5 Policies from Forbes Ed “All-Stars” to Make US Public Education “Tops” - NPQ - Nonprofit Quarterly

5 Policies from Forbes Ed “All-Stars” to Make US Public Education “Tops” - NPQ - Nonprofit Quarterly:

5 Policies from Forbes Ed “All-Stars” to Make US Public Education “Tops”

WRITTEN BY RICK COHEN  

CREATED ON MONDAY, 08 DECEMBER 2014 15:27

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December 1, 2014; Forbes

Forbes convened what it called the “top leaders from the four key constituent groups” in the arena of fixing or remaking U.S. public education to make it “again…tops in the world.” It might be a little presumptuous to name U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan as the spokesperson for the federal government, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo the articulator of state government concerns, and D.C. schools chancellor Kaya Henderson as the representative of local school boards. The notion of Henderson speaking for school boards—in the Forbes analytical structure, a stand-in for the interests of parents and student—is kind of dubious: Henderson isn’t a school board member, but an employee of the schools’ governing body and the successor to (and, some would say, acolyte of) Michelle Rhee. They all may work for parts of the education establishment, but they all have ideological biases that others among their “constituent groups” might not endorse.

The fourth top leader may be a dubious representative herself. Forbes recruited Randi Weingarten of the American Federation of Teachers to speak for the teachers unions. Without suggesting that AFT is better or worse, there is another teachers union of significance in the form of the National Education Association, whose membership of 3 million surpasses the AFT’s 1.6 million members (a total that includes 112,000 health professionals outside the teaching profession). And, though many of our friends in organized labor might not like this question, when it comes to speaking for teachers—as opposed to speaking for teachers unions—is the AFT, with or without the NEA, sufficient? Or do teachers have issues and concerns that may not be reflected in the AFT or NEA agendas? As an example, consider organizations like the Badass Teachers Association, which has 53,000 members, an endorsement by education reform critic Diane Ravitch, and a mission statement that rejects “assessments, tests and evaluations created and imposed by corporate driven entities that have contempt for authentic teaching and learning.”

In any case, these four top leaders—an “all-star lineup,” according to Forbes—participated in a roundtable conversation moderated by hedge fund mogul and Robin Hood Foundation founder Paul Tudor Jones to identify five education policies that merit serious public investment and, if “fully implemented,” could “vault” U.S. public education in each area into the world’s top five and “if undertaken together, would surely take us to number one.”

The five policies selected by the Forbes education all-stars were: “teacher efficacy, universal pre-K, Common Core standards, blended learning (incorporating technology into how students are taught) and school leadership (training and empowering principals).” As Duncan put it, the five policies are or should be “mutually enforcing” and should be tackled “full speed ahead and scale [sic] on all five.”

Even among the all-stars, there were different accent marks placed on the policies. The AFT’s Weingarten suggested that “you need to do them together with a real focus on equity,” a pleasantly obvious concept that seems to evade practical implementation more often than not. Cuomo put the issue of disparities in terms with which the Badass Teachers would agree : “We have two education systems, and it’s not public-private, it’s rich and poor.”

Perhaps it was the presence of a venture philanthropist like Jones moderating the conversation, but the all-stars quickly reached something of a consensus around the necessary role of philanthropy. Henderson, for example, credited $67 million from philanthropy as the “catalytic impact in pushing me to move blended learning across my district, with improving teacher quality,” without necessarily noting that the foundations’ money was keyed to helping D.C. negotiate a union contract, with a pay-for-performance requirement 5 Policies from Forbes Ed “All-Stars” to Make US Public Education “Tops” - NPQ - Nonprofit Quarterly:

The great charter school rip-off: Finally, the truth catches up to education “reform” phonies - Salon.com

The great charter school rip-off: Finally, the truth catches up to education “reform” phonies - Salon.com:

The great charter school rip-off: Finally, the truth catches up to education “reform” phonies

Fraud, financial mismanagement, lousy results: Reports highlight awful charter schools and people are catching on

JEFF BRYANT

Diane Ravitch, Michelle Rhee (Credit: MSNBC/AP/Jacquelyn Martin)

Last week when former President Bill Clinton meandered onto the topic of charter schools, he mentioned something about an “original bargain” that charters were, according to the reporter for The Huffington Post, “supposed to do a better job of educating students.”

