Bellevue School District : An analysis

The betrayal of teachers by the union

2011-09-12T20:31:00.000-07:00

The Belleve Education Association (BEA) capitulated to the Bellevue School District and agreed on a new two-year contract on Aug 31 2011. The agreement reiterates the union's commitment to policing its ranks via the merit pay system. It utilizes teacher time for non-teaching functions by implementing district control over early-release Wednesdays. The teacher workload is significantly increased by mandating that grades on assignments and tests be entered in the online Gradebook within 15 days.

The agreement also freezes teacher pay for two years. Taking the current rate of inflation so far this year into account, this is equivalent to a 3.6% salary cut for the teachers.

The union argues on the same lines as the district that "there is no money" and as such teachers have no recourse but accept lower pay for more work. However, a close look at the district budget shows that it is not a lack of money as a first principle but considerations and interests of policy makers that finally determine the state of funding for schools.

Teachers in Bellevue, just as teachers in other school districts and all across the country have been facing a systematic and sustained attack spearheaded by the Obama administration. The ideology for this attack is based on a false and ludicrous premise - that teachers are somehow responsible for the stagnant economy. This vaguely thought out premise holds that if teachers somehow were more successful, they will produce a smarter workforce that will be able to overcome the economic malaise.

However, the speculative nature of large hedge funds that culminated in the financial crash of 2008 is the immediate reason for the current decline in US economy. Rather than making the hedge funds pay for the crisis of their own making - both Bush, Obama administrations have spent trillions of tax payer money to prop them up. According to an "Associated Press" report, top CEOs of the nation made more in 2010 than 2007, when the economy was booming. For a layer of super rich, the recession has been a lucky stroke. It has allowed them to secure tax payer money for free or near zero interest, repossess land from bankrupt homeowners, drive down wages of employees that work for them and lower their individual and corporate taxes.

By deliberately ignoring the root of the criss, the Obama administration - just like its predecessor - asks the average worker, including the teacher to pay for this. This is the meaning of the term "shared sacrifice".

Thus all across the country, vital programs that working people and youth depend on are being slashed. Workers are being laid off across both the public and private sector. As the Obama administration continues to talk about creating an economy conducive to job growth, the federal government is planning on sacking 220,000 postal workers by 2015. States are not being helped and mass teacher layoffs have happend in Chicago, Detroit, NewYork City and elsewhere. While more than 100,000 teachers have been laid off across the country in 2010-11, a recent study published by the American Association of School Administrators estimates the loss of 220,000 education jobs for the 2011-12 school years.

The trade unions however have accepted this as the normal order of business. While pretending to be a movement for workers, the union has sided with the ruling class and helped keep the workers down and prevent the eruption of social struggle. AFL-CIO as well as American Federation of Teachers (AFT), National Education Association (NEA) follow the same prescription. The Bellevue Education Association (BEA), beholden to the dictates of the NEA is increasingly showing its support to the district and its determination to hold back the teachers from their struggle for a decent wage and good working conditions.

Even before BEA entered into negotiations with the district, they had signaled their willingness to police the rank and file teachers via the merit pay system. Even though the Bellevue School District was not chosen to pilot a merit pay system, BEA eagerly sought to join the district as it, along with the Washington Education Association (WEA) formed the "Teacher and Principal Evaluation Pilot (TPEP)". This clearly shows that the union is in agreement with the district on merit pay, they just want a seat at the table so that they can help implement such an attack on rank and file teachers.

If the union was actually opposed to the merit pay system, they would act differently. Rather than sit down with the district officials, they would have used the method of the Strike to demand teacher rights and a block on merit pay. They would recognize that teachers should unite across districts and then with the wider working class and move towards a General Strike.

Reading the notes published by the bargaining team of the union makes clear that the issue most important to the union leadership was getting a seat at the table to impose the merit pay system on its rank and file teachers. As we shall see, it was over this issue that the negotiations broke down.

The very first bargaining update on April 1 2011 mentions a team from the BEA working on a teacher evaluation plan. "Bryona Golding, Ingrid Saxon, Jenn Stevens and Michele Miller comprise BEA’s team focusing on the revision of the evaluation tool for Article 12. Since January, this team has been working toward the development of an evaluation tool with a focus on professional growth. State law mandates that all districts move to a revised, four-level rating system in 2013. Both sides agree on the need to take time to develop this new evaluation tool."

According to bargaining update #13 made on July 21 2011, negotiations broke down between the union and the district the day before, with the district requiring the mediation of the Public Employment Relations Commission (PERC). On this bargaining update, for the first time, we heard that the district was planning on excluding the union from designing the merit pay system: "BEA has proposed we join the Teacher & Principal Evaluation Pilot (TPEP) implementation consortium, so we can take advantage of state funding, project research, and the good work of the pilot school districts. The District wants to pilot immediately, prior to the release of the state’s recommendations and without the support of TPEP. Why would pilot an evaluation tool we might not even be allowed to implement?" (emphasis in original)

That the union was preoccupied with becoming a tool for the attack on teachers was further shown on their next update made on Aug 02 2011. The union was clearly worried that they might not get a seat at the table if they did not collaborate even more closely with the district. Almost the entirety of the union message was on this single issue as they continued to lament:

"The District wants to move forward in isolation, prior to the release of the state’s final evaluation requirements. The District’s insistence on piloting a new system in advance of the final TPEP recommendations would be premature, and would limit our ability to use the work of theTPEP project to guide us. Working outside the parameters of TPEP could lead to an evaluation tool we might not even be allowed to implement!"

By the absence of a contention in the merit pay plans, the bargaining update on Aug 26th shows that the union had been invited back to the table to implement the merit pay system. In turn, the union made the teachers give up some free time for early-release Wednesdays, enforced online grade reporting and a 3.6% pay cut considering inflation. The union also successfully blocked a strike. That was the price teachers paid in order to have the treacherous union leadership secure a role in the merit pay plan. Thus, in order to become a tool of the district in policing its own ranks, the district demanded of the union - and it agreed to - a further betrayal of the teachers.

However, it then became crucial that the union divert the anger and disappointment of teachers some other way. This was done by taking a no-confidence vote on the superintendent, a figure much despised by rank and file teachers as is shown by the more than 97% vote against her. The union here has taken a calculated risk knowing the deep unpopularity of the superintendent in both the teacher and parent community. However, the union did not lift a finger when Dr. Cudeiro fired hundreds of teachers and staff last year, nor when she closed Robinswood, a school for special-needs students.

If Dr. Amalia Cudeiro were to leave the school district in disgrace, teachers should view it as a victory for their persistent work in opposing her draconian measures over the past two years. A superintendent who leaves in disgrace is a liability to the ruling class, they will be less hesitant to use her again. But there should be no doubt that her successor would continue where she left off. Ultimately, it is not personalities that decide the turn of policy in the first instance, but stark economic factors.

If Dr. Cudeiro were to leave without substantial legal action against her, it is equally likely that she will continue her policies if given an opportunity again, in some other school district. Even though the ruling class would view her as a liability, they do realize that it takes considerable time grooming people who are apt at destroying the public school system, and she may still have uses for them. Similarly, some crook from another school district could become her successor right here.

When the PTSA sent out a community survey in March of 2011, portraying teachers in a bad light, the union instructed the teachers to not talk about this with parents. The union has always tried to isolate the teachers from parents and to promote the myth that there is a sizable body of "teacher hating parents".

On the contrary, Bellevue teachers have the sympathy of a large number of parents and community. When you went on a strike in 2008, the district wanted to use the legal system to get you back to work. Parents protested and the district was unable to use the law against teachers. However, the union proved timid - it made no significant attempt to grow the strike across school districts. Nor was an appeal made to the broader working class to join the strike.

While the 2011-12 budget does not anticipate any teacher layoffs for Bellevue, continued state cuts could likely change the situation. Teachers should prepare for a continued assault on their working conditions, wages, seniority rights, pensions. Placing trust in the union leadership will prove to be a dead-end. Forming committees of teachers to document the turn of events, including the betrayals of the union will be a key step. The moment a committee is formed, it gives the union notice and it provides a political framework for teachers to organize without the intimidation and demoralization of the union leadership.

A large segment of parents support teachers and find the success of their child in school directly connected to a good working environment for teachers. We reject the phony slogans of "Child First" uttered by the district, PTSA, LEV (League of Education Voters) and Stand (Stand For Children). This is a slogan designed by billionaires who want to portray teachers as somehow the enemy of our children. These are of course ridiculous claims, uttered by desperate people whose ways of swindling and profiteering on the backs of the poor is fast coming undone.

Ultimately, the union can't defend teachers as it is subservient to the Democratic Party, which just like its counterpart, is a party of big business. The NEA is busy trying to re-elect Obama - who spearheaded such a devastating attack on teachers and the BEA is undoubtedly trying to woo some other Democrat in the local elections.

As the past four years have clearly shown, teacher rights will not be protected by either of the two big business parties. Teacher rights can only be won by situating their struggle within the context of the struggle of the working class to achieve a degree of material comfort made possible by their contribution to society. The two big business parties and all their political affiliates should necessarily be counted as deadly enemies with whom negotiations will be fruitless.

The Dictatorship of the School Board

2011-09-01T01:08:00.000-07:00

The 2011-12 school budget was presented to the School Board on Tuesday Aug 30th 2011. There was very little discussion and the issues brought up on my previous article were predictably not addressed. The School Board showed their elation in the turn of teacher negotiations that exacted a wage freeze on the Bellevue teachers and still forced them back to school.

As the current rate of inflation tracked up to July this year stands at a 3.6%, teachers have in fact been handed a 3.6% pay cut. The real increase in prices outstrips inflation and thus the real pay cut is much worse. The negotiations have not been settled to the satisfaction of teachers.

The question and answer session was brief. The School Board president Chris Marks called on names of community members who had initially expressed a desire to raise questions. There were about 10 speakers. All but the last two or three speakers could not help but bend over backwards flattering the School Board for a job well done. It may not be a coincidence that these names were called first.

Among this first lot, spokespersons from the reactionary groups Stand (Stand For Children) and the League of Education Voters (LEV) were in display. A gentleman - whose name I do not recall - came up and acknowledged the treacherous work done by the PTSA with the guidance of Stand and LEV in its push/poll survey on teachers. Jess Hasken, an organizer for Stand followed with an appreciative note to the Bellevue Education Association (BEA) and the School Board for reaching a settlement on negotiations. The fact that this "negotiation" does not protect teachers, but is a further lurch by the union to the right was predictably not a concern for Miss. Hasken and this somewhat privileged layer who make their living out of the systematic destruction of the public school system.

Several other individuals came up to give testimony. They were all largely positive. The BEA president - Michele Miller - appeared to feign disrespect towards the Board by yawning as she left the microphone. There was not much else she could do when the union leadership worked from day one to block a strike and force the teachers to the school. The teachers' union and the district were in agreement to put the "children first", be damned the teachers.

By adopting the baseless and reactionary slogan of "children first", uttered by the most hypocritical of all people like the billionaires funding Stand and LEV, the teachers union shows where their true concerns are. The teachers union is responsible for disorienting and confusing the teachers and providing them false hope. The biggest lie they tell the teachers is that their struggle can be won without a protracted political struggle against the establishment on clear class lines.

Sometime after this, a teacher who also identified himself as a parent spoke up. [I believe his name was Todd, but I could be wrong] He was not a sycophant of the Board nor the Superintendent. He asked some pointed questions about the impropriety of Dr. Cudeiro who runs a private education consulting company while being employed as the Superintendent of the School District. He specifically asked the Board the reasons for their lack of transparency in addressing an issue of such vital importance to our children's education.

This is the point where the School Board - on impulse - decided to show its generally hidden face of Dictatorship. The Board president Chris Marks promptly condemned the teacher for asking such questions. She considered the questions rude and uncalled for and suggested that issues like conflicts of interest are not public concerns but things to be talked over in private! She suggested that this teacher come meet with her for an explanation. To his credit, the teacher re-clarified his position and demanded that these matters made public.

Chris Marks is possibly ignorant of general norms of Democracy. There are Washington state laws that are clear on what a conflict of interest is and the situation where it is not permitted for a state official like Dr. Cudeiro. I have remarked on this on a previous posting, bringing up the actual wording of the law (RCW) on the matter. Chris Marks's ignorance however does not excuse her - she is the President of the School Board.

Regardless of her level of education on such matters, the intended aim of her outburst is clear - that of silencing any opposition to the fragile position of the School Board who ardently defends all actions of the District.

Chris Marks' attempted intimidation was followed by a somewhat gentler admonishment from another new member of the Board - Christine Chew. Chew thanked the community who has unfailingly supported the school board and the district reminding the audience how all communication to the district and the board should be of a certain - presumably gentle and tactful - tone. According to Ms. Chew, this means that issues that upset the school board should preferably not be aired in public, and if it must, it has be couched in such language so that it is hard for normal people to understand.

The District has largely given up its pretense at Democratic norms. This year they no longer hold large public meetings. They arrange a small group of supporters to speak in their much smaller Board meetings. The small public meetings arranged by the district-led committees are also controlled by a core group of community members who are hostile to democracy and are quick to intimidate the audience who has genuine questions that runs against the privileged grain of this lot, as I have shown on other postings. Rank and file teachers are scared to criticize anything due to fear of punishment - this I sense through unsigned mail I get from teachers as well as the atmosphere of hostility that all predominant groups like PTSA, LEV, Stand have created towards our teachers.

After the speaker took his seat, a community member who identified herself as being in a profession related to legal matters spoke further on a District practice of providing third parties data on our children without explicit parental consent. She spoke about the loss of privacy this results and how such methods could be used by third parties in ways that could be damaging to the students.

None of these issues were answered by the School Board. Their singular aim was to adjourn the meeting and run to safer havens. The normal protocol for a Board meeting does not adjourn the meeting without asking the audience if there are further questions. But this Tuesday, such norms were abandoned. No further questions were taken.

As this process continues, even less people will attend these elitist meetings. The School Board enjoys their elitist Democracy and in ignorance of history assumes that they can continue without the support of a broad mass of people. And in this way, they provide for the deterioration of Democracy and a movement of the political establishment further to the right.

Today, we, the average working people, who care about a quality education for our children cannot depend on the School Board to conduct any meaningful reform of the school system. Concerned teachers, students and community members need to come together to create a plan for public education for the district of Bellevue. This plan must reject the notion of the district that "there is no money". There is enough money at the local, state and Fed levels but it is the considerations and interests that allocate resources for society that determine the quality of education and the general living condition of the masses of people.

And that is the reason that building a public school system for the twentieth century falls on our shoulders, we the working class who are many and are thus objectively united in our class interests. I ask all those interested to email me so that we can continue this work we started earlier.

BSD 2011-12 Budget Analysis

2011-08-30T03:27:00.000-07:00

The Bellevue School District will present the budget for 2011-12 to the School Board today, August 30th 2011. This happens while the Bellevue Education Association and the district are negotiating the teacher contracts as to how best to cut various benefits from teachers and reduce the quality of instruction and extra-curricular activities in the class room. Schools are supposed to start in 6 days and the two parties have not been able to reach full agreement so far. Meanwhile, the teachers and the public are kept in the dark about negotiations that happen behind closed doors.

The district nor the teachers union nor the PTSA are willing to explain to teachers and the community the true nature of the budget or the ongoing negotiations. Theirs is an elitist democracy where they all come together and agree to have us pay for the sins of the ruling class. We, the little people have no representation and the more in the dark we are, the easier it is for this cabal of elites to continue their destruction of our schools. Earlier in the year, the Bellevue PTSA leadership played a crucial role in designing a push/poll type community survey which is undoubtedly used by the district as a supporting document in its continuing attacks on our teachers. Up to this point, the PTSA has refused to even release the full survey results after repeated requests. Today, I heard from a parent that the PTSA does not take a side in the teacher negotiations. Regardless, that they take a side - that of the district against the teachers - is extremely clear by their actions. In fact not taking a side at this point simply means they take the side of the powers. Theirs is the action of cowards.

In such a situation, we - the small people - have to take it upon ourselves to use the scant resources available to piece together the story of our schools, its continued deterioration under the determined effort of a callous administration that pays lip service to slogans like the "child first" and turns around to stab child, parent and teacher all in their backs with customary charm.

