So-called Education Reform & the Art of Deception
The following are excerpts from a promotional pdf co-written in 2012 by Democrats for Education Reform (DFER) director Joe Williams & Charles Barone. The DFER group has links to Eli Broad, TFA, the Gates Foundation, charter schools and Wall Street hedge funds. They also helped place Arne Duncan in the position of Secretary of Education. From their paper:
PRESIDENT OBAMA IS THE BEST MESSENGER ‘THE MOVEMENT’ HAS EVER HAD
“For years, education reform was strong on message and somewhat weak on messengers. Too many of those who stepped forward to assume that role had their motives questioned… This President, chided by the right for his background as a community organizer, shattered that reality and reminded us that education reform is a deal which can, and must, be closed by Democrats.
The core of DFER’s mission rests on the understanding that it is our Party, the Democrats, which needs to take responsibility for preserving this crucial public institution, the cornerstone of our democracy. As Republican politicians like New Jersey Governor Chris Christie have noted, political reality necessitates that education reforms be led by Democrats if they are to succeed.
Indeed, governors of both parties nationwide have been empowered by the “cover” that has come from a Democratic President who has been willing to embrace reforms that are not always in line with the priorities of the nation’s powerful teachers unions.
The evidence of what this shift in a political messenger can bring is clear-cut. As a result of the RTTT competition, fifteen states lifted caps on the creation of new charter schools, and one state enacted a charter school law. Charter schools flourished more under three years of Obama than under eight years of George W. Bush. Funding for state charter school grants, for example, stayed between about $68 million and $81 million during Bush’s two terms, but jumped to $138 million during Obama’s first full budget year.
This increase wasn’t accidental – it was keeping a promise that then-candidate Obama made on the campaign trail. Obama also initiated, for the first time ever, a competitive grant program to expand and replicate high-quality charter school programs such as KIPP, Success Charter Network, and Uncommon Schools. In its first year alone, this program enabled 76,000 more students to attend 127 new and 31 expanded public charter schools in a dozen charter school networks nationwide.
The results of President Obama’s leadership on education have been profound in other areas as well. States from coast to coast have changed (or are in the process of changing) So-called Education Reform & the Art of Deception | Creative by Nature:
