Election

WANTED: Progressive Candidate With the Guts to Stand Up For Public Education

stevenmsinger Charter Schools, Common Core, Corporate Education "Reform", Democrat, Election, ESEA, Labor, Politics, Poverty, President, Racism, Republican , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

weird-help-wanted-9

Wanted:

Progressive presidential candidate.

MUST SUPPORT PUBLIC EDUCATION.

No. Not just the words. Not as a soundbite. Must actually support policies that help public schools – not tear them apart and sell them away piece-by-piece while you smile and brag about how much you support education.

This means you must:

1) Repudiate and Vow to Repeal Common Core State Standards

-Must know how they were created by unqualified partisans with little input from real educators.

-Cash strapped states were coerced into accepting them – in many cases even before they were done being written – as a condition for increased funding.

-They have never been proven to help kids learn and are in fact a massive social experiment at taxpayers’ expense and students’ peril.

-They are a huge payday for the testing and test prep industry who provide the new standardized assessments and new textbooks necessary for their implementation.

-They are developmentally inappropriate, demanding all students to learn at the same rate and at a time frame that is inconsistent with the way children cognitively develop.

2) End Annual Standardized Testing

-Must promise to end policies forcing public schools to give standardized tests in reading and math to all students in grades 3-8 and once in high school. Ideally, standardized tests should be completely eliminated.

-Must understand that standardized tests are poor assessments that have never been proven to measure academic achievement. However, they do an excellent job of demonstrating a student’s parental income – rich kids do well, poor kids less so.

-Must realize these tests are nothing but a money-maker for private industry and are used as an excuse to close under-funded schools predominantly serving children of color.

–MUST REPUDIATE THE MEDIA NARRATIVE OF FAILING SCHOOLS, which is not supported by facts and merely the propaganda of an industry feeding off of our public taxes and children’s misery.

3) Stop the Expansion of Charter Schools

-Must understand how for-profit charters siphon away public money for use as private profits. Charters reduce services for children to increase the bottom line.

-Must vow to protect funding meant for traditional public schools that is lost when charters open in the district.

-Must know that no research has ever shown charters to be better than public schools, and many studies have shown them to be drastically worse.

-Must appreciate the lack of transparency charters are afforded feeds the growing plague of national charter financial scandals.

4) Work to Stop School Segregation

-Our public schools are more segregated now than they were before Brown vs. Board of Education 60 years ago. This is intolerable and makes it easy to disenfranchise students of color.

-Must not only recognize this, but have a plan to solve the problem.

5) Promise to Increase Public School Funding – Especially to the Poorest Districts

-Must understand that nationwide, rich schools spend on average 15.6% more than high poverty schools. Being born poor should not mean you get a worse education. In fact, impoverished students have greater needs than wealthy ones. It costs MORE to educate them.

-Must champion an effective plan to address funding inequalities with an emphasis an equity.

6) Have a Plan to Address Child Poverty

-Must understand that more than half of public school students live below the poverty line.

-Must have an effective plan to help children, parents and families rise out of poverty.

7) Allow Teachers Autonomy and Recognize Them as Professionals

-Must support letting teachers run their own classrooms, champion teacher-created tests over standardized ones – in short, LET TEACHERS TEACH.

-Must vow to eliminate any so-called teacher accountability programs that evaluate educators based on student test scores. Let teachers be evaluated by their own administrators based on classroom observations.

8) Stop Supporting Teach For America

-Must admit six weeks training for college graduates without education degrees is not good preparation to become classroom teachers. All students deserve a teacher with a 4-year degree specializing in education.

-Must condemn valuing TFA recruits who have only promised to be in the classroom for two years over teachers who have devoted their whole lives to their students.

9) Repudiate Any So-called School Choice or Voucher Programs

-Must understand that these policies are often backdoor support for the unconstitutional practice of spending public money on religious or parochial schools.

-Must recognize these policies are another attempt by private industry to convert public taxes into profits. Private schools are not subject to the same regulations as public entities and as such can freely use tax money in more nefarious ways.

-Must acknowledge that school choice is a sham – sending children to schools without public school boards paradoxically reduces the choice parents have over how the school is run.

-Public schools must remain public. Policies allowing for choice among schools – if done fairly – would increase the cost of public education exponentially. It is a much more efficient policy and less open to fraud if we instead ensure every student has a quality education. We need one excellent education system – not multiple ones.

10) Support the Right of Workers to Unionize

-Must support policies to make it easier for private citizens to exercise their collective bargaining rights. Period.

I would be willing to vote for any candidate who met all of these requirements regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, background or party affiliation.

That’s right. This job need not be filled by a Democrat. Any party will do. I am sick of being offered false progressives under a Democratic banner.

And Hillary Clinton coming right out of the gate praising Common Core may have been the last straw.

Why vote for her over Jeb Bush when they support THE SAME THING!?

No. I will not vote Democrat just because. Never, never again.

If they want my vote, they will have to meet my job application. I will vote to hire the best candidate. Whoever that is.

And I bet I’m not alone.

The education vote is no longer a gimme for the Democrats.

Progressive education candidates? Are you out there?

NOTE: This article was additionally published on the Badass Teachers Association blog.

We Shall Overcome… Big Money: Rahm Wins Chicago, Loses Soul of Democratic Party

stevenmsinger Chicago, Chuy Garcia, Democrat, Election, Local Control, Politics, Rahm , , , , , ,

jesus-chuy-garcia

It’s a sad night.

Progressive challenger Chuy Garcia lost his bid for Chicago Mayor. Neo-liberal Rahm Emanuel won re-election.

It’s a headline that shouldn’t surprise anyone – but it does.

All the polls told us this would happen. Rahm just had too much money. Emanuel raised nearly $23 million compared to Garcia’s little more than $6 million.

That buys an awful lot of television commercials, advertisements, and confidence.

Emanuel had 20 different ads that aired over 7,000 times!

Even if you aren’t paying direct attention to it, after a while that kind of repetition seeps into your bones.

