Special Nite Cap: Catch Up on Today's Post 3/28/15

Special Nite Cap - Catch Up on Today's Post 3/28/15

Special Nite Cap 

CORPORATE ED REFORM

#DUMPRAHM

Señor Chuy Garcia race not just about Chicago #VoteChuyGarcia #fox32debate #IMWITHCHUY | Cloaking Inequity

Señor Chuy Garcia race not just about Chicago #VoteChuyGarcia #fox32debate #IMWITHCHUY | Cloaking Inequity:Señor Chuy Garcia race not just about Chicago #VoteChuyGarcia #fox32debate #IMWITHCHUYWhat the background on Rahm Emanuel and the Chicago runoff? Why are so many Democrats unhappy with a Democrat? In 2013, I wrote about his cozy relationship with billionaires in the post Bloomberg and Rahmbo:

by mike simpson / 15min 

With A Brooklyn Accent: Liz Phillips' Speech at the " Protect Our Schools Rally" at Cuomo's Offices in Manhattan

With A Brooklyn Accent: Liz Phillips' Speech at the " Protect Our Schools Rally" at Cuomo's Offices in Manhattan:Liz Phillips' Speech at the " Protect Our Schools Rally" at Cuomo's Offices in ManhattanWe all want great teachers teaching our children.  Unfortunately,the governor’s teacher evaluation proposals will do absolutely nothing to help us meet that goal—and in fact with

1 by mike simpson / 45min 

A Teacher Tries Opting Out | Teachers' Letters of Professional Conscience

A Teacher Tries Opting Out | Teachers' Letters of Professional Conscience: A Teacher Tries Opting OutThis is my first blog post and kind of the reason I decided to create my own blog: to keep people updated on what is going on with my request, as a teacher, to be allowed to opt out of administering the flawed Smarter Balanced Assessment.Last month, my local association stood before our school boa

1 by mike simpson / 1h 

Is the tug of war on education policy between liberal "reform proponents" and the unions, as the NY Times argues, or the 1% and nearly everyone else?

NYC Public School Parents: Is the tug of war on education policy between liberal "reform proponents" and the unions, as the NY Times argues, or the 1% and nearly everyone else?: Is the tug of war on education policy between liberal "reform proponents" and the unions, as the NY Times argues, or the 1% and nearly everyone else?NY Times ran a front page article on Wednesday, focus

1 by mike simpson / 1h 

LA Charter School Teachers Trying To Unionize | Crooks and Liars

LA Charter School Teachers Trying To Unionize | Crooks and Liars: LA Charter School Teachers Trying To UnionizeBy KaroliCharter school teachers in Los Angeles are trying to unionize within one of the largest charter school chains -- Alliance College-Ready schools. After being told by charter school managers that they would remain neutral, the opposite has happened.Teachers are receiving letters en

1 by mike simpson / 2h 

Exposing Hedge Fund Politics in New York - NYTimes.com

Exposing Hedge Fund Politics in New York - NYTimes.com: Exposing Hedge Fund Politics in New YorkTwo weeks ago, several busloads of New Yorkers made a pilgrimage to Greenwich, Conn., to visit the waterfront estate of the hedge fund titan Paul Tudor Jones II, where, suffice it to say, they were not invited in to see the china. It was a rainy Saturday afternoon and the protesters, many of them ordina

by mike simpson / 2h 

Thousands Rally Against Cuomo's Billionaire-Backed Education Scheme | Common Dreams | Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community

Thousands Rally Against Cuomo's Billionaire-Backed Education Scheme | Common Dreams | Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community: Thousands Rally Against Cuomo's Billionaire-Backed Education SchemeStudents, parents, and teachers protest New York governor's plan to tie standardized tests to teacher evaluations Thousands of parents, teachers, and students from across the state flooded t

1 by mike simpson / 4h 

New Bill Would Have Teachers Diagnose Psychological Issues in Children and Report them to Police | The Free Thought Project

New Bill Would Have Teachers Diagnose Psychological Issues in Children and Report them to Police | The Free Thought Project: New Bill Would Have Teachers Diagnose Psychological Issues in Children and Report them to PoliceDallas, Texas – Texas State Representative Jason Villalba (R-Dallas) is once again in the spotlight after submitting yet another Orwellian proposal, H.B. 985.Villalba first raised

1 by mike simpson / 4h 

An Activist Handbook for the Education Revolution: United Opt Out’s Test of Courage

An Activist Handbook for the Education Revolution: United Opt Out’s Test of CourageAn Activist Handbook for the Education Revolution: United Opt Out’s Test of CourageIn the summer of 2013, United Opt Out spent all of June writing 50 state opt out/refusal guides to arm everyone with an essential tool, specific to their state, in order to halt corporate education reform via opt out. This summer we h

3 by mike simpson / 4h 

CURMUDGUCATION: Help for the Failing Schools

CURMUDGUCATION: Help for the Failing Schools: Help for the Failing Schools This is newest reformster talking point-- the Big Standardized Test is a big boon to poor and minority students, and to ask them to opt out is to ask them is to ask them to become invisible. Robert Pondiscio was pushing it again at the Fordham's blog this week. It's a nice rhetorical move, but it's limited by the degree to

1 by mike simpson / 4h 

The Gates Foundation vs. the World Social Forum: A Tale of Two Meetings | Common Dreams | Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community

The Gates Foundation vs. the World Social Forum: A Tale of Two Meetings | Common Dreams | Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community: The Gates Foundation vs. the World Social Forum: A Tale of Two MeetingsbyMorten ThaysenFood sovereignty activists protest outside a secret elite corporate seed conference convened by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) and the United States Age

by mike simpson / 5h 

GUEST VOICES: Opting Out in the Jersey Suburbs, Or, White Like Me by Belinda Edmondson | parentingthecore

GUEST VOICES: Opting Out in the Jersey Suburbs, Or, White Like Me by Belinda Edmondson | parentingthecore: GUEST VOICES: Opting Out in the Jersey Suburbs, Or, White Like Me by Belinda Edmondson4The latest attacks by the education reformers and standardized testing advocates against the test-refusal movement have focused on the issue of race.  For example, on March 25, 2015, Robert Pondiscio of The

1 by mike simpson / 5h 

Stunning revelation Bill Gates has spent $2.3 Billion on Common Core – #PARCC | North Denver News

Stunning revelation Bill Gates has spent $2.3 Billion on Common Core – #PARCC | North Denver News: Stunning revelation Bill Gates has spent $2.3 Billion on Common Core – #PARCC The new curriculum driven into law by Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, the Common Core Standards, is a product of massive spending on an unprecedented historical level by Bill Gates.Research by Jack Hassard, Professor Em

1 by mike simpson / 8h 

Report: Idaho wasted millions on Pearson management system | Education Dive

Report: Idaho wasted millions on Pearson management system | Education Dive: Report: Idaho wasted millions on Pearson management systemDive Brief:The Idaho Legislature’s Office of Performance Evaluations has released a new report with some devastating findings: the state mismanaged and ultimately wasted $61 million on the rollout of a Pearson management system, Schoolnet.The report doesn't look go

by mike simpson / 8h 

Skull Measurements, Achievement Data and the Destruction of the Public School System | educarenow

Skull Measurements, Achievement Data and the Destruction of the Public School System | educarenow: Skull Measurements, Achievement Data and the Destruction of the Public School SystemIn the 1880’s, a white anthropologist named Samuel Morton theorized that the relative intelligence of different races could be determined by measuring and comparing skulls.  He then took to measuring hundreds of skull

1 by mike simpson / 8h 

Chicago's School Finances Grow Worse - Thanks Rahm #DumpRahm #Chuy2015

Divergent bond results for Chicago and Philadelphia schools - Yahoo Finance:Divergent bond results for Chicago and Philadelphia schoolsMarch 26 (Reuters) - Two of the nation's most distressed big-city school districts issued general obligation bonds this week, with very different results.The junk-rated Philadelphia School District borrowed at investment-grade levels thanks to a state intercept pro

by mike simpson / 9h 

We’re educating our kids all wrong: The progressive argument against standardized-test mania - Salon.com

We’re educating our kids all wrong: The progressive argument against standardized-test mania - Salon.com: We’re educating our kids all wrong: The progressive argument against standardized-test maniaBacklash against overtesting, "accountability" and Common Core is right on. Here's how we empower teachers and kidsTOM LITTLE AND KATHERINE ELLISON Excerpted from "Loving Learning: How Pr

1 by mike simpson / 9h 

Wethersfield Teachers Union, Administrators Discuss Negative Survey Results - Hartford Courant

Wethersfield Teachers Union, Administrators Discuss Negative Survey Results - Hartford Courant: Wethersfield Teachers Union, Administrators Discuss Negative Survey Results THERSFIELD — The school system and the teachers union privately discussed last week a union survey showing widespread discontent among elementary school teachers with many district policies."We had some good, fruitful discu

1 by mike simpson / 9h 

Do You Always get the Truth in Florida When You Ask to OPT OUT

Do You Always get the Truth in Florida When You Ask to OPT OUT?Parents Can Opt Out - United Opt Out NationalClick Here to go to United Opt Out National: Click Here to go to the Website- United Opt Out TeamClick Here to go to the Website FairTest

4 by mike simpson / 10h 

Ex-employee on Excel Bridgeport and the reform movement - Education Matters

Ex-employee on Excel Bridgeport and the reform movement - Education Matters:Ex-employee on Excel Bridgeport and the reform movementTurning my column today over to Jorge Cabrera, who for three years worked for Excel Bridgeport as a community organizer before he was laid off.He has something to say:The Movement: The Battle for Public Education in Bridgeport,A Repentant Reformer’s Reflections For nea

1 by mike simpson / 10h 

The End of the Road for PUBLIC SCHOOL Teachers? I Don’t Think So!

