Implosion! New Jersey's Fitting Trump Sendoff

New Jersey's largest newspaper, The Star Ledger, is reporting that Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino, is set for implosion on February 17th. After that date, all four of Trump's AC casinos—Trump Taj Mahal, Trump Plaza, Trump World's Fair and Trump Marina—will officially be no more. 

Trump Plaza one month before it closed.  So classy. (Photo | Dan McQuade)

ATLANTIC CITY

Casino implosion set for Feb. 17

Katie Kausch For The Star-Ledger

After one final delay, Trump Plaza has a new implosion date, Atlantic City Mayor Marty Small announced.

The implosion of the long-shuttered casino is now set for Feb. 17 at 9 a.m., Small said at a Thursday morning press conference. It was pushed back from a Jan. 29 implosion date earlier this month.

The delay was caused by a large concrete foundation that was originally unknown to demolition teams, licensing and inspection director Darryl Finch said at the press conference.

Pre-implosion demolition work remains underway, including drilling holes inside the structure to place dynamite, Finch said.

The implosion will impact a several- block area, and will include evacuation zones and areas where people are not allowed outside their buildings, Rick Bianchi with the Atlantic City Police Department said. Details on which blocks and buildings will be affected are not yet finalized.

An auction to push the button at the implosion fell apart after owner Carl Icahn objected, citing safety concerns, auctioneer Joseph Bodnar, owner of Bodnar’s Auction, told NJ Advance Media.

Meant to be a fundraiser to benefit the local Boys & Girls Club of Atlantic City, Icahn has pledged to donate $174,000 to the organization to replace money lost in the cancellation.

Icahn Enterprises, run by conservative billionaire Icahn, took ownership of the building in 2016 after Donald Trump divested from the property.

Since the cancellation of the fundraiser, Hard Rock and Oceans casinos have each donated five rooms, to be auctioned off for overnight stays before winners can watch from a prime viewing slot at One Atlantic to benefit the organization, Small said. Donations for the Boys & Girls Club are also being collected.

For those who can’t bid on a room, Bader Field will be used as a viewing area, Small said. Watchers will be charged for parking and asked to watch from the safety of their cars.

“The city can’t be naive to think that no one will show up. It has nothing to do with the former president. If it was any building in the city being imploded, people will come,” Small said.

The casino has been an eyesore in Atlantic City for years, with discussions of an implosion dating to at least 2017. The casino shuttered in 2014 after about 30 years in business.

Contrary to what Trump may have led you to believe, he didn't sell his Atlantic City holdings; he lost them. Bigly. He filed for bankruptcy not once, not twice, not three times, but four times: in 1991, 2004, 2009 and 2014. Surprised? You shouldn't be. What is happening on February 17th is a fitting metaphor for how he left our country: broken, battered, bashed and deeply in debt.

I've written about Atlantic City before (here, here, here, here, here to name a few). And I've been there many times. Despite a poverty rate over 40%, it has a lot going for it: some of the best restaurants I've ever eaten in (The Knife and Fork, Docks Oyster House, Buddahkan, Los Amigos, Angelos Fairmount Tavern) a beautiful beach, a fabulous retail outlet center, and some very nice hotels. But for reasons beyond my bandwidth of fiscal understanding, 43 years of gambling revenue could never get it out from under its bad rap of a honky-tonk, low-life town where more dreams are lost than won, and that's devastatingly unfair to all the hard-working people who live and work there.

So, it's no surprise that the last vestiges of Donald Trump are a failed coup attempt on our nation's capitol and the implosion of one of his long-shuttered properties in the second poorest city in New Jersey.

If I didn't have to work that day, I'd be there in Atlantic City cheering on the implosion and the dream that will—hopefully—arise from its ashes.

Buh-bye, Donnie. Can't say we'll miss ya.

Note: All emphasis mine.

7 Things Wrong with Gov. Christie's School Funding Proposal

There's an old joke that goes like this: 

Q: How do you know when a politician is lying? 

A: When their lips are moving.

I guess now that Christie's poll numbers are in the tank, his ego is pushing him to appear relevant. So what does he do when his back is against the wall? Attack public education of course. 

In true Christie style, he gave a speech yesterday that even Pinocchio would cringe at, ripping into the state's school funding formula—one of the most progressive in the nation—and vowing to change it to flat funding.

There are so many things wrong with it that it's hard to know where to begin. But let's start with this: Gov. Christie used the word 'unfair' seven times in his speech. So here are seven things that are unfair not only with his proposals, but with how he has treated public education over the past 6 years:

1. Gov. Christie has cut almost $7 billion in education funding statewide, and given away just about that much in corporate tax breaks, yet he has the nerve to claim that urban education is 'failing'.

2. Under Gov. Christie, urban charter schools have bled their host public school districts of hundreds of millions of dollars, which has forced massive layoffs and cuts to programs and vital services. 

3. Under Gov. Christie, segregation has skyrocketed in urban school districts as charters habitually skim the best and brightest (and least expensive to educate) students, and toss those most in need of additional resources back to cash-starved public schools. 

4. Under Gov. Christie's new funding formula urban districts would be drastically underfunded, thus devastating the very schools and students he claims to want to help most.

5. Under Gov. Christie, aid to those most in need in this state has been slashed. Funding for women's health centers, housing assistance for low income and chronically ill citizens, food stamps, and earned income tax credits have all been red-lined. He even fought the raise in the state minimum wage. These cuts directly affect parents in our large, urban centers, many of whom were already struggling to make ends meet before he became governor. And when their children do not have a good head start in life (like the majority in our wealthier, whiter suburbs), they have greater learning hurdles to overcome.

6. He simply will not, as he claims, "make sure that we have the aid for special needs students so that they may reach their potential too." Why? Because he is going to slash funding to our poorest, neediest districts where there generally tends to be a larger population of special needs children. He has not once kept his word to public school districts. Why should we believe him now?

7. This plan simply will not reduce property taxes. The year after Gov. Christie imposed the 2% tax cap, property taxes across the state skyrocketed an average of 20%. I don't know about you, but my property taxes have only gone up since then. But if by chance property taxes do decrease, it will be a massive tax break for wealthy, white, suburban NJ, and a massive tax hike for poor, brown and black urban areas. 

So, what will work? 

• Fair school funding, not equal funding. The two are very different.
• Full funding of our public schools as required by the law
• A moratorium on the expansion of segregationist charter schools
• Access to quality, affordable prenatal health care for every expectant mother in NJ
• Access to quality, affordable health care for every man, woman and child in this state
• Access to fresh, quality food in our urban centers
• Safe urban neighborhoods with true community schools as their anchors
• A living wage—not a minimum wage—so that parents don't have to work two or three jobs to make ends meet
• An end to unfunded mandates

This is just a start. There is much more that can and should be done, but unless and until profits are removed from the public education equation, things will never change.

Before I go...

Hat tip to my bloggy buddies, Jersey Jazzman and Dr. Bruce Baker for always having facts and figures at the ready...

... and Darcie Cimarusti (aka Mother Crusader) for reminding us what 'fair' really means:

 

NJ's literacy solution: longer school day for kindergarteners?

My blog has been quiet of late. Due to some health problems, I've had to scale back a bit on my workload. Nothing life-threatening, mind you, just enough for me to reprioritize for a little while. But I'm on the mend, and there's no better day to start back up than New Year's Day.

Courtesy: Upworthy

This week marks the end of the current NJ legislative session. Newly elected officials will soon be sworn in, but there's a bill coming before the Assembly Education Committee next week that has me scratching my head. 

A4779, sponsored by Ams. Reed Gusciora (D-15) and Asw. L. Grace Spencer (D-29) says: 

a. The Commissioner of Education shall declare an educational state of emergency for a school district in which, for at least 75 percent of the schools in the district, 65 percent or more of the students in the school to whom a State assessment was administered have not achieved proficiency in the English language arts/literacy subject area of the State assessment. 

b. Upon declaring an educational state of emergency pursuant to subsection a. of this section, the commissioner is authorized to distribute supplementary State aid to the school district, which shall be in addition to the State aid payable to the district pursuant to P.L.2007, c.260 (C.18A:7F-43 et al.) or any other law. The supplementary State aid shall be used for the specific purpose of establishing a mandatory after school program for students in grades kindergarten through three, the duration of which is two and a half hours from the end of the school day, which is designed to increase student proficiency in English language arts and literacy. The supplementary aid shall also be used for establishing voluntary literacy programs for students in other grades, including after school programs and summer programs. 

c. When an educational state of emergency is declared for a school district, the executive county superintendent of schools shall hold a public meeting of interested stakeholders for the district including, but not limited to, parents, students, teachers, school administrators, community leaders, and business leaders. The purpose of the meeting shall be to discuss community involvement and potential corrective measures to address the district’s low proficiency rate in English language arts and literacy.

d. A school district that establishes programs to increase student proficiency in English language arts and literacy pursuant to subsection b. of this section shall continue to implement the programs for a minimum of three years or for as long as the school district meets the criteria of subsection a. of this section, whichever is longer. (emphasis mine)

I have some real concerns about this bill, but before I get into them, let me be clear: I have no beef with Asm. Gusciora or Asw. Spencer. I don't know anything about the origins of this bill. I don't know Asw. Spencer, but Asm. Gusciora serves part of my county. He supported my assembly run, fiercely advocated for marriage equality, and generally supports causes I agree with. He's also a fellow member of the 'Wrath of Christie' club. My criticism is not aimed at them, but at the Christie administration and the NJDOE, who continue to hold our large, mostly poor/minority/urban school districts hostage, which forces workaround bills such as this one into existence.  

Here are my concerns:

First, I don't know about you, but whenever I read the words "state of emergency" as it pertains to public education, my ed 'reform' radar starts beeping. Newark, Camden, Jersey City and Paterson have all fallen victim to one definition or another of "state of emergency" which has resulted in one scenario: complete or partial state takeover, reduced funding, and the expansion of charter schools. None of which has been proven to help all students achieve.

Second, how do we define a "state of emergency"? If we are basing it solely on a state standardized test, which in this case is the PARCC, then we are making a false assumption. According to former NJ Assistant Education Commissioner Bari Erlichson, the PARCC test is not diagnostic:

Erlichson (at the 1:00 mark): In terms of testing the full breadth and depth of the standards in every grade level, yes, these are going to be tests that in fact are reliable and valid at multiple cluster scores, which is not true today in our NJASK. But there’s absolutely a… the word "diagnostic" here is also very important. As Jean sort of spoke to earlier: these are not intended to be the kind of through-course — what we’re talking about here, the PARCC end-of-year/end-of-course assessments — are not intended to be sort of the through-course diagnostic form of assessments, the benchmark assessments, that most of us are used to, that would diagnose and be able to inform instruction in the middle of the year. 

