NY Times Publishes Major Expose of Detroit’s Charter School Catastrophe | janresseger

NY Times Publishes Major Expose of Detroit’s Charter School Catastrophe | janresseger:

NY Times Publishes Major Expose of Detroit’s Charter School Catastrophe

Kate Zernike’s extraordinary expose in yesterday’s NY Times about K-12 education in Detroit, Michigan is a must-read.  The headline describes the reality today in Detroit: For Detroit’s Children, More School Choice but Not Better Schools.  This post will summarize Zernike’s critique, but you’ll need to read her piece to learn how Detroit’s school-choice realities are being felt by the city’s poorest parents—who must spend hours delivering their children to schools spread across the 140 square mile school district where public transportation is inadequate and many charters do not provide any busing.  You’ll also learn how unregulated, awful schools are truncating the futures of the children Zernike profiles.

Zernike narrates the history of Detroit’s school marketplace.  In 1993, John Engler, Michigan’s “free-market-inclined governor,” “embraced the idea of creating schools that were publicly financed but independently run….” “Michigan leapt at the promise of charter schools 23 years ago, betting big that choice and competition would improve public schools.  It got competition, and chaos. Detroit schools have long been in decline academically and financially. But over the past five years, divisive politics and educational ideology and a scramble for money have combined to produce a public education fiasco that is perhaps unparalleled in the United States. While the idea was to foster academic competition, the unchecked growth of charters has created a glut of schools competing for some of the nation’s poorest students, enticing them to enroll with cash bonuses, laptops, raffle tickets for iPads and bicycles. Leaders of charter and traditional schools alike say they are being cannibalized, fighting so hard over students and the limited public dollars that follow them that no one thrives.”

Lack of regulation was a cornerstone of school choice in Detroit from the very beginning. School districts, community colleges and public universities can authorize and supposedly oversee charter schools, and they get an incentive of 3 percent of the state dollars paid to each charter school they sponsor.  “And only they—not the governor, not the state commissioner or board of education—could shut down failing schools.”  Eighty percent of Michigan’s charter schools are operated by for-profit management companies: “The companies and those who grant the charters became major lobbying forces for unfettered growth of the schools, as did some of the state’s biggest Republican donors. Sometimes they were one and the same, as with J.C. Huizenga, a Grand Rapids entrepreneur who founded Michigan’s largest charter school operator, the for-profit National Heritage Academies.  Two of the biggest players in Michigan politics, Betsy and Dick DeVos—she the former head of the state Republican Party, he the heir to the Amway fortune and a 2006 candidate for governor—established the Great Lakes Educational Project, which became the state’s most pugnacious protector of the charter school NY Times Publishes Major Expose of Detroit’s Charter School Catastrophe | janresseger:

Cost of SBAC testing in Connecticut is unconscionable, unnecessary (by John Bestor) - Wait What?

Cost of SBAC testing in Connecticut is unconscionable, unnecessary (by John Bestor) - Wait What?:

Cost of SBAC testing in Connecticut is unconscionable, unnecessary (by John Bestor)

Connecticut educator and education advocate, John Bestor, has written another powerful commentary piece, this time dealing with the utter waste of scarce taxpayer funds on the unfair, inappropriate and discriminatory Common Core Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium SBAC testing scheme that is designed to fail a vast number of our state’s children.

With Governor Malloy implementing unprecedented cuts to vital state services, including public education, Malloy and the legislature should have started out by eliminating the funding for the SBAC testing scheme…long before the attacked the programs that are really helping Connecticut’s children, parents, teachers and public schools.

Published in the CTMirror and entitled, Cost of SBAC testing in Connecticut is unconscionable, unnecessary, Bestor writes;

Education activists have been speaking out and pushing back against the misguided Common Core State Standards and the flawed Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) statewide test protocol for several years now, as they have become more aware of the billionaire-driven, media-complicit, and politically-entrenched “corporate education reform” agenda.