Rahm’s going to win. Rahm’s going to win. Rahm’s going to win…

Even if you don’t want it to be true, even if you fight against it, there’s a part of you that can’t help but believe it.

It’s like being trapped in the coils of a monetary anaconda that looks you right in the eyes as it squeezes the life out of you and unhinges its jaw!

How else could Rahm win? His attempts to goose the city’s sluggish economy were nothing but an attack on the poor and minorities. He closed public health clinics, 50 public schools and installed red light cameras to raise fees. And none of it even worked!

You might think it’s counter-intuitive that money matters so much, but history disagrees. This is how it plays out almost every time. The candidate with the most green wins.

Look at New York.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo raised $30.5 million fending off challenger Zephyr Teachout. She raised only $600,000. And we all remember how that turned out.

Without the constant stream of campaign ads and only the bad taste of his actual policies, Cuomo’s popularity now is lower than it’s ever been. And that election was only half a year ago!

Buyers remorse? Sure! But just wait until the next campaign and a truckload of donor’s money to temporarily hypnotize people they should think otherwise and voila! Instant approval. Just add money!

But there’s good news in this nest of vipers, too.

Consider this: both races were internal. These were Democrats vs. Democrats.

But were they really? Rahm’s top donors were conservative billionaires. These are the same folks backing Scott Walker, Mike Pence and Mitt Romney!

The media is trying to spin this as the Elizabeth Warren wing of the party vs. the business wing.

Nonsense! It’s real, grassroots progressives vs. the DINOs – the Democrats In Name Only! And the DINOs keep winning!

But take heart. The future doesn’t belong to dinosaurs.

Look at how far Chuy Garcia pushed Rahm Emanuel! He got enough votes in the primary to force this runoff election. It was no cakewalk for Emanuel.

The people lost this one, but we will remember it.

Neither of these were high turnout elections. We don’t have that anymore in America.

No matter who is running, no matter what’s at stake, the public is so gripped by a sense of helpless apathy that most people don’t even show up at the polls to cast a vote.

But every time we have an election like this one, we stir people up. We fill them with passion. We make them care.

I knew Chuy Garcia had very little chance of winning, but I wanted it anyway.

I read up on him, talked to people, posted on facebook, sent out a barrage of tweets every day.

And I’ve never even been to Chicago!

But Chuy’s campaign meant something to me. It still does. Even with the election lost.

There is a growing majority of people who feel the same way. We care about closing 50 public schools for minorities. We care about local government control. It matters to us that our society is run justly, morally, progressively.

We repudiate the business model, the worship of money and profit at the expense of all else.

And there are more of us everyday.

Yes. In the short term, money still rules.

But what happens on the day when they open the polls and we all show up?

What happens when that passion spurs us – all of us – to actually get out and vote?

What happens when we drown out the drone of campaign commercials with the certainty of what is right?

I think on that day, the Rahm’s and Cuomo’s will fail. On that day the DINOs go extinct.

On that day, we take back our party and our Democracy itself.

It’s coming closer everyday.

“They tried to bury us. They didn’t know we were seeds.”
-Mexican proverb

NOTE: This article was also published in the LA Progressive and the Badass Teachers Association blog.

Oooh! Scary! What Would Happen if Pennsylvania Passed the Wolf Budget?

stevenmsinger Compassion, Democrat, Election, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia Schools, Politics, Poverty, Republican, satire , , ,

campfirestorrd

Gather round the campfire, children, and hear a story to chill the very marrow in your bones!

Let me turn off the lights and point this yellow flashlight beam on my face as I share a tale of terror straight from the Pennsylvania legislature!

Imagine – if you will – a Commonwealth that has invested in public education.

The schools are pristine palaces to learning and self-actualization.

Class sizes are down. We’ve rehired the 25,000 teachers we sacked four years ago to balance the books. All children get arts, music, science labs, foreign languages, sports and extra-curricular activities. Even amenities like school nurses and guidance counselors have been restored.

Children from all walks of life enter those hallowed halls and no matter their family background, parental education, income, race or social class, they leave fully functioning adult citizens ready to lead our state into a brighter future.

But!

Oh the horrendous but!

No one can afford toilet paper!

I know, children! It’s enough to shrink your sphincter with dread!

We’d pay for this educational utopia with an anal Armageddon!

Even the name of our fair state would have to change to Poopsylvania!

Educated urchins would roam the streets hunting for any scrap of angel softness. It would be bathroom chaos from the City of Phila-dookie-ah to the streets of Shittsburgh!

Because… TAXES!

Such is the horror story being told by Pennsylvania Republicans about Gov. Tom Wolf’s budget proposal.

They softly intone the words, “tax hike,” while squeezing the Charmin tightly to their chests.

Fortunately, they’re just talking out of their butts.

Gov. Wolf’s proposed budget WOULD increase education funding. In fact, it would heal the $1 billion in annual education cuts made by the previous administration.

To do so, the freshman governor has proposed an ambitious new tax plan.

Much income would be generated from a proposed severance tax on natural gas extraction, closing tax loopholes and other cost savings. However, the sticking point for fiscal conservatives is a plan to reduce local property taxes while increasing income and sales taxes.

“Tax hike!” they scream tearing out fistfuls of grey hair. But if you’re raising taxes on one thing and reducing them on something else, at the end of the day are you really raising taxes?

It depends.

In short, homeowner’s property tax bills will go down, but grocery bills will go up.

Some consumer analysts are projecting toilet paper, for example, to go up a whole six cents on the dollar!

This is where conservatives offer us a Sophie’s Choice: will your kids learn how to read and write or will you get to wipe your butt?

Apparently there is no middle ground.

But this isn’t a matter of opinion. It’s a simple question of math. Would most people save enough from the property tax reduction to come out ahead of the increased sales and income taxes?

The answer? According to the Wolf administration, the poor and middle class will end up paying less, while the rich will end up paying more. The average family would receive a net tax decrease of about 13%.

