Will Shelby County Commission Oppose Charter Schools?

The Shelby County Commissioners voted recently to oppose the voucher bills that are chasing each other through the TN state legislature this year.  They are concerned, they say, about the $70 million in public ed dollars that would be lost as students attend private schools with their $5,000 per child vouchers.

There has to be another reason for the opposition.  If the Commission was concerned about the financial integrity of the public school system, why have they not already passed a resolution against charter schools?

 After all, Shelby County already has approximately 18,000 students in charter schools now.  At $9,000 per child, that's $162,000,000 per year in public dollars going to privately-managed corporate charter schools.  By next year, we could see that number go over $200 million.  

Which Commissioner's hair is on fire about that hole in funding donut??

Will Dog the Bounty Hunter Save School Enrollment in a Dying City?

Every day brings a new reason to wonder why anyone would ever move to Memphis to teach.  Salary schedules are a thing of the past, and pay raises are now bonuses that are based on test scores.  Teachers are in constant fear of being surplussed or excessed or some other term to disguise the ugly truth of teacher firing. 

Pay for advanced degrees has been eliminated, and the oligarchs are pouring millions into alternative certification programs that now jeopardize the future of legitimate teacher education programs at University of Memphis.  White missionary temps fill the remaining downtown bars and eateries after 9 hour days and exchange horror stories.

Gangs of angry and destitute youth have taken to the streets to beat up innocent pedestrians, and with black schools converted to total compliance chain gangs, increasing numbers are just saying no to being treated like animals in test prep factories. 

The Corporate Appeal reported last week that the county school system has lost about 2,500 kids who just didn't show up for school this year. 

With the public coffers drained from paying for corporate charter operators, the toadies on the local school board are coming up with novel ideas to recover that 10,000 dollars for every missing child who has said take your school and shove it.

. . . While district counts were significantly off, equally troubling to the board is that it has 2,000 to 2,400 students it can’t find, which prompted newly elected board member Mike Kernell to suggest a $500 finders fee for agencies that could help get the students to school.

“We have better ways to keep track of dogs than we do children,” he said after a budget meeting. “If we spend $500, we have a lot to gain.”

The district gets about $10,000 in state and local taxes for each student. It gets nothing if they are not in school.  . . .

Will the Shelby County School Board hire a real professional to bring these delinquents back to lockdown high?  It would make a great TV series, you know.

How Much Will Shelby County Slash to Pay for the Increasing Burden of Charter Schools?

During this school year now winding down, Shelby County Schools will give up $67 million to corporate charter schools in Memphis.  Next year that amount will increase almost 16 percent to over $78 million, so that almost one dollar of every ten spent will be for charter schools.  That's $145 million in two years.

The 39 charter schools will get more, then, than all monies in the budget for student services, more than twice the amount that will spent on retirees' benefits, and more than all the combined costs for facilities, utilities, and custodial services.  By the end of the coming school year, the Shelby County Schools Fund Balance will have withered from $210 million to $149 million, a 30 percent drop in two years.

The $78 million for charters will not include almost $9 million for the "Innovation Office" and the bureaucrats who are scheming to create another money sink in the form of a virtual school ($6.6 million).

As you can see from the chart below, the 2014-15 budget plans all sorts of cuts to pay for the corporate welfare charters.  A 22 percent decrease in salaries and a 23 percent cut in employee benefits will serve to offset the costs for the continuing drain from charters, more contracted services with profiteers, and the increasing costs for debt services.

Will teachers and staff sit quietly as their livelihoods are sucked away to pay for the Gates Foundation School Privatization Plan to benefit billionaires and Wall Street vampires?

While we wait to see, the County is moving forward with a $16 million plan for merit pay based on test scores, a strategy that has not raised achievement any place it has been tried. What such meritless loser plans have done is intensify the focus on junk tests and test prep, which have supplanted learning in schools.