Although the computer-adaptive Smarter Balanced Assessment remains unproven and developmentally-inappropriate, proponents of the controversial test have been unable to demonstrate that SBAC is a 

Cost of SBAC testing in Connecticut is unconscionable, unnecessary (by John Bestor) - Wait What?:

US Supreme Court Overturns Former VA Gov. Bob McDonnell’s Conviction– and the Decision Has Implications for NY’s Silver and Skelos Convictions | deutsch29

US Supreme Court Overturns Former VA Gov. Bob McDonnell’s Conviction– and the Decision Has Implications for NY’s Silver and Skelos Convictions | deutsch29:

US Supreme Court Overturns Former VA Gov. Bob McDonnell’s Conviction– and the Decision Has Implications for NY’s Silver and Skelos Convictions

On Monday, June 27, 2016, the US Supreme Court vacated the lower-court conviction of former Virginia governor Bob McDonnell over the issue of how the term “official act” was (in the Court’s view) too broadly interpreted.

As CNN recaps, McDonnell was convicted in 2014 for “receiving gifts, money, and loans from Jonnie R. Williams, the CEO of a Virginia-based company, in exchange for official acts seen as favorable to Williams and his business.”

Williams, who was CEO of Star Scientific, Inc., later resigned as a result of the controversy raised in connection with McDonnell and another elected official.

Below are excerpts from the Supreme Court’s opinion in McDonnell vs. United States:

In 2014, the Federal Government indicted former Virginia Governor Robert McDonnell and his wife, Maureen McDonnell, on bribery charges. The charges related to the acceptance by the McDonnells of $175,000 in loans, gifts, and other benefits from Virginia businessman Jonnie Williams, while Governor McDonnell was in office. Williams was the chief executive officer of Star Scientific, a Virginia-based company that had developed a nutritional supplement made from anatabine, a compound found in tobacco. Star Scientific hoped that Virginia’s public universities would perform research studies on anatabine, and Williams wanted Governor McDonnell’s assistance in obtaining those studies. To convict the McDonnells of bribery, the Government was required to show that Governor McDonnell committed (or agreed to commit) an “official act” in exchange for the loans and gifts. The parties did not agree, however, on what counts as an “official act.” The Government alleged in the indictment, and maintains on appeal, that Governor McDonnell committed at least five “official acts.” Those acts included “arranging meetings” for Williams with other Virginia officials to discuss Star Scientific’s product, “hosting” events for Star Scientific at the Governor’s Mansion, and “contacting other government officials” concerning studies of anatabine. … The Government also argued more broadly that these 

US Supreme Court Overturns Former VA Gov. Bob McDonnell’s Conviction– and the Decision Has Implications for NY’s Silver and Skelos Convictions | deutsch29:

Cartoons: A Mix This Month | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Cartoons: A Mix This Month | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice:

Cartoons: A Mix This Month

Over the past seven years, I have published monthly cartoons on various aspects of policy and practice, school reform, etc. This month, the cartoons are a mix of ones that tickled me over the year. Yeah, I know, these choices tilt toward life in a digital world. So be it. Enjoy!

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Cartoons: A Mix This Month | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice:

“The reforms are introduced with blood”–A Oaxaca teacher on the life and death struggle against the testocracy | I AM AN EDUCATOR

“The reforms are introduced with blood”–A Oaxaca teacher on the life and death struggle against the testocracy | I AM AN EDUCATOR:

“The reforms are introduced with blood”–A Oaxaca teacher on the life and death struggle against the testocracy

“The reforms are introduced with blood,” mural in Oaxaca, Mexico in 2016. A. S. Dillingham

 The teachers in Oaxaca, Mexico have been setting the international standard for social movement unionism and the defense of public education for many years.

In her 2005 release of Granito de Arena, my friend, award-winning Seattle filmmaker Jill Freidberg, captured the story of hundreds of thousands of public schoolteachers in Oaxaca who have built a powerful grassroots movement, endured brutal repression over some 25-years of struggle for social and economic justice in Mexico’s public schools.

In 2013, when teachers at my school refused to administer the MAP test as an act of defiance to the corporate education reform test-and-punish agenda, I was worried about the consequences that such an action could have. I also remember talking with other teachers about the fact that if the teachers in Oaxaca could build barricades in the streets to defend their schools from corporate takeover, we could manage to organize the MAP boycott. And, in fact, teachers from Oaxaca came to our aid, writing the Seattle boycotting teachers a letter of solidarity.

Today, the struggle to stop the abuses of standardized testing of teachers and other corporate reforms in Oaxaca has literally become a life and death struggle with police officers brutallygunning downing at least eight protesters, including community members and teachers (for information about sending letters of protest, please visit the NPE site).

My good friend Shane Dillingham recently moved to Oaxaca, Mexico where he is working on a book about the history of indigenous struggle in the region.   Shane conducted this remarkable interview for Jacobin magazine with René González Pizarro, a Oaxacan teacher and union member, to discuss the impact of corporate education reform, union democracy and this history of his local 22 in the struggle for social justice.—

by A.S. Dillingham & René González Pizarro

This post originally appeared at Jacobin.

Ten years ago, as a group of striking teachers slept in their encampment during the early hours of June 14 in the state capital of Oaxaca, Mexico, government forces launched an attack to remove them from the zócalo, or town square. Riot police cleared the plaza while helicopters dropped tear gas from above.

The striking teachers were beaten, arrested, and pushed out of the city center. But not for long; the teachers and their supporters quickly regrouped, fighting back, block by block, and took the plaza back by midday.

The violent repression of striking teachers in 2006, ordered by the state governor, launched a social movement — called the “Oaxaca Commune” by supporters — that grew to encompass much more than the local teachers’ union.

The movement mobilized large swathes of Oaxacan society against the repressive governor. Aggressive federal intervention hobbled the movement, but failed to wipe it out. Today the dissident teachers’ movement is in the streets again, this time in opposition to the “The reforms are introduced with blood”–A Oaxaca teacher on the life and death struggle against the testocracy | I AM AN EDUCATOR: 

The connection between Brexit, education and the race for U.S. president - The Washington Post

The connection between Brexit, education and the race for U.S. president - The Washington Post:

The connection between Brexit, education and the race for U.S. president

Here’s a piece on the connection between Brexit, education and the race for U.S. president, written by Marc Tucker, president and chief executive officer of the National Center on Education and the Economy, a non-profit policy analysis and development organization based in Washington D.C. He researches and writes about the policies and practices of countries with the best education systems in the world. In 2014, the Education Commission of the States awarded him the James Bryant Conant award for his contribution to American education. His most recent book is “Surpassing Shanghai: An Agenda for American Education Built on the World’s Leading Systems.”

By Marc S. Tucker

We are told that the narrow majority of voters in the British referendum on staying in the European Union were mainly working people with less education than those who voted for staying in the Union.  We are also told that almost every economic expert who weighed in on the controversy, irrespective of their politics, said that the British economy would suffer if Britain left the E.U. and that the very people most likely to vote for exit were those likely to be hurt the most.  But, evidently, the winning side did not care what the experts had to say and voted for exit anyway.

What are we to make of this?  I think a majority of Brits have lost confidence in both their political leadership and the experts, from both parties—the leaders of both the Labor Party and the Conservatives came down hard on the side of staying in the EU.  For years, these ordinary, working class Brits have heard their leaders talk about the benefits of trade and of being in the E.U. (which amounts to the same thing, since being in the European Union was sold mainly on the benefits of free trade inside the Union).

While they saw their country benefiting, the benefits did not flow down to them.  They saw the City—Britain’s hugely powerful financial establishment—getting fabulously rich, they saw the price of real estate in London going so high they could no longer afford to live there, and they saw many in the south of England getting ever more wealthy, too.  But not them, not the working stiffs from the midlands and the north who made things and fixed things and sold things in small retail shops.  They saw Polish plumbers taking their jobs and British car companies getting sold off to global companies without a British nameplate and their jobs in that industry disappearing.  Somebody was getting rich for sure, but it was not them.

The experts had long argued that free trade with the world and access to the European market on insider terms would be good for Britain and the politicians had agreed.  Were the experts wrong?  No, they were right.  In the aggregate, trade has worked for Britain.  But who cares about the aggregate if you are among those in the aggregate who are getting hurt, who are working harder and harder every year and getting less and less as others are becoming fabulously wealthy.

