"A child's learning is the function more of the characteristics of his classmates than those of the teacher." James Coleman, 1972

Wednesday, August 19, 2015

Why Every Corporate Welfare Kingpin is Pushing ESEA (NCLB 2.0)

by Jim Horn
 
While the clueless NEA/AFT/NPE/FairTest drones celebrate the possibility of a decreased federal testing role in the new ESEA, they remain quiet as church mice about the real threat to children, parents, and teachers.  Their misleaders know what's coming, but they are all so heavily vested in the foundation money game that they are reduced to pathetic mumbling about the "small victories" of a reduced federal testing role.  The coming tsunami of cash for charter schools, the return to states rights education policy, and the disappearance of federal oversight are items Ravitch or Cody do not want to talk about--it might endanger their phony victory party.

The Gates-Broad-Walton endgame that ESEA will initiate is a transformation of public education to a system of corporate welfare charter schools that are paid for by taxpayers, operated by grandiose beginners who know nothing, and profited by the tech giants, billionaires, corporate foundations, and venture philanthropists.

These paternalistic predators want all poor and working class children miseducated in the ideology of the No Excuses test prep camps, where they can be schooled to work hard, be hard, and to accept their corporate futures as the only possible fate.

If the corporate ed giveaway (ESEA) passes, the amount going to charter schools expansion will triple from $250 million to three quarters of a billion dollars each year. As one of the chief corporate stooges recently salivated during a discussion of ESEA,
The federal charter program may end up being the most important federal education intervention. Tripling it from $250M to $750M will probably do more good for low-income kids than nearly every other federal program.
Where are the real advocates for children, public education, and the commons? 

1 comment:

  1. Anonymous12:48 PM

    We are rapidly becoming unemployed and unemployable.

    Abigail Shure

    ReplyDelete