Braun Crosses the Line

Where's YOUR line, Laura?

“…paranoid Ravichy fantasies…”

You mean like Bill Gates spending $200 million to 'buy' the CCSS????

Many of the parents and students who support charters do so because their options in conventional public schools are inferior and/or shrinking due to the conscious actions of (typically) state education officials or their local minions.

There's a big difference between a free-will choice and one more-accurately deemed a default.

As for NJ elected officials and their understanding of public education, don't go there.

In case you hadn't heard, money monopolizes the conversation in America, so focusing upon rich people and their influence on public education is entirely appropriate. I have no idea as to Bill Gates' true motivation re: CCSS. I just know he owns 'em.

I've got my own ideas regarding education, and they may be better than Gates'. Anybody care to lend me $200 million so i can sit at the grown-ups' table?

I'm not missing anything.

Educational outcomes are terrible in Newark and Camden because social outcomes are even worse. Those two cities have been abandoned to their fates by the collective actions of the state and federal governments over the last fifty years. Putting money into schools without stabilizing the social fabric of the community is likely a waste.

Successful charters have been (rightfully) accused of cherry-picking their student bodies. The real test of a charter is to absorb the entire student roster of the nearest “failing” public school. Has anyone ever done that?

Union influence is increasingly concentrated in a dwindling number of states (including NJ). It has largely been supplanted by the kind of focused big-money spending that seeks to influence both federal rules and those in right-to-work states. To say this tactic has not paid off handsomely is to ignore reality.

For example, can you seriously argue that PARCC testing yields a substantive benefit to anybody other than Pearson, LLC and vendors of necessary hardware and bandwith (and, of course, Microsoft)?

I agree there is no corporate conspiracy: corporations and the wealthy openly spend money to gain access and advantage. Why would anyone expect them to do otherwise? The fruits of their spending can be seen (for those not in denial)in the growing gaps between corporate profits and workers' wages and in the chasm separating the 1% from the rest of us.

As for “elevating the stars”, when will people recognize we need to elevate the daily practice of ALL teachers? Wall Street-type incentive systems will induce knowledge-hoarding (just as they did successful scheming on the Street) to the detriment of the system as a whole.

More importantly, an Eastern Airlines (“We earn our wings every day.”) protocol for job security—or lack thereof—is the best way* I know to kill the attraction of teaching as a stable, fairly-paid middle-class career path for young people.

But then the destruction of the middle class—and its greatest enabler, the unions—has been the agenda all along.

The countervailing force to self-serving corporate spending is not union spending but the votes of an informed public that fully understands its own self-interest.

Stay tuned on that one.

*along with sharp reductions in pensions

My facts are spot on. KIPP schools use entrance lotteries among those who apply. They do not wholesale convert existing public school student populations to their own.

Selection among those motivated to apply IS cherry-picking. Social fabric DOES determine outcomes. Research has consistently shown that reinforcement of learning at home is a crucial determinant of academic achievement (more important than teacher quality).

So if we want good outcomes for everybody, radical changes are necessary on the home front. Too bad folks like you view that as a 'luxury' we can't afford.

If your family actually does teach in NJ public schools, they might want to review the state Constitution which mandates a 'thorough and efficient system of free public schools' for all students, including those they deem 'laggards'.

As for “philanthropists” making money from ed “reform”, look no further than Paul Singer who has parlayed fund-raising for Chris Christie and his Republican cronies into a very lucrative contract to manage NJ's public pension fund assets.

Oh, yes, he's a big booster of charter schools, too, along with his fellow hedgie (and pension manager) Dan Loeb.

Sorry, but reality bites.

Kallikak,

Charter schools promise students a longer school day, a longer school year, a stricter discipline policy, and a tougher curriculum. How could anyone expect them possibly to have the same kind of students as other schools when the students opting into them are ones who are volunteering to do a lot more work?

The point of charter schools isn't to educate every single child in a city; the point is to educate the more motivated ones who are willing to accept an extra challenge to beat the odds and succeed in college.

And yet, when charters do things to simplify their admissions processes and expand to serve more students, you and affiliated groups still oppose that too.

You and other anti-charter people should just admit that you believe that since we can't help all kids, we should help none of them.

You use poverty as a way of distracting from the problems that exist in schools themselves. You think that since poverty is a bigger factor in school failure than schools themselves that we should ignore the problems of the schools. You think that since low-incomes are more harmful to kids than tenure is, that tenure is not a problem. You don't understand that the government can't legislate an end to poverty.

Shorter Kallikak,
“A cannot be bad because B is worse.”

If you want a seat at the table but don't have $200 million to give away there is still a way for your to have influence. It's called politics. Get elected.

Boy, you both are wrong with the facts, at least for KIPP. Yes, until One Newark KIPP had to do the lottery but they bent over backwards with employees attending every church, social setting, school and any other place to get parents to sign up. The goal is NOT to get the super motivated, the goal is to get a normal distribution of the city's children and prove you still can succeed. All of the metrics of students coming in look like the rest of the system, including percentages of special needs kids. They have succeeded repeatedly using the model SAG outlines.

I care about students in the now-eviscerated public schools (although its hard to be eviscerated losing 10% of your kids) but they didn't work before. Now 10% of the kids are outperforming. That can't be bad. You now have a model of what it takes to succeed. We should celebrate and emulate it.

Last year in Camden there were maybe 3 kids who graduated from HS college ready. It has the highest per pupil reimbursement in the country. Nothing has worked. Why wouldn't you want wholesale change to see if it works. The old system had all of the time and freedom to make it work.

I did not deny your two arguments on social fabric and the state constitution. I strongly agree. Nothing would be better than changing the social fabric but I've seen nothing that broadly works. Please suggest something. However, I do know properly educating our children is a proven and effective model within our current spending, so I certainly support it. On the constitution, my relatives and I agree with you! But the public schools have denied it to children up to this point. They are violating the constitution – so what is a better solution?

Public policy has always been held up to the highest bidder, unfortunately. Teachers union dues in NJ dwarfed all other contributions by at least 10 times. Don't you think they have impacted policy by being the largest contributor to every local election. So given that's how it works, and they have influenced it a long time, I'm open to alternative influences where the only payback is student outcomes.

Lastly, while nothing in NJ politics surprises me, NJ makes it very difficult to do pay-for-play. That said, if Singer got through that the retirees of NJ could be in a lot worse hands to build their retirement nest egg. Also, he only manages a small portion and it had nothing to do with any charter investments.

Go visit a KIPP school. Ask these questions. Review the alternatives. I agree with your goals of great education for all children. We disagree with the tactics.

Recommended reading for charter school boosters:

http://www.speno2014.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/SPENO-HQ.pdf

You really need to read the report I cited above to see what happens when 'full absorption' is implemented. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, politicians used Naomi Klein's 'Shock Doctrine' to remake New Orleans' schools in the manner you advocate. The district has been turned into a hothouse for education entrepreneurs with extremely uneven results, loss of central control and escalating costs.

The list of schools and their letter grades is especially interesting. Charter performance (from a host of operators—each with its own governing board) is all over the lot, ranging from 'A' to 'F' (please note the relatively low grades for KIPP schools).

While overall student achievement as measured by test scores has improved in New Orleans, the absolute level of scores remains well below that of the rest of the state. Is this the 'solution' you are challenging me to replicate?

What accounts for this continuing under-performance? Probably because post-Katrina New Orleans is just as dysfunctional socially as its pre-storm predecessor.

All of which begs the real question: why aren't you boosting philanthropy that actually improves the lives of all Newark residents? Is that too hard a challenge for your well-heeled Masters of the Universe?

Snarky? Do you realize that the typical member of your pantheon of heroes is paying a lower rate of taxes on his/her mega-income than the janitor at your local charter school?

In NJ, who actually pays for public schools? Why it's the little people, who—on paper at least—are supposed to have a say in how their schools are run through the workings of their local school boards. My constituents (all 26,000 of 'em) have yet to yield their sovereignty to Bill Gates or Paul Singer. Why is it that folks in Newark, Camden and Paterson can't exercise the same authority over their own affairs? You do know that failing schools in NJ are almost all in districts run by the state?

You are looking at New Orleans through rose-colored glasses. A more objective read of the Tulane study I cited above reflects a district literally out of control with escalating expenses and extremely uneven and relatively poor academic results from school to school. This is a model for NJ?

You want a better solution for children? Start by giving their parents some hope for the future via job opportunities at decent wages. Every place you cite as in need of reform suffers from economic desperation. The real issue of the day is economic inequality, not the educational variety. Good schools go with economically sound communities.

Paul Krugman is leaving Princeton to work on issues of income inequality which he views as the most important facing us today.

Dr. K is on to something. Real reform can only happen when core issues of inequality are addressed and corrected. There are ways to do this, but they will not have the support of well-heeled education 'reformers'.

Stop acting so put upon. I don't hate anybody. I just don't like to see the people's business hijacked by those whose only qualification is the wealth necessary to buy influence.

Dr. K called the turn five years ago regarding easing vs. austerity. Yesterday, the Europeans grudgingly acknowledged he was right. Too bad—for them and us—they ran themselves into the ground before they did

I don't need or want your gratuitous good wishes. More importantly, I don't do 'faith-based initiatives' so today's school 'reform' as dictated by a handful of oligarchs* will never be my goal.

That is today's profound reality. Someday—soon, I can only hope—you and others like you will realize how you have been used by these people.

An epiphany of that magnitude might even yield some productive change. I can't wait for the day.

*who have never had a problem exporting the kinds of jobs Newarkers could fill if such actions fattened the bottom line