Beware These Three Governors, All Republican Presidential Contenders | janresseger

Beware These Three Governors, All Republican Presidential Contenders | janresseger:

Beware These Three Governors, All Republican Presidential Contenders

After today, this blog will take a three week end of summer break.  Look for a new post on Monday, September 13!

Campbell Brown is the far-right, former CNN anchor who has become an advocate against teachers’ unions and due process protections for teachers.  She has now founded a so-called news site, The Seventy Four.  Reporters for Politico call it a “news advocacy site.” There are, of course, questions about objectivity in Campbell Brown’s venture, both in possible biases in the opinions expressed and in the selection of topics to cover.  For example, The Seventy Four has begun broadcasting debates on the topic of public education policy among the Republican candidates for president. Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have, to my knowledge, not been invited.  The first of these debates, co-sponsored by The Seventy Four and the American Federation for Children—Betsy DeVos’ organization that promotes school vouchers, took place this week.  Not surprisingly, the candidates declared themselves devoted to far-right education doctrine, and the program was set up to affirm the far right opinions of the candidates who appeared.

It is my plan to concentrate more deeply on the race for President in a few months when November 2016 is closer.  In the meantime, however, it is important for those of us who share a concern about the future of public education to be very clear about the candidates who have significant records on public education.  Three of the Republican candidates—whose ideas have been covered in recent weeks in the mainstream media or in reports from organizations that support public education instead of privatization—brag about education “reforms” as the centerpiece of their records as governor.  This post will explore these three governors’ records to provide some balance to what you may have heard in the recent event staged by Campbell Brown and Betsy DeVos.

There is Ohio’s current governor, John Kasich.  In a recent piece at the Education Opportunity Network, Jeff Bryant covers Kasich: “Given the current crop of Republican governors bidding for the presidential nomination, it is difficult to pick which has been worse on education policy… But the effect Governor Kasich has had on public education policy in Ohio is especially atrocious.”  In her Washington Post column, Valerie Strauss summarizes Kasich’s record on education: “Kasich has pushed key tenets of corporate school reform: expanding charter schools… increasing the number of school vouchers… (implementing) performance pay for teachers… evaluating educators by student standardized test scores in math and reading…. Meanwhile, the Ohio Education Department in Kasich’s administration is in turmoil.  David Hansen, his administration’s chief for school choice and charter schools resigned… after admitting that he had unilaterally withheld failing scores of charter schools in state evaluations of the schools’ sponsor organizations so they wouldn’t look so bad… Under his watch, funding for traditional public schools—which enroll 90 percent of Ohio’s students—declined by some half a billion dollars, while funding for charter schools has increased at least 27 percent, with charters now receiving more public funds from the state per student than traditional public schools…. If Kasich’s goal for his reform efforts was to Beware These Three Governors, All Republican Presidential Contenders | janresseger:

Why young kids need less class time — and more play time — at school - The Washington Post

Why young kids need less class time — and more play time — at school - The Washington Post:

Why young kids need less class time — and more play time — at school

I have published a number of pieces over the last year or so on the importance of allowing young children to play in school rather than sit for hours at a desk laboring over academic tasks. Here is a new post making the case for why less class time — and more play time — will actually lead to a better education for kids, however counter-intuitive that may sound. It was written by Debbie Rhea, an associate dean of the Harris College of Nursing and Health Sciences and director of the LiiNk Project (www.liinkproject.tcu.edu. ) at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth. The LiiNk Project is described in the post.

By Debbie Rhea

It seems counter-intuitive to think that less classroom time and more outdoor play would lead to a better education for kids. But longer time on task doesn’t equate to better results, only greater burnout.

For years, educators have tried different unsuccessful strategies – more testing, more instruction– to reverse these trends. The answer, however, is not more class time. It’s more play.

Other countries have figured this out. In Finland, for example, students take a 15-minute break for outdoor play after every 45 minutes of classroom time. In East Asia, most primary schools give their students a 10-minute break after 40 minutes or so of instruction.