The End of the Road for PUBLIC SCHOOL Teachers? I Don’t Think So!: The End of the Road for PUBLIC SCHOOL Teachers? I Don’t Think So!MARCH 28, 2015 BY NANCY BAILEY 1 COMMENTIs it the end of the road for public school teachers? It seems like a bad sign when a respected teacher wins an award for teaching, and during a conversation afterwards on CNN, tells young people to go into teaching only if they

1 by mike simpson / 10h 

Why Charter Schools Have to Try to Destroy Public Schools

(99) Why Charter Schools Have to Try to Destroy Public Schools: Why Charter Schools Have to Try to Destroy Public SchoolsMarch 28, 2015 at 4:17amMany observers have been perplexed about why Charter School Organizations in New York, especially Eva Mosokowitz's Success Academies, have been spending huge amounts of money to mobilize in behalf of Andrew Cuomo's entire package of education reforms, not

by mike simpson / 10h 

YESTERDAY

The Crony Capitalist War of greed against U.S. Public Education | Crazy Normal - the Classroom Exposé

The Crony Capitalist War of greed against U.S. Public Education | Crazy Normal - the Classroom Exposé: The Crony Capitalist War of greed against U.S. Public Education There are several forms of Capitalism in use throughout the world. Economics Help.org defines them and reports that Crony Capitalism is what’s used in the United States. The Age of Crony Capitalism says, “For most of US history, cron

1 by mike simpson / 22h 

Standardized testing: I opted my kids out. The schools freaked out. Now I know why.

Standardized testing: I opted my kids out. The schools freaked out. Now I know why.: I Opted My Kids Out of Standardized TestsThen I learned a thing or two.She's smiling because she knows taking the test may very well be easier than opting out.Photo by iStock/Thinkstock Deciding to opt my two daughters out of Colorado standardized testing seemed like a no-brainer. We aren’t permanent Colorado resi

1 by mike simpson / 23h hide  //  save

Special Nite Cap: Catch Up on Today's Post 3/27/15

Special Nite Cap - Catch Up on Today's Post 3/27/15Special Nite Cap CORPORATE ED REFORMAre Okla GOP Politicians Still For a Strong Supt?Are Okla GOP Politicians Still For a Strong Supt?: ARE OKLA GOP POLITICIANS STILL FOR A STRONG SUPT?Joy Hofmeister, Oklahoma Superintendent of Public InstructionPhoto by Brett Dickerson There are Republican politicians in Oklahoma. And then, there is that Republic

by mike simpson / 23h 

2015 National Conference – Chicago

The Countdown to Chicago Has Begun!

The Network For Public Education | 2015 National Conference – Chicago 

http://bit.ly/1FQFcQM

Señor Chuy Garcia race not just about Chicago #VoteChuyGarcia #fox32debate #IMWITHCHUY | Cloaking Inequity

Señor Chuy Garcia race not just about Chicago #VoteChuyGarcia #fox32debate #IMWITHCHUY | Cloaking Inequity:

Señor Chuy Garcia race not just about Chicago #VoteChuyGarcia #fox32debate #IMWITHCHUY

What the background on Rahm Emanuel and the Chicago runoff? Why are so many Democrats unhappy with a Democrat? In 2013, I wrote about his cozy relationship with billionaires in the post Bloomberg and Rahmbo: Sleight of Hand Artists. The reality of Rahm sponsored school closures in School Closure and Race Infographic: Something fishy going on in Chicago? and Mouth agape: What the data tell us about school closure in Chicago

A few more media articles about the Chicago race:

The Economist Can Jesús save Chicago?

Bloomberg Why is Rahm Emanuel’s Challenger, Jesús ‘Chuy’ Garcia, So Happy?

Huffington post Billionaire Who Backs Rahm Emanuel Also A Big GOP Donor

Al Jazeera Rahm Emanuel could lose re-election

Sun-Times Billionaire Ken Griffin throws in another $500,000 for Rahm re-election

See also Chuy’s interview with Maria Hinojosa (“The man who taught her to love politics”) on LatinoUSA below.

