Diane Ravitch

Wisconsin: Scott Walker Wants to Degrade University of Wisconsin

Diane Ravitch joints Valerie Strauss in weighng in on Governor Scott Walker's attempt to change the mission of the University of Wisconsin.  Now calling it nothing more than a drafting error, the pretender to the presidency of the United States, Walker wanted remove the words “search for truth” and “improve the human condition” from the statory purpose of the Univerity of Michigan and replace it with the term, “meet the state’s workforce needs.”

Ravitch writes;

Lani Guinier: We Have a “Testocracy” Pretending to be a Meritocracy

In this excerpt from her recent book, The Tyranny of the Meritocracy, Lani Guinier describes the tight linkage between standardized testing and family income. To the extent, then, that colleges rely on the SAT (or ACT) as a filter for college admission, they disproportionately screen out students who have not had the multiple advantages of living in affluence.

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What “Reformers” Really Want, in Their Words

I have had many exchanges with “reformers” who denied that they wanted to destroy public education and replace it with a privatized system. No, they insisted, competition will be good for the public schools. Charters and vouchers will improve public schools. I disagreed because I had heard many of their allies speak truthfully about their desire to privatize the public spending on education, behind closed doors, back when I was with them.

Now we know that competition doesn’t improve public schools. It takes money away from public schools. It weakens them.

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York City Students Lead Protest Against Charter Takeover

High school students in York City, Pennsylvania, have been handing out fliers to warn parents and the community against the state’s plan to hand their district public schools over to a for-profit charter chain.

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More on NJ Charter School Association's anti-1st Amendment maneuver

Bob Braun, the top investigative reporter in Néw Jersey, delves into the attack on Professor Julia Sass Rubin and graduate student (veteran teacher and blogger known as Jersey Jazzman) Mark Weber.

He calls it a “war against critics of charter schools” and an effort to silence them.

He writes:

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James D. Kirylo: How to Improve Teacher Education

 

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How Charter Operators Get Rich

Charter Schools USA is a very successful for-profit business. It is very profitable. Its CEO Jonathan Hage is an entrepreneur, not an educator. The company’s headquarters are in Florida but it operates 70 charter schools in seven states. It hopes to take over the entire York, Pennsylvania, school district. The money to operate the charter schools come out of money that would otherwise go to district public schools.How does Hage and the corporation make big money? It is not the management fee of 5%.

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