solidaridad: Schools Matter: Eli Broad pays Parent Revolution to champion charters not to empower parents!

solidaridad: Schools Matter: Eli Broad pays Parent Revolution to champion charters not to empower parents!:

Schools Matter: Eli Broad pays Parent Revolution to champion charters not to empower parents!

by Robert D. Skeels * rdsathene

"To support efforts to help Charter Management Organizations apply for new LAUSD schools under LAUSD's School Choice Resolution" — Broad Foundation Donation to Parent Revolution



My newest Schools Matter piece Eli Broad pays Parent Revolution to champion charters not to empower parents! once again exposes the astroturf fakes, phonies, and frauds of the foppish millionaire from Benedict Canyon, Ben Austin, and his posse of privatizers piloting the so-called Parent Revolution. In the essay I look at their corporate funders, and put to lie all of Austin's disingenuous bluster about a "kids-first agenda." A direct quote about the purpose of a whopping $50,000 donation to Parent Revolution from plutocrat Eli Broad reminds us that school privatization and growing charter school market share is Parent Revolution's only purpose and agenda.

Published 2011-09-17 on Schools Matter, please read it there and share widely.

CRUCIAL TURNING POINT IN FIGHT FOR AFFIRMATIVE ACTION. | BAMN

CRUCIAL TURNING POINT IN FIGHT FOR AFFIRMATIVE ACTION. | BAMN:

Home / Civil Rights Affirmative Action / Overturn Prop 209/Prop 2: What You Can Do

Donna Stern | 08, September 2011 | Affirmative Action, Civil Rights | No Comments

For 15 years, California’s Proposition 209 has excluded tens of thousands of Latino/a, black, and Native American students from California’s premier public colleges and universities. For five years, Proposal 2 has done the same in Michigan.

We now have our best chance in years to reverse those attacks.On July 1, 2011, the Sixth Circuit struck down Michigan’s Proposal 2 because it violated the Fourteenth Amendment. Then, on July 8, Governor Jerry Brown filed a brief in the Ninth Circuit supporting BAMN’s claim that Proposition 209 violates the Fourteenth Amendment.

The Sixth Circuit as a whole is now considering whether to review the panel decision. The Ninth Circuit will be considering the California challenge in the next six months. Either or both cases will almost certainly end up in the Supreme Court. In every court, the decision will be close.

SIGN ON-LINE PETITION HERE!

When former UC Regent Ward Connerly attacked affirmative action through the courts, BAMN initiated and the NAACP, the UAW and others joined in organizing a demonstration of 50,000 persons outside the Supreme Court on the day that Grutter v. Bollinger was argued. That demonstration was the culmination of years of organizing. It was the crucial factor in winning the historic victory in Grutter upholding affirmative action in university admissions.

Proposition 209 and Proposal 2 have meant that this victory is not real in California and Michigan. To make it real, we need to organize a national campaign like the one that led to the victory in Grutter.

1. Petitions signed by tens of thousands of students and residents and resolutions of support from every student, civil rights and other organization demanding that the Regents and Presidents of the University of California and the University of Michigan end their “neutrality” and stand with us in court saying these proposals are unconstitutional. Download a hard copy of the petition here!
2. Conferences, forums, and rallies to mobilize support from minority students, from the black, Latino/a, and Native American communities, and from every supporter of civil rights. Fill out the volunteer form and a BAMN organizer will contact you!
3. Donate to the campaign today!

Michigan and California are two of the greatest strongholds of the Civil Rights Movement. If we overturn Proposal 2 and Proposition 209 in these two states, the Latino/a, black, and Native American students of Arizona, Washington, Oklahoma, and Nebraska will be able to stop or overturn similar bans in their states. If we lose, we are certain to see more victories by Connerly and others like him.

We are fighting for what kind of future minority students and the nation will have. We ask you to join with us in making sure that we have an equal and integrated future.

We can win that future and now is the time to do so.

Schooling in the Ownership Society: Washington Post hosts ownership society soiree

Schooling in the Ownership Society: Washington Post hosts ownership society soiree:

Washington Post hosts ownership society soiree

by Mike Klonsky

Katherine and David Bradley

Steve Brill is this year's Davis Guggenheim. His aptly titled "Class Warfare" book is this year's Waiting For Superman and has become the rallying point for a waning and frustrated clan of anti-teacher union busters, charter school operators, and corporate-style school reformers.

The Washington D.C. branch of the clan, still reeling from the expulsion of last year's hero, Michelle Rhee, gathered Thursday evening, for a soiree co-hosted by Washington Post Co. Chairman Donald E. Graham at the Embassy Row home of power philanthropistsKatherine and David Bradley. The gala was called to

Schools Matter: Eli Broad pays Parent Revolution to champion charters not to empower parents!

Schools Matter: Eli Broad pays Parent Revolution to champion charters not to empower parents!:

Eli Broad pays Parent Revolution to champion charters not to empower parents!

by Robert D. Skeels * rdsathene

"The private sector experience is important because there are business best practices which can improve the way the education organizations are operated." — The Broad Residency

"Parent Revolution, using the trigger law as leverage, mobilizes parents, school-by-school, to vote for one of four reform efforts—firing staff, replacing the principal, closing the school or converting to a charter. Once such a change is made, there is no mechanism for parents to be organized for sustained, long-term action to improve their local schools and communities. Organizing, in this sense, is an ongoing process that develops the capacity of its own members and uses the power of their experiences and numbers to effect change." — UCLA IDEA

Recently a community based activist (as opposed to Bill Gates funded astroturf activism), asked me about where the foppish millionaire from Benedict Canyon, Ben Austin, and his posse of privatizers piloting the so-called Parent Revolution (née Los Angeles

An open letter to Michael Moore from Sharon Higgins « Parents Across America

An open letter to Michael Moore from Sharon Higgins « Parents Across America:

An open letter to Michael Moore from Sharon Higgins

by leoniehaimson

Dear Mr. Moore,

I am one of the people who will have the opportunity to see you at your UC Berkeley book event this Saturday night. It’s going to be great to hear you speak!

