Parents to Rep. George Miller: To celebrate “National Parents Day,” please listen to parents!

Parents to Rep. George Miller: To celebrate “National Parents Day,”
please listen to parents! 

Parents Across America, a network of grassroots parents and parent
groups across the U.S., has learned that Rep George Miller, ranking
Democratic member of the House education committee, is holding a
teleconference today to celebrate the July 28th National Parents Day.

The teleconference is taking place today, July 26, 2013, at 1:00 p.m.
EST

Toll-free U.S. dial-in #:866-952-1907 

Conference Call: National Parents Day; Password: Parents

The teleconference is clearly designed to promote parent trigger laws;
Rep. Miller's guest for the teleconference is Ben Austin, head of Parent
Revolution, a group generously funded by corporate reform supporters
including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Walton
Foundation. No one from Parents Across America was invited to
participate in this event. 

Parent Revolution has been exposed for paying so-called parent activists
to promote the disastrous “Won’t Back Down” movie and to go around the
U.S. testifying about the parent trigger. 

Although Parents Across America strongly supports true parent
empowerment, we oppose the parent trigger process. While the parent
trigger allows parents to voice discontent with a school, it gives them
no opportunity to choose among more positive reforms, and fails to
promote the best practices for parent involvement from the ground up. In
addition, the process creates huge potential for abuse, disruption and
divisiveness to school communities. The push for parent trigger laws
across the U.S. raises deep concerns. As with other deceptively
simple-sounding solutions, this law is likely to cause more problems
than it solves.

Parents Across America instead supports a process in which parents are
authentically involved at the ground level in developing strategies for
improvement. These strategies might include smaller classes, more parent
involvement, or other reforms that have been proven to work and are
aligned with the individual needs of the school and its students.
PAA’s recommendations

We urge lawmakers to oppose proposals like the Parent Trigger that would
exploit parents’ legitimate concerns in order to hand public property
over to private hands. 

Please also see PAA’s position paper, “The Empowerment Parents Want: The
LSC Model for School Reform.”

For more detail, please see our position paper, “Parents Across America
on the Parent Trigger.”