Years ago, the Labor Party could be counted on to represent the interests of the coal miners and the truck drivers and retail clerks and plumbers.  After all, most of them, or at least their The connection between Brexit, education and the race for U.S. president - The Washington Post:

Is School Violence on the Rise—and Is Restorative Justice Actually Working? - The Atlantic

Is School Violence on the Rise—and Is Restorative Justice Actually Working? - The Atlantic:

​​​​​​​Is Discipline Reform Really Helping Decrease School Violence? 

A lack of concrete information about student misconduct—and how to address it—may be hindering efforts to make campuses safer.

The allegations sound like a parent’s nightmare. Roughly two dozen children at New York City schools were hit, kicked, and bullied by fellow students while administrators stood by, according to a recent class-action lawsuit.

“The data we have seen shows a clear and undeniable escalation of violence in New York City schools,” said Jim Walden, an attorney for the plaintiffs in the suit, which is being backed by the charter-school advocacy group Families for Excellent Schools. The suit claims that the New York City Education Department isn’t doing enough to stop the violence.

The complaint details a litany of violent behavior. In one case, a 9-year-old boy in an East Harlem school was repeatedly bullied even when the teacher was in the classroom. The bully, according to the lawsuit, “repeatedly kicked him on his body, and verbally harassed him.” The boy’s mother tried to get the principal to intervene but was allegedly met with indifference.

The suit is among the signs of rising concern about violence in schools, partly driven by mass shootings like the one in Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, in 2012. In response to such fears, school administrators are instituting a wide range of tactics to boost safety, including by installing metal detectors and hiring security guards. Schools are also turning to social-reform programs such as those that embrace the restorative-justice model, an approach that emphasizes bringing together the perpetrators and victims of misconduct through meetings and discussions.

But a lack of hard data and conflicting views on safety measures make it difficult to assess whether school violence is in fact increasing—and whether those measures are actually effective. Some observers worry that the absence of concrete information and confusion over the amount of violence in schools are hindering efforts to reduce violence and bullying.

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Despite the concerns expressed by parents like those in the lawsuit, many experts say that the incidence of school violence is dropping. New York City school officials contend that violence on campus is on the decline, a trend that experts say is mirrored across the country.  

At the local level, statistics on school violence can vary depending on the source. Walden pointed to state statistics showing that the number of violent episodes in New York City schools rose 23 percent from the 2013-14 school year to the one that ended in June 2015. But the New York City school administration uses police data showing that crime in the city’s schools declined 29 percent from the 2011–12 school year to the 2014–15 year. Some observers have said that the state data does not make a distinction between minor disciplinary problems in schools and more Is School Violence on the Rise—and Is Restorative Justice Actually Working? - The Atlantic:

Teachers union reaches agreement with Mexican government as blockades spread - World Socialist Web Site

Teachers union reaches agreement with Mexican government as blockades spread - World Socialist Web Site:

Teachers union reaches agreement with Mexican government as blockades spread

As protests and barricades in support of striking teachers spread across Mexico, the National Organization of Educational Workers (CNTE) and the National Regeneration Movement (Morena) party of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador are maneuvering to bring the growing movement under control.

Yesterday morning, the CNTE announced an agreement with the administration of President Enrique Peña Nieto to continue negotiations aimed at bringing a weeks-long teachers’ strike to an end. The CNTE and the government also scheduled a publicity stunt meeting between the government and victims of the recent massacre in Oaxaca. On June 19, police fired on a demonstration in the rural village of Nochixtlan, killing 13 teachers and supporters and wounding dozens more.

Adelfo Alejandro Gomez, a leader of CNTE Section 7, announced the government negotiations would “give way specifically to the theme of justice for the recent events in Asuncion de Nochixtlan, Oaxaca. There has been a willingness on both parts to attend to and resolve all of the harms caused by the repression exercised by the federal police.”

In reality, there is no willingness on behalf of the Mexican government to bring justice to the friends and relatives of those killed demonstrating against the right-wing education reforms. The government's response has thus far been first to lie about the killing and blame the attack on the teachers themselves.

The CNTE's agreement is aimed at instilling illusions in the Mexican state as it works in conjunction with Wall Street to privatize public education through the right-wing Pact for Mexico austerity program. The massacre of June 19 was not a misunderstanding, it was a calculated maneuver to defend the interests of Mexico’s ruling class. The agreement will allow the government to hold a photo-op meeting next Wednesday, posing as sympathetic to family members of victims.

