User:Jon Awbrey/PATCH

Patch — School Leaders Hoping For Update

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Patch -- School Leaders Hoping For Update

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School Leaders Hoping For Update, Feedback During Forum Tonight
• http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight

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Three recent stories on the push to privatize schools:

Virg Bernero on the GOP Agenda for Education
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7vhjTiqpX0

The United Gates of America
• http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/22/978218/-The-United-Gates-of-America

Rupert Murdoch, “Education Software Provider”
• http://www.businessinsider.com/rupert-murdoch-news-corp-education-2012-presidential-campaign-2011-5

Anyone with a working long-term memory knows where this agenda to “Starve Public Schools Out Of Existence” came from.

Good thing there's web search for the rest of us —

Richard DeVos Advocates “Stealth” Strategy Against Public Education
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-fTAhc4QC4

Blackwater In-Law DeVos Outlines “Stealth” Plot Against Public Education
• http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/04/972949/-Blackwater-In-Law-DeVos-outlines-stealth-plot-against-Public-Education

Strategy for Privatizing Public Schools Spelled out by Dick DeVos in 2002 Heritage Foundation Speech
• http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/5/3/12515/58655/Front_Page/Strategy_for_Privatizing_Public_Schools_Spelled_out_by_Dick_D

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_770258

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Mr. Ranger,

People of good sense are not fooled by the Educational Voucher Con any more than they are fooled by the Medical Voucher Con. That is why they reject these scams time and time again when they come to a vote, and that is why the Privatization Axis keeps getting sneakier, stealthier, and more deceptive year after year.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_812103

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The Facebook page, “Wear Red For Public Ed”, collects news and opinion about the state of public education across the national scene:

• http://www.facebook.com/wearredforpubliced

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_813225

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Mr. Reno,

You wrote, “It will be interesting to see what happens in Pennsylvania.”

I simply supplied an additional source of information and opinion about what is happening with public education on the national scene.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_813597

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In a related story …

Wealthy Families, Corporate-Backed Foundations Behind Push for School Vouchers
• http://www.prwatch.org/spin/2011/05/10778/wealthy-families-corporate-backed-foundations-behind-push-school-vouchers

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_813905

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Joshua Raymond wrote:

“I am not wealthy nor corporate-backed. As I mentioned in my post above, I just want options for gifted children who aren't having their needs met in Rochester Community Schools. The options suggested by some RCS employees have often been tuition-based schools which many parents, including me, cannot afford. Please suggest some options and not just another link.”

Mr. Raymond,

It may well be that every child is gifted in something — it might be art, or athletics, or astrophysics, or any one of a thousand other things. All the true teachers I have ever known were the sorts of persons who loved nothing better than seeing those gifts come to light. What constrains the administration and faculty of RCS from doing justice to all those gifts?

Do you think it's a lack of dedication or desire on the part of the administration and faculty? I personally doubt that.

Do you think it's that much ballyhooed austerity? I think that anyone watching the dollars in the air and where they are going will have to admit that austerity in general is one of the biggest of the Big Lies that we have seen in many decades.

Where private dollars go is determined by private interests — some of the links I shared are informative on that score.

Where public dollars go ought to be determined by the Public Will. Is that what we see happening in the current state of things?

That is the question that we ought to be asking here.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_815185

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Mr. Raymond,

I am not acquainted with a Public Will or a Philosophy of Education on the contemporary scene that promotes such attitudes toward the actualization of any human potential. There is simply no percentage in it, either for the individual or for society. The fact that some people feel that way does not elevate the attitude to the level of Public Will. The constraints on tailoring education to diverse individuals come from other considerations than the best educational philosophy and practice.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_815459

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What can I say?

Keep bashing your teachers. Keep listening to con men. Keep cutting funds to public education and expecting to get high quality education as a result.

Welcome to Michissippi !

