In Melissa Ross’s interview with Florida board of education chairman Gary Chartrand onWJTC radio this morning, Floridians were reminded of education commissioner’s Tony Bennett’s many conflicts of interests.
Explaining the difference between the two assessment consortiums which will create standardized tests for Common Core – SMARTER Balanced and PARCC – Chartrand mentioned as an aside that Bennett is the chairman of PARCC. Florida will be using PARCC. To be precise, PARCC classifies Florida as “a Governing State in and the Fiscal Agent for the PARCC Consortium.” As “fiscal agent,” Florida is designated as the state that makes the financial decisions on behalf of the other PARCC states – 2o and the District of Columbia.
On paper, the fiscal agent is Florida. In reality it’s Bennett. Indiana’s was designated as fiscal agent while Bennett was the state’s top educator. He brought the title with him to Florida.
There’s more associations. Jeb Bush’s Foundation for Excellence in Education has