*Updated 3-20-15: There are many parents, teachers, administrators and board members who are fighting a very tough fight in Oklahoma and other states right now against a very corrupt idea misnamed “school choice”.
For those of you who need ideas to talk about and links to use in comments and Facebook/Twitter/Google+/Reddit posts, here are my posts so far that are directly pointing at the problems with “school choice”: (Each title is a clickable link to the post.)
*School Choice and the Fear of “Those People”
–“School Choice” is more about the deep fear of “those people” than proponents will admit.
How School Choice Turns “We” Into “Me”
–“School choice” turns the “we” of society into the “me” of taking care of my child at the expense of everyone else.
Teacher, You live in two worlds
–We teachers live in two worlds: One is of collaboration and democracy. The other is of contest and domination. We do well in the first, but not the second.
So you want evidence of choice and charter problems?
— Evidence of the potential problems with proposed charter laws in Oklahoma and several states is easy to find in states where the same laws have been tried.
Cynical school choice stunts ramp up in Oklahoma
— Public school districts in Oklahoma have used magnet schools for years to combat racial segregation. But that’s not what “school choice week” is about.
Does school choice mean that you choose the school?
— This is “School Choice Week”. Does that mean that parents chose the school? Sometimes. More often, it really means that the school makes the choice.
Bait and switch with parent choice?
— A sweeping charter bill was defeated last year in the Oklahoma Legislature. So charter proponents have shifted back to promoting “parent choice”.
Here comes the money
— With public schools in Oklahoma, the effort to move parents from the status of citizen to consumer has started in earnest. There’s big money behind it, too.
Education reformers engineer a teacher brain drain
— Even though experienced teachers as a group have a high degree of love for their students and their work, they are leaving education in large numbers. Why?
Education reform is not disruptive innovation
— Education reformers love to strike a heroic pose as they refer to themselves as engaging in “disruptive innovation”. But, that’s not what they are doing.
Investors resist idea of society as stakeholder in public education
— American society used to be quite clear that all taxpayers paid for public education because all benefited. Not any more. What has changed? Investors.
Charters don’t do it better or cheaper
— Investors’ big spin on their own charter corporations is that they do education better, and for cheaper than those bad public schools. But they do neither.
Investors ready to liquidate public schools
— Plans are under way for investment corporations to execute the biggest conversion – some call it theft – of public schools property in U.S. history.