Diane Ravitch and the Corporate Reign of Error

I've been teaching for almost thirty years, and I don't know precisely when my colleagues and I became public enemy number one. But after reading Reign of Error by Diane Ravitch I'm getting a pretty good handle on why.

Corporate reformers like Bill Gates, Eli Broad, and the Walton family seem to believe teachers have done a disservice to kindergarteners by allowing them to blow bubbles in their milk and push trucks around on the floor. Why weren't we training them to take valuable multiple-choice exams? Why did an entire generation of Americans, including public school teachers, misdirect its energies by trying to eradicate poverty? Couldn't we just fervently ignore it, as corporate reformers have done so successfully?

In Reign of Error, Ravitch demonstrates how, by ignoring poverty, America has managed to shift blame to public schools for its consequences. That's clear when the Governor of New York declares schools with poor test scores deserve the "death penalty," and the mayor of Chicago closes 50 schools in one fell swoop.  The fact that all so-called failing schools have high percentages of high-needs kids is either attributed to coincidence or ignored  completely. Standard practice is to replace them with privately run schools that generally perform either no better or much worse. Still, no one can argue they don't place more tax money into the pockets of investors.

Reign of Error  shows us corporate reform is largely about where the money goes. Americans are led to believe teachers earn too much, and entrepreneurs like Rupert Murdoch and the Walmart family earn too little. To correct this inequity, corporate reformers work to erase collective bargaining, unionism, teacher tenure, and other outrages that have left middle-class people able to make a living. This, of course, is all done in the name of helping children.

The most trendy way to redirect public money into private hands is via charter schools. If charters don't have unions, they don't have to worry about collective bargaining. If they largely exclude learning disabled and ESL students, they not only improve their test scores, but also save a ton of money on mandated services. Charter trailblazer Geoffrey Canada, who pays himself a half-million per year, turned away an entire student cohort rather than deal with their impending scores.

Ravitch points out in detail the excellent investment opportunities charters can provide. People who have enough money to really appreciate it can get more of it before it's frittered away on the education of impoverished children. They save even more money for needy rich people by hiring less-qualified instructors, thereby cutting teacher salaries. And wealthy foreigners have literally bought green cards via investing in charters

Charters are all about choice. They therefore choose whether they're public or private depending on the circumstances. Their reps go to court to prevent audits, because in those cases they're private schools. But they happily accept government support because in those cases they're public schools. And even if they fail on test scores, the sole criterion by which corporate reformers judge schools, it makes no difference. They're still, evidently, providing the all-important choice of where our still-needy children will fail these tests.

Reign of Error shines a bright light on cyber charters, which save quite a bit of cash for eager investors. Unlike brick and mortar charters, cybers cannot jack up rents 900% for profit. But they make up for it in other ways. Cyber charters divert many millions that might otherwise be wasted on live teachers and human interaction with children. While graduation rates are abysmal, and a CREDO study found 100% of them perform worse than public schools, there is no denying their immense profitability.

On every page of Reign of Error, Diane Ravitch paints a portrait that's conspicuously absent from mainstream media. She shows us a tangled web, and paints every thread with an arrow pointing to where our tax dollars are really headed. Anyone who's interested in the true meaning of corporate reform needs to read this book. If you're already focused on what moves and motivates our educational system, it will surely sharpen that focus. If not, it will be an eye-opener.

And for the naysayers, Ravitch goes into detail about what America would do if it really wanted to help children, rather than simply test them and redirect public money. Here's hoping that school boards and mayors everywhere read this book.

Why the Push for Teacher Evaluation?

There is a crisis in this country. A crisis of unprecedented proportions. Apparently, there are billions of dollars being poured into this education thing, and many hedge fund managers are not getting even a fraction of this cash. What to do? Most importantly, we have to get rid of this whole union thing so we can stop frittering away vital resources on salaries for teachers. Of course, that message would not sell well enough to accomplish the goals of redirecting the cash.

Thus, there is a crisis in this country. Apparently, the public schools the children of hedge fund managers would not attend on a bet need fixing. The problem? Teachers, the very people preventing the hedge fund managers from wetting their beaks, need to be removed before things can be set right. Therefore, we need evaluation systems like the one in Tennessee that will enable us to remove as many of them as possible. Since it would not be cost-effective to deal with poverty (After all, hedge fund managers tend not to be impoverished anyway.), we'll need to blame all student defects on the teachers. Then, we can get rid of them and their inconvenient job protections, and hire temps to do the job for a few years for almost nothing.

Here in New York, we have a system, a system designed in conjunction with the UFT, NYSUT, and the geniuses who run the State Education Department. This system is so flawed that more than half of Long Island's principals have come out against it. Diane Ravitch applauds them, as principals with principles.

Governor One Percent, Andrew "I am the government." Cuomo, has unveiled a mini Race to the Top, designed to pressure districts into accepting a new evaluation system. Who cares whether or not they work? Governor Andy's priority is protecting millionaires, and indeed, he's taken a principled stand against asking them to pay taxes. That's for the little people, like school teachers, and if they lose their jobs for no reason, why the hell should he care?

Whether or not systems are effective is of no consequence to him, other corporatist politicians, or the corporate media. In fact, days after Michael Winerip hammered home the flaws of the Tennessee system in the pages of the NY Times, its editorial board strongly endorsed it, apparently not having bothered to read their own paper.

Here in NY, trials of the new evaluation system are a disaster, and the writer of the framework the DOE uses doesn't much care for the way it's being used. Is it asking too much for the DOE to bother comprehending the framework it claims to support? Apparently, yes it is.

In any case, if the union wishes to help the billionaires realize their vision of having more money at our expense, it will rush to place an evaluation, any damn evaluation, in place ASAP. After all, how else will NYC get Governor Andy's grant money--money which cannot be wasted on things like reducing class sizes or hiring more teachers, but will be fully dedicated to "reforms" to ultimately place money wasted on schools in the pockets of billionaires.

If, on the other hand, the union wishes to help actual working people, it will take all the time in the world to make sure any evaluation system actually works. And it's an uphill battle, considering that at least 20% will be based on "value-added" metrics, not proven to be effective anywhere for anything.

Saint Rudy Talks Numbers

Well, we all know Saint Rudy's favorite number--9/11. After all, on 9/10 he was a bum, about to slink away from NYC, and the next day he was America's sweetheart. That's pretty good for a guy most people would be afraid to invite to their houses for spaghetti.

And it's damn good for a guy who went to court to demand the right to bring his mistress to a home he shared with his wife and young children. No Bill Clinton there. More like, "Damn right I was with Ms. Lewinski, and I'm bringing her home to meet the wife and kids right now."

But now Rudy is on a mission to make sure health care doesn't get to the bootless and unhorsed. To that end, he put an ad on the radio:

In the radio ad, Giuliani, who has suffered prostate cancer, said the U.S. survival rate for the disease was 82 percent, but the survival rate in Britain was just 44 percent "under socialized medicine."

It appears, though, that Mr. Giuliani got his statistics from the same folks who said we needed to invade Iraq:

A health department spokesman said the latest figures from Britain's Office of National Statistics showed a five-year survival rate of 74.4 percent for prostate cancer.

That's a significant difference. And that's not all:

Even that difference, as experts explained, probably has nothing to do with the British National Health Service and much to do with the aggressive screening programs employed in this country. (And for the moment, let's merely mention another highly pertinent issue, namely that the great majority of prostate cancers occur in men over 65, which indicates that many if not most are treated successfully under Medicare -- our version of national health insurance for the elderly -- or by the Department of Veterans Affairs, which comes as close to truly socialist healthcare as any system in the world.)

But the supreme irony is this--Saint Rudy was actually treated under a government program--specifically GHI, then a non-profit health care network popular with New York City employees (like me). So I guess it's easy for him to say we don't need to help those who've got nothing. After all, that was his entire approach to the school system--My kids don't go there, so what the hell do I care? That's why he had no problem proposing welfare recipients be required to work in public schools. Why shouldn't people chronically unable to find jobs serve as role models for our kids? After all, they're not his kids.

Sadly, that approach is precisely the one taken by the current administration, which has no qualms about sending kids to toxic waste sites or fighting tooth and nail when people ask leased schools be inspected as thoroughly as city-owned schools. Note they don't build sports stadiums on toxic waste sites. The billionaires who own the teams would never put up with that.

I read somewhere, "If Rudy becomes president, every day will be 9/11"

You Take That Mush, and Eat It

Well, they had a meeting over at the Ross Charter School. That's the school run by billionaire Courtney Ross. As you may recall, Ms. Ross did not care for the digs first offered her by the city, so they decided to push her school into the NEST school, the one parents had spent hundreds of thousands of their own dollars fixing up. As those nasty NEST parents fought Ms. Ross in the press, of all places, there was no choice but to relocate them.

So the DoE placed them in their state-of-the-art facilities at Tweed. I often think of them in my trailer. After all, who knows if they could fit 34 kids in a state-of-the-art classroom? Who knows if Ross kids could do without AC, or computers, or soap in their bathrooms? You have to be a real man to put up with that sort of thing (even if you're a little girl).

You'll be happy to know that the Trustees (Ms. Ross was not in attendance) determined to keep class size at twenty.

While your classes may appear to still have 34 (or more), in actual fact they will only have 33.5. That's because of the great strides we've made in class size, and don't doubt that in five or ten years you'll only have 33.2.

And stop whining. In Mr. Bloomberg's New York, it's all about rugged individualism.

To Serve You Better

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, while sitting on billions of surplus dollars, is planning to cut millions in unimportant programs that are, admittedly, of little use to billionaires:

Bloomberg has called for slashing $22.2 million in city education programs, $30.3 million in aid to the City University of New York, $5.4 million to the beleaguered Administration for Children's Services, $6 million for child health clinics and $3 million for rapid HIV testing.

Aside from that, the Mayor is cutting a few other troublesome programs for the bootless and unhorsed:

$19.7 million from the "Teacher's Choice" program, an initiative that gives teachers up to $100 each to purchase instructional materials of their choice.

$9.3 million from youth programs directed at immigrants.

$5.9 million from mental health programs.

$4.8 million from initiatives aimed at preventing infant mortality.

But fear not. Sports stadiums will not be affected, nor will the number of luxury boxes. And there will be no tax increases on either yachts, helicopters, or aircraft chartering fees. But as the old saying goes, why charter a private aircraft when simple first-class reservations will do?

Hungry for Knowledge?

I hope so, because you're not getting lunch today.
It's not convenient to make space for you, so Mayor Mike is sending you to science lab instead.

Mayor Mike's glitzy Children First brochure does not specifically mention the effects of hunger on education. It does not mention the value of public schools built on toxic sites, or multi-million dollar boondoggles for private schools either. It fails to mention the value of forgetting to add dropouts to graduation rates.

Oddly, it neglects to mention intergalactic recruitment, the highest class sizes in the state, the lowest standard for teachers in the state, or the all-too-common practice of sweeping incidents under the rug (while maintaining a public insistence that they be reported).

It does not mention that teachers are 100% responsible for everything that happens in schools, and that neither the mayor, the chancellor, the dilapidated facilities, the home lives of kids, the weather, or hunger (in the case of science students) play any role whatsoever in performance. At least that's what Deputy Chancellor Alonso publicly proclaims.

They must have forgotten that the very best facilities the city has to offer are reserved for charters run by billionaires.

It neglects the mayor's practice of closing schools in the face of unconscionable overcrowding, or taking perfectly good buildings like the one on Livingston Street, and turning them into condos. After all, who's to say the contaminated land isn't good enough for city kids? As Barbara Bush might say, "This is working very well for them." Certainly home buyers, Dalton kids, and billionaires who run charters and build stadiums are accustomed to better.

It's Children First, Children First, and Children First if you read the smiley-face pamphlet. Unlike the mayor and the chancellor, though, I see those children each and every day. The kids aren't fooled at all.

Thanks to Schoolgal

Pay No Attention to That Man Behind the Screen

Chancellor Joel "El Exigente" Klein doesn't play favorites. He just calls 'em as he sees 'em.

That's why he went out of his way to condemn the NEST-M school. He does not care for the selection process. It's failed to meet his exacting standards for objectivity. Klein's criticism, of course, is totally unrelated to the parents successfully having fought his proposed placement of a billionaire's charter school in their building.

His removal of the NEST principal, despite the fact that her school was excellent by all accounts, is also completely unrelated. When the parents protested, and were hauled away by the police, it had nothing whatsoever to do with their actions. The chancellor adores parental involvement. The impending audit of parent association finances is just a coincidence.

Furthermore, the fact that the billionaire's charter was placed in the very best facility the city had to offer was another coincidence. What NEST should have done was let absolutely everyone and anyone in, and let the building swell to 250% capacity (and growing), just as my school has. After all, no one's died in a fire, and no one's been trampled to death in my building.

Not yet, anyway. But the point is you don't see us rejecting students for any reason whatsoever.

Moving Right Along...

After Mike "Accountability" Bloomberg and Joel "#@%&^&#$" Klein accidentally left 339 kids behind, they were roundly criticized for over-reliance on standardized tests. Being the only district in the entire state that had this problem, many felt such criticism was well-deserved.

Of course, that didn't dissuade these intrepid reformers. Mayor Mike says, "Our children have high-stakes tests every day. Do they have a baby? Do they get married?" Bloomberg was accompanied by Florida governor Jeb Bush, a fellow crusader against lowering class sizes.

"Children do not decide to get married at age 8," said Jane Hirschmann of Time Out From Testing. "This shows how out of touch these people are."

Of course, Ms. Hirschmann is probably just another of the bootless and unhorsed, without the remotest notion of how rich people spend their time. Just look at all the inbreeding among royal families. Who knows what the hell these people do behind closed doors?

The more kids fail, the more schools we can close down, and the more we can ease Steve Forbes' tax bill. That's the American way, and anyone who opposes it is a far-left Michael Moore pinko liberal partisan commie traitor bastard.

Thanks to Schoolgal

Please, Sir, May I Have Some More?

Because Mayor Bloomberg cares so deeply about public education, he's leasing the ball fields on Randall's Island to 20 elite private schools. This will buy them 80% of the use of these fields after school.

To ensure the city doesn't profit in any way whatsoever, Mayor Mike is paying 70 mil up front and letting them pay back 85 million over thirty years. Crazy Mike is practically giving those facilities away!

The city is improving 31 fields and creating 34 new ones for the ever-needy private school kids. On the bright side, since only 80% of the space is being leased, NYC's 1.1 million public school students will get to divide the remaining 20% amongst themselves.

No, you can't have more. Now be good little boys and girls and move to the back of the bus.

Thanks to Patrick

Passing the Buck

Mike "Accountability" Bloomberg and Joel "Antichrist" Klein are doing such a great job with the city schools that they want someone else to run them. That's right, private enterprise.

Apparently, they've enjoyed playing with Bill Gates' money so much, they've decided to begin playing with yours too.

It's a beautiful thing, actually. There'll be accountability, and someone (besides teachers) to blame when things go wrong. Not Klein or Bloomberg, of course.

And why they hell not keep on trying new gimmicks and reworking old ones for NYC's 1.1 million public school kids? Everyone knows what works, everyone knows it costs too much, and that it hardly leaves what's urgently required for stadiums and charter schools for needy billionaires.

Let Them Eat Cake

While 1.1 million New York City students get by on scraps, and 75% of NYC's high schools suffer from overcrowding, billionaire Courtney Ross gets to reject sites for her charter school. The NEST school, largely improved and supported by NYC parents, was not the first choice after all.

Before opting for space at NEST, the founder of Ross, Courtney Sales Ross, had been shown space on the top floor of P.S. 147 on Bushwick Avenue in the remote eastern reaches of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, across from a housing project.

Ms. Ross rejected that space.

If this doesn't prove that Ms. Ross's charter is more important to Bloomberg than the schools the overwhelming majority of NYC kids attend, I don't know what does.

Here's a comment from Norm Scott:

The space at PS 147 in Williamsburg in Brooklyn (not the fancy part) that Courtney Sales Ross rejected included the amazingly large space of the classroom I taught in for 27 years on the 4th floor. The entire floor is empty of kids now except for the computer lab. An old building but in fabulous shape with high ceilings and big rooms, yet Ross tried to squeeze into NEST with the support of Klein when the PS 147 space was clearly empty and available. Then she gets further rewarded with space at Tweed.

Why did Ross reject this space? Maybe because she would have to accept kids from the projects across the street? Or maybe the neighborhood is just not chi-chi enough for Ms. Ross? Poor dear. She would have had to go into Brooklyn to visit her school.

Actually, it doesn't much matter to me why she rejected it. The fact that she had such an option, while I teach in trailers behind a building at 250% capacity, shows clearly that "Children First" doesn't actually apply to those attending public schools.

It also takes a great deal of wind out of the sails of those who called the parents of the NEST kids racist for fighting this mayor. They worked to make a great school and wanted to preserve it. Despite the lip service this administration pays to parental involvement, when these parents actually put hundreds of thousands of their own dollars into a school they loved, what was Mayor Bloomberg's response?

He tried to cut it into pieces. Thanks, Mayor Bloomberg. Doubtless scores of parents will work to improve the decrepit buildings you offer their children, so that you can give them away to petulant billionaires.

It's the trickle-down theory. If you aren't a billionaire, don't forget your umbrella.

A Charter Finds a Home

Mayor Bloomberg, on the heels of the NEST-Ross fiasco, has decided to award the non-union Ross charter school the best classrooms in the city--the state of the art facilities at Tweed, funded by city taxpayers. While public school kids are sent to trailers, hallways and bathrooms, the Ross students will be fine.

A note to the teachers working for Ms. Ross--avoid talking about union salaries and benefits. You know what happens to people like that.

"Boy, how nice is it for a privately run school to get such wonderful attention!" said Carmen Colon, a parent who runs a group of parent leaders. "It would be nice if our public schools were getting this type of attention."

Stuart Marques, a spokesman for teachers union president Randi Weingarten, said the move "certainly shows where the chancellor's priorities are."

Perhaps if public schools received this sort of consideration, they wouldn't be in the state they are now. In fact, all things being equal, a lot of people think public schools are just as good , or even better than private schools.

Personally, even beyond what test scores say, I think they're better. I can't muster much sympathy for bazillionaires like Ross who deny working people their right to unionize. However good her school may be (and it's certainly getting better treatment than any public city school), the kids who leave it, thanks to her "vision", are going to enter an economy with even fewer opportunities.

Thanks to Schoolgal for the tip!