A writer at Salon called the remark “stunning” because it brought to light the fact that the overwhelming majority of charter schools do no better than traditional public schools. Yet, as the Huffington reporter reminded us, charter schools are rarely shuttered for low academic performance.

But what’s most remarkable about what Clinton said is how little his statement resembles the truth about how charters have become a reality in so many American communities.

In a real “bargaining process,” those who bear the consequences of the deal have some say-so on the terms, the deal-makers have to represent themselves honestly (or the deal is off and the negotiating ends), and there are measures in place to ensure everyone involved is held accountable after the deal has been struck.

But that’s not what’s happening in the great charter industry rollout transpiring across the country. Rather than a negotiation over terms, charters are being imposed on communities – either by legislative fiat or well-engineered public policy campaigns. Many charter school operators keep their practices hidden or have been found to be blatantly corrupt. And no one seems to be doing anything to ensure real accountability for these rapidly expanding school operations.

Instead of the “bargain” political leaders may have thought they struck with seemingly well-intentioned charter entrepreneurs, what has transpired instead looks more like a raw deal for millions of students, their families, and their communities. And what political leaders ought to be doing – rather than spouting unfounded platitudes, as Clinton did, about “what works” – is putting the brakes on a deal gone bad, ensuring those most affected by charter school rollouts are brought to the bargaining table, and completely renegotiating the terms for governing these schools.

Charter Schools As Takeover Operations

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The “100 percent charter schools” education system in New Orleans that Clinton praised was never presented to the citizens of New Orleans in a negotiation. It was surreptitiously engineered.

After Katrina, as NPR recently reported, “an ad hoc coalition of elected leaders and nationally known charter advocates formed,” and in “a series of quick decisions,” all school employees were fired and the vast majority of the city’s schools were handed over to a state entity called the “Recovery School District” which is governed by unelected officials. Only a “few elite schools were … allowed to maintain their selective admissions.”

In other words, any bargaining that was done was behind closed doors and at tables where most of the people who were being affected had no seat.

Further, any evidence of the improvement of the educational attainment of students in the New Orleans all-charter system is obtainable only by “jukin the stats” or, as the NPR The great charter school rip-off: Finally, the truth catches up to education “reform” phonies - Salon.com:

Investors Resist Idea of Society as Stakeholder in Public Education

Investors Resist Idea of Society as Stakeholder in Public Education:

INVESTORS RESIST IDEA OF SOCIETY AS STAKEHOLDER IN PUBLIC EDUCATION

Parents are key stakeholders in any child’s education. Does that mean that they are the only stakeholders? One upon a time in America most people would say “no”. They would say that it’s all of society. But not anymore. Investors are what has changed that equation.

Reformster propaganda is having its effect

Most of the people who I know would agree that the whole of society benefits from mandatory public education. However, reformsters and too many state school chiefs have been pushing for a different understanding. They speak, issue administrative directives, and lobby the legislatures as though parents are the ultimate stakeholder in a child’s education.

It’s given as the justification for massive, high-stakes testing, value-added measurement (VAM) of teachers, and A-F “report cards”.

Isn’t that concept of parents being the only stakeholder convenient for investors who want a nation-wide industry of literally selling education? Once the general public, big media, politicians, and school boards start accepting that notion, then it will be easier to sell education to those who can pay. The investors will come out way ahead.

But big-money reformsters have to convince more of us that education is a product to be sold to parents for this to happen. That’s why there has been millions spent for right-wing think tanks to promote the idea of the parent as the sole stakeholder in public education.

“Parent trigger” laws open the way for private interests

So how do they do that? “Parent trigger” laws have been passed in several states now by using the argument that parents are just stuck with awful public education and need a way out.