The Mexican government made clear it has no intention of repealing or revising the education reform. Speaking alongside Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Ottawa yesterday, Peña Nieto told the media that his government “will not give in to any provocation” by teachers. Trudeau Teachers union reaches agreement with Mexican government as blockades spread - World Socialist Web Site:

A Sea of Charter Schools in Detroit Leaves Students Adrift - The New York Times

A Sea of Charter Schools in Detroit Leaves Students Adrift - The New York Times:

A Sea of Charter Schools in Detroit Leaves Students Adrift

DETROIT — On the face of it, Ana Rivera could have had almost any choice when it came to educating her two sons. For all the abandoned buildings and burned-down houses in her neighborhood in the southwest part of this city, national charter school companies had seen a market and were setting up shop within blocks of each other, making it easier to find a charter school than to buy a carton of milk.

But hers became the story of public education in a city grasping for its comeback: lots of choice, with no good choice.

She enrolled her older son, Damian, at the charter school across from her house, where she could watch him walk into the building. He got all A’s and said he wanted to be an engineer. But the summer before seventh grade, he found himself in the back of a classroom at a science program at the University of Michigan, struggling to keep up with students from Detroit Public Schools, known as the worst urban district in the nation. They knew the human body is made up of many cells; he had never learned that.

When his school stopped assigning homework, Ms. Rivera tried enrolling Damian at other charters, but the deadlines were past, the applications onerous. Finally, she found him a scholarship at a Catholic school, where he struggled to rise above D’s all year. “He doesn’t want to hear the word engineering,” she said.

Michigan leapt at the promise of charter schools 23 years ago, betting big that choice and competition would improve public schools. It got competition, and chaos.

Detroit schools have long been in decline academically and financially. But over the past five years, divisive politics and educational ideology and a scramble for money have combined to produced a public education fiasco that is perhaps unparalleled in the United States.

While the idea was to foster academic competition, the unchecked growth of charters has created a glut of schools competing for some of the nation’s poorest students, enticing them to enroll with cash bonuses, laptops, raffle tickets for iPads and bicycles. Leaders of charter and traditional schools alike say they are being cannibalized, fighting so hard over students and the limited public dollars that follow them that no one thrives.

Detroit now has a bigger share of students in charters than any American city except New Orleans, which turned almost all its schools into charters after Hurricane Katrina. But half the charters perform only as well, or worse than, Detroit’s traditional public schools.

“The point was to raise all schools,” said Scott Romney, a lawyer and board member of New Detroit, a civic group formed after the 1967 race riots here. “Instead, we’ve had a total and complete collapse of education in this city.”

The city has emerged almost miraculously fast from the largest municipal bankruptcy in American history. Downtown Detroit hums with A Sea of Charter Schools in Detroit Leaves Students Adrift - The New York Times:

Sacramento City Unified School District gets proposals for Marshall, Jefferson school sites - Sacramento Business Journal

Sacramento City Unified School District gets proposals for Marshall, Jefferson school sites - Sacramento Business Journal:

Housing, commercial uses floated for Marshall, Jefferson school sites

Developers have expressed strong interest in both the Marshall and Jefferson school sites in midtown Sacramento, suggesting concepts involving housing and commercial uses for the shuttered buildings.

In response to a request for letters of interest, the school district received three concepts for Jefferson and six for Marshall.

Enlarge

The entrance to the shuttered Jefferson School.

DENNIS MCCOY | SACRAMENTO BUSINESS JOURNAL

But the Sacramento City Unified School District is going in slightly different directions with each site in taking them from concepts to actual projects.

District staff are currently preparing a request for proposals for Jefferson, on the northeast corner of 16th and N streets. SCUSD spokesman Gabe Ross said trustees will likely consider some kind of land swap with a developer for the site.

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According to the district, the letters of interest for Jefferson were:

– From The Alpine Companies LLC to create a mixed-use class A building with restaurants or retail businesses on the ground floor, and office uses on a second floor. The building would also have a community meeting room.