Here in the United States, however, the average first-grader spends seven hours a day at school, sometimes without any recess, much less one outdoors and unstructured.

[Why so many kids can’t sit still in school today]

Kids are built to move, and having more time for unstructured, outdoor play is essentially like a reset button. It not only helps to break up the day, but it allows kids to blow off steam and apply what is taught in the classroom to a play environment where the mind-body connection can flourish.

When any human sits for longer than about 20 minutes, the physiology of the brain and body changes, robbing the brain of needed oxygen and glucose, or brain fuel. The brain essentially just falls asleep when we sit for too long. Movement and activity stimulate the neurons that fire in the brain. When we sit, those neurons aren’t firing.

Study after study has affirmed the importance of play in children’s physical and mental health. It helps boost language development, problem solving, risk management and independent learning skills. Play is linked to improvements in academic skills, classroom behavior, healthy emotional Why young kids need less class time — and more play time — at school - The Washington Post:

Republicans’ deep hatred for teachers can’t be denied — and they’re not even trying

Republicans’ deep hatred for teachers can’t be denied — and they’re not even trying:

Republicans’ deep hatred for teachers can’t be denied — and they’re not even trying

John Kasich wants to take lounges away from teachers. He is just the latest Republican to make an enemy of America’s educators

It’s August, the heat is miserable, kids are going back to school and that means one thing for America’s conservatives: it’s the perfect time to take a cheap shot at the nation’s teachers.

John Kasich, the Republican governor of Ohio – who is generally considered less extreme than Texas Senator Ted Cruz, less dynastic than former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and less crazy than professional troll Donald Trump – recently said : “If I were, not president, if I were king in America, I would abolish all teachers’ lounges where they sit together and worry about ‘woe is us’.”

Kasich addressed a New Hampshire “education summit” sponsored by the 74 Million , an education “news site” which Huffington Post points out is run by failed CNN hostCampbell Brown “despite having little to no training in education, and never having taught students herself.” Many other Republican presidential hopefuls, including Governors Bush, Scott Walker of Wisconsin, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana and Chris Christie of New Jersey, addressed the gathering.

Republicans love to hate teachers and imply that all the ills of US society are the result of their laziness. If only schools could be turned over to market forces and not held back by greedy teacher unions, conservative logic goes, everything would be fine – even though charter schools perform no better than traditional schools. Trying to bust unions in general (and those of teachers in particular) turns conservatives on as much as trying to deny climate change , defend the NRA , defund Planned Parenthoodor battle for a check from the Koch brothers.

But trying to deny teachers a place to rest for a few minutes between classes, as Kasich is fantasizing about, is ludicrous. What’s wrong with having a place to eat a snack between classes or talk to other teachers about lesson plans and their common students without 30 children within ear shot?

According to Politico’s analysis of Kasich’s 45 minute conversation with Brown, the Republican hopeful wants to remove teachers’ lounges to keep educators from complaining to one another and, presumably, to keep them from colluding in greed to protect their benefits and working conditions. Imagine the possibilities. Without a Republicans’ deep hatred for teachers can’t be denied — and they’re not even trying:

Fired Broward teacher should be rehired, state judge says - Sun Sentinel

Fired Broward teacher should be rehired, state judge says - Sun Sentinel:

Judge blasts Broward school leaders, defends fired teacher

Controversial math teacher was wrongly fired due to the actions of "incompetent, careless and biased" Broward school administrators and should be rehired, a state judge has recommended.

Steven Yerks, 55, lost his job at Boyd Anderson High in Lauderdale Lakes after receiving a poor evaluation. But Administrative Law Judge Robert Meale said Yerks worked "faithfully and diligently for his students," improved student achievement and was the victim of a botched review.

Yerks, who made $75,000 a year, should be reinstated with back pay, the judge wrote.