Tax savings would depend on several factors – income, whether you own or rent your home, which school district you live in, and how much you spend on taxable items each year.

If this seems too complex to you, far right think tanks have simplified the matter to a pure “The Sky is Falling” scenario.

The Heritage Foundation estimates Wolf’s budget would cost families an additional $1,400 a year. However, this estimate is highly contested. No one seems to be able to show where it comes from, how it was calculated or to prove that it truly takes into account the cost savings from reduced property taxes.

It’s an amorphous number, floated in obscurity in great need of being flushed away.

More over, these gloom and doom calculations are clearly politically motivated. A few years ago, Republicans proposed a similar plan, themselves!

That’s right! Conservatives had no problem offsetting property taxes with increased sales taxes when it was the GOP proposing it! However, when almost-the-same-plan comes out of the mouths of Democrats, it’s suddenly a three-ply catastrophe!

Property tax relief has been a major issue for both Democrats and Republicans in the Commonwealth for decades.

Pennsylvania has one of the worst tax codes in the country. Currently, the less income you bring home, the higher percent you pay in taxes.

This is true for taxpayers nationwide, but in the Keystone state we take it to a whole new level.

This is largely due to unequal property taxes. The Commonwealth’s poorest households pay nearly 4% of their total income on their homes, while the wealthiest pay just 1.6%. This is a much larger difference than in most states. Wolf’s new tax plan would address this inequality directly making for a fairer distribution of costs for the average resident.

The problem is even worse for our public schools that are forced to rely far too heavily on property taxes. The Commonwealth only pays 36.1% of the cost of education. This is far below the national average of 45.5%, and ranks 45th in the nation. Wolf’s budget would bring state spending up to 50% – more in line with what the rest of the country invests in its children.

Add to this a funding formula that would ensure poorer schools get a fair distribution of the pie, and you get a whole mess of education equity. A whole mess that Republicans want to wipe away.

It is a sad commentary on our right-leaning legislators that they’re pissing and moaning about putting back the funds this year that they had no problem stripping away four years ago.

After one term of a Republican governor, Pennsylvania is the laughing stock of the country in terms of education. We spend less on our poor students compared to our rich ones than ANY OTHER STATE!

That’s right! When it comes to cheating impoverished kids out of an education, we’re number one!

Nationwide, rich schools already spend on average 15.6% more than high poverty schools. But in Pennsylvania, the difference is 33%!

We are systematically short-changing our neediest children year-after-year, and there are actually people out there who can look at you with a straight face and complain about toilet paper!?

But you know what? Let’s entertain this criticism for a moment.

Let’s say that the Commonwealth Foundation, Americans for Prosperity and a host of other far right think tanks are correct. Wolf’s budget taxes things it shouldn’t.

Does that mean you scrap the whole education funding plan? Or does it mean you find the money elsewhere?

Do we just shrug, clutch the bathroom tissue to our chests and walk away? Or do we make education a statewide priority?

Even Wolf’s budget reduces taxes for corporations and big business. Perhaps we could generate some revenue there instead of in the toiletry aisle.

It’s funny how you never hear that offered as a solution.

The reason? They don’t give a shit about poor kids. Even if they had reams of toilet paper!

So the next time you hear someone try to sell you on this bogus bathroom Catch 22 – turn up your nose.

It’s not a question of toilet paper or education.

It’s not a question of the butt or the brain.

It’s a question of conscience.

NOTE: This article also appeared in the Badass Teachers Association blog.

Forget Education Saviors – They Aren’t Coming

stevenmsinger Charter Schools, Common Core, Corporate Education "Reform", Democrat, Election, Politics, President, Republican, Standardized Testing , , , , , , , , , , ,

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I feel so left out.

I get the emails just like you:



Run Warren Run!

Run Sanders Run!



Are You Ready for Hillary?

But I just can’t get excited about any of them as potential presidential candidates in 2016.

Sure I like Elizabeth Warren’s stance to hold Wall Street accountable. I like Bernie Sanders‘ New Deal rhetoric. I even like Hillary Clinton’s overwhelming confidence and competence.

But none of them pass the most important test.

None of them are really committed to supporting our public school system.

For education advocates like me, it’s a case of being once bitten, twice shy.

One of President Obama’s campaign promises was that he would reform our education system. And he did! If by “Reform” you mean “make things much worse!”

I remember watching him at a 2008 rally in my hometown as he spoke about standardized testing overload and how we needed to support teachers. He promised to improve No Child Left Behind, hold charter schools accountable, provide better resources for struggling schools instead of punishing them, etc.

I was so overwhelmed that a politician actually cared about the same things I did, as he was leaving the arena I reached over the barrier and shook his hand. (Personal Note: he moisturizes.)



I hung signs, I passed out “Hope” buttons, I took to the phones – things I had never before done for a political candidate. And the results are less than overwhelming.

Sure he’s done some good things. Obamacare’s not bad. It’s a good first step toward universal single-payer healthcare. Yes, it’s nice we finally got Osama bin Laden, federal stimulus, drawing down troops on foreign soil – it’s all a step up from his predecessor.

But when it comes to education, Obama is actually worse than George W. Bush.

It’s so liberating to say that out loud. Liberating and scary.

Standardized testing, national curriculum, privatization – all of these have become worse under Obama. While he and his laughably unqualified Education Secretary Arne Duncan still pay lip service sometimes to the problem of toxic testing, they make no move to reduce it. They just increase their support year-after-year.

Whenever you say this to a hardcore Democrat, they usually respond that it’s not his fault. He was blocked from initiating the policies he wanted by a Republican Congress, they say. And this is true on some issues, but education isn’t one of them. He’s chief executive. He controls the US Department of Education and thus national policy.

Race to the Top and all its failures belong squarely at his feet. It will be interesting to see him try to distance himself from these policies in his retirement years attempting to preserve a legacy as a liberal lion. Nice growl. Toothless bite.

