This article proved to be prescient in Illinois politics and education reform. Check out this video with a co-founder of Stand for Children and their plan to take down the teacher union there [LINK]. They're in Indiana now and also very vague about what their agenda is although they make an adamant case that they are grassroots, a coalition of community folks working to improve education. When I see this type of savvy political manuevering behind the scenes, I can't help but think that good folks in Indiana are being co-opted.
ILLINOIS Who’s behind Stand for Children?
BY RICH MILLER Illinois Times October 21,2010
It’s not every day that a group almost nobody has ever heard of gives $175,000 to a single state legislative candidate. But that’s just what happened on Oct. 7 when Stand for Children Illinois PAC handed over that gigantic check to Republican Ryan Higgins, who is vying to replace retiring state Rep. Paul Froehlich (D-Schaumburg).
In fact, Stand for Children’s $175,000 check represents the largest single contribution to a legislative candidate – other than from a caucus leader, party organization or candidate loans to themselves – since contribution records were put online 16 years ago. It’s probably a good bet that the group’s contribution to Higgins is the single largest “outside” legislative campaign check in modern Illinois history.
Yet Stand for Children has received almost zero press coverage. Fox Chicago followed up on a story I wrote earlier this month, but that’s it, even though the group has contributed $650,000 to rank and file legislative candidates since Oct. 4.
Republicans had hoped to receive nearly all of the group’s prodigious contributions this fall, but the majority of its money went to six Democrats. Rep. Jehan Gordon (D-Peoria) received a $100,000 check. State Reps. Bob Flider, Mark Walker and Keith Farnham and Sen. Toi Hutchinson have all received $50,000 contributions, as well as House Democratic candidate Daniel Biss. Three Republicans received money from the group.
Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan met with the group after hearing what it was up to, said his spokesman. Madigan can be a very persuasive man. Huge contributions have been the norm in Illinois for decades. Usually, though, when we see big checks run through the system we have a general idea what the group wants. So far, though, Stand for Children has not established any sort of public presence here. There have been no editorial board visits or public relations blitzes. Their campaign finance filings show that their money is coming from their parent organization, which doesn’t have to list its contributors. So we really don’t know who is actually bankrolling this group.
After several tries, the organization did send me a flier about how it intends to “Improve Illinois Public Schools.” “Our vision is to dramatically increase improvement for all Illinois children by building a powerful, independent, statewide voice asking that we make what’s best for public school children the center of all education policy,” the flier states.
Um, OK, but what do they want? They say they want to “redefine” teacher tenure so that it is a “benefit that is earned and kept based on high expectations and student achievement.” Their website indicates that the group strongly backs testing to gauge achievement. And they appear to want to apply those test results to teachers. They also want to make sure that administrators and teachers have “exhausted every possible avenue during contract negotiations before resorting to a strike.” Details about how they would do that were not available.
“Certainly, any time you see a new group not from Illinois dropping significant dollar amounts into legislative races, it does raise some red flags,” said a spokesperson for the Illinois Federation of Teachers. “Where is their money coming from, who is funding them, what are their objectives? We’re certainly curious to see what their agenda is.”
While they don’t seem to be explicitly saying so, it looks like the group is taking advantage of a peculiar situation in Illinois politics. The two teachers unions are furious at legislators for voting for a major pension reform bill, so many of those incumbents are not receiving the unions’ endorsements. Plus, the unions’ contributions, along with everybody else’s, will be capped at a much lower level starting Jan. 1, and that could hinder their influence.
The thinking is that Stand for Children is now filling a unique void created by the relative lack of teacher contributions. But that theory doesn’t totally hold up. For instance, Rep. Farnham and Sen. Hutchinson were both endorsed by the IEA. And Rep. Flider has sponsored three bills making it easier for teachers to receive tenure more quickly.
However, if Speaker Madigan retains the majority and the group continues to, um, “stand” with his candidates and the unions refuse to step up, it’s possible that we could see a significant education reform push next year. Stay tuned.
Rich Miller publishes Capitol Fax, a daily political newsletter, and thecapitolfaxblog.com.
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Rethinking Schools on "Stand for Children"
A chapter has started in Indianapolis with the support of the Mind Trust, the Mayor's Office, and the State Superintendent. The story below, worth reading at length, tells the tale of a grassroots organization that has lost its way (or is co-opted a better word?). Questions abound when original members and leadership quit and corporate interests take over the Board. It seems important that Indiana Citizens knows the background of these powerful forces and what may indeed be its real agenda.
For or Against Children? The problematic history of stand for children
Fall 2011, By Ken Libby and Adam Sanchez
Last October, a friend called with a question: “What do you know about Stand for Children?” The advocacy organization, based in our hometown of Portland, Ore., was expanding into his state of Illinois, and he hoped to glean some insight into the kinds of reforms the group would support. Just two months later, Stand’s Illinois branch had amassed more than $3 million in a political action committee and unveiled an aggressive teacher evaluation bill. “Have they always been like this?” he asked. The short answer: no.
Stand for Children was founded in the late 1990s as a way to advocate for the welfare of children. It grew out of a 1996 march by more than 250,000 people in Washington, D.C. The aim of the march was to highlight child poverty at a time when Congress and the Clinton administration were preparing to “end welfare as we know it.” Jonah Edelman, son of children’s and civil rights activist Marian Wright Edelman, co-founded the group and continues to serve as CEO. Stand’s first chapter was in Oregon, but the group now operates in eight additional states: Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Texas, and Washington.
According to Susan Barrett, a parent volunteer who recently left Portland’s Stand chapter, Stand started with a genuine focus on improving the lives of poor children:
[Stand] worked on smaller issues with positive impact, such as after-school program funding and emergency dental care for uninsured kids. Many parents like me who joined Stand a while back still remember how it was an organization fighting for the Portland Children’s Levy, which provided funds for early childhood education, foster care, child abuse prevention programs, and a variety of other programs centered on children.1
Here is a snapshot of Stand’s agenda during that period:
•Health coverage for uninsured children
•Monitoring the impact of welfare reform
•More money for affordable, high-quality child care
•Safe and productive after-school activities
•Schools that have small classes, well-trained teachers, high standards, and involved parents. 2
Fifteen years later, Stand seems to have morphed into something quite different. For Oregonians, the first public indications that Stand had made a striking 180-degree turn in its politics was its support for Race to the Top legislation and its active promotion of the antiunion, anti-public school film Waiting for “Superman.” Stand led a well-financed, intensive campaign for the film, organizing special invitation-only showings for various constituencies.
According to Barrett: This past year, Oregon Stand staff wanted us to press our legislators to pass a “bipartisan education package,” which basically tied the release of much-needed school funding to the expansion of charter schools, online learning, and other so-called “reforms.” Stand also pushed to lower the capital gains tax.
For Tom Olson, another former Portland Stand member, the final straw was the appointment of a new executive director for the Oregon chapter:
We were appalled that [Sue Levin] had virtually no experience leading grassroots organizations. Instead, we were told that she had a truly impressive background as an “entrepreneur” (a phrase we began to hear [CEO Edelman] use quite frequently during [his] transformation during 2009–10). Levin had been the founder and CEO of a women’s apparel company, Lucy Inc. Prior to that, she had been a women’s sports apparel VP at Nike Inc. Grassroots leadership experience? Absolutely none. Connections with millionaires? A whole bunch. 3
For Stand’s Portland chapter, where the organization is headquartered and one of the few places where it has a significant history of grassroots activism, the changes in Stand’s role have clearly been traumatic for parents and community members who had a very different image of the organization. This is clearly not a local phenomenon. As Stand has expanded, it has followed a similar pattern: In state after state, Stand has made the corporate-driven agenda of expanding charter schools and tying teacher pay and evaluations to student test scores their top priority.
