Latest News and Comment from Education

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

BAMN - Operation Save Public Education!

BAMN - Operation Save Public Education!

BAMN is leading and coordinating resistance in communities to the cynical, deceptive national effort to replace public schools with segregated charter schools. The popular, widely-supported principles of universal public education and of realizing Dr. King's dream of integration ("separate can never be equal") can be defended through mass student/teacher/parent/community organizing.

ESSENTIAL:

Fighting the New Jim Crow in American K-12 education

• ARTICLE by the UCLA Civil Rights Project summarizing research that shows that school integration is essential to closing the school achievement/ opportunity gap for racial minorities
• (NBC4 NEWS STORY + DEBATE)BAMN and L.A. students win right to intervene in court case to defend city's school integration plan against racist lawsuit
• "Operation King's Dream: A Call to Action - Restoring the Promise of Brown v. Board of Education Starting in Michigan" Analysis of the roots of educational inequality in Michigan and perspective of building a united mass, integrated civil rights movement for equal, integrated, quality education for all.
• "The Truth About Segregation in Ferndale Schools" The New Jim Crow in American education—argument against the emerging system of separate, unequal, charter schools in Metro Detroit.

DETROIT:

We are engaged in a historic struggle to save Detroit's public schools, public jobs, and public services. Mayor Bing and Rob Bobb are using the economic crisis as a pretext to make a sweeping attack on the people of this city. Come here to help organize the student/worker/community movement that is needed to win!
  • BAMN Declaration to Save Dr. King's Vision for America in Detroit
  • SAVE OUR CITY! -Statement from AFSCME Local 207 laying out the political situation and how we can stop the attack on public services and public education in Detroit and across the country.

  • LOS ANGELES:

    Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and charter school magnate Eli Broad are trying to give away dozens of LA's public schools to charters over and against the will of students and parents. This is an ORGANIZING CENTER to defend LA's public schools!
    • Circulate the citywide "Petition to Defend Public Education in Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD)" Download as PDF
    • Circulate the "Petition to Oppose Our School from Being Turned into a Charter/Innovation School"!
    English: Word PDF
    Español: Word PDF
    • CALL TO ACTION to UTLA TEACHERS ( English Español )

    BERKELEY:

    We are fighting the creation of a charter school that would split off from Berkeley's historic and popular school integration plan and provide many of the district's black and Latina/o students a separate, substandard education.

    • Call to Action: Save Dr. King's Vision for America in Berkeley
    English Español
    • Sign & Circulate the Petition!
    English Español Online Petition
    • BAMN's criticism of Berkeley's achievement-gap report: "'2020 Vision': A Cover for Charter Schools"
    English Español

RICHMOND:

VICTORY! Richmond teachers succeeded at fending off an effort by their union leadership and the school district to convert the Richmond schools into a CHARTER SCHOOL DISTRICT under the aegis of the Chevron Corporation. The effort to charterize schools CAN be defeated. Read BAMN's flyer to Richmond teachers urging them to hold strong against the attack on public education.

UPDATES:

Public Education / K-12 Integration

6/16/2011
Save Catherine Ferguson Academy!
CFA stays open -- Build the new civil rights movement, defend public education -- Join BAMN!
6/7/2011
ALL OUT to Catherine Ferguson Academy June 16th!
Detroit students, fight back! Defend your right to a quality education!
4/30/2011
The Summer Leadership Project
Leadership training for the youth leaders of the new civil rights movement
4/15/2011
2/11/2011


Defeat Governor Brown's Proposed Budget Cuts of 1.4 Billion Dollars to the UC, CSU, and CC Systems! No privatization of higher education!