According to Al Jazeera, Garcia is narrowing the lead that Rahm had two weeks ago (See School debate threatens Rahm Emanuel’s re-election). But Emanuel is still enough ahead that it will take a lot of work to narrow the gap.

Last week Democrat Emanuel’s political action committee got half a million dollars from Ken Griffin a Scott-Walker supporting-conservative-hedge-fund-manager, BIG GOP donor billionaire (Griffin has donated $1 million to Rahm’s PAC. $750,000 since March 2)

Reports of Emanuel’s campaign coffers are listed as either $20 or $30 million. 

It is hard to beat that kind of money. In fact, in the United States of America 91% of the time the better-financed candidate wins. I suspect the Supreme Court knows that and has struck down limits on money in politics

The 5 to 4 McCutcheon decision — striking down the limit on the total amount of money wealthy donors can contribute to candidates and political committees — was the fifth since Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. joined the court that agreed with constitutional arguments challenging laws designed to blunt the influence of money in politics.

But with the Network for Public Education and other grassroots support we can beat billionaires—Monica Ratliff (LA) and Ted Gordon (Austin) Also, see the post Is a Billionaire or Millionaire looking to buy your election Nov 4? (Please Vote Ted in Austin)

So what will be the outcome of the runoff?

This race is a referendum on public education vs privatization. Democracy vs Cronyism. The 1% against everyone else.  It’s Monica Ratliff and Tom Torlakson races all rolled into one.

Early voting for the Chicago mayoral race between Rahm Emanuel and Jesus Chuy Garcia ends next Saturday, April 4th.  The election is Tuesday, April 7th.

Diane Ravitch: I Endorse Jesus (Chuy) Garcia for Mayor of the great city of Chicagohttp://wp.me/p2odLa-9uo via @DianeRavitch

So for the next week, any way you can get the word out, please do so.

Facebook, Tweet, call long lost relatives who live in Chicago, make a donation at https://secure.actblue.com/contribute/page/

Next Tuesday, from 7:00 p.m.-9:00 p.m, Chicago time, the Network for Public Education is doing a Twitter storm in partnership with CTU. The storm is coinciding with the last mayoral debate so it should be exciting.  Please join in and tweet.  If you don’t tweet, share the Garcia campaign messages that are up on NPE’s Facebook.

Here are some tweets for Chuy!! 

• Chuy supports sustainable community schools in every neighborhood! @garcia4chicago!
• Closing 50 neighborhood schools shouldn’t get u a 2nd term. Vote #chuygarcia @NetworkPublicEd
• @garcia4chicago! Garcia’s 1st act as Mayor: go to Springfield & demand action 2 give Chicago an elected school board. #fox32debate
• Close our schools, degrade our neighborhoods? Bye-bye, Rahm Hello, Chuy! 
• @garcia4chicago! @CTULocal1 @coreteachers @EdBlogNet
• @garcia4chicago! Chicago needs an elected school board.  Chuy will fight for it. 
• @garcia4chicago! Chicago needs elected school board-not Rahm’s appointed friend$$ #onetermrahm
• Chicago needs elected school board not 50 shuttered schools @garcia4chicago!
• @garcia4chicago! Chicago needs elected school board Chicago needs Chuy #VoteGarciaApril7
• @garcia4chicago! Chicago needs elected school board not a board of rahm’s buddie$ #onetermrahm
• Closed schools, broken promises, time for change, time for Chuy @garcia4chicago!
• Chuy Garcia race not just abt Chicago Wake-up call for every politician working to destroy public ed #voteChuy @garcia4chicago @NetworkPublicEd
• #chuyGarcia Garcia will give students books, libraries, rec facilities. language, literature, art classeshttp://www.livingindialogue.com/chicago-mayoral-candidate-jesus-chuy-garcia-talks-schools/
• I vote to protect our democracy. I vote for public education @garcia4chicago!
• Chicago Mayoral Candidate Jesus “Chuy” Garcia Talks About Schoolshttp://www.livingindialogue.com/chicago-mayoral-candidate-jesus-chuy-garcia-talks-schools/
• After every campaign promise Rahm makes, I finish his thought with “and I had 4 years to do that.” @garcia4chicago!
• #fox32debate
• “@MarcusAWinn: I’m ready to #DumpRahm the same way he dumped public schools.”
• Chicago didn’t vote for Garcia b/c of Mayor’s personality, but because of broken promises, bad choices, wrong priorities. #fox32debate
• Anthony Cody talks with Jesus”Chuy” Garcia .http://www.livingindialogue.com/chicago-mayoral-candidate-jesus-chuy-garcia-talks-schools/
• @garcia4chicago! @NetworkPublicEd endorses Jesus “Chuy” Garcia!
• Vote Garcia April 7
• Close public schools to  re-open them as private charters: unacceptable. #votechuygarcia April 7
• Koch’s want to spend $889 million to buy elections They can’t buy our votes #VoteChuyGarcia April 7
• Chuy Garcia race isn’t just abt Chicago Put the fear into every politician working to destroy public ed #VoteChuyGarcia
• Send a message across the US-we are many & we won’t let you privatize public ed #VoteChuyGarcia.
• @NetworkPublicEd
• #VoteChuyGarcia: Equal opportunity 4 ALL Chicago’s children to learn & succeed
• Ravitch says Send a signal 2 entire nation: privatizing our public schools has failed #VoteChuyGarcia
• Ravitch: Garcia will restore true education–not test scores–as the center of school life #VoteChuyGarcia
• Politicans start your boot shaking.  We’re sending Rahm home Who’s next? @garcia4chicago!
• Time to go home Rahm, you may have the $$, but Chuy’s got the people. @garcia4chicago!
• You want our votes, Rahm? You should have protected our kids. #VoteChuyGarcia