To be sure, Stand has maintained some vestiges of its original focus on children. Stand recently supported bills in Colorado and Oregon that would allow undocumented students to pay in-state tuition at state colleges; in both states, conservative activists expressed hostility to these measures. The Colorado chapter opposed a proposition and two statewide amendments that would have gutted education funding. The Arizona chapter supported a temporary 1 percent tax increase that avoided significant cuts to public schools. The Tennessee chapter fought an English-only amendment that would have negatively affected schools and families, supported changes to suspension policies that hurt children, and pushed for more pre-K funds.
But, unfortunately, the dominant impact of Stand, everywhere it has a presence, is much more pro-business than pro-children. This was certainly the case in Illinois, where Stand for Children played a part in crafting what they are touting as their biggest victory yet: Senate Bill 7.
Standing Against Illinois Teachers
SB 7, which passed the Illinois Senate in a unanimous vote and the General Assembly with a single dissenter, undermines seniority as the basis of teacher job security and specifically singles out the Chicago Teachers Union by severely restricting its right to strike.
Chicago has become a testing ground for corporate education policy. Recent CEOs of Chicago Public Schools have included Paul Vallas (1995–2001), who later became the architect behind the union-busting and charterization plan in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina; and Arne Duncan (2001–08), who privatized Chicago public schools at a rate of about 10 per year before becoming Barack Obama’s education secretary. The policies pushed by these corporate reformers have been touted as “miraculous” by business leaders, but have created a horrendous environment for Chicago teachers.
Intensive and strategic organizing in the face of layoffs, increasing attacks on teachers, and school closings led to last year’s victory for the Caucus of Rank-and-File Educators (CORE), which swept the 2010 Chicago Teachers Union elections, winning every single seat. But CORE came to power in the context of an economic crisis in which workers are being forced to bear the brunt of economic sacrifice. The city’s elite became even more determined to break the teachers’ union.
Bruce Rainer, a Republican venture capitalist, recruited Edelman to come to Illinois and help with this task. Thanks to a speech caught on video and posted on YouTube, we now know the intimate details of how Stand for Children helped shape Illinois’ latest anti-teacher legislation. Speaking at the Aspen Ideas Festival, billionaire James Crown and Jonah Edelman caused an uproar with their comments about SB 7.
Their panel discussion, titled “If It Can Happen There, It Can Happen Anywhere: Transformational Education Legislation in Illinois,” began with Crown painting a picture of an all-powerful teachers’ union that consistently blocks education reform and has a stranglehold on Illinois politics. Crown was particularly angry that teachers in Illinois had maintained their right to strike. “In 45 of the 50 states, there is no right to strike by teachers,” he protested. “So this was an incredibly strike-permissive environment with these other efforts by the unions, and so forth, that created an unsustainable structure in our school system.”
Following Crown, Edelman gave a step-by-step account of how Stand for Children worked to undermine teachers’ union rights in Illinois. After explaining how Stand essentially bought a handful of Illinois legislators with campaign contributions—most crucially, Democratic Assembly Speaker Michael Madigan—Edelman explained Stand’s strategy:
After the election, Advance Illinois and Stand had drafted a very bold proposal we called Performance Counts. It tied tenure and layoffs to performance. It let principals hire who they choose. It streamlined dismissal of ineffective tenured teachers substantially—from two-plus years and $200,000 in legal fees, on average, to three to four months, with very little likelihood of legal recourse.
And, most importantly, we called for the reform of collective bargaining throughout the state—essentially, proposing that school boards would be able to decide any disputed issue at impasse. So a very, very bold proposal for Illinois, and one that six months earlier would have been unthinkable, undiscussable. . . .
We hired 11 lobbyists, including the four best insiders and seven of the best minority lobbyists, preventing the unions from hiring them. We enlisted a statewide public affairs firm. . . . We raised $3 million for our political action committee between the election and the end of the year. That’s more money than either of the unions have in their political action committees.
And so essentially, what we did in a very short period of time was shift the balance of power. I can tell you there was a palpable sense of concern, if not shock, on the part of the teachers’ unions in Illinois that Speaker Madigan had changed allegiance, and that we had clear political capability to potentially jam this proposal down their throats, the same way the pension reform had been jammed down their throats six months earlier.
Edelman’s comments produced outrage among union and education activists. He issued an apology, saying he regretted that he “left children mostly out of the equation,” and that the speech “could cause viewers to wrongly conclude that I’m against unions.” For their part, the leaders of Illinois’ three main education unions blasted Edelman in a joint statement:
"We heard a lot from Jonah Edelman about power in politics, power over unions, and management power over teachers. Sadly, we didn’t hear anything in that hour-long session about improving education. . . . What’s worse is that these false claims clearly show an organizational agenda that has nothing to do with helping kids learn."
It’s clear from Edelman’s remarks that Stand’s effectiveness is reliant on a public perception that it represents the interests of parents. But in fact, Stand’s agenda is now closely aligned with those who call for privatization, charters, vouchers, and an end to teachers’ unions.
This is true throughout the country. For example, Stand’s most significant work in Colorado was their support of Senate Bill 191, a landmark piece of legislation that bases 50 percent of a teacher’s evaluation on student achievement data. As Dana Goldstein explained in a recent American Prospect article, this may lead the state to test every student, in every grade, in every subject—including art, music, and PE. The poisonous debate around the bill vilified those in opposition and demoralized teachers across the state. One teacher, recalling the negotiations over the bill, told Goldstein, “I’ve chosen a profession that, in the public eyes, is worse than prostitution.”
Stand’s Colorado operations are funded in part by the Walton Family Foundation and the Daniels Fund, two right-wing philanthropies that have pushed for vouchers and charter schools.
Stand entered Texas in early 2011 as the state wrestled with a budget shortfall that could be as high as $27 billion. The dramatic cuts to schools in the Lone Star state will undoubtedly harm children, yet Stand put their might behind a campaign to evaluate teachers. Texas Senate Bill 4 and the companion bill in the House call for basing from 30 to 50 percent of teacher evaluations on test score growth. In addition, Stand supported legislation that would aid Texas charter schools.
To further this agenda, Stand hired nine lobbyists with ties to the Republican Party, including three lobbyists from Delisi Communications. The firm’s president, Ted Delisi, purchased Karl Rove’s consulting and direct mail company when Rove joined the Bush presidential campaign in 1999, and ran the Bush/Cheney fundraising and mailer campaign the following year.
Stand set up shop in Indiana in early 2011 and began advocating for changes to teacher evaluations as Gov. Mitch Daniels and the Republican-controlled legislature passed the most expansive state voucher program in U.S. history, expanded charter schools, restricted collective bargaining, and made serious changes to teacher evaluations. Stand’s advocacy for test-based teacher evaluations included statements that were blatantly false, including: “Studies show that a teacher’s influence on student achievement is 20 times greater than any other variable, including class size or poverty.”
How Did This Happen?