"Among the first teachers to arrive at school each day, always wearing a tie, (Yerks) typically reported for duty … between 6:15 a.m. and 6:30 a.m., which was 30 to 45 minutes before teachers were required to report," Meale wrote. "When necessary, he stayed late and made himself available to meet with students during lunch."

Meale's decision is non-binding, so the School Board still has the final decision whether to rehire Yerks. The board has a mixed record when it comes to accepting recommendations to rehire teachers.

Yerks could not be reached for comment but his teaching history was detailed in a Sun Sentinel article in August 2014.

District officials accused him of making racially insensitive comments in his class, calling students names such as moron, stupid and idiot, yelling at reading coaches in front of students and locking students out of class.

Yerks was a placed on probation and recommended to be fired from Cooper City High in 2000, but was transferred to Boyd Anderson after he filed a grievance. He received satisfactory evaluations every year except his final year. Although he was investigated for allegations of misusing district money and child abuse, he was never found guilty.

Administrators also voiced concerns because most students in Yerks' advanced level and remedial classes were failing. Yerks told the judge the administration was placing unqualified students in advanced classes, and students in remedial courses were "unmotivated and did not try." He said he wouldn't give them grades they didn't earn.

Meale agreed, saying Yerks did not assign poor grades randomly or mistakenly. "The students earned these grades," he wrote.

The judge accused Boyd Anderson Principal Angel Almanzar and Assistant Principal Leslie Farr of misusing a complicated classroom observation tool in a way that was unfair to Yerks on his evaluation. As an example, the judge wrote that Yerks was penalized for not having a bulletin board decorated with students' work, even though the evaluation doesn't require that.

"The deployment of such a powerful, flawed tool by observers who are careless, incompetent and biased yields lots of useless data," the judge wrote.

Almanzar declined to comment andFired Broward teacher should be rehired, state judge says - Sun Sentinel:

Read the judge's decision on Steven YerksDocument

Elia says supporting opt-outs ‘unethical,’ vows to keep pushing feds for waiver | Chalkbeat

Elia says supporting opt-outs ‘unethical,’ vows to keep pushing feds for waiver | Chalkbeat:

Elia says supporting opt-outs ‘unethical,’ vows to keep pushing feds for waiver 

The head of New York’s education department came down hard Thursday on teachers who encouraged the growing boycott of state tests this year.

“I think opt-out is something that is not reasonable,” State Education Commissioner MaryEllen Elia said at an event hosted by the teacher advocacy group Educators 4 Excellence. “I am absolutely shocked if, and I don’t know that this happened, but if any educators supported and encouraged opt-outs. I think it’s unethical.”

Elia’s comments came after an unprecedented number of students declined to take the New York’s English and math exams this spring. Tallies released last week put the total at about one in five students statewide, though the opt-out movement had a smaller presence in New York City.

The commissioner’s remarks are in line with her previous comments about the tests, which Elia has defended as tools that help educators guide their work, track achievement gaps between student groups, and indicate when individual schools aren’t measuring up. Butparents and advocates who have encouraged the opt-out movement say the tests don’t provide useful information, encourage schools to narrow their curriculum, and feed into unhelpful teacher evaluations.

Elia is under pressure to keep the movement from growing, which could jeopardize teacher evaluations and assessments of struggling schools in some districts. Since starting in July, she’s announced that the state is replacing the controversial test-maker Pearson and called attention to a planned review of the Common Core standards.

At another point in the event Thursday, the commissioner defended teachers against critics of the education system, saying that pundits shouldn’t direct blame toward those doing the work of helping students learn.

“I’m a commissioner that will never bash teachers,” she said. “We can’t look at making the teacher the scapegoat for problems that may have existed in bureaucracies we have to fix.”

Elia also criticized the federal education department for not allowing the state to make changes that could have reduced or eased testing for students with severe disabilities and some English learners.

“I believe we have not done as a profession, and the education leaders of this country through [the Department of Education], have not done what’s necessary to put in place appropriate assessments for kids who are severely disabled,” she said.

