Koch Ca$h Not Enough to Save Privatizers

If you are a Nashville school board member with ideological or financial ties to the corporate reform school crowd, you should look out.  A wave is building that is not for you to ride.

from Valerie Strauss:

It was a bad night for conservative school reformers in two Colorado elections being watched nationally in the education world — and public education advocates did well in key Philadelphia races as well.

Voters in the Denver suburb of Jefferson County on Tuesday tossed out three conservative members in a recall vote that was marked by some $1 million in spending, including support for the incumbents from a Koch-backed organization. The school board earned national attention when the members in 2014 said the Advanced Placement U.S. History course was not patriotic enough and needed to be changed.

In Douglas County south of Denver, voters who in 2009 and 2013 supported conservative reformers for the school board voted against three of them who had pushed controversial measures, including a voucher program.

According to the Denver Post,  the votes weren’t close, as predicted. It said that in Jefferson County, the recall won 64 percent to 36 percent. In Douglas County, the incumbents lost 58 percent to 42 percent.

In Jefferson County, Julie Williams, Ken Witt and John Newkirk  have been in office for two years. They won seats in 2013 on the five-member board and moved quickly to institute controversial school reforms, including a merit pay system for teachers and an educator evaluation system that used student test scores.

Public school activists charged that the three were part of a reform movement trying to privatize public education and started a recall effort that attracted national attention, including money from outside the state from partisans on both sides. Americans for Prosperity, the national organization founded by Charles and David Koch, contributed to the reformers, while unions supported their opponents. Some $1 million was believed to have been spent in the race, one of a few local elections around the country in which outside money played a role.

Eighty-Four Percent of Boulder Valley Students Refuse State Tests

From The Daily Camera:

More than 1,500 Boulder Valley high-school students — 84 percent of the district's seniors — refused to take the state's new science and social studies tests Thursday in a widespread protest against how much classroom time is devoted to standardized testing. 

At Boulder's Fairview High, nine out of 530 eligible seniors took the test, while about 200 seniors showed up at the school to wave signs, collect food and school supplies for holiday drives, and write letters to policymakers. 

"That we had so many students out there in the freezing weather really shows how committed we are," Fairview senior Jessica Piper said. "We had a really good turnout."

Seniors, for the first time, are taking state science and social studies tests, with Boulder Valley and many other districts in the state scheduling the test for Thursday and Friday. In previous years, ninth- and 10th-graders took state tests, while juniors took the ACT and seniors were exempt.

Students in other districts also failed to show for the tests, with parents in both Boulder Valley and elsewhere agreeing to opt them out.

Those parental refusals were concentrated in a few of the state's highest-performing and most affluent school districts. 

At nine Douglas County high schools, nearly 1,900 students did not take the tests, or more than half the overall student population at those schools, according to preliminary data provided by the district.

The student protests come as educators and parents are raising concerns that too much time is now spent on testing, with Boulder Valley Superintendent Bruce Messinger agreeing that the state hasn't found "the right balance."

He added that the students did a good job of demonstrating their concern.

"We hope it will generate good discussion around these assessments," he said.

'Protesting in the freezing cold'

A state task force, with a report due to the state Legislature by Jan. 31, is now investigating testing cost, timelines, impact on instruction and opt-out options.

In a statement Thursday, Colorado Education Commissioner Robert Hammond said he hears the concerns about the timing and volume of testing.

"I understand the frustration," Hammond said. "I am fully committed to evaluating how the testing goes and working with districts and policymakers to identify ways to improve. I know that together we will find the best pathway forward that yields the best results for students."

Along with protesting, seniors at Fairview, Broomfield High and Centaurus High wrote an open letter — complete with footnotes — to the community about the reasons behind the protest.

At Fairview on Thursday morning, senior Cody Limber said students wanted to make their displeasure over the standardized tests heard.

"We're not happy with not only the money being spent, but with the time being spent," he said.