What happened? How did Stand morph from an organization with a focus on children’s health issues, nonschool factors, and research-based school improvements to an organization that pushes core elements of the corporate destruction of public education? Stand has seen an enormous influx of corporate cash. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation began by offering a relatively modest two-year grant of $80,000 in 2005. In 2007, Stand for Children received a $682,565 grant. In 2009, the point at which Stand’s drastically different political agenda became obvious, Gates awarded a $971,280 grant to support “common policy priorities” and in 2010, a $3,476,300 grant.
Though the Gates Foundation remains the biggest donor to Stand for Children, other players in the world of corporate education reform have also begun to see Stand as an effective vehicle to push their agenda.
New Profit Inc. has funded Stand since 2008—to the tune of $1,458,500. According to its website, New Profit is a “national venture philanthropy fund that seeks to harness America’s spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship to help solve the country’s biggest social problems.”
The Walton Family Foundation made a 2010 grant of $1,378,527. Several other major funders are tied to Bain Capital, a private equity and venture capital firm founded by Mitt Romney.
In a similar time frame, Stand’s National Board of Directors has seen dramatic changes. Lauene Powell Jobs joined the board of Stand for Children in 2006. She also serves on the board of Teach for America. Both Powell Jobs and Julie Mikuta, who joined the Stand board in 2007, are integrally involved with the NewSchools Venture Fund. NewSchools is a venture philanthropy firm, started by Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and financed by many of the same donors who give to Stand for Children—Bill Gates, the Walton Family—as well as Eli Broad and Gap founder Donald Fisher. NewSchools Venture Fund pours money into charter schools and “human capital” projects with the aim of using market models and corporate management to drastically reshape the education system.
In 2010, Emma Bloomberg, daughter of billionaire New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, became the newest member of Stand’s national board. Emma Bloomberg is a program officer at the Robin Hood Foundation, another venture philanthropy organization, whose board of directors is dominated by corporate titans like General Electric CEO Jeffery Immelt and JP Morgan CEO Jes Staley.
Marian Wright Edelman is no longer a board member. In fact, 11 of the 14 board members of Stand for Children and the Stand for Children Leadership Center have joined the organization since 2006.
The education policy environment has changed significantly during the past 10 years. Particularly since the onset of the economic crisis, teachers have increasingly been blamed for “failing public schools.” Major foundations have spent millions in efforts to tie teacher evaluations to student test scores, make it easier to hire and fire teachers, and restrict teachers’ rights to due process and to strike. Co-opting organizations like Stand for Children Reshapes the public face of corporate education reform and helps make anti-union and privatization schemes more palatable to liberals and progressives. It’s clear that conservative foundations and corporate-backed operatives recognize that organizing parents is a promising way to further their agendas (see David Bacon’s “Trigger Laws: Does Signing a Petition Give Parents a Voice?” ).
Conclusion
There is a legitimate concern for teacher quality, how layoffs are handled, and the need for greater parent and community involvement in teacher contract negotiations. These are serious issues for low-income families and other marginalized communities, but Stand’s approach fails to bring parents, teachers, and communities together, and instead embraces policies favored by historic opponents of public schools and teachers’ unions.
As Susan Barrett explains: "My fear is that unwitting parents and community members will join Stand because they want to rectify the problems they see every day in their children’s public schools, such as underfunding, lack of arts programs, large class sizes and cuts to the school year, only to find that they get roped into very different goals. . . I worry we will lose a truly democratic discussion and action on education weighted in favor of corporate reforms."
We agree. There is a need for a parent- and community-driven organization that is not directly tied to teachers unions. An organization that pushes for quality early childhood education, adequate funding for the public education system, and attention to childhood health issues would certainly represent a kid-first agenda. It is even possible to critique teacher training, hiring, and firing in such a broad agenda. But putting kids first is no longer the focus of Stand for Children.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For or Against Children? The problematic history of stand for children
Fall 2011, By Ken Libby and Adam Sanchez
Last October, a friend called with a question: “What do you know about Stand for Children?” The advocacy organization, based in our hometown of Portland, Ore., was expanding into his state of Illinois, and he hoped to glean some insight into the kinds of reforms the group would support. Just two months later, Stand’s Illinois branch had amassed more than $3 million in a political action committee and unveiled an aggressive teacher evaluation bill. “Have they always been like this?” he asked. The short answer: no.
Stand for Children was founded in the late 1990s as a way to advocate for the welfare of children. It grew out of a 1996 march by more than 250,000 people in Washington, D.C. The aim of the march was to highlight child poverty at a time when Congress and the Clinton administration were preparing to “end welfare as we know it.” Jonah Edelman, son of children’s and civil rights activist Marian Wright Edelman, co-founded the group and continues to serve as CEO. Stand’s first chapter was in Oregon, but the group now operates in eight additional states: Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Texas, and Washington.
According to Susan Barrett, a parent volunteer who recently left Portland’s Stand chapter, Stand started with a genuine focus on improving the lives of poor children:
[Stand] worked on smaller issues with positive impact, such as after-school program funding and emergency dental care for uninsured kids. Many parents like me who joined Stand a while back still remember how it was an organization fighting for the Portland Children’s Levy, which provided funds for early childhood education, foster care, child abuse prevention programs, and a variety of other programs centered on children.1
Here is a snapshot of Stand’s agenda during that period:
•Health coverage for uninsured children
•Monitoring the impact of welfare reform
•More money for affordable, high-quality child care
•Safe and productive after-school activities
•Schools that have small classes, well-trained teachers, high standards, and involved parents. 2
Fifteen years later, Stand seems to have morphed into something quite different. For Oregonians, the first public indications that Stand had made a striking 180-degree turn in its politics was its support for Race to the Top legislation and its active promotion of the antiunion, anti-public school film Waiting for “Superman.” Stand led a well-financed, intensive campaign for the film, organizing special invitation-only showings for various constituencies.
According to Barrett: This past year, Oregon Stand staff wanted us to press our legislators to pass a “bipartisan education package,” which basically tied the release of much-needed school funding to the expansion of charter schools, online learning, and other so-called “reforms.” Stand also pushed to lower the capital gains tax.
For Tom Olson, another former Portland Stand member, the final straw was the appointment of a new executive director for the Oregon chapter:
We were appalled that [Sue Levin] had virtually no experience leading grassroots organizations. Instead, we were told that she had a truly impressive background as an “entrepreneur” (a phrase we began to hear [CEO Edelman] use quite frequently during [his] transformation during 2009–10). Levin had been the founder and CEO of a women’s apparel company, Lucy Inc. Prior to that, she had been a women’s sports apparel VP at Nike Inc. Grassroots leadership experience? Absolutely none. Connections with millionaires? A whole bunch. 3
For Stand’s Portland chapter, where the organization is headquartered and one of the few places where it has a significant history of grassroots activism, the changes in Stand’s role have clearly been traumatic for parents and community members who had a very different image of the organization. This is clearly not a local phenomenon. As Stand has expanded, it has followed a similar pattern: In state after state, Stand has made the corporate-driven agenda of expanding charter schools and tying teacher pay and evaluations to student test scores their top priority.
To be sure, Stand has maintained some vestiges of its original focus on children. Stand recently supported bills in Colorado and Oregon that would allow undocumented students to pay in-state tuition at state colleges; in both states, conservative activists expressed hostility to these measures. The Colorado chapter opposed a proposition and two statewide amendments that would have gutted education funding. The Arizona chapter supported a temporary 1 percent tax increase that avoided significant cuts to public schools. The Tennessee chapter fought an English-only amendment that would have negatively affected schools and families, supported changes to suspension policies that hurt children, and pushed for more pre-K funds.