This spring, federal officials rejected New York’s appeal to exempt English learners who have attended U.S. schools for less than two years from taking the tests. That waiver would have also provided more flexibility to adjust the difficulty level of tests taken by students with severe disabilities.

“I’ve had conversations with U.S. DOE about it, and we need to get there,” Elia said. “It is on my agenda.”Elia says supporting opt-outs ‘unethical,’ vows to keep pushing feds for waiver | Chalkbeat:

How Will Pearson Spend $2 Billion More On Education? : NPR Ed : NPR

How Will Pearson Spend $2 Billion More On Education? : NPR Ed : NPR:

How Will Pearson Spend $2 Billion More On Education?

Pearson was already the biggest education company in the world. Now its education business is getting even bigger. In the last several weeks the company has sold off its two major media brands, the Financial Times (for $1.3 billion), and The Economist(for about $730 million).

This move is part of a general moment of back-to-school upheaval in the education industry. News Corp has just announced that its much-hyped ed-tech brand Amplify is a $371 million writeoff. Yet at the same time, ed-tech venture capital deals havedoubled in the last 12 months to a reported total $2.3 billion. Chinese ed-tech companies, in particular, are raising lots of money.

There is a lot of room for everyone to grow. Pearson says it currently does $5 billion worth of business annually in the U.S. That's out of what the company estimates is a total of $1 trillion dollars spent each year on education — most of it public money.

As digital technologies continue to play a larger role in both instructional delivery and assessment, many observers see a larger role for private industry as well.

"In the future world there are going to be more public-private partnerships in education," says Pearson's North American CEO, Don Kilburn. In other words, this isn't just about the expansion of a few companies — this is about the maturing of an entire sector.

Pearson CEO John Fallon announced that thanks to The Economist and FT sales, the company is now "100 percent focused on our global education strategy." In a blog post,he elaborated:

"In recent years, we've developed an increasing focus on our biggest, most exciting opportunity — to help people make progress in their lives through learning ... it's become clear to me and the Pearson board that the scale of the challenge requires our undivided attention."

But is all this money and attention good news for learners?

Prove You're Good

Amar Kumar says it will be. He is a Senior VP at Pearson and part of a relatively new unit called "Efficacy & Research." And he says the company wants to bring more "rigor and transparency" by measuring the impact of everything they do.

"This company is serious about doubling down on education," he says. "We care about it. We feel like we're well equipped to do it. The efficacy agenda ensures that when we do it, it's going to be with the right level of quality and rigor."

Since 2013, Kumar says, Pearson has begun evaluating all its investments and partnerships not only on financial performance (Can we get customers and make money?) but also on educational performance (Can we help learners succeed?).

It may seem like a pretty basic proposition: Invest in products and services that can How Will Pearson Spend $2 Billion More On Education? : NPR Ed : NPR:

The Founding Fathers Are Turning Over In Their Graves. | DCGEducator: Doing The Right Thing

The Founding Fathers Are Turning Over In Their Graves. | DCGEducator: Doing The Right Thing:

The Founding Fathers Are Turning Over In Their Graves.

The First Amendment of The Constitution of the United States says,“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

The Fourteenth Amendment adds, “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” (including the first amendment)

So how well has Republican presidential hopeful and Governor of Ohio John Kasich defended the first amendment?

As the Ohio Republican explained it, he believes teachers congregate and, while talking among themselves, express concerns to one another about lost benefits and pay cuts. Kasich “apparently sees this as a problem – not the threat of lost benefits and pay cuts, but rather, the fact that teachers have these ‘negative’ conversations, driven by “the unions.”

He said, “I’ll tell you what the unions do, unfortunately, too much of the time. There’s a constant negative comment to, “They’re going to take your benefits,” “They’re going to take your pay.” And so if I were not president but king in America I would abolish all teachers’ lounges where they sit together and worry about how “woe is us.”