So I hope I may be forgiven for looking toward the horizon. Is there anyone on the political scene who promises to change this situation in 2016?

The short answer: no.

There are Republican legislators who oppose Common Core, but their criticism often comes down to – Ooooh! Yuck! A black man touched it!



I fear that if a member of the GOP somehow gains our highest office, Common Core will suddenly be rebranded as something Saint Reagan thought of – or perhaps something Jesus told W. to bring to the people along with endless war and tax cuts for the rich.

Those few conservatives who actually do have a reasoned argument against Common Core lose me when they talk about what should replace it. Because it’s usually school choice.

I guess it makes sense. They hate any kind of national curriculum or standards but have no problem with leaving it all in the hands of big business privatizers. They take it too far like someone whose boots are too tight so he spends the rest of his life barefoot in all weather.

So I turn back to my Democrats – the party of my father. And I’ll admit it proudly – I’m a lifelong, FDR-loving, donkey riding, social policy supporting Dem. But when I look around at the current crop of democratic presidential hopefuls, there’s not much support for education.

Take Hillary Clinton – the clear frontrunner for the party nomination.

This is not her first rodeo. Her positions are no mystery. All you have to do is a little bit of research to see what she’s championed in her long career in public service.

And she’s been on the right side from time-to-time.

She’s pushed for universal pre-kindergarten, arts education, after-school tutoring, smaller class sizes and the rights of families.

As a college student in the 1960s, she even volunteered to teach reading to children in poor Boston neighborhoods. She fought to ensure voting access for African Americans and even worked at an alternative newspaper in the black community.

However, at core she’s a true political animal. Whatever her real feelings on the issues, she never lets that get in the way of an expedient compromise.

Sometimes that’s a good thing – but when it comes to education, that usually means someone’s losing big – and that someone’s usually a child.

For example, she opposes religious instruction in public schools – but sees no problem with school-led prayers.

She is against merit pay for individual teachers but champions it for entire schools.

She opposes using taxes to fund students attending private or parochial schools but thinks parents should be able to choose among public schools.

And she is a strong advocate for charter schools as a solution to the media-driven fallacy of “failing” public schools.

But perhaps worst of all is her support for Common Core. Both she and her husband backed national standards before they were even called Common Core.

One of President Bill Clinton’s central education policies (to which Hillary gave her full support) was a push for national voluntary education standards – something that Republicans in Congress vehemently opposed and squashed. Then George W. Bush became president and the Republicans suddenly loved the idea until Obama championed it, too.

As much as I admire Hillary Clinton, the person, I cannot trust Hillary Clinton, the politician. Even if she changed her stated views on all education issues and received the full support of the NEA and AFT, I could never trust that if the winds changed she wouldn’t change her positions right back.

That takes us to Elizabeth Warren – Clinton’s main challenger for the nomination.

Warren hasn’t announced that she’s running. In fact, she’s denied it many times. However, my buddies on the left are completely enamored of her.

Moveon.org is trying to generate support on the Left for Warren to challenge Clinton. And they have good reasons. There’s plenty to like about her.

She was an early advocate for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. She’s opposed big banks being labeled “too big to fail” and pushed to hold Wall Street accountable for the risky business practices that crashed our economy. She’s in favor of increasing the minimum wage and fighting against income inequality.

But for all that, she’s strangely quiet on education policy.

The only major education legislation she’s supported in her time in the Senate is reducing loan rates for college students.

Strange for someone who actually worked as a teacher!

For a year she taught children with disabilities in a public elementary school in New Jersey. Though she had originally aspired to be a teacher, she didn’t finish her degree. She used an emergency certification. Then she moved on to law school.

With a personal story like that, it’s not surprising the NEA supported her successful run for John Kerry’s Senate seat.

So what’s the problem?

She wrote a book – not a minor article, not an off-the-cuff remark – an entire book championing school choice.

It’s called The Two-Income Trap: Why Middle-Class Mothers and Fathers are Going Broke. In it, she makes a case for a universal school voucher program. She strongly supported giving parents taxpayer-funded vouchers they could use at any school – public, private or parochial. This would “relieve parents from the terrible choice of leaving their kids in lousy schools or bankrupting themselves to escape those schools.”

Not exactly the kind of policy you’d expect from a far left liberal – but she was a Republican then. As soon as she changed parties, her support for school choice was stashed in the closet.

When asked about it, she said she was misunderstood. Like Clinton, she said she never intended taxpayer money to go to private or parochial schools – only that parents could chose an adjacent public school for their children if they wished.

It’s a huge stain on an otherwise nearly blank book. Like Obama, she can rhapsodize on the importance of public schools as much as she wants at her stump speeches. I’d like to see her support some real education policies before backing her horse for president.

Could she convince me? Maybe. If I’m honest, I want to be convinced. But I need more than words. I need deeds.

Which brings me to the last populist champion for the Democratic Presidential nomination – Bernie Sanders.

The Vermont Senator is technically an Independent but he caucuses with the Democrats. In fact, unlike most on the left who cringe at the label “Socialist,” Sanders actually uses it to describe himself as a Democratic Socialist.

He’s been a leader calling for breaking up media monopolies, and a staunch supporter of universal healthcare. He was against the bank bailout and a warrior against income inequality.

Though education policy has never been his forte, his voting record is mostly positive. He voted to increase federal funding for public schools, in favor of grants to Black and Hispanic colleges, in favor of reducing class size in the early grades, against school prayer, and against school choice. In fact, he is one of the most aggressive enemies of school vouchers in Congress.

Most recently, when President Obama suggested making two years of community college free for everyone, Sanders championed going even further– free tuition at any public college or university!

It’s a pretty impressive record. However, it’s not perfect.

In 1998, he voted to expand funding for charter schools. Considering that his home state of Vermont had zero charters at one point – yes, zero – it’s unclear how knowledgeable he was on the issue. It certainly doesn’t sound like the kind of thing he’d be for now. That was 17 years ago. Has he learned more in the meantime? Is he now for or against charters? It’s unclear.