The district has released three documents related to the 2011-12 budget. The first is a presentation (pdf) made by the Superintendent on August 4, 2011 to the School Board. Next is a summarized version (pdf) of the budget, followed by a more complete version (pdf). Dr. Cudeiro has also written an "open letter" to the community where she explains how the state-mandated 1.9% cut on teacher salaries is being used to demand a heavier work load and limit the freedom of teachers even more. It shows a remarkably misplaced confidence that parents will still side with the district, regardless of the ruthlessness of the attack. It seems that Dr. Cudeiro believes that our community can be understood by reading the drivel written in Seattle Times.

While drawing a salary of $225,100 according to data from kitsapsun.com, Dr. Cudeiro comments :

"We are facing very difficult economic times when many people are losing their jobs or suffering significant pay cuts. Some districts will not be reinstating the 1.9% state salary cuts for their teachers. The Bellevue School District is willing to reinstate the 1.9% state salary cut and add one paid professional development day in each of the two years of the agreement. We do so, because we value our teachers. This will cost the District nearly two million dollars in each year, but the District is asking to see movement on the issues stated above."

The "issues stated above" refers to the district's insistence that teachers upgrade grade books online in eight days as well as allow the administration to control the time of teachers to plan and co-ordinate activities on Wednesdays after early release of students. Since the Bellevue Education Association supported the merit pay provisions and accepted that as part of the negotiations, these two issues are the only major ones that now remain on the table.

Dr. Cudeiro signals she is ready to go ahead with the 1.9% salary cut if teachers did not agree on these two issues - this after the district got one of their biggest and most destructive designs on merit pay agreed to by the union. It is clear that the administration is not budging much. Whatever concessions have so far come from teachers in large measure, and that points clearly to the role of their union in betraying the interests of the teachers, time after time.

When Bellevue School District applied for the Race To The Top (RTTT) Funds last year along with the state of Washington, BEA agreed on provisions for merit pay for teachers. While the Washington state did not get funded, the district and the teachers union are committed to going ahead with the initial plan. BEA claims that it had to join the "Teacher and Principal Evaluation Pilot (TPEP)" to "take advantage of state funding, project research, and the good work of the pilot school districts."

In the "open letter", Dr. Cudeiro attempts to pass the wage freeze on teachers as something inevitable that needs to be done due to tough economic times. The union, from a position of asking for a pay raise for teachers have fallen back to the position of defending a wage freeze. However, looking through the 2011-12 budget shows that the issues are not simply a lack of money as a first principle, but rather the considerations and interests that determine how resources of society are allocated.

In the summary report, page 8 shows that from year 2010-11 to 2011-12 there is a budgeted increase of 3.2% in the average salary for the category that involves teachers, data coaches - now renamed to be "Instructional Technology curriculum Leaders (ICTL)" and other extra-curricular staff etc excluding central administration. For this same group, there is a 3.7% increase in average pay and benefits. However, we are told that the teachers would either face a 1.9% cut at worst or at best their salaries will not increase. This shows that certain "teachers" within this group are getting raises, and they could be substantial depending on the number of this sub group.

Since the district does not break down the cost structure for this somewhat diverse group, we need to look for clues in the budget document. Page 10 notes the existence of 22.6 ICTL personel and page 9 mentions that $2.45 M has been allocated from the Capital Fund for the same category. Thus, we see that ICTL absorbs at least an average of $108,407 whereas the more complete budget document in page 45 shows that the average elementary teacher salary for Bellevue is a mere $48,295. The highest salary for a teacher is shown to be $65,115 and the average salary for an elementary principal is $104, 339 - which is lower than the package for ICTL.

The reason ICTL are paid highly has to do with their role - they administer programs that are unpopular among teachers/students and in turn police the teachers to make sure they adhere to such programs. The term "data coach" was commonly used to describe them as their role is to use data to invent punishment systems for teachers and students, merit pay for teachers and high stakes testing for students. The reason that Dr. Cudeiro insists on teachers grading student work online in a timely manner has really nothing to do with any overriding concern for keeping parents informed of their children's progress. It has all to do with better enabling these number crunchers to present the administration with the proverbial whip to lash the teachers and students with.

The school board sees no real problem with any of this as they obligingly rubberstamp the decisions of the superintendent and her subservient cabinet. While the board does not strictly get paid, the budget does show an amount of $617,680 under "Purchased Services" and "Supplies/Materials". A breakdown is not given. This is a 8.9% increase from 2010-11 (around page 41, 98 of the more complete budget document).

The superintendent's office has seen a funding increase of 36.9% for the same period, while the district's propaganda arm - referred to in the category of "Public Relations" has grown an unprecedented 70%. The growth of the propaganda arm hints at the growing awareness of the public of the the general rotten nature of the administration - thus more money has to be spent to deceive us. (page 98 of the more complete budget document)

However, none of the people who actually administer the schools take home the biggest haul. That function is performed by the bond investor - the parasite, that instead of paying as high a percentage of tax as the average worker to help the schools, makes money from the worker paying taxes/levies into the school. This he does by buying bonds from the school. When you and I pay into a local levy, that goes to pay this gentleman's interest. To the extent that the district works at hiding these social relationships from us, its administration is allowed a few choice crumbs off the table. The bond holders have had their interest payments increased from $14.3M to $29.6 M, a full 106.8% from year 2010-11 to 2011-12.

While the General Fund has been increased from $182M to $192M, the funding per student has decreased from $10,586 down to $10,576 as the number of students increased from 17,224 up to 18,157 (page 2, 4 of the summary budget document). If we adjust the 2010-11 dollars for the inflation rate of 3.6% for the current year, up to July, then we actually see a decrease of $392 per student in the General Fund. Also, software licences that are generally paid via the Capital Fund are now being paid via the General Fund (page 26 of the summary budget document), to the tune of $1.5M and this represents another raid on the General Fund by corporate interests. [I will recall the reader to my previous exposure of the fund categories and the class interests that underly them - which upset the superintendent enough to most unceremoniously try to unsuccessfully shut me down in a public meeting last year.]

So what have we seen? Nothing but the continuing deception of the district who claims to put the child first, who claims that they are committed to student excellence in learning all the while hiding their true aims - that of supporting the current capitalist exploitative structures in gutting the public school system.

Our students are being sold down the river in an increasingly stressful environment that is conducive to anything but genuine learning. Our teachers have been deprived of their defenses by a union that speaks the language of the district. All the current leaders we have been handed down by history continue to manipulate us, isolate us, divide us and ultimately betray us. Where do we go from here?

I believe the first step is to reject the program of the district - reject this budget - completely. We need to come together to create a budget and program for our schools based on the broad interests of students, teachers and the average working person in our community. We started this work in the Bellevue Public Library recently. Much remains to be done. I ask anyone interested in developing this critical understanding of the social process happening around the public school to please contact me so we can continue to develop our own informed plan for a sound public school system for Bellevue.

A sham survey from a district in hiding

2011-07-07T15:13:00.000-07:00

The Bellevue School District has come up with another community survey purportedly to find out how we would like to receive communication from the district. This attempt at posturing reveals itself as a way to validate the district's continued hiding from the public.

The district - along with the teachers union - is clearly intent on making drastic cut backs on education. The recent 1.9% pay cut handed to teachers come on the heels of significant lay offs, health care premium increases over the last two years. Last year, the district officials called several large meetings where the superintendent and members of her cabinet tried to explain the reasons for their attacks on our children's education.

This year, the large meetings where the officials - including the superintendent who runs a private company related to education - have to stand up and face the public have been eliminated. It is clearly because the district finds it difficult to keep lieing. As a community, we have been tempered by the continued erosion of the public school over which these officials have presided. We have discussed and written about these issues and analyzed the reasons for their actions. We have exposed them for deceivers and in fact determined that this is in fact their whole job - deception of the public.

So today, faced with the prospect of facing a politically conscious community, the district hides. As it hides, it tries to build cover for its hiding using a survey. The survey is meant to give us the illusion that the district is clueless about the most effective method of imparting information to us. The fact that they have more than a clue is clear from the single choice they omit in this particular question number 10:

We are not allowed to vote on a choice such as : Hold public meetings where the superintendent and her cabinet addresses the public.

The superintendent has replaced the larger public meetings with "Coffee Meetings". These are small meetings set deliberately in a cordial setting where the superintendent can never be challenged. The smaller number of people cozying up to the superintendent over a warm cup of coffee do not create an atmosphere of accountability for the district officials. Clearly that is why the coffee meetings are the district favorites this year.

In a large public meeting where the district officials are on stage with us plebeians below them, the separation is clear. We instinctively feel that the two sets have different interests, opposing interests. They are on stage to dismantle our children's education by whatever means they can, and we are there to ensure our children get a high quality education.

Over coffee, with a smiling superintendent to your left, it is easy to forget this. And in this setting, the superintendent also has considerable help from a small group of parents who support the district. We saw this happen once with what I called the "center table phenomena" where a small group of parents kowtow to the district and attempt to stop public discussion of key issues. These parents are not just misguided, they have connections to the district, they have relationships built with the high up officials of the district as well as possible ties to moneyed interests intent on privatizing public education. In a large setting, these parents do not have the nerve to shut down the democratic voice of the people, but they are certainly emboldened in a setting where they hold well over a quarter of the attendance.

It is also quite troubling that the district is aware that these surveys can be taken multiple times by a single person. If the superintendent or one of her friends from the "center table" wants a certain outcome, she can take the survey multiple times and tilt the results.

Following is the result of the short email conversation I had with Jacqueline Coe - Director of Communication and Community Engagement of BSD - which clearly shows that the district is aware of possible breaches and is indifferent to them:

Their indifference to the quality of the survey is similar to the contempt shown to the non-English speaking population who according to them must wade through a full page comprising twelve questions in English, and somehow miraculously know to answer in the affirmative to this question that is the third on the second page of the survey:

As these halfhearted attempts show, the district is trying hard to appear friendly. But a politically conscious community is never fooled by wolves in sheep's clothing. As the district continues these attacks, they will at some point be forced to discard the sheep skin. We need to be prepared because anger alone will not be sufficient to save our schools. We must mobilize independently to create our own plan for a public school system, give a voice to our hard working teachers and take up this fight for the sake of our children's future. It is of paramount importance to wrest leadership from reactionary groups like PAGE, the PTA so that our independent strength can be realized.

thank you.

PTA : Who really drives this organization?

2011-06-01T22:56:00.000-07:00

The Parent Teacher Association (PTA) is a familiar face on the public school and many of us associate it with helpful parents lending their time and money to schools, teachers and the class room. However, like most organizations, this group has a certain hierarchical leadership with definite characteristics/tendencies along with a larger number of members who fall in line with the demands made by the leadership. In this article, we shall explore this organization in more detail so we can come to a better understanding as to how it operates and what our relationship to it should be.

Perhaps we can start by looking at a most recent effort to solicit parent input driven by the Bellevue PTSA Council. All PTAs of Bellevue schools are hosted under the Bellevue PTSA and in turn, the PTSA's of all cities in the state of Washington align themselves with the priorities set by the WA State PTA. This in turn is a part of the National PTA thus compelled to follow its lead.

Parents of Bellevue got an email from their respective school PTAs around March 4th 2011 that said:

"The Bellevue PTSA Council requests that all PTA members and Bellevue public school parents complete the following survey. The purpose of the survey is to gauge the level of support for a Community Values statement that is currently being developed. The intent of the statement is to provide a data point to both the district and the union about what is important to Bellevue public school stakeholders."

This wording makes it clear that this survey is not the independent effort of the school PTA. The school PTA was simply the messenger. The message of the survey was - we are led to believe - crafted by the Bellevue PTSA.

The survey, unfortunately, is no longer available. It was largely asking the community whether it agrees with having "effective" teachers in schools and whether we support the implementation of various performance driven measures for teachers.

Since then, there has been a large enough backlash on PTA's efforts that the leadership decided to not publish the detailed results of the survey. I met with Linda Mui, Kristen Edelhertz, Carolyn Watson - President, Legislative Director, Secretary of the Bellevue PTSA respectively on May 31 2011 where they clarified that the survey has created a difficult climate specially with regards to teachers and they were trying to "put it behind them" - hence the reason to not publish the survey results.

Kristen Edelhertz presented me with a folder where the council members had "summarized" the comments of the community. Before the meeting, I was promised I could see the comments but that turned out to not be the case. This is the email I got from Linda Mui before the meeting that alluded to being able to go through the comments:

However, it was clear from my subsequent meeting with Linda, Kristen and Carolyn Watson that a large number of teachers correctly viewed the survey as an attack on their profession. Teachers felt - I was told - that parents would likely not be aware of the depth and breadth of issues around the public school system and that their answers to the survey could not but reflect that limited understanding.

This is of course true. What may seem as a simple system - the public school - is anything but. I have been researching the many aspects of the public school for the last two years and there are areas I have not yet begun to explore. Many of the policies driven by the Obama administration - which is really a continuation of the Bush policies with more punitive/incentive measures - are highly debated in intellectual circles. High stakes testing - where punitive measures are tied to the results of a test - has been critiqued by many scholars. Whether tying student scores to teacher evaluations could help student "performance" is another highly debated topic. Understandably, large numbers of parents do not understand these issues well, but the PTA survey quite clearly attempts to use the limited knowledge of parents to advance an agenda that deserves closer study.

It may come as a surprise that the PTA organization - that is widely viewed as the democratic voice of the community - has fallen behind the Obama administration's insistence that it is not chronic underfunding but "bad" teachers that is at the heart of the problems confronting the nation's schools. Many of the PTA membership loves our teachers - they spend countless numbers of hours helping teachers in the class room, on field trips, on special projects, conducting teacher appreciation efforts etc. So it is clearly not this wide membership that has decided to advance an agenda to hurt teachers. The agenda for the PTA has been borrowed from the state - it is clearly not the democratic voice of an informed membership.

As we have already seen, the survey was not designed by the individual PTAs of schools. While the wording of the initial email by the Bellevue PTSA serves to misguide us that the survey was the independent idea of the Bellevue PTSA, a barrage of negative feedback to the survey later compelled them to expose more of the role they played in the form of a letter to the community.

The Bellevue PTSA decided to respond to the negative feedback it received on April 17, 2011 by publishing a letter to the community where they admit that the survey was not even their independent idea. In this letter, Linda Mui explains that "We are bringing aspects of the State PTA legislative platform to the local level and following the lead of other PTA Councils in our area who have also engaged in local advocacy to gather and share parent voices with their negotiating parties."

So what is happening here is simply the extension of the state's agenda under the guise of representative democracy. The Washington State in turn - in their insistence on not allowing tax subsidies for big business to expire and hence claiming that there is a funding crisis in education - carries on the agenda of the Obama administration. By hiding behind groups like school PTAs - that at first glance seems to be democratic - these scoundrels implement their dictatorship on us and further insult us by calling it democracy.

The Bellevue PTSA letter to the community makes a strained claim - or suggestion - that teachers should sacrifice for the benefit of the children. PTA takes the claim made by the Obama administration that "there is no money" for public education as a given, an unquestionable first principle. In refusing to challenge this contemptuous lie, they can then do no more than pit teachers against students, pit younger teachers against the more senior teachers and divide the community all the while claiming that "working together we will continue to strengthen our schools." How such divisive efforts can help in their stated goal of collaboration with teachers is left unexplained.

Even assuming that there really is no money for education - which by the way is absolutely not the case - how can pitting teachers against students help? If my child's teacher has to finish school and rush to a second job, how can that help my child get a good education? If a teacher has to obsessively focus on tests and test results, would my child then be helped to inculcate a love of learning and how to be a life long learner? If younger - less expensive - teachers replace older teachers, would that not mean that these younger teachers would soon themselves leave, thus not being committed to teaching our children? Teacher attrition of this form is already quite clearly happening with Teach For America (TFA) recruits that are generally brought into replace more senior teachers.