It seems, therefore that Governor Kasich wants to prohibit “the right of the The Founding Fathers Are Turning Over In Their Graves. | DCGEducator: Doing The Right Thing:

Common Core: The Lego Kit of Education | Steve Nelson

Common Core: The Lego Kit of Education | Steve Nelson:

Common Core: The Lego Kit of Education

I always hated kits.

My Cub Scout career lasted two meetings. The handbook for knot tying was so much less interesting than my own efforts to hang the dog from a low branch, only to have the slipknot slip. I wasn't an animal abuser. He was the only nearby heavy object with a collar. Fortunately, my knot experimentation came to fruition later, when I learned how to suspend a backpack with cheese in it from a tree branch so as to save my dinner from the bears. I invented the clove hitch. (Although modesty requires that I admit that I was probably not the first).

I hated model airplanes. I did like the smell of the glue, so my dislike of the kits probably saved me from a serious addiction. Anything with numbered parts and instructions continues to irritate me. When assembling various toys and appliances over the years, I try to put things together by sight and logic and refer to instructions only when stymied. I know . . . it's stupid. Kits and instructions are convenient and save time and trouble.

But not in education.

It's a lovely thing to have childhood biases confirmed. My innate inclination was affirmed by the recent report on the relative benefits of Lego kits vs. Lego "free play."The findings were not surprising to me from either an innocent child or skeptical educator point of view. Children who play with piles of Legos, inventing and building as they wish, exhibit far more long-term creativity than children who build things from Lego kits. It is clear that rearranging Legos from a messy pile is a better learning experience than working from a kit with directions (unless you're in a hurry and hope to use the finished Lego product as a household appliance).

In the political cacophony over the Common Core, this fundamental understanding is seldom, if ever, heard. The Common Core and other iterations of standardized expectations and assessments turn the powerful joy of discovery and experimentation into the model airplane kits of 21st century education policy. (Unfortunately, the glue part too, as too many adolescents self-medicate to avoid the tedium and stress of current school practice.)

Most folks who study child development recognize the importance of play. This is widely understood - if not broadly enough applied - in early childhood education. But as is true of most things in education, a little understanding is turned into a lot of kits. In our commercialized educational culture, the simple idea of play is monetized, with very intentionally designed materials and sequences of "play" packaged in colorful, highly promoted "innovations." This is profitable, but unnecessary. Good nursery schools, pre-schools and kindergartens provide raw materials with which small children construct knowledge, exercise the fantastic and create marvels that adults might never imagine.

This understanding of discovery, exploration and imagination is endangered in today's early education environment, threatened by pre-academic work and developmentally inappropriate expectations. That's bad enough, but discovery, Common Core: The Lego Kit of Education | Steve Nelson:

ESEA Should Address the Impact of Child Poverty on STEM Performance | Commentary - Beltway Insiders

ESEA Should Address the Impact of Child Poverty on STEM Performance | Commentary - Beltway Insiders:

ESEA Should Address the Impact of Child Poverty on STEM Performance 

“It is nothing short of a miracle that modern methods of instruction have not yet entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry.” That was Albert Einstein’s assessment of American education in 1949.

As Congress prepares to complete reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, members should reflect on Einstein’s judgment, especially when they shine the spotlight on science. Striking the right balance between quantifying outcomes through standardized tests and evaluating creative performance through relatively subjective appraisals is not an easy task. But if we care about the science, technology, engineering and mathematics workforce of the future, we must get the balance right. And we must understand the extraordinary impact childhood poverty has on science performance.

Had 9/11 never happened and President George W. Bush not responded by invading Iraq, he might be remembered for his real passion: education. He proposed his signature domestic policy bill, No Child Left Behind, on Jan. 21, 2001, just one day after he was sworn into office. One year later, he signed the bill into law, reauthorizing the ESEA, as preceding presidents had done every five years since it was first enacted as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s “War on Poverty” in 1965.