Even more damning, in May 2001, he voted for No Child Left Behind requiring states to conduct annual standardized testing. That’s hardly an unforgivable sin. You’d be hard pressed to find anyone in Congress fully against testing – especially back in 2001.

But that wasn’t his only misstep. Sanders also showed brief support for Common Core. As recently as 2011, he explicitly supported legislation to expand it in Vermont. However, lately he has refused to give an opinion either for or against it.

Could he be souring on corporate education reform? The most tantalizing answer lies in legislation he helped author in 2013.

In a bid to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, he developed legislation that would have allowed states to demonstrate student learning through innovative projects instead of standardized testing. The bill fizzled, however, with lack of Congressional will.

Is Sanders evolving away from the testocracy of Bush and Obama or is he just playing it close to the vest? I would like to know more. Sanders would need to do some work to convince me he is on the side of public schools, but he might be able to do it. If that’s what he really wanted.

Of the three candidates examined here, he is most likely to become a true education advocate. But he is also least likely to receive the party’s nomination or to win a general election.

So where does that leave us? Who can I support as a possible education savior in 2016?

The answer again: no one.

We have to face it, people. No one is coming to save us and our children. There never will be. Politicians aren’t made of that kind of self-sacrificing stuff. Not Democrats, Republicans or Independents.

Those of us who cherish public education will have to push 2016 hopefuls to move as far our way as possible. But when it comes to the actual election, we may have to face the distinct possibility that there will be no one in whom we can safely vote.

We may have to run our own independent candidate – someone with no chance of winning, but who might continue to push the mainstream candidates toward education. Because no matter who wins, chances are he or she won’t be as friendly toward public schools as they are toward the lobbying dollars of the privatizers and standardization movement.

We can’t elect our way to sound education policy. It will take a massive popular movement of parents, teachers, students and people of conscience. Demands will be made. Protests will be staged. Revolutions may be waged.

Because the only education savior we can count on is us.

This article also was published in the LA Progressive and the Badass Teachers Association blog.

Dear Gov. Wolf – 10 Ways to Help Pennsylvania’s Schools

stevenmsinger Charter Schools, Common Core, Corbett, Corporate Education "Reform", Election, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia Schools, Standardized Testing, Value Added Measures, York Schools , , , , , ,

wolf-edu-infographic-blog-photo

Dear Gov. Tom Wolf:

It’s so nice to hear your name. Wolf. Wolf. Wolf.

I could write it all day. It’s so much better than Corbett.

As one of millions who voted for you, campaigned for you and even posted a yard sign for you – I want to offer my most cordial congratulations and welcome to office.

I know it may take a few weeks to get used to the new job. Heck! It could take a month just cleaning out all the skeletons left by your predecessor. It’s no coincidence that most of them are child sized.

Your forerunner treated public education like his own private piggy bank. He slashed education budgets with glee blaming it on federal stimulus dollars, Gov. Rendell or anyone but himself. Moreover, he trashed a newly created funding formula designed to ensure needy districts received adequate support. He stopped partially reimbursing poverty-stricken districts for the extra costs of having charter schools drain their coffers. And for a candidate who campaigned on limited government, he dramatically expanded the state role in education policy.

In short, it was a disaster. As a public school teacher, those were the four longest years of my life. I dearly hope we can expect better from you. One could easily make the case that you owe your position as governor to your stance against all these policies and the expectation that you would reverse course.

So let me offer some help. This is what I’d like to see you do as governor. I know it won’t be easy. I know you’ll probably have to compromise to work with a Republican legislature that enabled all these disasters to take place.

But you play a vital role – to set the agenda. And I fully expect you to do that for the children of Pennsylvania.

These are the top 10 ways to Help Pennsylvania’s schools:

1) Reverse Course in York

Talk about an American tragedy! York City Schools is a victim of your predecessor’s Draconian budget cuts. But instead of actually helping the district recover from years of underfunding, it was further hobbled by ideologues and profiteers.

First, Pennsylvania underfunds the already impoverished York Schools. Then when the district can’t cope with the lack of support, it’s labeled a “failure” and forced into a ridiculous recovery program. How does this make sense: tighten your belt, try a few targeted reforms and if that doesn’t work, give control of the district to a for-profit charter operator with a record of failure!?

And when the duly-elected school board has second thoughts, the state snatches control away from them and sends the school into receivership so this ridiculous privatization scheme can be instituted unmolested by Democracy!?

No. You need to listen to the taxpayers. Give control of the district back to the school board. Give the so-called Chief Recovery Officer his walking papers, throw his “Recovery Plan” into the trash and properly fund the district. No charters. Just common sense reform.

2) Return All Schools to Local Control

Public schools should be exactly that – public. Their actions should be governed by the community – not the state. Within certain Constitutionally mandated limits, the state has no business deciding what schools should be doing. The state’s main job is to ensure schools have what they need to function.

Yet Pennsylvania is running a handful of districts. Philadelphia Schools have been under control of the School Recovery Commission and appointed CEO for almost two decades with no improvement. Likewise, Duquesne and Chester Upland districts have struggled through receivership with nothing to show for it but misery and lack of services.

That’s why these schools were taken over in the first place. New leadership was never the problem. It was lack of funds.

Restore all Pennsylvania districts to the taxpayers and democratically elected school boards. Fund properly and stand back. Watch them flourish.

3) Increase the Education Budget

You campaigned on it. It’s time to do it. Bring funding back to pre-Corbett levels. In fact, increase it to reflect the increased costs of services. And bring back the charter school reimbursement.

A small increase will not be enough. Our schools have suffered through too much neglect. We need to lower class sizes and restore arts and music, extra-curricular activities, school nurses, librarians – everything we lost under your forerunner.

Critics will say this is throwing money at the problem. The rest of us call it an investment. We need to put more money toward educating children than locking up high school dropouts. We need to put all the strength and power of the Commonwealth into ensuring the next generation will have a better chance at succeeding than the current one.

That takes money. It takes taxes – especially on the wealthy and corporations that have had a tax holiday for the past four years. It’s time to pay up.

4) Institute a Fair Funding Formula

This is another of your campaign promises. Even your predecessor eventually came around to supporting it – after he trashed the one that had already been in place.

We need to make sure schools get the money they need to operate. This means the state has to provide more funding to cash-strapped schools than rich ones. After all, wealthy districts can rely more on local taxes. Poor districts cannot.

Start by re-instituting the funding formula the legislature created in 2008.

5) Halt Charter School Expansion

Speaking of money, it makes no sense to have two separate educational systems. It’s unnecessary and wasteful. We don’t need traditional public schools AND charters.

It’s all about performance. Traditional public schools often do much better or as well as charters – especially cyber charters.

So put a moratorium on new charter schools. Then make the ones we have transparent and accountable. You know? Like we already do for public schools!

No more holding board meetings in private, keeping budgets secret and discouraging difficult students from enrolling. Otherwise, the potential for malfeasance is huge – especially at those organized for-profit.

Direct the state Department of Education to investigate all existent charter schools to determine which are exemplary and which substandard. Close the bad, keep the good.

We simply can’t afford letting profiteers suckle on Pennsylvania’s school budgets.

6) Divest from Common Core. Return to PA Standards

Technically Pennsylvania never adopted Common Core State Standards. It just plagiarized them. We pretend our wonderful PA Core Standards are something new and innovative. They’re not. They’re just Common Core with Pennsylvania in the name.

What a waste of time and money! We don’t need the state telling districts what to do. There’s nothing wrong with benchmarks – suggested goals to which districts can aim. But unfunded mandates? No, thank you.

The Pennsylvania Standards that preceded PA Core were closer to the benchmark ideal. They were a guide – not a high-stakes mandated gun-to-your-head de facto curriculum.

Every teacher knows you don’t help children by simply changing the bar. But you do help textbook publishers by making them uniform. You create a market.

It’s time to do what’s best for children, not corporations. Throw out Common Core. Return to PA State Standards.

7) Cut Back on Standardized Testing

Everyone is sick of standardized tests. Teachers are sick of them. The kids and parents are sick of them. Even politicians are sick of them.

It’s time to do something about it.

Pennsylvania’s standardized test system is a joke. We took our own Pennsylvania System of School Assessments (PSSAs) – flawed as they were – and threw them away in favor of copying the horrific PARCC tests. The PSSAs weren’t exactly fair, nor did they accurately evaluate student learning. But at least they held reasonable goals.

The new state tests are so much like the PARCC, they expect students to be far above what is developmentally appropriate. Kids just aren’t ready for certain concepts until they’re older. These new tests ignore everything we know about how the growing mind works in favor of a scheme to fail more kids and sell more remedial textbooks.

We need to scrap these new tests and – in fact – dramatically reduce the number of standardized tests we give. In a perfect world, we’d give only one standardized test in high school and call it a day. Let kids in elementary and middle school learn their basic skills without the sword of Damocles hanging over their heads.

Moreover, don’t attach high-stakes to any test. That corrupts the score. Use it as a tool. It’s a way of checking the oil on a school’s educational engine. But you don’t throw a temper tantrum and blame the car when it’s low on oil. You add more oil. (See increase school funding.)

8) Abolish VAM Teacher Evaluations. Let Districts Design Their Own Evaluations.

When experts like those in the American Statistical Association are complaining that you’re using statistics incorrectly, you need to listen. Value-Added Measures are a horrible way to evaluate teachers. You simply can’t use student test scores to judge the effectiveness of teachers. It’s like measuring the size of the potholes on your work route to determine if you’re a good driver.

Moreover, the evaluation system now in place is a gothic, baroque mess. It’s cumbersome, takes way too much time from teachers and administrators and ultimately doesn’t provide a fair evaluation.

Let each school district come up with its own evaluation system. Yes, this probably means going back to relying on principals to actually observe their own teachers in their own ways.

Critics will complain this system is flawed because too many teachers get positive evaluations. So what? Most principals, parents and students are well satisfied with the quality of the teachers in their districts. Who are these corporate bureaucrats to tell them they’re wrong?

9) Appoint a Teacher as Secretary of Education

The state should have a limited role in setting education policy. You’d think your predecessor would agree seeing how he downsized the state Department of Education. But those employees he did keep – especially at the highest levels – had little to no education background.

In the rare case when an educator was hired, that background was almost completely in management positions – hardly any time in the classroom.

The Secretary of Education and the majority of staff running the Department of Education should be teachers – not CEOs, political advocacy nuts with an agenda – not even principals, superintendents, or academics. They should have real world experience doing the job recently. No more corporate shills. If you want the state to do what’s right for children, you need to employ their best advocates, people who know what’s needed and how to achieve it – teachers.

10) Kick Out TFA

Speaking of teachers – that’s who should be running our classrooms – Not lightly trained temps who have no intention of staying in the field.

It is a sad joke that our politicians have valued Teach for America recruits equally or more than educators. Teachers graduate from intensive education programs at our best colleges. TFA recruits go through a few weeks of training.

It is ridiculous and insulting to accept TFA as a substitute for well-trained staff – especially at our poorest schools. As governor, you should push for a moratorium on any new TFA recruits at our public schools. Every student matters. Every student deserves a real teacher.

In closing, thank you for your time. I hope you will consider enacting these reforms. You would be doing what’s truly in the best interests of the citizens, parents, teachers and children of the Commonwealth.

But be warned. We have had enough of politicians who come into office on a promise and a smile but don’t back it up with real action. We gave you our overwhelming support in the last election. Now it’s up to you to keep it.

Yours,

Steven Singer

This article appeared in its entirety on the Badass Teachers Association blog, and a shortened version was published in the York Daily Record. I also did a radio interview on the Rick Smith Show where I went over all 10 points. 