Notice the whole framework of this: Parents, if your school is not meeting up to your expectations, just vote for our parent trigger law as a way to pull your kid out of that school and shop for a better school product.

A part of class warfare against democracy

These big investors are a part of the very rich class, and do not want those parents to do things that might threaten minority rule of the rich like organizing, engaging in collective protest, exercising their democratic power to elect new school boards and demanding change in their publicly-owned schools.

For the very rich investors, they want to sell education to parents as shoppers at taxpayer expense while cutting out those very taxpayers from the decisions and input into just what kind of education the current generation of children are getting.

The bait-and-switch of pretending to rescue the children of the poor by these methods is a ruse to make us believe that there is something noble about the very rich trying to create new investment opportunities at taxpayer expense.

Some are realizing this for what it is as reports from those parent trigger states start coming to light such as in California where some charters have taken taxpayer money, shortchanged the students and teachers, and sent tax money up the line to administrators and investors. It is a money grab at the public’s expense.

We have allowed radical experimentation on the poor

In a series of three posts that I have written about New Orleans, Detroit, and Newark, I have shown that in fact, investor-owned Investors Resist Idea of Society as Stakeholder in Public Education:

Video: Bill Gates, Expert On All That Matters | deutsch29

Video: Bill Gates, Expert On All That Matters | deutsch29:

Video: Bill Gates, Expert On All That Matters

December 21, 2014

Billionaire Bill Gates has been buying the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) for years now. He started doing so after being asked to by former Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) President Gene Wilhoit and edupreneur, CCSS “lead architect” David Coleman in the summer of 2008.

Gates has spent at least hundreds of millions on CCSS.

One Gates-funded entity is the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), a “think tank” full of “scholars” who promote corporate-feeding “solutions” in American arenas, including education. As such, the “enterprise” in American Enterprise Institute is free enterprise.

Specifically, AEI has received over $5 million in Gates bucks. In August 2014, Gates gave AEI a fresh million for, among other promotions “in the K-12 and higher education space,” “impactful convenings.”

AEI is also connected to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) as well as Koch-funding funnel, Donors Trust. Low bottom line. High profits. The ultimate in what matters.

When a billionaire gives millions to a nonprofit group of philanthropic-dependent “scholars” like those of AEI, well, those scholars just have to interview him extensively as though he is an expert on all of his purchased issues.

So it goes, apparently.

In the March 2014 AEI video interview below, Gates admits, “…There’s no proof that [public education] is going to be dramatically better 10 or 20 years from now” (9:20).

Yet Gates continues to pour millions into CCSS.

At the ten-minute point, Gates is expressing surprise that there is no clear connection between state per-pupil spending and “excellence” (a euphemism for stats, the corporate-reform centerpiece of which is the standardized test score). He states that Washington, DC, has “improved somewhat” via “personnel policies, shuttering schools” and “letting the charter schools take a somewhat higher share of the cohort.” Nevertheless, Gates states, DC is still “an abysmal system.”

No mention of former DC Chancellor Michelle Rhee, who (according to her 2008 Video: Bill Gates, Expert On All That Matters | deutsch29:

Our fight for justice | Randi Weingarten

Our fight for justice | Randi Weingarten:

Our fight for justice

Our country strives to be a more perfect union--one that believes in freedom, opportunity and justice for all. Every day, our union, the AFT, strives for fairness, democracy, economic opportunity and high-quality public education, healthcare and public services for our students, our families and our communities.

Yet, too many things still stand in the way of American dream: Economic and racial inequality and bias. Sexual discrimination. Wage stagnation. Retirement insecurity. Escalating student debt and child care costs. The greatest wealth gap since the 1920s, and poverty that impacts nearly one-quarter of our children (and half of all kids in public schools).

We must knock down these obstacles if we are going to reclaim the promise of America--the promise that when you work hard and play by the rules, your family can thrive. That you can send your kids to strong neighborhood public schools and give them the chance to be successful in college, career and life without being trapped by debt. That working people are provided with a voice, the freedom to join a union, high-quality healthcare, the ability to take time off to take care of a sick child, and, after a lifetime of hard work, a retirement with dignity. That's what we all want for ourselves and our families.