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_816212

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Here is a post from the Facebook page of the Ferris Faculty Association:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Ferris-Faculty-Association/146689847768

“We all know the struggles public schools face with declining per pupil funding. We have seen Governor Snyder's plan for the future. The following link is a fund raiser trailer for Greenhills, the school Snyder has his daughter enrolled in. They're fund raising because $20,000 per year per student is not enough to properly educate a child. This trailer shows what Snyder wants in a school for *his* children.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAfBHj9Lc8E

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_817410

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Mr. Reno,

What I oppose is those who would destroy our longstanding system of universal free public education. That system of education is one of the foundations of a successful democracy, and I believe that a democratic form of government is essential to any society that hopes to survive and even, with grace and luck, thrive in a complex world. There have been other fits and starts toward democracy that failed for the lack of well distributed education and information among the people who would rule. I will do what I can to weigh against destroying that system of education.

I did not invent the fact that others are pushing for a different route, the route of total corporate privatization of the entire public sector, including public education as one subsidiary of their intended incorporation. The pushers of privatization have stated their goals. They have numbered vouchers among their methods. They have been weighing heavily and steadily for what they want with all their wealth and all the power they can muster. And they have been doing all that for a long time now.

The only thing that has changed this time around is that their tactics have become more deceptive, less open and less forthright.

I oppose that deception, and so should you.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_818343

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Mr. Reno,

You are using the word “monopoly” in a very curious fashion that I have only recently heard. I cannot tell if your intention is supposed to be ironic or not.

Yes, all forms of government might be said to maintain a “monopoly” over those functions and institutions that are considered essential to their public purview. Now and again we see stories in the news of people who chafe against Uncle Sam's monopoly on the printing of money, and there was indeed a time in our history before that irritating but apparently necessary regulation on commerce was imposed. Oh well, at least they left us our coupons.

Perhaps you honestly do not know what a true monopoly is, or what a private corporate monopoly of our nation's educational system would look like.

I pray that we do not find out.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_818571

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Well, it took a bit of work to drag the truth out into the open, but at least we have established the fact that some people really do still believe in vouchers.

That is a kind of progress …

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_818919

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Mr. Meta-Reformer,

I confess that I sometimes get frustrated with the opinions that I read from a certain contingent on this blog. But then I stop and remind myself of all that I learned about biased samples in my years of statistical consulting. That tells me that the views expressed by these folks cannot possibly be representative of the community as a whole — or else there would be no teachers at all working in the local schools.

So buck up, there is hope yet …

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_821675

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(Oops, hit the wrong button … Reposting the above)

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_821704

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So It Was You !

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_821730

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Cheesy?

Let the record show that Ms. T brought Wisconsin into this.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_821962

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Linda Darling-Hammond • “The Service of Democratic Education”
• http://www.thenation.com/article/160850/service-democratic-education

<quote>
Precisely 100 years ago, nationally distributed tests of arithmetic, handwriting and English were put into use. Their results were used to compare students, teachers and schools; to report to the public; and even to award merit pay — a short-lived innovation due to the many problems it caused.

In the view of these brilliant managerial engineers, professionally trained teachers were considered troublesome, because they had their own ideas about education and frequently didn’t go along meekly with the plan.

As one such teacher wrote in “The American Teacher” in 1912:

We have yielded to the arrogance of “big business men” and have accepted their criteria of efficiency at their own valuation, without question. We have consented to measure the results of educational efforts in terms of price and product — the terms that prevail in the factory and the department store. But education, since it deals in the first place with human organisms, and in the second place with individualities, is not analogous to a standardizable manufacturing process. Education must measure its efficiency not in terms of so many promotions per dollar of expenditure, nor even in terms of so many student-hours per dollar of salary; it must measure its efficiency in terms of increased humanism, increased power to do, increased capacity to appreciate.
</quote>

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_822342

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Mike,

I am (he computes) 62 years old. My first experience with educational reform was when I had to help my little brothers and sisters with “The New Math” while I was still being trained on “The Old Track”. So I got to see the clouds of chalk-dust from both sides at the very outset. My high school and undergrad years were filled with curricular reforms going under a parade of Acronyms and Isms that I don't even want to try and remember. I have lost count of all the Crusades and Movements and Programmes and Revolutions and Reformations that I have survived since then.