But, unfortunately, the dominant impact of Stand, everywhere it has a presence, is much more pro-business than pro-children. This was certainly the case in Illinois, where Stand for Children played a part in crafting what they are touting as their biggest victory yet: Senate Bill 7.
Standing Against Illinois Teachers
SB 7, which passed the Illinois Senate in a unanimous vote and the General Assembly with a single dissenter, undermines seniority as the basis of teacher job security and specifically singles out the Chicago Teachers Union by severely restricting its right to strike.
Chicago has become a testing ground for corporate education policy. Recent CEOs of Chicago Public Schools have included Paul Vallas (1995–2001), who later became the architect behind the union-busting and charterization plan in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina; and Arne Duncan (2001–08), who privatized Chicago public schools at a rate of about 10 per year before becoming Barack Obama’s education secretary. The policies pushed by these corporate reformers have been touted as “miraculous” by business leaders, but have created a horrendous environment for Chicago teachers.
Intensive and strategic organizing in the face of layoffs, increasing attacks on teachers, and school closings led to last year’s victory for the Caucus of Rank-and-File Educators (CORE), which swept the 2010 Chicago Teachers Union elections, winning every single seat. But CORE came to power in the context of an economic crisis in which workers are being forced to bear the brunt of economic sacrifice. The city’s elite became even more determined to break the teachers’ union.
Bruce Rainer, a Republican venture capitalist, recruited Edelman to come to Illinois and help with this task. Thanks to a speech caught on video and posted on YouTube, we now know the intimate details of how Stand for Children helped shape Illinois’ latest anti-teacher legislation. Speaking at the Aspen Ideas Festival, billionaire James Crown and Jonah Edelman caused an uproar with their comments about SB 7.
Their panel discussion, titled “If It Can Happen There, It Can Happen Anywhere: Transformational Education Legislation in Illinois,” began with Crown painting a picture of an all-powerful teachers’ union that consistently blocks education reform and has a stranglehold on Illinois politics. Crown was particularly angry that teachers in Illinois had maintained their right to strike. “In 45 of the 50 states, there is no right to strike by teachers,” he protested. “So this was an incredibly strike-permissive environment with these other efforts by the unions, and so forth, that created an unsustainable structure in our school system.”
Following Crown, Edelman gave a step-by-step account of how Stand for Children worked to undermine teachers’ union rights in Illinois. After explaining how Stand essentially bought a handful of Illinois legislators with campaign contributions—most crucially, Democratic Assembly Speaker Michael Madigan—Edelman explained Stand’s strategy:
After the election, Advance Illinois and Stand had drafted a very bold proposal we called Performance Counts. It tied tenure and layoffs to performance. It let principals hire who they choose. It streamlined dismissal of ineffective tenured teachers substantially—from two-plus years and $200,000 in legal fees, on average, to three to four months, with very little likelihood of legal recourse.
And, most importantly, we called for the reform of collective bargaining throughout the state—essentially, proposing that school boards would be able to decide any disputed issue at impasse. So a very, very bold proposal for Illinois, and one that six months earlier would have been unthinkable, undiscussable. . . .
We hired 11 lobbyists, including the four best insiders and seven of the best minority lobbyists, preventing the unions from hiring them. We enlisted a statewide public affairs firm. . . . We raised $3 million for our political action committee between the election and the end of the year. That’s more money than either of the unions have in their political action committees.
And so essentially, what we did in a very short period of time was shift the balance of power. I can tell you there was a palpable sense of concern, if not shock, on the part of the teachers’ unions in Illinois that Speaker Madigan had changed allegiance, and that we had clear political capability to potentially jam this proposal down their throats, the same way the pension reform had been jammed down their throats six months earlier.
Edelman’s comments produced outrage among union and education activists. He issued an apology, saying he regretted that he “left children mostly out of the equation,” and that the speech “could cause viewers to wrongly conclude that I’m against unions.” For their part, the leaders of Illinois’ three main education unions blasted Edelman in a joint statement:
"We heard a lot from Jonah Edelman about power in politics, power over unions, and management power over teachers. Sadly, we didn’t hear anything in that hour-long session about improving education. . . . What’s worse is that these false claims clearly show an organizational agenda that has nothing to do with helping kids learn."
It’s clear from Edelman’s remarks that Stand’s effectiveness is reliant on a public perception that it represents the interests of parents. But in fact, Stand’s agenda is now closely aligned with those who call for privatization, charters, vouchers, and an end to teachers’ unions.
This is true throughout the country. For example, Stand’s most significant work in Colorado was their support of Senate Bill 191, a landmark piece of legislation that bases 50 percent of a teacher’s evaluation on student achievement data. As Dana Goldstein explained in a recent American Prospect article, this may lead the state to test every student, in every grade, in every subject—including art, music, and PE. The poisonous debate around the bill vilified those in opposition and demoralized teachers across the state. One teacher, recalling the negotiations over the bill, told Goldstein, “I’ve chosen a profession that, in the public eyes, is worse than prostitution.”
Stand’s Colorado operations are funded in part by the Walton Family Foundation and the Daniels Fund, two right-wing philanthropies that have pushed for vouchers and charter schools.
Stand entered Texas in early 2011 as the state wrestled with a budget shortfall that could be as high as $27 billion. The dramatic cuts to schools in the Lone Star state will undoubtedly harm children, yet Stand put their might behind a campaign to evaluate teachers. Texas Senate Bill 4 and the companion bill in the House call for basing from 30 to 50 percent of teacher evaluations on test score growth. In addition, Stand supported legislation that would aid Texas charter schools.
To further this agenda, Stand hired nine lobbyists with ties to the Republican Party, including three lobbyists from Delisi Communications. The firm’s president, Ted Delisi, purchased Karl Rove’s consulting and direct mail company when Rove joined the Bush presidential campaign in 1999, and ran the Bush/Cheney fundraising and mailer campaign the following year.
Stand set up shop in Indiana in early 2011 and began advocating for changes to teacher evaluations as Gov. Mitch Daniels and the Republican-controlled legislature passed the most expansive state voucher program in U.S. history, expanded charter schools, restricted collective bargaining, and made serious changes to teacher evaluations. Stand’s advocacy for test-based teacher evaluations included statements that were blatantly false, including: “Studies show that a teacher’s influence on student achievement is 20 times greater than any other variable, including class size or poverty.”
How Did This Happen?
What happened? How did Stand morph from an organization with a focus on children’s health issues, nonschool factors, and research-based school improvements to an organization that pushes core elements of the corporate destruction of public education? Stand has seen an enormous influx of corporate cash. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation began by offering a relatively modest two-year grant of $80,000 in 2005. In 2007, Stand for Children received a $682,565 grant. In 2009, the point at which Stand’s drastically different political agenda became obvious, Gates awarded a $971,280 grant to support “common policy priorities” and in 2010, a $3,476,300 grant.
Though the Gates Foundation remains the biggest donor to Stand for Children, other players in the world of corporate education reform have also begun to see Stand as an effective vehicle to push their agenda.
New Profit Inc. has funded Stand since 2008—to the tune of $1,458,500. According to its website, New Profit is a “national venture philanthropy fund that seeks to harness America’s spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship to help solve the country’s biggest social problems.”
The Walton Family Foundation made a 2010 grant of $1,378,527. Several other major funders are tied to Bain Capital, a private equity and venture capital firm founded by Mitt Romney.