Fifty years ago, Martin Luther King, Jr. reminded us that the struggle for civil rights is a struggle for good jobs, with decent wages. That educational opportunity is the highway to economic opportunity. This message is just as important today as we fight to ensure everyone can climb the ladder of opportunity.

And that's why fighting racism, sexual assault, wage stagnation and retirement insecurity is as much the AFT's work as fighting for high-quality public education, healthcare and public services. We won't settle for a public education system or economic system that only works for the wealthy few. Or a criminal justice system that offers anything less than justice for all.

It's our collective responsibility to confront racism-- before it robs more people of opportunities. During a trip to Ferguson, Mo., this week, I heard hope and real fear in the voices of the students, teachers and community members with whom I met. Think about the fact that more black men are behind bars today than were enslaved in 1850. And many of us are haunted by this question: If Michael Brown, Eric Garner andTamir Rice were white, would they be alive today?

Over the past several weeks, thousands have protested and engaged in civil disobedience because of the fear that our criminal justice system is not colorblind. Ijoined them, and was arrested myself, because sometimes it's not enough to simply speak out against injustice.

Cops are not the enemy--they are our first responders--bias, racism and economic inequality are. Creating more good jobs can be a springboard for change. We must work together to create a more perfect nation where all people see justice.

Likewise, when scores of young women began coming forward to share how their colleges failed to deal with accusations of rampant sexual assault, our union helped to change policies on campus. And I shared my own story of sexual assault nearly 30 years ago, because if more survivors feel emboldened to speak out, and more understand that they aren't to blame, we'll begin to shatter the culture that has allowed this epidemic to take hold.

It's not enough to say that everyone should be able to go to college; we must pave the way for all students to achieve their dreams--not to be devastated by assault or Our fight for justice | Randi Weingarten:

Federal Complaint Puts Charter School Segregation on Blast | TakePart

Federal Complaint Puts Charter School Segregation on Blast | TakePart:

Federal Complaint Puts Charter School Segregation on Blast

The ACLU and the Community Legal Aid Society allege that 75 percent of charter schools in Delaware are racially divided.

By Joseph Williams

A veteran journalist and former White House correspondent for Politico, Joseph Williams is a freelance writer, blogger, and essayist in Washington, D.C.

full bio

Hailed as the future of public education, charter schools were sold to the public as an innovative, taxpayer-funded solution to failing schools in poor minority neighborhoods and a growing achievement gap between black and white schoolchildren.

A new federal civil rights complaint, however, alleges that charter schools in Delaware have actually turned back the clock to the era of separate-but-equal education.

The complaint, filed jointly by the American Civil Liberties Union and the Community Legal Aid Society earlier this month, contends that more than three-quarters of charters statewide are identifiable as either mostly white or mostly minority, and the predominantly white ones far outperform the mostly minority ones on standardized achievement tests.

“Specifically, the state’s Charter School Act of 1995 has led to the proliferation of high-performing charter schools with practices and policies that result in the disproportionate exclusion of African-American and Hispanic students, low income students and students with disabilities,” according to the complaint, filed with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights. The disparities, the complaint continues, stem from state-sanctioned “preferential treatment” of some students, including its “failure to adequately regulate school-level barriers to admission” such as expensive uniforms, mandatory parental involvement and activity fees.

The ACLU and CLAS want the Office for Civil Rights to stop Delaware from authorizing and opening new charter schools until the state comes up with an acceptable desegregation plan—including eliminating funding disparity between charters and traditional public schools.

"The power of choice should be with the student and the family, not with the charter school," Kathleen MacRae, the ACLU's executive director, said at a press conference announcing the lawsuit.

The Delaware complaint, while eye-opening, is simply the latest challenge alleging racial Federal Complaint Puts Charter School Segregation on Blast | TakePart:

What Happens When Your Teacher Is a Video Game? | The Nation

What Happens When Your Teacher Is a Video Game? | The Nation:

What Happens When Your Teacher Is a Video Game?

