Texas Shuts Door on Millions in Education Grants

[TomCADem]

Source: NY Times

Texas will not compete for up to $700 million in federal education money, Gov. Rick Perry said on Wednesday, calling the Obama administration’s main school improvement grant program an unacceptable intrusion on states’ control over education.

Mr. Perry’s decision, days before a Jan. 19 deadline, interrupted months of work by Texas officials and a consulting company financed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to prepare the application for the federal grant competition, known as Race to the Top. Texas had been eligible to win up to $700 million of a total of $4 billion the department will award for encouraging charter schools, improving teacher instruction, overhauling schools and joining an effort to adopt common academic standards.

“We would be foolish and irresponsible,” Mr. Perry said, “to place our children’s future in the hands of unelected bureaucrats and special-interest groups thousands of miles away in Washington.”

Mr. Perry, who is seeking re-election in November, is locked in a tough Republican primary battle with Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, and both candidates have been trying to appeal to conservative voters.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/14/education/14texas.html

[MinneapolisMatt]

1. What a stupid move.

Cut off your nose to spite your face.

[Mithreal]

23. The stupid move is for Dems to embrace Republican education policy

[mbperrin]

56. Actually, this is the only time I agree with Perry, but not for the reason

listed.

Race to the Top provides bonus money for teachers whose students make top scores on standardized tests, ignoring such factors as:

Are students distributed homogeneously, or are they already divided into AP, GT, "Regular", or remedial groupings? If they are divided, then the AP students will always do well on standardized tests, since that is their reason for being.

No one has ever followed up these tests to determine what they measure, if anything, and what is their predictive capability for future success for students who take them.

Some categories of teachers are untested, like art, economics, government, PE, choir and so on, and so they will never have a chance at the bonus money.

Monetizing and making teaching competitive, rather than cooperative, will have disastrous effects on collegiality and training at the ground level. Instead, it will encourage teachers to closet themselves and their abilities in order to benefit by a few hundred dollars personally.

In addition, the teachers whose students score at the bottom will be dismissed from their contracts and fired. Only at Lake Woebegone is everyone above average, and so teachers in poverty areas, new teachers, and those teaching special needs students will be more liable to dismissal simply because of the student category they teach in. This will further steer teachers away from these fields, exacerbating the shortages already present, further harming those students.

More money to improve infrastructure, to provide more clothing and food assistance to students needing it, socialization into the mainstream? Sure, and gladly. But nobody's offering that.

So the stopped clock is right this time.

[UpInArms]

70. somewhere buried in this piece of shit legislation

it mandates that the school send the daily scores to some office in Washington, D.C. - i.e. the day's spelling test, etc

this is the most idiotic piece of shit that I have ever heard of. period. bar none.

I'd venture to say that NCLB - and Race to the Top are equally evil.

[mbperrin]

78. Yes, both are. Three decades in the classroom, and most of the

ills of academics can be traced to the creation of a single "magic" number overriding all other indicators and measurements, and all without any study at all as to the validity of same.

[Mithreal]

77. Excellent post

[MUAD_DIB]

2. Is Governor Goodhair looking to lose big?

What's his game?

[Anakin Skywalker]

3. Well, They Elected Him!

Wonder how much of a margin he won by...

[texanwitch]

4. Not all of us.

Goodhair is running for office again.

He is trying to look tough for his base.

[SergeStorms]

39. And apparently "looking tough for his base".......

includes screwing over school children so they won't get a decent education. :banghead: Yep, that would be one of the priorities of his "base", alright. :wtf:

[Mithreal]

44. President Obama is trying to look tough for Perry's base too.

[nyy1998]

49. I really hope Bill White beats him.

We could use a real governor for a change.

[damntexdem]

66. Actually, I would like to see White beat Hutchinson ...

after Perry was knocked out in the primary.

It won't happen, but it would be great.

And Perry also has a Tea Party challenger in the primary. If only she could cut into his support among the nuttiest of the nutcases -- i.e., the core of his support.

And they all debate on campus here at the University of North Texas tonight. Don't think I'll make it in person, nor watch the statewide broadcast on PBS.

[virtualobserver]

8. 2006 results

Rick Perry (R) Chris Bell (D) Carole Keeton Strayhorn (I)

Percentage 39.03% 29.79% 18.13%

[Left Coast2020]

30. Is his campaign slogan, "Standing With Ignorant Texas Voters?"

Amazing when I see stories like this, I'm reminded of the time I interviewed this dirtbag when I was a reporter In Houston in 02. Glad I'm not in that state anymore.

[Geoff R. Casavant]

53. He didn't get a majority the last time

But there were 3 or more candidates, and he got the plurality.

[damntexdem]

65. As I recall, about 10%, 40% to 30% in a three-way race.

And he faces a strong primary challenge this year.

[Zoeisright]

5. I see the governor is as stupid and short-sighted as ever.

I think his hair gel has rotted his brain.

[kentauros]

10. What brain?

I mean, really!

He was Ag-Commissioner while W was governor, and got elected with the help of the chemical-farming lobby. His brain was likely rotted away long before he was governor.

Interesting how he states that he doesn't want to "place our children’s future in the hands of unelected bureaucrats" when the SBOE (State Board of Education) is exactly that.

[Mithreal]

16. He's right but for the wrong reasons

[Zoeisright]

55. No, he isn't right.

Refusing education grants is just plain stupid and mean.

[Mithreal]

58. I am sure you are well intentioned but there is much more to the story

read down the threads for an idea or just read MadFloridian's journals.

[AnneD]

61. At our union stewads meeting yesterday....

they were saying the same thing. Perry's turning it down was the right thing to do even if is wasn't for the right reason. The requirement for the teachers was outrageous and it was only a grant (which can be a one time deal but the paperwork and testing went on forever. Sometime hadcuffs can be golden but they are still handcuffs.

[MadMaddie]

6. Another idiot move by this guy

He will be begging for the money but it will be too late.

[damntexdem]

67. He turned down stimulus money for unemployment comp.

Then went begging to DC when the state's unemployment comp system ran out of money -- which he had been warned would happen if he turned the stimulus money down.

[Mithreal]

7. I am against these Race To The Bottom grants as well

and for good reasons. Knock this dumbass all you want, but the Obama admin ed policy is as excellent as health care reform, more wars, and protecting profits.

Perry is a broken clock on this one. Consider the strings that are attached before supporting anything that comes from Arne Duncan.

[madfloridian]

14. Our county just turned down the funds as well.

I am also against these bribes to districts to build more charters and destroy public education.

[Mithreal]

24. Our state turned them down last year but is supposed to revisit the issue

this month.

I made it clear in no uncertain terms to my reps and I am willing to press very much harder.

Naomi Klein warned us about disaster capitalism. For the Obama admin to use the crisis in this way disgusts me.

[girl gone mad]

17. Yes, I find myself in rare agreement with Perry.

The guy's an idiot, but he's right about this.

[JCMach1]

Speaking of race to the bottom... how about that Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison

Tweedle B and Tweedle DUMB

[Mithreal]

22. Fix our elections the right way, and maybe we will see a change for the better

[JCMach1]

42. The only consolation is the Texas Gov. is probably the weakest of all 50 states

Much more of a figurehead than anywhere else...

[Mithreal]

45. Gives em more time to practice vacationing. No offense to those that took the job seriously.

39 Dems and 6 Rs as governors of Texas.

[JCMach1]

48. LOL... why LBJ never considered running for Gov. of TX

[SharonAnn]

72. He would've wanted to be Lt. Governor of TX. That's where the power is.

Texas has a "weak governor" structure where the governor has little real power. The Lt. Governor is the one who can introduce legislation, budgeting, etc. and particpates in legislative action.

That's why * could be governor in TX and still have so much time for workouts, video games, and naps.

[winyanstaz]

27. Thats right....

[Bette Noir]

9. And this would be because Texans are so well known for their erudition?

[kentauros]

12. You mean like Bill Moyers?

Molly Ivins?
Horton Foote?

How about a list, so I don't waste any more time with ya?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Famous_Texans

[Mithreal]

15. Don't knock Texans please.

[NoQuarter]

18. I'll knock the ones I've known.

Without exception, they have been dumber than a bag of hair. Those who don't leave me wondering how they make it through the day, moved there after their formal education somewhere else.

[Mithreal]

21. I lived in North Caolina and knew a bunch of stupid short sighted folks too

but I wouldn't knock North Carolina in general.

Knock the ones you know, fine, but there are a lot of good Dems there as well who don't need our derision. A fellow DU'er made the request recently. I choose to honor it.

[argyl]

34. Then you haven't met many.I'm not going to bother with a list of Texans whose boots you aren't fit

to lick. As ignorant as you appear to be you probably wouldn't have heard of them anyway.

[girl gone mad]

19. We sure have a lot of Nobel Science Prize winners, for such a dumb state.

Texas Instruments, Dallas, TX, USA
2000 - Physics, Jack S. Kilby

University of Texas, Austin, TX, USA
1977 - Chemistry, Ilya Prigogine

University of Texas Medical School at Houston, Houston, TX, USA
1998 - Physiology or Medicine, Ferid Murad

University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, Dallas, TX, USA
1988 - Chemistry, Johann Deisenhofer
1985 - Physiology or Medicine, Michael S. Brown
1985 - Physiology or Medicine, Joseph L. Goldstein
1994 - Physiology or Medicine, Alfred G. Gilman

Rice University, Houston, TX, USA
1996 - Chemistry, Richard E. Smalley
1996 - Chemistry, Robert F. Curl Jr.

[kentauros]

20. And Dr. Paul Chu at the University of Houston.

He discovered "high-temperature" superconductivity. As I recall, it made the news the world over for quite a while ;)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chu_Ching-wu

[damntexdem]

68. But none of them got elected governor.

Well, after all, they were too smart to run. ;-)

[Ilsa]

73. Don't forget the other sciences, including Agricultural Science (feed the world)

Even Bill Clinton mentioned Dr. Norman Borlaug on Letterman several months ago. Borlaug, recently deceased, and others at Texas A&M University are working on ag projects to feed people in drought-stricken countries, purify water in others, etc. And they are getting recognition for their work, too.

[argyl]

33. What enlightened state do you reside in? You don't even have the guts to post where you live.

Do the residents of your state a favor and continue to keep it secret.No doubt most of them would find your kneejerk insulting a disgrace.

[onehandle]

11. Moron. nt

[TexasObserver]

13. Gov Good Hair is remarkably stupid, even for the GOP.

[Igel]

25. Hmm...

Money versus local control.

Always a tough one. Do I go for money because I'm afraid we'll go broke? Do I give in to my fear we can't figure out what's right for our kids and that only the Smart People in DC know?

Do I opt for homogenization of the education system? Or do I fear pockets of incompetence--at the risk of creating a giant sea of incompetence, if the Smart People turn out, against all expectations, to be not just fallible but wrong?

Or do I keep the right to vote in local elections for control over local schools?

Listen to my fears and greed or preserve a right and listen to other fears?

Tough call.

[rpannier]

26. I gotta say

Good for him on this issue

The Race to the Top is just a way of funneling money into more Charter schools and undermining public education.

[sandnsea]

28. But..but.. Texas is pro-privatization

So if this is a privatization program - then why oh why would they be opposing it!!! :sarcasm:

This is really unfortunate for the children of Texas and sad that the left is so completely paralyzed by similar hatred that they're opposing education money for pilot projects all over the country, out of nothing more than conjecture and fear.

[Mithreal]

31. Then why can't they accomplish the same goals

working within the public school system?

And Republicans are in general stupid. This was the same guy talking secession.

Care to tell me how well NCLB has worked or how well charter schools do compared to ordinary public schools?

http://www.democracynow.org/2004/8/20/white_house_backed_charter_schools_lag

Care to tell me the consequences of Republican experimentation in New Orleans? Care to tell me why it takes a so-called Democratic majority to push Republican education policy?

Those who have such great concerns about education should put their money where there mouths are.

Again, I ask, why are the concerns of teachers being ignored? And why are you characterizing them as nothing more than conjecture and fear?

[sandnsea]

36. New Orleans has had much success in education

But since you characterize it as Republican, your biases are already shown. Most people don't consider charter schools "Republican". In fact, it was liberals who originally promoted education outside of the regimented public school system. Funny that the pilot study projects that liberals funded through govt back in the 70s wouldn't make it today because of a bunch of reactionaries.

The PTA supports Race to the Top. Why are the concerns of parents being ignored?

[Mithreal]

38. Privatizing the schools, starving poorer communities' schools,

crushing teachers' unions, ignoring education professionals' advice, vouchers, focusing on "bad" teachers are all Republican devices. There are others.

Posing some sort of dichotomy between parents and teachers is also a rightwinger meme.

I am not saying you are a rightwinger, so don't get me wrong.

And who are these reactionaries you speak of, could you mean education professionals since I can only guess based upon your bias?

PTA support is not across the board and neither does it lack controversy. I will need to study the NO schools, that is not what I have heard but I will do a little more digging.

But go ahead and ignore my primary question.

[Mithreal]

40. Who is the National PTA advisory board? Aetna, McGraw Hill, Viacom, Gates Foundation, etc

http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2009/12/national-pta-announces-corporate.html

Today, the national PTA announced a new advisory board. The list includes a rep for Aetna's foundation, a senior VP of McGraw-Hill, an executive VP of media giant Viacom (which is partnering with the Gates Foundation for a project), and a number of other corporate fools. Remember: the Gates Foundation recently donated a cool million to the PTA to push national standards. We can rest assured that the corporate world can now influence PTAs across the country, yet another example of dubious "advisors" feeding parents and the general public more bogus information about education reform proposals:

National PTA Advisory Board Members 2009-2011
Tichina Arnold
Actress (best known for her role as Pam on the sitcom Martin)
Charlotte Frank
Senior VP, McGraw Hill Companies
Patrick Gaston
President, Verizon Foundation
Floyd W. Green III
Head of Community Relations, Aetna Foundation
Greg Schuman
VP and Group Publisher, Parenting Magazine
Guy Vickers
President, Tommy Hilfiger Foundation
Judy Werthauser
VP of Human Resources, Target
Denise White
Executive VP, Viacom
James White
President & CEO, Jamba Juice

http://www.pta.org/3731.htm

[sandnsea]

60. Local PTA's, the PTSA, all kinds of parents groups

Teachers say the problem is parents, well parents are saying it's the current public school bureaucracy and slow as mud process to make changes or implement new methods or even new technologies.

[Mithreal]

62. I am not going to research local PTAs or other groups right now

Teachers say, parents say is oversimplifying to extreme and beyond usefulness.

[Mithreal]

41. Left Behind: The Story of the New Orleans Public Schools & Capitalizing on Disaster

Documentary Synopsis

Left Behind is a 90-minute documentary that tells the story of three African-American high school seniors as they navigate through their final year of high school. Their final year in one of the poorest cities in the state; in a state ranked as the poorest in America; in one of the most violent cities, states and countries in the industrialized world.

The film, shot before, during and after Hurricane Katrina, shows how an uneducated impoverished population reacts under the stress. Our never-before-seen Katrina footage highlights our two-year-long documentary. We show reasons for the looting, rape, murder and mayhem -- the effects our man-made environment has on human behavior. We examine the core of our American values, the framework by which we live, and we show how our most vaunted beliefs and government policies have played a role in our nation's shame.

Interviews with Noam Chomsky, Jessie Jackson, Ice T, Congressmen William Jefferson and Maxine Waters, author Michael Eric Dyson, Jim Derleth (US AID Specialist in development and conflict resolution assigned to East and West Africa) and others accent our narrative.

http://neworleansleftbehind.com/



Capitalizing on Disaster:

To make this argument, Kenneth Saltman focuses on the right-wing trend of taking advantage of disaster situations in order to commercialize public schools for profit. Thinkers such as David Harvey, Naomi Klein, Henry Giroux, Zygmunt Bauman, among others, contribute to the emerging critique of neoliberalism and neoconservatism as a political strategy of redistributing wealth upwards, of promoting the market as the only solution to social problems; that is, translating social issues into private concerns. Saltman labels the practice of rebuilding public schools after a disaster or crisis in a way that enables corporate neoliberal profiteers and neoconservative think tanks to benefit financially as "smash and grab". He uses this euphemism to describe the case studies in his book. The case studies illustrate how advocates for the neoliberal and neoconservative reorganization of schooling preserve the increased marginalization of the poor and the deeper entrenchment of inequalities by reducing the role of education to market functions; that is, produce U.S. workers who are globally competitive for the future. Social policies, however, serve only to justify the gutting of public schools rather than investing in them. Saltman's primary concern regarding schooling for profit is that it severely compromises the ability of an educational system to foster critical democratic principles in its citizens. In the "smash and grab" atmosphere of commercial schooling, the focus of education is centered around a corporate structure of production and the possibility of profit rather than on developing a citizenry capable of engaging rational debate. The case studies presented in this book demonstrate how two political rationalities, neoliberalism and neoconservatism, converge on public schools. Together these rationalities work to undermine egalitarianism, self-governance, and meaning-making activities on which a democratic culture is built.

Saltman's first example of "taking and breaking public schools" is post-Katrina New Orleans. Prior to hurricane Katrina, New Orleans had some of the most neglected public schools in the country. Following Katrina, private companies used New Orleans schools as an opportunity for experimentation. Despite public outrage against privatization prior to the storm, school vouchers were issued to thousands of students. Typically, vouchers work to redistribute taxpayer money to private schools and charter schools in order to subsidize private enterprise. Though made palatable through the language of "choice", their ultimate effect is to take financing out of the coffers that could have been geared towards rebuilding schools, impoverishing the public system to the benefit of private contractors, The administration touted the voucher program as the "silver lining" in this terrible tragedy. The moneyed reference began the neoliberal campaign to couch the challenges of the New Orleans public schools in a system of corporate, moneymaking jargon. Saltman identifies this shift away from civic discourse as a method that conceals the unequal ways in which school administrators and public officials are distributing material resources. Privatizers tout unjustified efficiencies of the private sector and contrast that to the "failures" of the public sector. Once words such as "choice", "competition", "achievement" and "accountability" become commonplace in the community's vocabulary the ability of the community to challenge corporate programming is compromised (though there are plenty of examples--as Saltman indicates--of communities resisting). Vouchers redirect much-needed public funds from destroyed New Orleans schools. Those funds are distributed to privatized schools and charter schools. Such schools typically have been fashioned in accordance with a neoconservative agenda. The neoconservative agenda that promotes busting teachers' unions, exchanging curricula for discipline and unequally--as have many neoliberal social policies--targeting racial minorities for public disinvestments.

In the final Chapter "Renaissance 2010 and No Child Left Behind", Saltman examines two domestic programs that demonstrate the "smash and grab" pursuit of public schools. These two examples are the Renaissance 2010, the school reform model in Chicago, and George Bush's No Child Left Behind (NCLB) program. The combination of these two programs is the most stark example of neoliberal and neoconservative ideologies working together to de-democratize public schools. NCLB sets up the public schools to "fail" by making impossible demands to reach an ever-increasing "Annual Yearly Progress". After the schools are declared to be ineffective at educating, private industry is called in to "fix" the problem. These two programs team up to offer Illinois residents fewer public schools, less public housing, less community influence, and the redirection of community resources into private corporations. Despite the protests of teachers, scholars, and students and despite a lack of empirical evidence demonstrating that corporate schooling is successful, these two programs are touted as exemplary models for the rest of the country.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Capitalizing+on+Disaster:+Taking+and+Breaking+Public+Schools.-a0209475726

[sandnsea]

59. Sophie B. Wright

The thing that kills me about the opposition to these schools is that they empower teachers which is exactly what teachers have been complaining about for decades. Teachers and principals can do what they need to do in their schools without layers of bureaucracy. They also have backup for discipline and can remove disruptive kids from the school, which is also what they say they need. Charters are also usually not for-profit corporate entities.

http://www.nola.com/education/index.ssf/2009/12/post_67.html

[Mithreal]

63. You give me marketing? Why? Why is marketing more persuasive

than what education professionals are saying. And you want to trust private sector over public schools? You talk like you have embraced the New Dem philosophy of the Third Way.

I am irritable right now, probably shouldn't even be typing. Been calling my Congress critters. I am very frustrated atm.

[sandnsea]

71. Great argument /sarcasm

Care to try to debate some facts now.

Teachers are professionals and deserve to have control over their classrooms. True or false?

Teachers could do a better job if they had more authority to remove disruptive students. True or false?

[Mithreal]

75. Right, but imposing Republican agendas does not a solution make

My answers are true and true. And go ahead and let rightwingers and corporations include the devil with the details.

And the "debate some facts" is out of line. Your facts are all squishy. I gave you some sources for discussion and you waved them off.

[depakid]

29. "known as Race to the Top."

Instead, Texas gets to "Race to the Bottom" with Mississippi.

[Mithreal]

32. Dems have learned from Republican marketing gimmicks

[boppers]

35. Crappy public schools teaching junk science with no accountability...

..or programs that threaten the existing dynamic, at the cost of educational equality....

It's actually quite tough.

[Mithreal]

43. That is a perfect example of false dilemma.

[boppers]

74. Yes, it is. I wonder why Texas didn't want to participate, then.

:shrug:

[Mithreal]

76. Who cares, Republicans are usually wrong but when they are right

it is often for the wrong reasons. At least modern day R's.

[MrsBrady]

37. Rick likes being number 1 -- we're the best at being the worst. n/t

[Hubert Flottz]

46. Rick don't need no education

All and all he's just another prick with no balls.

Playing politics with America's future.

[SkyDaddy7]

47. The stupidity of these people is amazing!

Forget helping the next generation of Texas children get a better education. Plus, that damn Obama is trying to push for more Math & Science which is simply an attack on Christianity...Especially that damn Evilution! "Evilution is just a theory"! :sarcasm:

[LeFleur1]

51. Charter Schools?

I hate them. They might improve schools where anything would be an improvemment, but they don't improve good schools in the states. Just the opposite.

[SkyDaddy7]

52. Really?

I have read a lot of good things about them. Granted I have not done any serious look into them but I know there are a lot of people who like them. They have had sucess where others clearly have not.

[Swede]

50. Why are there school?

Seen that on an ask Yahoo page.

[NashVegas]

54. GOOD For Texas

Vermont threatened to do this during the Bush admin, and we cheered them on.

[w8liftinglady]

57. texas ranks 48th...perry is an incompetant buffooon

http://www.edweek.org/ew/qc/2007/17csi.h26.html
and yes,all three of boys have attended Texas public schools,which is why this pisses me off.

[damntexdem]

64. We doan need thet gummit money for edjukashun.

And doan mess with Texas -- leave hour messes alone. We lik em jus fine.

;-)

[goforit]

69. What an idiot. A protege of George W.