But NCLB put the ESEA on a new footing by mandating statewide standardized testing for all students. To qualify for Title I federal funding under NCLB, schools had to demonstrate “adequate yearly progress” — but only in mathematics and reading. A number of STEM advocates warned at the time that teachers would teach to the test and in the process simply snub science.

And that’s exactly what happened. During the late 1980s and through the mid-1990s, the time elementary school teachers spent on math and science instruction in grades one through four had been increasing modestly. But during the late 1990s, science hours began to slip, and by 2008, seven years into NCLB, they had plunged by almost 25 percent from their 1994 high, declining to their lowest level since 1988, according to the National Center for Education Statistics Schools and Staffing Survey. Not surprisingly, reading and math hours suffered no reductions: reading actually rose by almost 10 percent.

By 2008, the ESEA had been modified to include science testing. But in the latest reauthorization bills (HR 5 and S 1177), all of STEM education seems to be a child left behind. While the bills, eliminate testing as a requirement for Title I funding — a positive step, Einstein would say — the initial drafts omitted any significant reference to STEM. And although the Senate Education Committee eventually passed an amendment including reauthorization of the Math Science Partnership program, the vote was a narrow 12 to 10. In the House bill, STEM has remained an orphan.

There is little dispute that 21st century jobs demand increased proficiency in STEM, and that as a nation, we are falling behind our global competitors in those critical areas. That makes the resistance on Capitol Hill all the more puzzling.

But even if lawmakers wake up, the ESEA may still be far off the mark when it comes to science. Programs such as the Math Science Partnerships, for example, focus on secondary school education, but there is strong evidence that by the time children reach high school age much of their life’s die has already been cast. It is particularly true for science, which by its nature is linear and sequential.

Still, early engagement is only a partial answer, as a 2010 Department of Health and Human Services study of the Head Start program showed. Head Start, begun as part of the War on Poverty, attempts to improve the school readiness of low-income children. But the 2010 study found that by the end of first grade, the benefits of Head Start are largely absent.

Robert Putnam’s recent book, “Our Kids: The American Dream In Crisis,” provides an insight into why that might be. Putnam, a renowned Harvard political scientist, makes a compelling case that de facto segregation by socioeconomic status in housing and schools is a major ESEA Should Address the Impact of Child Poverty on STEM Performance | Commentary - Beltway Insiders:

'Smell Something, Say Something!' Teachers' Unions Do Not Hurt Student Outcomes. | Jared Bernstein

'Smell Something, Say Something!' Teachers' Unions Do Not Hurt Student Outcomes. | Jared Bernstein:

'Smell Something, Say Something!' Teachers' Unions Do Not Hurt Student Outcomes.

Welcome to the first edition of a new On The Economy feature, dedicated to the parting admonition of the great Jon Stewart: when it comes to BS, "smell something, say something!"

To be clear, I'm not trying to emulate the fact checkers out there. Nor am I going to peruse the papers, like Dean does so effectively, to find errant economics reporting. Instead, I'm just going to occasionally pounce on a specific brand of assertion: a stylized, accepted fact that isn't a fact at all.

For example, conservative partisans (as well as many centrist Democrats) consistently assert that teachers' unions are bad for student outcomes, and if we want to improve such outcomes, we must diminish the impact of teachers' unions. Most recently, this negative role of unions was a featured assertion in a Republican primary debate.

That claim smelled bad to me, as in I know of no body of evidence to support it. I know it's a constant refrain, but I figured I'd have seen something from the deep academic community that runs analyses of such issues over the years to support it, and I haven't.

Maybe I missed it. So I asked some experts in this field and they confirmed my intuition.

-- Berkeley econ prof Jesse Rothstein, who's done important work on "value-added-measurement" in teacher evaluations, confirmed my priors that such evidence is wanting.

