Boston's Mayor Goes Full Scott Walker on Charter Schools
Mayor Marty Walsh has broken up with Candidate Marty Walsh.
C'mon, Marty Walsh. This is not acceptable.
The ever-essential Diane Ravitch catches Walsh in the middle of performing what we like to refer to around the shebeen as a "full Scott Walker"—namely, pulling a fast one once you're elected that you never made a part of your campaign. It's not breaking a campaign promise. It's breaking a campaign presumption, which is supposed to make a difference. Anyway, Walsh beat John Connolly at least partly by accusing Connolly, who is an open ally of the education "reform" grifters, of trying to destroy the public school system in the city where public schools were invented in this county. Now, it appears that Mayor Walsh has broken up with Candidate Walsh. He's cut a deal with some of the most odious practitioners of the school "reform" grift, including the Walton Family of Wingnuts, and he did so under the radar. His goal, a "facilities plan," is to close 36 public schools in order to make way for charters—and, it seems, for the city's parochial schools. Fortunately, a local blogger filed a FOIA request and got her hands on the relevant documents.
The real irony is that, while he's covertly soliciting money from Bill Gates and from the heirs of Sam Walton, Walsh is also squabbling with Republican Governor Charlie Baker's plan to open the floodgates of charterism statewide. The results of this can be seen in the testimony of an administrator from a suburban Massachusetts public school district.
Ruth C. Gilbert-Whitner, superintendent of the Whitman-Hanson Regional School District in Southeastern Massachusetts, said charter schools have siphoned $309,000 from the district's budget this year, causing drastic cuts in its library services. "Each and every student in the Commonwealth deserves a high-quality education," she said, "[not] a dual system of publicly funded education that charges traditional districts for circumstances beyond their control and requires them to operate school systems under a vastly different set of regulations."
Charterism is privatization on the public's dime, the worst of all possible worlds. It doesn't matter if the tap gets turned on slowly, or all at once. It's about corporations being allowed by law to get their mitts in the till. C'mon, Marty. You know that's true.Boston Charter Schools - Mayor Marty Walsh Reverses Position on 'School Reform':
