s first term is that he has presided over perhaps the most energetic American government in nearly half a century. He unleashed a surge in spending that briefly slashed the childhood poverty rate in half. He breathed life into a beleaguered union movement. And he produced an industrial policy that aims to reshape the American economy.
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There is plenty to debate about the merits of all of this. A steep rise in federal spending has aggravated the country’s worrying fiscal trajectory. Subsidies for companies to invest in America have angered allies and may yet end up going to waste. But there is no denying that many of these policies are already having an impact. Just look at the boom in factory construction: even accounting for inflation, investment in manufacturing facilities has more than doubled under Mr Biden, soaring to its highest on record.
What would he do in a second term? Mr Biden’s re-election motto—“we can finish the job”—sounds more like a home contractor’s pledge than the rhetoric of a political firebrand. Yet to hear it from the president’s current and former advisers, Bidenomics amounts to little short of an economic revolution for America. It would be a revolution shaped by faith in government and a mistrust of markets.
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Five elements stand out. The first is a desire to boost workers, mostly through unions. The second is more social spending, especially on early-childhood education. Third is tougher competition policy to restrain big business. Fourth, a wave of investment intended to make America both greener and more productive. Last, Mr Biden wants to tax large firms and the wealthy to pay for much of this.
As with any president, Mr Biden’s agenda thus far has been limited by Congress. The five elements were all present in the $3.5trn “Build Back Better” bill that Democrats in the House of Representatives backed in 2021, only to run smack into a split Senate. The result is that the most prominent part of existing Bidenomics has been the investment element, comprising three pieces of legislation focused on infrastructure, semiconductors and green tech. Signing three big spending bills into law nevertheless counts as a productive presidential term. They add up to a $2trn push to reshape the American economy.
If Mr Biden returns to the White House for a second term but Republicans retain control of the House or gain the Senate, or potentially both, advisers say that his focus would be on defending his legislative accomplishments. Although Republicans would be unable to overturn his investment packages if they did not hold the presidency, they could chip away at them.
Take the semiconductor law. Along with some $50bn for the chips industry, it also included nearly $200bn in funding for research and development of cutting-edge technologies, from advanced materials to quantum computing. But that giant slug of cash was only authorised, not appropriated, meaning it is up to Congress to pass budgets to provide the promised amount. So far it is falling well short: in the current fiscal year, it is on track to give $19bn to three federal research agencies, including the National Science Foundation, which is nearly 30% less than the authorised level, according to estimates by Matt Hourihan of the Federation of American Scientists, a lobby group. If Congress refuses to work with Mr Biden, these shortfalls will grow.
The funding directed at infrastructure and semiconductors is more secure, but much of it will run out by 2028, before the end of a second term. Without Republican support for funding, the investment kick-started over the past couple of years may ease off. High-cost producers will struggle to survive. Critics may see no reason to devote so much treasure to manufacturing when a modern economy based on professional, technical and scientific services already generates plenty of well-paying jobs.
But Mr Biden will have some leverage if Republicans try to water down his policies. Many of the big tax cuts passed during Donald Trump’s presidency expire at the end of 2025. Republicans want to renew them, to avoid income-tax rates jumping up. So one possibility is that Mr Biden could fashion a deal in which he agrees to an extension of many of the tax cuts in exchange for Republicans in Congress backing some of his priorities, including his industrial subsidies—never mind that such an agreement would be fiscally reckless.
The White House is also hoping that Mr Biden’s investment programmes will develop momentum of their own. “We are very pleasantly surprised by the extent to which private capital has flowed in the direction of our incentives,” says Jared Bernstein, chair of the president’s Council of Economic Advisers. Much of the money is going to red states, spawning constituencies of businesses and local politicians who would object to cuts. Meanwhile, there is, in principle, bipartisan support for federal spending on science and technology as a way of safeguarding America’s competitive edge over China. That is why a few dozen Republicans in the House and Senate, albeit a minority, voted for the semiconductor package. Given this constellation of interests and leverage, the industrial policies that defined Bidenomics in the president’s first term would probably survive his second term, albeit in somewhat more limited form.
