New Orleans is the nation’s largest and most complete experiment in charter schools. After Hurricane Katrina, the State of Louisiaana took control of public schools in New Orleans, and launched a nearly complete transformation of a public school system into a system of charter schools. Though there are
LAUSD Board President, Steve ZimmerIn many urban centers-- L.A. is one-- the Republican brand is so toxic that it's a real stretch for the party to even run plausible candidates. So the special interests and big money behind the kind of corrupt conservatism that the GOP embodies, finds its way into the campaigns of corrupt conservative Democrats-- the Republican wing of the Democratic Party.
If cutting-edge educational technologies can scientifically maximize student learning, then why do so many Silicon Valley bigwigs at Google, Apple, Hewlett-Packard, and Yahoo!
Gates and other venture philanthropist’s have ‘pioneered’ and ‘seeded’ new education markets through direct funding and by shaping ‘education reform’ policies. Charter schools are an essential component of this mission… allowing impact investors to be the drivers of the education reform industry’s final mission: to fully dismantle public education by way of “anywhere, anytime learning” and “personalized” technologies.
Collin Peterson-- not a real Democrat, a Dreck DemocratThe other day, I mentioned on twitter that 3 House Democrats-- all extremely reactionary, odious Blue Dogs-- had voted with the Republicans to make it more difficult for women to exercise their constitutional right to Choice: Henry Cuellar (TX), Dan Lipinski (IL) and Collin Peterson (MN).
Yesterday charter school shill Sarah Hernandez jumped into the open seat race for CA-34, one of the bluest districts in the country. The last thing that kind of district needs is some pawn on the charter school billionaires jumping into Congress disguised as a progressive Democrat just because EMILY's List demands a woman fill the seat. Betsy DeVos is a woman too.
It's all over, suckersI've been in a state of denial since November 9 but Trump's appointment of Betsy DeVos yesterday snapped me right out of it. Sure, Trump hired an actual neo-Nazi as virtual co-Chief of Staff. And no matter how many times the clueless shills on Morning Joe try to assure everyone that Trump won't be governing the way he ran his vile campaign and that everything is back to normal and he'll have a fine cabinet, it just ain't so.
I was just watching a giant L.A. school district walk-out on TV, tens of thousands of students protesting Trump's odd and very questionable ascension to the presidency. L.A. students I've spoken with are worried about Trump's intolerance, xenophobia, racism, misogyny and homophobia and how that mindset may manifest itself as part of a policy agenda sure to be rubber-stamped for the next 2 years by a Republican Congress. But the other topic I heard from the majority of students I spoke with in the last week was Climate Change.
Last week you may have caught Señor Trumpanzee's telepromter speech in Cleveland on education. You could tell it was read from a teleprompter because he sounded like he was on Ambien and because he didn't say he would model the American education system on Trump University. Instead he pushed the charter school industry's privatization agenda.