As Linda Mui outlines in the community letter, the State PTA sought the input of two groups - "Stand For Children (Stand)" and the "League of Education Voters (LEV)" to come up with a values statement which was then submitted to the community as a survey. These two groups support legislative efforts aimed at stricter teacher evaluation. They support the privatization of public schools via charters, Stand quite openly and LEV with some ambivalence. They both have wealthy backers. A look into their annual reports as well as the IRS Form 990 of 2009 - required filing for non-profit groups - showed that a bulk of their funding comes from a few corporate sources. Thus - contrary to their claims, these are not grassroots organizations. [Since then, it appears the organizations - specially LEV - have tried their best to hide these sources, the 2009 report is not linked from their site and the donor composition has not been revealed for year 2010. Neither LEV nor Stand seem to have filed a Schedule B for the Form 990 - which must describe the largest donors and their contribution amounts - and I received no response to my subsequent query as to the missing Schedule B. But you can still find links from donor organizations that point their way. You may check on the 990's using this site.]

The turn to attack teachers by these well-heeled business interests is a reaction on their part to resolve the contradictions in the economy of their own making on the backs of our teachers, children and working families. While parasitic hedge funds gambled and lost trillions of dollars of wealth - social wealth, teachers struggled with increasing work loads and were asked to do even more. While big executives of Wall Street were bailed out handsomely, teachers were laid off and they were told that the nation needs "better" teachers to prepare for a "new" global economy. While hard working families in Detroit had their wages slashed with a turn to an even cheaper labor economy, teachers were told to deal with the "New Normal", the era of starving and getting by for the poor while the rich bloats themselves up to astronomical proportions. While not a cent more was used to alleviate the utter human misery that exists for millions of children - teachers returned home from their second job and corrected home work done under lamp light when utilities were cut off for hundreds of thousands of working class families. As Washington State Billionaires including Steve Ballmer, Paul Allen and Jeff Bezos spent $6.3 Million to successfully defeat I1098 - the initiative to tax the richest 10% - teachers dived into their meager savings to buy clothes and supplies for homeless students. When the comfortable upper middle class functionaries of the PTA sent surveys attacking teachers to trap unwary parents, teachers continued to teach our children and shelved their tears - for they knew through bitter experience that even walls had ears.

In stating that the negative feedback received from the community regarding the survey prompted them to revise the Community Values Statement, the PTA once more attempts to deceive us. This statement is meant to make us think that the PTA leadership took out the harmful aspects from the statement. In fact, a closer look at the final Community Values Statement reveals that no such thing took place.

The values statement was made shorter by lumping a few of the regressive measures together making no substantial difference from their initial draft. Evaluation systems for teachers and the attack on seniority rights are intact in the final values statement.

Kristen Edelhertz claimed that the survey revealed that large numbers of respondents supported the values and that is why no "major" revisions were made. However, the letter clearly states that the PTA received just 876 responses in a school district that is home to 17,870 students based on figures as of May 2010. Kristen takes the response of barely 5% of the community and decides that there is support for the views of the PTA leadership.

At this point, I'm sure that the famous "unconcerned parents" cry will be raised quite loudly. However, has the PTA done a single thing to make sure that more parents were aware of the issues concerning our public schools so that they will be inclined to respond to the survey? In a school district where 9% of students study English as a second language and 30% of students speak a first language other than English, was any attempt made to translate the survey to other languages? In a district of vast inequality highlighted by 22% of its students using Free and Reduced Priced Lunch services, was any attempt made to send the survey in non-electronic form?

The answer to all those questions is a resounding No. A teacher confided in me that the survey had the feel of a "push poll" and thus she did not take it. Push-poll is a technique that attempts to influence or alter the view of respondents under the guise of conducting a poll where the data gathered is of secondary importance. I myself did not take the poll for similar reasons.

Unfortunately, this is not the first instance that the PTA has shown its hidden agenda of backing the undemocratic policies of the state to the direct detriment of the community.

Last year, the PTA was strictly opposed to any form of community education regarding school budget and its inequitable allocation. Once I understood the issues in March 2010, I appealed to the PTA to make this information available to parents. Carolyn Watson effectively blocked this initiative by kowtowing to the elite of the city that controls much of the local school policies. Ms. Watson put me in touch with such pleasant personalities like Janet Suppes - the former president of the Bellevue PTSA Council. Apart from Shirley, none of these people were in our local PTA, but it was quite clear how the local PTA was supposed to kowtow to their point of view which wasn't enthusiastic about educating the community. The main view of this group was that I should work within their reactionary organization - the PTA - and help them with their various legislative efforts and get my voice "heard" by "important" people in legislature and so forth. There was no need to educate the community, as far as they saw, but apparently we must spend large amounts of time educating these "important" people who should know more about these issues than us, as that - in fact - is their well paid job.

Here is how Ms. Watson at that time showed her allegiance to this elite set while marginalizing an issue of paramount importance - that of educating the parent community on school related issues:

This year, while the district has run from the community fearing questions from informed parents, effectively delegating this work to a civilian police that calls themselves "Parents Alliance For Gifted Education (PAGE)", what indeed has the PTA done to make the district hold the necessary public meetings where the public can educate themselves on the wrecking job of the district? What has the PTA done to expose the sham that goes on in the Community Engagement Forums conducted by the district?

Of course the PTA claims that the state has no money for public eduction and that teachers are not doing a good enough job - which are nothing but the parroted lies of the Obama administration - are easy enough to see through. The harder problem is then to figure out how to move forward as concerned parents. How do we ensure that this reactionary organization does not hijack the community's desires for a decent public school system?

Parents clearly see lots of issues confronting their children in the class room. But there is not a single voice that tries to educate us about them in an insightful way. Instead we are left to grope around our immediate concerns amid a set of increasingly loud voices that tell us that teachers are the problem - get rid of the "bad" ones and things will be better, they insist.

And this presents us - the average parent who wants to do the right thing - with a rather difficult problem. If the PTA is advancing the agenda of the state without critique, how do we start learning about the reality of the class room, what teachers face daily and how it affects our children? We cannot expect an organization that uncritically tows the line up and down the education food chain to help us understand these issues. We must turn to our rank and file teachers for this understanding.

But here again, we are faced with another perhaps even more difficult problem. Teachers - like any persecuted group - are fairly hesitant to openly discuss the issues they face. Sometimes they are mandated to teach in ways that they know is not the best for our children, but they must do so if they are to keep their jobs. Teachers need all our support and one way we can support them is by an unflinching critique of the policy work of the PTA. A lack of critique would make teachers think that most parents are behind the PTA agenda and that is not the case.

But that is not all that we need to do. If we wash off our hands by critique, we are no worse than those elected officials that insist we must write yet more pointless letters to the same crooks that are hell-bent on destroying the last vestige of a decent public education system. Moving forward, there is an urgent need to come together as a concerned group of parents, teachers and students to organize and develop our independent plan for a sound public school system. We started this work in the Bellevue Public Library recently. Much remains to be done. I ask anyone interested in developing this critical understanding of the social process happening around the public school to please contact me so we can continue to develop our own informed plan for a sound public school system for Bellevue.

thank you.

Stand For Children – Who do they really stand for?

2011-05-18T22:00:00.000-07:00

Stand For Children is a group funded by corporate interests and certain wealthy individuals with high stakes in the education market. Since its inception in 1996 it has been active in a number of states lobbying and gathering support for certain K-12 education initiatives. In particular, the group supports the Obama administration’s drastic cuts to the quality of education, which is touted as “education reform”. Thus when the years 2009-2010 saw an unprecedented number of school closures, teacher layoffs, cutbacks on programs and services essential to students, Stand proudly claims in its 2009 annual report that “Stand made a BIG difference in 2009 and early 2010”.

The group has a charitable arm carrying the 501(3)(c) status known as the “Stand For Children Leadership Center” as well as a political arm called simply “Stand For Children” filed under 501(4)(c) status. The law prohibits a 501(3)(c) firm from substantial political activity. Stand For Children is quite clearly a group that aggressively lobbies for education initiatives in the legislative arena and as such requires a 501(4)(c) filing status to conduct such activities. As its 990 forms for 2009 show, the bulk of funding - $5,499,200 - is raised through the charitable arm which provides a tax deduction for donors, whereas a mere $546,095 is raised through the political arm. [You can find the 990 forms by querying:

http://dynamodata.fdncenter.org/990s/990search/esearch.php]

In its 2009 annual report, Jonah Edelman, the CEO of the organization, identifies the lack of qualified teachers as the fundamental problem facing public schools. Mr. Edelman iterates the basic thrust of Stand to “getting great teachers and principals in our schools and ensuring that they have the support, the freedom, and the compensation they need to do their best work.” Clearly he is arguing that there are inadequate teachers in public schools, there is a lack of support for great teachers and finally that there is a need for greater compensation for the better teachers. He follows quickly that this would also require a commitment to apply “consequences for consistently ineffective teachers and principals”.

There is a system already in place to fire consistently ineffective teachers in the public school. A teacher is granted tenure only after three years. Before this time, a principal can fire a teacher without due process. About half of all new teachers leave the profession within the first five years showing the demanding nature of the job. Contrary to popular misconception spread by the mainstream media, tenured teachers can be fired but they are entitled to due process. It prevents an administrator from arbitrarily firing a teacher who has clearly shown a commitment to the public school for more than three years. Clearly Stand finds this setup less than adequate.

Stand For Children is lobbying to pass bills that would allow administrators to layoff the “least effective” teachers rather than the most junior teachers. It is a strong supporter of SB 5399 in the state of Washington. SB 5399 attacks seniority rights and allows for the firing of the higher paid, more senior teachers. It is – in Stand's own words - a “Great Schools Bill”.

In the state of Indiana, Stand supported a similar bill – SB 1 and conducted a carefully worded poll to get public support for its regressive measures.

How can the community refuse to lay off the least effective teachers instead of the more effective ones? Clearly the community wants the most effective teachers in the class room. As we have shown, it is highly likely that the demanding nature of the profession self-selects the best and most effective teachers in the first five years, if not sooner. Thus the demand now to insist that this is not enough and that the state must mount a further punishment on top of this is due to an altogether different reason. And that is the sustained drain on the education budget and the refusal of the Obama administration to fund public education as it allows the bankers and big corporations to loot the treasury.

It is a lot cheaper to fire the better paid more senior teachers. Regardless of how much more experienced they are, regardless of how much commitment they have shown to the public school, regardless of how much students have come to know and develop relationships with – they are just not “economical” in a system where labor is simply a commodity to be exploited to the maximum possible by the super rich. Insistence on the need to fire the less effective teachers is thus simply a ploy to fire the on-average more effective senior teachers.

Due to the ongoing economic recession resulting from the financial crisis of Nov 2008, there is a severe lack of funding for K-12 throughout the country making for a sustained effort in the part of the Obama administration to lower teacher salaries and further drive down the quality of life of teachers. Firing the teachers who are more expensive to keep is part and parcel of this strategy of underfunding public education. Stand For Children demonstrates its basic alignment with this cruel strategy that ultimately harms the students as teachers start leaving a profession where they cannot guarantee any sort of stability based on their demonstrated commitment to the profession.

Race To The Top program allows for the closing of schools, firing all or half of its staff, conversion to a charter school if a school does not meet Yearly Adequate Progress (AYP) criteria. Rather than address the vast social problems that confront the students in poor communities where these punitive measures have now become routine, RTTT removes even the highly limited resources provided thus delegating a large section of poor children and youth to a life of poverty and crime. Stand For Children is an ardent supporter of this despicable policy as evidenced by its ready embrace of the same. In its 2009 report, Stand highlights legislative victories in Massachusetts that give superintendents “targeted intervention powers to quickly turn around failing schools” as well as changes made in Washington legislature that enables it to punish struggling schools with this “turn around” model.

The evidence that underperformance in students/schools is tied largely to economic factors is undisputed. In a society rife with a despairing economic gulf between vast wealth and utter misery, the poor students of this country have almost insurmountable obstacles that they struggle to overcome every day. While the government-based social programs for the poor have continued to dwindle, the public school has over the years stepped up to provide a highly limited set of services – like free/cheaper lunch options, student counseling and other social services. Now with Race To The Top, the Obama administration prepares to remove even those highly limited functions of the school amounting to a naked attack on a most vulnerable section of our society – poor children. And Stand For Children stands in awe as can be seen by Jonah Edelman’s address on Stand’s 2008 Annual Report : “President Obama and the team he has assembled will lead well. Not perfectly, but well and certainly boldly. But whether this time of great peril becomes an era of vital progress depends as much on whether we step up, as our forebears did, as on President Obama’s leadership.”

Since then, Stand’s support for the Obama administration is less vocal, undoubtedly due to the growing community/teacher backlash on this reactionary agenda. However Stand’s support for “turnarounds”, increasing charter caps of key states, support for firing teachers without due process, attacking seniority, establishment of a steep pay hierarchy in schools make it all too evident that Stand is supportive of these policies that are unarguably harmful to the most vulnerable of the nation’s children.

Despite its claims to be a “grass-roots” organization, Stand does not have wide support in the communities it serves. As can be seen from its financial statements, the bulk of its funds comes from a few sources – and they are all organizations and individuals connected to wealth. Stand’s 2009 Annual Report shows that out of its total revenue of $5.5 M at least $1.5M (27%) came from three organizations and three individual families. This includes the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation as well as the ACCIO Education Grant setup by Helios Education Foundation which itself was formed in 2004 after the sale and acquisition of a student loan/services company by Sallie Mae – the student loan giant.

The organization is thus propped up because this wealthy elite recognizes the advantage in removing the input of teachers from the education process, which then allows this handful of key individuals to make decisions regarding education very simply, without consulting parents or teachers. This creates a vast opportunity for wealthy backers to invest and make substantial profits in the increasingly privatized education market place.

A key step in removing the voice of the teacher from the discussion around schools is the attack on the more experienced, senior and thus tenured teacher. If such a teacher can be made afraid of the prevailing political trend of “reform”, there will be a hesitancy to speak out when disastrous policies are suggested by the administration. This in fact is what the wealthy elite interested in the moneymaking possibilities of education is eying. Democracy and labor rights to them are mere trifles, needless obstructions to do away with as fast as possible.

But does all this help children? To think that doing away with democracy helps education is to give preference to elitist – even dictatorial – rule. And to say that business people - Big Business at that - know what works in the classroom better than teachers, is an insult not only to teachers, it is an insult to the intelligence of the American people.

The American people – contrary to what Stand may think– have not forgotten that Big Business not only does not know the next thing about education but that they are unable to save the economic system of their own creation without massive government subsidies and outright bailouts. We saw how these hedge funds and mega banks had no compunction in asking for taxpayer help after following decades of speculation and outright fraud, they brought ruin on themselves. We also saw how the government at that time did not insist on figuring out “what works” but scrambled to provide whatever was being demanded.

That reckless act of the government, quite predictably did not solve any of the contradictions that gave rise to the Nov 08 crash. The gigantic hedge funds, banks and the whole parasitic network of financial thiefdoms are increasingly unable to invest profitably due to these contradictions and thus large sections of them have turned to education as a reliable place to invest. Stand is simply a front organization that they fund in order to achieve these objectives on two fronts, first on education legislature, second on the minds of a community that is feeling the brunt of the economic crisis and increasingly looking for answers.

That the market for K-12 is sizable can be seen from reports published by various research firms. For example, Outsell Corporation came up with a report putting the K-12 market at $23.7 Billion in 2007, a 3.6% increase over 2006. The report states at the start: “The US K-12 Education segment, as defined in this report, grew 3.6% in 2007 to reach $23.7 billion. It was dominated by state, district, and school spending on assessment and enterprise software and technology services, as No Child Left Behind (NCLB) continued to leave its mark on the industry.”

Stand is fully supportive of the assessment (testing) infrastructure being expanded across all states, a key priority for them in 2010 being “Improved teacher and principal evaluation systems by using multiple measures to distinguish teachers and principals, a four-tier rating scale…”. In an open letter to Washington residents, Stand lists as its Number 3 priority - “Building 21^st-Century Data Systems”.