But what if Mr Biden is less constrained? To really understand the potential scope of Bidenomics, it is worth asking what the president would do if the Democrats end up controlling both houses of Congress. Once they come down from their elation at such an outcome, the team around Mr Biden would know that they have a limited window—probably just two years, until the next set of midterm elections—to get anything of note done.
For starters they would turn to the social policies left on the Build Back Better cutting-room floor. These include free pre-school for three- and four-year-olds, generous child-care subsidies, spending on elderly care, an expanded tax credit for families with children and paid parental leave. Janet Yellen, the treasury secretary, has described this agenda as “modern supply-side economics”. She argues that investments in education would make American workers more productive, while investments in care would free up people, especially women, to work, leading to a bigger labour force. But it would also be costly, running to at least $100bn a year of additional spending—adding half a percentage point to the annual federal deficit (which hit 7.5% of gdp in 2023). And implementation would be challenging. For instance, funding for child care would fuel demand for it, which in turn would exacerbate a chronic shortage of caregivers.
Mr Biden’s desire to strengthen unions would also receive fresh impetus. The president describes himself as the most pro-union president in American history—a claim that may well be true. In his first term support for unions was expressed most clearly through words and symbolic actions: when he joined striking auto workers near Detroit in September, he became the first president to walk a picket line. Mr Biden would have liked to have done more. He had at first wanted to make many industrial subsidies contingent on companies hiring unionised workers, a requirement that did not make it into law. The labour movement’s big hope for a second Biden term is passage of the pro Act, which would boost collective bargaining by, among other things, making it harder for firms to intervene in union votes. That would represent a gamble: the flexibility of America’s labour market is a source of resilience for the economy, which has been good to workers in recent years.
The flipside of Mr Biden craving approbation as a pro-union president is that he has also come to be seen as anti-business. Members of his cabinet bridle at this charge, noting that corporate profits have soared and that entrepreneurs have created a record number of businesses during his first term. Yet the single biggest reason why Bidenomics has got a bad rap has been his competition agenda, led by Lina Khan of the Federal Trade Commission (ftc). Although her efforts to cut down corporate giants have spluttered, with failed lawsuits against Meta and Microsoft, she is not done. The ftc has introduced new merger-review guidelines that require regulators to scrutinise just about any deal that makes big companies bigger, which could produce even more contentious competition policy. Excessive scrutiny of deals would also use up regulators’ scarce resources and poison the atmosphere for big business. An alternative focus, on relaxing land-use restrictions and loosening up occupation licensing, would provide a much healthier boost to competition.
Captain of Industry
At the same time, Mr Biden may double down on the manufacturing policies of his first term. The $50bn or so of incentives for the semiconductor industry has been a start, but it is small relative to how much investment is required for large chip plants. Advisers talk of a follow-on funding package. There would also be a desire to craft new legislation to smooth out bumps in the implementation of industrial policy. Todd Tucker of the Roosevelt Institute, a left-leaning think-tank, advocates a national development bank, creating a reservoir of cash that could be channelled to deserving projects.
How to pay for it all? Mr Biden has long made clear that he wishes to raise taxes on the rich, in particular on households earning over $400,000 a year and on businesses. The president’s advisers argue that he truly believes in fiscal discipline. His budget for the current fiscal year would, for instance, cut the deficit by $3trn over a decade, or by 1% of gdp a year, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (crfb), a non-profit outfit. That, however, is predicated on Democrats exercising restraint as tax receipts increase—something that is hard to imagine, says Maya MacGuineas of the crfb….
