Are Public Schools Safe for Black Children?

THE RESULTS OF A STUDY BY THE U.S.
DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION SHOW THAT
AFRICAN-AMERICAN CHILDREN RECEIVE
LESS RESOURCES AS COMPARED TO
CHILDREN OF OTHER RACES.
(PHOTO: JAN-GEPHARDT.BLOGSPOT.COM)

By Lynette Holloway, 

The Root

09 March 12

n Tuesday the U.S. Department of Education released the Civil Rights Data Collection sample, which found that public school educators unfairly punish minority students. The Associated Press had previously reported on a preliminary release of the report.

The survey of 7,000 school districts and 72,000 schools was conducted during the 2009-2010 school year. It also found that African-American children were less likely to be exposed to high-level curriculums and experienced teachers.

"The data portend a very disturbing picture," Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Russlynn Ali explained during a conference call on Tuesday. "They tell us that across the country, African Americans, Latinos, students with disabilities and English-language learners continue to receive less than their fair share of our most important resources."

For example, while African-American children represent 18 percent of the sample in the study, they represent 35 percent of the number of students suspended once, 46 percent of those suspended more than once and 39 percent of all students expelled, the report shows.   READ MORE

Do Politicians Know Anything About Schools and Education? Anything?

Jasmin Garces, 7, along with other second graders,
watches as President Obama delivers a back-to-school
address to school children in Denver, Colorado,
08/08/09.
(photo: John Moore/Getty Images North America)

By Diane Ravitch, Nieman Watchdog

08 February 12

Diane Ravitch poses a dozen piercing questions on education and school policy. Some of them turn conventional thinking on its ear, and each could be a starting point for reporting on elections, from the presidency on down to local school boards.

1. Both Republican candidates and President Obama are enamored of charter schools - that is, schools that are privately managed and deregulated. Are you aware that studies consistently show that charter schools don't get better results than regular public schools? Are you aware that studies show that, like any deregulated sector, some charter schools get high test scores, many more get low scores, but most are no different from regular public schools? Do you recognize the danger in handing public schools and public monies over to private entities with weak oversight? Didn't we learn some lessons from the stock collapse of 2008 about the risk of deregulation?

2. Both Republican candidates and President Obama are enamored of merit pay for teachers based on test scores. Are you aware that merit pay has been tried in the schools again and again since the 1920s and it has never worked? Are you aware of the exhaustive study of merit pay in the Nashville schools, conducted by the National Center for Performance Incentives at Vanderbilt, which found that a bonus of $15,000 per teacher for higher test scores made no difference?    READ MORE

Michelle Rhee Adds Anti-Immigration State Alabama To Her Portfolio

Posted: 08 Feb 2012 06:00 AM PST



Here are some basic facts about Alabama. They have the most draconian immigration laws in the country, forcing people to produce identification proving they have legal status before they can even get water service, much less an education for their children. Under Alabama's horrible law, teachers are required to check the immigration status of their students. These policies are inhuman in a state where there are already far too many poor people, citizen and immigrant alike. Also? Alabama does not currently have charter schools.

Alabama's education system is underfunded and in need of reforms, but not Rhee's flavor of reforms. To get a sense of who she really is, watch the video at the top where she admits she was a bad teacher while selling herself as a reformer.

And now she's sold herself to Alabama as The Great Education Savior, under what can only be described as very strange and odd circumstances.
----

Let's have a look at the parallels between Michelle Rhee's priorities and ALEC's.
READ MORE

The US schools with their own police

Texas is a huge state. There are 1229 Independent
School Districts (ISDs) and Charter Schools in Texas
serving over 4 million students.READ MORE

January 9, 2012, The Guardian (One of the UK's leading newspapers) More and more US schools have police patrolling the corridors. Pupils are being arrested for throwing paper planes and failing to pick up crumbs from the canteen floor.

Why is the state criminalising normal childhood behaviour? Like hundreds of schools in the state, and across large parts of the rest of the US, Fulmore Middle [school] has its own police force with officers in uniform who carry guns to keep order in the canteens, playgrounds and lessons.

Each day, hundreds of schoolchildren appear before courts in Texas charged with offences such as swearing, misbehaving on the school bus or getting in to a punch-up in the playground. Children have been arrested for possessing cigarettes, wearing "inappropriate" clothes and being late for school.

In 2010, the police gave close to 300,000 "Class C misdemeanour" tickets to children as young as six in Texas for offences in and out of school, which result in fines, community service and even prison time. What was once handled with a telling-off by the teacher or a call to parents can now result in arrest and a record that may cost a young person a place in college or a job years later. "We've taken childhood behaviour and made it criminal," said Kady Simpkins, a lawyer.

"They're kids." The very young are not spared. Texas records show more than 1,000 tickets were issued to primary schoolchildren over the past six years . Note: For a long list of bizarre arrests of children, for behavior not at all unusual, that have been reported in the mainstream media, click here.

Why Do the Koch Brothers Want to End Public Education?

By Robert Greenwald, Open Mike Blog

16 August 11

Call David Koch and tell him to stop funding school resegregation now! His number is 212-319-1100." -- CW/RSN

he Koch brothers have more than $42 billion to make public policy out of their anti-government ideology, and their assault against public education epitomizes their tactics to remake our nation.

The Koch brothers founded Americans for Prosperity and have contributed more than $5 million to its political coffers. Americans for Prosperity, in turn, contributed to organizations that financially influenced a community school board election.

That's right: the Koch brothers are involving themselves, through their wealth-backed political apparatus, in local schools.

READ MORE