School Choice and Charter Proponents Target Public Education in Key States |

School Choice and Charter Proponents Target Public Education in Key States |

School Choice and Charter Proponents Target Public Education in Key States

But teachers and their allies are fighting back in Arizona, Kentucky and elsewhere.

Three years ago in West Virginia, roughly 20,000 educators went on strike and shut down public schools across the state, protesting low pay and high health care costs. Their historic nine-day labor stoppage led to a 5% pay increase for teachers and school service personnel. Inspired by the success in West Virginia, strikes in states including Oklahoma, Colorado and California soon followed.

The uprising sparked a wave of national attention, and the future of teacher organizing seemed more promising than it had in years. Their movement even had a name: “Red for Ed” — which referenced the red clothing educators and their allies wore each time they took to the streets for public schools. A year later, West Virginia educators walked off the job again in an effort to defeat a bill permitting charter schools to operate in their state. This time their success was more limited; teachers watered down the legislation, but lawmakers still rammed a version through in a special session, authorizing three charters to open by July 2023, with potential for more after that.

---

Join our email list to get the stories that mainstream news is overlooking.
Sign up for Capital & Main’s newsletter and get more stories like this in your email.

---

Today, it’s school choice advocates who feel they have the momentum. Since the start of the year, two states that helped launch the national teacher uprising in 2018 — West Virginia and Kentucky — have passed some of the most expansive school choice policies in the country. And public education advocates in a third pivotal “Red for Ed” state, Arizona, have been fighting CONTINUE READING: School Choice and Charter Proponents Target Public Education in Key States |

Can Unions Defang Charter School Vampires? | gadflyonthewallblog

Can Unions Defang Charter School Vampires? | gadflyonthewallblog

Can Unions Defang Charter School Vampires?

What if a vampire suddenly lost its fangs?

Would it still be a vampire?

That’s the question at the heart of a major change in the largest charter school network in western Pennsylvania.

This week, staff at the Propel network of charter schools voted overwhelmingly to unionize.

So the money men behind the Allegheny County system of charter schools are probably wondering if they’re still investing in charter schools at all.

After all, when encumbered by the need to collectively bargain with employees, can a charter still do all its usual profitizing tricks?

Thursday, Propel teachers and other staff voted 236-82 to join the Pennsylvania State Education Association (PSEA).

The drive took 9 months to achieve. Propel enrolls about 4,000 students at 13 schools in Braddock Hills, Hazelwood, Homestead, McKeesport, Pitcairn, Turtle Creek, Munhall, McKees Rocks and the North Side.

Though PSEA represents staff at about a dozen charters throughout the state, CONTINUE READING: Can Unions Defang Charter School Vampires? | gadflyonthewallblog

Education Matters: Gary Chartrand spreads misinformation about charter schools, again.

Education Matters: Gary Chartrand spreads misinformation about charter schools, again.

Gary Chartrand spreads misinformation about charter schools, again

Gary Chartrand really supports charter schools; that is undeniable; however, the same can’t be said for public schools, which he has for decades sought to undermine. His tenure on the state board of education, a position he as a grocer was completely unqualified for saw, high stakes testing go up, and teacher salaries go down as well as the creation of one unfunded mandate after another that, for the most part, charter schools are exempt from. 

Gary Chartrand has his truth; unfortunately, his truth is filled with caveats that he leaves out. Let’s look at his claim about the IDEA charter schools, which are coming to Jacksonville paid for with Jacksonville tax dollars. 

He claimed that 100 percent of their graduates have been accepted to college. I am reminded of the old adage if something seems too good to be true, it probably is, and this definitely seems too good to be true. I could not find anything to independently verify that statement. Still, I was able to find plenty of how they routinely counsel out poor performers, and only sixty-five percent of their ninth-graders made it to graduation. Then it gets worse.

This is from the IDEA student handbook: As required by the IPS charter, a student may graduate and receive a diploma only if the student successfully completes the curriculum requirements identified by the SBOE, has been accepted into a four-year college or university, has completed a minimum of 125 hours of community service, and has performed satisfactorily on required end of course assessment instrument.

They are required to be accepted, not attend or do well, but just be accepted. To give you some CONTINUE READING: Education Matters: Gary Chartrand spreads misinformation about charter schools, again.

