Are Democrats Going To Finally Get Behind Public Education For Real-- And Leave Charter Schools To The Republicans?

This week I left my house for something that isn't part of my normal routine. While I braved rush-hour freeway traffic-- something I have avoided for at least a decade-- my friend drove straight from work to meet me at the Broad in downtown Los Angeles (DTLA), where it costs $8 to park-- every 15 minutes. My friend had to drive from Compton where he teaches elementary school. When we got to the imposing building that multi-billionaire Eli Broad built to house his contemporary art collection, my friend stopped for a moment. He's a teacher's union activist and he wanted to remind me that Broad has given nearly $700 million to fund the anti-union charter school movement. "Im only going to this because it's free," he said. I wouldn't give that asshole a dime." Yeah, me neither, but he's 86 and sick and soon God will be asking him why he spent so much time and effort trying to destroy public education. That photo up top is me at the Broad. So is this:

Yesterday, Moriah Balingit, writing for the Washington Post, reported that the Democrats are finally on the verge of leaving support for charter schools to the GOP, where it belongs. Yesterday, seven Democratic presidential candidates attended an education forum in Pittsburgh organized by teachers unions and civil rights groups, where they were asked about charter schools. "Teachers unions,"wrote Balingit, "have led the opposition to charter schools because they say the privately run but publicly funded campuses lack accountability and take critical resources away from traditional public schools."

Charter schools long enjoyed bipartisan support. They were championed by Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, who picked Arne Duncan, a reliable charter school ally, as his education secretary.

That era has ended. Near the end of Obama’s term, the NAACP called for a moratorium on charters. And President Trump’s appointment of Betsy DeVos, a Michigan billionaire who poured her fortune into expanding charter schools and school voucher programs, has galvanized public education advocates fighting charter school expansion.

Last year, three Democratic governors campaigning on pledges to halt the expansion of charter schools won elections. Among the original eight candidates who were to speak Saturday, only Sen. Cory Booker (NJ) is an outspoken supporter of charters. Booker canceled late Friday because of the flu, his campaign manager said.

There are few places where school districts have felt the growing pains of charters more acutely than in Pennsylvania, a state that is among the most inequitable when it comes to funding among districts. Critics say charters, which often set up shop in low-income districts, exacerbate the gap between the haves and the have-nots.

...Under state law, school districts are required to pay tuition for children who decamp to charter schools, cutting monthly checks. The tuition is based on a rough calculation of what districts spend on their own students, but public schools say the amount is exorbitant, and beyond what charter schools need to operate. Cyber charter schools, with little in the way of facility costs, are paid just like bricks-and-mortar campuses.

Clairton, where more than 90 percent of students are economically disadvantaged, sends nearly 15 percent of its budget-- about $2.2 million-- to charter schools. That does not include transportation costs the district is required to cover for charter students-- even though the district cannot afford buses for its own students. Poor districts such as Clairton bear the brunt of charter school expenses, because students from wealthier districts have little incentive to leave their schools.

“What’s going to happen? We’ll be out of money in a year or so,” said Superintendent Ginny Hunt. “I’ve been able to keep us solvent by cutting everything. There’s nothing left to cut.”

The district has attempted to merge with neighboring systems, including West Jefferson Hills, where the median household income is more than double that in Clairton. The difference in school spending between the districts is so vast that it caught the attention of researchers, who concluded that the funding gap was the fourth largest among contiguous school districts in the country.

West Jefferson Hills said no. This year, when students in Clairton returned to a century-old building not renovated since the 1980s, high school students in the neighboring district began classes in a $95 million building. The new Thomas Jefferson High was designed to evoke Monticello, Jefferson’s mansion.

Across the river, in Mc­Keesport, schools Superintendent Mark P. Holtzman Jr. has viewed the two charter schools in his city with increasing trepidation, including Young Scholars, which attempted to buy an abandoned school building from the district. Officials rejected the offer, even though Young Scholars promised far above the asking price.

“If, in fact, they got their hands on this property, it would really sink us financially,” Holtzman said.