Yesterday, as I listed to your interview on NPR’s Talk of the Nation, I was happy to hear how you have considered doing a documentary about the American school system. I’d like to add my voice to the chorus of people who make that request of you everyday.

It’s clear that you are aware of some of the devastating issues facing public education, such as the demoralization of teachers. I was impressed that you knew how Finland’s success is the result of great policy decisions made years ago (the type of decisions our country continues to ignore). I was very gratified to hear that you did not like Waiting for Superman.

I believe that you are going to get more and more requests to make a documentary about public education. A lot of public school supporters are extremely upset at how public

Jersey Jazzman: The "Passion" of Chris Christie

Jersey Jazzman: The "Passion" of Chris Christie:

The "Passion" of Chris Christie

by Duke

Our governor just can't understand why, after two years of relentless teacher bashing, broken promises, and slashed salaries, anybody wouldn't want to go into public service:

Popout

I think for those people who are feeling discouraged right now, because they're going to have to pay a percentage of their health insurance premium, or they're going to have to pay one or two points more towards a lfietime pension, then I would suggest to you respectfully that those people have completely lost touch with reality, and probably didn't have the passion to begin with.

See, all you cops and firefighters, you've got to understand that you can't expect to make salaries in the high five-figures just because you do a job where people point guns at your head or you run into burning buildings.

IL pension. Crunch time. « Fred Klonsky's blog

IL pension. Crunch time. « Fred Klonsky's blog:

IL pension. Crunch time.

by Fred Klonsky

The IEA has posted a video on their website reporting that meetings are now underway between legislators and union representatives regarding the future of Senate Bill 512, the pension killer.

From the sound quality, apparently the video was recorded using a string and an empty can of Progresso minestrone soup.

While not providing much in the way of detailed info, IEA lobbyist Will Lovett does report that the meetings will run through Tuesday.

It appears we will know what a bill will look like at that time.

So.

Get ready. Get your building ready. Get your email list ready.

It’s crunch time.

solidaridad: Elizabeth Terzakis and Adrienne Johnstone on Pedagogy and Liberation

solidaridad: Elizabeth Terzakis and Adrienne Johnstone on Pedagogy and Liberation:

Elizabeth Terzakis and Adrienne Johnstone on Pedagogy and Liberation

by Robert D. Skeels * rdsathene

"It is not surprising that the banking concept of education regards men as adaptable, manageable beings. The more students work at storing the deposits entrusted to them, the less they develop the critical consciousness which would result from their intervention in the world as transformers of that world. The more completely they accept the passive role imposed on them, the more they tend simply to adapt to the world as it is and to the fragmented view of reality deposited in them." — Paulo Freire (Pedagogy of the Oppressed)

Elizabeth Terzakis and Adrienne Johnstone speaking at Socialism 2011 on July 01, 2011 — Chicago, Illinois.



[Click if you can't listen to the audio]

Poverty for American Families on the Rise — Personal Voices

Poverty for American Families on the Rise — Personal Voices:

Poverty for American Families on the Rise — Personal Voices

by cynthia

This week we all saw grim statistics documenting how poverty is increasing for many more Americans: more than 46 million live below the federal poverty line. What is that line? $11,139/year for an individual, and$22,314/year for a family of four. Can you imagine living on that sum in a big city, where everything costs even more?

It confirms what we know when we look around in our own lives — longer periods of unemployment among friends and family, salaries cut but with more responsibilities for those still lucky enough to have a job, lack of

Stranger in a strange land. « Fred Klonsky's blog

Stranger in a strange land. « Fred Klonsky's blog:

Stranger in a strange land.

by Fred Klonsky

Guest post by North Shore Teacher.

Your latest post on the late Harvard educator and his concerns about the damaging effects of central curriculum and standardized testing made me want to share something that is happening presently in my classroom. We have a new student, and this is her first year in a traditional public school. Her previous experience was in a private progressive school that didn’t use tests, textbooks, or even school bells.

She is brilliant. Curious, knowledgeable, engaged, humorous, and caring. Her parents picked our school because they felt it would be a bridge between her progressive world and traditional public schools, but now, after just under 4 weeks of school, they have a sleepless, anxious daughter who

Friends of Education asks your help to evaluate Superintendent Boasberg | DeFENSE

Friends of Education asks your help to evaluate Superintendent Boasberg | DeFENSE:

Friends of Education asks your help to evaluate Superintendent Boasberg

by defensedenver

From our allies at Friends of Education:

The Denver Public Schools Board of Education has begun work on Superintendent Tom Boasberg’s annual review. Here at Friends of Education, we thought we’d help the Board’s process along by giving you a chance to voice your opinion. We’ve created a survey online, and we would like you to take 2 minutes to fill it out. The survey is anonymous.

Click here for the survey: http://www.surveygizmo.com/s3/641920/Survey-of-Denver-Public-Schools

Feel free to forward this link to as many people you know who care about Denver’s schools. Only one survey per computer is allowed.

Remember, it’s Our DPS, and we all have the right to voice our opinions about how we think our school district is being run.

Sincerely,

Nicolas Weiser, President

Friends of Education

Please go fill it out!