Education’s "Big Tobacco" Strikes Again | National Opportunity to Learn Campaign | Education Reform for Equity and Opportunity

Education’s "Big Tobacco" Strikes Again | National Opportunity to Learn Campaign | Education Reform for Equity and Opportunity:

Education’s "Big Tobacco" Strikes Again

Posted on: Thursday October 17th, 2013

By Joe Bishop, OTL Campaign Policy Director

In 1996, Vanity Fair published an article on growing opposition to "Big Tobacco" and their stronghold on American life and politics. Public outcry eventually led to significant changes to the cigarette industry and people's attitudes towards tobacco’s influence on their daily lives.

Today, public education has its own version of "Big Tobacco" with a similarly strong financial and political presence.Teach for America (TFA), which places recent college graduates with only five weeks of training in high-need schools, has grown over the years into a well-funded, political machine that, as history suggests, seems to be more interested in growing its network than fueling long-term impact in schools. It will take a similar sea change of public opinion to expose TFA's far-reaching influence and the impact of putting underprepared teachers in schools.

Since December 2009, Teach for America corps members, despite their minimal training, have been classified as ‘highly qualified’ under federal law. This is the same designation given to credentialed teachers, yet no other profession in the country allows individuals to be classified as such without the completion of proper licensure. This misleading classification distorts state and local data about the distribution of truly qualified teachers and allows inexperienced teachers to be concentrated in underserved communities.

TFA’s political influence reaches deep into district board rooms, state houses and even the halls of Congress. Last night, a Congressional provision was extended for Teach for America, allowing the organization and its partner districts to be eligible for Title I funding and consequently more state money for their cause. The Obama Administration, Democrats and Republicans continue to go to bat for the org