In a similar time frame, Stand’s National Board of Directors has seen dramatic changes. Lauene Powell Jobs joined the board of Stand for Children in 2006. She also serves on the board of Teach for America. Both Powell Jobs and Julie Mikuta, who joined the Stand board in 2007, are integrally involved with the NewSchools Venture Fund. NewSchools is a venture philanthropy firm, started by Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and financed by many of the same donors who give to Stand for Children—Bill Gates, the Walton Family—as well as Eli Broad and Gap founder Donald Fisher. NewSchools Venture Fund pours money into charter schools and “human capital” projects with the aim of using market models and corporate management to drastically reshape the education system.
In 2010, Emma Bloomberg, daughter of billionaire New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, became the newest member of Stand’s national board. Emma Bloomberg is a program officer at the Robin Hood Foundation, another venture philanthropy organization, whose board of directors is dominated by corporate titans like General Electric CEO Jeffery Immelt and JP Morgan CEO Jes Staley.
Marian Wright Edelman is no longer a board member. In fact, 11 of the 14 board members of Stand for Children and the Stand for Children Leadership Center have joined the organization since 2006.
The education policy environment has changed significantly during the past 10 years. Particularly since the onset of the economic crisis, teachers have increasingly been blamed for “failing public schools.” Major foundations have spent millions in efforts to tie teacher evaluations to student test scores, make it easier to hire and fire teachers, and restrict teachers’ rights to due process and to strike. Co-opting organizations like Stand for Children Reshapes the public face of corporate education reform and helps make anti-union and privatization schemes more palatable to liberals and progressives. It’s clear that conservative foundations and corporate-backed operatives recognize that organizing parents is a promising way to further their agendas (see David Bacon’s “Trigger Laws: Does Signing a Petition Give Parents a Voice?” ).
Conclusion
There is a legitimate concern for teacher quality, how layoffs are handled, and the need for greater parent and community involvement in teacher contract negotiations. These are serious issues for low-income families and other marginalized communities, but Stand’s approach fails to bring parents, teachers, and communities together, and instead embraces policies favored by historic opponents of public schools and teachers’ unions.
As Susan Barrett explains: "My fear is that unwitting parents and community members will join Stand because they want to rectify the problems they see every day in their children’s public schools, such as underfunding, lack of arts programs, large class sizes and cuts to the school year, only to find that they get roped into very different goals. . . I worry we will lose a truly democratic discussion and action on education weighted in favor of corporate reforms."
We agree. There is a need for a parent- and community-driven organization that is not directly tied to teachers unions. An organization that pushes for quality early childhood education, adequate funding for the public education system, and attention to childhood health issues would certainly represent a kid-first agenda. It is even possible to critique teacher training, hiring, and firing in such a broad agenda. But putting kids first is no longer the focus of Stand for Children.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday, November 7, 2011
Support Brandon Cosby in IPS
The Battle for Indiana Public Education stands in support of these students that are fighting to bring their principal back to Shortridge High School. Brandon Cosby is a powerful educator trying to do something in a beleagured district and he's inspired his students to the degree that they've sent this email looking for support from the broader community.
Subject: Shortridge Needs Your Help!
The students at Shortridge need your help! We know you can help us with this. We also know you have alot of influence among community leaders and we need as many supporters as possible!
Our Principal Mr. Brandon Cosby was suspended pending an investigation regarding allegations of "insubordinance". This insubordinance stems from Mr. Cosby's desire to prove that Shortridge students are much more than a test score. Amidst much negative media concerning the failings of IPS as a whole, Mr. Cosby fought continually to make Shortridge a safe and inspiring learning environment, to foster connections with families, students, and the community. He is responsible for transforming Shortridge into what it is today. In order for Shortridge to continue to be set apart from other IPS schools, we need Mr. Cosby as our leader. Please let your support for our wonderful principal be known.
*These are the most important numbers to call. The point of this is to flood the phone lines with inquiries about what is going on. Please be respectful and ask questions such as “Why is Mr. Cosby suspended?” “When will he be returning to work?” rather than being accusatory or defensive. Keep asking questions and don’t accept quick answers. Call as many of these numbers as possible, as many times as you can, on Monday and Tuesday.
Phone numbers to call Monday, November 7, 2011
Shortridge Main Line: 226-2810
*Lori Elliott (vice principal) 226-2816
*Jim Larkin (vice principal) 226-2818
Department of Secondary Education:
Nicole Haywood (secretary to Jackie Greenwood) 226-3875
*Jackie Greenwood (direct supervisor of Mr. Cosby) 226-4541
*Willie Giles (Deputy Superintendant) 226-4545
*Li-Yen Johnson (Associate Superintendant) 226-3128
*Dr. White (Superintendant’s Office; Sandra Ginder secretary) 226-4411
*Administrative Assistant to the School Board 226-4418
IPS switchboard 226-4000
IPS Human Resources 226-4150
We need as many people as possible to call in tomorrow, because we know that there is strength in numbers. So if you could foreword this to people who will support us.
You can also show your support of Mr. Cosby by "liking" our Facebook Page Dedicated to our support to reinstate Mr. Cosby:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Save-our-Principal-NO-Cosby-NO-Shortridge/289399771090579
Thanks in advance for your support of our efforts.
Subject: Shortridge Needs Your Help!
The students at Shortridge need your help! We know you can help us with this. We also know you have alot of influence among community leaders and we need as many supporters as possible!
Our Principal Mr. Brandon Cosby was suspended pending an investigation regarding allegations of "insubordinance". This insubordinance stems from Mr. Cosby's desire to prove that Shortridge students are much more than a test score. Amidst much negative media concerning the failings of IPS as a whole, Mr. Cosby fought continually to make Shortridge a safe and inspiring learning environment, to foster connections with families, students, and the community. He is responsible for transforming Shortridge into what it is today. In order for Shortridge to continue to be set apart from other IPS schools, we need Mr. Cosby as our leader. Please let your support for our wonderful principal be known.
*These are the most important numbers to call. The point of this is to flood the phone lines with inquiries about what is going on. Please be respectful and ask questions such as “Why is Mr. Cosby suspended?” “When will he be returning to work?” rather than being accusatory or defensive. Keep asking questions and don’t accept quick answers. Call as many of these numbers as possible, as many times as you can, on Monday and Tuesday.
Phone numbers to call Monday, November 7, 2011
Shortridge Main Line: 226-2810
*Lori Elliott (vice principal) 226-2816
*Jim Larkin (vice principal) 226-2818
Department of Secondary Education:
Nicole Haywood (secretary to Jackie Greenwood) 226-3875
*Jackie Greenwood (direct supervisor of Mr. Cosby) 226-4541
*Willie Giles (Deputy Superintendant) 226-4545
*Li-Yen Johnson (Associate Superintendant) 226-3128
*Dr. White (Superintendant’s Office; Sandra Ginder secretary) 226-4411
*Administrative Assistant to the School Board 226-4418
IPS switchboard 226-4000
IPS Human Resources 226-4150
We need as many people as possible to call in tomorrow, because we know that there is strength in numbers. So if you could foreword this to people who will support us.
You can also show your support of Mr. Cosby by "liking" our Facebook Page Dedicated to our support to reinstate Mr. Cosby:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Save-our-Principal-NO-Cosby-NO-Shortridge/289399771090579
Thanks in advance for your support of our efforts.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Opt-Out of Testing!
