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Educate yourself…The upside of controversy…Take a break in Italy

UNCONVENTIONAL CONVENTIONS. The political conventions are history. Can we get an “amen” and “hallelujah”?! No matter the outcome in November, COVID insured these will be remembered as the strangest conventions ever held. On the issue of education, the Republicans spoke about school choice every night, while the Democrats took to empty classrooms to promote the NEA political agenda. This seems like an opportune time to reprint the open letter from Dr. Howard Fuller to Joe Biden reminding him that the votes of black and brown charter school parents matter. We take no position on political races, but point out that on issues of school choice and innovation, the two parties are polar opposites. Educate yourselves on the positions candidates of both parties take — and not just those running for President. Act like your kids’ future depends on it…because it does.

DIVISIVE IS NOT ALWAYS A DIRTY WORD. In a perfect world the adjective “divisive” would never have to be used. Someone please wake us when that world arrives. In the meantime, “polite” doesn’t always work in the world we have. CER’s Jeanne Allen explains why in the current education battles with folks like teachers unions who would destroy all choice for all kids, it’s sometimes okay to be divisive. Heck, we might even argue that at times it’s mandatory.

KIDS? WHAT KIDS? WE WANT POWER AND MONEY. That sadly seems to be the motto adopted by the unions as they pull every power lever and trick in the book to gain unlimited power and money over education. The very liberal Sacramento Bee newspaper details how over this summer teachers union leaders are hurting kids.

CHARTERS LEAD THE WAY – AGAIN. A new report from Public Impact shows that charter schools appeared to follow a more routine class schedule and stay in closer contact with students and families following shutdowns than district schools. Charters also outdistanced district schools in teachers providing instruction, synchronous education, teachers checking in with students and attendance tracking.

SPREADING THE WORD. Jeanne Allen is making sure our — and your — viewpoints are well represented in the public square. She was recently on Fox News supporting the right of local school districts to make their own decision to open schools — or not — for students, and the Journal Editorial Report exposing the unreasonable — and largely unreachable — demands that the unions insist on before allowing kids to go back to school. She, CER, and — according to Jeanne, the world’s cutest grandchild — were featured in the Italian Sons and Daughters of America newsletter.

TAKE A VIRTUAL VOYAGE TO ITALY. Speaking of things Italian – and we just were – CER is proud to present with Stoa, the most important and historic management school in the South of Italy, the U.S. – Italia Education Innovation Festival, September 21–23, at Stoa, steps from Pompeii and overlooking the Bay of Naples. The Festival will be the first global Ed Tech event in Italy with a concentration on innovations and technologies that amplify, engage and educate the world’s students in the arts and sciences. Registration and virtual attendance is easy. And for the adventurous there is still a limited in-person attendance option available. Viva Italia – and pass the Chianti.

Thinking about the two months between now and the election brings to mind Bette Davis’ famous quote from “All About Eve,” “fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy ride”. Our hope is that it is not too bumpy for all Americans — or at least most Americans — to come together afterwards, no doubt after a time for some wound healing. In that spirit, we offer the wish of the Supremes…turn up the speakers and enjoy exquisite artistry. 

Trust parents. Not a complicated idea, but one that the unions flee from like Dracula from a cross… Kids are the losers — but some schools are riding to the rescue with innovation…Special hostility toward Catholic Schools?

And as always — please let us know how we can help you, your students and your school.

MONEY FOLLOWS PARENTS…. PARENTS HAVE POWER… JOIN THE ONLINE PARENT RALLY… UNIONS DERAIL SCHOOL – Again. 

School bells — or the ping of a laptop or tablet — will soon be heard throughout the country. As we watch the last few days of August disappear, we’ll do our part to get you ready for the very different school experience just about everyone is going to have.

MONEY FOLLOW KIDS? How radical is the notion that if money spent for education is NOT being spent on education then it should be spent on education?

POLICIES CONGRESS SHOULD ADOPT…RETURN OF THE POD PEOPLE… THE BATTLE OVER “SCHOOL”….

SHOW US THE MONEY.  Six weeks have now passed since the CARES Act appropriated  $13 billion for K – 12 schools, yet only 2 percent of that has been drawn down. This is frankly scandalous. Read CER’s new Four Freedoms Policy Agenda  to get the relief — and the schools working…today

WISDOM IN THE GRANITE STATE. New Hampshire Governor John Sununu is not letting his state’s CARES money sit idle.  He is using it for its intended purpose, helping all Granite State students attend schools this fall.  If only all the governors could put politics aside for just a moment and follow Sununu’s example of doing what is right for the kids.

POD GENERATION. A new generation of “pod people” — much nicer than those in the 50’s film “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” — is appearing in response to COVID. Parents are teaming up to provide “learning pods” in different homes on different days of the week, while assuring that quality education takes place. Recent examples of what innovative thinking can do come from Kansas City, Los Angeles and Denver. This is also producing a demand for teachers, or qualified professionals with subject matter expertise, who are looking for work alternatives.

BEACH BAG BOOK GIVEAWAY.  Feed the mind while relaxing (a little) this summer before the world changes again. CER’s Beach Bag Book giveaway gives you a chance to not only build up that book bag this summer but to get informed and entertained without doing a lot of work. CER’s experts will personally curate your education reading material this summer from amidst a library of books you won’t easily find anywhere. Operators are standing by!

TO OPEN OR NOT TO OPEN. The debate rages on. Let’s be clear. We believe that this remains a local decision — as Dr. Anthony Fauci has argued, the epidemic varies everywhere — and we believe choices must be at the heart of every decision a parent or teacher makes, whether to go in person, online, a combo or somewhere else entirely different. But we do not believe this is a time to play politics. Alas, would that we had a magic wand. Here’s just a sampling of the news playing out across the country.

• From today’s Wall Street Journal an editorial explaining how unions are using COVID and their conditions for opening schools as “political extortion”.
• Centers For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) with its views on why it is urgent and vital to students’ health that schools re-open.
• South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem highlights that science shows not going to schools hurts kids much worse than COVID.
• Maryland Governor Larry Hogan obviously agrees with the CDC and fellow Governor Kristi Noem.
• Our own Jeanne Allen has been much in demand by the media.  Buckle up and read her latest on these topics.
• It was announced that a majority of schools on military bases  plan to open for in-person learning.
• Our neighbors to the north present a clear example of successfully opening schools amid the COVID crisis.

INNOVATION CONTINUES AT CHARTERS. To close on some good news, schools in Wisconsin, Colorado and Nevada show the power of creative thinking and the freedom to do what best fits their local situation with successful navigation of the COVID crisis.

Wow — it’s August already.  Labor Day is bearing down on us with more than the usual angst and stress of “back to school” concerns. That’s inescapable. But we hope you can take  a little time this month to relax and, as we try to do every day, count our blessings. To help at least a little, here’s an American icon — Louis Armstrong — on the wonderful world  we have.  And as always — let us know if we can be of assistance to you in any way.

Education = National Security…Schools Delay Opening..Unions threaten security strike. 

You can’t get better credentials to speak about National Security than Rear Admiral McRaven and former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. As if to highlight their warnings,  teachers unions across the country have unveiled “demands” having little to do with actual education and much to do with politics

K-12 EDUCATION IS BIGGEST NATIONAL SECURITY RISK. Take it from one who knows — retired Rear Admiral and Navy Seal William McRaven, who was also Chancellor of the University of Texas System. He’s seen just about every kind of threat to U.S. national security (he oversaw the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden) and without hesitation he believes America’s  #1 national security issue is the failings of our current K-12 education system. Much wisdom in this very sobering piece, which sadly indicates little if any progress from 2014 when former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said exactly the same thing.

UNION DEMANDS PUT VESTED INTERESTS OVER KIDS. A prime example is the Massachusetts Teachers Association’s ongoing assault on logic, common sense, not to mention the kids they’re supposed to care about. As you can read in Jeanne Allen’s exposé, their demands seem right out of Alice In Wonderland.

UNIONS DEMAND MORE MONEY, LESS WORK, LITTLE EDUCATING. While our nation’s teachers would love nothing more than to get back to educating, learning what they need to learn to be innovative and keep the students they love moving forward, the unions that they’ve been required to pay (up until Janus of course) have been working hard to extract new demands from the government as a condition of going back to work. We could fill pages with the absurdities, but here’s a few sadly representative examples.  Read ‘em and weep:

• Massachusetts.  Delay school start by 2 weeks so teachers have time “to collaborate and plan together.” And of course gut charters, abolish the police, etc. ad nauseam. Take a deeper dive into this with Jeanne’s article above.

• Los Angeles. No in-person teaching or schooling “until a vaccine is available” — which could be never — shut down charters, increase taxes, more homeless shelters…a laundry list of items that don’t once mention effective teaching.

• Tennessee. Protesting Governor Lee’s plan to follow CDC guidelines while returning to in-person schooling various local unions are calling for — surprise — more money and for schools to remain closed until counties have not had a confirmed COVID case for 14 days. Setting a terrific example for any students watching, they also accused the Governor of wanting teachers to die.

• D.C. Apparently out of logic and persuasion to support their anti-in person schooling stance, D.C. teachers lined up dozens of body bags outside the schools’ offices to protest plans that could send them — gasp — back to classrooms in the fall. We agree with two comments in the story, “time to fire these clowns and hire people who want jobs,” and “give the money back to parents”.  Mother – and father — know best.