In fact, the 2009 statistics at http://www.edreform.com/Fast_Facts/K12_Facts/ shows that only 28% of all K-12 education funding is expensed as teacher salaries. In the city of Bellevue, WA, the Capital Fund and Bond Payments both made up close to half of the 2010-11 budget. Both these funds are absorbed by the private sector for the many services rendered to the public school as a result of increasing privatization of the school. Only 34.74% of the district budget is being used for teacher salaries and benefits. A close study of school budgets throughout the state would show that a substantial amount of the budget is already diverted to private companies. Thus any "in-efficiency" touted by the reformers must first be addressed where the bulk of this funding is channeled to.

There is an urgent need to reevaluate if increasing privatization has helped the school or rather hastened its decay. This is all the more urgent as we clearly saw in Nov 2008 how inept the private sector has been with regard to preserving its capital. But Stand sees the subsequent economic devastation as an “opportunity” to further strengthen the privatization agenda, reduce teacher autonomy and move towards a dictatorial model in running our public schools. But opportunity for whom? – Clearly for whom Stand really stands for which are certainly not the children.

Committee for K-12 Education (Apr 27, Bellevue Public Library, Room 1, 7-9 pm)

2011-04-11T21:39:00.000-07:00

Please join us for an open public meeting at the Bellevue Public Library, Room 1 on April 27th from 7 - 9 pm where we will form a neighborhood committee to develop a comprehensive plan for K-12 public education.

Some may ask the question - "Why form a committee ourselves, does the district not do this work?" While the district does have a strategic committee, and it is tasked with developing a plan for K-12, its past track record does not convince us that the outcome will be one that would serve the needs of students, teachers or parents.

Developing a plan that addresses our diverse needs will not be a simple task. The biggest road-block to creating such a plan is the current existence of divisions that pit different parent groups against each other, students against teachers and teachers against parents. These divisions are accepted and gently encouraged by the practices of the currently predominant advocacy groups. The district utilizes the creative energies of such splintered advocacy groups to create the illusion of democracy. Creating an independent committee seeks to address these problems.

Looking at the devastation the district has done to public education to date, the interests of the district seem to narrow down to two main items:

1) Taking any and all possible measures to reduce the quality of education given the state mandated budget cuts. These include but are not limited to increasing class sizes, reducing teacher salaries forcing them to take additional jobs, increasing fees for athletics, cutting down arts and athletics programs.

2) Create a strict high-stake testing regime and re-focus education from learning to test taking. The test results are used to constantly measure and punish students as well as teachers, thus creating a hostile environment for teachers and specially those involved with disadvantaged student groups.

These interests are in stark contrast to the interests of students, teachers and parents. We reject the notion that there is "no money" for public education and that cuts need to happen. We will show the $15 Billion of funds the state loses yearly due to tax subsidies it provides to big business. The state budget deficit for 2011-13 is less than one third of this at a $4.6 Billion. The K-12 deficit for the same period is only $2.2 Billion. Quite clearly there is money, it is the priorities set up by those in power that reduces the money for public education. [Seattle Times article, Crosscut article, LivingGreedy trade ins]

When Governor Gregoire mentioned "making difficult choices" regarding the 2011-13 budget, she quite remarkably overlooked these tax subsidies.

After answering the question of nay-sayers who say "there is no money", we can turn to formulating the plan. What we require from K-12 public education can be summed up along the lines of:

1) A well-rounded education, funded adequately where arts, athletics play a role every bit as important as math, science and reading.

2) Our senior teachers with much experience should be valued and compensated fairly for their understanding of children and proven teaching ability. We do not want to see young college graduates who commit to teaching a year or two replace senior teachers as a matter of "economy".

3) We realize that there is a wide range of abilities in a group of students and to teach every child well it is important to have small class sizes. Students needing extra help should continue to receive special needs assistance and academically more skilled students need the Highly Capable Program.

4) Due to the additional difficulties faced by students from families with low income, we believe schools should continue supporting social services programs.

5) We see the value of counselors, librarians and school nurses as integral to the public school system. We realize that reductions in these services hit the poorer students much harder and thus cannot be separated from public education that strives to be equitable.

Thus, we will form a committee and create a K-12 plan that serves our interests. We will present this plan to the wider community and show how the 2011-13 state/district budget can be utilized for implementing the plan. By working outside the influence of the district, we will be able to create a plan capable of garnering wide support in the community.

References:
http://www.eoionline.org/tax_reform/reports/EverybodyElseGetsOne-Apr08.pdf (Analysis by Economic Opportunity Institute on tax breaks/subsidies in the state of WA)

http://www.eoionline.org/tax_reform/fact_sheets/NewRevenueOptions-Jan2011.pdf (Outlines how ~ $4B revenue can be realized by removing selected tax breaks)

The looming budget crisis and fairy tales from the district

2011-03-18T11:01:00.000-07:00

Washington State governor Christine Gregoire's proposed K-12 education budget cut for 2011-13 stands at $2.2 Billion a little short of 3 times the cut ($800 Million) made in 2009-11. About 1,084 new students enrolled in the Bellevue School district in 2009-11 according to data from OSPI. But around 108 school personnel was let go during this period. Around 84 of them were class room teachers. As the district budget FAQ for 2009-11 (pdf) shows, the librarian positions of middle and high schools were eliminated and out of three high schools, two of them had counseling positions reduced.

We need to expect an evisceration of services about 3 times as much for the coming two years. It is likely to be even more as local education levies - that try to make up for funding cuts by increasing property taxes - do have a more difficult time passing due to a depressed housing market, cost of living increases and a severe and persistent unemployment situation. Even if the education levies pass, with high rates of foreclosures and depressed value for houses, they may not collect nearly enough revenue.

Under these bleak and frightening prospects, the Bellevue School District has organized a Strategic Plan Advisory Committee to decide how they could implement the necessary changes so the schools can function with a lot less funding. The strategy group works in two distinct settings. The first setting is a private meeting of the committee members where they decide on goals, priorities and action plans that are in line with the strategy of the district. The second setting is a public meeting where all interested community members can come in and hear the work being done by the committee as well as provide their input into the process. These two groups meet about once each month.

It is instructive to peruse the committee meeting notes that are published on the BSD web site. The first set of notes (pdf) introduces Mr. James Randle as the facilitator of the process and makes it clear that it is Mr. Randle's business skills, which he learnt at the Harvard Business School, that are primarily being sought here. Clearly, subordinating the interests of students and teachers to the needs of "business" is at the heart of the plan.

Next, the committee is told that their work must align with the guiding principles set out by the School Board. No less than eight guiding principles are outlined.

1) Excellence
2) Equity
3) Accoutability
4) Collaboration
5) Quality Teaching and Learning
6) Innovations and Continuous Improvement
7) Diversity
8) Balancing the Budget

However, the track record of the Superintendent and the district in following these guiding principles is poor, to say the least, except in the last principle of balancing the budget. Quite clearly they see this as well and thus in their meeting notes they do not refer to the eighth goal as "Balancing the Budget" but use the much more arcane phrase of "Resource Stewardship".

Truth be told, as far as the state is concerned, the only job of the school district is balancing the budget. To do this without provoking the ire of the community is what they are paid to do.

Last year, the district demonstrated their commitment to "Equity" by closing down a special education school - Robinswood - where children who had been transferred have shown a steady improvement. But as part of their commitment to "Innovations and Continuous Improvement", they re-purposed the school building to create the "Big Picture School" that certainly does not cater for special needs students.

In the committee meeting notes, Dr. Cudeiro talks at length on closing the achievement gap. Robinswood Mid/High school was making steady progress in closing the achievement gap without sending students to juvenile detention centers or prisons. With Robinswood being closed, Dr. Cudeiro must have a new method to bring down the achievement gap, which she has so far not elaborated upon. However, let us think what might happen to the previous students of Robinswood as they get integrated back into their old school.

Some students of Robinswood, due to emotional problems, have had run-ins with the law in their previous school setting. Sometimes, this was the reason for their transfer to Robinswood where a smaller class size and a highly dedicated staff proved capable of supporting this student group to improve their academic skills. Thus, Robinswood saved these students from spending time in a juvenile detention center or a prison. Now with Robinswood gone, it is likely that a portion of these students end up back in jails. There is no juvenile detention center or prison for students in Bellevue. Students deemed necessary to be housed in such places will be moved to Seattle or Issaquah. Then their scores - on which achievement data is based upon - will not appear in the statistics of the Bellevue School District.

But of course, all this was done last year. The budget cuts are becoming more severe, rising poverty at the low income brackets are causing severe stress on the social services provided by the district. Much more stringent measures will need to be developed in the coming two years to deal with it. And that in a nut shell is the agenda of the district.

From going through the committee meeting notes, it is clear that the committee is driving the district's agenda, which is figuring out how to keep schools running under a serious reduction of budget. The committee's focus on "Accountability" for students and teachers bring to light the methods they are thinking of using to cope with this budget reduction. At the heart of the strategic plan is to figure out how to use technology as a tool to increase class size, focus on "core" subjects, by which they plan to reduce support for arts, history and language studies, reduce teacher salary and benefits overall while perhaps creating a high salary bracket for the few teachers who agree with the district's brand of teaching.

The community engagement forum is supposedly a venue where this reality is explained to us. However, the March 9th forum certainly did not attempt to do that. Mr. Randle insisted that we not think of the pending budget cuts but think of how to build our "dream school".

These meetings are quite different from the committee meetings. The district is clearly capitalizing on the lower political consciousness of the community in order to read us a fairy tale. While the actual work of gutting the class room, stripping teacher rights and their dignity is underway in the Strategic Committee, in the engagement forums the community is being lulled to sleep. We are given the illusion that we can participate in a democratic process to build a "dream school" while they are busy creating what should more appropriately be termed as a nightmare for our children and teachers.

It is vital that parents, teachers and students correctly understand the process at work here. We cannot rely on the district to build us good schools. We must make our own plan, taking our interests as the starting point. I ask you to attend a public meeting at the Bellevue Public Library, Room 1 on April 27th, 2011 from 7 -9 pm where we will form our own independent committee to plan such a process.

thank you!

Community Engagement Forums - A Democratic Cover for a Top-down Approach

2011-03-10T22:27:00.000-08:00

The Bellevue School District held its fourth Community Engagement Forum for the school year on March 9th at the Sammamish High School. It was attended by around forty members of the community consisting mostly parents, some teachers and librarians. From the start, the speaker - James Randle - proceeded to narrow down the focus of the participants to the goals that the district had already decided upon. This meeting, just like all other community meetings held by the district, attempts to put a Democratic stamp of approval on a top-down method of governing the public school.

Mr. Randle insisted that this was an opportunity for the community to create the "dream school". A librarian in the audience voiced her concern that with impending budget cuts, a more prudent approach may be to identify what programs should be kept vs what should be cut. That this request came from a librarian is indicative of the sustained attack they have faced in the last two years. They likely see further cuts and are politically more motivated to resist them.

The concern was voiced that input from the members would be used by the district as justification for the cuts. The concern a number of members had was that, with large budget cuts looming, the input from the community could be manipulated to justify cuts.

For example, if more participants insist on focusing on math, science - that may be given as a reason to cut the Arts program.

The proposed 2011-13 cuts to K-12 for the state of Washington stand at $2.2 billion almost 3 times that was cut from K-12 in 2009-11. The effects to BSD of a $800M state cut in 2009-11 would thus be magnified almost 3 times in the coming two year period. We lost 84 teachers in 2009-11 while adding 1,098 new students. Middle/High school librarians were completely removed. High school counselors were reduced. What would an impact three times this much mean?

Dr. Randy Stocker tried to reassure the audience that it was not the intention of the meetings to build rationale for cuts. He explained that with community input, even under a tight budget, they will be better able to create more efficiencies in a manner that benefited schools.

The word efficiency - synonymous with the disastrous policy of increasing class size - was used multiple times by Mr. Randle as well.

Unfortunately, the argument of Dr. Stocker and Mr. Randle ultimately does not convince. To accept their argument that it is possible to make better schools under a reduced budget, we must accept that schools are over-funded for the tasks they do at the moment. However, our experience with teachers and our children is a crying vindication of the exact opposite : teachers struggling with increasing class sizes, a percentage of students bored as a single teacher finds it difficult to motivate across a wide range of learning ability in a class of 30+ students, teachers forced to do multiple jobs to make ends meet with stagnant salaries and increasing health care costs.

To accept Mr Randle's and Dr. Stocker's argument, we have to accept that some tasks of the school either can be eliminated or can be done at a lower cost. However, the district does not feel it prudent to name them at this stage as that would cause a split in the community members giving input to the process. Thus the district allows the illusion to persist that it would be possible to take all the input of the community and make a "dream school" to everyone's liking - a task that is mathematically impossible.

Mr. Randle's other argument is that when state and district funding dry up, we must turn to other funding sources like the business community and philanthropic foundations. He did not care to explain what the public school would be giving up when it becomes beholden to funds from the business sector.

Under a deepening economic recession, there are fewer high-end jobs being created. The business sector is finding it profitable to pay people less to do more and they are determined to permanently drive down wages. What they need from schools is a mass of students just adequately tooled in working in their offices and factories for as low a wage as possible. A high quality education, with deep analytical skills, is not being demanded by the business sector. And when the public school takes their money, they will insist in exactly that kind of student to be produced by the school system. When the public school takes their money, they strike a bargain with the devil, and it accelerates the dumbing down of the curriculum and deskilling of students.

According to the introduction given by the superintendent (pdf), James Randle comes with a degree from Harvard Business School where he learnt what the district calls "Strategic Planning". It is clear that his role is to guide the conversation on business lines where this sort of "strategy" belongs. While Mr. Randle had been a teacher, it is clear from his career moves that he is more attracted to the business aspect of education. He is a person the administration can count on to cut the quality of education by using the principles of business.

No effort was spared to show the transparency of the process. I objected to this rationalization of transparency as I have first-hand information of teachers who are terrified to voice their opinion. Senior teachers specially have become favorite targets of the district. I said that Mr. Randle would first have to make an environment where teachers are not penalized for voicing their opinions before suggesting that there is any transparency in the current scheme of things.

At this point a woman from the center table - who identified herself as a parent - said that teachers are giving their input and that this proves that they are not terrified. A couple of teachers expressed that indeed they need to be careful in how they approach the district with their views as the district is trying to cut back. However, this testimony of teachers did not seem to convince the parent that teachers did fear to voice their opinion.

Mr. Randle asked the participants to come up with their subjective view on the proficiency level of a student at each grade level. The participants were placed in groups of four, and each group had to write down three requirements for a grade level of their choice.

A number of parents had questions as to whether they were qualified to make these decisions. Mr. Randle assured that it did not matter, all they had to do was write what they felt was appropriate.

Members in the audience proceeded to query both speakers on such issues when suddenly a parent from the table at the center rose up and made an impassioned plea for everyone to stop the questions and support the district in what they are doing so that "we all can get on with it". This was quite surprising as this parent did not seem to understand that there was a real reason that parents wanted to ask deeper questions without blindly setting up on a task.

By this time, it was clear that the parents at the center table had a special relationship with the district. They seemed to be the most closely aligned with the agenda of the district and least likely to find fault with it. They would also be the first group to shut down the democratic voice of others.

Later, a speaker from each table presented their decisions to the audience. Revealingly, even though the district had tried to keep the focus on achievement levels, there were a number of remarks the community made on the importance of funding programs and keeping smaller class sizes.

What is clear is that most parents instinctively feel that the district is leading them on. However, parents have yet to unite to form an independent committee and develop their independent plan. We call on all parents to support forming an independent committee.

The need to form independent committees

2011-02-27T15:34:00.000-08:00

The Bellevue School District is continuing to under-fund our public schools. The goal of the district is to balance the budget to the detriment of the students. Three years of their most vicious attacks on our students and teachers show that we cannot rely on them to do one thing on behalf of our students.

The Superintendent - Dr. Amalia Cudeiro - has shown a calculated ruthlessness in shutting down schools for our most vulnerable students. She has consistently used her authority over our schools to advance the interests of the for-profit educational company Targeted Leadership Consulting owned by her and her husband, Jeff Nelsen.

The Bellevue School Board is subservient to the needs of the district and in craven fashion rubber-stamps the decisions of the superintendent. They fully stand behind the goals of the district and the private interests of the superintendent. It is pointless looking towards them for help.

The PTSA Council and the PTA groups set up by different schools do not take efforts to educate the community about the willful destruction carried out daily by the district. Most of the time, the PTSA is a willing accomplice in these efforts. For example, they are currently backing the bill that encourages firing senior teachers from our schools.

The Teachers Union of Bellevue (Bellevue Education Association), very much like its counterparts in other cities, beholden to the rules set by National Education Association, has proven impotent in preventing the destruction of teacher jobs and a steady erosion of their economic condition.

Why are all these organizations supposed to serve our interests in fact working against them time after time? Why are they divisive and work only to support a narrow set of interests? Why is enrollment in such organizations low unless mandated via closed shop contracts? These are all questions that must be discussed and answered.

There is an urgent need to form new independent organizations that unite the community of parents, students and teachers to work for better schools where our children can excel. And it is impossible for our children to excel if teachers aren't provided a decent wage and freedom of expression. It is possible to unite the community once we start separating ourselves from the deeply divisive organizations that currently claim to represent us.

I will report on the situation as it unfolds without mincing words at http://bsdbudget.blogspot.com and I encourage you to look through the writing I have done over the last year. As we start organizing independently, I can bring these attempts to light and help explore the many ideas in an easily accessible form.

The deepening crisis of the state

2011-02-20T18:45:00.000-08:00

The above three graphs illustrate the severity of the crisis and how the policy planners of the state err on the severity each time the budget is made.

Each time, a rosy picture is painted two to three years into the future and people are asked to bear the pain presumably only up to that time. But each year, this rosy scenario is further postponed to another one more year, and we are asked to bear more pain.

And with the passage of time, the policy makers seem to forget the root of the crisis and those who are culpable. Indeed, Gregoire's first budget after the Nov '08 crisis names the financial institutions that precipitated the crisis, but the subsequent addresses given at the end of 2009, 2010 conveniently omits any mention of this aristocracy who has used the crisis to get immensely wealthy.

Here is the tiniest mention of culpability in her address at end of 2008:

At the end of 2009, the financial criminals have been forgotten. In fact it is impossible for Gregoire to blame them as the administration claims that they have been "bailed out" and the bail out money fully recovered. But if this is indeed the case, why has not the economy improved? After all, the official reason given for the bail out of the financial institutions was that it will improve the economy. However, two years later, the economy has continued to worsen as Gregoire readily acknowledges in her subsequent yearly addresses.

But the bailed out institutions are doing remarkably well. The executive compensation packages have reached their heady heights before the recession. Corporate profits have risen where wages have fallen.

In spite of all these objective facts, it is readily acknowledged that business taxes should not be increased. Washington State has sizable tax subsidies that are never adjusted to balance the budget. A handful of rich individuals carried out a successful campaign to defeat initiative 1098. The proposal would have imposed a tax on the adjusted gross income of individuals earning more than $200,000 and couples earning more than $400,000, beginning in 2012. Microsoft Corporation publicly opposed the initiative and likely advised its employees on its position and adverse impact to salaries if the initiative was passed. Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, Boeing, Russell Investments, Paccar Inc., software billionaire Charles Simonyi and members of the Nordstrom family opposed the initiative.

Interestingly enough, Bill Gates Sr, and Bill Gates supported the initiative. However, the Gates Foundation's forays into education - using such arms like the League of Education Voters (LEV) - have not gained the trust of the community. Groups like LEV, financially backed by the Gates Foundation are fully behind the nation-wide campaign to discredit teachers, strip them of seniority rights and water down curriculum. Their methods are un-democratic and underhanded. Clearly, even though they spent 6.1M$ surpassing the spending of 5.0M$ by the opposition, they could not convince the voters of the value of their brand of intervention in education or health services.

References:
http://www.nwcn.com/news/politics/AP-State-income-tax-Initiative-1098-fails.html

Seattle School Board : Who is Kay Smith-Blum?

2010-12-12T15:14:00.000-08:00

People of Seattle,

Lend me your ears for a moment (or eyes, at it may be) as I present to you the financial make-up of Kay Smith-Blum, one of your School Board Directors.

Much of this information is readily available at the SPS web site. There is an additional source of information that can be used to construct a more detailed picture. Those are the F-1 disclosure forms that the directors are required by law - oh that magnificent, decayed but still alive instrument - to file. The forms are public, and can be requested from the Public Disclosure Commission.

Here is the F-1:

First, notice that Smith-Blum does not state her personal residence for the mailing address, this is standard practice. The address here is of the specialty clothing store she owns.

But you can see that she started writing probably what was her home address and then changed her mind. We do see later that the scratched out address is either a property she owned that she since sold, or in fact her personal residence at the time of filing.

While this says that she sold this property, Ms. Smith-Blum does not list any property that she wholly or partially owns. Since it is highly unlikely that she lives in her clothing store, we think this is probably a mistake.

Using google maps, we can get an idea of the neighborhood of Smith-Blum's likely residence. While we do not have a good view of that residence, panning left gives a clear indication that this is an up-scale neighborhood.

Lastly, we see that Smith-Blum has no creditors. Most people with a house has a mortgage. Most small business have some loans. But we see here that Ms Smith-Blum is financially quite independent.

So let's ask ourselves the question - does Smith-Blum have the interests that are common to average working people? If not, then is it possible for her to represent the vast lot of people who have very different interests, specially at a time when the state seems hell-bent on removing every last bit of support less affluent people get?

Seattle! - Fight for a Representative School Board

2010-12-11T09:54:00.000-08:00

Dear Seattle residents, teachers, parents, students,

The time has come to understand the common problems our community faces at the hands of a few elite, who share none of our interests. The time has come to show them for who they are, who they serve. The time has come to form our own School Board, elected by us, from among us, in the spirit of true representative democracy.

What are the common interests of the Seattle community that have seen their schools destroyed, the curriculum trampled upon, good teachers transferred and let go in these past few tumultuous years? They are simply, preserving and enhancing a sound education for their children. What do they rely on to achieve this? They depend on a strong public school built on democratic values to achieve these aims. They do not possess the financial capabilities to cope with the current changes the administration is forcing on schools. They cannot easily pull their children out of a decaying school and transfer them to a private school. They do not like seeing the curriculum degraded and the chances of a good education and thus a decent job being deprived to their children. It is financially burdensome for them to send their children to after-school tuition (ex: Kumon). They find it difficult to pay increased fees for extra-curricular programs. They lack the business, political and other relationships that would allow their children a chance at social mobility. Thus, they depend primarily on a solid K-12 education followed by a university education to have a hope of assuring a decent livelihood for their children.

That is how the interests of the larger community, that at once appears diverse, are actually seen to have a high degree of commonality.

This majority community of Seattle relies on the Superintendent and the Seattle School Board to represent their interests. However, we ask, are the interests of these officials aligned with the interests of the community? If they are not, that would be problematic, as a group in power regularly advances its own interest. It is to mitigate these tendencies that we elect members of our community to serve local boards such as the School Board. But have we done a good enough job here? To answer this question, we now examine the interests of the School Board officials as a group.

A close look at the social position of these officials makes it clear that they belong in the upper middle class of society. The annual compensation for Superintendent Maria Goodloe-Johnson is in the 300,000$ range. Apart from this salary, she may get paid by different for-profit entities due to positions she holds in their boards (ex: NWEA). Michael DeBell is a managing general partner of Meverick Ventures, a family owned real-estate investment. Sherry Car is a financial leader at Boeing. Peter Maier is a leading private practice attorney with a graduate degree from Harvard Law School. Steve Sundquist has an extensive background holding executive roles in the Russel Investment Group. Kay Smith Blum is a former executive of Neiman Marcus and currently the co-owner and CEO of Butch Blum Inc, a European specialty designer-fashion store catering to the elite, where you could pick up a shirt for 400$. Harrium Martin-Morris is a Quality Assurance Manager at Boeing. Betty Pau is certainly the exception in this circle, a 30 year employee of the Seattle Public Schools.

Now that we realize the much higher financial capabilities of the Board, we can start examining their interests as a group. A good public school system is something they are interested in, no doubt. However, given a deteriorating public school and a less than adequate curriculum, they have more choices in avoiding their detrimental effect. Due to their financial position, they can choose the more affluent neighborhoods to live in, where due to higher property taxes, we find schools that are better funded. Their communities, having a higher number of single-earner families, are more engaged in the local PTA and play a remarkable role in managing sizable PTA funds for the best use of the schools as decided by the community. Thus they are somewhat immune from any mismanagement of funds by the SPS. Given a less than adequate curriculum, they are able to supplement the work of the teacher by after school private tuition and by spending time with their children. If their children face a problematic teacher, this group can wield their sizable influence in the business and political elite circles to change the situation for their children's advantage.

Thus, we see that the interests of the board are not necessarily aligned with the larger community. This is a result of their superior economic position giving them more choice, when it comes to their children and school.

However, there is a state budget deficit and the school board is asked to make cuts by their higher officials. Now, the school board will, naturally, work to minimize the impact of these cuts on their interests. And, unless the interests of the larger community are aligned with theirs, this results in them gravitating towards policies that harm the interests of the wider community. When the interests of the officials are aligned with those of the community, this poses no issue, and that is precisely why we value representative democracy. But we have just seen that the two groups have different, at times opposing, interests.

When faced with dividing a shrinking pie, everyone can't be a winner, and for the losses to be divided evenly, we need a true democratic representation in the body that decides the rations. And we clearly see we do not have this prerequisite in our School Board.

Faced with a shrinking or stagnant economy, the upper middle class faces severe competition from below. This likely makes them work even harder to limit the gains in education to the students of the upper middle class. They realize that a stagnant economy creates a larger number of low-skilled jobs and a fewer number of better paying ones. They want to, naturally, make sure their children preserve and build upon their current advantages in this race. This makes them want to work towards preventing the social mobility of the groups below them, in economic standing. They would much rather see poorer students being deprived a high paying job, than their kids falling down a rung in the economic ladder. This is a natural human instinct and we should not lose time blaming the School Board. What is required is for us to elect our own School Board with interests similar to ours.

Hereby, we have explained why we believe that the composition of the Seattle School Board is not representative of the wider Seattle Community that use its services. This is why we believe our interests are not served by this School Board. And that is why we must form a representative School Board, without delay.

In Part II of this article, we will attempt to lay out an appeal to the community to start forming a truly representative School Board. In the concluding Part III, we will discuss the challenges we are likely to face here and how to overcome them.

Diane Ravitch endorses KIPP and provides cover for the charter movement

2010-11-18T11:43:00.000-08:00

I have written about Dr. Diane Ravitch before. There are a number of groups claiming to support public education that sees Dr. Ravitch in a positive light. She has consistently played a role to advance the charter/privatization movement during her long public career. Each time when she comes out ostensibly in support of teachers and the public school at large, if you listen closely, you can spot the cover. The recent speech she gave at the invitation of KIPP provides us an excellent opportunity to uncover this tactic of Dr. Diane Ravitch. The full video of this speech that I will attempt to analyze is found here.

I came to know of the speech from the Facebook page of a group that calls themselves "Support Public Schools". It is an interesting group with an authoritarian method of filtering discussion. You should still be able to see parts of the discussion I had with the administrator of the site. In their wall, look for Dr. Ravitch's speech titled: "Diane Ravitch address TFA and KIPP on the reform movement."

Unfortunately, the most revealing comment of mine has been deleted. No public explanation was given as to why it was deleted. After my first comment (which is still not deleted), the administrator expressed strong disapproval without arguing about any of the points I made. Then I was asked to leave the forum. I asked them to "illuminate me" as to why I should leave. At this point I was asked to watch the video.

Now this is one long video. And as I had explained to the nice administrator, I had read Ravitch's book. Not only had I read it, I had read it well enough to find holes in her argument which I then attempted to articulate in my blog posting that I shared with "Support Public Schools". It was clear that much of what Dr. Ravitch would say in the speech would be re-iterations of the book.

But still, given a challenge, unlike the ego-centric leadership at "Support Public Schools", the humble person must oblige. So I took some time after work to go over the speech. And like I thought, the content was similar to the book, but I noticed that this particular speech had a certain thrust to it. It became pretty clear that Dr. Ravitch had carefully prepared the speech for KIPP supporters. It became pretty clear as the speech proceeded that Dr. Ravitch was giving recognition to KIPP as an exemplary charter.

And that is of course why KIPP invited her. KIPP very shrewdly realizes that along with the planned destruction of the public school, the competitive landscape of the complete school system (which includes private schools, charters and public schools) undergoes a shift.

[I have explained this to some extent in my article on privatization of the public school system, interested readers are asked to look at it, as I lay out the most likely path I can see where public education is headed without a serious opposition from regular people on the ground.]

One effect of the increasing disappearance of public schools is an inevitably increased level of competition among charters. KIPP wants to assure a leadership position here and they quite clearly attracts Dr. Ravitch to their camp for this reason. Dr. Ravitch's praise of KIPP goes along with the comment that "successful charter schools must share their methods with the public school". For any teacher who has seen how the public school has started using the "successful" methods of charters, this should indeed be chilling. But Dr. Ravitch seems oblivious, in her haste to curry favor with the "good" charters.

The truth is that the charter movement is first a business. It can remain a quality public service only after it has fulfilled the profit margin requirements of the various layers of investors in the movement who depend on the public trough to replenish their ill-gotten wealth, some of which they lost in the November 2008 crash by their own gambling ways.

Thus, it is a dangerous move to start praising a set of charters, as primarily, they are about profits and profit rates at the level deemed appropriate to finance capital. Education, if submitted to the profit rate, will deteriorate quickly as the business landscape deteriorates further in the deepest recession we have seen since the Great Depression. Even the most optimistic economists agree that we are not "out of the woods yet". Millions of people have lost their homes. Millions more stand to lose their homes this year and next. Property taxes all over have taken a massive hit. State budgets have been slashed to the bare bone. Military spending has sky rocketed surpassing 1 Trillion $ for 2010.

It is in this backdrop, we need to look at KIPP and the charter movement. What Dr. Ravitch does is to ignore this social/economic context and react to the events. Without explaining to the teachers the real economic reasons that cause the charter movement to invade the public schools, Dr. Ravitch lulls them to sleep by saying, in effect - "look all of these charters aren't bad. we should support the good ones. and may be you can learn from their ways..."

Teachers, specially with more seniority, largely do not believe her. They have bitter experience of how Dr. Ravitch's friend Albert Shanker, then head of AFT provided a cover for charters at their inception in 1980's. Dr. Ravitch, again oblivious to this history, in fact hints at this in her speech. Shanker then did what the union leadership does best - demoralize and confuse the teachers about the impossibility of preserving the public school system without "compromise" with the ruling class. So at the time Shanker said that teachers will be able to come together to create charters, so they should not oppose it. He played on the fear among the best teachers who were being stifled by the education bureaucracy, and got teachers to accept charters as an inevitable reality which he said could in fact help teachers as well.

Any one who has an iota of common sense of how the business world works should have been able to see through this cover. Imagine a group of teachers getting the funding, the political backing to start a charter when well connected sharks of corporate America has been given the nod to go wreck the public school - and by the union, most of all! What a fight between unequals, and what does it tell us about the leadership of the teachers unions, who to this date covers up for most of the atrocities of the administration?

Dr. Ravitch is a good friend of the teachers union leadership. She does not see a bungling, lieing, conniving approach. Just "unforeseen" events. Either way, a leadership that does not foresee events do not deserve to remain in their leadership role. It is time for teachers to remove these well-clothed ladies and gentlemen from their lofty citadels and start their struggle organically.

It is time to see Dr. Ravtich for who she is. She is no friend of the teachers. And I have attempted to tell you why, and I promise I will continue to do so at every opportunity I'm sure Dr. Ravitch will present us.

Deconstructing Dr. Diane Ravitch

2010-10-26T16:21:00.000-07:00

Dr. Diane Ravitch has had some recent influence on teachers as the trade union leadership of NEA, AFT have been busy hosting her speeches across the country. I contend that Dr. Ravitch has no clear idea of why these horrible attacks happen to our teachers and the public education system. She has, throughout her long career, attempted to understand history by living it. In the beginning of that process, she has been one of the ardent attackers on teachers and public education in general. When the process of privatization that she supported turned specially vicious and vindictive, and the hoped for success of that process did not readily materialize, Dr. Ravitch has turned a new leaf and is going around the country educating us with her new found wisdom.

