pobod

The record does speak for itself.

Charters vouchers and testing have been the centerpiece of education reform

Now testing is PROVING that vouchers and charters are not living up to the hype, not delivering on their promises and in their very best studies, equal to public schools, very often both vouchers and charter are below public schools in giant studies like NYC, Minnesota, Cleveland.

Simply not worth the effort.

http://www.politico.com/story/2013/10/vouchers-dont-do-much-for-students-97909.html?hp=f1

They do not even improve academic education for the kids IN vouchers.

https://www.au.org/church-state/february-2011-church-state/featured/10-reasons-why-private-school-vouchers-should-be

For some who fear their kids could care less about religion they are an attempt to get religious schools funded.

That itself is a bad idea.

Milwaukee public schools outperform vouchers in both reading and math.

Voucher only reason to exist is to get public money to support religious instruction or creationism


http://www.aclu-wi.org/story/three-reasons-why-voucher-schools-are-bad-idea-wisconsin

Time to look at the track record of the public education system in the 21st century based on the student outcomes after 12 years of schooling. There is so many discussions taking place by the public educators where one side is insisting it is all about the external SES variables and on the other side, it is all about the the education policies and practices of the schools.

The track record of the public education system is nothing to raved about. In fact, the public education stakeholders may be solely responsible for the destruction of the public education system. How? By consistently denying the rights of students, parents and the public access to the gates of the educational opportunities. The vast majority of the US court cases, including the Moore case in Canada, are all about denying access to the education opportunities. by the public education authorities and the education stakeholders.

It is amazing the divisions of the various camps within the public education system among the educators. And yet the powers to be within the public education are stubbornly refusing to leave the 19th century, failing in their mandate to educate the masses, and leaving parents no choice but to seek education options other than the public schools. The educational theorists of the public education system, are being thoroughly tested by the external forces and within where rights of the people,  clashes with the authoritative educators legally charged to provide education services. Where else, one would find school districts paid by the public tax purse,  paying for private tuition, private tutoring, and other private services ordered by the courts,  on education services that the public school system refuses to provide for all students?  And the powers to be within the public education system, are quite happy to be paying the the extra costs, because the courts cannot order the public education system and its stakeholders to change their 19th century ways. Yet within the data streams of the public education system, the number of public school educators sending their children to alternative education choices other then the public education system is on the rise. In some states, it is now reaching 40 % of teachers opting not to send their children to the public schools.

Crazy eh??  And yet the public education advocates will fight tooth and nail, using the public tax purse as their means, to battle the forces within and outside of the public education system, while ignoring the schools with the pipelines leading to prison, the pipelines leading to low literacy and numeracy skills, and ignoring the pipelines that denies education choice other then what the public education system are willing to provide, while keeping the access doors to the education opportunities locked to the masses.

POSTED ON BEHALF OF DOUG

I never quite know what century we are in around here.

If Nancy’s argument is that public schools could also be better as well of course she is correct.

That notwithstanding, public schools are outperforming charters and vouchers everywhere now. Are public schools all that they could be? No but privatization according to all of the testing insisted on by reformers shows that this is now pervasive.

Rick hess warned over and over that the reform model was overpromising and underdelivering on the basis of free market faith. Chicken are coming home to roost.

In Ravitch’s latest book a must read and a NY Times best seller, she outlines the research based ways to improve public schools. The reform model has no research base.

Solutions

reduce and eventually eliminate poverty, it is not difficult, it is a policy decision

Early Childhood education like Quebec, and everyone else is going

small class size

prenatal care, more of it

a rich curriculum, art PE great literature history geography music languages for all

real charter, all non profit and no contracting out of management or labour, only the curriculum and pedagogy are variables. treat them as lab schools not a parrallel system

wrap around services psch, soc, vision, dental, nutrition etc

summer and after school programs especially for poor kids

parental education

local democratic control through school boards

The fastest way to deliver this is to look very carefully at the schools the rich and powerful give to themselves and duplicate the class sizes and rich curriculum they offer and give it free to the masses.

The record says vouchers are not about academics they are about religion.

When forced to finally write the states tests…

Disaster

http://www.publicschoolshakedown.org/the-voucher-boondoggle-in-wisconsin

Two issues with Doug’s post. The first is the typical solutions of the progressives without the details on how to managed the individual rights versus the collective rights within the framework of the progressive education and pedagogy theories versus the legal authority of the public education system.

Parental education?  Not working very well in some districts who are trying the route of home visits to families. Another nasty situation is brewing where the school districts are going to land in court for violating the rights of the students and their families. In the 21st century, it is pretty hard for parents to be told what they should do or not do in their own home. Worse yet, be criticized for not providing the proper education environment in the home or providing an educational environment that runs counter to the progressive agenda.

Keeping the above in mind - Doug’s link - provides a window in the thinking of the public education advocates who are against school choice. Instead of using rhetoric, the author fudges on the facts, to take advantage of reinforcing the myths of the public education system.

“As a result, a voucher school can ignore basic constitutional protections such as due process and freedom of speech. It does not have to provide the same level of special education services. It can expel students at will. It can ignore the state’s open meetings and records requirements. It can discriminate against students on the grounds of sexual orientation. The list could go on.

For more than 20 years, voucher schools have been a conservative ideologue’s dream: no teacher unions, no governmental bureaucracy, no curricular restrictions. But, despite the rhetoric propelling the voucher movement, these private schools do not out-perform public schools.”

Not at all true for a number of reasons, but the main one is that public schools are legally charged to provide education and deliver education services to the public.  The public education system and its stakeholders have full legal authority over what will be and not be in the content of the curriculum and the public education system model has full autonomy over the operations of the public system within the parameters of the laws of the state, the federal level and at the constitution level.

Part two

Charter schools, the difference lies in the curriculum and pedagogy practices, allowing them far more leeway then the public schools. However, the charter schools must follow the identical state, federal and constitution laws as the public school system does.

As a result, “a voucher school can ignore basic constitutional protections such as due process and freedom of speech. It does not have to provide the same level of special education services. It can expel students at will. It can ignore the state’s open meetings and records requirements. It can discriminate against students on the grounds of sexual orientation. The list could go on.” is a false statement. Public schools can do all the above, and often without ever being held to account for the education outcomes of their students.

In essence, both charter, private or public schools must abide and respect the individual rights of students over the collective rights of the education stakeholders running the show. Prior to the beginning of the 1990s, the public education establishment in the United States, enjoy the ability who will or will not access the educational opportunities and services offered by the public schools for free. As in the Moore case ruling, the Supreme Court Justices employs the analogy of the education ramp where students climb aboard on the ramp on their way learning new skills and knowledge that gives the students the ability to access the educational opportunities. In the case of the Moore boy, the Moore boy was kicked off the education ramp, and was denied education services that would build the skills and knowledge to access the educational opportunities being offered. What use is a textbook, when the student cannot read the text, and was denied access to audio text, because the student did not meet the criteria by the education establishment? Not a whole lot of learning going on, when students are being kicked off the educational ramp is there now?

Ergo, school choice became the siren call for the students who were being kicked off the education ramp by the public education stakeholders. Quite the collective group of students being kicked off the education ramp, and all helped by the public education’s legal authority and charge with providing education services. What the public schools do not have to account for, are the education outcomes of students, when the main body of pedagogy and education theories does an excellent job in kicking students off the education ramp.