Gordon Lafer on September 24, 2014 - 6:57PM ET

This fall, New Orleans's Recovery School District became the country's first all-charter district, completing a process begun following Hurricane Katrina, when the Bush administration refused to pay for reopening public schools, instead providing $45 million for charter schools to take their place. While these schools are publicly funded, the local community has no control over their curriculum or quality because they are not overseen by any democratically elected school board.

If corporate lobbyists have their way, the New Orleans model will be replicated across the country, with Netflix CEO and charter booster Reed Hastings leading the call to "get rid of school boards."

Sixty years after Brown v. Board of Education, a new type of segregation is spreading across the urban landscape. The US Chamber of Commerce, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), Americans for Prosperity and their legislative allies are promoting an ambitious, two-pronged agenda for poor cities: replace public schools with privately run charter schools, and replace teachers with technology.

What was accomplished by a hurricane in New Orleans is being pursued elsewhere by legislation. The formula is simple: use standardized tests to declare dozens of poor schools "persistently failing"; put these under the control of a special unelected authority; and then have that authority replace the public schools with charters. In 2011, Tennessee and Michigan created special districts to take over low-scoring schools; in both cases, the superintendent was specifically authorized to replace public schools with charters. This year, Wisconsin legislators considered a bill that bypassed the middle step and simply required that low-performing public schools be replaced with privately run charters. Since test scores are primarily a function of poverty, it's no surprise that 80 percent of the Tennessee schools targeted for privatization are in Memphis, or that the Michigan and Wisconsin bills focus, respectively, on Detroit and Milwaukee.

Recently, corporate-backed reform advocates have begun insisting that no public authority whatsoever be responsible for running schools. Neerav Kingsland, the former CEO of New Schools for New Orleans, warns that superintendents "must not succumb to the temptation to improve schools through better direct operation. Rather, [they] must humbly acknowledge that a marketplace of school operators will…out-perform even the best direct-run system." Hastings similarly suggests that the role of elected school boards be limited to "bringing to town more and more charter-school networks. Sort of like a Chamber of Commerce would to develop business."

Thus, what "slum clearance" did for the real-estate industry in the 1960s and '70s, high-stakes testing will do for the charter industry: wipe away large swaths of public schools, enabling private operators to grow not school by school, but twenty or thirty schools at a time.

This is not an evidence-based policy; research shows that replacing public schools with privately run charters will, in itself, do nothing to improve education. But this hasn't dampened the vigor of charter-school boosters.

* * *

Corporate lobbyists are increasingly promoting a type of charter school that places an emphasis on technology instead of human teachers. One of the exemplars of this model is Rocketship Education, based in Silicon Valley but with contracts to open schools in Milwaukee, Memphis, Nashville and Washington, DC. Rocketship's model is based on four principles. First, the company cuts costs by eliminating teachers. Starting in kindergarten, students spend about one-quarter of their class time in teacherless computer labs, What Happens When Your Teacher Is a Video Game? | The Nation:

What Pearson Education Asked Santa For

Fewer Teachers, More Data In The Schools Of The Future:

Fewer Teachers, More Data In The Schools Of The Future

Technology has already transformed education, but there is an increasingly widespread belief that the process is only just getting started. In one scenario, we are heading towards a paradigm shift that will mean fewer teachers and more data in the schools of the future.

According to a new report by two respected educationalists, we are on the verge of a historic change in the way schools operate.

In this model, huge quantities of data will finally make personalized education a reality, while large numbers of teachers will be replaced by support staff.

The study has been put together by Australian educationalist Dr Peter Hill, who has held senior positions both in his home country and in the U.S., as director of research and development at the National Center on Education and the Economy, and Sir Michael Barber, a former professor at the Institute of Education in London and one-time advisor to U.K. prime minister Tony Blair.

In their vision, the combination of globalization and new technology, plus the apparent stagnation of top-performing education systems, will drive the biggest revolution in education in more than 100 years.