Voting early? Get your ballot in by Saturday April 4 locations here! 

@Garcia4Chicago!

Also join, us in Chicago April 25-26 for Network for Public Education’s 2nd Annual Conference “Public Education: Our Kids, Our Schools, Our Communities” I will attend and convene a panel entitled Having a Conversation with Teach For America. See the entire 2105 NPE Conference Chicago schedule here. Register here. If you are going, please use this logo for your Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook etc.

See you there!

I will also be in Chicago for 2015 American Educational Research Association conference from April 16-20 presenting on a variety of topics. Click on the links in the Tweet below for topics, times, and locations.

Señor Chuy Garcia race not just about Chicago #VoteChuyGarcia #fox32debate #IMWITHCHUY | Cloaking Inequity:

Please Facebook Like, Tweet, etc below and/or reblog to share this discussion with others.

Want to know about Cloaking Inequity’s freshly pressed conversations about educational policy? Click the “Follow blog by email” button in the upper left hand corner of this page.

Twitter: @ProfessorJVH

Click here for Vitae.

Interested in joining us in the sunny capitol of California and obtaining your Doctorate in Educational Leadership from California State University Sacramento? Apply by April 1. Go here.

Thanks to Robin Hiller for her research and writing for this post.

Señor Chuy Garcia race not just about Chicago #VoteChuyGarcia #fox32debate #IMWITHCHUY | Cloaking Inequity:

With A Brooklyn Accent: Liz Phillips' Speech at the " Protect Our Schools Rally" at Cuomo's Offices in Manhattan

With A Brooklyn Accent: Liz Phillips' Speech at the " Protect Our Schools Rally" at Cuomo's Offices in Manhattan:

Liz Phillips' Speech at the " Protect Our Schools Rally" at Cuomo's Offices in Manhattan

We all want great teachers teaching our children.  Unfortunately,the governor’s teacher evaluation proposals will do absolutely nothing to help us meet that goal—and in fact with have the opposite effect as great teachers and principals become demoralized and leave the profession—or decide not to enter it in the first place.

50% OF A TEACHER’S EVALUATION WOULD BE BASED ON A FLAWED GROWTH MODEL ON FLAWED STATE TESTS.  It is shocking to think that a model that has been shown to have a high margin of error—particularly for those who teach the highest and lowest performing students—would count for 50% of a teacher’s rating.  In New York City we remember what happened just a few years ago with TDR scores based on a growth model.  

Fabulous teachers by any other measure were at times rated in the lowest percentiles.   It is ironic that a year after passing a law mandating that state tests cannot be used for high stakes decisions for students, the governor has decided that they should be more high stakes than ever for teachers.    

But of course, making tests so high stakes for teachers will  make them high stakes for students.  Many schools will narrow their curriculum, focusing even more time than they currently do on test prep at the expense of an enriched curriculum that helps students develop critical thinking and problem solving skills.  And there is no doubt that this will happen more in schools where students have traditionally had more With A Brooklyn Accent: Liz Phillips' Speech at the " Protect Our Schools Rally" at Cuomo's Offices in Manhattan:

A Teacher Tries Opting Out | Teachers' Letters of Professional Conscience

A Teacher Tries Opting Out | Teachers' Letters of Professional Conscience:

A Teacher Tries Opting Out

This is my first blog post and kind of the reason I decided to create my own blog: to keep people updated on what is going on with my request, as a teacher, to be allowed to opt out of administering the flawed Smarter Balanced Assessment.Last month, my local association stood before our school board to say that as a group, we are opposed to the Smarter Balanced Assessment. I spoke at that meeting and stated that I object to administering it and asked to be excused from administering based on my professional and personal objections.

On March 9th, I had not yet heard a response to my request and sent this email to the school board, our superintendent, and my principal.

“As you all know, at the February 19 school board meeting I declared my strong objections to the Smarter Balanced Assessment and asked to be excused from administering the assessment based on those objections. The statement I made to the school board is attached.

I have objected to this system of test and punish since it’s original implementation in 2001 with NCLB. I knew at that time that a requirement of 100% proficiency by 2014 would result in exactly what has happened in Washington state, where their legislature turned down the Race to the Top waiver and they remain under NCLB: 100% of schools are in “failing” status. There is virtually no goal or standard that can be set, including breathing without assistance, that every child in the nation can meet on the same day at the same time.

I attended a presentation by ODE and saw how their representatives are misleading parents about the SBAC. It made me sick and angry. I feel horrible about trying to put a smiley face on this for parents, and most of all for my students. I know that some of them will be okay. I know that most of them will be frustrated and feel stupid. Even in the best case scenario described by ODE, only 30% will do well. In the case of my students, I feel that will be much lower. ELL students who have taken similar Common Core tests in English A Teacher Tries Opting Out | Teachers' Letters of Professional Conscience:

Is the tug of war on education policy between liberal "reform proponents" and the unions, as the NY Times argues, or the 1% and nearly everyone else?

NYC Public School Parents: Is the tug of war on education policy between liberal "reform proponents" and the unions, as the NY Times argues, or the 1% and nearly everyone else?:

Is the tug of war on education policy between liberal "reform proponents" and the unions, as the NY Times argues, or the 1% and nearly everyone else?

NY Times ran a front page article on Wednesday, focused on the tug of war for Hilary Clinton’s soul, supposedly between the teacher unions and the big donors, mostly hedge fund operators, who want to privatize public schools and ramp up high-stakes testing, weaken teacher tenure and base their evaluations on student test scores. Value-added test based teacher evaluation has proved to be highly unreliable, and many expert groups, including the American Statistical Association and the National Academy of Sciences, have concluded that it could have damaging impact on morale and the quality of education.   

In the article, the hedgefunders make it clear that they will threaten to withhold their contributions if Hillary does not adopt their positions:

“This is an issue that’s important to a lot of Democratic donors,” said John Petry, a hedge fund manager who was a founder of the Harlem Success Academy, a New York charter school. “Donors want to hear where she stands.”

Yet in the process of writing about this ideological battle, the reporter, Maggie Haberman, characterizes Democrats for Education Reform, one of the principle hedge fund-backed lobby groups as a “left of center group,” which is absurd.  For some reason, DFER has managed to persuade reporters that it has any liberal credentials, despite the fact that as Diane Ravitch pointed out, the California Democratic Party has repudiated it.   

Parents Across America wrote an open letter to the NPR ombudsman in 2011, objecting to the fact that Claudio Sanchez, the NPR reporter, had called DFER a “liberal” organization, while quoting their criticism of the progressive participants in the anti-corporate reform Save Our Schools march in DC.   

We also pointed out that DFER’s founder, hedge fund operator Whitney Tilson, admitted that the only reason he put “Democrats” in the organization’s title and focused on convincing Democrats to adopt their pro-privatization agenda was that GOP leaders were already in agreement with most of their positions.  The following is an excerpt from a film made by Tilson called “A Right Denied”: 

“The real problem, politically, was not the Republican party, it was the Democratic party. So it dawned on us, over the course of six months or a year, that it had to be an inside job. The main obstacle to education reform was moving the Democratic party, and it had to be Democrats who did it, it had to be an inside job. So that was the thesis behind the organization. And the name – and the name was critical – we get a lot of flack for the name. You know, “Why are you Democrats for education reform? That’s very exclusionary. I mean, certainly there are Republicans in favor of education reform.” And we said, “We agree.” In fact, our natural allies, in many cases, are Republicans on this crusade, NYC Public School Parents: Is the tug of war on education policy between liberal "reform proponents" and the unions, as the NY Times argues, or the 1% and nearly everyone else?:

LA Charter School Teachers Trying To Unionize | Crooks and Liars

LA Charter School Teachers Trying To Unionize | Crooks and Liars:

LA Charter School Teachers Trying To Unionize

By Karoli

Charter school teachers in Los Angeles are trying to unionize within one of the largest charter school chains -- Alliance College-Ready schools. After being told by charter school managers that they would remain neutral, the opposite has happened.

Teachers are receiving letters encouraging them not to organize and in some cases principals have conducted meetings with them to discourage any union activity.

Daily Kos:

One of the big appeals of charter schools, for the hedge funders and politicians who support them, is that they're a way to break unions. But as charter schools become more entrenched, and their teachers see the problems that come with high turnover, low wages, and lack of due process protections, they're starting to unionize. Which was definitely not the plan of the charter industry. Earlier this month, teachers at the largest Los Angeles charter chain, Alliance,launched an organizing drive, because:

"We believe that when teachers have a respected voice in policymaking it leads to school sustainability and teacher retention," said Elana Goldbaum, who teaches history at Gertz-Ressler High School, a member of the Alliance group. "We have a lot of talent and we want to see that stay. We want to see our teachers be a part of the decision-making and we want to advocate for our students and ourselves."

Alliance hasn't held up their promise to remain neutral.

Alliance has now launched an anti-union website as part of a broader effort to keep teachers from joining together to get collective bargaining and other union rights. Not exactly neutral, though I guess Alliance management isn't yet saying teachers don't have the right to unionize, they're just saying they really don't think teachers shouldexercise that right. Since Alliance is publicly funded, these anti-union messages are being paid for with public money; teachers are enlisting community support in the request for true neutrality.

No charter school chain wants teachers to join a union. After all, their primary reason for existing is to break unions so they can turn a profit for the ones who funded them. In LA, charter schools have been a huge battleground for the hedge funders and billionaires who are anxious to profit from public education.

Teachers have put up a petition at MoveOn.org asking the CEO of Alliance to remain neutral. You can sign it here.

↓ Story continues below ↓

LA Charter School Teachers Trying To Unionize | Crooks and Liars:

Exposing Hedge Fund Politics in New York - NYTimes.com

Exposing Hedge Fund Politics in New York - NYTimes.com:

Exposing Hedge Fund Politics in New York

Two weeks ago, several busloads of New Yorkers made a pilgrimage to Greenwich, Conn., to visit the waterfront estate of the hedge fund titan Paul Tudor Jones II, where, suffice it to say, they were not invited in to see the china. It was a rainy Saturday afternoon and the protesters, many of them ordinary working people who have felt cheated by the inequities of a tax system that favors the rarefied few, were there to call attention to Mr. Jones’s educational agenda, built on the premise that the extravagantly rich know better how to teach reading, and to his support of Republican candidates and causes in the New York State Legislature that disadvantage the poor and working class.

It is this kind of political spending, a total of $1.6 million over the past 12 years, they maintain, that undermines his philanthropic efforts through the Robin Hood Foundation, the poverty-fighting charity he created. To civilians, of course, Mr. Jones can seem like someone needing remedial work in cause and effect, a billionaire whose industry thrives on extracting economic value rather than producing it, and yet is comfortable speaking on the corrosive impact of inequality.

“When we begin to put justness on par with profits,” Mr. Jones said in a TED Talk recently, “then we get the most valuable thing in the world. We get back our humanity.” Hearing that is like listening to the Real Housewives of Orange County say that once we start prizing restraint over consumer spectacle, we’ll be well on our way to a new chapter in cultural dignity.

Those who made the trip to Connecticut were marching on behalf of a group called the Hedge Clippers, a nascent organization backed by the American Federation of Teachers, prominent labor and community groups, and Zephyr Teachout, the liberal former Democratic candidate for governor. It is aimed at outlining the ways hedge funds bleed the economy through self-interested practice and then extend the damage through the lavish purchase of political influence. According to an analysis by the group, hedge fund managers have made $40 million in political contributions in New York State over the past 15 years, with Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo receiving close to $5 million. Many of those donors are prominent supporters of charter schools, and nearly all would presumably denounce the elimination of tax loopholes that magnify their fortunes.

The Hedge Clippers produce and issue reports at a speed that would make many graduate students envious. This week they released a paper detailing the flow of money from hedge fund managers and high-frequency traders into Rahm Emanuel’s coffers; in Chicago, Mr. Emanuel’s mayoral tenure has been challenged by a bid from the left. Another report offered a list of buyers at One57, the ultraluxury condominium in Manhattan that benefited from considerable tax breaks.