A powerful new movement is gaining momentum as parents start to question the dominance of high-stakes testing in US education. I'm not sure if folks in Indiana are getting involved but we'd be interested to hear about it. Check out the national website: United Opt-Out ....More to come I'm sure.
Standardized tests: Time for a national opt-out
Parents have the power to break the stranglehold of standardized testing
Here's an update to a clichéd philosophical question: If a test is scheduled and no one is around to take it, will this test matter? The new school year for many public school teachers begins weeks before students arrive. Educators attend hours of workshops to discover that the newest acronym is simply a substitute for an older one. More importantly, piles of test data are pored over to both assess the previous year and to fully appreciate what is to come with a new crop of students.
With every new testing mandate, combined with recent scandals chipping away at the once impossibly smooth veneer of test-based education reforms, many teachers, parents and administrators are getting frustrated. Where have market-driven and data-obsessed policies taken us over the last 10 years? Are public schools necessarily better off than they were when No Child Left Behind (NCLB) was initially greeted with bipartisan support?
Another important question: What of education have we lost as a result of strict adherence to standardized tests? Many are answering, "Too much — and enough is enough." The result is that more and more parents and educators are mulling what was once unthinkable: opting children out of state standardized tests.
For example, Tim Slekar, a professor of education in Pennsylvania, opted his son Luke out of his state's tests last school year to "make my community aware and to try and enlighten them of the real issues." This parent and professor's plea is simple and forceful: "Stop treating my child as data! He's a great kid who loves to learn. He is not a politician's pawn in a chess game designed to prove the inadequacy of his teachers and school."
In July, a large group of public school advocates organized the Save Our Schools March in Washington, D.C. to protest the continued, and in some cases stronger, embrace of standardized testing. Even amid budget shortfalls, millions of taxpayer dollars are spent on things like researching newer exams, test security, investigating lapses in that security, and manufacturing data collection systems. Meanwhile, schools must contend with smaller staffs and larger class sizes.
Educators are frustrated by the exclusion of teachers from the larger debate on education reform and policy in the United States. Individual classroom teachers and researchers have been highlighting for years the deleterious effects of focusing solely on success or failure with regard to standardized tests. And even now, with the revelation that high-stakes environments are perfect breeding grounds for desperation and resulting dishonesty, the dispiriting march through another year of test preparation must continue.
In a political and cultural environment that at best feigns listening to educators and at worst demonizes them, the most active public school advocates — like Mr. Slekar — are beginning to feel that opting their children out of completing the state tests is the only message that will get through. Those who began their research into the issue are finding it remarkably easy to do, despite the dissembling of school officials when asked for information. Parents considering opting their children out of state testing are aware of the implications — that a diminished level of participation will affect the school's ability to make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP). But the threat of no AYP does not appear as ominous as it once did. What is more, the Department of Education's hemming and hawing over the reauthorization of NCLB, plus this whole business of granting waivers that states don't even want, could mean that the punitive era of education reform is slowly coming to an end.
Growing groups of parents and public school advocates have decided to hit the contemporary reform movement where it counts by taking away the privilege of collecting coveted data. They realize that their children are more than just test scores. They now understand that a laser-like focus on testing and test preparation comes at the expense of numerous other facets of an engaging and well-rounded education. Most of all, these same folks are slowly but surely grasping the power that eluded them during the height of the NCLB era. Despite being largely locked out of the conversation on public education, parents, teachers, and parents who are teachers know they don't have to give up the data any longer.
Opting-out groups are turning to social media to organize. A Florida-based Facebook group, "Testing is Not Teaching," boasts more than 12,000 supporters. A similar, fledgling group called "United Opt Out" claimed 600 national members after just a few days of existence online. Local numbers for Maryland are elusive, and it's too early to tell whether pressing the "Like" button will translate into actual opting out of test taking.
So, to come full circle: If tests were scheduled and no one took them, would it matter? It would probably be the exact opposite of the proverbial tree falling with no one around. Fewer students filling in fewer bubbles would sound an alarm akin to 1,000 trees falling in the forest. This time, one could not ignore hearing it. And the sincere grievances public school advocates have about the dominance of testing might finally receive an attentive audience.
Shaun Johnson is an assistant professor of elementary education in the College of Education at Towson University. His email is spjohnson@towson.edu.
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Corporate Shock Doctrine in Indiana
Check out this article from Salon.com and think about all the shady connections emerging from Tony Bennett and the Mitch Daniels Machine. What's amazing about this is how even though standardized test scores are good enough to fire teachers and, as in Indianapolis, turn schools over to for-profit charter corporations, they're not good enough to determine if the multi-million dollar contracts for corporations peddling easy solutions and fairy dust. A previous post shared some the new information on corporate campaign donations to Dr. Bennett--we're sure its only the beginning. Didn't we learn to follow the money? This was found at the Newteacher blog.
"Let's hope the fiscal crisis doesn't get better too soon. It'll slow down reform." -- Tom Watkins, a consultant, summarizes the corporate education reform movement's current strategy to the Sunday New York Times. Watkins' outburst of candor, buried in this front-page New York Times article yesterday, is so important: It shows that the recession and its corresponding shock to school budgets is being used by corporations to maximize revenues, all under the gauzy banner of "reform."
"Let's hope the fiscal crisis doesn't get better too soon. It'll slow down reform." -- Tom Watkins, a consultant, summarizes the corporate education reform movement's current strategy to the Sunday New York Times. Watkins' outburst of candor, buried in this front-page New York Times article yesterday, is so important: It shows that the recession and its corresponding shock to school budgets is being used by corporations to maximize revenues, all under the gauzy banner of "reform."
The "Shock Doctrine" comes to your neighborhood classroom: Corporate reformers use the fiscal crisis and campaign contributions to hype an unproven school agenda
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Follow the Money--Bennett and Campaign Money
Murdoch’s Wireless Gen. and EdisonLearning Donated Money to Tony Bennett | |
| By: Doug Martin Monday August 29, 2011 11:58 am | |
As the Indiana State Board of Education decides to hand over Indiana’s so-called “failing” schools to EdisonLearning, Charter Schools USA, and Rupert Murdoch’s Wireless Generation today, it is important to note that both Edison and Wireless Generation have donated to Education ReformIdol Indiana supt. of public instruction Tony Bennett’s campaign chest. In fact, Wireless Gen. even lavished money on Mitch Daniels and Indiana Republicans, the month before Murdoch acquired the company.
Freshly clabbered by public school advocates like Leonie Haimson, Diane Ravitch, and others in New York City, and thus losing out on a $27 million contract with the schools, Wireless Gen. will now “partner” with the New Teacher Project (whose CEO is Ariela Rozman, who also sits on the board of Indy’s corporate reform group, the Mind Trust) to run Washington Community High School in Indianapolis. EdisonLearning is taking over a school in Gary.
For 2009-2010, Bennett’s donors are both local and national corporate school reform players, and many of them also funded him in 2008:
EdisonLearning: $2,000
Wireless Generation: $1,000
James Bopp, Jr.: $250 (corporate lawyer of Citizens United; used his Terre Haute law firm’s mailbox to funnel millions of Amway-Besty DeVos’ American Federation for Children money to “school reformers” in Indiana and throughout the country)
Bopp Coleson, and Bostrom: $2,500 (law firm of James Bopp, Jr.)