According to their report: “New models of learning and teaching are evolving that make traditional classroom, teacher and textbook modes of formal learning obsolete.”

A key change is the availability of data. “Next-generation learning systems will create an explosion in data because they track learning and teaching at the individual student and lesson level,” the report says, with data providing “instant and detailed feedback” on pupil progress.

This approach also involves “a movement away from predominantly teacher/text instruction towards and online learning environment in a range of settings, supported by small-group and one-on-one tutorial assistance.”

Fewer Teachers, More Data In The Schools Of The Future:

Education’s Newsmaker Of The Year: Charter School Scandals:

Education’s Newsmaker Of The Year: Charter School Scandals

Since it’s the time of the year when newspapers, websites, and television talk shows scan their archives to pick the person, place, or thing that sums up the year in entertainment, business, sports, or every other venue, why not do that for education too?

In 2014 education news, lots of personalities came and went.

Michelle Rhee gave way to Campbell Brown as a torchbearer for “reform.” The 

comedian Louis C. K. had a turn at becoming an education wonk with his commentary on the Common Core standards. Numerous “Chiefs for Change” toppled from the ranks of chiefdom. Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett went down in defeat due in part to his gutting of public schools, as Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker remained resilient while spreading the cancerous voucher program from Milwaukee to the rest of the state. New York Mayor Bill De Blasio rose to turn back the failed education reforms of ex-mayor Bloomberg, only to have his populist agenda blocked by New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo who insisted imposing policies favored by Wall Street. Progressives formed Democrats for Public Education to counter the neoliberal, big money clout of Democrats for Education Reform. And Kentucky Senator Rand Paul and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush emerged as rival voices in the ongoing debate about the Common Core among potential Republican presidential candidates.

on

But hogging the camera throughout the year was another notable character: charter school scandals.

In 2014, charter schools, which had always been marketed for a legendary ability to deliver promising new innovations for education, became known primarily for their ability to concoct innovative new scams.

From Local Stories To National Scandal

Troubling news stories about the financial workings of charter schoolshad been leaking slowly into the media stream for some years.

A story that appeared at Forbes in late 2013 foretold a lot of what would emerge in 2014. That post “Charter School Gravy Train Runs Express To Fat City” brought to light for the first time in a mainstream source the financial rewards that were being mined

from charter schools. As author Addison Wiggin explained, a mixture of tax incentives, government programs, and Wall St. investors eager to make money were coming together to deliver a charter school bonanza – especially if the charter operation could “escape scrutiny” behind the veil of being privately held or if the charter operation could mix its business in “with other ventures that have nothing to do with education.”

As 2014 began, more stories about charter schools scandals continued to drip out from local press outlets – a chain of charter schools teaching creationism, a charter school closing abruptly for mysterious reasons, a charter high school operating as a for-profit “basketball factory,”recruiting players from around the world while delivering a sub-par Education’s Newsmaker Of The Year: Charter School Scandals:

CHARTER SCHOOL SCANDALS WEBSITE

CHARTER SCHOOL SCANDALS

A compilation of news articles about charter schools which have been charged with, or are highly suspected of, tampering with admissions, grades, attendance and testing; misuse of funds and embezzlement; engaging in nepotism and conflicts of interest; engaging in complicated and shady real estate deals; and/or have been engaging in other questionable, unethical, borderline-legal, or illegal activities. This is also a record of charter school instability and other unsavory tidbits.