The Monsters on Main Street – The Worst of Pennsylvania’s Political Freak Show


stevenmsinger Corbett, Election, Metcalfe, Politics, Republican, Saccone, Uncategorized ,

monster pic

Monsters are coming to your door.

You hear them shambling outside, dragging themselves up your front stoop and ringing the bell.

Unaware, you open the door and choke back a scream of disgust at their grotesque faces – enormous elongated smiles under sad clown eyes.

They aren’t wearing Halloween masks. They aren’t trick-or-treaters. They’re a gaggle of local GOP politicians aching to press the flesh!

Aaaaaaaaaaah!

Sorry, but the idea of these morally bankrupt, mentally challenged, scientifically illiterate Republican lawmakers at the threshold of my own home is enough to make me scream in terror.

But that’s where they’re headed – accompanied by campaign organizers and volunteers – armed with clipboards full of apologies or (more likely) attacks on their political opponents.

It’s almost funny that they even remember us, voters. The whole year long they act as if they have no constituents other than corporate lobbyists and the party line.

Slash funding for public schools? Oh yeah!

Healthcare for women? Not on my dime!

Environmental protections? Drill, Baby, drill!

Voter protections? Naah! Voter Obstructions!

But when election time rolls around, the rhetoric gets muted, and the false smile is duct taped in place. Disgusting!

And what’s worse – they know we’re repulsed. They’re actually overjoyed by it! That’s exactly the effect they’re going for!

It’s a calculated gamble. Instead of filling us with a burning desire to vote for them, they figure their chances for re-election are even better if we don’t show up at all.

An empty polling station is a vote for the status quo.

It’s the same in my home state of Pennsylvania as it is across the country.

Let me tell you; Democracy takes a strong stomach.

In that spirit of intestinal fortitude, I present to you a menagerie of monsters.

Look closely at these twisted public figures all suddenly begging for your vote. Watch as they rage and foam expelling rapacious quantities of gas and bluster – all safely locked behind thick glass for your protection. Of course!

I present for your entertainment and edification “Pennsylvania’s Worst Political Monstrosities: Rancid Republicans on Parade!”
 
 

Rick Saccone

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In God we trust. For Rick Saccone, that’s not just the national motto – it’s his signature piece of legislation.

The Tea Party Republican authored a bill to force all public schools in the state to paint those words on the front of their buildings. The bill was eventually watered down to merely allow schools to break the Separation of Church and State and not force compliance.

But it didn’t matter. Saccone was trying to make a point.

“Don’t trust the gub’ment,” his smirking face seemed to say. “Put your trust in a higher power.”

As if to prove his point, in 4 years as a lawmaker he slashed almost $1 billion in funding for school children, kicked out supports for the sick and elderly and basically stomped on the poor and needy across the Commonwealth.

I’m no Biblical scholar, but I don’t think the core message of religion is to screw everyone over just to see if The Divine will step in.

Maybe if Saccone spent more time worrying about meeting the needs of the kids in those school buildings instead of just on what’s painted outside them, he wouldn’t have to rely on miracles to do his neglected job!

If that makes you want to vomit, Rick’s got you there, too. His second biggest legislation authorized a state day of fasting. So dry heave away!

The rest of the time, he just let Gov. Tom Corbett and the GOP do his thinking for him. In fact, he voted for Corbett’s initiatives 95% of the time giving him the nickname of Corbett’s “Mini-me.”

His Democratic challenger in the 39th Legislative District is Lisa Stout-Bashioum. You may have seen signs for her candidacy throughout southern Allegheny and northern Washington Counties if they haven’t been mysteriously torn down yet. Strangely, none of Saccone’s signs seem effected. Weird!

Will residents finally give Saccone his walking papers or are they resigned to more toadying and Biblical legislation?

Considering that Saccone only won re-election last time by 114 votes (less than .5% of the total voting in his district), it wouldn’t exactly take a tidal wave to wash him out to sea.

Here’s hoping that his constituents are as fed up with him as the rest of us are. Yuck!

 Daryl Metcalfe

Daryl-Metcalfe

Bigot. Xenophobe. Idiot.

State Representative Daryl Metcalfe is all that and more!

Remember our controversial Voter ID law that tried unsuccessfully to disenfranchise minorities, seniors and college students? As chairman of the powerful House State Government Committee, Metcalfe sponsored the darn thing.

It doesn’t matter that the law was eventually struck down by the courts as unconstitutional. It doesn’t matter that millions were wasted implementing this farce. The eight-term Republican put the blame where he thinks it belongs – on the people of Pennsylvania. He said, “…this judicial activist decision is skewed in favor of the lazy who refuse to exercise the necessary work ethic to meet the commonsense requirements to obtain an acceptable photo ID.”

But let’s not forget Metcalfe’s homophobia. There’s something about gay marriage that just gets him all hot and bothered. Since a federal court struck down Pennsylvania’s ban on same-sex marriage, Metcalfe can be seen most weekends on his hands and knees pleading with the governor to appeal the decision. The economy’s tanking. Our environment is being poisoned by frackers. Our schools struggle to function on crumbs. But Metcalfe is working on what’s really important – blocking gay people’s right to equal treatment!

This issue is so important to Metcalfe, he wouldn’t even allow anyone else to voice a dissenting opinion. When State Rep. Brian Sims, the first openly gay lawmaker in Harrisburg, tried to speak on the house floor in support of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to strike down the Defense of Marriage Act, Metcalfe denied Sims the right to speak. He said Sims’ intended remarks were “in open rebellion against God’s law.” It’s so nice we have such an expert in the house chamber!

One could go on recounting Metcalfe’s backward world view for days (a personal favorite of mine is when he opposed immigration reform as an “illegal alien invasion”) but to make matters worse – he’s also dumb as a brick.

One of his first pieces of legislation in 2001 was to introduce a resolution asking the federal government to fund and deploy a national defense missile system. Daryl, why would state lawmakers debate what the federal government should or should not be doing? The state can’t send soldiers into battle. It can’t declare war on a foreign power. Heck! It can’t even change the color the army paints its tanks. Why would it be in charge of missile defense?