-- He and education policy expert Kevin Carey made the same interesting point: there's a significant measurement challenge in that school districts that don't have unions, and would thus serve as a useful control, "tend to have teachers associations and/or contracts that aren't too different from what unionized districts have" (Rothstein).

-- The unions themselves will correctly tell you that states with fewer unions, including "right-to-work" states, have worse student outcomes. And there are countries, like Finland, that have very high unionization rates and consistently rank highly in international comparisons of student outcomes. But, as Carey stressed, right-to-work states are also poorer, and Finland ain't the US, and there's the quasi-union arrangements noted above, even in non-union states. So it's very hard to make an all-else-equal run at this question.

-- Larry Mishel shares this paper by himself and Emma Garcia. It tests -- rigorously, I thought -- for correlations -- again, we're not talking causality -- between the strength of teachers unions and whether unions shift more experienced and higher credentialed teachers away from poorer schools. Their results fail "to show an association between the strength of unions in the states and the allocation of teacher credentials across schools. We find no negative or no association between the allocations of credentials in average schools or in high poverty schools and the unions' 'Smell Something, Say Something!' Teachers' Unions Do Not Hurt Student Outcomes. | Jared Bernstein:

“Lay us off now,” Chicago Teachers Union official says - World Socialist Web Site

“Lay us off now,” Chicago Teachers Union official says - World Socialist Web Site:

“Lay us off now,” Chicago Teachers Union official says

The Chicago Public Schools (CPS), the third-largest school district in the United States, hosted public hearings on the district’s budget on August 18. Hundreds of parents and teachers expressed their anger at continued cuts to neighborhood schools and described the effects these would have on teaching and learning conditions.

CPS announced a proposed budget that slashes an additional 479 positions on top of an already-announced 1,400 layoffs, and cuts $200 million in spending. The proposed budget deficit is currently $480 million short, and additional cuts and layoffs are expected. Special education programs are expected to be hardest hit, with an estimated 200 positions eliminated district-wide. While neighborhood schools will be hit by $60 million in cuts, charter schools will receive a $30 million increase in funding.

If anyone expected the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) to oppose the cuts and layoffs they would have been sadly mistaken. Speaking at the end of the hearing on the north side, CTU Vice President Jesse Sharkey, a leading member of the International Socialist Organization, gave advice to CPS officials on how best to wipe out teachers’ jobs.

Referring to potential layoffs of more teachers in the midst of the school year if the $480 million budget gap is not resolved, Sharkey expressed his preference for immediate layoffs, saying, “If you lay us off now, we can look for new jobs. If you let us go in the middle of the year, that’s our livelihood.”

Sharkey’s comment is only the latest confirmation of the right-wing character of the ISO, which is little more than an adjunct of the Democratic Party. The organization, which has nothing whatsoever to do with socialism, accepts without question the necessity for austerity, teacher layoffs and other anti-working class attacks. In his position in the leadership of the CTU, Sharkey functions as every other union bureaucrat enforcing the dictates of big business and the capitalist political establishment.

The CTU are facilitating Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s plans to downsize the district. Sharkey and other officials have repeated the lie that there is no money and blocked a strike by the district’s 28,000 teachers when the labor agreement expired on June 30. Since then they have diligently worked to lower teacher expectations over wages and benefit improvements.

During the 2012 strike and in the years afterwards, CTU president Karen Lewis and vice president Sharkey presented Emanuel as the arch-villain in order to posture as opponents of his attacks on teachers and school privatization policies. However, they have long since mended fences with the mayor.

In an interview earlier this month with Chicago magazine, Lewis stressed her now cozy relationship with the Democratic mayor. “I think that my relationship with Rahm is better,” Lewis told the magazine. “I can just run [my ideas] up the flagpole by Rahm. And he has been very open.”