Florina Rodov: What Turned Me Against Charter Schools - LA Progressive

What Turned Me Against Charter Schools - LA Progressive

What Turned Me Against Charter Schools

I fell for the charter school hype. I agreed with former President Obama’s education secretary Arne Duncan who advocated for “school choice.” I trusted the research that said charters “close [the] achievement gap” for Black and Latino students.

When I saw “Waiting for ‘Superman,’” I rooted for the kids in the documentary to escape their failing public schools by snagging spots at charter schools. And though I encountered very few bad teachers in my four years teaching and 12 years learning at public schools, I never questioned why Time published stories about “Rotten Apple” teachers being swept out of classrooms by wealthy education “reformers.”

I believed the hype so much that in 2012, knowing almost nothing about charter schools and having no administrative experience, I joined a friend in submitting a half-baked petition to the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) with the intention of starting our own charter school. When LAUSD denied it, we presented it to the Culver City Unified School District, which also, rightfully, rejected it.

Still intrigued by charters, in 2016 I interviewed for an English teacher position with a woman I’ll call Ellen Peters, the principal and co-founder of Savior Academy, a charter school serving grades six through 12. (The names of the school, administrators and students have been changed for this story.)

Her assertion that the close bond between students and staff made it feel “like a family” inspired me to sign a non-union contract on the spot, though the school had recently lost its co-founder Cathy Reynolds (name changed), who stepped down from the board, and several teachers, who CONTINUE READING: What Turned Me Against Charter Schools - LA Progressive

Florina Rodov: I Believed the Charter School Myth — Until I Learned About the Reality and Who Was Behind It | Ed Politics JEFF BRYANT

Florina Rodov: I Believed the Charter School Myth — Until I Learned About the Reality and Who Was Behind It | Ed Politics

FLORINA RODOV: I BELIEVED THE CHARTER SCHOOL MYTH — UNTIL I LEARNED ABOUT THE REALITY AND WHO WAS BEHIND

I fell for the charter school hype. I agreed with former President Obama’s education secretary Arne Duncan who advocated for “school choice.” I trusted the research that said charters “close [the] achievement gap” for Black and Latino students. When I saw “Waiting for ‘Superman,’” I rooted for the kids in the documentary to escape their failing public schools by snagging spots at charter schools. And though I encountered very few bad teachers in my four years teaching and 12 years learning at public schools, I never questioned why Time published stories about “Rotten Apple” teachers being swept out of classrooms by wealthy education “reformers.”

I believed the hype so much that in 2012, knowing almost nothing about charter schools and having no administrative experience, I joined a friend in submitting a half-baked petition to the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) with the intention of starting our own charter school. When LAUSD denied it, we presented it to the Culver City Unified School District, which also, rightfully, rejected it.

Still intrigued by charters, in 2016 I interviewed for an English teacher position with a woman I’ll call Ellen Peters, the principal and co-founder of Savior Academy, a charter school serving grades six through 12. (The names of the school, administrators and students have been changed for this story.) Her assertion that the close bond between students and staff made it feel “like a family” inspired me to sign a non-union contract on the spot, though the school had recently lost its co-founder Cathy Reynolds (name changed), who stepped down from the board, and several teachers, who resigned.

But the chasm between the hype and reality became evident to me immediately upon starting work. There were high attrition rates of students and teachers. Over the summer, more than half the faculty resigned and were replaced by new teachers. About three-quarters of the students hadn’t returned either, and though new kids had registered, the enrollment wasn’t CONTINUE READING: Florina Rodov: I Believed the Charter School Myth — Until I Learned About the Reality and Who Was Behind It | Ed Politics

CURMUDGUCATION: A Really Bad Anti-Public School Analogy

CURMUDGUCATION: A Really Bad Anti-Public School Analogy

A Really Bad Anti-Public School Analogy

You know I love a good analogy. I spent four decades trying to help people understand one thing by connecting it to some other thing. So I love a good analogy. 

This is not a good analogy.

Nick Freitas is an army vet and Virginia politician, who served in the house of delegates before making a couple of unsuccessful runs for the US Congress (both House and Senate). In his bid for national office, he was backed by folks Rand Paul and Mike Lee, the Club for Growth, and Freedomworks. He has been writing for the ultra-right Daily Wire, where he usually sticks to war and the evils of communism. But this week, he decided to stick his oar into education waters with "We Wouldn't Let Government Control Our Grocery Stores. Why Do We Let Them Control Our Schools?" Transparency requires that I link to the article so you can check my work if you're so inclined, but I'm going to ask you to resist giving this thing any more clicks than you can help. So here's the link.