– From Cresleigh Homes to develop a mixed-use building with street-level retail, restaurants, office space and a community room, and residences on upper floors, with new buildings at the corners of N, 16th and 17th streets.

– And from Immanuel Housing. In a partnership with Community Architecture Inc. and Cowan Construction Services, Immanuel would develop semi-independent housing for emancipated foster youth and veterans, with an education component. There would also be a basketball court.

It was not immediately clear in the information provided by the district how any of those three concepts would make use of existing but largely vacant buildings on the site now.

Two of the proposals mention land swaps, while Alpine would buy the property. Ross said replies to the request for proposals should detail not only what would be developed on the site but what land could be swapped in the district’s interest.

“The board is being really intentional about the process being open and public and transparent,” he said. The goal is to issue the request for proposals and to get responses back quickly enough to have a formal recommendation for action by the end of the summer, Sacramento City Unified School District gets proposals for Marshall, Jefferson school sites - Sacramento Business Journal:

Anonymous email threatens students at Berkeley school after Sacramento rally tied to local teacher | Berkeleyside

Anonymous email threatens students at Berkeley school after Sacramento rally tied to local teacher | Berkeleyside:

Anonymous email threatens students at Berkeley school after Sacramento rally tied to local teacher

A police cruiser was parked outside Martin Luther King. Jr. Middle School on Monday. Photo: Emilie Raguso

Local and federal authorities investigated threats Monday targeting youth at a North Berkeley middle school by a group that demanded the termination of a teacher who protested against a neo-Nazi rally in Sacramento over the weekend.

The rally Sunday made national headlines due to violent clashes between the white supremacists who took out a permit to rally at the state capitol and the counter-protesters who showed up to confront them. According to some news reports, members of the counter-protest appear to have initiated the violence. The LA Times reported that seven people were stabbed and 10 hospitalized.

One of the people who took responsibility for helping organize the counter-protest was Yvette Felarca, a teacher at North Berkeley’s Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School, at 1781 Rose St. Felarca is an organizer with the activist group By Any Means Necessary, which helped lead a series of Black Lives Matter protests in Berkeley in December 2014.

Parents of day campers were told Monday morning that one of the counter-protesters from Sacramento had been linked to the Berkeley school where the camps were located. The public outing had prompted an influx of emails to the principal demanding that the teacher be fired.

The Berkeley Unified School District confirmed, in a prepared statement at 5:40 p.m., it had been informed Monday morning that a King teacher had been involved with the protest in Sacramento.

“Since that incident, the school and principal have received calls and emails from parents and community members. One anonymous email in particular threatened that if certain actions were not taken against the teacher within the week, someone would come to King with the intent to harm students,” according to the statement. “The FBI has reviewed the email in question and has determined that by their criteria it should be considered a low level threat.”

The statement continued: “Meanwhile, the Berkeley PD has said that they are taking this threat seriously. They have increased their patrols around our schools and are assigning an officer to King. We have sent security staff to King, and we have moved two outside user groups who are renting space for summer programs to other locations. We do not have any BUSD programs at King at this time.”

BUSD Superintendent Donald Evans said, according to the statement, that the district would do “whatever is necessary” to protect students and staff, and “continue to work closely with law enforcement to monitor this situation.”Anonymous email threatens students at Berkeley school after Sacramento rally tied to local teacher | Berkeleyside:

Read more: www.berkeleyside.com/tag/berkeley-protests/ 

Russ on Reading: Don't Look Behind the Curtain: The Education Reform Switcheroo

Russ on Reading: Don't Look Behind the Curtain: The Education Reform Switcheroo:

Don't Look Behind the Curtain: The Education Reform Switcheroo

If you haven't yet read the New York Times article on what school choice has meant for the children of Detroit, please do. I could not read the piece without tears coming to my eyes and my blood coming to a boil. As I have said in previous posts and as many others have been saying for years, school choice will destroy public education. It has already done so in Detroit.

The Times piece lays bare the true motivation of corporate education reform: to try to get people to focus on schools as the problem, so that they won't look behind the curtain at the real problem facing the country - income inequity. As the historian and social theorist, Michael Katz, put it in the 2003 update to his great book, The Irony of Early Education Reform, "education has been used in America as a way out of public dilemmas - as a painless substitution for the redistribution of wealth." Education reform always fails because it is not meant to succeed; it is only meant to distract us from the real issue. 