There are no simple answers. Some things can be quantified, some things cannot. Reality demands competence and creativity, exactness and humanity. I do not know how we are judged in the end, but we learn to be whole human beings by interacting with other whole human beings, and there is no escaping that in the meantime.

I have known enough teachers to know that none of them ever goes into teaching to make the Big Bucks or to have an easy life. They all, so far as I know, start out with some hint of a calling, a true love of teaching, and trying the best they can. If they get ground into the dust somewhere along the way, that is a human tragedy, both for them and their charges, but there are forces beyond any isolated person's control, and it would be a gain for society if we inquired into what those are.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_822745

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Diane Ravitch • “Waiting for a School Miracle”
• http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/01/opinion/01ravitch.html

“Be skeptical of stories of rapid educational transformation.”

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Educators know that 100 percent proficiency is impossible, given the enormous variation among students and the impact of family income on academic performance. Nevertheless, some politicians believe that the right combination of incentives and punishments will produce dramatic improvement. Anyone who objects to this utopian mandate, they maintain, is just making an excuse for low expectations and bad teachers.
</quote>

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_824060

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Just sharing a tidbit from my daily newsfeed, as I do run across a lot of random readings that I find slightly more interesting and always a lot more coherent than my own rambling thought process.

I dimly remember reading a little of what Ravitch was saying in the early 1990s, I think when she was doing her bit for Bush 1.0.  That was probably tangential to my reading in the literature on Critical Thinking, and I don't remember thinking too highly of her point of view in those days.  It's only recently that I have run across her latest Op-Ed pieces, and she strikes me as that rare breed of person who is capable of changing her theories in response to the data of experience.  I always find thinkers like that worth another thought.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_824284

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I think the word is in the public domain. That is actually the very word I always use to describe off-topic posts in the Wikipedia Review meta-discussion forum that I occasionally moderate. And believe you me, the people there are very tangential.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_824472

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Mackinac Center For Public Policy • “State Needs Privatization”
http://www.educationreport.org/15050

<quote>
The Michigan Legislature should consider privatization in order to correct the state’s overspending crisis, a Center expert told the Lansing State Journal.

“There are all sorts of areas that the state should consider privatization,” Fiscal Policy Analyst James Hohman said. “You have to monitor everything to make sure you’re getting the value for the money. It’s not just a blanket privatization arrangement that will work for the state.”

Michigan’s public schools have found increasing success with privatization of noninstructional services over the last decade. Mike LaFaive, director of the Center’s Morey Fiscal Policy Initiative, recently wrote about privatization in the Michigan prison system.
</quote>

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_825421

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Lansing State Journal
“Going Private? — Snyder, Republicans Put New Focus On Merits Of Privatization”
http://www.lansingstatejournal.com/article/20110515/NEWS04/105150528/GOING-PRIVATE-Snyder-Republicans-put-new-focus-merits-privatization

<quote>
Once a buzzword in Michigan state government in the 1990s, privatization now is coming back in a big way.

Touting his goal of reinventing government, Republican Gov. Rick Snyder has proposed privatizing prison food and store services, dairy farm and plant nursery inspections and resident care in two veterans homes to bring state costs under control.

A far more sweeping measure would privatize the processing of Medicaid and day care aid applications in the state Department of Human Services, which union officials say would lead to layoffs of several hundred state workers. That measure, proposed by Republicans, has been passed by the Senate and now must be reconciled with the House budget.
</quote>

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_825489

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The Governor and his Privateers are starving the Public Sector in Michigan out of existence for a reason, so that private corporations can complete their hostile takeover of all public services. They stopped being content with tax abatements, bailouts, bribes, incentives, kickbacks, and worker concessions a long time ago — they want nothing less than the automatic funneling of tax dollars directly into their private corporate bankrolls without the annoying interference of all you pesky peasants.

Mackinac Center For Public Policy • “State Needs Privatization”
• http://www.educationreport.org/15050

Lansing State Journal • “Going Private? — Snyder, Republicans Put New Focus On Merits Of Privatization”
• http://www.lansingstatejournal.com/article/20110515/NEWS04/105150528/GOING-PRIVATE-Snyder-Republicans-put-new-focus-merits-privatization

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_825943

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Democracy Demands Universal Free Public Education

The purpose of universal free public education is to promote the general welfare. In order to do that governments must (1) insure equal opportunities for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, (2) provide all citizens with enough education that the Republic as a whole has the best chance of surviving and prospering, and (3) enable citizens to exercise their civic rights and responsibilities with the information, the knowledge, and the faculties of reason that it takes to do so with the best chance of success.

Education is not a private commodity. Education is not a personal luxury. Education is a necessity of life in a democracy — if we intend to secure that democracy for ourselves and our posterity.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_831233

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In a democracy the state is just people.
Just people will constitute a just state.

TGIF !

TUFSO ! (Thank Unions For Saturdays Off)

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_837529

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Being a realist I believe that ideas are controlled by reality. The way that reality controls ideas is complex and subtle, but the end result of the control process is just one of two things. Ideas that represent reality will live, ideas that do not will die.

Enough about disembodied ideas.

What educators really care about is the body of ideas that lives in the hearts and minds of a given people, in other words, the culture of a given society.

A culture that represents reality, a people who make reality their friend — that culture and people will live. A culture that fails to represent reality, a people who make reality their enemy — that culture and people will die.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_837832

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And just in case anyone thinks these Educational Privateers are relics of bygone days, here's a couple of recent stories that tell of what they have in mind for one of democracies most precious resources.

<a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/22/978218/-The-United-Gates-of-America">The United Gates of America</a>

<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/rupert-murdoch-news-corp-education-2012-presidential-campaign-2011-5">Rupert Murdoch, Who Bought 90% Of An Education Software Provider, Launches Initiative “To Make Education A Top Issue In 2012 Presidential Campaign”</a>

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Real educators will have to educate the public as to what real education is, and stop taking guff from bean counters who don't know beans about it.

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The pushers of regressive education do not care about the quality of education in our public schools. They are bent on destroying our system of universal free public education and the disruptive technology of testing is simply one of the weapons in their arsenal. It is a technology of control not a means of improving education. Real education is something these bean counters don't know beans about.

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If The People Rule, The People Must Be Wise

The fundamental principle is that being educated and informed is essential to the exercise of one's duty as a citizen, so education must be as universal as the franchise. If the People must provide for their education and information, then the People must insure the quality of both.

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The Logic Of Democracy

Our Nation's Founders saw the catch that decides the fate of every try at democratic government —

If The People Rule, The People Must Be Wise.

The upshot is that education and information are not just private commodities but vital public interests. Their widest distribution is essential to the wisest functioning of democratic government. And the public must provide its members with the means to do their civic duty.

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Universal Free Public Education

The principle of Universal Free Public Education is fundamental to the proper functioning of our democracy, as the Founders of our Nation well understood.  Provisions for charter schools have long been in place, and there is no problem with that in principle, but it becomes a problem when charter schools are used to undermine the right to Universal Free Public Education.  Parochial, pay, and private schools do not operate on that principle and they should not be subsidized by public funds.

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The principle of Universal Free Public Education is fundamental to our democracy. I gather that provisions for charter schools have long been in place, and there need be no problem with that in principle, but it becomes a problem when charter schools are used to undermine the right to Universal Free Public Education. Parochial, pay, and private schools violate that principle.

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The principle of Universal Free Public Education is fundamental to the working of our democracy.  Provisions for charter schools have long been in place, and there need be no problem with that in principle, but it becomes a problem when charter schools are used to undermine the right to Universal Free Public Education. Parochial, pay, and private schools violate that principle.

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Taxes are properly levied in support of the public good. Universal free public education is a public good essential to the working of our representative democracy. Taxation in support of parochial, pay, and private schools violates the principle of universal free public education, and that is not a good thing.

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Taxes are properly levied in support of the public good.  Universal free public education is a public good that remains essential to the working of our representative democracy.  Taxation in support of parochial, pay, and private schools violates the principle of universal free public education, and that is not a good thing.

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url=http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/Bridging-Differences/]Diane Ravitch[/url] • [url=http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/Bridging-Differences/2011/05/the_outrage_of_the_week.html]The Outrage of the Week[/url][/b]

What I think from reading the comments is that many people get it, the same caring, hard-working, and wise people who have always gotten it. But let's face it — $$$ for the sake of making more $$$ speaks far louder in the U.S. today than all the caring, hard work, and wisdom put together. You are talking to people who just don't care, who simply laugh out their asses at the sorts of saps who would actually spend their evenings grading papers and preparing lesson plans instead of working their portfolios on e*trade™. Wake up and smell the TEA, you will have to strike early, strike often, and strike nationwide. You are going to have to throw a Corporate Armada full of money-grubbing privateers out of your schools while you still have a profession left to call your own. That's what I think.

— [url=http://www.edweek.org/persona.html?U=2222558&plckUserId=2222558]Jon Awbrey[/url] • [url=http://sitelife.edweek.org/ver1.0/gocomm?ck=CommentKey%3ad2b75bf6-289b-4894-ae64-21a3a76954d2]3 May 2011[/url]

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That is a common confusion. It comes from viewing everything from education to environment to healthcare to the parks and zoos as market commodities rather than common resources. People have been by misled by certain brands of bean-counter thinking to regard education as a private good, something you buy so you and yours can get ahead of them and theirs in life. But that is not how the very wise founders of our democracy saw it. They knew that universal free public education was essential to making our novel form of democracy succeed where all previous and even many later attempts failed.  You can't have one without the other.

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Who is screwing who is always a good question in politics. Where does the fault rest? Does it rest with the members of the local school board who decide where to spend the funds they receive? Does it rest with the Governor and Legislature who decide how they will act on the priorities that the People of Michigan express as their deepest concerns and highest values?

As long as we have a democratic government we have a way of holding elected officials accountable. We do not have that power over the appointed managers, emergency or other otherwise, of private corporations. Human mendacity and perfidy being what they are, what kind of system would you trust to be more accountable to the people — a private corporation or a democratic government?

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Anyone with a working long-term memory knows where this agenda to “Starve Public Schools Out Of Existence” came from.

Good thing there's web search for the rest of us —

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-fTAhc4QC4
">Richard DeVos Advocates “Stealth” Strategy Against Public Education</a>

<a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/04/972949/-Blackwater-In-Law-DeVos-outlines-stealth-plot-against-Public-Education
">Blackwater In-Law DeVos Outlines “Stealth” Plot Against Public Education</a>

<a href="http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/5/3/12515/58655/Front_Page/Strategy_for_Privatizing_Public_Schools_Spelled_out_by_Dick_D">Strategy for Privatizing Public Schools Spelled out by Dick DeVos in 2002 Heritage Foundation Speech</a>

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The Governerd and his Privateers are starving the public sector in Michigan out of existence for a reason, so that private corporations can complete their hostile takeover of all public services. They stopped being content with tax abatements, bailouts, bribes, incentives, kickbacks, and worker concessions a long time ago — they want nothing less than the automatic funneling of tax dollars directly into their private corporate bankrolls without the annoying interference of all us pesky commoners:

Mackinac Center For Public Policy • “State Needs Privatization”
• http://www.educationreport.org/15050

Lansing State Journal • “Going Private? — Snyder, Republicans Put New Focus On Merits Of Privatization”
• http://www.lansingstatejournal.com/article/20110515/NEWS04/105150528/GOING-PRIVATE-Snyder-Republicans-put-new-focus-merits-privatization

Three recent stories on the push to privatize schools:

Virg Bernero on the GOP Agenda for Education
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7vhjTiqpX0

The United Gates of America
• http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/22/978218/-The-United-Gates-of-America

Rupert Murdoch, “Education Software Provider”
• http://www.businessinsider.com/rupert-murdoch-news-corp-education-2012-presidential-campaign-2011-5

Anyone with a working long-term memory knows where this agenda to “Starve Public Schools Out Of Existence” came from.

Good thing there's web search for the rest of us —

Richard DeVos Advocates “Stealth” Strategy Against Public Education
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-fTAhc4QC4

Blackwater In-Law DeVos Outlines “Stealth” Plot Against Public Education
• http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/04/972949/-Blackwater-In-Law-DeVos-outlines-stealth-plot-against-Public-Education

Strategy for Privatizing Public Schools Spelled out by Dick DeVos in 2002 Heritage Foundation Speech
• http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/5/3/12515/58655/Front_Page/Strategy_for_Privatizing_Public_Schools_Spelled_out_by_Dick_D

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Patch — McMillin Mentioned in CNN Blog

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Patch -- McMillin Mentioned in CNN Blog

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McMillin Mentioned in CNN Blog About School Funding
• http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-mentioned-in-cnn-blog-about-school-funding

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Note 1

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There's irony and then there's double irony.

The second irony is that the Party of ALEC has the same plans for privatizing corrections as they have for privatizing education.

At least it will make the transition easier for those among the poor peon population who are unlucky enough to fall into either institution.

In related stories …

Snyder Seeks Massive Concessions From Prison Workers
• http://michiganmessenger.com/49044/snyder-seeks-massive-concessions-from-prison-workers

Two U.S. Judges Plead Guilty To Selling Children To Private Prisons
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4q7p3ME95E

Pennsylvania Judge Convicted in Alleged “Kids for Cash” Scheme
• http://abcnews.go.com/US/mark-ciavarella-pa-juvenile-court-judge-convicted-alleged/story?id=12965182

Related tags at the Daily Kos —
• http://www.dailykos.com/news/ALEC
• http://www.dailykos.com/blog/Exposing%20ALEC
• http://www.dailykos.com/news/inmate%20labor
• http://www.dailykos.com/news/prison%20labor

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-mentioned-in-cnn-blog-about-school-funding#comment_818129

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Note 2

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“Scarce educational dollars” were made scarce by decisions in Lansing.

They were made scarce by the fact that the Governerd and the Republican-controlled Legislature decided to slush the available funds in other directions.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-mentioned-in-cnn-blog-about-school-funding#comment_818129

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Note 3

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The Governor and his Privateers are starving the Public Sector in Michigan out of existence for a reason, so that private corporations can complete their hostile takeover of all public services. They stopped being content with tax abatements, bailouts, bribes, incentives, kickbacks, and worker concessions a long time ago — they want nothing less than the automatic funneling of tax dollars directly into their private corporate bankrolls without the annoying interference of all you pesky peasants.

Mackinac Center For Public Policy • “State Needs Privatization”
• http://www.educationreport.org/15050

Lansing State Journal • “Going Private? — Snyder, Republicans Put New Focus On Merits Of Privatization”
• http://www.lansingstatejournal.com/article/20110515/NEWS04/105150528/GOING-PRIVATE-Snyder-Republicans-put-new-focus-merits-privatization

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-mentioned-in-cnn-blog-about-school-funding#comment_825815

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Note 4

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Mr. Ray,

I'm not sure what you are saying, but I'll take a few guesses and maybe we can clarify the issue over a few exchanges.

I don't think people of good sense are saying that privately funded education at any level is a bad thing.  That would be kind of silly.  In reality, there are probably only a few cases of schools and universities that are funded purely from private sources or purely from tax dollars, especially if you look into scholarship foundation monies.

The basic principle is this — Public Funds, taxpayer dollars managed by Constitution-Fearing government entities, are accountable to the constituents of those governments, by whose general consent they maintain their sole legitimacy.  That is a very different sort of accounting system from the kind that we find in privately-owned corporations.  There are Federal and State constitutional constraints on how those funds can be spent, if they are spent legitimately.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-mentioned-in-cnn-blog-about-school-funding#comment_826434

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Note 5

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I have been following this and several related discussions on the Rochester Patch:

Marleau, McMillin Update School Audience on State Budget Cuts (May 24, 2011)
• http://rochester.patch.com/articles/marleau-mcmillin-and-mull-speak-about-funding-cuts-to-rochester-community-schools

School Leaders Hoping for Update, Feedback During Forum Tonight (May 23, 2011)
• http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight

McMillin: 'We Made Tough Choice to Bring Excellence Back to Classrooms' (May 5, 2011)
• http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-we-made-tough-choice-to-bring-excellence-back-to-classrooms

What I hear a lot in these discussions is that parents are focused on their own kids' education, which is a good thing. But con artists bent on destroying our system of universal free public education exploit that focus, turn it into a fixation on the false idea that taxes are something they pay for their kids only, and blind them to the fact that education is a public good that people with no school-age kids or even any kids at all pay to support. This is part of a long-running campaign by private corporations, their corporate-owned media, and their corporate-owned politicians to erase the very idea of the public good from the People's minds. And they have been spending all the Big Bucks they can muster to do it. Why? I'm guessing you can tell by the dollar signs in their eyes.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-mentioned-in-cnn-blog-about-school-funding#comment_847714

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Note 6

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Janet,

I don't see any conflict between the Public supporting the Public Good, which is why we have public-funded education in the first place, and the good of our local public schools.

I do see a conflict between a number of private interests that seek to destroy universal free public education and replace it with a kind of Toll Education, something parents will have to pay for child-by-child and minute-by-minute like their phone bills, with arm-&-a-leg roaming charges and no roll-over.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-mentioned-in-cnn-blog-about-school-funding#comment_847999

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Note 7

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On Private Truths —

Fight Brews Over Sarah Palin On Paul Revere Wikipedia Page
• http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/sarah-palin-fans-fight-over-paul-revere-wikipedia-page/2011/06/06/AGxtzHKH_blog.html#pagebreak

<quote>
Supporters of former Alaska governor Sarah Palin have taken to Wikipedia, where they have been trying all weekend to revise the page on Paul Revere to reflect her recent comments.
</quote>

Is it 1984 already?

Where the truth about Paul Revere depends on whether you went to a TEA Party School or Yer Average Party School, and what side has the most Astroturfers and Sockpuppets this week.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-mentioned-in-cnn-blog-about-school-funding#comment_849029

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Note 8

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Mr. Raymond,

I'm guessing that's a joke, since the proverbial People Of Good Sense do not blame teachers for *everything* that a child fails to learn, and I'm sure that no respectable school, public or private, would assume responsibility for the strange ideas that pass between some people's ears, not to mention across their lips into public spaces.

Like they say —

“People are entitled to their own opinions, but they are not entitled to their own facts.”

Governments derive their right to levy taxes on the condition that those taxes support the Public Good.  People want their taxes to be limited, so the amount of Public Good that can be achieved is also limited, more and more lately to the barest essentials that it takes prospective citizens to perform their role as citizens.  The People's contribution to the Public Good can be greater if the People will it to be so.

There are times when it takes a rather large effort to communicate the Will of the People to the people who are charged to represent that will.

This looks like one of those times.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-mentioned-in-cnn-blog-about-school-funding#comment_850545

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Note 9

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Mr. Raymond,

Anyone who knows the history of our current funding model for education knows that it has nothing to do with any philosophy of education that teachers prefer to practice under, much less Government Mind Control. It arose from the natural desire of parents to exercise local control over the quality of education in their areas.

When I first came to Michigan in the 1960s, many of the less well off districts actually did quite well with their education funding because they had businesses and industries that still paid property taxes — as opposed to seeking tax abatements on the threat of moving to China or Mexico or wherever — and the general population always passed millages adequate to the task. There was in addition a lot more money coming from the Federal level. The purse strings have shifted a bit since then, but people still want the power that came with them. That appears to be creating some tensions.

http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-mentioned-in-cnn-blog-about-school-funding#comment_850797

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