Lewis went on to claim that Emanuel was really the victim of the Republican governor Bruce Rauner, elected in November 2014, who forced the mayor into doing things he really didn’t want to do: “I think part of the problem we had last time is that Rahm had an agenda that was pushed by other people, including [Gov. Bruce] Rauner, that I don’t know if Rahm even truly believed in. A lot of it was kind of like, ‘Put the union in their place and dah dah dah.’ The elephant in the room is the budget and not having any money. So then it becomes a matter of what your priorities are, what your vision is. And I think we have yet to see that, but I think [Rahm’s] thinking about it.”

In other words, Emanuel has seen the light: it is far better to use the services of the CTU to lay off teachers and destroy public education than to try to circumvent it and provoke a rebellion by the teachers that Lewis, Sharkey & Co. might not be able to control.

These developments are yet another damning indictment of all those who held up the CTU “Lay us off now,” Chicago Teachers Union official says - World Socialist Web Site:

Democratic Party Elites Abandoned Public Education | Al Jazeera America

Democratic Party Elites Abandoned Public Education | Al Jazeera America:

Democratic Party elites have abandoned public education

Too many Democrats advocate education reforms that affect other people’s children

For years, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s children attended public school in Virginia. Now, he hasannounced that they will go to the University of Chicago Laboratory School, the private school where Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel sends his kids and where Barack Obama sent his daughters when he lived in Chicago. Thetuition for the 2015-2016 school year is approximately $30,000.

Duncan’s senior advisor and former education commissioner of New York, John King, also sends his daughters to a private Montessori school near Albany; New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s daughters, on their part, attend an elite boarding school in Massachusetts.

There is nothing wrong with private school. The problem here, though, is that too many Democratic elites advocate education reforms such as the Common Core standards, charter schools, and high-stakes testing with minimal first-hand knowledge of how they affect schools or children. In sending their children to private schools, Democratic elites exempt themselves from policies that they might oppose if they saw their own children being harmed by them.

Obama’s lead

In 2008, many Democrats hoped that Barack Obama would send his children to public school as Jimmy Carter did before him. In their book “President Obama and Education Reform,” Robert Maranto and Michael Q. McShane explain why that was not likely to happen.

The key to understanding Obama’s education policy, according to Maranto and McShane, is his biography. Obama attended the prestigious Punahou School in Hawaii, an experience that prepared him for college and law school. Obama also observed from a distance a Hawaiian public school system rife with ethnic violence, low academic standards and an unresponsive bureaucracy. These experiences influenced Obama’s decision to send his daughters to Sidwell Friends, the elite Washington, D.C. institution whose alumni include the younger Albert Gore and Chelsea Clinton.

As president, Obama has advocated reforms to the public education system that include upping merit pay, weakening tenure rules and evaluating teachers by student test scores. Obama’s most controversial education policy, however, was the Race to the Top program that gave states additional incentives to adopt the Common Core standards. 

Arne Duncan chose for his own children a school that was minimally affected by the reforms he advocated for as Education Secretary.

The Common Core, according to one critic, is “the product of a push by private foundations acting in the interest of multinational corporations to colonize public education in the United States.” The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Business Roundtable and corporations such as IBM and Exxon have backed the Common Core. Still, politicians are essential to generate sufficient support for effective market-based education reform.

Maranto and McShane applaud Obama’s efforts to recast education reform in the language of equity, justice and civil rights. Just as President Richard Nixon was able to convince Republicans to make peace with China, Obama has been able to convince Democrats to support market-based education reforms.

The question remains, though: Are these reforms making public schools better? Or are they widening the gap between the kinds of education offered at public and elite private schools?

No skin in the game

According to education scholar Diane Ravitch, most educated parents believe that good schools have full curricula, experienced staffs, arts programs, well-staffed libraries, beautiful campuses and small classes. All of these things are par for the course at America’s finest private schools.

But it costs a lot of money to offer students this kind of education. In response, education reformers favor economies of scale, where students across the country take the same standardized tests, as well as reforms that tend to favor corporations rather than teachers. For example, the Race to the Top program awarded Pearson Democratic Party Elites Abandoned Public Education | Al Jazeera America: