Thread by @doctorow

Critiques of #CharterSchools usually focus on poor quality education (disproportionately affecting racialized and poor people) and dangerous ideology (the movement is funded by billionaire dilettantes and religious maniacs), and with good reason!

1/

Charters hand public funds to private institutions with minimal oversight. Public money should not go to schools that endorse slavery and indigenous genocide, nor schools that deny evolution and claim humans and dinosaurs co-existed.

web.archive.org/web/2018060400…

2/

Charter students know they're getting substandard educations - that's why the 2019 valedictorians for Detroit’s Universal Academy used their speech to denounce the school, its curriculum and administrators.

freep.com/story/news/edu…

3/

The more we learn about charters, the worse the situation gets. Take New Orleans, where, post-Katrina, the Republican statehouse and wealthy dilettante "philanthropists" eliminated all public education in favor of charter schools.

nola.com/news/education…

4/

A decade later, the state education regulator gave half these schools "D" or "F" grades.

No wonder that charter teachers joined LA public school teachers on their #RedForEd pickets in 2019:

latimes.com/local/lanow/la…

5/

Charter schools pitch themselves as grassroots phenomena, made possible thanks to the passion of parents seeking quality educations for their kids. The reality is that the movement is funded and promoted through a corrupt network of ultra-wealthy ideologues.

6/

The Kochs and the Waltons (Walmart) have secretly funneled vast fortunes into disinformation campaigns aimed at demonizing teachers' unions:

theguardian.com/education/2018…

7/

They were joined by the likes of Trump education secretary Betsy DeVos, a fundamentalist who makes no secret of her view that charters can remove the barrier between church and state and institute publicly funded Christian indoctrination in schools:

cnn.com/2017/02/02/pol…

8/

Destroying public education is the sport of kings. Bill Gates blew $775m on a failed charter experiment whose subjects were children who got no say in the matter:

bloomberg.com/opinion/articl…

9/

Gates has solid teammates in his anti-public-education crusade. I mean, who can say no to Mark Zuckerberg?

nytimes.com/2019/04/21/tec…

10/

Misery LOVES company, which is why the Sacklers - mass-murdering architects of the opioid epidemic - sunk so much blood money into the charter project (incredibly, this "philanthropy" is supposed to IMPROVE their reputation):

web.archive.org/web/2017111304…

11/

But a critique of charters that starts with poor outcomes and ends with ideological billionaires misses the third leg of this stool: money-laundering and financial fraud.

12/

Admittedly some of that has been in plain sight for years. Remember when an LA school board exec plead guilty to felony finance fraud and conspiracy for his role in the charter-backed takeover of the board?

latimes.com/local/lanow/la…

13/

But "Chartered For Profit," a report from @Network4pubEd is by far the most comprehensive look at the means by which billions are transferred from public school districts to profiteers, at the expense of kids in both the charter and public system.

networkforpubliceducation.org/wp-content/upl…

14/

In an interview with @Jacobin's @meaganmday, NPE's executive director @carolburris discusses the blockbuster report, which is so damning that it prompted a bill in Congress that bans funding to charters that are managed by for-profit contractors.

jacobinmag.com/2021/07/charte…

15/

Burris explains that even though nearly all charters are nonprofits (except in AZ), there's a widespread practice of contracting with for-profit corporations to "manage" these schools; the for-profits are often owned by the schools founders or their relatives.

16/

Others are nationwide chains that offer comprehensive management services - "comprehensive" in the sense of steering schools to procure materials, services and supplies from affiliates that overcharge and kick-back to the management companies.

17/

From substandard, overpriced cafeteria fare; to janky, nonfunctional ed-tech; to unqualified, underpaid teachers, these for-profit entities figure out how to minimize costs, maximize profits, and disguise poor student outcomes so they can keep doing it.

18/

They deploy opaque corporate structures to give the appearance of a thriving ecosystem of suppliers - meanwhile, the largest chain, @Academica, consists of 56 companies at one address, more than 70 at another, and a network of real-estate, holding and finance companies.

19/

Real estate plays a major role in charter profiteering. Profiteers scoop up tax-advantaged funding and subsidized loans to buy buildings, leased at inflated rates to charters, with the tax-payer paying their mortgage.

20/

When the mortgage is paid, more tax dollars are used to buy the school at inflated prices.

But it's even more profitable to run a "virtual school" where you can deliver canned lectures and fake attendance records and pocket vast sums in public money.

21/

For-profits are also loan-sharks. They offer credit to the nonprofit charters so they can afford the inflated prices for educational "services," charging high interest rates that ensure they get an additional rake off of every public dollar the charter receives.

22/

NPE's #AnotherDayAnotherCharterScandal page is a good look at the tip of the corruption iceberg - from fake invoices to outright embezzlement. Charter execs use the school's credit card to pay for fancy dinners even trips to Disney World.

networkforpubliceducation.org/another-day-an…

23/

Charters shouldn't exist, period. But if they must exist, then the loophole that allows for-profits to run the notionally nonprofit charter sector must be closed.

24/

Meanwhile, if you want a look at education "reform" that WORKS, check out @aagabor's 2018 "After the Education Wars," and learn how eliminating hierarchy, funding the arts, offering good wages and good training to teachers transform schools.

ineteconomics.org/perspectives/b…

25/

The formula is rather simple, really: "a respect for democratic processes and participatory improvement, a high regard for teachers, clear strategies with buy-in from all stake-holders, and accountability frameworks that include room to innovate."

26/

"Robust leadership and strong teacher voice. Their success underscores the importance of equitable funding and suggests that problems like income inequality are far more detrimental to education that the usual suspects, like bad teachers."

eof/

ETA - If you'd like an unrolled version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

pluralistic.net/2021/07/26/agg…