These are in fact summative test scores that have a different purpose than the one that we’re talking about here in terms of diagnosis. (emphasis mine)

Third, the tests were designed for students to fail. NJ's own reading expert, Ryder University Professor Russ Walsh, examined the PARCC sample questions and found them to be several grade levels above that being tested. And since the Common Core Standards are directly tied to the PARCC, we would be subjecting little children to more and more developmentally inappropriate instruction. Throw in the fact that many high poverty schools also have a higher percentage of English Language Learners than their wealthy and mostly White suburban counterparts, and you have a recipe for a manufactured "state of emergency."

Fourth, extending the day by two and a half hours for 5-7 year olds? Why? In Finland, the top performing education country in the world, first graders attend only a half day of school and get 15 minute breaks between each lesson. As a teacher of full-day kindergarteners, I can tell you firsthand that by about 1:30 pm, most are shot (this holds true for many first graders and some second graders). And when many K's get that tired, they don't slow down. Quite the opposite: they tend to ramp up. They're tired of sitting and paying attention. Their little brains are tired of thinking and concentrating. They need to play. But thanks to the Common Core, they're being pushed to learn more at an earlier age, and that's not a good thing. A 2015 Boston Globe article reported:

In two reports published earlier this year, the Boston-based nonprofit Defending the Early Years took aim at the kindergarten standards in ELA (focused on literacy at this age) and math. The first report singled out the expectation that kindergartners should be able to “read emergent-reader texts with purpose and understanding.” 

Emergent-reader texts include repetitive lines like, “Brown bear. Brown bear. What do you see?” or, “The fat cat sat on a mat.” These are no trouble for some 5-year-old kindergartners and even some 4-year-olds, says Nancy Carlsson-Paige, an emeritus professor of early-childhood education at Lesley University and the report’s lead author. But, Carlsson-Paige adds, many normally developing kids won’t read these books on their own until age 7. “When we require specific skills to be learned by every child at the same time, that misses a basic idea in early childhood education,” she says, “which is that there’s a wide range to learning everything in the early years.” 

Take walking as an example. An average child might learn to walk at 1 year, while some will be walking at 8 months and others might not take their first steps until they’re 15 months. They all end up walking just fine. 

What does earlier reading in kindergarten predict for reading proficiency and academic success in later grades? Not much, according to the report, which cites study findings that by fourth grade, children who were reading at age 4 were not significantly better at reading than their classmates who’d learned to read at age 7. The report also points out that in Finland and Sweden, kids don’t even start formal schooling until they are 7 years old. Yet, Finnish and Swedish teenagers regularly trounce their American counterparts in international tests of reading, math, and science. 

Given the wide developmental variation in young learners and the evidence that early reader advantages fade, the report concludes that a kindergarten literacy standard will simply crush the spirits of the late bloomers, linking school with “feelings of inadequacy, anxiety, and confusion.” (emphasis mine)

Since the bill requires a minimum of 3 years of implementation or "as long as the school district meets the criteria", my guess is that if it's passed, this clause will be forgotten and "3 years" will stretch into a permanently extended school day to compete with the longer school day of many charters.  

Fifth, where will the money come from? Gov. Christie has defunded NJ public education to the tune of $6 billion. Newark charter schools are bleeding the public school system of millions of dollars. It's so bad that Charter Cheerleader/Superintendent Chris Cerf (former NJ Education Commissioner), has ordered administrators to make drastic budget cuts, and Newark Mayor Ras Baraka is pleading with current Education Commissioner David Hespe to halt the expansion of charters to keep the district from drowning...

I'm not suggesting that we leave struggling readers to fend for themselves, but we cannot continue to throw taxpayer dollars at programs that are not research-based and developmentally appropriate. Why not fund the schools according to the law and let the administrators decide where and how the money would best be spent? Ah, but that assumes those who work with students every day know what's best, and we can't have that now, can we?

The Assembly Education Committee is chaired by Asm. Patrick Diegnan who has been a staunch supporter of public education. My hope is that the committee will listen to the voices of those who know what works in public education and revise or kill this bill.

Debunking Reformy Logic One Tweet At A Time Part 3

This one's personal

As I reported in Part 1 of this series, I recently got into a Twitter debate with Laura Waters, Derrell Bradford and Ryan Hill which turned into an all-day affair, with Save Our Schools NJ, Jersey Jazzman and a few other pro-public education advocates chiming in. It all started with this Tweet:

It was a 3-pronged discussion focusing on:

1. Part 1: Waters' continuous, illogical reasoning 
2. Part 2: Hill's assertions that:
   - charter schools are underfunded compared to district schools
   - every child should have choice but only when that choice is a charter school
3. And here Part 3: Bradford's assertions that:
   - I'm a teacher, therefore I am not an expert on public education
   - I'm a white, suburban woman so I should "say nothing"

Who is Derrell Bradford?

Currently the executive director for the 'reformy' group, NYCAN (The New York Campaign for Achievment Now), his previous stints include two 'reformy' NJ shops: the billionaire-funded Better Education for Kids (B4K), and Excellent Education for Everyone (E3).

Bradford's 'reform' pedigree also includes many public speaking gigs including one wherein he claimed in a rather snarky tone to be an expert on education because he watched the movie, "Dangerous Minds". I kid you not. I, along with many, many others saw this video online and shared it before it mysteriously disappeared from public consumption—and with good reason. It's an Excellent Example for Everyone (E3) of the truly 'Dangerous Minds' behind the 'reform' movement.   

Jersey Jazzman wrote about Bradford back in 2014 which included this Twitter exchange:

And this:

Bradford's sole experience in anything remotely having to do with education was working at the now-a-ghost-of-its-former-self voucher lobbying shop, Excellent Education for Everyone, or E3: first as a director of communications, and then as Executive Director. E3's mission was to bring "choice" in the form of opportunity scholarships vouchers to New Jersey's urban children. 

Bradford is always happy to use his personal story to sell the idea of "choice": he claims he just wants for every child what he himself had. What he fails to acknowledge is that he went to an extremely expensive and elite private school (not that there's anything wrong with that) that spends twice per pupil what the local public schools spend. Yet he questions whether New Jersey schools spend too much on "bells and whistles," and the opportunity scholarships vouchers he promoted wouldn't have come close to providing children with the "hoity-toity" (his words) education he enjoyed. Derrell Bradford's "personal story" has nothing to do with his preferred policies.

... 

Bradford's service on [Gov. Christie's teacher evaluation] task force produced a disaster of a report, which led to a disaster of a teacher evaluation scheme (AchieveNJ, aka Operation Hindenburg). But it also opened up new possibilities in reformy advocacy -- for Bradford, that is. When the Christie administration needed someone to serve on the secret charter school review panels of 2010, they called Bradford. When they needed someone to take a cheap swipe at then-NJEA President Barbara Keshishian, they called Bradford:

(My note: The video originally embedded in Jazzman's post is no longer visible. It now looks like this:)

Hmmm... is someone cleaning up their image? I do hope so because in this video, he is quoted as saying this about then NJEA President Barbara Keshishian:

I go up against the president of the teachers union in New Jersey all the time, right? She's got a bad haircut and terrible fashion, right? 

Way to keep it classy. 

Who is really listening?

So, when Bradford said this to me:

I let him know who I listen to:

• The students who have been denied choice because they didn't win the charter school lottery
• The students who've been denied their choice of school in the disastrous One Newark enrollment plan
• The outraged parents whose children are sent to schools all over Newark also as a result of One Newark
• The parents in NJ's state-controlled school districts who've been denied choice because they have no say in how their local school district is run
• The students who've marched in the streets to protest the closing of their school of choice: their neighborhood school
• The voters of Newark who overwhelmingly elected an educator as their mayor as part of a city-wide referendum against the Christie, Cami, Cerf, Hespe education 'reform' blitzkrieg

These people have been denied choice and voice in a democracy and that is somehow something to be celebrated? That is good for all students? That will ensure all students are magically lifted up out of poverty even though the 'reform' agenda starves public schools, and will never, ever provide students with the choice to attend an elite private school such as the one Bradford attended?

And as for the 'privileged power structure' comment, what exactly does he mean? I don't have billionaires at my beck and call throwing me money to set up shop whenever and wherever. I don't have direct lines of communication with the governor that will ensure I get a seat on panels and committees that help shape education policy. And I'd sure like to compare our paystubs because I have a feeling his has a few more zeros and commas than mine.

Sit down and shut up

But what really got to me was this:

It's the epitome of the 'reform' industry's opinion of education professionals: We don't care how many degrees or years of experience you have, just sit down and shut up because we (with little to no education experience) know what's best for kids. And as for that 'choice' thingy that suburban kids have so much of? The majority of students in wealthier suburbs choose to attend their local public school. So, why are so many students in our state controlled districts being denied that choice?

And people wonder why I use SHOUTY CAPITALS and bold, italic, underlined text in my posts. Oy!

I freely admit I don't know what it's like to attend a school where the overwhelming majority of students suffer the effects of poverty. I don't know what it's like to live in a neighborhood that is unsafe; where I couldn't go outside to play; where violence is a frequent occurrance. I don't know what it's like to be born with a skin color that automatically puts me at a disadvantage. 

But here's what I do know: 

I know what it's like to be homeless, to go to school hungry, to steal food because there was none in the house, to not have proper clothing to wear or medical intervention, to not have parental support and supervision, to suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, to attempt suicide, to experience abuse and neglect, to go home to a war zone every day, to go to sleep at night and wonder if I'd even wake up the next day. While my family wasn't poor on paper, it was very dysfunctional. My father earned a good living but squandered it on his addiction. 

I know what it's like to go to a strict, regimented Catholic school where drill and kill were all we knew. Where art, music and PE were non-existent and recess was withheld as punishment. Where kids were hit, slapped, locked in closets and put in garbage cans in the name of discipline. Where class sizes often topped out at 35, 40 and even 50 students. Where there were no special education, minority or ESL students, and those who didn't toe the line were there one day and gone the next. I didn't know which was worse: home or school. But for whatever reason, my sisters and I were blessed with academic minds. We all excelled at school, we are all artists and teachers, and we all have numerous scars from the work we did to heal the wounds that threatened to consume us. 

So, while I may not know how it feels to be a high-achieving student (which I assume Bradford was), possibly living in a dangerous neighborhood and attending a school where the majority of his classmates suffer the debilitating effects of poverty, I have my own history, my own hole that I had to crawl up out of, that has profoundly shaped my views on public education. And unless education 'reformers' have a recipe to address all the baggage that many students in their target districts carry with them to school every day, their efforts will never, ever succeed. 

Bradford, my sisters and I made it. We are the success stories. But we are in the minority. Not every person has the ability to pull themselves up out of debilitating situations. Not every person has the mental and emotional strength to keep pushing forward despite seemingly insurmountable odds; to never give up. So when those kids don't win the golden ticket that gets them a seat in the latest miracle charter school, they damned well better have an excellent public school to fall back on. Unfortunately, that is simply not the case. The students who are left behind in the name of 'choice' simply become collateral damage as the 'reform' machine marches on.

So, when Bradford accuses me of being part of a 'privileged power structure', I have to laugh because I prefer to stand with the people who are standing up and fighting back because they have been denied the right to choose their neighborhood public school because—ironically—people like him choose to impose their 'power structure' on them.

If that makes me 'privileged' then so be it. I guess the only 'privilege' we have is that our freedom of speech hasn't been taken away—yet.

Debunking Reformy Logic One Tweet At A Time-Part 1

My blog was mostly quiet this summer. I made a conscious decision to dial back and re-charge my batteries after several years of non-stop work. But as if on cue, on the second day of school, this happened on Twitter and we were off to the races:

The exchange between Laura Waters, Derrell Bradford, Ryan Hill and I turned into an all-day affair with Save Our Schools NJ, Jersey Jazzman and a few other pro-public education advocates chiming in. It was a 3-pronged discussion focusing on:

1. Waters' continuous, illogical reasoning 
2. Hill's assertions that:
   - charter schools are underfunded compared to district schools
   - every child should have choice but only when that choice is a charter school
3. Bradford's assertions that:
   - I'm a teacher, therefore I am not an expert on public education
   - I'm a white, suburban woman so I should "say nothing"

Part 1: Laura Waters' Illogical Reasoning

Waters, a 'reformer', blogger and Lawrence Twp BOE member frequently posts at NJ Spotlight and is frequently excoriated in the comments for her illogical reasoning and inability to grasp basic public education facts, policy and research. See here, here, here. See Mother Crusader here, here; Jersey Jazzman here, here, here; Bob Braun here. 

Here's an example from her latest post that started all this (linked in the tweet above):

Notice she doesn't deny any of this. But in her world, calling out the district and Hill's charter schools for possibly violating both state and federal laws in numerous ways, including segregating students who are most in need of these 'miracle' schools, is defending "the status-quo". 

As for the "lobbying groups" comment? This is news? If Waters is so concerned about lobbyists pressuring legislators, perhaps she should look in her own backyard. The NJ Charter Schools Association (which stayed mum during the whole exchange) is one of many education 'reform' (*ahem*) non-profits including Students First (Michelle Rhee), NYCAN (Derrell Bradford is ED), The Foundation for Excellence in Education (Jeb!s baby), The Gates, Walton, Broad and Koch Foundations, ALEC and a zillion other pro-charter/pro-ed 'reform' organizations that spend a lot of time and money lobbying legislators. And yes, so do ELC, NJEA and SOSNJ. Unfortunately, that's the business of government, made worse by Citizens United. 

But what does New Jersey have to show for all that lobbying, and other stuff, by ELC, NJEA and SOSNJ (which is a volunteer organization)? Plenty! The list of accolades for NJ's public schools is long. We consistently rank as one of the top three in the nation, we outperform many countries, and our school funding forumla (at least what's left of it after Christie has hacked away at it) which the Education Law Center originally litigated and continues to fight for, is a national model for school funding. NJEA provides one of the largest educator professional development conferences in the country (that pesky convention in November that Gov. Christie hates), and despite his best efforts to weed out all those "bad teachers", over 97% of us were rated effective or better last year. All of this didn't happen by magic. It happened because of the continued efforts of organizations such as these. Don't believe me? Check out their mission statements, then tell me about the status quo. 

But... we are also home to one of the poorest, most dangerous cities in the country: Camden, with a staggering 52% of children living below the poverty level. And while poverty numbers in the rest of the country have declined, NJ's have risen. So, it defies all logic and reasoning—not to mention research—to think that slashing funding, closing public schools and opening charter schools will magically cure all the ills in our poorest communities. But pesky facts never stop 'reformers' from spouting stuff like this:

Speaking of reality checks: where's the link to the research that backs that claim? Which students? Special ed? ELL? Disabled? Free lunch? Free and reduced price lunch? Do better at what? Which schools? What about attrition rates? So many questions, no answers from someone who refers to herself as “one of the premier analysts of New Jersey education policy”. I would think that if she really wanted to make her case, she would have posted a link to some research or at least the NJDOE website. C'mon, throw us a bone... a scrap... something... anything?

And as for that question I asked? Yup, never got an answer. I have never seen nor heard a charter advocate admit that most serve a different population than traditional public schools even though recent research confirms this. And therein lies the rub.

In Part 2 I take on Ryan Hill and his "All you need is [choice]" mantra.

Dear President Obama

Welcome to the Garden State. I hope your visit to Camden is successful. 

