CURMUDGUCATION: Charter Investment Seminar with Walton, Gates and DFER

CURMUDGUCATION: Charter Investment Seminar with Walton, Gates and DFER:

Charter Investment Seminar with Walton, Gates and DFER

Well, gosh. I don't know how I missed this one.

Last March 10, the Walton Family Foundation and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation sponsored a seminar in Manhattan about how to make money in the charter school game.

The program was a who's who of charter school profiteers. Whitney Tilson, top dog of D[sic]FER was the keynote speaker for "Bonds and Blackboards: Investing in Charter Schools" His kickoff was followed by such sexy fare as "State of Charter School Facilities Financing," "Authorizers and Lenders: What Can We Learn From Each Other," and "Assessing a Charter School: Investor Voices." A panel on future trends promised to cover this info:

Discussion about tools market participants can utilize to create a more efficient market, such as: pools, credit enhancement, more state involvement, etc. Discussion will include trends in borrower characteristics and continued disclosure needs.

The panels included lots of folks from the financial sector, including Bank of America, Prudential CURMUDGUCATION: Charter Investment Seminar with Walton, Gates and DFER:



Stopping Bad Charters

Over at Campbell Brown's Reformsters R Us PR site, charter fan Richard Whitmire addresses the question of how to handle terrible awful no good very bad charter schools. It's an important question, and his five answers are worth discussing. But it's also worth discussing how his answers direct attention to some fundamental charter issues.

Whitmire starts out by acknowledging that the charter movement keeps getting shot in the foot by its own friends. He drops the ball by characterizing charter opponents as either unions or competition-hating superintendents, skipping right past other opposition from groups like "people who care about public education" or "people who don't want schools to be used primarily as money-making tools for investors" or even "people who think the whole charter-choice approach is grossly inefficient and over-expensive." But he does nail his central point-- when charter foes ask why anyone should approve more charters when "so many crappy charters remain in business," they have a point.

Whitmire offers five ways that charter fans can sweep away the junk that is making Charterville look kind of shady and run-down.

Advocates Need To Change Their Mindset

Whitmire argues for quality over popularity. Filled seats and a waiting list don't prove that a schooStopping Bad Charters