This will end discussion of education policy for now----I want to emphasize what global corporate control of our K-university will look like and lead to and also say that although it is hitting underserved schools hardest----it will come to all public schools. So, do not sit there thinking it is OK for this to happen to low-income or students of color----don't sit there believing global corporations are doing this because they really care about the best education for the poor. That is ridiculous. They are doing it to take all Federal funding for public education. Wall Street scored most of our Federal funding for higher education between Clinton and Obama---now Obama ran with Bush policy to take K-12.
IT IS UNCONSTITUTIONAL -----IT IS ILLEGAL------AND IT WILL FILL K-12 WITH THE SAME LEVEL OF FRAUD AND CORRUPTION EVERYWHERE IN CORPORATE OPERATIONS.
Baltimore's pol are leading the way by introducing education bills written by Johns Hopkins. They run as Democrats and serve as Bush neo-conservatives and we need to get rid of all of Maryland's global corporate pols!
New Orleans Corporate Education Reform 101
http://owl.li/L10we
'The drastic changes in the public education landscape post Hurricane Katrina, despite its dismal failure, offers invaluable lessons for cities across the country. These lessons are not only important for cities and communities considering implementing the New Orleans failed corporate reform model but also it proved that the business model approach to improving public education as touted for years by noted public school privateer Milton Friedman and other doesn’t work'.
New Orleans Corporate Education Reform 101 What they won’t tell you about the education reforms in New Orleans?
By Raynard Sanders, Ed.D. | Originally Published at EmpathyEducates. March 30, 2015
The corporate education reforms in New Orleans have been touted has the national guide for turning around urban school districts. As a result of the devastation of Hurricane Katrina and more than willing elected officials, New Orleans quickly became the national poster child for privatizing public education. In that most of these changes happened within months after Katrina there was little or no local resistance in that more than 80% of the population was evacuated from the city. In light of that, the corporate education reforms in New Orleans has been in the raw so to be speak as charter school proponents were able to created a perfect environment for turning public schools into profit centers. This unique situation attracted billions of dollars from the Louisiana Legislature, the federal government, and foundations promoting the privatization of public education. Thanks to a supportive national media the narrative of the corporate education reforms in New Orleans immediately hit print media, television and Internet claiming unprecedented academic success predicated on school choice. Of course these media outlets were repeating the story told by state education officials and charter schools proponents labeling the reforms in New Orleans as a “miracle”. With that cities and states across the country are now looking at the reforms in New Orleans as guides to improve their failing public schools. However the real story of chronic academic failure, fiscal mismanagement, and inequitable practices, as reported by external researchers, universities and journalists, has gotten limited coverage in the mainstream media.
The drastic changes in the public education landscape post Hurricane Katrina, despite its dismal failure, offers invaluable lessons for cities across the country. These lessons are not only important for cities and communities considering implementing the New Orleans failed corporate reform model but also it proved that the business model approach to improving public education as touted for years by noted public school privateer Milton Friedman and other doesn’t work. For the past nine years New Orleans had all the conditions that Freidman and others said was needed to improve public education; schools managed by private boards with no interference from an elected school board, no teacher union contract, young smart and intelligent teachers (as all the teachers in New Orleans were fired after Hurricane Katrina) and school choice where parents could chose a school which is best fits their child needs and not be forced to go to those failing neighborhood school. Additionally in New Orleans charter operators received unprecedented funding, which for several years has been more than three times the funding of other school districts in Louisiana post Hurricane Katrina.
Corporate school reform is spreading across the country like wild fire. It comes to communities like a sheep in wolf’s clothing, before communities realize it corporate education reformers have taken over their public schools; plummeting test scores while resurrected equity and access issues affecting mostly poor and minority students. Below are a few of the major problems with the corporate reforms that proponents will never say as they travel across the country promoting the unsuccessful schools they have created:
School ratings, which determined a school’s passing or failing status is a moving, target. In Louisiana the definition of a failing school changes at least once every two years post Hurricane Katrina. Thus creating an environment where schools suddenly become failing schools, opening the door for a charter operator to move in a take over the school.
The take over the school in New Orleans was initiated when the Louisiana Legislature passed legislation which raised the standards for determining a failing school and removed other qualifying conditions, however this legislation was crafted only for public schools in New Orleans. This legislation immediately affected most of the schools in New Orleans; in they were suddenly being judged by new standards. With that dozens of schools that were cited for progress and given accolades for academic achievement in May of 2005 suddenly became failing schools in November 2005. Meanwhile state officials and charter proponents told that nation that all the schools were failing. In passing this discriminatory legislation the state took over 107 of 123 schools. If New Orleans would have been judged by the standards that all other school districts in Louisiana were judged possibly four to six schools was eligible for state take over at the time of Hurricane Katrina.
Since then the academic standard policy for taking over schools have changed several times and today it is lowered than it was in 2005. To date almost ten years later only four charter schools managed by the Recovery School District have met the academic standard that was set by the state education department to take over schools in November 2005.
The public is completely taken out of the decision making process of a public education. A state education board of eleven members, which has only two members from New Orleans, making all decisions regarding public education in New Orleans. This state education board has selected the Recovery School District’s superintendent who oversees the 107 public schools in New Orleans with no public input. The state education board makes all decisions regarding the closing of neighborhood schools and selection of charter operators. This board also makes all budgetary decisions for schools in New Orleans, without public publicizing the budget to the citizens of New Orleans and there is no public review or opportunity for local comment.
This is clearly taxation without representation, which seems to be acceptable with the local political leaders.
Public schools are turnover to charter board that has unquestionable authority. Groups or individuals with no education experience are commonly awarded contracts to run charter boards in New Orleans. These charter school boards sign a contract with the state to provide public education. Unlike like other contracts to vendors to provide a public service, which require specific experience and capabilities, the contracts for charter schools have no such criteria. Charter school contracts have been awarded to individuals with no experience and/or shady experience in running schools. The charter boards are usually selected by an individual who submitted the charter application who in turn self-appoint themselves over time, there is no mandate from the state to have elected charter boards or to appoint parents or community members. It is not uncommon for charter school boards to be comprised of members who are not from the school community of the school they managed. It is also not uncommon for a charter school board with a majority of white board members overseeing largely an African-American student population.
These charter boards act like private entities not following state sunshine laws with no connection or concern for parents and the community needs. State education officials give these charter operators unquestionable accountability and rarely intercede in their operations regardless of complaints from parents or violation of state and federal policy. Most of the charter boards pay extremely high administrative salaries with several administrators in a school making more that school district superintendents in Louisiana, while eliminating social workers counselors and librarians and extra circular activities. There have been cases where charter board members have personally taken grant monies from foundations that were given to improve the schools they manage.
Charter schools are encouraged to hire untrained and experience teachers instead of experienced, trained certified teachers. Despite the overwhelming research that trained and experience and teachers are needed to provide quality education experiences most charter school operators opt for young untrained recent graduates. Most charter school operators hired a majority of Teach for America candidates, while many are well intended; they are not prepared for the job. Thus charter boards decrease their overhead and increase their bottom line at the expense of children’s education. Additionally many of the charter schools are led by principals who are untrained as a administrator and generally ascend to the principal position after two to three years of teaching and are former Teach for America teachers. When you include the lack of experience in the principal office and the classroom it is no surprise that most of the charter schools in New Orleans are rated either “D” or “F” with high schools in New Orleans having the lowest ACT average score in the state of Louisiana for the second year in a row.
It should be noted that the few schools in New Orleans that are posting high test scores are by and large staffed with certified teachers and administrators.
Charter Schools were allowed to violate federal and state policy by denying admission and/or services to special needs students. Despite hundreds of complaints from parents and education advocates about the refusal of charter schools to admit and/or serve special needs students over the years state officials refused to intervene and mandate charter schools to follow state and federal policy. Charter schools in New Orleans have been given unquestionable autonomy, which gives them the right to teach who they want and how they want. After several years of unsuccessfully working with state officials to follow the law a class action lawsuit was filed by the Southern Poverty Law Center in 2010. The complaints over the years were horrific as noted in a report from the Southern Poverty Law Center in 2010:
Accountability and ethical behavior in public schools no longer exists. Despite numerous reports of fiscal mismanagement by the state’s Recovery School District, which manages charter schools in New Orleans, the mainstream media and government watchdog groups have largely ignored gross fiscal mismanagement. Since 2008 the Recovery School District has received numerous scathing reports by the Louisiana Legislative Auditor which have included; fiscal mismanagement of federal, state and local funds, not following state and federal policy in its contractor procedures, not following state human resource policies and recently was cited for not being able to account for millions of dollars in property. While this fiscal irresponsibility involves millions of dollars in local and state tax dollars the traditional government watchdog groups haven’t said a word. Usually these groups, specifically the Bureau of Governmental Research and the local Inspector General’s office closely watch taxpayer’s dollars and policies and are quick to recommend changes. Pre Hurricane Katrina when the Orleans Parish School Board had more than its share of fiscal mismanagement the Bureau of Governmental Research attended every school board meeting and led the charge in demanding fiscal accountability. This selective accountability brings to question their professional integrity given the gross mismanagement of taxpayer’s dollars.
It is a literary a “free market” in New Orleans for the Recovery School District and its charter schools without any oversight as our public schools have become huge financial opportunities for the private sector.
State education officials annually mislead the public about the academic progress Academic integrity is a fundamental value and characteristic of academic institutions and state education agencies. The accurate reporting of test scores and other data is an open and transparent process that informs parents, policymakers and the public of the progress of our schools and more importantly gives directions educator’s guidance for improvement. It is also common practice of creditable academic institutions to share information with researchers, universities, graduate students this helps us understand what works and shapes educational policy.
In Louisiana state education officials has taken the unusual approach to limit information of the state mandated test results to the public while giving glowing analysis of progress touting the success of the corporate education reforms. When public information requests are made to state officials they usually refuse the request ignoring state and federal law around the Freedom of Information Act. They have however given test data to selected individuals and organizations, most of which have a contractual relationship with the state department of education. In that agreement these groups and individuals are obligated to share all information with state officials before publishing any analysis or reports on Louisiana test scores. Other researchers across the state have had to suit the Louisiana State Department of Education to get data, which by law are public documents.
If the test scores in Louisiana are so good why are state officials refusing to share the data? Any other creditable state department of education or academic institution would be happy to share details of their great progress. Not sharing this public information raises serious questions about their claims of success and shows their lack of academic integrity.
State education officials and corporate reformers have spent millions of dollars creating a narrative claiming unprecedented success about the education reforms in New Orleans. It is well crafted and is selling itself to school districts around the country as instance success and the final solution in turning failing schools. Hopefully folks considering the New Orleans model will look beyond the bells and whistles.
Raynard Sanders, Ed.D has over thirty years of experience in teaching, educational administration, and economic and community development. As a principal of a New Orleans high school, he developed the first high school DNA lab in the state of Louisiana and created the Creole Cottage Project, an innovative program for his students to build and renovate houses in the school’s community.
Dr. Sanders also served as the Executive Director of The National Faculty at New Orleans, a professional development agency designed to improve the quality of teaching in poor performing schools throughout the Mississippi Delta. He also served as the Director of the Urban Education Graduate Program at Southern University at New Orleans. | Please join Raynard Sanders on-air, on The New Orleans Imperative Education conversation
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Here in Baltimore our city schools are already buying Rupert Murdoch online lessons to sit children in front of computers as a cheap education resource. This is to what education funding sent to Baltimore went towards while classrooms fight to find funding for toilet paper. Involving Rupert Murdoch ----a neo-conservative like Johns Hopkins so you can see why Baltimore has these online corporate lessons-----in education is like allowing a US defense industry corporation come to Maryland to open and run a hospital----moving all that Federal and State funding for public health to the same small group of global corporations.
This is what making the US an economic colonial region overseen by global corporate tribunals and courts looks like. The American people have no say in how these global corporations operate----there is no accountability ---and this is what we see in Maryland already before they vote to install Trans Pacific Trade Pact. All of this is telling the citizens of Maryland
TO WAKE UP AND GET RID OF CLINTON WALL STREET GLOBAL CORPORATE NEO-LIBERALS AND BUSH NEO-CONS! ALL OF MARYLAND'S POLS ARE GLOBAL CORPORATE POLS.
Do you know the citizens of Baltimore do not even know Rupert Murdoch is in their schools because Baltimore has absolutely no public discussion of public policy at any level?
Rupert Murdoch sees $500 billion profit waiting in US public education. Getting his share.
There's a battle being waged in this country against our public school systems. It's not irate parents, it's a corporate battle.
These education "reformers" have the money to buy up politicians in both parties to get laws passed for their benefits. Public schools have little resources to fight back.
Hey, lobbyist, leave them kids alone!
There is no doubt that the performance of U.S. students against their international counterparts continues to disappoint. But since the reasons for this are so difficult to pin down, a parade of self-proclaimed experts and “reformers” has emerged in recent years, touting the urgency of their proposed solutions – never mind if they require redirecting streams of taxpayer dollars into the pockets of their friends.
News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch is among the more-recognizable faces of this movement, having purchased education technology firm Wireless Generation for $360 million in November 2010.
“When it comes to K-12 education,” Murdoch said at the time, “we see a $500 billion sector in the U.S. alone that is waiting desperately to be transformed by big breakthroughs that extend the reach of great teaching.”
Despite the scandals associated with his name and his News Corp company, Murdoch is getting a foothold in the "reforms" going on now. He and his Wireless Generation company are getting a huge profit from a contract with the Chicago school system.
Just like I always say, accountability is only for public school teachers....never for the very rich.
Looks like Rupert Murdoch will profit from "reform" of Chicago school system.
In case Chicago missed it, Rupert Murdoch is now profiting from the testing craziness hitting Chicago's public schools. He owns an outfit called "Wireless Generation" that is now a contractor with CPS. Anyone who doesn't already know that the administration of Chicago Public Schools, the nation's third largest school system, is in the hands of amateurs (or worse, outsiders who want to destroy public education and turn it over to the private sector at all costs), should be contacting any of the 241 principals of the so-called "Track E" schools which begin receiving their students on August 13, 2012.
Things have gotten so crazy in the 2012 world of edits, memos, Power Points, orders, reforms, re-reforms, and re-re-re-reforms from the administration of former Rochester school supt. Jean-Claude Brizard and former "Relationship Banker" Rahm Emanuel that it would take a team of a dozen investigative reporters on the ground school-by-school (with a backup team of another dozen researchers) to separate out the greed, mendacity, incompetence, and silliness that is being foisted on Chicago behind the smokescreen of the latest iteration of "School Reform." Meanwhile, the city's communities, teachers, principals, and children will be facing centrally planned chaos as the first full year of Rahm's version of "School Reform" kicks in non Monday August 13, 2012. The 241 Chicago "Track E" schools would make this sub-system one of the 20 largest school districts in the USA were it a separate system. But it would be one of only three (the other two are Detroit and New Orleans) currently ruled by a group of outside mercenaries dedicated to destroying public education.
Murdoch was going to get 27 million from the Race to the Top money in New York City, but State Controller Thomas DiNapoli rejected the contract.
"New York City ditched a $27 million education contract with News Corp subsidiary Wireless Generation, citing the ongoing investigations into the phone hacking allegations related to News Corp's now-defunct News Of The World tabloid.
State Controller Thomas DiNapoli rejected the Education Department's contract with the company, the New York Daily News reports, which would have paid $27 million to create software to track test scores. The funding would have come out of the state's $700 million "Race to the Top" education funds, but DiNapoli's office said that there were concerns about News Corp's "incomplete record" and about the ongoing scandal
A NY education spokesman said that "“They’ll get a small piece of a smaller pie than they would have received under last year’s proposed contract".
I firmly believe that Rupert Murdoch should not be getting even a small sliver of the pie. He should get zero public money.
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KEEP IN MIND THIS IS THE FACE OF MARYLAND'S GOVERNOR MARTIN O'MALLEY AS MEDIA BEGINS TO PAINT HIM 'PROGRESSIVE' JUST AS THEY DID OBAMA. IF YOUR POLITICAL MEDIA OUTLET IS SELLING O'MALLEY AS PROGRESSIVE---THEY ARE A CLINTON WALL STREET GLOBAL CORPORATE NEO-LIBERAL GROUP.
Below you see the level of injustice in Maryland and especially Baltimore that plays to loss of rights as citizens. This is literally the school to prison pipeline and Baltimore invented this policy. If you look at the Maryland Education stats under O'Malley you will see all kinds of improvement in children from underserved communities and at-risk students and yet ---NONE OF THAT IS TRUE. You read the article below stating shortcomings----with a mention that grades from these juvenile programs need to be sent to the child's home district so as not to add to lowering the achievement scores in Baltimore -----and that seems to be the focus. If conditions are so bad as everyone knows in these juvenile facilities, are these children REALLY getting grades that are reflective of high school graduation requirements?
OF COURSE NOT. THEY ARE JUKED OUT OF THE SYSTEM OFTEN THE FACE OF CHILDREN UNABLE TO READ OR DO MATH.
So, the problem for children in Baltimore starts with the public policy of meeting Federal guideline of equal protection ----opportunity and access to a good public school and education----it grows larger with the public policy with the only goal to make as cheap as possible labor in the city leaving high unemployment in lieu of out of state labor and immigrant labor----and then it gets worse when children are criminalized at an early age and subjected to this prison/jail/police culture. It is all preventable---these policies are done deliberately to keep poor people poor. No oversight and accountability allows complete failure of all public agencies in Maryland.
This happens because Maryland politics is controlled by Clinton Wall Street global corporate neo-liberals and Bush neo-cons who do not 'see' the US Constitution. Keep in mind that Baltimore has around 650,000 citizens 70% of them being low-income and black.....so when you ignore that many citizens in public policy, you create third world conditions as described in this video on torturing juveniles in the Baltimore Detention Center. None of this has to happen----the Baltimore economy and quality of life for all would be better if it did not.
I keep reminding people that the goal of TPP is to take the US to third world status with US workers earnings falling to that level. So, these policies capturing people of color and the poor will come to everyone as 90% of Americans are pushed to poverty. WAKE UP---AN INJUSTICE TO ONE WILL BECOME INJUSTICE FOR ALL!
Is The Baltimore Detention Center Torturing Juveniles?
Criminal justice expert Marc Schindler discusses recent allegations from the justice department that a Baltimore detention facility is illegally subjecting j...youtube.com
Shortcomings In Md. Juvenile Offender Schooling June 5, 2014 12:58 AM WJZ -TV Baltimore
HAGERSTOWN, Md. (AP) — The Maryland State Department of Education says it’s addressing shortcomings in the schooling it provides in juvenile justice centers.
In a report released Thursday by the state’s Juvenile Justice Monitoring Agency, the department acknowledged that credits earned in confinement are not necessarily applied toward graduation requirements at the students’ home schools.
The department also acknowledged that a shortage of teachers and support staff at the youth centers means classrooms are sometimes run by uncertified instructional assistants.
The department says it’s working to correct the shortcomings. Some of them were the subject of a November complaint by the state public defender’s office.
The department assumed educational instruction at the youth centers last June amid concerns by state officials that the previous program run by the Department of Juvenile Services was inadequate.
(Copyright 2013 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
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Since Race to the Top is about ending Equal Protection opportunity and access public education and since people of color are most affected by that----you would understand the flooding of Department of Education with civil rights complaints. Race to the Top is also about urban development and using schools as gentrification tools as Obama and Duncan know-----all of which violates all of the US Constitutional protections of education and housing. People who don't care about race or class had better look into those Obama eyes----Wall Street is taking all public schools---they are just beginning with voiceless underserved communities. SO, WAKE UP TO CLINTON WALL STREET GLOBAL CORPORATE NEO-LIBERALS AND GET RID OF THEM.
Sentencing people for juking the stats when we know it goes on all across the nation by politicians pushing for positive results----25 years is outrageous. I just posted an article about Montgomery County juking algebra scores------remember, closing failing schools in cities is a great part of this bias---- but also remember it is this same juking the stats in Maryland that had education achievement so low but reported so high.
11 Former Atlanta Educators Convicted in Cheating Scandal
by: Kate Brumback Associated PressApr 2, 2015
ATLANTA (AP) -- In one of the biggest cheating scandals of its kind in the U.S., 11 former Atlanta public school educators were convicted Wednesday of racketeering for their role in a scheme to inflate students’ scores on standardized exams.
Civil rights complaints to U.S. Department of Education reach a record high
By Lyndsey Layton March 18 Washington Post
President Barack Obama speaks at the White House in Washington on March 16 with Education Secretary Arne Duncan sitting at left. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin) Straining under a record number of civil rights complaints, the U.S. Department of Education wants to hire 200 more investigators to expand its civil rights division by 30 percent.
Attorneys and investigators in the civil rights office have seen their workloads double since 2007, and the number of unresolved cases mushroom, as complaints have poured in from around the country about students from kindergarten through college facing discrimination on the basis of race, sex and disabilities.
“Some of this is about the community believing that we’re here and we’re in business and we’re prepared to do the work,” said Catherine E. Lhamon, the department’s secretary for civil rights. Some of the increase, she said, was due to guidance her agency has issued, reminding the public as well as schools and universities of various protections under federal law and how to report illegalities.
Complaints of discrimination to the department have soared from 6,364 in fiscal 2009 to a record of 9,989 in the most recent fiscal year. Lhamon expects another record to be set when the current fiscal year ends in September. It is a sign that “we have the trust of the national community bringing to us their deepest hurts and asking for resolution,” she said.
The agency does not open an investigation into every complaint; some are quickly dismissed because they fall outside of the jurisdiction of the office, Lhamon said. She could not say what percentage of cases are dismissed but noted that even when a complaint is discarded, it is still time consuming because an investigator must make a determination.
In its budget proposal for next year, the Department of Education is seeking $131 million for its Office for Civil Rights, an increase of $30.7 million, so it can hire an additional 200 lawyers and investigators. That would be in addition to its current staff of 554 employees.
Lhamon said that without the additional employees, the current staff will continue to strain under growing caseloads and it will take longer to resolve complaints. The backlog of cases that have been pending for longer than 180 days has doubled during the past five years from 315 to 630.
“I have a very real concern about our ability to do the work the way we want to do it, and the way students who rely on us want it done, if we cannot get the resources we need to handle the caseload,” Lhamon said.
She said there was no single category of grievance that accounted for the rise in complaints. But a breakdown of agency statistics show that the category of sex discrimination has grown from 391 in 2010 to 2,354 in 2014. Discrimination based on disabilities make up the largest category, or 39 percent.
Sex discrimination comprised 24 percent of total complaints. Lhamon said two individuals were responsible for filing more than 1,700 of those allegations of sex discrimination. She declined to identify them, citing confidentiality requirements.
Agency officials and outside observers point to a key action by the Obama administration that probably triggered the increase in sex discrimination complaints. In 2011, the Office for Civil Rights issued guidance to that said sexual harassment of students, including acts of sexual violence, is a form of sex discrimination prohibited by Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. Up until that point, Title IX was commonly understood to ensure equal opportunity for girls and women in athletics and other educational programs and activities.
The guidance was part of an effort to make colleges and universities take campus sexual assault more seriously, Lhamon said. And after it was issued, complaints under Title IX soared.
Critics say the federal guidance was confusing, and that’s one factor behind the rise in complaints.
“To a large extent, this crush of complaints is a problem of OCR’s own making,” said Robert Shibley, executive director of FIRE, a Philadelphia-based civil liberties group. “There’s been a huge amount of confusion among colleges and administrators about how to handle these things. And that’s led to a lot of investigations being opened. I’m not saying that universities were handling sex assault complaints properly before — I doubt that they were. But increasing OCR’s staff by 30 percent would be the wrong way to go.”
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pension committee and a former Education Secretary, has been critical in the past of Lhamon and suggested that she has overstepped her role.
“Senator Alexander has raised his concerns with Ms. Lhamon about her expansion of authority through the use of guidance to impose requirements on universities without proper notice and comment,” an aide to Alexander said. “He will evaluate the merits of the budget request with those concerns in mind.”
IT IS UNCONSTITUTIONAL -----IT IS ILLEGAL------AND IT WILL FILL K-12 WITH THE SAME LEVEL OF FRAUD AND CORRUPTION EVERYWHERE IN CORPORATE OPERATIONS.
Baltimore's pol are leading the way by introducing education bills written by Johns Hopkins. They run as Democrats and serve as Bush neo-conservatives and we need to get rid of all of Maryland's global corporate pols!
New Orleans Corporate Education Reform 101
http://owl.li/L10we
'The drastic changes in the public education landscape post Hurricane Katrina, despite its dismal failure, offers invaluable lessons for cities across the country. These lessons are not only important for cities and communities considering implementing the New Orleans failed corporate reform model but also it proved that the business model approach to improving public education as touted for years by noted public school privateer Milton Friedman and other doesn’t work'.
New Orleans Corporate Education Reform 101 What they won’t tell you about the education reforms in New Orleans?
By Raynard Sanders, Ed.D. | Originally Published at EmpathyEducates. March 30, 2015
The corporate education reforms in New Orleans have been touted has the national guide for turning around urban school districts. As a result of the devastation of Hurricane Katrina and more than willing elected officials, New Orleans quickly became the national poster child for privatizing public education. In that most of these changes happened within months after Katrina there was little or no local resistance in that more than 80% of the population was evacuated from the city. In light of that, the corporate education reforms in New Orleans has been in the raw so to be speak as charter school proponents were able to created a perfect environment for turning public schools into profit centers. This unique situation attracted billions of dollars from the Louisiana Legislature, the federal government, and foundations promoting the privatization of public education. Thanks to a supportive national media the narrative of the corporate education reforms in New Orleans immediately hit print media, television and Internet claiming unprecedented academic success predicated on school choice. Of course these media outlets were repeating the story told by state education officials and charter schools proponents labeling the reforms in New Orleans as a “miracle”. With that cities and states across the country are now looking at the reforms in New Orleans as guides to improve their failing public schools. However the real story of chronic academic failure, fiscal mismanagement, and inequitable practices, as reported by external researchers, universities and journalists, has gotten limited coverage in the mainstream media.
The drastic changes in the public education landscape post Hurricane Katrina, despite its dismal failure, offers invaluable lessons for cities across the country. These lessons are not only important for cities and communities considering implementing the New Orleans failed corporate reform model but also it proved that the business model approach to improving public education as touted for years by noted public school privateer Milton Friedman and other doesn’t work. For the past nine years New Orleans had all the conditions that Freidman and others said was needed to improve public education; schools managed by private boards with no interference from an elected school board, no teacher union contract, young smart and intelligent teachers (as all the teachers in New Orleans were fired after Hurricane Katrina) and school choice where parents could chose a school which is best fits their child needs and not be forced to go to those failing neighborhood school. Additionally in New Orleans charter operators received unprecedented funding, which for several years has been more than three times the funding of other school districts in Louisiana post Hurricane Katrina.
Corporate school reform is spreading across the country like wild fire. It comes to communities like a sheep in wolf’s clothing, before communities realize it corporate education reformers have taken over their public schools; plummeting test scores while resurrected equity and access issues affecting mostly poor and minority students. Below are a few of the major problems with the corporate reforms that proponents will never say as they travel across the country promoting the unsuccessful schools they have created:
School ratings, which determined a school’s passing or failing status is a moving, target. In Louisiana the definition of a failing school changes at least once every two years post Hurricane Katrina. Thus creating an environment where schools suddenly become failing schools, opening the door for a charter operator to move in a take over the school.
The take over the school in New Orleans was initiated when the Louisiana Legislature passed legislation which raised the standards for determining a failing school and removed other qualifying conditions, however this legislation was crafted only for public schools in New Orleans. This legislation immediately affected most of the schools in New Orleans; in they were suddenly being judged by new standards. With that dozens of schools that were cited for progress and given accolades for academic achievement in May of 2005 suddenly became failing schools in November 2005. Meanwhile state officials and charter proponents told that nation that all the schools were failing. In passing this discriminatory legislation the state took over 107 of 123 schools. If New Orleans would have been judged by the standards that all other school districts in Louisiana were judged possibly four to six schools was eligible for state take over at the time of Hurricane Katrina.
Since then the academic standard policy for taking over schools have changed several times and today it is lowered than it was in 2005. To date almost ten years later only four charter schools managed by the Recovery School District have met the academic standard that was set by the state education department to take over schools in November 2005.
The public is completely taken out of the decision making process of a public education. A state education board of eleven members, which has only two members from New Orleans, making all decisions regarding public education in New Orleans. This state education board has selected the Recovery School District’s superintendent who oversees the 107 public schools in New Orleans with no public input. The state education board makes all decisions regarding the closing of neighborhood schools and selection of charter operators. This board also makes all budgetary decisions for schools in New Orleans, without public publicizing the budget to the citizens of New Orleans and there is no public review or opportunity for local comment.
This is clearly taxation without representation, which seems to be acceptable with the local political leaders.
Public schools are turnover to charter board that has unquestionable authority. Groups or individuals with no education experience are commonly awarded contracts to run charter boards in New Orleans. These charter school boards sign a contract with the state to provide public education. Unlike like other contracts to vendors to provide a public service, which require specific experience and capabilities, the contracts for charter schools have no such criteria. Charter school contracts have been awarded to individuals with no experience and/or shady experience in running schools. The charter boards are usually selected by an individual who submitted the charter application who in turn self-appoint themselves over time, there is no mandate from the state to have elected charter boards or to appoint parents or community members. It is not uncommon for charter school boards to be comprised of members who are not from the school community of the school they managed. It is also not uncommon for a charter school board with a majority of white board members overseeing largely an African-American student population.
These charter boards act like private entities not following state sunshine laws with no connection or concern for parents and the community needs. State education officials give these charter operators unquestionable accountability and rarely intercede in their operations regardless of complaints from parents or violation of state and federal policy. Most of the charter boards pay extremely high administrative salaries with several administrators in a school making more that school district superintendents in Louisiana, while eliminating social workers counselors and librarians and extra circular activities. There have been cases where charter board members have personally taken grant monies from foundations that were given to improve the schools they manage.
Charter schools are encouraged to hire untrained and experience teachers instead of experienced, trained certified teachers. Despite the overwhelming research that trained and experience and teachers are needed to provide quality education experiences most charter school operators opt for young untrained recent graduates. Most charter school operators hired a majority of Teach for America candidates, while many are well intended; they are not prepared for the job. Thus charter boards decrease their overhead and increase their bottom line at the expense of children’s education. Additionally many of the charter schools are led by principals who are untrained as a administrator and generally ascend to the principal position after two to three years of teaching and are former Teach for America teachers. When you include the lack of experience in the principal office and the classroom it is no surprise that most of the charter schools in New Orleans are rated either “D” or “F” with high schools in New Orleans having the lowest ACT average score in the state of Louisiana for the second year in a row.
It should be noted that the few schools in New Orleans that are posting high test scores are by and large staffed with certified teachers and administrators.
Charter Schools were allowed to violate federal and state policy by denying admission and/or services to special needs students. Despite hundreds of complaints from parents and education advocates about the refusal of charter schools to admit and/or serve special needs students over the years state officials refused to intervene and mandate charter schools to follow state and federal policy. Charter schools in New Orleans have been given unquestionable autonomy, which gives them the right to teach who they want and how they want. After several years of unsuccessfully working with state officials to follow the law a class action lawsuit was filed by the Southern Poverty Law Center in 2010. The complaints over the years were horrific as noted in a report from the Southern Poverty Law Center in 2010:
- The graduation rate for RSD students with disabilities is less than half of the overall graduation rate.
- Only 6.8% of RSD students with disabilities exit with a high school diploma, while across the state, the average is 19.4%.
- In the 2008-2009 school year, RSD schools suspended nearly 30% of all students with disabilities — a rate that is 63% higher than the state average.
- During the 2007-08 school year, 94.6% of eighth grade RSD students with disabilities failed the Louisiana Educational Assessment (LEAP) exam. For the same year, 78.3% of all eighth grade charter school students with disabilities failed the LEAP.
- On average, school districts throughout Louisiana have identified 12.2% of their students as eligible for special education services. New Orleans Public Schools have identified only 8% of their students as eligible for special education services. Comparable school districts throughout the country identify almost twice as many students with disabilities.
Accountability and ethical behavior in public schools no longer exists. Despite numerous reports of fiscal mismanagement by the state’s Recovery School District, which manages charter schools in New Orleans, the mainstream media and government watchdog groups have largely ignored gross fiscal mismanagement. Since 2008 the Recovery School District has received numerous scathing reports by the Louisiana Legislative Auditor which have included; fiscal mismanagement of federal, state and local funds, not following state and federal policy in its contractor procedures, not following state human resource policies and recently was cited for not being able to account for millions of dollars in property. While this fiscal irresponsibility involves millions of dollars in local and state tax dollars the traditional government watchdog groups haven’t said a word. Usually these groups, specifically the Bureau of Governmental Research and the local Inspector General’s office closely watch taxpayer’s dollars and policies and are quick to recommend changes. Pre Hurricane Katrina when the Orleans Parish School Board had more than its share of fiscal mismanagement the Bureau of Governmental Research attended every school board meeting and led the charge in demanding fiscal accountability. This selective accountability brings to question their professional integrity given the gross mismanagement of taxpayer’s dollars.
It is a literary a “free market” in New Orleans for the Recovery School District and its charter schools without any oversight as our public schools have become huge financial opportunities for the private sector.
State education officials annually mislead the public about the academic progress Academic integrity is a fundamental value and characteristic of academic institutions and state education agencies. The accurate reporting of test scores and other data is an open and transparent process that informs parents, policymakers and the public of the progress of our schools and more importantly gives directions educator’s guidance for improvement. It is also common practice of creditable academic institutions to share information with researchers, universities, graduate students this helps us understand what works and shapes educational policy.
In Louisiana state education officials has taken the unusual approach to limit information of the state mandated test results to the public while giving glowing analysis of progress touting the success of the corporate education reforms. When public information requests are made to state officials they usually refuse the request ignoring state and federal law around the Freedom of Information Act. They have however given test data to selected individuals and organizations, most of which have a contractual relationship with the state department of education. In that agreement these groups and individuals are obligated to share all information with state officials before publishing any analysis or reports on Louisiana test scores. Other researchers across the state have had to suit the Louisiana State Department of Education to get data, which by law are public documents.
If the test scores in Louisiana are so good why are state officials refusing to share the data? Any other creditable state department of education or academic institution would be happy to share details of their great progress. Not sharing this public information raises serious questions about their claims of success and shows their lack of academic integrity.
State education officials and corporate reformers have spent millions of dollars creating a narrative claiming unprecedented success about the education reforms in New Orleans. It is well crafted and is selling itself to school districts around the country as instance success and the final solution in turning failing schools. Hopefully folks considering the New Orleans model will look beyond the bells and whistles.
Raynard Sanders, Ed.D has over thirty years of experience in teaching, educational administration, and economic and community development. As a principal of a New Orleans high school, he developed the first high school DNA lab in the state of Louisiana and created the Creole Cottage Project, an innovative program for his students to build and renovate houses in the school’s community.
Dr. Sanders also served as the Executive Director of The National Faculty at New Orleans, a professional development agency designed to improve the quality of teaching in poor performing schools throughout the Mississippi Delta. He also served as the Director of the Urban Education Graduate Program at Southern University at New Orleans. | Please join Raynard Sanders on-air, on The New Orleans Imperative Education conversation
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Here in Baltimore our city schools are already buying Rupert Murdoch online lessons to sit children in front of computers as a cheap education resource. This is to what education funding sent to Baltimore went towards while classrooms fight to find funding for toilet paper. Involving Rupert Murdoch ----a neo-conservative like Johns Hopkins so you can see why Baltimore has these online corporate lessons-----in education is like allowing a US defense industry corporation come to Maryland to open and run a hospital----moving all that Federal and State funding for public health to the same small group of global corporations.
This is what making the US an economic colonial region overseen by global corporate tribunals and courts looks like. The American people have no say in how these global corporations operate----there is no accountability ---and this is what we see in Maryland already before they vote to install Trans Pacific Trade Pact. All of this is telling the citizens of Maryland
TO WAKE UP AND GET RID OF CLINTON WALL STREET GLOBAL CORPORATE NEO-LIBERALS AND BUSH NEO-CONS! ALL OF MARYLAND'S POLS ARE GLOBAL CORPORATE POLS.
Do you know the citizens of Baltimore do not even know Rupert Murdoch is in their schools because Baltimore has absolutely no public discussion of public policy at any level?
Rupert Murdoch sees $500 billion profit waiting in US public education. Getting his share.
There's a battle being waged in this country against our public school systems. It's not irate parents, it's a corporate battle.
These education "reformers" have the money to buy up politicians in both parties to get laws passed for their benefits. Public schools have little resources to fight back.
Hey, lobbyist, leave them kids alone!
There is no doubt that the performance of U.S. students against their international counterparts continues to disappoint. But since the reasons for this are so difficult to pin down, a parade of self-proclaimed experts and “reformers” has emerged in recent years, touting the urgency of their proposed solutions – never mind if they require redirecting streams of taxpayer dollars into the pockets of their friends.
News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch is among the more-recognizable faces of this movement, having purchased education technology firm Wireless Generation for $360 million in November 2010.
“When it comes to K-12 education,” Murdoch said at the time, “we see a $500 billion sector in the U.S. alone that is waiting desperately to be transformed by big breakthroughs that extend the reach of great teaching.”
Despite the scandals associated with his name and his News Corp company, Murdoch is getting a foothold in the "reforms" going on now. He and his Wireless Generation company are getting a huge profit from a contract with the Chicago school system.
Just like I always say, accountability is only for public school teachers....never for the very rich.
Looks like Rupert Murdoch will profit from "reform" of Chicago school system.
In case Chicago missed it, Rupert Murdoch is now profiting from the testing craziness hitting Chicago's public schools. He owns an outfit called "Wireless Generation" that is now a contractor with CPS. Anyone who doesn't already know that the administration of Chicago Public Schools, the nation's third largest school system, is in the hands of amateurs (or worse, outsiders who want to destroy public education and turn it over to the private sector at all costs), should be contacting any of the 241 principals of the so-called "Track E" schools which begin receiving their students on August 13, 2012.
Things have gotten so crazy in the 2012 world of edits, memos, Power Points, orders, reforms, re-reforms, and re-re-re-reforms from the administration of former Rochester school supt. Jean-Claude Brizard and former "Relationship Banker" Rahm Emanuel that it would take a team of a dozen investigative reporters on the ground school-by-school (with a backup team of another dozen researchers) to separate out the greed, mendacity, incompetence, and silliness that is being foisted on Chicago behind the smokescreen of the latest iteration of "School Reform." Meanwhile, the city's communities, teachers, principals, and children will be facing centrally planned chaos as the first full year of Rahm's version of "School Reform" kicks in non Monday August 13, 2012. The 241 Chicago "Track E" schools would make this sub-system one of the 20 largest school districts in the USA were it a separate system. But it would be one of only three (the other two are Detroit and New Orleans) currently ruled by a group of outside mercenaries dedicated to destroying public education.
Murdoch was going to get 27 million from the Race to the Top money in New York City, but State Controller Thomas DiNapoli rejected the contract.
"New York City ditched a $27 million education contract with News Corp subsidiary Wireless Generation, citing the ongoing investigations into the phone hacking allegations related to News Corp's now-defunct News Of The World tabloid.
State Controller Thomas DiNapoli rejected the Education Department's contract with the company, the New York Daily News reports, which would have paid $27 million to create software to track test scores. The funding would have come out of the state's $700 million "Race to the Top" education funds, but DiNapoli's office said that there were concerns about News Corp's "incomplete record" and about the ongoing scandal
A NY education spokesman said that "“They’ll get a small piece of a smaller pie than they would have received under last year’s proposed contract".
I firmly believe that Rupert Murdoch should not be getting even a small sliver of the pie. He should get zero public money.
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KEEP IN MIND THIS IS THE FACE OF MARYLAND'S GOVERNOR MARTIN O'MALLEY AS MEDIA BEGINS TO PAINT HIM 'PROGRESSIVE' JUST AS THEY DID OBAMA. IF YOUR POLITICAL MEDIA OUTLET IS SELLING O'MALLEY AS PROGRESSIVE---THEY ARE A CLINTON WALL STREET GLOBAL CORPORATE NEO-LIBERAL GROUP.
Below you see the level of injustice in Maryland and especially Baltimore that plays to loss of rights as citizens. This is literally the school to prison pipeline and Baltimore invented this policy. If you look at the Maryland Education stats under O'Malley you will see all kinds of improvement in children from underserved communities and at-risk students and yet ---NONE OF THAT IS TRUE. You read the article below stating shortcomings----with a mention that grades from these juvenile programs need to be sent to the child's home district so as not to add to lowering the achievement scores in Baltimore -----and that seems to be the focus. If conditions are so bad as everyone knows in these juvenile facilities, are these children REALLY getting grades that are reflective of high school graduation requirements?
OF COURSE NOT. THEY ARE JUKED OUT OF THE SYSTEM OFTEN THE FACE OF CHILDREN UNABLE TO READ OR DO MATH.
So, the problem for children in Baltimore starts with the public policy of meeting Federal guideline of equal protection ----opportunity and access to a good public school and education----it grows larger with the public policy with the only goal to make as cheap as possible labor in the city leaving high unemployment in lieu of out of state labor and immigrant labor----and then it gets worse when children are criminalized at an early age and subjected to this prison/jail/police culture. It is all preventable---these policies are done deliberately to keep poor people poor. No oversight and accountability allows complete failure of all public agencies in Maryland.
This happens because Maryland politics is controlled by Clinton Wall Street global corporate neo-liberals and Bush neo-cons who do not 'see' the US Constitution. Keep in mind that Baltimore has around 650,000 citizens 70% of them being low-income and black.....so when you ignore that many citizens in public policy, you create third world conditions as described in this video on torturing juveniles in the Baltimore Detention Center. None of this has to happen----the Baltimore economy and quality of life for all would be better if it did not.
I keep reminding people that the goal of TPP is to take the US to third world status with US workers earnings falling to that level. So, these policies capturing people of color and the poor will come to everyone as 90% of Americans are pushed to poverty. WAKE UP---AN INJUSTICE TO ONE WILL BECOME INJUSTICE FOR ALL!
Is The Baltimore Detention Center Torturing Juveniles?
Criminal justice expert Marc Schindler discusses recent allegations from the justice department that a Baltimore detention facility is illegally subjecting j...youtube.com
Shortcomings In Md. Juvenile Offender Schooling June 5, 2014 12:58 AM WJZ -TV Baltimore
HAGERSTOWN, Md. (AP) — The Maryland State Department of Education says it’s addressing shortcomings in the schooling it provides in juvenile justice centers.
In a report released Thursday by the state’s Juvenile Justice Monitoring Agency, the department acknowledged that credits earned in confinement are not necessarily applied toward graduation requirements at the students’ home schools.
The department also acknowledged that a shortage of teachers and support staff at the youth centers means classrooms are sometimes run by uncertified instructional assistants.
The department says it’s working to correct the shortcomings. Some of them were the subject of a November complaint by the state public defender’s office.
The department assumed educational instruction at the youth centers last June amid concerns by state officials that the previous program run by the Department of Juvenile Services was inadequate.
(Copyright 2013 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
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Since Race to the Top is about ending Equal Protection opportunity and access public education and since people of color are most affected by that----you would understand the flooding of Department of Education with civil rights complaints. Race to the Top is also about urban development and using schools as gentrification tools as Obama and Duncan know-----all of which violates all of the US Constitutional protections of education and housing. People who don't care about race or class had better look into those Obama eyes----Wall Street is taking all public schools---they are just beginning with voiceless underserved communities. SO, WAKE UP TO CLINTON WALL STREET GLOBAL CORPORATE NEO-LIBERALS AND GET RID OF THEM.
Sentencing people for juking the stats when we know it goes on all across the nation by politicians pushing for positive results----25 years is outrageous. I just posted an article about Montgomery County juking algebra scores------remember, closing failing schools in cities is a great part of this bias---- but also remember it is this same juking the stats in Maryland that had education achievement so low but reported so high.
11 Former Atlanta Educators Convicted in Cheating Scandal
by: Kate Brumback Associated PressApr 2, 2015
ATLANTA (AP) -- In one of the biggest cheating scandals of its kind in the U.S., 11 former Atlanta public school educators were convicted Wednesday of racketeering for their role in a scheme to inflate students’ scores on standardized exams.
Civil rights complaints to U.S. Department of Education reach a record high
By Lyndsey Layton March 18 Washington Post
President Barack Obama speaks at the White House in Washington on March 16 with Education Secretary Arne Duncan sitting at left. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin) Straining under a record number of civil rights complaints, the U.S. Department of Education wants to hire 200 more investigators to expand its civil rights division by 30 percent.
Attorneys and investigators in the civil rights office have seen their workloads double since 2007, and the number of unresolved cases mushroom, as complaints have poured in from around the country about students from kindergarten through college facing discrimination on the basis of race, sex and disabilities.
“Some of this is about the community believing that we’re here and we’re in business and we’re prepared to do the work,” said Catherine E. Lhamon, the department’s secretary for civil rights. Some of the increase, she said, was due to guidance her agency has issued, reminding the public as well as schools and universities of various protections under federal law and how to report illegalities.
Complaints of discrimination to the department have soared from 6,364 in fiscal 2009 to a record of 9,989 in the most recent fiscal year. Lhamon expects another record to be set when the current fiscal year ends in September. It is a sign that “we have the trust of the national community bringing to us their deepest hurts and asking for resolution,” she said.
The agency does not open an investigation into every complaint; some are quickly dismissed because they fall outside of the jurisdiction of the office, Lhamon said. She could not say what percentage of cases are dismissed but noted that even when a complaint is discarded, it is still time consuming because an investigator must make a determination.
In its budget proposal for next year, the Department of Education is seeking $131 million for its Office for Civil Rights, an increase of $30.7 million, so it can hire an additional 200 lawyers and investigators. That would be in addition to its current staff of 554 employees.
Lhamon said that without the additional employees, the current staff will continue to strain under growing caseloads and it will take longer to resolve complaints. The backlog of cases that have been pending for longer than 180 days has doubled during the past five years from 315 to 630.
“I have a very real concern about our ability to do the work the way we want to do it, and the way students who rely on us want it done, if we cannot get the resources we need to handle the caseload,” Lhamon said.
She said there was no single category of grievance that accounted for the rise in complaints. But a breakdown of agency statistics show that the category of sex discrimination has grown from 391 in 2010 to 2,354 in 2014. Discrimination based on disabilities make up the largest category, or 39 percent.
Sex discrimination comprised 24 percent of total complaints. Lhamon said two individuals were responsible for filing more than 1,700 of those allegations of sex discrimination. She declined to identify them, citing confidentiality requirements.
Agency officials and outside observers point to a key action by the Obama administration that probably triggered the increase in sex discrimination complaints. In 2011, the Office for Civil Rights issued guidance to that said sexual harassment of students, including acts of sexual violence, is a form of sex discrimination prohibited by Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. Up until that point, Title IX was commonly understood to ensure equal opportunity for girls and women in athletics and other educational programs and activities.
The guidance was part of an effort to make colleges and universities take campus sexual assault more seriously, Lhamon said. And after it was issued, complaints under Title IX soared.
Critics say the federal guidance was confusing, and that’s one factor behind the rise in complaints.
“To a large extent, this crush of complaints is a problem of OCR’s own making,” said Robert Shibley, executive director of FIRE, a Philadelphia-based civil liberties group. “There’s been a huge amount of confusion among colleges and administrators about how to handle these things. And that’s led to a lot of investigations being opened. I’m not saying that universities were handling sex assault complaints properly before — I doubt that they were. But increasing OCR’s staff by 30 percent would be the wrong way to go.”
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pension committee and a former Education Secretary, has been critical in the past of Lhamon and suggested that she has overstepped her role.
“Senator Alexander has raised his concerns with Ms. Lhamon about her expansion of authority through the use of guidance to impose requirements on universities without proper notice and comment,” an aide to Alexander said. “He will evaluate the merits of the budget request with those concerns in mind.”
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