Keep checking

CHARTER SCHOOL SCANDALS

Be sure to check out two other Great blogs:

-THE BROAD REPORT (as in Eli)
-THE PERIMETER PRIMATE

Tips For Fixing The Nation’s Education System | The Onion - America's Finest News Source

Tips For Fixing The Nation’s Education System | The Onion - America's Finest News Source:

Tips For Fixing The Nation’s Education System

INFOGRAPHIC • Education • News • ISSUE 50•36 • Sep 12, 2014

Public schools throughout the nation continue to contend with budget shortfalls and insufficient classroom resources, while U.S. test scores remain far behind those of many other developed nations. Here are measures that can be taken to fix America’s troubled education system:

• Discourage teacher turnover by downplaying the importance of having money and respect
• Limit school shootings to once a year in order to give students more time to focus on schoolwork
• Allow students from disadvantaged areas to be bussed into stronger schools, such as those in Finland or South Korea
• Maybe get some underprepared, overconfident recent college graduates in there to figure things out
• Federal law that prevents Dylan from raising his hand and wasting everybody’s time with the wrong answer
• Get rid of fungi unit
• Begin offering tenure to children who have been in the public school system for more than three years
• Offset the failures of the education system by de-emphasizing the importance of success, self-worth, and intellectual ability in our culture at large
• Tattoo grades on foreheads to shame low performers
• Toss Northrop Grumman another $4.5 billion and see what kind of curriculum it pumps out
• Whatever you do, don’t change anything about a property-tax-based funding system in which rich schools get richer while poor schools get poorer. That’s working just fine.
• Cut losses and reallocate funding to nation’s prison system

Tips For Fixing The Nation’s Education System | The Onion - America's Finest News Source:

The Latest in Blaming Teachers for EVERYTHING: Rudy Giuliani Edition:

The Latest in Blaming Teachers for EVERYTHING: Rudy Giuliani Edition

December 19, 2014 by Lily

Categories: General, I just had to say this

Tags: blaming teachers, Eric Garner, police, Rudy Giuliani, violence

First, I know you want to scream, but let’s all stay calm. We need to understand. There’s always a simple answer for every complex question. We will understand Rudy Giuliani’s bizarreness when we understand the answer to the following:

Teachers’ unions are responsible for…

1. Global Warming
2. Ebola
3. Police taking the life of Eric Garner

I’m not sure he wouldn’t make the case for All of The Above, but in recent interviews, Reality-Challenged Rudy Giuliani says “3”.

Because we oppose corporate franchise charter schools that have dismal records of improving education for poor kids and are racked with fraud and mismanagement. Because we don’t support private school vouchers where schools cherry-pick the students they want. Because we don’t think teachers should be paid by hitting their quota of kids who pass a standardized test.

So, according to Rudy regarding the situation in New York, “there’s some blame here that has to go to the teachers union” for the death of a man in Staten Island who was being arrested by several police for selling cigarettes on the street. Now, I could end there, but you’d think I was kidding. Or at least exaggerating.

Oh that it were so.

Google “You Can’t Make This Stuff Up” and you will find several pages of Rudy answering the question put to him by Geraldo Rivera about his opinion of the public outrage in the wake of the decision not to indict police officers responsible for the death of Eric Garner.

Brave Rudy wasn’t afraid to call out exactly who was to blame in the death of unarmed Eric Garner, wrestled to the ground by several officers, video-taped not resisting, but instead crying out that he couldn’t breathe in the choke hold that killed him. Brave, only because he had to know it would make him look completely ridiculous, and he tried to sell it anyway.

“Maybe all these left-wing politicians who want to blame police, maybe there’s some blame here that has to go to the teachers union for refusing to have schools where teachers are paid for performance, for fighting charter schools, for fighting vouchers so that we can drastically and dramatically improve education.”

There are quotes around those words. It’s on video.

Honestly, I’m not making this up. Let me translate.

Geraldo (kind of): Who gets blamed for police conduct?

Rudy (seriously): Education unions that won’t support privatizing public schools and paying teachers by test scores.

I just finished a presentation in Nashville on the elegantly simple tactic of school profiteers and privateers. It’s easy as 1, 2, 3.

1. Focus on poor and minority communities whose schools don’t even offer access to the courses they need to get into college and then use their fill-in-the-bubble test scores to call the whole public education system a failure.

2. Blame “bad teachers” for everything: Poverty, leaky roofs, hungry kids, Everything.

3. When someone wants to talk about what students in poverty need to succeed like a path to STEM fields or The Latest in Blaming Teachers for EVERYTHING: Rudy Giuliani Edition: