NO MERIT: MN Union backs competitive pay for its
own employees, blocks merit pay for its teacher members. Details in CER
Newswire July 30, 2002. NO MERIT: MN Union backs competitive pay for its
own employees, blocks merit pay for its teacher members. Details in CER
Newswire July 30, 2002.
The National PTA: Becoming Irrelevant?:
"Once
the central gathering point for parents to be substantially involved in making
their schools better, the agenda of the National PTA is now decidedly
non-educational, and reflects a defense of the status quo rather than a mission
for change. In a nation where less than forty percent of all fourth graders can
read and write at expected levels, and lack mastery of history, math and more,
the PTA’s agenda is clearly irrelevant."
By Jeanne Allen, CER President, July 2002,
Link to full text.
TRYING TO HOLD BACK THE TIDES OF CHANGE ... Parents' constitutional
right to school choice has been affirmed once and for all by the United States
Supreme Court, and the BLOB has come out in force declaring their support for
the supremacy of the system over the well-being of the student. When you throw open the doors to change,
you can generally expect those in the entrenched positions to react negatively.
We were not disappointed. Below is just a smattering of responses from the BLOB
and their attendant supporters. (We never cease to be amazed by the lack of
respect they give parents while revering a system that is continually failing
our children.)
-- Bob Chase, President of the National Education Association"The National Education Association pledges to …oppose divisive and counterproductive proposals to divert energy, attention, and resources to private school tuition vouchers… We will continue to fight in allegiance with the vast majority of American parents who want good schools in their communities."
"Vouchers are bad education policy. Our nation’s commitment to
public education is longstanding, built upon the principle of open and equal
access for all our children. This means these schools – just as public
schools are – must be open to all students. They must comply with civil
rights laws that protect against discrimination on the basis of race, creed,
color, gender or national origin…. These schools must meet the same
standards required of public schools and report to the public about student
achievement, graduation rates and teacher qualifications."
"Vouchers divert funds from public schools that are already
inadequately funded… We will continue to fight voucher programs and advocate
for programs that improve education for all children."
"A legal ruling will not persuade parents, community leaders and
elected officials to change their minds about opposing the use of public money
in private schools."
"[T]odays’s ruling is very disappointing and could prove to be quite
damaging to America’s public and private education system in years to come…vouchers
may hurt both public and private schools…"
Check out our Special Edition Newswire for more incredible opposition quotes and a brief legal summary. For all the details, link to CER's full coverage of this School Choice Victory for Parents.
DIGGING IN: The National
Education Association appears to be gearing up to train its members how
to impede or stop the implementation of the new elementary and secondary
education law in their schools and communities. Details in CER
Newswire June 18, 2002.
DERAILED, FOR NOW: California lawmakers spent the last
few months actually considering enacting a measure that would have given school
employee unions unprecedented control of what happens in the classroom. The bill
which would have done that, AB 2160, was finally withdrawn in the face of
overwhelming opposition, but its provisions have only disappeared for the
moment. Get more details on this potential education train wreck in the June
2002 Monthly Letter as well as CER Newswires for April 23, 2002,
May 28, 2002, June 4, 2002, and
Jeanne Allen's Op-Ed in the San Francisco Chronicle, California's Schools: Will AB2160
Improve Them? New Bill Won't Help Teachers.
UNION DIVIDE: The Education
Intelligence Agency's May 6, 2002 report, "New Projects Start Next
Phase in Union Battle Against School Choice" indicates that, while the Cleveland
voucher program is being examined by the Supreme Court, the " NEA and its
affiliates found time to fine-tune their strategies to deal with other avenues
of school choice." Their next target: tuition tax credits. Details in CER
Newswire May 7, 2002.
800-POUND GORILLA: Charter opponents in Minnesota are pressing to reverse the
school improvement trend that started in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. The unions have proclaimed a
dismantling of charter school as part of their legislative agenda (see CER's
Minnesota Charter School Page for more). The following quote was found to be "Worth Repeating"
in the February 11, 2002 issue of the Education Intelligence Agency's
report:
"I've never seen two more arrogant people. Their attitude was: ' We call our own shots and you're powerless against us and you'd better not take us on because we're the 800-pound gorilla,'" reported Minnesota Gov. Jesse Venture, discussing a meeting he had last year with the then-co-presidents of Education Minnesota, the state's teacher and staff union.
UNIONS: The Evergreen Freedom Foundation in Washington State has been
in hot pursuit of the public school employee union, the Washington Education
Association, for its illegal political spending of dues payments. Over the last
few years, the case has quietly made its way though the courts with the WEA and
many of its top officials being fined and found guilty of wrongdoing. Recently,
a state judge declared that the state affiliate was guilty of intentionally
violating teachers political rights and paychecks. After the state attorney
general prosecuted the WEA, rather than face the courts, the group's parent
organization— the NEA — voluntarily reimbursed 4,000 Washington teachers
money that would have been the object of further court action. The checks
arrived in teachers' mailboxes without explanation, which the EFF later happily
supplied to the delight of the 1,000 teachers who responded to their email
message. For more, go to: http://www.effwa.org/.
MONSTERS, INC.: Joining the search for bogeymen under the bed, the
American Association of School Administrators is spending time NOT helping their
members to best implement the new federal act requiring more accountability and
allowing more independence (they opposed it!), but rather, is running a massive
research project to determine "Who's Behind Vouchers?" This special
interest group argues that vouchers are only an issue today because of a handful
of wealthy individuals. They can't fathom that perhaps the reason people spend
money on groups and foundations - like this one - is to help the people who do
not have a voice and who need better options for their children to get them.
Unlike AASA, the groups working to bring about more choices for children don't
have access to taxpayer-supported dues payments, federal and state contracts and
lavish receptions at annual meeting times. For more, see the Truth
About Vouchers and School Choice Facts. (From CER Newswire,
January 22, 2002.)
ANTI-CHARTER AGENDA: Card-carrying blob organizations in New York and
Minnesota ring in the new year with their latest anti-charter resolutions. See CER
Newswire, January 22, 2002 for pronouncement from Minnesota school employees
unions, and CER
Newswire, January 15, 2002 for words from the New York State School Boards
Association.
CYBER THREAT: The Pennsylvania School Boards
Association was recently joined by four Keystone state school districts in
filing suit against cyber charter schools, challenging funding requirements for
students that cross district lines to attend cyber charters. "The arguments used by PSBA
against cyber charter schools are the exact same arguments they employed to
oppose enactment of the original charter law - it is clear that cyber charters
represent a threat to the way they do business and they want to limit that
growth," says CER's Neal McCluskey. For more on the cyber charter
phenomenon, see CER's new report, "Beyond Brick and Mortar:
Cyber Charters Revolutionizing Education". Not to be outdone, the North
Carolina State Board of
Education appears to have thumbed its nose at a money-back guarantee that was
offered to the board by the founder of a proposed Cyber-charter school. The state board raised concerns, not about the educational
value of the school (it appears) but whether or not new people not currently
getting a public education would be drawn to it. Isn't that what schools were
supposed to be about? See CER Newswire
February 12, 2002 for more.
IT'S THE MONEY, HONEY:
TALK IS CHEAP: Tennessee is in the news for its growing activity toward charter schools which while still in the early stages, is giving its union indigestion. A quite big plum of a document was leaked from union headquarters, outlining its most enlightening slant toward charter schools. While publicly the Tennessee Education Association (TEA) and its national colleagues spout all manner of tepid praise for charters, privately they speak otherwise.
TEA's summary of a bill to create charters begins with this comment: "What is wrong with Charter Schools? A short course follows on the crime of mugging children and taxpayers…"
Link to more sad, but true excerpts. [From CER Monthly Letter, December
2001]
PARENTS
SHOULD VOTE TO IMPROVE SCHOOLS: "School bureaucrats
hardly ever care about what parents think when their children are in failing
public schools, but they suddenly praise the right of parents to vote when it's
possible that they may lose control over that school... This tale of woe in education is
not about Edison Schools, of course, or any private company in particular. It's
about who has power over education and who makes progress. The reason there is a
national demand for more accountability in public education is precisely because
schools have been allowed for too long to act like monarchies whose subjects
exist for their convenience. Apparently what's good for the
goose is not good for the gander, and the only time the education bureaucrats
cry for democracy is when the tables have been turned and they can control the
vote." Link to full Newsday article
by Jeanne Allen, February 16, 2001
DENIAL: Despite
a recent court victory in Utah that made it the 12th charter school law to
be upheld by a state's high court against the wishes of that state's school boards
associations, National
School Boards Association President Anne Bryant denies CER assertions that
school boards oppose charters. In a letter to Education Week Bryant
wrote: "Neither the NSBA nor any of our 50 state school boards’
associations is leading a frenzy of litigation against charter schools." The fact is that while local
school boards have often mouthed nice words about the charter school concept,
they’ve kept charter organizers busy by initiating a flurry of lawsuits
against them. More in CER Newswire, January
23, 2001.
FIGHT OVER
VOUCHERS WILL GO ON:
The A+ [Florida school choice] program offers accountability and funding to
improve schools and scholarships for students in failing schools. It has
resulted in improvements in Florida schools but was attacked by the education
establishment for one key component: opportunity scholarships. The NEA spends
millions in court and public-relations campaigns to defeat reforms like choice,
accountability and standards. That money should be spent to create effective
remedial programs for children who aren't learning. -- Link to Jeanne
Allen's Letter to the Editor,
Miami Herald, January 22, 2001.
SCHOOL CHOICE IS HERE TO STAY; PUBLIC TRIES
IT, LIKES IT, Statement by Jeanne Allen, President of the Center for
Education Reform, Regarding Comments Made by NEA President Bob Chase on the
Future of School Choice, November 15, 2000
TESTY: The Massachusetts
Teachers Union is on an all out assault against the state's accountability
package, using $600,000 in dues money to fund a TV campaign against the state's
testing program, MCAS. Governor Paul Celucci derided the union for "giving
up" on the state's children. State Board of Education Chairman James Peyser
blasted the ads, noting, "If they (the teachers union) were investing this
$600,000 on developing effective remedial programs for high school students or
middle school students in math, they'd be making a much greater contribution to
education." (CER Newswire, November 14, 2000.)
'ANALYSIS'
FULL OF HOLES: The National School Boards Association is among
the staunchest opponents of charters, and its recent charter report is written
by people whose own charter views are suspect. Not surprisingly, the report's
assertions that charters show little diversity, innovation, or student
achievement is backed up by no evidence! See also: Jeanne
Allen sets the record straight with the Washington Post.
UN-BUSINESS AS USUAL:
Striking Out -- Philadelphia Teachers Vote to Deliver Bare Minimum as
Students Prepare to Come Back to School.
TIME OUT:
Sometimes education proposals are so sad that they are actually funny. Not to be
outdone by the NEA (see below), the American Federation of Teachers has offered up its own
miss-the-point perspective on reform at its annual convention. CER awards the AFT this month's
citation for Most Outrageous Proposal for their proposition that only by adding an optional year to the
traditional four year track will we be serving more challenged students well.
Jeanne Allen's July Monthly Letter looks at the union's latest antics.
WITHOUT MERIT: Despite the growing national focus on teacher quality issues,
this year's annual conferences of the two largest teacher unions gave little attention to how to recruit, retain and reward high quality teachers.
Instead, the NEA reiterated its opposition to merit pay, and agreed to dues hike
of $10 million annually to fight school choice and other reform efforts focused
on accountability and achievement. The
Center for Education Reform challenged the unions to put into play policies and
practices to ensure
opportunity and excellence for students. Instead, the unions have once again
opted for the status quo. Get the latest...
CITY
SWITCH: Educators have long called it the "dance of the lemons."
News that District of Columbia school superintendent Arlene Ackerman is likely
leaving to take on the same post in San Francisco was met with curious protests
from city officials, who fear that DC schools will "backslide" without
Ackerman. To her credit, Ackerman has in fact reconstituted some schools and
instituted new standards and testing since she arrived in the Nation's Capital
as its chief school officer. Despite some progress, schools haven't improved,
huge gaps remain and she spent more than a month of this school year fighting
over one tiny charter school conversion pushing to open. Ackerman has also had
zero success in straightening out financial, transportation and basic
administrative issues. She says she's been "frustrated" by such
problems — and yet a CEO at a major company who cried frustration rather than
solve the problems would likely be ousted by shareholders and not recycled to
another company. For more information, link to: Ackerman's
Fleeting Legacy, by Marc Fisher, The Washington Post, May 18, 2000
-- From CER
Newswire, May 16, 2000.
GET A FIX ON THE BLOB:
SCHOOL
CHOICE, FAILING SCHOOLS AND A 'BUM
REP': ... "These schools are getting a bum
rep that they don't deserve," said Weaver, national vice president of the
National Education Association, ... [after visiting] the only two schools labeled chronically failing by the state
Department of Education. "When you hear the letter F, you
think unsafe, dirty schools with discipline problems," he said. "You don't think
of the orderly, enthusiastic schools that I saw here today."
Under Gov. Jeb Bush's voucher law, some parents can opt out of F
schools and attend private schools on the taxpayers' tab. [Two] Pensacola
schools have been in the national spotlight since last year, when they
failed standardized tests and [their students] became eligible for
vouchers.... "No one has bashed those two schools," said Jeanne
Allen, director of the Center for
Education Reform, a national voucher advocacy group. "If the union
spent as much time and money on getting a good reading program as they do
on making visits and ads and lawsuits, we might not be having this
discussion." Pensacola News Journal, April 1, 2000
POISON PILL: "The union that
represents Los Angeles teachers opposes a plan that would increase salaries.
That's an odd position for an organization that claims to want to increase
teacher's pay.... The Los Angeles Unified School District is proposing a new
contract that includes a 6% raise. But it also contains what the unions consider
a poison pill - a merit-pay proposal." Investors Business Daily.
Link to: full article.
PTA
Power Grab: First it was Michigan
... then Virginia ... and the latest reports
of PTA shenanigans now come from
Brentwood, NY, on the subject of charters. Once again children served as carrier
pigeons to deliver the PTA's anti-reform propaganda. Parents were treated
to PTA-circulated myths over a pending charter school:
referring to the potential opening of the Nehemiah Charter School, their flier
charged "this charter school may have a devastating impact on the education of your
child and could significantly raise property taxes. Programs for our children
could be eliminated and class sizes increased." The PTA flier assured
readers that "your PTA and all PTAs in Brentwood passed a resolution
opposing Charter Schools." [Link to: full
flier text.] Clearly the PTA's membership
losses over the years to less than 10% of all parents means they don't have the
attendance at local meetings to ensure their message gets out to all who choose
to hear it voluntarily. Thus they've taken to school-sanctioned propaganda,
despite many legal warnings about such actions possibly violating state and
local policies regarding political and advocacy work.
Propaganda
Machine: As we've reported over the years, there's rarely an education
coalition that doesn't include the PTA walking lockstep along side the unions,
the principals' groups, the administrators groups and so on (hence the BLOB
monicker). So it's not surprising that the various BLOB anti-charter school
campaigns sound amazingly similar -- as can be seen in this official DC Public
Schools notice from the Office of the District Superintendent. Without any basis
of fact, it provides a laundry list of danger and disasters that could result
should charter school conversions be permitted. Link to: full
text.
HEROES AND ZEROS:
THE
100,000-TEACHER SCAM By David W. Kirkpatrick: There are nearly 3,000,000
public school teachers now; so 100,000 more will mean approximately one new
teacher for every 30 now on the scene. Reduced class size? ... In short,
billions will be spent. Thus, even if everything works perfectly, the impact
will be minimal. Except for one thing. About 90% of the public school teachers
in the nation belong to the National Education Association or the American
Federation of Teachers.... So it can be expected they will pick up about 90,000
new members. At an average of $500 for local, state and national dues per year
per teacher, they will gain $45 million in income. More
...
|
|
A HOLIDAY POEM FOR REFORMERS:
|
WHO'S
GOING TO TAKE OUT THE GARBAGE? The following is from a person named
Gerald Bracey, in response to someone inquiring whether or not social promotions
and exit exams are designed to create a new underclass.
BRACEY: ...our culture absolutely requires larger numbers of unskilled workers which the culture refuses to acknowledge.…It seems to be a structural necessity unless one can imagine a different structure....In the countries that I have visited where overeducation is a problem ... the solution is always to get more people from undereducated, underpaid countries to emigrate. As a nation of immigrants, we never have had to confront this problem. (Gerald Bracey, 11/8/99, via list-serve.)
Bracey argues that Virginia's cut-off scores for passage on the state's new tests are too high and that these children are already doing as well as they should be according to his own, ahem, analysis. Some of Bracey's first public comments (1991) are illustrative:
BRACEY: In the U.S., we avoid discussing the implication of overeducation because we fear that we may reach conclusions that clash with our idea of equal opportunity for all.... however loath we are to admit it, we must continue to produce an uneducated social class…
Why all the fuss? Because tens of thousands of good, committed educators are exposed to this rot each year in well-funded speeches and articles. More...
GRADE INFLATION: In Florida, the
education establishment was last seen petitioning the State Board of Education
to change the grading system by which schools are judged to alleviate the
possibility this spring that as many as 30,000 children will be eligible for
vouchers. One of the ways the school boards and superintendents propose that the
state judge schools is by asking children how well they think they are educated
and their own "expressed confidence" in their possession of
significant skills." Geez – and these folks are in charge?
PARENTS
FOR THE STATUS QUO: There's a relatively new parent group around now
which is attempting to gain a foothold in education with its friendly and
seemingly innocuous approach to important policy issues. This group says it
doesn't take positions on any choice mechanisms other than vouchers (it opposes
them). But some indepth analysis of its work, and its recent coverage of
charters schools makes us wonder whether Parents for Public Schools (PPS) might
more aptly be Parents for the Status Quo. More
...
SUN BLOCK:
While many individual school board members are personally supportive of reform,
state and national school board groups have begun to strategically block strong
charter efforts and schools from opening.
MISINFORMATION STATION: A coalition of
more than a dozen education special interest groups are rallying on October 23rd
in Cincinnati, Ohio to protest the establishment of Ohio's community, or charter
schools. Most of what the coalition opposes about charter schools is in fact
untrue. For example, this group alleges in fliers it has distributed statewide
that community schools don't have to take state tests, which is false. They also
suggest that charters don't have to do background checks on teachers, or enroll
special education children - again all falsehoods. The Ohio Education Blob of
course had nothing valid to rally against. Their motto must be: when it doubt,
create problems. (From CER Press Release: JUSTICE
GETS SPANKED, MISSOURI URBAN SCHOOLS FAIL AGAIN, AND THE OHIO EMPIRE STRIKES
BACK, October 15, 1999.)
CHARTER EXILE: Frank Barham, Virginia
School Board Association director, has long tried to convince his colleagues
that Virginia has a perfectly fine charter school law. It's so fine that only a
few school boards have decided to consider proposals and after one full year of
being on the books, only one school has even signaled any interest.
Nevertheless, Barham declared that "Virginia has the best charter school
law in the Nation." So we were quite taken aback by a later communiqué to
VSBA members in which Barham tells what he would do for public education if he
were a dictator for a day:
"School safety and violence would be reduced and eliminated. Any student who could not recite the Scout Law daily would be exiled (emphasis added) to the nearest Charter or Home School for a year. They would have to pass a re-entry test for re-admission to a public school."
So this taxpayer-funded staff member of the Virginia School Boards Association, on behalf of all school board members, is saying that charter schools and home schools are places to which children should be banished!? That's charter support? Rather, as we've predicted and seen in weak law states, school boards will use charter schools as a way to get federal money, to banish "bad" kids or kids they don't want for any number of reasons. Link to: September Monthly Letter, for more of the gory details.
ACTION: If you know of a Virginia school board member or two who would like to see a better law, or parents and teachers who want to start charters, let us know and we'll gladly get their stories to those concerned about children in Old Dominion.
THE RAINBOW GROWS: Willie
Breazell was, until recently, head of the 800 member Colorado Springs, CO NAACP.
However, as reported in the Wall Street Journal, Breazell was forced to
resign because he wrote an article in support of school choice, in which he said
that the "status quo leaves the poorest kids who need the most
help...trapped in our very worst schools." He says the overwhelming
majority of the local NAACP membership wanted him to stay but he resigned under
pressure from the main office; three others of the 11 member executive committee
also resigned in support. Breazell told the Journal, "I was kind of
lynched, so to speak.... If you don't have the group-think mentality you won't
last."
The National NAACP has a strict anti-voucher policy, and other African
American leaders and legislators who have broken ranks with the NAACP over
school choice say that it is not hard to glean from where the NAACP's strong
stance against vouchers comes: they get a large portion of their funding from
the unions.
Links to:
School choice would give all students a shot at the best education, By Willie H. Breazell Sr., Colorado Springs Gazette, August 17, 1999;
VOUCHERS STRAIN OLD ALLIANCE, More minorities are backing school choice - parting ways with the Democratic stance, by Gail Russell Chaddock, The Christian Science Monitor, September 23, 1999;
more on African Americans challenging the NAACP's anti-school-choice stance;
MICHIGAN: PTA's
ANTI-VOUCHER PROPAGANDA: The mother of a student at
North Hill Elementary School in Rochester, Michigan was outraged by a leaflet
her child brought home from school last week. The leaflet, which had no logo or
letterhead but which referred to policies of "our" PTA, advanced
misleading and false information about the origin and purpose of school choice
and education tuition vouchers.
CER wants to know:
Link to: CER response to
leaflet.
Link to: full text of anti-school-choice
leaflet.
PENNSYLVANIA: ...True to why we call
"it" the Blob, the association that represents Pennsylvania teacher
training institutes and the state union, the PSEA, have sued over the
Department of Education’s new alternative certification program. Under that
plan, intended to attract new troops to the ranks of teachers, one would not
need a full teacher education degree, but rather a subject-driven bachelor’s
degree and a 3.0 GPA in the subject he wants to teach in order to meet the
requirements for a 15-month certificate. There has been a dramatic rise in the
number of emergency teachers with fewer qualifications in the Keystone State,
but that doesn’t seem to bother those suing. The groups argued that the plan
would "jeopardize the future well-being and education of students."
FLORIDA: Florida’s state PTA
council voted 42-7 to join the suit against the state’s school choice
program. I guess all those rumors about the PTA being out of touch are really
true. Reports from the Sunshine State say that the PTA president herself once
had her child in a private school. It seems that old classic saying — What’s
good for the goose is good for the gander — must be politically incorrect.
NEA WOLF
IN SHEEP'S CLOTHING By Andrea Neal
The National Education Association has repackaged itself in the rhetoric
of school reform.... Behind the scenes, the teachers' union is amassing monopoly
power unlike anything it's had before. This effort won't promote quality, but
will lead to higher teacher salaries and more teachers trained in progressive
political philosophies that have little to do with education.
For more Views from the Blob, visit our Monthly Letter Archives. Also check out The Education Forum for additional perspectives on Blob activity.
