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Saturday, August 6, 2016

Amy Frogge, Nashville Hero, Won Re-Election with “An Army of Moms” | Diane Ravitch's blog

Amy Frogge, Nashville Hero, Won Re-Election with “An Army of Moms” | Diane Ravitch's blog:

Amy Frogge, Nashville Hero, Won Re-Election with “An Army of Moms”



Amy Frogge is a member of the Metro Nashville School board. She is a lawyer and a parent of children in the Nashville public schools. When she was first elected four years ago, the charter industry spent $125,000 in an effort to defeat her. At the time, she was running as a concerned parent who thought there was too much testing, and she was unaware of the battles behind the scene between privatizers and supporters of public schools. She was outspent 5-1, and yet she won. For the past four years, she has been an intrepid supporter of public schools and has helped to repel the rapacious charter movement. For her courage and dedication to children, she is on the honor roll of this blog.
In the election this past week, the “reformers” spent $150,000 to taker her out, and she won again, overwhelmingly.
She was attacked by the local newspaper and by mailers that smeared and defamed her. There were even “push polls,” in which voters were falsely told that Amy defended child molesters and pornographers. Amy has never had criminal clients, and she is not currently practicing law (her husband was a public defender). Other pro-public school candidates were targets of similar smear tactics. It was an amazingly dirty campaign, funded by the usual corporate types, which funneled their money through Stand for Children.
The people of Nashville gave a sound thrashing to Stand for Children and its dirty politics and dark money.
How did Amy do it? She mobilized parents to work as volunteers in her campaign. Stand for Children dubbed them “an army of moms.” Great name!
To see a picture of Amy and some of her “Army of Moms,” look at her Facebook page.
I made an error in reporting the Nashville election results. One of Stand’s pro-charter candidates, incumbent Sharon Gentry, was re-elected. However, another pro-charter incumbent, Elissa Kim, stepped down and her seat was won by former teacher Christiane Buggs. (Kim was until recently head of recruitment for TFA nationwide.) Buggs will be an ally of the pro-public school members. There are nine board members. Only three are strongly pro-charter.
A great night for Nashville public schools, and a great lesson about how parents can beat Dark Money. Amy Frogge, Nashville Hero, Won Re-Election with “An Army of Moms” | Diane Ravitch's blog: