I went to Lafayette, La., last week to speak to the Louisiana School Boards Association. These men and women, representing their local schools from across the state, are trying to preserve public education in the face of an unprecedented onslaught by Gov. Bobby Jindal and the state's Republican-dominated legislature. Jindal has the backing of the state's corporate leaders, the nation's biggest foundations, and some powerful out-of-state supporters of privatization for his sweeping attack on public education.
Gov. Jindal has submitted a legislative proposal that would offer vouchers to more than half the students in the state; vastly expand the number of privately managed charter schools by giving the state board of education the power to create up to 40 new charter authorizing agencies; introduce academic standards and letter grades for pre-schoolers; and end seniority and tenure for teachers.
Under his plan, the local superintendent could immediately fire any teacher—tenured or not—who was rated "ineffective" by the state evaluation program. If the teacher re-applied to teach, she would have to be rated "highly effective" for five years in a row to regain tenure. Tenure, needless to say, becomes a meaningless term, since due process no longer is required for termination.
The bill is as punitive as possible with respect to public education and teachers. It says nothing about helping to improve or support them. It's all about enabling students to leave public schools and creating the tools to intimidate and fire teachers. This "reform" is not conservative. I would say it is radical and reactionary. But it is in no way unique to Louisiana...
The New Orleans' "miracle" is supposed to be evidence for the value of handing public education over to private managers and uncertified teachers. But the state's own website contradicts that "miracle" narrative. The state education department rated 79 percent of the charters in the Recovery School District as D or F.
The state also reported that the New Orleans Recovery School District was next to last in academic performance of all 72 districts in the state. It has made gains, but only in comparison to its own low base line in 2007.
All this data was compiled before the Jindal takeover of the state board of education. Currently, researchers are having trouble getting any data from the state education department.
Why are the elites of both parties so eager to hand children and public dollars over to private corporations? Why are both parties complicit in the dismantling of public education? Why do so many Democrats at the top advocate what used to be known as the right-wing agenda for education? ...
Tuesday, March 06, 2012
Bobby Jindal vs. Public Education
This from Diane Ravitch at Bridging Differences:
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Ravitch asks:
“Why are the elites of both parties so eager to hand children and public dollars over to private corporations? Why are both parties complicit in the dismantling of public education? Why do so many Democrats at the top advocate what used to be known as the right-wing agenda for education?”
She is getting awfully forgetful.
Ravitch should do a little remedial reading in a great book titled, “Left Back.” In there, among many other pearls of wisdom, it says (page 465) that some great errors in education include the belief that only a portion of children need access to a high-quality academic education and that emphasizing a student’s immediate experiences minimizes the need to transmit knowledge. On the next page it says, “A society that does not teach science to the general public fosters the proliferation of irrational claims and antiscientific belief systems.”
What makes those “Left Back” comments especially poignant today is a news release from the US Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights about the continuing disadvantages of minorities in our school system. Suspension rates are higher, and enrollment opportunity in upper level courses is lower for minorities (go to www.bipps.org/bipps-blog for more, or just read the post below in KSN & C).
Ravitch’s currently unquestioning love for the traditional public school system apparently blinds her to what more logical and concerned citizens can easily see – our educational system has serious and chronic problems and new tonics are needed to cure the ills.
By the way, all of Ravitch’s complaints about Louisiana fall on deaf ears once you take a look at how that state has progressed on the ACT in comparison to Kentucky (More on that here: http://www.bipps.org/more-on-louisiana-vs-kentucky-on-the-act/#comments). Louisiana is starting to move out in education. The fact that Ravitch can’t, or won’t, see that is particularly sad.
Oh, why is Ravitch forgetful? She wrote “Left Back.” How soon she forgets.
Everyone has been whipped into a hysteria the last 5 to 10 years into believing that we have to be better than CHina, INdia, Netherlands or whoever when infact we have never scored well on these national perceived national academic comparisons going all the way back to the SPUTNIK fears.
Next we have vendors competing for tax dollars which are being thrown out at anyone who says they have the anwer.
In the mean time we are getting ready to disenfranchise one of the largest if not largest professions in our country.
What do these people think is going to happen a few years from now when the savior charter school or voucher system doesn't result in the competative based results they promised. Private sector is not going to invest in something which become unmarketable or unprofitable. We will have this all fall right back into the government's lap in a decade as we find ourselves still not being able to best China's best students on a standardized test which is suppose to predict our national economic, social and intellectual future.
Richard:
Well, let me just put this out there – so we’re clear. Despite reminders to myself that nobody’s perfect, and that education changes people’s minds – I blame Diane Ravitch for some measure of the current edupolitical landscape.
She is a solid researcher who started out with Lawrence Cremin. I read her early stuff (along with Lagemann, Tyack, Spring and many others) but when I got to Left Back, I became totally confused. I couldn't reconcile where she started with where she ended up. I mean, the Hoover Institute for heaven's sake.
I believe her defection left a big void in the national debate and helped fuel the present corporate reform movement. And in my less charitable moments, I blame her.
Ravitch is not forgetful. She knows very well that the data did not support her previous conclusions, and as a credible researcher must do, she changed her tune. But in doing so, she came home.
Richard,
So you are saying that Ravitch was wrong in "Left Back" when she said some great errors in education include the belief that only a portion of children need access to a high-quality academic education and that emphasizing a student’s immediate experiences minimizes the need to transmit knowledge?
Was she wrong to say, “A society that does not teach science to the general public fosters the proliferation of irrational claims and antiscientific belief systems”?
And, now she is 'back in the fold' because she refuses to understand how a lot of people outside the school system see major continuing problems with achievement gaps and high college remediation rates, etc. and want better answers for kids (not just the adults in the system)?
Richard,
No. Nothing so specific. I suppose I went off on my own little tangent there.
Everybody needs access to high quality education. When that happens we find very capable kids among the poor and traditionally marginalized who grow up to become producers.
I suspect her comments on science are correct.
Being back in the fold has less to do with her book (I probably shouldn't have stated it the way I did) than what was happening at the time of the book. But she became a full fledged corporate school reformer who more recently backed off way of charters, mayoral control, and high-stakes assessment. She is very opposed to
punishing teachers by publishing evaluation rankings....
As for achievement gaps, one only needs to review the affirmative actions of legislatures and courts to make a strong case that the achievement gaps (and all kinds of social gaps) were deliberately created. There was no achievement gap in 1954. why not? It has only been since about 1995 that achievement gaps became an issue at the school level.
As (I think) we agree, attention on college-career readiness for every high school is important, but perhaps a goal of 85 or 90% attainment is more reasonable than the expectation that every child will do what is necessary to earn a proficient education.
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