Holtzman, a McKeesport graduate, said rising charter expenses have forced the school board to repeatedly raise taxes on residents and businesses. His district educates some of the county’s neediest students, including those from a residential center that houses foster children and students in trouble with the law.

But rising charter school expenses have meant the delay of important maintenance projects, like repairing the middle school’s foundation or upgrading the stadium, which sprouts worrisome leaks when it rains. The high school has had to cut so many electives that many seniors leave school early because there are no classes for them.

Students at McKeesport Area High are keenly aware of what school would be like if the city were wealthier-- they see what it looks like when they pass through affluent schools for activities. Their school does not have enough laptops, and existing computers are outdated, making it difficult to access online class materials.

Even so, they struggle to understand why people would not want to attend their school, which they describe as welcoming, warm and close-knit. For students grappling with difficult upbringings, it’s a refuge.

“School is more a safe haven for some people,” said Aundre Robinson, a junior and the highest-ranked member of the school’s ROTC program. “It’s the only place where some kids eat throughout the day. It’s the only place where they don’t get yelled at and screamed at for something.”

One of the most important planks in Bernie's platform is about re-investing in public education. Recently, he wrote, "Every human being has the fundamental right to a good education. On this 65th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education decision, we are committed to creating an education system that works for all people, not just the wealthy and powerful." There are 8 main goals he wants to achieve:

• Combat racial discrimination and school segregation
• End the unaccountable profit-motive of charter schools
• Provide equitable funding for public schools
• Give teachers a much-deserved raise by setting a starting salary for teachers at no less than $60,000, expanding collective bargaining rights and teacher tenure, and funding out-of-pocket expenses for classroom materials.
• Strengthens the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) by ensuring that the federal government provides at least 50 percent of the funding for special education and giving special education teachers the support they need.
• Provide year-round, free universal school meals, and incentivizes locally sourced food.
• Make schools safe and inclusive by protecting the rights of all students from harassment, discrimination, and violence and enacting comprehensive gun violence prevention laws.
• Rebuild, modernize, and green our nation’s schools.

Bernie: "The United States, as the wealthiest country in history, should have the best education system in the world. Today, in a highly competitive global economy, if we are going to have the kind of standard of living that the people of this country deserve, we need to have the best educated workforce. But let me be very honest with you, and tell you that, sadly, that is not the case today. Our nation used to lead the world in the percentage of young Americans with college degrees. We were number one. Today, we are number 11, behind countries like South Korea, Japan, Canada, Ireland, the United Kingdom, and Australia-- and that is not acceptable. And here is the simple truth: 40 or 50 years ago, in California and Vermont, virtually any place in America, if you received a high school degree, the odds were pretty good that you would be able to get a decent paying job, raise a family, buy a house, buy a car, all on one income. That was the world 40 or 50 years ago. But that is not the world we live in today. The world has changed, the global economy has changed, technology has changed, and education has changed. Over the past decade, states all over America have made savage cuts to education, while, at the same time, providing massive tax breaks to the wealthiest people and largest corporations in America. Our kids and our students are too important to cut back on education, especially when those cuts reduce educational opportunities for underserved students, students of color, low income students, LGBTQ students and students with disabilities... In the twenty-first century, a free public education system that goes from kindergarten through high school is no longer good enough. If we are to succeed as a nation, public colleges and universities must be tuition free. Higher education should be a right for all, not a privilege for the few. That means we have got to make public colleges and universities tuition free and we must substantially reduce student debt. Each and every year, hundreds of thousands of bright and qualified young people do not get a higher education for one reason and one reason alone: their family lacks the income. That is unfair to those families; and it is it is unfair to the future of this country."

Bernie’s education plan addresses the serious crisis in our education system by reducing racial and economic segregation in our public school system, attracting the best and the brightest educational professionals to teach in our classrooms, and reestablishing a positive learning environment for students in our K-12 schools. This plan calls for a transformative investment in our children, our teachers and our schools and a fundamental re-thinking of the unjust and inequitable funding of our public education system.

