Bernie is right on charter schools
Late last month, 11 people connected to California charter schools were indicted on criminal charges of grand theft, conspiracy, personal use of public money and financial conflict of interest. According to the Washington Post, over $50 million in total was stolen; the L.A. Times reportsthat $8.18 million went into the bank accounts and charitable trusts of the charter management company’s leaders, Sean McManus and Jason Schrock. The pair allegedly inflated enrollment numbers and cheated the kids who attended the schools they used as piggy banks.
This story is far from unique. During the month of May alone, we identified more than 40 newspaper stories from across the country documenting charter mismanagement, failure and outright fraud.
There was the May 29 story of the Tennessee charter CEO who was running a side business out of his charter school while its teachers were not being paid. and the May 25 story about the former charter board member who is seeking to make a real-estate killing based on knowledge he gained while on the Monument, Colo., charter school board. There was the May 6 story of a former school board member in Milwaukee who was bribed by a Philadelphia-based charter school company to operate three schools in Wisconsin.
Charter corruption, which now occurs every day, was one of several reasons why the NAACP called for a moratorium on new charter schools. Yet these daily instances of mismanagement, failure and fraud have not been enough to persuade charter advocates to address the concerns of our nation’s most prominent civil rights organization.
It is equally inexplicable that when Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders publicly supported that moratorium, he was subjected to a racialized attack — not only by The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools but here in the Daily News. It is long past time to set the record straight.
The majority of black and Latino families choose public schools, even when charters are an CONTINUE READING: Bernie is right on charter schools - New York Daily News