Most of the action, then, would be in the domestic arena—the battleground for everything from child-care spending to semiconductor subsidies. Supporters argue that these policies would make America more equal, propel its industry and tilt the playing-field towards workers and away from bosses. To many others, they look like a lurch back to bigger government, with an outdated focus on both manufacturing and unions, which may strain ties with allies. Mr Biden was a most unlikely radical in his first term. If the polls head his way, he may go further yet in a second. 7
Several weeks ago, the Charlotte News-Observer in North Carolina, reported that a charter school —Children’s Village Academy—was under investigation because a member of its board was paid more than $140,000 in interest on a loan to the school of $180,000. The member in question is a high-level federal official, Dr. Peggy Carr, Commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), a federal agency that oversees data collection, issues reports, and supervises the NAEP assessment program.
The state ordered the school to repay money it is accused of spending inappropriately. The charter itself is under review as to whether it will lose its charter. As a side note, NCES tweeted a congratulatory note about School Choice Week, an unusual move for a statistical agency.
The latest update:
A North Carolina charter school tied to a high-ranking federal official has been ordered by the state to repay $162,597 it’s accused of inappropriately spending.
The state Department of Public Instruction presented reports in December alleging conflict of interest violations and misspending of state and federal dollars at Children’s Village Academy in Kinston. On Monday, DPI sent the school a letter ordering it to repay $162,597 in “unallowable costs” in the next 10 days.
The letter comes as the state Office of Charter Schools has recommended that both Children’s Village Academy and Ridgeview Charter School in Gastonia lose their charters when they expire in June. The Charter Schools Review Board will vote in March whether to renew the schools.
On Monday, Children’s Village leaders told the Review Board that it’s addressing the concerns, including investigating questioned financial transactions and improving its internal control policies….
Many of the questions have revolved around the school’s dealings with Peggy Carr, the vice chair of Children’s Village’s board of directors…
Carr is commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, which is part of the U.S. Department of Education. The center oversees the National Assessment of Educational Progress, commonly called NAEP, which is a series of national tests given to assess the state of education.
Carr’s family founded Children’s Village Academy in Lenoir County in 1997. In 2008, Carr gave the school a loan of $188,000 to help it get through a financial crisis.
DPI questioned the documentation of the loan and how Carr has received more than $140,000 in interest payments so far.
“Although the reports do not say so expressly, they implicitly allege that the board should not have taken out the loan, or that it paid too much interest,” Matthew Tilley, Carr’s lawyer, wrote in a letter to the Review Board.
“Those allegations, however, are unfounded and would require DPI or the CSRB to second-guess the board’s business judgment.”
Tilley said that the amount repaid in interest was reasonable for a 15-year loan. But Tilley said that both his client and the school agree that the loan could have been “better documented.”
I am pleased to endorse Sherlett Hendy Newbill for election to the Los Angeles Unified School District Board in District 1. The accomplished incumbent George McKenna is retiring, and Newbill would be an outstanding replacement for him.
Sherlett is a native of Los Angeles and a graduate of the Susan Miller Dorsey Senior High School in Los Angeles, where she has spent her professional career after earning her bachelor’s degree at Xavier University in New Orleans.
She has worked as a physical education teacher, department chair, director of athletics, and dean of students since 1998. As a PE teacher and dean, she has been deeply engaged in the physical and mental health and well-being of students. Since 2007, she has been the UTLA representative at her school.
In recent years, she has worked in the office of George McKenna, the District 1 board member, as an education policy advisor. She has worked with district stakeholders and understands the needs of the district.
She was endorsed by the Los Angeles County Democratic Party, the Los Angeles Sentinel, PST (Parents Supporting Teachers), a large grassroots parents organization. She has also been endorsed by the incumbent LAUSD board member, George McKenna, as well as LAUSD board members Jackie Goldberg and Scott Schmerelson.
I warmly, heartily, enthusiastically endorse Scott Schmerelson for re-election to the LAUSD board, representing District 3. I have known Scott since he was first elected in 2015, and I admire his dedication to the children, families, and educators of the schools in his district. He is a steadfast champion of public schools.
It was Scott who told me in 2019 that 80% of the charter schools in Los Angeles had empty seats. When I saw him a year ago, he told me that the percentage of vacant seats is even higher now.
The best way to introduce Scott, aside from expressing my heartfelt admiration for him, is to post his story, which appears on his website. No razzle-dazzle here: just an experienced and dedicated educator who wants to work to make the schools better for all children. Here is his campaign website.
Scott Schmerelson knew when he graduated from high school that he wanted to become a teacher. The first member of his family to attend college, he graduated from Temple University with a B.A. in Foreign Language Education and soon began his career as a high school Spanish teacher in Philadelphia. In 1978, he moved to Los Angeles and joined the LAUSD family.
Scott’s commitment and service to the children of LAUSD began with 12 years at Virgil Middle School as a teacher, school counselor and Assistant Principal. He later became an Assistant Principal at Griffith Middle School in East Los Angeles for 5 years and the Principal at Lawrence Middle School in Chatsworth for 5 years. Scott retired as Principal of Johnnie L. Cochran, Jr. Middle School in South Los Angeles after 10 years of leadership that included significantly improving test scores, a deteriorated physical plant, and student, teacher and parent morale.
After almost four decades in the classroom, and school counseling and administration, Scott could not envision a retirement that did not include continuing to advocate for the future of public education in the second largest school district in the United States. In 2014, at the urging of colleagues and community members, Scott decided that he could make a difference for kids and for our neighborhood public schools, which he considers the heart of our communities, by running for School Board.
On July 1, 2015, Scott Mark Schmerelson took the oath of office as the duly elected LA Unified School Board Member representing Board District 3. He was re-elected on November 3, 2020.
Scott has been a proud member of the Associated Administrators of Los Angeles, United Teachers Los Angeles, and the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers. He also served as the treasurer of the Middle Schools Principals’ Association and is currently the treasurer of the Cuban-American Teachers’ Association. He is a member of the Association of California School Administrators (ACSA) and served a two-year term as President of ACSA Region 16. He is past Executive Director of Region 16 which encompasses the entire Los Angeles Unified School District.
If you live in School District 1 in Los Angeles, please cast your vote for Scott Schmerelson!
Los Angeles has an important school board election coming up on March 5.
The esteemed school board President, Jackie Goldberg, is retiring, leaving her seat open in District 5.
Five candidates are running for the seat, and one stands out: Fidencio Gallardo.
Gallardo is an experienced educator who has worked in LAUSD for 35 years as a middle school English teacher (18 years), a high school English teacher (9 years), an assistant principal (3 years), an adult school teacher (3 years), and as a deputy to board member Jackie Goldberg for the past four years.
He is also the Mayor of Bell, California. And an Adjunct Professor of Curriculum and Instruction at Cal State, LA. Whew!
As you might surmise, he is a highly accomplished professional who has devoted his life to educating young people.
Gallardo has been endorsed by Jackie Goldberg, who is one of my personal heroes. I met Fidencio on a Zoom fundraiser where I offered my personal endorsement based on his stellar record.
Of the four candidates running, Gallardo articulates the clearest vision for improving student achievement and well-being in the wake of the pandemic. And his breadth of experience puts him the best position to actually get things done.
Gallardo said he plans to prioritize student literacy and achievement, which along with attendance, has suffered tremendously since the pandemic. He would continue the important work of greening school campuses that are asphalt-laden hot spots and detrimental to children’s health and learning.
His most recent teaching experience as an 11th-grade English Language Arts instructor at South Gate High School gives him insight into the best ways that the school board can allocate resources to help students struggling with reading.
Gallardo is appropriately critical of some decisions by district leaders in recent years. That includes Carvalho’s move to replace the successful Primary Promise program that helps elementary school students struggling with reading and math with a new program that includes middle school students, and the board’s 2021 decision to remove school police from campuses without a clear plan to keep students safe.
Gallardo said he will push for more unarmed school safety officers so that every campus has someone consistently responsible for keeping students safe, and for giving individual schools greater discretion over what type of safety personnel are on their campuses. It’s middle-ground positions like these, that seem reasonable but are at odds with UTLA, that could be a good indication of what to expect from Gallardo on the board.