Therese Rooney: $10,000 (daughter of J. Patrick Rooney, the man who started the Educational CHOICE Charitable Trust and was a national leader in the voucher movement)
Patrick Byrne: $5,000 (Overstock.com)
Luke Messer: $175 (School Choice Indiana)
Heather Neal: $150 (works at IDOE)
David Shane: $150, (member of Indiana Board of Ed. Wife Anne, now a trustee at Ivy Tech, worked for the Mind Trust)
Connections Academy: $2,000 (online school)
Education Networks of America: $2,000 (Tennessee network which connections Indiana public school corporations. Operates in several states)
Hoosiers for Economic Growth: $5,000 (front group behind Indiana school “reform”)
McGraw-Hill: $3,000 (mega-book and testing company which oversees ISTEP+ testing in Indiana)
Apangea Learning: $1,000 (online tutoring company which has a contract with IDOE)
Education Services of America: $1,000 (has a contract with East Allen County Schools to use their Ombudsman Educational Services for at-risk students)
Robert Enlow: $500 (runs Milton Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice)
Rollin Dick: $150 (consultant with MH Equity Investors, a private equity investing group, formerly of Conseco, works for charter operator, the GEO Foundation)
Thanks to Jane Ruppel Nicholls for pointing me to this new Follow the Money list. This piece is cross-posted at B-Town Errant. Please check it out!http://my.firedoglake.com/dougmartin/2011/08/29/murdochs-wireless-gen-and-edisonlearning-donated-money-to-tony-bennett/
Monday, August 1, 2011
Indiana was there!! Grass-roots Movement of Educators Gathers in DC
It was blistering hot, traffic and parking were terrible, the media was preoccupied with the debt crisis and Congress's inability to compromise but....over 8000 educators and supporters of public education gathered to raise a collective voice. An exciting moment and Indiana educators were there--the next step is organizing state-level protests. Stay in touch and post a comment if you support the cause!!
The Save Our Schools March
“I don’t know where I would be today if my teachers’ job security was based on how I performed on some standardized test.”
That was actor Matt Damon talking to thousands of teachers, parents, principals, school board members and other education activists who stood today for hours in 90-plus-degree temperatures near the White House to protest the standardized testing mania that is at the heart of the Obama administration’s school reform policies. He was one of dozens of speakers — including education historian Diane Ravitch; prominent educators Linda Darling-Hammond, Jonathan Kozol, Deb Meier; Jon Stewart (on video); and Florida activist Rita Solnet— who protested the Bush administration’s No Child Left Behind, and the current administration’s Race to the Top, which, to the disappointment of many Obama supporters, is as punitive and at least as test-centric as NCLB. If their message has been heard before, this part was new: It was the first time that teachers from across the country have raised their voices publicly in protest of education policies at a Washington rally.
I don’t know how members of the audience (the Park Service unofficially estimated as many as 8,000 attended, more than some had predicted and fewer than some had hoped) withstood the heat but they did, and then they marched to the White House, in hopes that someone would let President Obama know about their disappointment in his education policies.
[Note: Some have questioned whether I was an active participant in the Save Our Schools march. I was not. I was invited to be a speaker at a two-day conference that preceded the rally and I declined long ago. Readers of this blog know that I rather obviously have opinions about school reform but I don’t participate in advocacy events.]
While U.S. legislators on the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue were embroiled in negotiations to try to stop the country from defaulting on its debts, the rally and march, planned for many months, went on, noting that the health of the public education system is just as key to the country’s future as anything else.
Critics of the march had claimed that it was union-inspired but, though some speakers were union members, this wasn’t a union-organized or inspired march but actually a grass-roots production organized by teachers, parents and others. (The 15-member executive committee was testament to that.) Critics also accused participants of supporting “the status quo,” which is a phrase commonly used by modern school reform leaders to disparagingly suggest that they would rather keep bad teachers in classrooms than fire them. It’s nonsense (the issue is how to give teachers due process). If any of these critics listened, they would have heard people literally desperate for some sense to be returned to education policy.
Ravitch, whose best-selling 2010 “The Life and Death of the Great American School System” helped galvanize teachers to publicly protesting their discontent with former president Bush’s No Child Left Behind, and the current administration’s Race to the Top, told the crowd that public schools are “not shoe stores” and shouldn’t be managed as businesses.
“We are here to stand up for basic American values,” she said. “The shame of our nation is that we lead the developed world in childhood poverty,” she said, then noting that our best schools, those with the fewest children who live in poverty, rank on international tests at least as high as any other nation.
Her celebrity with people in the crowd was such that when she was done, they began to chant, “Thank you.”
Speakers protested policies that evaluate teachers based on standardized tests, and that scapegoat teachers for things over which they have no control (such as whether a student comes to school hungry, tired, sick or entirely disinterested). Damon, who has spoken before publicly about testing mania, was there because his mother, Carlsson Paige, asked him to come. She is a childhood development expert and a professor at Lesley University in Cambridge and was involved with the march.
It is one of the unfortunate aspects of American culture that celebrities get listened to more than everybody else — even, and maybe especially, in Washington, D.C.
If Washington’s policymakers don’t want to listen to teachers — and so far, they haven’t — just maybe they will take a minute to read Damon’s speech. It was smart and powerful. (I will post it separately.)
They could learn from it.
That was actor Matt Damon talking to thousands of teachers, parents, principals, school board members and other education activists who stood today for hours in 90-plus-degree temperatures near the White House to protest the standardized testing mania that is at the heart of the Obama administration’s school reform policies. He was one of dozens of speakers — including education historian Diane Ravitch; prominent educators Linda Darling-Hammond, Jonathan Kozol, Deb Meier; Jon Stewart (on video); and Florida activist Rita Solnet— who protested the Bush administration’s No Child Left Behind, and the current administration’s Race to the Top, which, to the disappointment of many Obama supporters, is as punitive and at least as test-centric as NCLB. If their message has been heard before, this part was new: It was the first time that teachers from across the country have raised their voices publicly in protest of education policies at a Washington rally.
I don’t know how members of the audience (the Park Service unofficially estimated as many as 8,000 attended, more than some had predicted and fewer than some had hoped) withstood the heat but they did, and then they marched to the White House, in hopes that someone would let President Obama know about their disappointment in his education policies.
[Note: Some have questioned whether I was an active participant in the Save Our Schools march. I was not. I was invited to be a speaker at a two-day conference that preceded the rally and I declined long ago. Readers of this blog know that I rather obviously have opinions about school reform but I don’t participate in advocacy events.]
While U.S. legislators on the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue were embroiled in negotiations to try to stop the country from defaulting on its debts, the rally and march, planned for many months, went on, noting that the health of the public education system is just as key to the country’s future as anything else.
Critics of the march had claimed that it was union-inspired but, though some speakers were union members, this wasn’t a union-organized or inspired march but actually a grass-roots production organized by teachers, parents and others. (The 15-member executive committee was testament to that.) Critics also accused participants of supporting “the status quo,” which is a phrase commonly used by modern school reform leaders to disparagingly suggest that they would rather keep bad teachers in classrooms than fire them. It’s nonsense (the issue is how to give teachers due process). If any of these critics listened, they would have heard people literally desperate for some sense to be returned to education policy.
Ravitch, whose best-selling 2010 “The Life and Death of the Great American School System” helped galvanize teachers to publicly protesting their discontent with former president Bush’s No Child Left Behind, and the current administration’s Race to the Top, told the crowd that public schools are “not shoe stores” and shouldn’t be managed as businesses.