Anyone can make mistakes and the fact that Dr. Ravitch seems capable of a partial learning from hers, is to be commended. Her description of how the savage beast of corporate control with direct government help has ravaged the public school system is noteworthy. However, her inability to see the reasons for these attacks in turn renders her solutions inadequate. To change the world, one must understand it first. That is her folly and I will attempt to show the readers why her outlook fails based on various remarks she makes on "Death And Life of the Great American School System".

From page 203:

Some left-wing critics think the Waltons are pushing privatization so they can make money in the education industry, but that does not seem credible. It simply doesn't make sense that that a family worth billions is looking for new ways to make money.

This notion that rich people are not out there looking for new ways to make money should then imply that executives and share holders of Google, Amazon, Microsoft not worry about the share values of their companies and simply "do the right thing". As the profit rate drops, Google should not move into developing Chrome OS, that being the traditional domain of Microsoft and Apple. Microsoft should not decimate its engineering work force from the Windows Operating System development to grow its "Bing" search engine and a variety of online services - again the domain of Google.

It should imply that rich people, rather than trying to shelter their income from taxes, should simply pay their fair share. It should imply that rich people from Medina (since we are talking about Bellevue) stop writing the sub-laws of education in the Bellevue School District to deprive the poorer communities from adequate facilities.

Contemporary America with its stark levels of inequality and entrenched class interests is enough to convince anyone but the most naive reader that rich people will do whatever it takes to make more money, resorting to outright violence against the poor if the situation warrants that, in their terms. Monsanto, one of the word's largest monopolies use its legal clout to force farmers to buy seed from them creating an unneeded dependence that results in bankruptcies for the poorest farmers. Melinda Gates Foundation owns shares in Monsanto.¹

Dr. Ravitch follows this "rich people are good" argument by her next fancy, that they are indeed "good but mis-guided"

But why should it be surprising that a foundation owned by one of the richest families in the United States opposes government regulation and favors private sector solutions to social problems?

In other words, the tycoons of the world's largest sweat shop are clearly only misguided in their attempts to bring private sector solutions to the public space. Dr. Ravitch contends that there are these two distinct spaces - public and private - and warns that private enterprise encroaching on the public space is misguided. But how do we recognize this line in the sand? Where, in theory at least, does the private space end and the public space begin (or vice versa)?

Dr. Ravitch is characteristically not too concerned about such theoretical questions. She does not explore how the private enterprise of sweat shop labor in China and low skilled labor in USA have direct attributions to the education system in both countries. Indeed, as the Walmart machine expands to every suburb in the United States, it requires an obedient work force to be de-skilled enough to accept near starvation wages. Walton Foundation's deliberate policy of destroying public education today, builds for it tomorrow, that servile worker force to be shackled to its profit machine.

Why should it be surprising that a global corporation that has thrived without a unionized workforce would oppose public sector unions?

Here, the implication is clear that unions, at least, are not required for the private sector in their unbridled hunt for profits on the backs of increasingly destitute workers. But there is an insistence that this should not be the case for the public sector. However, the attempt is to move education completely into the private sector as Dr. Ravitch agrees. Thus what is the argument she makes here? To the careful reader she is not making an argument except detailing the methodical way a public instrument is stolen by the corporate machine over to the private sector.

Her earlier failure to demarcate the line between public and private enterprise exposes her argument to be a confused attempt to say something without full understanding.

Dr. Ravitch follows thus, in conclusion of that section of her book on "The Billionaire Boy's Club":

Nor should it be surprising that the Walton Family Foundation has an ideological commitment to the principle of consumer choice and to an unfettered market, which by its nature has no loyalties and disregards Main Street, traditional values, long-established communities, and neighborhood schools.

Her insinuation that Walton Family is only attacking public education as a matter of ideology is a most dangerous illusion. Students, teachers and the wider community need to appreciate fully that ideologies do not spring out of the ether - every ideology supports certain conditions in society, and the particular ideology of "unfettered markets" supports the plundering of labor of the many for the vast enrichment of a few. As this system needs to continually expand, it has no choice but to "look for new ways to make money". When enough money can be invested in research, this expansion is possible in the later years. However, on an economic downturn, it becomes impossible to collect enough capital to conduct further research and the profit machine starts breaking down. In this situation, driven by desperation, corporations are forced to use any and all means to enter into other fields of existing business (as opposed to new lines that are not being created due to lack of research funding) including the ones long held in the public domain.

Dr. Ravitch would thus disagree with my article on privatization. History, I believe, will tell who is right.

Footnotes:

1 http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1166559/000104746910007567/a2199827z13f-hr.txt

The flawed statistical methods of charlatans promoting charters

2010-09-01T16:20:00.000-07:00

Today, I take a path away from the local situation in Bellevue and examine a specific report that puts the New York charter schools way ahead of the New York public schools (pdf). The report comes from Dr. Caroline Hoxby, a proponent of charters who has used statistically incorrect methods - according to the Educational Policy Institute (EPI) (pdf) - to exaggerate some limited measured success of charter schools.

This is certainly not the first report from Dr. Hoxby who remains a firm advocate in using whatever means available - statistically correct or not, backed by science or otherwise - to mislead and misdirect the debate on charters. She has persisted in rebutting the statistical methods of CREDO-Standford in their much cited study that finds that charter schools lead to no significant improvement. These rebuttals have been rebutted repeatedly by CREDO. While the CREDO web site carries the full arguments (look under CREDO-Hoxby Debate), Dr Hoxby's web site, in the manner suited to charlatans, conveniently only carries her version of the story. Data can increasingly be used in this unethical manner to distort the issues and present the lie as the truth. These efforts however, strike a body blow at the corporate deform movement (you may have heard this being referred to as "reform" by some mistake) that uses data as the final and only yardstick to evaluate learning and teaching.

It needs to be repeatedly and insistently voiced that the public does not rely on the unethically manufactured conclusions using data in provably incorrect manner. Just as the public has no faith in the provably incorrect representation of data by the charter proponents, it has no faith in data driven conclusions made by people cut from the same cloth - those that worship at the altar of neoliberal "free" markets - to misguide the education process for the children and youth of this nation.

EPI finds a statistical flaw in Dr. Hoxby's report that the experiment "destroys the randomization of the sample". The main argument is that comparing scores at each grade level to later make a cumulative comparison destroys the randomization present at the very beginning. EPI agrees with Dr. Hoxby that the subjects are completely randomized at the beginning due to the lottery effect making sure that students from largely similar backgrounds are indeed measured in both lotteried-in and lotteried-out groups.

In fact, there is more to this than that. The EPI rebuttal - as solid as it is - misses the crucial variable of the peer group. The student group of the charter school undeniably has a better motivated, more educationally capable mix than the local public school. This is true even if students are lotteried, as it is the case that economically disadvantaged parents are less likely to apply for the lottery. Also, any student who cannot make it in the strict regime of the charter school will be summarily dismissed and re-enrolled in the public school. I have explained the complete reasoning on the process of privatization here. Thus Hoxby's study attempts to fix all variables except the school (charter vs public) but crucially cannot fix the peer group variable. Thus whatever measurements made will reflect the effect of two variables - the school and the peer group. Therefore the study loses all scientific validity.

One notable study that demonstrates the peer group effect is the work of Dave Orbits from "Where's the Math". Dave was kind enough to share some of his extensive research with me. Please see the following graph that plots the pass rate of various student groups with the poverty level on the X axis. The trend lines for both low income and high income students show a drop, and there is strong reason to believe that peer group is indeed the reason for this, as that is the main factor not being accounted for.

It should be revealing how subtle these issues seem when attempts are made to analyze them outside the social context. Insights into these issues can only be developed as we gain a deeper understanding of the basic injustice and in-equity of the American education system. Researchers and leading scholars on matters of education policy must discard the dead-weight of "disinterested" scholarship and undertake a serious attempt to challenge the powers that shape education policy with an empathy towards those who have no voice in the supposedly "free" market of neoliberal America. As the concerned public, we are fully aware of the dangers the academia face as they take upon themselves this grave task and we would support such efforts in any way we can.

Role of Seattle Times in deceiving the public

2010-07-15T00:32:00.000-07:00

Today I want to explore the role of the corporate media - in particular - Seattle Times in the light of the retrograde educational policies being practiced in Bellevue. Seattle Times has so far mostly stuck to the educational issues in Seattle, not particularly caring to bother with the murky waters across the waters - so to speak.

Breaking that tradition, the paper carries an article crying out to the uninformed as a balanced view of our beloved superintendent, of whom we have written with much fan fare in the recent past.

The article starts out by praising the surveillance function of the superintendent as she "shuttles from one school to the next, taking the measure of the classrooms, the teachers and the principals". In fact, much of what passes for education has become a mode of observation and punishment, so it is no wonder that Seattle Times - an unapologetic mouth piece for the corporate apparatus hell-bent on destroying the public school system - finds this woman with the clipboard a savior of the little children.

It is noteworthy that after this bout of sycophancy - the article moves along in objective fashion to what it calls criticism. I read with bated breath, heart pounding - to find the section where any of the number of conclusions we have been writing about for some time - to jump at me from the pages of that revered paper. I need not have worried. I re-read the whole critical section no less than five times. I am not the smartest of people, and English is not my first language, so I wondered if this damning indictment of the superintendent is somehow hiding in the twists and folds of language that is supposed to represent American courtesy and politeness. But it was hard to find.

The single most glaring contradiction that we see is that, in the section titled "Cudeiro's critics", we hear so many accolades of the superintendent. For ex:

Cudeiro also says she wants to develop a new way of evaluating teachers, which would include a merit-pay system to give the best teachers more money. She talks frankly of easing poor teachers out of the classroom.
"She has a very good, focused view on what she wants to accomplish," said board member Paul Mills. "I think we made an excellent choice."
Tyee Middle School teacher Benjamin Evans served last year on a school leadership team and came away believing Cudeiro's ideas can make a difference.
"You get a lot of references to drinking the Kool-Aid" from other teachers, Evans said. "And I understand that — teachers are a pretty independent bunch."
But Cudeiro's methods are "the strongest, most organized and pointed initiative I've seen," the eight-year teaching veteran said. "This is a process I see as helping me."
Last year, as part of the process, Evans — a Spanish teacher — shared ideas with a language-arts teacher and, based on her methods, decided to do a "vocabulary inventory," informally testing his second-year students to see if they knew the definitions of common words and grammatical terms. To his surprise, they stumbled over common words.
So Evans began emphasizing the meanings of common words in class, and did a "word wall" that outlined important words and their uses. The idea also fit into an overarching goal at Tyee to help students learn "academic vocabulary" — key terms they need to know in any subject in order to gain a deeper understanding of the content.
Before last year, Evans and the language-arts teacher had never had any formal planning time together. "The idea is you go talk to teachers you don't normally visit with. I ended up with a pretty cool idea," he said.

There is plenty little criticism to be found in this whole section. That is in fact more than half of the "critical section" in the article. Seattle Times is doing a balancing act here - appearing to be critical to the less careful reader while appealing to the superintendent and all the state and corporate powers that back her and prop her up. This is the art of disinformation of which Seattle Times has become quite good at over time.

Notice that the testament of a single teacher - Evans - is used to discredit all the teachers who find fault with the superintendent's methods. And for this treacherous work, Evans gets due credit - his work on the "word wall" is highlighted for public consumption and he is, all else being equal, guaranteed his job for a while at least.

My intention is not to say that the "word wall" is not a good idea. I'm sure it is a good idea. However, the message here will not be lost on any teacher. Seattle Times is simply becoming the mouth piece for the school district : "Tow the line, and I may throw you a bone. If you don't, well - in a budget crisis, the teachers that take more time to be molded to the new system are the easiest to let go".

Also, it is disingenuous to take credit for the teacher collaboration mentioned here on two counts:

1) Teachers have always been known to collaborate, there is simply not much this superintendent has done to make any further collaboration needed or even desired. The attempt has been to create an environment where teachers can get to know each others' weaknesses which - in private conversations between the administration and the district - can now be found and used as a further tool to terrorize teachers and strip their autonomy even further.

2) The practice of tying student scores to teacher evaluations - of which the superintendent is a huge fan of - creates dis-incentives for teachers to co-operate. Even the one-time proponent of NCLB - Diane Ravitch agrees with this. A few teachers I have talked to had similar concerns as well.

From Diane Ravitch's interview with NPR:

"There should not be an education marketplace, there should not be competition," Ravitch says. "Schools operate fundamentally — or should operate — like families. The fundamental principle by which education proceeds is collaboration. Teachers are supposed to share what works; schools are supposed to get together and talk about what's [been successful] for them. They're not supposed to hide their trade secrets and have a survival of the fittest competition with the school down the block."

But of course, why not take the credit, specially as this "8 year veteran teacher" is willing to let her take it. A whole sale betrayal of fellow teachers have been roundly praised, but the discerning public will not be deceived.

It is instructive to say that this article is in fact the first public document I found that mentions Targeted Leadership Consulting being run by the superintendent and her husband, Jeff Nelsen. The last names of the couple are different, and a few teachers confided in me that the relationship is generally kept "under the radar" in the district.

In fact, what is even more alarming is what the BSD public web page says about the superintendent's role in the company:

"Dr. Cudeiro was most recently a Senior Partner at Targeted Leadership Consulting."

Could I speak plainly - that lost art in America - and say that the district just lied to us here? One might think - if one did not grasp the interests the Seattle Times represents - that this might have been worth mentioning.

There is also the disrespect thrown at the late Mike Riley - who as far I learn from teachers - had done an incredible job in revamping the curriculum. Teachers tell me that Riley's strong suit was the involvement of teachers. He is not known to have taken quick decisions but he would keep asking the teachers to tell him more. The gifted program PRISM owes a large debt to Riley. After he left, there have been numerous attempts to disband this program - a program that should be expanded has been systematically reduced.

I quote:
Riley tried to tackle the achievement gap by creating a Web-based common curriculum for six core subjects. But the standardized curriculum may have helped push a dissatisfied teaching staff to go on strike in 2008, a year after Riley left.

The superintendent has some memorable parting words:
"I want to do one district well," she said. "And then I want to go back to my consulting business."

At this point, it is instructive to look at the title of the home page for Targeted Leadership Consulting. It proudly proclaims:
"Leadership for differentiating schools and classrooms by Targeted Leadership Consulting"

The buzz word differentiation is key. As the Seattle Times article explains, the superintendent is getting teachers to use "differentiated instruction" — a kind of classroom juggling act in which a teacher uses different methods to reach students who are struggling, while also challenging the brightest.

It seems clear that the superintendent is using her private company's consulting methods in the great student laboratory the tax payers have lent her, no questions asked. The guinea pigs in this 21st century laboratory - which can also be dubbed a sweat shop, considering the random walk-throughs, incessant monitoring of students and teachers, the high stakes testing making nervous wrecks of young and impressionable students - are of course our children.

The "credentials" she builds for the private consulting practice - by steam rolling over our most hard working and knowledgeable teachers, and the most vulnerable students like those who until recently attended Robinswood - somehow does not constitute a breach in ethics. It does not even fall into the purview of violating a conflict of interest.

Such is the law that creates the immunity that emboldens the superintendent as she carries out attack after attack on a vulnerable student and teacher population. While Seattle Times gleefully mentions the superintendent's frank talk of easing poor teachers out of the classroom - I know that some of the best teachers in the district are leaving. Teachers are generally terrified of the superintendent and are not willing to openly criticize her as they have collective memories where the district had ear-marked critics for lay-offs and disciplinary action in the past.

The summer of democracy is fast fading - with the approaching winter chill of fascism, a populace huddles, drawing down the shutters. But inside shuttered doors, people are thinking, figuring, writing, connecting, organizing. Some of that collective thought leaks over to Seattle Times and they want to placate the people and make a great pretense of objectivity in reporting. The purpose is to fool us into thinking that the storm is abating, and that we can relax and let down our guard. But let us not be fooled as it is time to correctly grasp the struggle for the soul of education as a struggle between competing interests. Our students and teachers are not tipping the scales yet, on the other side we have the whole corporate juggernaut of which our government is only a paid servant. It is our job to tip the scales - and that we will do, that we must do.

Good night.

The money flow based on Robinswood closure

2010-06-25T17:26:00.000-07:00

Delving a little deeper into the superintendent's claim as to the closing of Robinswood (pdf), we find some interesting financial information. It is instructive to note that money is in fact saved by the Robinswood closure. However, the savings and whatever surplus carried over in the Robinswood operating budget are being used largely for planning for the new alternative school.

Here is the breakdown: (page 16)

Basically - 310,000$ is being used to plan for the new alternative high school. The public has been given hardly any information about this new school. The word "choice" was used to describe it. This word is synonymous with inequity. The whole idea of building "choice" schools allowing parents to choose a school belies the fact that all schools are not created equal. It is a thinly veiled attempt to further dismantle schools in poorer neighborhoods where the parents do not have the time and resources to do the research and find out the details about these choice schools.

In conclusion, what we see happening is a clear example of the rich robbing from the poor. A school that helped predominantly poor students is being closed. And the savings are being used to create a school primarily for the more affluent students - that is the statistical conclusion one has to reach, given the data.

Furthermore, it is instructive to see how planning for the new school cost is broken down (from page 15):

Salary of a new principal : 147,251$
Travel and conference costs : 10,000$
Cost of material (ex: start up textbooks) : 100,000$
Clerical assistance : 50,000$

Adding this up, we don't get exactly the number in the above chart - 310,000$. There is some inconsistency of around 3000$. The Bellevue School District appears not too alarmed by these discrepancies, checking their data and facts do not seem to be their strong suit. Their capacity to conduct these brutal attacks on the most vulnerable students of the district, and the immunity they enjoy from these actions must surely embolden them to flagrantly disregard the need to present accurate numbers in their financial calculations.

It is not exactly clear what type of material is needed. If students are simply transferring from other schools don't they already have the required material? If the material is so vastly different, then we need to know why. Tax payer money is used for programs the public knows nothing about. Is any of this money going even in an indirect way to Targeted Leadership Consulting where the superintendent is a founding partner? The public needs to know this.

Continously Enrolled Students and how students disappear from AYP calculations

2010-06-20T20:30:00.000-07:00

Race To The Top program needs to identify the bottom 5% of persistently lowest achieving schools and re-structure them. Student scores on math, reading as well as graduation rates are used in a "Adequate Yearly Progess" (AYP) calculation which is then sorted to identify the rank of each school.

OSPI site has a document that describes the AYP calculation (pdf). Page 5 describes the requirement to use only "continuously enrolled students".

If a student is not "continuously enrolled" in a school, his/her score, graduation status do not factor into the AYP for the school.

If a student is not "continuously enrolled" in a school district, his/her score, graduation status do not factor into the AYP for the school district. Such a student is simply removed from the school district as far as the AYP statistics are concerned.

If a student in Bellevue is placed in juvenile detention, that may constitute a break in enrollment in the district. There is one juvenile detention center for King County, that is the Interagency Academy in Seattle. Thus for each Belleve student transferred to juvenile detention, the Bellevue School District gets to not worry about the yearly progress of that student. If a student is performing poorly in the district, the district has a huge incentive to create the structures, practices and policy to allow a transfer of such a student to juvenile detention.

It is also possible to transfer students to a more rigorous facility - Echo Glen in Issaquah school district is such a facility. It's youngest class is Gr. 5. It is not clear what sort of crime a Gr. 5 student - a ten year old - could do in order to be placed in such a correctional facility for over a year.

The school to prison pipeline is a rather well studied phenomenon. As this study from NAACP Legal Defense ad Educational Fund (pdf) cites:

"In addition to impacting students’ behavior, the lack of sufficient resources in our schools also creates perverse incentives for school officials to remove children from school. Ironically, some of the hallmarks of modern education reform— including demands for greater accountability, extensive testing regimes, and harsh sanctions imposed on schools and teachers—actually encourage schools to funnel out those students whom they believe are likely to drag down a school’s test scores. Rather than address the systemic problems that lead to poor educational performance, harsh discipline policies provide schools with a convenient method to remove certain students and thereby mask educational deficiencies. Second, the overuse of suspensions, expulsions and arrests is itself a reflection of this lack of resources. Many well-intentioned educators want to help troubled students. Yet, due to a lack of guidance counselors and useful intervention programs, they feel that they have no alternatives at their disposal. So they too often take the easier road by suspending or expelling students or, in some cases, using law enforcement agencies and juvenile courts as their disciplinary arm."

Closing Robinswood might help the Bellevue School District improve its overall AYP scores by removing students with learning disabilities from Bellevue to other districts like Seattle, Issaquah via the arm of the criminal justice system as applied to minors.

What are the real reasons for closing Robinswood?

2010-06-12T15:19:00.000-07:00

By now, we have poured through lots of data released by the Bellevue School District, the board in their public testimony, Puget Sound ESD, that we can start to determine the real reasons for the closure of Robinswood.

Here, we are not concerned about random speculation, but we want to identify the intentions of this huge injustice from the public documents, speeches and announcements made by the education authorities.

In other words, the intention of the closure is clearly specified in the public discourse the officials make. This is necessary as the officials are completely aware of the reasons for the closure and while they want to hide it by using largely unrelated concerns at the forefront, obscuring the truth, it is impossible for them to completely hide it, even in their public records. Because, when their intentions become clear as time will show, they will require, out of necessity to point to their historical public record and justify that this information was always known to the public and as such there was no marked opposition to the closure.

It is important to understand the larger process at work here - In a democracy, even in a highly flawed one, the decisions taken by the political establishments have to take a democratic form, where public hearings are held, the reasoning for terrible proposals that hurt communities explained to the public, and the consent of the majority obtained.

Such is the democratic process. If you paid close attention to how the board answered the grievances of the community that had gathered at the public meeting, you would have seen this process. The board members made repeated attempts to say that "while there are some particular concerns that have been raised here, these issues are not those of a majority".

In a democracy, unless a majority of the affected community come forth with a strong opposition, the administration can ram through any unpopular process forward. And if the majority knew the truth, had access to the real data and reasons, they will oppose. So the majority opinion is carefully controlled by deceptive practices at best, personal retribution at worst.

Since I've been involved in this process of exposing the savage attacks of the Bellevue School District on the most vulnerable students among us - the kids at the end of the road, exhibiting a remarkable mixture of courage and resilience - according to one wonderful parent who gave testimony - I have been approached by a number of teachers on conditions of anonymity. They are clearly afraid that they will be targeted if they speak up against this invasion of the barbarians.

We notice that the speech and presentation the superintendent makes to the community is quite different from her official statement as to why the school must be closed. (pdf) It is important that it is the latter document that is legally binding. The presentation is a lot less formal, and as such, there is a chance for the real reasons for the closure to be mentioned there, albeit under some camouflage.

The superintendent makes the point that Robinswood is not a "true alternative model". She does not define what a true alternative model is. But she continues that the new Robinswood be "more inclusive" and attendance will not be based on a "punitive" approach, but based on "choice".

Parsing through these disparate statements, we realize they are not really disparate. The single underlying thread underscoring all these statements is that a new school will be built that does not cater for special ed students, certainly not those with learning disabilities. The school that was designed with the specific purpose of helping disadvantaged kids is being torn down. A new "true alternative" school is being constructed that will be open to all kids, not just the disadvantaged. As such a school need not have any special considerations for special needs students, it is likely that special needs students will have a lower quality education there and thus increase the achievement gap that the superintendent says she wants to reduce.
The new school will celebrate a "hands-on" approach as opposed to traditional methods of a broad education. This is the basic corporate model where the purpose of education is being reduced to creating cookie-cutter workers for the corporate machine, their thinking reduced to the most menial tasks, philosophies snuffed into docile obedience of authority ready to accept their future low-wage jobs that is increasingly the lot of the regular worker.

The superintendent demands a year to build the teaching material for a "new alternative model". It is not specified, except in the most abstract way, what this model is. It is not clear what teaching material would be used. Rumor has it that teachers in Bellevue have been asked to look at the teaching material from the superintendent's for-profit company - Targeted Leadership Consulting.

The students and parents have been consulted one-on-one on the closure and their options explained to them. This is of course part of the disinformation process. Given the choice of coming into a new school built on a highly dubious plan vs going back to their regular neighborhood school, most students had decided to go back to their mid/high school. The superintendent, however, uses this point as a way to emphasize that the students do not value Robinswood.

Such is the height of deception that is used, that it stops being deceptive and starts sounding senseless.

The closure of Robinswood can thus only be understood in terms of the market philosophy of disposablity. Under a crisis created by its own internal contradictions, the market demands that certain sections of youth be denied the basic access to education. The remaining students are to be dumbed down by a restrictive curriculum, monitored relentlessly and their individual autonomy reduced to a level of fear and passivity, thus creating the obedient wage slave of the future.

Education, which used to be the beacon of hope for many, is fast being turned to a fascist tool of oppression. Robinswood is only one example of this process of which we have certainly not seen the end.

Robinswood closure and the cagey response from the accrediting agency : PSED

2010-06-12T14:12:00.000-07:00

Reading the superintendent's report, it is clear that Robinswood was closed because it was not accredited for the years 2010-11. However, in my email conversations with PSED, the accrediting agency, the response has been that the district decided to not pursue the accreditation, of their own accord.

PSED did not even have a list of Bellevue High Schools that they have accredited so far. Their responses to these requests have been comical at best, highly disingenuous at worst. While Julie Rolling, Executive Director of Learning and Teaching at PSED had a list of schools they have accredited, none of them being from Belleve, when asked about the list of Bellevue schools they had accredited, the response was that she has not been working at PSED long enough (less than a year) to know this information.

She did not think she should refer me to any one else in the organization for this information though. Chances are that there probably is no one beyond the Director of Learning and Teaching who would have some idea of the history of this dubious organization.

I will post one full email thread on this issue I had with her, as it is highly instructive to examine the cagey behavior and guarded replies. It is clear that the district and PSED are running scared when they are asked these questions.

Attached is information about Accreditation and Approval for your reference.
Julie

Julie Rolling
Executive Director
Learning and Teaching
Puget Sound ESD

FAQ Accreditation and Approval.pdf

Me to Julie May 29
    
thank you, Julie.
    
Jun 4 (8 days ago)
    
Julie - could you send me the list of schools your agency has accredited so far?
thx,

Me to Julie Jun 7 (5 days ago)
    
Hi Julie - do you not have this information readily available?

Julie Rolling to me Jun 7 (5 days ago)
    
Just a busy day...here are the schools accreditated by PSESD:

Lakes High School: Clover Park SD
Kentwood Christian Academy: Kent, WA
Peninsula High School: Peninsula SD
Gig Harbor High School: Peninsula SD
Henderson Bay Alternative High School: Peninsula SD

5 Bellevue High Schools will be officially accredited after June 11th meeting

|
Me to Julie Jun 8 (4 days ago)
    
thanks Julie - so how many Bellevue High Schools are already accredited - I realize 5 will be accredited aftet June 11, but what is the current status?|

Julie Rolling to me Jun 8 (4 days ago)
    
All 5 schools will have completed the process by Friday, June 11.

(Sammamish, Interlake, Bellevue, International and Newport)


Me writes:
thanks Julie - so how many Bellevue High Schools are already accredited -

I realize 5 will be accredited aftet June 11, but what is the current status?


Me to Julie Jun 8 (4 days ago)
    
So that means there are no Bellevue High Schools that are currently accredited by your organization?

thx,


Julie Rolling to me Jun 8 (4 days ago)
    
The ESD began accrediting schools 5 years ago.  I began working with Bellevue schools this year.  You will need to contact other accreditation agencies for past accreditation work with Bellevue.


Me to Julie Jun 8 (4 days ago)
    
but wouldn't you know when a school applies for accreditation, whether it is for a new application, or not?
so your organization has a 5 year history on accreditation, so wouldn't someone in your organization know whether any Bellevue school got accredited during those 5 years?

Julie Rolling to me Jun 8 (4 days ago)
    
No, we would not.  Those records would be with the school/district and the agency that granted the accreditation.  PSESD does not have those records.  Again, accreditation is a voluntary, not mandatory process.


Me to Julie Jun 8 (4 days ago)
    
ok - then what is the official document that explained the reasons as to why robinswood was not accredited for 2010/11?

Julie Rolling to me Jun 8 (4 days ago)
    
Given the criteria of having a SIP plan and process, Robinswood choose not to pursue accreditation this spring. They did not feel they could have those two requirements in place by June. So, they chose not to engage in the process.   If they choose to pursue accreditation in the future, we would be happy to accreditate them.


Me to Julie 1:57 PM (13 minutes ago)
    
Julie -

What you say right here, contradicts with the public statement the
Bellevue superintendent has made.

This is what she says:

"The district was informed that due to the current restructuring
process underway at  Robinswood High School, the school would not be
eligible for accreditation until the planning and implementation
process as completed"

"The district also consulted with a second accrediting body and that
organization agreed that accreditation of the existing model would not
be appropriate because the school is in the process of restructuring.
During a follow-up conversation, the second accrediting agency
suggested that at best, the school could begin the process of seeking
a three-year provisional status but that they could not offer
accreditation for the 2010-2011 school year"

And you can read this at the source :
http://www.bsd405.org/Portals/0/administration/Superintendent/4333_001.pdf
(page 3)

Note that the school district insists that your organization denied
accreditation - you are saying the district did not wish to pursue
with the accreditation. That is a huge disconnect, when you consider
that the district is telling everyone very publicly that they are
closing the school because your organization did not give the school
accreditation.

Could you please clarify - I will seek clarification from the school
district as well.

Mon, Jun 14, 2010 at 7:59 AM


I will reiterate what I know.  To be approved by AESD, a schools needs a current School Improvement Plan and to have gone through a process to engage all stakeholders in the creation of that plan.  When I was in conversations with Robinswood this spring, they did not have a current plan in place and felt like they could not engage a variety of stakeholders in a meaningful way to create a plan by June, 2010.
Julie

How closing Robinswood could save the district money

2010-06-04T18:03:00.000-07:00

Let's attempt to explore the claim made by the superintendent that "we are not closing robinswood to save money, this decision has not been made due to budgetary constraints".

First, it is important to appreciate how this statement is justified - in the off-handed manner we are quite used to now. The superintendent says "all the staff at robinswood will be re-allocated, no body will lose their job".

Thus, having conveniently "explained" the zero-impact on the budget since all teachers are still employed after Robinswood closure, necessitating no cost reduction, the superintendent merrily moves along to the other important items.

Not for a bit does she stop to talk about how the small class size of Robinswood might be a factor here. Neither does she bother to explain whether there really are new classes planned on the neighborhood schools as a result of 166 students moving back to the neighborhood programs.

However, we know this - there is no state or federal law that puts a lid on the class size. This question keeps being asked at every meeting where the suits make an appearance, and always the answer is that "class size can - theoretically - increase with no upper limit".

In fact a great deal has been said recently, by the zealots of "Race To The Top" funded by the billionaires of education reform that "class size is not indicative of learning patterns". The only people who disagree seem to be those who are actually involved in teaching - but apparently those people have conflicts of interest so their testimony is considered irrelevant in the minds of the billionaires and their appointed government serfs who of course harbor zero conflict of interest in this great money laundering operation that is still called education.

As noted here, the board has been a zealous advocate of increasing class size. In this particular study, eliminating 17 teachers, which would increase class size by 1 student, was calculated to save the district 1.36M $.

The government, as usual, takes the path of the coward - their basic stance is that:

"The pattern of research evidence only favors class size reduction if it is substantial and brings the class size below a certain threshold. Reducing class size from 30 to 25, for example, may well have no effect whatsoever."

They approach the argument by saying there is a lack of funds that force - force - the class size to be above 20. And it is claimed that from this point on, increasing the class size has no adverse effect, as they found that reducing the class size from 30 to 25 produced no measurable effect.

First, we have to question the assumption that there is no funds - that is blatantly false as an absolute first principle. Close to a trillion dollars are being spent on the war. Money is not an issue.