This letter is a long time coming. I have drafted it in my head many times as I lie awake at night wondering how much longer I can afford to remain in my profession and still keep my integrity, passion, drive, and yes, my home. And now you're here, so here goes:

I openly wept on election night 2008 as you gave your historic victory speech to a nation of adoring supporters of all races who waited generations for that moment. I have been awed by your unyielding composure over the past seven years as Congress has behaved like—well—spoiled, rich, white men who couldn't handle the fact that someone not like them was now Commander in Chief. I have willed you on to make the right decisions, to move this country forward in the face of tremendous odds, and dig us up out of the Great Recession because I knew that you knew in every fiber of your being, because of your history, because of your place in history, that if the poor and the middle class couldn't make it in America, no one could.

Your presidency has epitomized the promise of Emma Lazarus' words:

"Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

But it pains me greatly to say that these huddled masses who look to you because you are just like them, have, in one significant way, no more relief than if Mitt Romney had won in 2012.   

Again, these words do not roll off my tongue easily, Mr. President, but you have failed our future—our children. Failed us in a way that is so profound, that it touches the very DNA of our nation. Your education policies are, in a word, disastrous. They are moving this country back to the pre-civil rights era. They are undoing all the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and all the brave men and women who gave their blood, sweat, tears, and yes, their lives, to ensure that every child had a thorough and efficient education, and who made it possible for you to be where you are right now. Your education policies are destroying one of the bedrocks of a democracy. They are further segregating our highly segregated inner cities like Camden. They are silencing the voices of millions of people who looked to you to be their "lamp beside the golden door". They are further marginalizing those already living in the margins, the "huddled masses", "the wretched refuse".

These are not just my sentiments, Mr. President. Since Arne Duncan, who never taught a day in his life, first rolled out Race to the Top, another civil rights movement has sprung up all across this country pushing back against your devastating 'reforms' that have turned education into a sick competition with winners profiting handsomely, and losers—namely public schools, teachers and students (particularly those of color and low economic status)—being left in the deep end of the pool without a life preserver. Educators, parents, and concerned citizens from coast to coast are outraged that our public schools have become under-funded test factories, our teachers reduced to scripted robots, and our students to CPU's—data in; data out—while those who are pushing, financing and profiting from this wretched agenda can afford to send their children to elite, private schools that wouldn't stand for this child abuse for one second.

I enthusiastically voted for you once. I half-heartedly voted for you the second time because the alternative would have been exponentially worse. But Mr. President, I am not alone. I'm willing to bet there are tens of millions of Americans out there who agree with me. Under your watch, our public education system is being sold off piece meal to the highest bidder while child poverty rages seemingly unchecked and teachers are simultaneously blamed and praised in a national theatre of the absurd that would leave even Eugene Ionesco scratching his head.

Mr. President, the new norm in teaching is that every year decades of experience are being lost as more and more veteran teachers are retiring early or leaving the profession altogether because they cannot and will not subject their students to this abuse. This is having a devastating effect on the long-term health of public education and the teaching profession. What does it say about an education policy that is so heavily invested in 'reforming' public education while simultaneously driving out those with the most to offer young educators? In a nation whose students not living in poverty are competing with Finland and other top-performing nations on the PISA, this will be your legacy. Are you prepared to live with that?

I expect this from Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, Bobby Jindal, Scott Walker, Rick Scott, Mitt Romney and all the rest in that crowd who want nothing better than to see public education turned into a voucher/corporate system so they can pad their coffers and maybe build yet another garage with an elevator, but not you. Never you. 

While you are in Camden today, I hope you take the time to speak with people whose voices have been silenced, who are no longer allowed to be part of the democratic process that runs wealthier, suburban New Jersey school districts. I hope you make the time to speak to parents whose children have been denied 'choice' in their public education because their neighborhood school was closed and they had no say. I hope you listen to the educators who are being robbed of their souls, forced to teach in a way that is antithetical to all that they have been taught and all that they believe about excellent teaching. I hope the voices of the citizens in the poorest and most dangerous city in America echo in your mind along with the voices of all those brave men and women who fought so long and so hard and sacrificed so much all those years ago, but who never lived to see the ultimate fruit of their labor: you in the oval office.

There is still time. You can still change this, if you dare.

NEA President Lily Eskelsen Garcia has no time to be patient – Part III

'Absurd' 'Idiotic' 'Toxic' 'Voodoo' 'Abusive'

These are all words NEA President Lily Eskelsen Garcia used to describe education 'reform'—particularly standardized testing—in her recent 90-minute meeting with NJ ed bloggers, and quite frankly, they were music to my ears. I've been waiting for the NEA leadership to draw a hard line in the sand. 

Part I of this series focused on the devastating effects of high-stakes testing on special needs children, and how edu-preneurs—21st century carpetbaggers—are profiting from the testing boom. 

Part II focused on the ways billionaires and their 'charities' are controlling the media to push out their messaging to an uninformed public.

Part III's focus is on Lily's visits to two very different New Jersey schools, and how NEA—and all its members—must fight back against destructive education 'reform'.

As with the two previous posts, unless otherwise indicated, Lily's quotes are in red.

A tale of two cities

Credit: REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

Photo courtesy of actionplusrealty.com

In her tour of New Jersey, Lily stopped at two schools: Pyne Poynt Middle School in Camden, which shares a building with the co-located Mastery Charter School, and West Windsor-Plainsboro Regional High School. The median household income in West Windsor is $147,234, with only 2.5% of its residents living below the poverty level, while Camden's median household income is $25,681 (no, that's not a typo), and 45% of its residents live below the poverty level. Two years ago the state swooped in, took over the school district, and appointed as superintendent in the 'Most Dangerous City in America' Paymon Rouhanifard, a 32-year-old former New York City school system bureaucrat/former Wall Street analyst/Teach for America alumnus who spent a grand total of two years and one month in front of a classroom. Makes perfect sense, right?

For more on Paymon's track record, read Jersey Jazzman's post here. For more on the state takeover of Camden's schools and the push back by parents see here, here, here, here and here. 

In both schools she spoke with students, staff, parents and administrators. 

On the city of Camden:  

"Look at all the shut down, abandoned buildings."

Credit: www.racelies.com

About a dozen Camden parents found out she was there and wanted to meet with her. They wanted to talk about the co-location of Mastery Charter School in their building. They wanted her to know that they felt like their kids weren't important anymore, that they were being pushed out. They felt like too many doors had been closed on them. They wanted desperately for someone to hear them because the local school board won't listen. They're all appointed and part of the local political machine. The parents have no say in how the district is run.  

Phil Dunn of the Courier Post reported on their conversation. Each one of them expressed how angry, frustrated and disheartened they felt. Dunn reports:

Parents told Eskelsen Garcia they also felt the traditional public school district was taking a back seat to the three Renaissance schools that opened this fall. Many students reported to public schools last week only to find substitute teachers, they claimed.

"We are dealing with understaffed schools, and our students are losing," said Camden parent Byheijja Sabree.

"We are not getting the resources our children deserve in public schools."

School officials said vacancies are up because more than 100 staffers retired or resigned from the district in late July and August, including some who failed to show up to work on the first day or give notice.

As of Thursday, the district had 40 teacher vacancies, down from 88 on the first day of school. School officials said 96 percent of classrooms have permanent teachers.

Save Our Schools NJ reports:  

"What's going on in this school is an insult to African-Americans and Latinos in this community. We're talking about coming together ... You cannot divide this school .... You cannot put a charter school inside a public school like this and then try to create a feeling within the school that we're all one." 

These words were spoken by a Camden parent in reference to the Pyne Poynt school in Camden, which is being used by the Christie Administration for a forcible co-location with the Mastery charter chain.

[...] 

The story told by Phil Dunn's article is in sharp contrast with the article that the Philadelphia Inquirer ran on the forced Pyne Point/Mastery co-location.

The Inquirer's happy coverage of the forced co-location may have been shaped by the fact that the newspaper's new owner and his son are both long-term supporters of the Mastery charter chain, which has co-located in the Pyne Poynt. In fact, one of the Mastery campuses is named after the Inquirer's owner. (emphasis mine)

Despite a lawsuit filed by some Camden parents, the NJ State Senate recently passed a bill that would give greater power to the Renaissance charters to expand. On September 29th the NJ State Assembly is voting on the same bill. If it passes, Gov. Christie will almost surely sign it into law. 

On West Windsor-Plainsboro:

"It was wonderful! I wanted to go there!"

Lily spoke to a female student about testing. The girl's comments were, unfortunately, not surprising:

"Pretty much in this school, you better be making a 4.0. Your safety school is Yale. Everybody wants to know how you did on your SATs. 

"Last year I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety disorder. But I'm on medication this year and I think it will be so much better."

"In Camden they fire teachers for not meeting their test score quota, but it's just as bad to say 'You got an A-, and [that's not good enough].' It's no less harmful to those students than these students."

"This complete waste of time is supposed to mean that a child is 'college and career ready'? Seriously? I think a nine-year-old could figure this out. It's abuse, plain and simple." (emphasis mine)

Dis-'Education Nation': the false invitation to educators

"Educators no longer have individual control over and participation in how and what they teach."

Photo courtesy NBC

Four years ago, educators around the country quickly tuned into—then just as quickly tuned out from—NBC's 'Education Nation' when we saw that real K-12 educators were relegated to the audience while talking heads with no teaching experience were on the stage controlling the message. It was a huge slap in the face. While I did stick around for the second year if only to commiserate on social media with other equally furious educators, I haven't watched since. Quite frankly, I have better things to do with my time, and I'd like to keep my normally low blood pressure right where it is. If the brand has changed to be more inclusive and educator-driven, great, I'll give another look. But based on what I saw, it was more about talking to educators than with them.

As I wrote in Part II, Bill Gates spends enormous sums of money lulling the unsuspecting general public into believing everything they see and hear about 'bad teachers' and 'failing schools'. Gates and his buddies love to call this craziness an 'experiment' and call for 'conversation' between people in his camp and educators. The problem is, as Anthony Cody writes, that we never asked to have this grand experiment performed on us, and the conversation is always one-sided. The experiment was never piloted. Instead, it was forced on the nation, rammed down our throats so hard that our voices have been choked off by the mainstream media and many teachers' own fears of recrimination. Gates demands that educators and voters let this experiment continue, so we'll see what's good for us (insert condescending pat on the head). 

Gates says:

There's a lot of issues about governance, whether its school boards or unions, where you want to allow for experimentation, in terms of pay procedures, management procedures, to really prove out new things. As those things start working on behalf of the students, then I believe the majority of teachers and voters will be open-minded to these new approaches. And so we have to take it a step at a time. They have to give us the opportunity for this experimentation. (emphasis Cody's)

"They have to give us the opportunity." Why? What if we say no?

Cody explains why 'No' is a pretty good answer:

A report released last year by the nonprofit advocacy group Broader, Bolder Approach to Education took a close look at the big cities—the very ones cited by Bill Gates in his 2008 remarks quoted above as being models of reform, and found that rather than being showcases of success, they have yielded poor results overall.

Be sure to read the entire post.

The real problem

"It's not about closing the achievement gap; it's about closing the equity gap.

"All of the research, facts and evidence is on the side of common sense: that you use tests for what they were meant to be used for. That you empower people at the building level. All of this ['reform'] is an excuse to move the conversation away from the gaps in resources. To move the conversation away from what the 'haves' have and the 'have nots' don't because that costs money."

I've said this here far too many times, so if you don't believe me, look it up for yourself: the US has the second highest child poverty rate in the industrialized world, and the highest infant mortality rate. This is deplorable, unacceptable, and why many students struggle to learn. It requires an enormous investment of public resources to fix, but it doesn't turn a profit, so that's why nothing is being done.

When parents and rank and file educators don't stand up to those charged with writing and implementing education policy—from Arne Duncan right on down to building principals—we are just as guilty of the destruction of public education and young minds as they are.

"None of the evidence for corporate reform is on their side. Not with charters or vouchers or de-professionalization with TFA. And by the way, since we're guaranteed to hire a bunch of bad teachers, let's make it really easy to fire them."

Where do we go from here?

"The laws on the state level that were influenced by federal policy are so absurd and idiotic that they're indefensible. Governors are backing away from them. Nobody wants to own them."

Toward the end of our discussion, Lily told a story about a young special education teacher who wanted to quit because she teaches students in wheelchairs with drool bibs and she now has to put a No. 2 pencil in their hand and manipulate it to get them to fill in the bubbles on a test so her district can make their quota. The teacher was in tears as she related the story: "These kids will cry, they'll wet their pants, and I don't want to do this anymore." 

Credit: www.scpie.org

Too many educators are quitting because they refuse to be complicit in damaging their students. Too many are taking early retirement because they just can't take it anymore. How many of those Camden 'no-shows' simply decided the night before school started that they had had enough and just walked away? New teachers entering the profession have no idea what it's like to teach before No Child Left Behind/Race to the Top, and that's the way many 'reformers' want it. What's better than a highly skilled, low wage workforce that can be turned over every few years or so? It's a great fix for the pension system!

Then, someone in our group asked if civil disobedience is what educators need to do. Her answer was a pleasant surprise (emphasis mine).

"I think that's the right road to go down, but here's how I think we hit this:  

"Here's what I find out when I go into a school and talk to educators. What do you love about this school? I love the kids. What would you improve? The damned testing—make it stop; it's gotta stop. It makes me feel like I'm not a professional.'

[...]   

"We are sitting on something here. We are at more than a crossroads. This is gonna blow. We can harness that passion that the educator has [because] this touches your soul.

[...]  

"When you're a union the greatest power is numbers. We can't beat the Kochs' money. The only way we're going to beat this is collective action. We have to organize what's already happening. It can't be 'isn't this a shame, it's hurting kids'. It has to lead to some collective action.

[...]  

"I don't want anyone to get fired or lose their job. What we want is to have those politicians going, 'Oh my God, we gotta fix this'. And as long as they can shoot at individuals, they won't fix this. When they're the ones that are being hurt, when they're the ones being the joke on The Daily Show, then they're going to start saying, 'Ok, who do we talk to?'

[...] 

"We have to influence the President of the United States."

How do we get there?

The road to change isn't paved with hand-wringing; it's paved by putting one foot in front of the other, one step at a time, every day. We will empower ourselves when we empower parents to fight standardized testing, too. 

"But Marie," you say, "I can't do that. I don't have time, and besides, I don't like politics." Oh no? How do you not? How do you not have time to advocate for those in your charge who cannot advocate for themselves? How do you not have time to advocate for the protection of a basic civil right? How do you not have time to fight for your profession? 

This is what happened when one Florida educator just said, 'No!'

Education Commissioner Pam Stewart ended the Florida Assessments for Instruction in Reading, known as the FAIR test, in kindergarten through second grade. In its place, teachers will observe children's reading abilities in a more informal setting than the online exam, which recently experienced glitches. 

Stewart announced the change in a memo to superintendents. 

"It's amazing," said Susan Bowles, the Alachua County kindergarten teacher whose widely publicized refusal to administer FAIR this fall sparked the state's move. "I am very grateful that they have seen that the test was not a good thing for children."

Not every educator can do what Susan Bowles did, but every educator can start educating parents on the toxicity of standardized testing. Every educator can attend board of education meetings and start making their concerns heard. Every educator can start calling their elected officials and holding them accountable. And every educator can vote! 

Final thoughts...

I was inspired and energized by what Lily shared, by her passion and her commitment to end the toxic effects of testing. Now, here's what I want to say to Lily:

Don't fail us. Millions of educators and parents are ready and waiting for a massive push back against standardized testing. We need more national leaders to walk the walk—not just talk the talk. We have seen far too many good leaders be swayed by the money and power education 'reform' brings, or fall victim to political correctness. Stand firm in your beliefs and it will be easier for more of us to do the same.

"They have to deal with it when it's massive and it will only be massive if it's organized.  And that is what NEA is committed to."

Light the match, spark the flame, Lily. Let's get going and stop this madness now!