“We are here to stand up for basic American values,” she said. “The shame of our nation is that we lead the developed world in childhood poverty,” she said, then noting that our best schools, those with the fewest children who live in poverty, rank on international tests at least as high as any other nation.
Her celebrity with people in the crowd was such that when she was done, they began to chant, “Thank you.”
Speakers protested policies that evaluate teachers based on standardized tests, and that scapegoat teachers for things over which they have no control (such as whether a student comes to school hungry, tired, sick or entirely disinterested). Damon, who has spoken before publicly about testing mania, was there because his mother, Carlsson Paige, asked him to come. She is a childhood development expert and a professor at Lesley University in Cambridge and was involved with the march.
It is one of the unfortunate aspects of American culture that celebrities get listened to more than everybody else — even, and maybe especially, in Washington, D.C.
If Washington’s policymakers don’t want to listen to teachers — and so far, they haven’t — just maybe they will take a minute to read Damon’s speech. It was smart and powerful. (I will post it separately.)
They could learn from it.
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Hear! Hear!
School turnaround companies not a sure thing; let community try 1st
Dear Mr. Tully,
I agree with you and the state's superintendent of public instruction, Tony Bennett, on one thing: It's sad that we as a community have let Indianapolis Public Schools get to this point. Few could look at the performance of the seven district schools under threat of a state takeover and feel any other way.
Everyone wants to do something to turn things around. Continuing to do nothing is absolutely unacceptable. But doing something doesn't mean we should try anything. And, in my book, allowing the state to take over any of the schools and then turn them over to a management company definitely counts as "anything."
Who's to say a private and possibly out-of-state company would do any better than a locally run and elected school board?
After all, the research on the effectiveness of these turnaround companies is anything but conclusive. Even those who support them admit that. "There really isn't a big track record for many of these groups to stand on," said M. René Islas, an education consultant who has worked in Indianapolis and is the director of the Learning Forward Center for Results. "We're kind of in uncharted territory."
Kind of like California during the Gold Rush. Never before has there been $5 billion of federal funding available to turn around failing schools. Education Secretary Arne Duncan hopes to overhaul 5,000 of the nation's 100,000 public schools in the next few years.
A lot of those turnaround efforts, as is the case here, involve paying a private, for-profit company to overhaul schools. Yet nationwide, oversight of these companies hasn't been the best. Many of them are new, formed in response to a burgeoning market for fixing schools, and they have yet to establish proven records of success.
And the privatization of government services doesn't always work. The botched attempt to modernize Indiana's welfare system comes to mind. Gov. Mitch Daniels pulled the plug on the $1.3 billion contract with IBM less than three years into the supposed 10-year implementation.
Do we really want to take that chance with our schools? With our children? What happens if the state hires a turnaround company, and then a year from now or two years from now, test scores at a school don't go up? Will Bennett fire that company and hire a new one? Will that new company once again fire half the staff and oust the principal?
These are things we need to think about long before we consider crossing the bridge into state takeover land.
Why? Because, above all else, students need stability and consistency.
This came through loud and clear at both of last week's meetings to gather public feedback on the possible state takeover. At Arlington Community High School, teachers and parents complained about the inconsistent meting out of discipline and the rotating cast of principals and teachers over the past four years.
At Broad Ripple, IPS Superintendent Eugene White pointed out that the school is only in its second year of being a full magnet high school for the arts. My point is, there hasn't been enough consistency or stability at either of these schools for the students or teachers to develop any kind of traction for success."The research tells us that the full turnaround of any organization takes three to five years," Islas said.Ripping everything up again at these schools likely would do more harm than good.
What do we do instead? Let the community take up this fight first.
One result of Bennett saying the state should intervene has been that parents and community groups appear to be serious about improving education. The Indianapolis Urban League has vowed to work with the NAACP and the National Council on Educating Black Children to help implement improvement plans at all the schools.
This should have happened years ago when students' grades first started to slide, but that's a gripe for another day. The success of students depends as much on what goes on in the classroom as at home. Without support from parents and the community, kids, especially kids in poor urban districts, have a much harder time making the grade. Their involvement could make all the difference.
Let the community and parents try again. Don't take these schools out of their hands just yet.
That's a "something" I can get behind.
Call Star columnist Erika D. Smith at erika.smith@indystar.com, or reach on Twitter @indystar_erika.
Dear Mr. Tully,
I agree with you and the state's superintendent of public instruction, Tony Bennett, on one thing: It's sad that we as a community have let Indianapolis Public Schools get to this point. Few could look at the performance of the seven district schools under threat of a state takeover and feel any other way.
Everyone wants to do something to turn things around. Continuing to do nothing is absolutely unacceptable. But doing something doesn't mean we should try anything. And, in my book, allowing the state to take over any of the schools and then turn them over to a management company definitely counts as "anything."
Who's to say a private and possibly out-of-state company would do any better than a locally run and elected school board?
After all, the research on the effectiveness of these turnaround companies is anything but conclusive. Even those who support them admit that. "There really isn't a big track record for many of these groups to stand on," said M. René Islas, an education consultant who has worked in Indianapolis and is the director of the Learning Forward Center for Results. "We're kind of in uncharted territory."
Kind of like California during the Gold Rush. Never before has there been $5 billion of federal funding available to turn around failing schools. Education Secretary Arne Duncan hopes to overhaul 5,000 of the nation's 100,000 public schools in the next few years.
A lot of those turnaround efforts, as is the case here, involve paying a private, for-profit company to overhaul schools. Yet nationwide, oversight of these companies hasn't been the best. Many of them are new, formed in response to a burgeoning market for fixing schools, and they have yet to establish proven records of success.
And the privatization of government services doesn't always work. The botched attempt to modernize Indiana's welfare system comes to mind. Gov. Mitch Daniels pulled the plug on the $1.3 billion contract with IBM less than three years into the supposed 10-year implementation.
Do we really want to take that chance with our schools? With our children? What happens if the state hires a turnaround company, and then a year from now or two years from now, test scores at a school don't go up? Will Bennett fire that company and hire a new one? Will that new company once again fire half the staff and oust the principal?
These are things we need to think about long before we consider crossing the bridge into state takeover land.
Why? Because, above all else, students need stability and consistency.
This came through loud and clear at both of last week's meetings to gather public feedback on the possible state takeover. At Arlington Community High School, teachers and parents complained about the inconsistent meting out of discipline and the rotating cast of principals and teachers over the past four years.
At Broad Ripple, IPS Superintendent Eugene White pointed out that the school is only in its second year of being a full magnet high school for the arts. My point is, there hasn't been enough consistency or stability at either of these schools for the students or teachers to develop any kind of traction for success."The research tells us that the full turnaround of any organization takes three to five years," Islas said.Ripping everything up again at these schools likely would do more harm than good.
What do we do instead? Let the community take up this fight first.
One result of Bennett saying the state should intervene has been that parents and community groups appear to be serious about improving education. The Indianapolis Urban League has vowed to work with the NAACP and the National Council on Educating Black Children to help implement improvement plans at all the schools.
This should have happened years ago when students' grades first started to slide, but that's a gripe for another day. The success of students depends as much on what goes on in the classroom as at home. Without support from parents and the community, kids, especially kids in poor urban districts, have a much harder time making the grade. Their involvement could make all the difference.
Let the community and parents try again. Don't take these schools out of their hands just yet.
That's a "something" I can get behind.
Call Star columnist Erika D. Smith at erika.smith@indystar.com, or reach on Twitter @indystar_erika.
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