He also wants to see more educational support for kids during their critical middle school years, including more one-on-one instruction.
The Arkansas Times, one of those super-valuable local news sites, reported on a plush political deal. The state awarded a no-bid contract to a business called ClassWallet to administer voucher funds. Parents submit bills, and ClassWallet pays them. Surprisingly (or not), ClassWallet employs the same lobbyist who represents former Governor Mike Huckabee, father of current Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders. What a coincidence!
The Arkansas Department of Education did not seek competitive bids last year before awarding the contract to manage the inaugural phase of the state’s “Education Freedom Accounts” to Kleo Inc. of Florida, a company that does business under the name ClassWallet. That contract is expected to earn ClassWallet more than $1 million in its first year.
A quick look at the Arkansas secretary of state’s website shows that ClassWallet is represented by the lobbying firm Legacy Consulting, who also lobbies for Huck PAC Inc., former Gov. Huckabee’spolitical vehicle.
Additionally, Legacy Consulting was founded by Chad Gallagher, Mike Huckabee’s former political advisor.
The contract to administer school voucher finances for LEARNS’ second year recently went out for a bid, garnering five out-of-state contenders, including ClassWallet. The winning vendor stands to earn about $2.4 million in service fees during the 2024-25 school year alone…
ClassWallet currently manages voucher programs in five states: Arizona, Indiana, Missouri, New Hampshire and North Carolina. The company is considered a leader in its field, but it is not without its controversies.
The state of Oklahoma filed a lawsuit against ClassWallet on Jan. 29 of this year for failing to prevent education funds from being misspent. According to a Jan. 31 article from The Oklahoman, this is the second time ClassWallet has been sued by the state.
In the first lawsuit filed by the state of Oklahoma in 2022, federal and state audits found $1,500 grants meant to be used for educational expenses were instead spent on kitchen appliances, power tools, video game consoles and other non-educational items. The lawsuit claimed that about $1.7 million was misused.
In response, ClassWallet denied any wrongdoing. Federal and state auditors said government officials, not ClassWallet, were at fault for failing to put proper guardrails in place. Oklahoma’s attorney general dropped the initial lawsuit, but Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt announced last month that he’s refiling the complaint.
Open the link and read the story, written by Arkansas Times reporter Jeannie Roberts.
Many educators have worried about the pernicious agenda of “Moms for Liberty,” which arrived on the scene in 2021 with a sizable war chest.
What is that agenda? Defaming public schools and their teachers. Accusing them of being “woke “ and indoctrinating students to accept left wing ideas about race and gender. Banning books they don’t like. Talking about “parental rights,” but only for straight white parents who share their values.
M4L got started in Florida, as do many wacky and bigoted rightwing campaigns, but it has been shamed recently by the sex scandal involving one of its co-founders, Brigitte Ziegler. The two other co-founders dropped her name from their website, but the stain persists.
CNN reports that this rightwing group is encountering stiff opposition from parents who don’t share their agenda and who don’t approve of book banning.
The story begins:
Viera, FloridaCNN —
In Florida, where the right-wing Moms for Liberty group was born in response to Covid-19 school closures and mask mandates, the first Brevard County School Board meeting of the new year considered whether two bestselling novels – “The Kite Runner” and “Slaughterhouse-Five” – should be banned from schools.
A lone Moms for Liberty supporter sat by herself at the January 23 meeting, where opponents of the book ban outnumbered her.
Nearly 20 speakers voiced opposition to removing the novels from school libraries. One compared the book-banning effort to Nazi Germany. Another accused Moms for Liberty of waging war on teachers. No one spoke in favor of the ban. About three hours into the meeting, the board voted quickly to keep the two books on the shelves of high schools.
“Why are we banning books?” asked Mindy McKenzie, a mom and nurse who is a member of Stop Moms for Liberty, which was formed to counter what it calls a far-right extremist group “pushing for book banning and destroying public education.”
“Why are we letting Moms for Liberty infiltrate our school system?”
Diane Ravitch's blog 