Anyway, under this back-drop, class size is increasing ad infinitum. Today morning, I talked to a few schools in Bellevue to get a sense of the class size. What I was told was that each middle/high school in Bellevue has the same average class size around 30, for this year. This is supposed to go up to 35 next year.

Here is the list of class sizes I found:

Bellevue High : 33
Interlake High : 26
Newport High: 30
Chinook Middle : 30
Tyee Middle : 32

Under this setup, it is highly likely that the Robinswood kids will be absorbed into the existing class structures with no additional classes needing to be created.

Let us do some math under this scenario. From the public page for Robinswood, I found 52 staff members. Let us cross 20 for administration and special instruction (like music, PE) that would leave us 32 regular teachers, each of whom can be assigned a single class, for our purposes. If the class sizes could increase - as is allowed - under budget considerations, all these teachers become expendable as kids can be crowded into already crowded class rooms - after all, the ideological backing for this movement came from the government study cited above. What remains is the practical execution - mafia style - by the state/board apparatus.

However, this does not mean that 32 teachers from Robinswood will be let go - the condition is that this move will create 32 surplus teachers in the district, and they will be let go. Some could be from Robinswood, and some could be from other neighboring programs. Thus there is a definite budget reduction, but it does not happen directly, it is hidden, similar to the general method of the school board we have come to see and appreciate so well.

How much is 32 teachers? From the district's own analysis, eliminating 17 teachers saves 1.36M$. Thus reducing 32 teachers should save the district around 2.56M$ [1.36/17*32]

However, let us give the board the benefit of doubt. Let us assume that no over-crowding happens and the kids are scuttled into regular size class rooms. The regular class size is 30, and for the Robinswood student population of 166, this requires an additional 5.53 classes/teachers [166/30]. But Robinswood currently has - according to our estimate - 32 regular teachers. Thus, even in this favorable scenario 26.47 teachers (32-5.53) becomes surplus, saving the district 2.12M$ [1.36/17*26.47]

The fact that Robinswood students won't get 5.53 separate classes does not change the math one bit. The same objective conditions apply as kids are absorbed into the existing class structures.

And that is how we expose - yet again - the misrepresentation of fact courtesy Bellevue School District.

Why close Robinswood?

2010-06-03T23:32:00.000-07:00

At the public venting meeting organized by the Bellevue School Board, it was reiterated that the proposal to close the Robinswood school was not inspired by a desire to save money. However, the person who prepared the budget breakdown - Simone Sangster - was not present, and thus quite conveniently, we did not get to see how this small miracle was achieved. Because it is a miracle to be able to close a school of a lot smaller class size, crowd students into regular, larger, class sizes and still not save money.

Once I find information on the class size on Robinswood, we should be able to do the math on that one.

I called the Puget Sound ESD again today asking for a list of schools they have accredited to-date. No body has gotten back to me. When I asked Julie Rolling this question early in the week, she mentioned that this information might be "private information" from the perspective of the school.

Let us think this through - Accreditation is supposed to be something that grants access to schools. And as such there is nothing private about it. The accredited schools are quite happy to share this information with interested parents/students and community. But Puget Sound ESD did not, for unexplainable reasons, think so. According to them, accreditation is a secret - only the school should know about it, which begs the question why get accredited in the first place.

In fact, today morning, I called Lake Washington High and inquired whether they were accredited. I got an instant reply in the affirmative. The person I talked to did not have to refer me, pull up any old file, she had the information right there.

In fact, the other agency that provides accreditation for the region - Northwest Association of Accredited Schools - clearly publishes the list of schools it accredits. It is actually filed under "Most Requested Documents" on NAAS home page.

Puget Sound ESD is a completely different story. Looking through their home page, it is not even clear if they offer any accreditation service. The people I talked to - including Julie Rolling - were hardly helpful. It seemed they were extremely wary of questions, and wanted to not say anything that would compromise things.

Then there is the issue whether high school accreditation is required for universities. The school board was painting the lack of accreditation as a serious handicap for students wanting to go to college. Again, I called the University Of Washington this morning, and was told that they had no requirement to treat accredited high schools differently. They recognize credit transfers from accredited colleges, but as far as high schools go - that does not count.

What we must ask is why we common people have to do this work? Isn't it the duty of the board to find this information, compile it and have it available? It seems lately that any angle we explore on the issue of Robinswood, we end up with data that completely refutes the statements made by the superintendent and the board.

What do we common folks do, when they own the law and we are only allowed to rent their prisons? Where do we go when a democracy has been shattered to splinters so small that it is impossible to collect the shards to make a whole? To whom do we appeal when the criminals are invisible - anonymous faces obscured by the "free" market?

It is time we understood what is happening in front of our eyes - the dismantling of the public education system goes hand in hand with the destruction of basic dignities for millions of people, to satisfy the insatiable appetite of the ravenous elite in their gilded ghettos.

The board agrees to close Robinswood

2010-06-01T22:53:00.000-07:00

I went to the meeting today where the superintendent and the board graciously allowed us common folks to express our views on the proposed closure of schools. I listened intently for a single opinion that was supportive and I was sorely disappointed.

For over an hour parents, teachers and students expressed their heart-felt sorrow at the destruction they see happening. Moving stories were heard about students who made a life for themselves thanks in great part to the program at Robinswood and its dedicated staff. One gentleman made a thorough report with facts that challenged the school board that the reasons given for the closure were completely fabricated. The claims were solid, the district has still not come up with the documentation to refute these claims months after the initial request has been made.

This gentleman's views are not too different from mine. The issue he brought up was around accreditation, and when I talked to several officials of rating agencies, I could hardly get a direct answer. Upon persistent questioning, Julie Rolling of Puget Sound ESD made it known that the issue spans several departments and is a matter between the school district, the school board and the various accrediting agencies of which she was a Director of just one. She mentioned that whenever the issue crosses boundaries like this, she did not want to "get caught in the middle".

Clearly she saw that this was a contentious issue and did not want to implicate herself.

There is a fear that is palpable in this city you could cut it with a knife. There is a deadening silence that screams at our souls, disorienting a student body and turning away the best teachers from this difficult and emotionally draining occupation. There is a crime being committed in front of our eyes and we lack the larger vision to fully see it - yet. Bits and pieces are brought to the table. We have to think this through. Examine each piece of evidence, each sliver of thought brought to the table, by a grieving parent, a fearful teacher, a saddened student. We need to weave a strand across these many threads, bond them together in strength and solidarity and unite against this oppression we have leveled against us. We don't have much time to lose.

After over an hour of community testimony, the board proceeded to ask the officials involved details about the proposal. The executive director of Special Ed/Guidance and School Support - Patty Siegwarth made a careful speech that detailed the extensive amount of work she had to do to find evidence of even a past accreditation another school - Newport High - had. She was obviously doing a careful tight-rope act and her subtle message was that there really was no evidence that this accreditation issue has ever been such an important consideration. If one has to search through 3-5 year old email archives to find this information on accreditation, it stands to reason that the program was never given serious consideration at all - that is up until now when that reason is used as the reason to close the school.

Mind you, no official has been able to find the documentation of accreditation - even an email that they can publicly share - for Robinswood. If accreditation is so important, it should be in some form of a certificate, easily retrieved. But a board member (was it Michael Murphy?) went onto say that he found a large number of emails where it was clear the school was accredited in the past and thus it was an issue.

As to the request to publish documentation of this in a pdf format on the public web site, he was not sure it could be done immediately, but re-assured it will be done at some point in the future.

So, all they have - if he is speaking the truth - is a bunch of emails. As far as I know it is contentious whether an email is a valid legal document due to the fact that emails can be easily forged - SMTP, the protocol used to transmit email is an insecure protocol by design. (Being a techie has minor advantages in social issues)

From all testimony, it was quite clear that a non-issue had been brought up to close the school. When the board "deliberated" for another hour, they did not answer any of the questions the community voiced except talk in generalities. Everyone except Michael Murphy agreed to have the school closed. Peter Bentley made a mockery of his particular vote by saying that he is voting "aye" on one condition - that being that he needs to see a report prepared by the school board periodically on how the new program is going.

Everyone should by now realize that the board had already decided to close the school. The meeting was a mere formality to give the community the illusion that their voice is heard. There will come a time when the community will realize this. That day is coming.

Mind recalls a statement from Grapes Of Wrath - John Steinbeck. "Fear the time when the bombs stop falling while the bombers live - for every bomb is proof that the spirit has not died"

A brief history on the proposed closure of Robinswood, Bellevue

2010-05-23T12:12:00.000-07:00

There is a lot of dis-information going around as to the reasons for the closure of Robinswood. This should come as no surprise to anyone paying attention to the role of the mainstream media that increasingly chooses to polarize the public, fails to analyze situations from a historical perspective and serves private interests that are intent in grabbing a bigger share of public funds.

We need to cut through the lies and deception to get at the truth of the matter. In the case of Robinswood, the media reports have painted two reasons for the school closure proposal:

1) The low average scores that places Robinswood in the bottom 5% of schools in the district.
2) The school losing accreditation by a couple of agencies

However, this is an over-simplification as to the real reasons - in the superintendent's own words (pdf) - as to why the school should be closed. In the statement the superintendent made, she makes it very clear that the reasons for the closure proposal is because the school is losing accreditation. In page 2, she says:

After this point, instead of clearly specifying the actions that led to the removal of the accreditation - where the superintendent clearly played a decisive role, she attempts to conflate issues and confuse. This should come as no surprise to those who did a critical analysis of how the superintendent and her subservient school board made the budget presentation for 2010-11.

So we have to cut through the mis-information, again. Let's start at page 3 and we find this little gem:

So now we have the reason for the removal of accreditation - there was already underway a process at "reform". That is the reason. Let us follow along and see how and why this process of "reform" came about, since evidently it is that process that resulted in the removal of accreditation which in turn resulted in the proposed school closure.

What were the reasons to implement these "reforms"? By the administration's own admission, and with test scores that can be independently verified, students at Robinswood had made double digit gains in reading and a staggering 82% improvement in math.

"The school saw double-digit increases in the percentage of eighth and tenth graders passing the reading portion of the test, as well as a leap from 23 percent to 42 percent for seventh grade math. "

So why was the reform path chosen? Clearly it cannot be due to considerations of student achievement, because the data shows a clear improvement of students.

The superintendent goes on to describe the reasons that led to the "reform". Robinswood is a school of largely poor kids, 55% of students receive free and reduced price lunches, which is a clear indication of the conditions of poverty through which these kids struggle daily. So quite clearly, the administration saw a need to not provide funding for these kids when Robinswood was proving to be a successful model where poor, disadvantaged kids get a chance at social mobility. However, this in-convenient truth did not sit well with the philosophy that the poorer schools that struggle to overcome enormous odds do not deserve public funding as long as their output is not "economical".

However, the superintendent now chooses to obscure and conflate these issues starting with a largely useless statement (page 2):

It is not new information to say that Robinswood is one of the lowest performing schools in the district. Poverty is tied undeniably to low performance, and it is the poverty level of this school that merits Title I. This is another clear case where the superintendent is trying to dissociate cause and effect and make a statement with no illuminating basis - in order to support her next argument of illogic. But let us follow this path and see where it leads (page 2):

Here, the superintendent is quite brief. She does not describe the School Improvement Grant process, and for good reason. Looking at the state documents for the process of School Improvement Grants, it is clear that this is a process that the law never mandates a school district to follow, it is completely voluntary. In fact the legislature thought this highly relevant that they high-lighted (in bold font) that the program was voluntary:

"The state is tasked with identifying its persistently low-achieving schools and their districts and with providing these districts the opportunity to volunteer to apply for federal School Improvement Grants."

Thus it was completely under the jurisdiction of the superintendent whether the school district needed to apply for the grant or not. One should not have any illusion that the SIG gives the school district flexibility in how the grant should be applied. It is clear in the SIG document that:

"Based on federal guidelines, districts which volunteer to apply for SIGs may use these funds to:

Implement selected intervention model(s) in identified Tier I and Tier II schools with fidelity.
Support activities and services in identified Tier III schools.
Create effective structures and conditions in schools and across their district which are essential to turning around student performance and sustaining reforms after the funding period ends."

Therefore it is clear to all educators who have experience with children, and disadvantaged children at that, that these purposes for which the SIG money could be channeled do not a single thing to help the students to learn. In fact all these methods cause disruption and are extremely harmful - this is a point on which educators largely agree and the business community does not. It is also the reason that these programs are voluntary, when schools apply for these grants, it is generally at the insistence of bureaucratic forces that are difficult to fight.

And the reason for the divergent goals of educators from the business community has already been addressed.

We learn about the study done by the BERC group and its recommendations (page 2):

It pays to pay careful attention to the wording here. What does the report mean when it says "the transient nature of the population was found not to be conducive to ensuring student academic success"? In English, this is describing two things. First, that the way the school is set-up, it invites a transient population. Robinswood is a school where students who fall through the cracks in their neighborhood school go to, to get the needed extra help. Once their grades improve, they can move back to their old neighborhood school. This in fact creates room at Robinswood for another student who needs that extra help. That is the philosophy on which the school functions, and it has shown to work by the numbers of students who improve their grade and move on - creating a "transient population".

Here is another account where the superintendent agrees with the actual success (vs the measured failure) of Robinswood.

"For years, Bellevue has sent struggling high-school students to Robinswood to help them catch up with course work, Cudeiro said. Once they were back on track, they would return to their neighborhood high school."

Secondly, what that loaded statement is really saying is that the arbitrary metric the state uses to judge "success" is heavily flawed as it cannot measure the success of a school where the best students leave, leaving the school with a population who will in general perform at a lower level than the average.

But, rather than showing how inappropriate the metrics for student / school success has become, the superintendent does a sleight of hand to hint that there is something wrong with Robinswood and the way it is set up. So the answer is to remove that set-up and replace it with a completely untested variety that is being paraded around the country with utmost zeal by the self-appointed billionaires of education "reform".

And the proposal done by the BERC group - a for-profit institution that welcomes private funding to public schools - was rejected and the SIG funding did not come through, in superintendent's own words (page 3):

Now this gets even more interesting because, since the proposal of the school was not accepted by the OSPI, and thus the SIG funds were not forthcoming - no contract has been made between the district and the OSPI and there is no mandate to go with any form of re-structuring euphemistically paraded as "reform".

However, this did not stop the district with going ahead with the "reform" either. It chose to subvert funds that would/could have been used for teaching students into this "reform" charade:

Notice, that from this point on, from a point of reducing the funding from the student's vital learning activities, demoralizing teachers who are un-arguably doing a heroic job in educating a vulnerable student population, the deterioration of the moral fiber of the school had started.

What happens next is what makes your jaw drop - it follows like a plot from a Bond movie or a Tom Clancy novel:

So what have we discovered? The district began a legally not required reform process on a school that used to get kids back on track, knowing this process would leave that school out of the running for accreditation, and then blamed the lack of accreditation on other forces, and provided the lack of accreditation as a reason to close the school. The superintendent faced a setback in the process as the SIG grant did not even come through thus providing an easy way out of having to go throught he reform. However, this did not deter her in pushing through with the reform. And it was the reform that was underway that resulted in the potential loss of accreditation for the school, which then was cited as the reason to close it.

And that is how we make the connection. The school closure was an event carefully planned, pushed to the public in stages. And it awaits the final execution at the hands of the executioner, our beloved superintendent. We have a chance at venting as it clearly states on the site:

"The Board will hold a public hearing at 7:00 pm on June 1, 2010 at the Wilburton Instructional Service Center, 12241 Main Street, Bellevue, Washington to hear from any individual who may wish to provide testimony to the Board regarding the proposed closure of Robinswood."

But it is startlingly obvious how low it places this event - of utmost concern to the neighborhood - that they mention this after a much more important event - the selection of yet another Medina elitist to the school board. Medina writes the "sub-law" within the school district. Their presence is everywhere, it is impossible to get to any PTA and encourage them to disseminate truthful information as the good and rich people of Medina has such a strong-hold on these organizations - but that is another topic, and I'm sure we will visit that in scholarly detail of us common folks in good time.

Notes:
Cached copy of the superintendent's statement