• Minneapolis – St. Paul. Not to be outdone by their comrades in D.C., the Twin Cities teachers unions organized a march to express outrage at the prospect of having to earn their salaries by teaching in a classroom. They obviously think the CDC is staffed by ghouls —  their logic-free slogans included “I can’t teach from a grave” and “Exactly how many dead kids is acceptable”.  Exactly how much ignorance of the best current science is acceptable?

• Michigan. The AFT is encouraging its members to ignore any back-to-school orders they don’t like. They are providing members with ways to remain on the payroll without going back to school.  These include invoking the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Family Medical Leave Act, the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, and through their own union contracts. And these folks pretend to be role models for our kids?

Last but not least, today the American Federation of Teachers threatened in school reopening negotiations on Capitol Hill that they will run “safety strikes” if all of the above and more are not met.  Here’s the question, are YOU going to take this sitting down?

IT SHOULDN’T TAKE A PANDEMIC to bring the obvious into focus, but “a system whose structure makes it impervious to failure in everything, from reading to college or career readiness, is a system that is incapable of innovating.”  It’s time for action. Read what we can do to solve the new irresponsibility movement.

TWEETS AREN’T JUST FOR THE BIRDS. Join us on Twitter where the debates, personal attacks and lies are flying from those who want to put adults ahead of children.

ONE LITTLE PIECE OF GOOD NEWS. A virtual charter school in Carmichael, California is seeing enrollment soar as  the coronavirus pandemic changes education. The number of students enrolling in the non-classroom based charter school has maxed out. Visions in Education has been around for two decades, but its educational model has grown in popularity since COVID struck. School leaders aim to deliver “flexibility without the drama,” and  hope to be “an incubator of innovation.” Bring it on.

As August waits on the doorstep, we hope you and yours are able to achieve some meaningful, traditional “down time” in this most untraditional of summers.  We’re doing our best — but as always are ready and anxious to answer any questions you might have or offer assistance in any way needed. In the meantime, relax and enjoy the inimitable Nat King Cole singing one of the iconic summer songs.

Let The Kids Learn…Powerful Black Voices…Size Doesn’t Always Matter.

REOPENING. What’s it look like, how should it happen, and why the choice between going to physical school and going remote are not the only options that should be on the table? Much to be said. Read everything, think and demand options. We will have much more to say about this later this week. Meanwhile, here’s a thought from Reason’s Corey DeAngelis:  “Don’t force schools to reopen but don’t force families to pay for closed schools.”

BLACK MINDS MATTER. A hyper-powerful first person account of the need for school choice in minority communities is made by Denisha Merriweather of the American Federation of Children. A small taste: “Those committed to protecting black lives cannot simultaneously refuse to nurture black minds. Our essence and our being deserve life. Our black minds matter.”

SO DO BLACK VOICES.  The most recent CER ACTION event, titled  The Existential Union Threat to Charter Schools, featured unbridled honesty about unions, their intentions and their political allies. Hear from our stellar guests Mr. David Hardy (Boys Latin of Philadelphia) and Dr. Steve Perry (Capital Preparatory Magnet School) as they showed us why racial equity depends on money following kids.

GIVE BAD COPS AND BAD TEACHERS THEIR PINK SLIPS. One bad apple — whether the barrel it’s in is labelled “law enforcement” or “teachers” —  as the old adage warns, can spoil the entire group. That’s why they both need to be weeded out. But it’s a lot harder to fire a bad teacher than a bad cop, thanks to people like AFT President Randi Weingarten, who continue to put union power above student rights.

BIGGER DOESN’T MEAN BETTER. The COVID virus hit parents hard in two vital areas — school and child care — especially difficult for working parents. The crisis has spawned many bright innovations, one of the newest being the concept of “Micro-Schools”. These are  home-based learning centers for younger children that house four to twelve at a time, in a garage or spare room. Learn all about it in this fascinating report from “Good Morning America”.

SAVE CATHOLIC SCHOOLS. The Archdiocese of New York is closing another 20; That makes nearly 90 schools over the past decade. Since COVID, more than 100 private schools have permanently closed around the country. The New York Daily News explains two easy steps to keep the rest of the schools open:  make sure they get their fair share of CARES Act dollars and give state support to parents who choose private education for their kids. Both of these topics and more are explored in  “Saving Catholic Schools,” now on video, with Thomas Carroll, Superintendent of Schools for the Boston Archdiocese and Paul Escala, Superintendent for the L.A. Archdiocese.

We  hope you and yours are successfully navigating the dog days of summer.  As a grace note to our items above about black minds and voices, here is the amazing Marian Anderson singing at the Lincoln Memorial. Turn up your speakers and prepare for goose bumps. Our country could use more singing and less shouting.