Author to speak about corruption in Indiana schools
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What do you do when you find out the schools in your state are being controlled by the media, politicians and the wealthy elite? Some would say ignore it, but Doug Martin exposes it.
Doug Martin is the author of “Hoosier School Heist,” a book that reveals the secrets of how corporations have shaped the Indiana education system.
“‘Hoosier School Heist’ is an important book about how the privatization of Indiana schools and corporate influence on education is hurting children and teachers,” said Bill Mullen, a professor of American studies at Purdue.
Martin first became interested in the education system after reading a series of articles in the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette about the rental schemes of a for-profit charter school to milk taxpayer money.
“I started investigating the corruption and crony capitalism behind the so-called school reform movement in Indiana and across the country, and what I found was so shocking I had to write this book,” said Martin.
He found that politicians and charter school leaders were setting up a free–market–type system of schools in Indiana.
“People, many of them wealthy and with political ties, profit from taxpayer money while giving services to school children that never live up to the hype,” said Martin. “Which even, at times, leave kids without permanent qualified teachers and without books in the classroom. Those not profiting from this directly are merely using their ‘couch change’ to destroy public education to prime it for the ‘free market.’”
One of the concepts emphasized in Martin’s book is school privatization. Privatization happens when bills are passed by government officials that drain money from public schools and give the money to religious schools and charter school operators, some of whom, Martin points out in his book, have ties to politicians and help fund their campaigns.
“Because of lack of funding, public schools end up cutting teachers and staff,” said Martin. “This in turn sets up an environment where more charter schools can move in and take over. Naomi Klein, a Canadian activist, and others call this ‘disaster capitalism.’ If there is not a natural disaster which the powerful can financially profit from, then government officials create one, a manufactured crisis, for this to happen. Standardized tests are one of the weapons to further school privatization.”
Although these issues are happening in high schools and lower, it affects college students, too.
“College students are the product of public schools,” said Mullen. “Many college students will become teachers. Also, there is pressure to privatize higher education which must be resisted.”
Martin believes that addressing these issues in schools will be difficult and more people are needed to help end Author to speak about corruption in Indiana schools - Purdue Exponent: Features:
