The Smartest Ed Deformers in the Room/NY Senate Passes Charter Cap Lift

Having seen the play Enron which I wrote about here, I was looking forward to see the documentary Enron, the Smartest Guys in the Room and low and behold, there it was on CNBC the other night. As Enron was plotting to cause havoc with the California energy system, we heard how often Choice - or cherce as Ralph Cramden would have said - was used to justify playing trader with peoples' lives by using rolling blackouts to push energy prices beyond the stratesphere.

Sound familiar?

"Choice" is the buzz word of the ed deformers who have pumped up charter school parents to get up at meetings and talk about how it is their right to have cherce. This is part of the same bait and switch used by Enron, which if it hadn't gone kaput, would be joining Broad, Gates and Walmart in the charter school gold rush. When there are no more public schools to rape and charters are the only game in town, they will pull plugs all over the place to cream not only kids but as much public money from the system as they can.

Then we'll be seeing stories about black boxes and raptors. Can't wait for the play "Charters."

Add-on
There's a lot of to-do over the NY State Senate passing a bill to lift the charter school cap by a vote of 45-15. With the threat of charter school/Wall Street money flowing into local political races, we are seeing how charter schools are a political movement, not an educational one, a point I made in my testimony at the Perkins hearing as I was looking at 3 HSA parents.

I mean, if you have your kids in a charter school already, why are you so willing to be used as a political wedge to get more charters? Altruism for your fellows who didn't make the lottery even if you know that there can never be enough charters that can handle all the kids, especially those who are left behind in special ed?

The big battle will be the Perkins Senate seat and watch it get dirty as charges of white money and white paternalism invading Harlem start flying around. Don't be surprised to hear references being made to a certain uncle who had a certain cabin down south in pre-civil war times.

Sign the petition to vote no on lifting the cap:

http://www.change.org/petitions/view/vote_no_to_raising_the_cap_on_charter_schools

Here is an excerpt from the Daily News:

The state’s powerful teachers unions accused Senate Democrats of caving in to charter-school advocates, who have threatened to spend $10 million to unseat at risk senators if they did not pass the bill, reports Glenn Blain of the DN's State Capitol Bureau. Union leaders vowed to hold the vote against lawmakers in the coming election season.

United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew dumped on the news this way:

"It’s a shame that the Senate has spent its time passsing a one-house charter bill that has no chance of becoming law, instead of concentrating on solving the budget crisis that threatens the education of millions of public school children across the state,” he said.

Assembly spokesman Dan Weiller said only, "This legislation, like all legislation, will be reviewed through our normal committee process."

Two senators were excused from the vote: Thomas Morahan (R-Rockland County) and Ruth Hassell-Thompson (D-Westchester).

The No votes were:
Neil Breslin
Tom Duane
Liz Krueger
Ken LaValle
Velmanette Montgomery
Suzi Oppenheimer
Frank Padavan
Bill Perkins
Stephen Saland
Eric Schneiderman
Jose Serrano
William Stachowski
Toby Ann Stavisky
Andrea Stewart-Cousins
Antoine Thompson

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dailypolitics/2010/05/state-senate-passes-charter-sc.html#ixzz0mur2jvJT

For more on the impact of private money determining public ed policy, see my previous post (and follow the links as I've moved a big chunk of it to Norms Notes.) Rhee in a Nutshell