I have been in education long enough to have been through several reform movements. In 1976, I was appointed to a Pennsylvania commission called Project 81. Project 81 was a five year plan aimed at strengthening high school graduation requirements in the state through "competency-based education.". The governor and legislature of Pennsylvania, had determined that schools were not being held accountable enough and that graduation requirements needed to be strengthened (sound familiar?). As a representative of my school district on the commission, I attended conferences, met with teachers from across the state, listened to the best minds on competency -based education and assessment, wrote reports and Russ on Reading: Don't Look Behind the Curtain: The Education Reform Switcheroo:

Subtle factors combine to fuel school-to-prison pipeline - NonDoc

Subtle factors combine to fuel school-to-prison pipeline - NonDoc:

Subtle factors combine to fuel school-to-prison pipeline

A graph from the Oklahoma Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights highlights racial incongruity in school suspensions. (Provided)

The Oklahoma Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights has published a study examining the civil rights impact of school discipline and juvenile-justice policies.

The study explains how excessive and disparate suspensions of students “may lead to high rates of juvenile incarceration” — particularly among youth of color, boys and students with disabilities — in what has become known as the school-to-prison pipeline.

In its report released this month, the committee issued a number of commonsense recommendations ranging from better professional development of teachers, of school law enforcement officers and of juvenile-justice workers to a repudiation of “zero-tolerance” disciplinary policies.

The committee recommended that the department “impose mandatory reforms to disciplinary policies for schools that demonstrate significant disparities in disciplinary actions on the basis of race, color, or disability,” but that’s not as ominous as it might seem.

I emailed Melissa Wojnaroski, civil rights analyst with the commission, for clarification.

“The U.S. DOE in collaboration with the U.S. DOJ has already issued ‘best practice’guidance for reducing disparities in school discipline on the basis of race, color, sex and disability,” Wojnaroski wrote in her reply. “The recommendation is to make some of these Subtle factors combine to fuel school-to-prison pipeline - NonDoc:

 

Jury orders Phila. schools to pay firm $2.3 million in bias suit

Jury orders Phila. schools to pay firm $2.3 million in bias suit:

Jury orders Phila. schools to pay firm $2.3 million in bias suit

A federal jury entered a $2.3 million judgment against the Philadelphia School District and the late Superintendent Arlene C. Ackerman on Monday, finding that she discriminated against a Bucks County company by steering a $7.5 million no-bid contract to a smaller, minority-owned firm that had not sought the work.

Newtown-based Security & Data Technologies Inc. (SDT) filed the racial discrimination suit after, it said, Ackerman and the School District "deselected" it in 2010 for a contract to install surveillance cameras at 19 schools that the state had deemed "persistently dangerous."

The company, which had begun preliminary work, said Ackerman changed course and ordered the emergency contract be awarded to IBS Communications, which was not on a state list of companies eligible for no-bid contracts.

Ackerman told several administrators at a meeting in September 2010 that she was sick of the district's giving work to contractors who she said did not look like her.

John Byars, a former top district procurement official, said Ackerman also said at the meeting that she would make sure that "all these white boys didn't get contracts." She asked why "a black firm [couldn't] get it," and directed that the job be given to IBS.

The case is one of four - and the second that the School District has lost - stemming from a 2010 Inquirer report that Ackerman pushed SDT aside to give the project to IBS.

"My client has been struggling with this fact of being rejected for a contract because of race for nearly six years," said attorney Michael Homans, who represented SDT with Melissa Kay Hazell. "It's been a long, hard journey. Justice was served."

District spokesman Fernando Gallard said Monday night, "We are extremely disappointed with the outcome."

Jesse C. Klaproth, who represented the School District and Ackerman's estate at trial, said he and his clients "plan on exploring our appellate options."

The eight-member panel - consisting almost entirely of white jurors - took four hours to reach a decision following a weeklong trial.

The jury found that the School Reform Commission, which was also sued by SDT, was Jury orders Phila. schools to pay firm $2.3 million in bias suit: