Bill Gates should be ashamed: His back-room, charter-school power play hurts kids, public education
Gates and his pals talked Washington legislators into an end-around on charter funding. It's a rotten deal for kids
Washington state has a school problem. The legislature confronts two court decisions that it doesn’t like.
First, the highest state court ordered the legislature to fund the schools fairly. For every day the legislature fails to do so, it pays a fine of $100,000. This affects 1,070,000 children.
Second, the court ruled that charter schools are not public schools and cannot receive public funding. This was a direct rebuff of Bill Gates, who lives in Seattle and spent millions on a referendum supporting charters that won by less than 1%. He and his friends want the legislature to bypass the court ruling so charters can get public money. This affects 1,000 children.
Which issue do you think the legislature acted on?
The one that mattered to Bill Gates and 1,000 students, of course.
The State Senate voted 27-20 in favor of a “fix” that allows charters to get public funding that helps 1,000 children. The legislature has done nothing to increase the fair, equitable funding of 1,070,000 children.
The dissident senators understood what an epic fail this vote was:
“Yet some legislators disagreed that the bill was the measure that was needed when the legislature is being fined $100,000 a day by the state Supreme Court for failing to fully fund education. Referred to as the McCleary lawsuit, legislators questioned whether that sweeping imperative should take priority over the fate of charter schools. Some proposed amendments to the charter school bill, which would have added language to confirm the precedence of fully funding K-12 education.