In New York, the Hedge Clippers have been protesting at a very lively pace. One rally was recently held outside 15 Central Park West, a luxury tower that functions as a financial-industry dormitory. That day the focus was on the hedge fund manager Daniel S. Loeb, the chairman of the Success Academy charter school network, who bought an apartment in the building seven years ago. At the rally, the Hedge Clippers offered a tutorial to the public on the complicated ways hedge funds work and accumulate money Exposing Hedge Fund Politics in New York - NYTimes.com:

Thousands Rally Against Cuomo's Billionaire-Backed Education Scheme | Common Dreams | Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community

Thousands Rally Against Cuomo's Billionaire-Backed Education Scheme | Common Dreams | Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community:

Thousands Rally Against Cuomo's Billionaire-Backed Education Scheme

Students, parents, and teachers protest New York governor's plan to tie standardized tests to teacher evaluations

 Thousands of parents, teachers, and students from across the state flooded the streets of Manhattan on Saturday to call out Governor Andrew Cuomo for selling out the public school system.

"Wall Street got a bailout. Public schools were sold out," was the message as protesters blocked traffic outside Cuomo's 3rd Avenue office building. The group is calling on the state government to fully fund public schools, limit high-stakes testing, support struggling schools, fairly evaluate teachers, and stop the expansion of charter schools.

Organized by a coalition of groups, the demonstration included former progressive gubernatorial candidate Zephyr Teachout, as well as other members of the Hedge Clippers—a recently founded campaign, backed by Teachout, as well as the American Federation of Teachers, and other prominent labor and community groups.

According to the group's site, the Hedge Clippers seek to "expose the mechanisms hedge funds and billionaires use to influence government and politics in order to expand their wealth, influence and power" by calling out the politicians who do their bidding. 

During Saturday's protest, the group wielded large paper scissors and held signs accusing Cuomo of being the "number one recipient of hedge fund cash." Throughout the day, images from the demonstration were shared widely on Twitter as well as on Thousands Rally Against Cuomo's Billionaire-Backed Education Scheme | Common Dreams | Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community:

New Bill Would Have Teachers Diagnose Psychological Issues in Children and Report them to Police | The Free Thought Project

New Bill Would Have Teachers Diagnose Psychological Issues in Children and Report them to Police | The Free Thought Project:



New Bill Would Have Teachers Diagnose Psychological Issues in Children and Report them to Police

Dallas, Texas – Texas State Representative Jason Villalba (R-Dallas) is once again in the spotlight after submitting yet another Orwellian proposal, H.B. 985.

Villalba first raised the ire of civil libertarians by proposing a bill, H.B. 2006, which would have eliminated the religious exemption for vaccination, essentially creating a forced government vaccination program without exception.

More recently, Villalba was thrust into the national spotlight when he proposed H.B. 2918, which would usurp citizens of the ability to hold law enforcement accountable for their actions. The bill would negate the people’s ability to create an accurate and impartial record of police interactions by restricting citizens from filming within 25 feet of an officer.

Now with H.B. 985, Villalba intends to give school officials the authority to force psychological screenings of students that teachers and staff diagnose as having mental health issues.

Once the process is set in motion by school officials, parents would be forced to take their child to a mental health professional within 30 days, under threat of suspension of the child from school.

“ …the requirement that the parent or guardian, before the expiration of the 30-day period, to avoid suspension of the student under this section, take the student to the nearest local mental health authority or a physician specializing in psychiatry to receive a mental health screening and a certificate of medical examination for mental illness, as described by Section 533.03522(c), Health and Safety Code, that contains the examining physician’s opinion that the student is not a danger to self or others.”

While under suspension the child would still receive an education, but they would be sent to an “alternative school.”

School administrators would be required under the law to provide the student’s name, address, and information regarding the complaint to the local mental health authorities and the police department upon verification of the complaint.

(i) A school counselor or a principal who receives notice
under. Subsection (b) about a student who subsequently is subject to
a notice of intent to suspend under Subsection (g) shall:
(1) provide the student’s name and address and
information concerning the conduct or statement that led to the
notice of intent to suspend to:
(A) the school district police department, if the
school counselor or principal is employed by a school district and
the district has a police department;
(B) the police department of the municipality in
which the school is located or, if the school is not in a
municipality, the sheriff of the county in which the school is
located; and
(C) the local mental health authority nearest the
school;

Teachers have enough on their academic plates without them being forced to become armchair psychologists in the classroom.

Also, it is highly inappropriate and dangerous for unqualified teachers to play the role of child psychiatrists. Unless they’ve had special training and are certified to diagnose the disorders, it can also be illegal.

We are already witnessing the damage caused by parents believing teachers who think that every child who acts out in their classroom has ADHD. It’s called The Ritalin Explosion.

The idea that students’ personal information would be submitted to mental health facilities and police departments for

Read more at http://thefreethoughtproject.com/bill-teachers-diagnose-psychological-issues-children-report-police/#sjwPOOkpdypl38u9.99