...Recognizing the problems in a one-size-fits-all model of education, teachers’ unions and parent activists established alternative, experimental “charter” schools to better serve kids struggling within the traditional system. But few charter schools have lived up to their promise. Instead, billionaires like DeVos and the Waltons, together with private equity and hedge fund executives, have bankrolled their expansion and poured tens of millions into school board and other local elections with the hope of privatizing public schools. Charter schools are led by unaccountable, private bodies, and their growth has drained funding from the public school system.

Moreover, the proliferation of charter schools has disproportionately affected communities of color-- 17 percent of charter schools are 99 percent minority, compared to 4 percent of traditional public schools. This has led the NAACP, the NEA, AFT and others to criticize the charter movement for intensifying racial segregation.

The damage to communities caused by unregulated charter school growth must be stopped and reversed.

As president, Bernie Sanders will fight to:

• Ban for-profit charter schools and support the NAACP’s moratorium on public funds for charter school expansion until a national audit has been completed to determine the impact of charter growth in each state. That means halting the use of public funds to underwrite new charter schools.
• We do not need two schools systems; we need to invest in our public schools system. That said, existing charter schools must be made accountable by:

◦ Mandating that charter schools comply with the same oversight requirements as public schools.
◦ Mandating that at least half of all charter school boards are teachers and parents.
◦ Disclosing student attrition rates, non-public funding sources, financial interests and other relevant data.
◦ Matching employment practices at charters with neighboring district schools, including standards set by collective bargaining agreements and restrictions on exorbitant CEO pay.
◦ Supporting the efforts of charter school teachers to unionize and bringing charter schools to the negotiating table.

...As president, Bernie Sanders will fight to equitably fund our schools. He will:

• Rethink the link between property taxes and education funding.
• Establish a national per-pupil spending floor.
• Eliminate barriers to college-readiness exams by ensuring states cover fees for the ACT, SAT and other college preparatory exams for all students.
• Triple Title I funding to ensure at-risk schools get the funding they need and end funding penalties for schools that attempt to desegregate.
• Provide schools with the resources needed to shrink class sizes.
• Provide $5 billion annually for career and technical education to give our students the skills they need to thrive once they graduate.
• Ensure schools in rural communities, indigenous communities, Puerto Rico and other U.S. Territories receive equitable funding.
• Give schools the funding needed to support arts, foreign language and music education to provide all students with important learning opportunities.

Bernie: "The historic teacher strikes of the past few years has brought national attention to the fact that teachers are paid totally inadequate wages. As a result of low pay and other inequities, 20 percent of teachers now leave the profession within five years-- a 40 percent increase from the historical average. This high rate of turnover is more pronounced in low-income communities of color." He promises, among other things, to fight to "significantly increase teacher pay by working with states to set a starting salary for teachers at no less than $60,000 tied to cost of living, years of service, and other qualifications; and allowing states to go beyond that floor based on geographic cost of living; to protect and expand collective bargaining rights and teacher tenure; and to triple the above-the-line tax deduction for educator expenses and index it to inflation to reimburse teachers for the nearly $500 on average they spend on out of pocket classroom expenses each year."

UPDATE

A friend of mine, uncredentialed, works at a charter school near my home. I asked him what it's like working there. He told me that "Like most workers these days, the oppression of the staff manifests itself in job precarity, inadequate compensation and poor working conditions. Despite its non-profit status the charter school functions like any business; there is even a multimillion dollar property building equity with each mortgage payment. And like any business, there is a bottom line placing downward pressure on the wage and benefits of its employees. Every employee hired by the administration, from the teachers to the custodial staff, is an 'at will employee', meaning their contract can be terminated at any point for any reason. This system of employment leaves us little room to bargain individually for better pay and was recently weaponized against us in our attempts to unionize. This past year teachers organizing with UTLA were met with a series of reactionary tactics by the administration including intimidation and spying. In one of the most disturbing cases a particularly outspoken teacher organizer had her hours cut in half once her yearly 'at will' contract ended."