Oh well. Calmer heads prevailed. Republicans passed the measure anyway!

Residents of the 12th Legislative District may have had their fill of these shenanigans. In May, Metcalfe almost lost a write-in campaign to Republican challenger Gordon Marburger. Metcalfe got 54% of the vote vs. 45% for Marburger – an impressive total for a write-in candidate.

Perhaps Democratic challenger Lisa Zucco will finally be able to unseat this blowhard. Residents of this gerrymandered Republican-leaning district will have to decide which they hate more – Democrats or being the laughing stock of the Commonwealth!


Gov. Tom Corbett

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Speaking of sick jokes, there’s Tom Corbett – the chief executive of Keystone A-holes.

Wow! One has to wonder how such an incompetent public servant could ever be elected to a post as high as Governor of a populous state like Pennsylvania! It’s almost like electing Gomer Pyle, Screech or… George W. Bush!

In his 4 long, miserable years in office, Corbett has done more damage to the Commonwealth than an invading army. Let’s revisit some of his biggest catastrophic blunders:

Colossal Education Cuts – Larger class sizes in 70% of public schools, 19 districts completely eliminating full-day kindergarten, 56% of schools cutting full-time librarians, cuts to the arts, music and extracurricular activities, not to mention 27,000 teachers out of work.

This kind of catastrophic elimination of services doesn’t just happen – no matter how much Corbett tries to convince voters otherwise.

Corbett presided over the deepest education cuts in the state’s history. Originally, he wanted to slash more than $1.1 billion in school funding.

The Republican-led legislature eventually balked at such a huge sum and instead slashed only $860 million. With little change, these cuts have continued with every budget since, compounding the damage every year. So after three disastrous budgets, our school system is actually down approximately $2.5 billion!

But Corbett isn’t just against little kids getting an education. Like a villain in a slasher movie, he’s also after the frat boys and sorority girls at your local community college. He wanted to cut funding for state-owned and -related colleges by 50% in his first budget; but he settled for a mere 18% chop. Higher education has been flat-funded ever since. That’s why tuition has gone up 7.5%, technology fees have skyrocketed by 50%, not to mention other costs.

What about taxes? Corbett’s biggest campaign promise has always been not raising them. However, when you cut necessary services, the cost usually gets passed on someplace else. For instance, local taxes have increased at 75% of public schools statewide. At the Commonwealth’s colleges, higher tuition and costs were just passed on to the students. So technically Corbett’s right to claim he didn’t raise state taxes. He just made you pay for it elsewhere!

Voter Identification Law – It takes a person with a special depth of stupidity to ignore his own officials time and again. Well, Corbett has the right stuff! His administration officials told him the elderly would be disproportionately affected by the voter identification law (not to mention minorities, women, the poor, etc.) But with the 2012 presidential election coming up, Corbett did it anyway. Anything to get rid of that Bla… I mean “Kenyan Communist” Obama.

The courts, however, were unconvinced since the state couldn’t prove a single instance of voter fraud. If Tommy had had his way, more than 100,000 Pennsylvanians might have been disenfranchised. It remains to be seen if they’ll turn out in November to “thank” him at the polls.

Rejected Medicaid Expansion – Healthcare? You don’t need no stinking healthcare! Until recently Corbett held out on the Republican hissy fit against Obamacare longer than most other far right governors.

He just refused to accept the Medicaid Expansion, an estimated $17 billion in federal funds, leaving Pennsylvanians high and dry, while every bordering state took the free money.

Not only was this decision once again against the recommendations of his aides, it put Corbett to the far right of even Republican governors like John Kasich of Ohio and Chris Christie of New Jersey, who agreed to accept federal dollars for the expansion of Medicaid in their states. Facing dismal re-election polls, Corbett finally caved somewhat and accepted the funds only if he could provide the stingiest benefits in the country. Well, he has to live with himself somehow!

Mandatory Ultrasounds – There’s something hilarious about a politician who screws over school kids but is so concerned about unborn fetuses. Corbett proudly supported his party’s version of Shariah Law called misleadingly the “Women’s Right to Know” Act. It would require doctors to perform an ultrasound on a patient, offer her two personalized copies of the image and play and describe fetal heartbeat in detail before she can have an abortion. Maybe they should have called it “Women’s Right to be Forced to Know.” Anyway, Corbett made the off-color remark that if a woman feels the measure goes too far “you just have to close your eyes.”

After outraged calls from doctors, the legislature decided to abort any further debate on the measure.

XXX

There are so many more catastrophic blunders. Everything from sinking the state’s job creation record from 6th to 47th in the country, the fiscally unsound lottery privatization, ethical fiascos, selling off government positions to his gas company campaign contributors… Oh, Tom, you are such a piece of sh… work.

Corbett is running against York businessman Tom Wolf who is killing the incumbent in the polls. I guess running on the exact opposite of Corbett’s policies is somehow popular. Who knew? Certainly not Corbett!

But “expected voters” and the real thing aren’t always the same. Will Pennsylvania rise up as one to swat this Republican insect from our collective posterior? I sure hope so.

And there you have it, Ladies and Gentlemen! The Monsters of Pennsylvania!

I hope it wasn’t too distressing for the kiddees to see. Just remember these creatures have no power unless you give it to them.

Even in our post-Citizens United age where corporations apparently are people, only YOU have the right to vote.

These slurping, burping, hideous fiends tried to take that away! With flag pins hypocritically shinning on their lapels, they actually tried to stop people from casting a ballot.

And even though they lost, they’re betting that you don’t care. You’d rather shut your eyes tight and wait for them to shamble on by.

If horror movies have taught us anything, it’s this: the person who refuses to hide in the woodshed, the person who stands and fights is the one who makes it out alive.

So wrap your ballot in a clove of garlic, spritz a little holy water on it and shove it down these critters throats.

The secret about any monster is that it’s actually afraid of you!