Added senior Emma Boelts, "We're all out here protesting in the freezing cold for our educational rights."

The students are planning to continue the protest Friday.

Students 'were very thoughtful'

Fairview Principal Don Stensrud said he was "very proud of the students for exercising their rights."

"They were very thoughtful in their planning," he said. "They wanted to make sure it wouldn't cause any harm to the district."

While this first round of senior science and social studies tests won't count for school accountability measures, districts will be held accountable for reaching a 95 percent participation rate. If Boulder Valley's participation is lower, Messinger said, the district will need to show that it made an effort to get students to test or face a lower state accreditation rating.

Schools gave new state science and social studies tests in elementary and middle school in the spring. New online tests in reading and math will debut in the spring of 2015.

The Colorado Department of Education estimates that third-graders will spend 490 minutes on tests, fourth- and fifth-graders 800 minutes, sixth graders 570 minutes, seventh- and eighth-graders 840 minutes, ninth- and 10th-graders 600 minutes, juniors — who take the ACT along with state tests — 795 minutes, and seniors 540 minutes.

The Denver Post contributed to this report.

Amy Bounds: 303-473-1341, boundsa@dailycamera.com or twitter.com/boundsa

Gates, Bloomberg, and Corporate Welfare Are Losers in Colorado Vote

With support from major plutocrats who own the U. S. Department of Education and most state departments of education, the plan to turn Colorado’s PreK-12 urban schools into segregated corporate reform schools has gone down in flames with an overwhelming rejection by Colorado voters, 65-35.  For a measure to aid education to be paid for with a tax increase, voters have to know that there is some value to be added.  

What they know from decades of corporamental meddling in Colorado and elsewhere is that, over the past 20 years, public schools have been retooled by corporate know-nothings into competitive testing pressure cookers and cultural sterilization programs meant to pacify the poor.

Several days ago, the Wall Street Journal carried a big story on the impending Colorado vote, with this clip:

Unlike previous fundraising attempts, the current Colorado initiative is tied to comprehensive school reform proposals, which has helped proponents build broad support. Stacy Rader, spokeswoman for the Colorado League of Charter Schools, said charter schools were part of the consultation process that culminated in the drafting of Amendment 66, and, while they didn't get everything they wanted, "there's some good things in this.''

Good things, indeed.  Any public education measure supported by these CorpEd losers is going to lose because the public is not nearly as stupid as our corporate royalty give them credit for being.  

Taxpaying parents have had enough "disruption" from the self-serving corporate troublemakers in our schools.  Colorado has just maybe decided to kick them out the classroom so that learning can continue.

From the NYTimes:

DENVER — They had $10 million in contributions, a barrage of advertising and support from the usually warring factions of the educational establishment. But Democratic leaders in this swing state were dealt a stinging defeat on Tuesday as voters resoundingly rejected an effort to raise taxes by $1 billion a year to pay for a sweeping school overhaul.

The outcome, a warning to Democrats nationally, was a drubbing for teachers unions as well as wealthy philanthropists like Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York and Bill and Melinda Gates, who pumped millions of dollars into the measure, and it offered a sharp rebuke to Gov. John W. Hickenlooper and the Democratically led legislature, who have recently tugged Colorado to the left with laws on gun control and clean energy.

Waves of newcomers and growth across Denver and its suburbs have made Colorado fertile ground for Democrats in local and national elections in recent years, burnishing its reputation as a liberal outpost flanked by more traditionally rural and conservative states, a place where craft beer abounds, marijuana is legal and same-sex couples can get civil unions. But analysts say those changes belie a bedrock of libertarian disdain for higher taxes and overarching government reforms. The Obama administration also lent its support. . . .

What the New York Times does not get is that there is nothing liberal in the corporate rape of public education and the segregated miseducation of minorities, whether or not it is performed by politicians labeled by (D) or (R). Colorado progressives and progressives everywhere know this—it’s too bad the Wall Street liberals east of the Hudson don’t.