There are so many things wrong here. But it's worth poking through this pile because it's representative of how the anti-gummint school crowd views the issues.

Freitas opens by reducing the many debates about school to two sides--one side all for "choice and freedom" and  the other side "insists that improved education can only be achieved through strict government control of schools." Well, no, not really. It's not clear what exactly he means by "government control" or "strict," but a lot of straw is going to fly before he's done. We have locally elected school boards, which is government, but their control is not particularly strict in most case. We have oversight on the state and federal level, which is where most of the rules and regulations that he might be upset about come from, but if we were going to have strict control from that level, we'd have lefties CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: A Really Bad Anti-Public School Analogy

New York Magazine’s Jonathan Chait Is Bragging Again About Charter Schools | janresseger

New York Magazine’s Jonathan Chait Is Bragging Again About Charter Schools | janresseger

New York Magazine’s Jonathan Chait Is Bragging Again About Charter Schools

Last week, New York Magazine‘s Jonathan Chait published another of his long rants about the failure of public schools, the glories of charter schools, and all the reasons he disdains teachers unions.  Chait begins:

“In the dozen years since Barack Obama undertook the most dramatic education reform in half a century—prodding local governments to measure how they serve their poorest students and to create alternatives, especially charter schools, for those who lack decent neighborhood options—two unexpected things have happened.  The first is that charter schools have produced dramatic learning gains for low-income minority students… What was ten years ago merely an experiment has become a proven means to develop the potential of children whose minds had been neglected for generations. And yet the second outcome of the charter-school breakthrough has been a bitter backlash within the Democratic Party.  The political standing of the idea has moved in the opposite direction of the data, as two powerful forces—unions and progressive activists—have come to regard charter schools as a plutocratic assault on public education… ‘I am not a charter school fan because it takes the options available and money for public schools,’ Biden told a crowd in South Carolina during the Democratic primary, as the field competed to prove its hostility toward education reform in general and charters in particular.”

Chait is honest about his personal connection with the charter school sector—through his wife, Robin Chait, a Senior Policy Advisor at WestEd, whose website describes her work: “Chait’s primary responsibility is to manage WestEd’s work on the National Charter School CONTINUE READING: New York Magazine’s Jonathan Chait Is Bragging Again About Charter Schools | janresseger

Using DATA and RESEARCH to Unlearn Chait’s False Opinion about Charter Schools | Cloaking Inequity

Using DATA and RESEARCH to Unlearn Chait’s False Opinion about Charter Schools | Cloaking Inequity

USING DATA AND RESEARCH TO UNLEARN CHAIT’S FALSE OPINION ABOUT CHARTER SCHOOLS

In this blog I respond to Chait’s grossly unfounded opinions in the New York Magazine article entitled Unlearning an Answer with data, peer reviewed research and by highlighting the work of scholars who have conducted extensive research about charter schools. I will also recognize when the predominance of the research supports his opinions.

Political support for Charters is waning among Democrats Chait writes that “political support among Democrats has collapsed.” Chait is right on this point, it’s true political support amongst Democrats has dropped. In a recent meeting I was shown internal polling from the last election that indicates this fact. I also saw in the same data that Republicans are bigger fans of vouchers than they are of charters. The memory of Betsy DeVos and Donald Trump’s unwavering support for charters will probably have a longstanding and poisonous political legacy for Democratic party support of charter schools. Also, this past year, I met with legislative staffs on the Hill and they relayed that previously increased federal funding for charters had been a requirement for Republicans in the budget but in recent years they have had other priorities besides charters— such as vouchers.

Charter Schools do not deliver extraordinary results— in fact on average their results are quite limited. Contrary to Chait’s argument, as an academic, I can assuredly tell you that “education researchers” HAVE NOT been shocked by charter schools gains— I think unimpressed is probably a better word. Check out this extensive list of more than 30 National Education Policy Center “top experts” whose peer reviewed research findings are largely contrary to Chait’s grandiose claims about school choice. Also, Chait cited studies produced by The Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) located at the conservative Hoover Institution. CREDO studies are not peer reviewed. But Chait and charter school supporters point to CREDO’s 2015 urban charter study to say that African American and Latino students have more success in charter schools. Leaving aside the integrity of the study for a moment, what CONTINUE READING: Using DATA and RESEARCH to Unlearn Chait’s False Opinion about Charter Schools | Cloaking Inequity