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Archive for the ‘Education’ Category

Oops, DOE is onto us: probe of IT emails seeks to plug leaks, plant bogus stories; Ixnay noay tatesay omputerscay ipstay

Posted in ATC, Education, Governor's Office, Layoffs, Public Records on July 16, 2013| 26 Comments »

John White just doesn’t get it. A few months ago he went ballistic over information leaked to LouisianaVoice and sources inside the Department of Education (DOE) told us he launched an in-house investigation, including employee emails, in an effort to learn the source of the leaks.

We responded to that report by sending an email to White informing him that none of his employees were as careless with emails as he (remember the “Dude, you are my recharge” email he sent to Pete Gorman, senior vice president of News Corporation’s education division Amplify when Gorman asked White to dinner?).

We informed White that the information we received had been downloaded on a flash drive and passed along to us. We even offered to supply White with a blank flash drive in case he had any information he would like to provide. He never responded to our offer.

Then there was that mysterious email accidentally copied to us from DOE legal counsel Joan Hunt to Troy Hebert, director of the Office of Alcohol and Tobacco Control (ATC) as a result of one of our many requests for public records that DOE loves to ignore until they’re hauled into court and hit with fines, court costs and attorney fees. The message to Hebert, who apparently has wormed his way into Gov. Jindal’s inner circle, said, “Troy, we need to reply and say that.”

That’s it. Nothing else. And when we tried to obtain a copy of that email, we were informed that it was subject to attorney-client privilege despite the fact that Hebert, as head of ATC, is not affiliated with DOE, is not an attorney, and certainly is not a client of Hunt.

But now, a new twist has surfaced that may be (or maybe not) related to that exchange between Hunt and Hebert.

Were they laying the groundwork to set up a couple of internet bloggers who have been an ongoing nuisance to White and DOE? If current reports are accurate, it could well be.

Word out of DOE is that administrative types (we have their names but we are not prepared to release them at this time) are leaning hard on DOE employees in the Information Technology (IT) section, even to reviewing all their emails and harassing them in attempts to learn who is leaking information to Jason France of the Crazy Crawfish blog and to Tom Aswell of LouisianaVoice.

Also part of the alleged game plan is to plant tantalizing—but bogus—stories in an effort to get our sources to leak the information to us and to get us to publish them so that we can be discredited publicly and revealed as hacks—and so the leakers can be nailed to the wall.

Silly rabbits, you can’t even devise a plan to plug leaks without the plan itself being leaked. You couldn’t plant petunias without growing a crop of ragweed. I’ve known mayonnaise farmers in Missoula, Montana, who were better at planting things.

As we said earlier, we know the identities of three of the administrative types at the center of this little high school stunt but we’ll keep them confidential for now with the option of releasing them down the road.

Finally, we would be remiss if we did not remind White that our sources are not stupid, nor are they careless. Anything they reveal to us will never be through a state computer—unlike the state employee (Department of Public Safety) who used his state email account to log a commit on our blog today (Tuesday)—at the bottom of our June 28 IT consolidation story—asking us if racism was at the root of our criticism of Jindal. (First of all, we’re anything but racist. Secondly, Lord knows we don’t need racism as grounds for offering legitimate criticism of this administration.)

Finally, Mr. White, we have already been investigated by the best (in Gov. Jindal’s eyes, apparently, and of course, in his own mind). Mr. Hebert ordered an investigation of us some months ago and that came up empty.

Seems we’re actually pretty boring but you’d never know it by the amateur sting operation being concocted by DFA (Detectives for America, the investigative arm of TFA— Teach for America).

Wonder if we should submit a public records request for interoffice emails dealing with planting fake news stories with a couple of pesky blogs?

ESSAGEMAY OTAY OURCESSAY: IXNAY NOAY HETAY TATESAY OMPUTERSCAY.

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Notable Quotables (in their own words)

Posted in BESE, Contract, Contracts, Education, Notable Quotables, Public Records, Transparency on June 24, 2013| 2 Comments »

“…the Department is not in possession of any public record(s) responsive to the above-written request.”

—May 9 Reply from the Department of Education’s legal department in response to LouisianaVoice public records request of April 22 in which we asked for “the official letter or email that you (Superintendent of Education John White) sent to inBloom to cancel the data storage agreement” as quoted in the Monroe News-Star report.

“White said he’ll send the certified letter to inBloom, but he said he’s sent several letters already notifying the organization that Louisiana’s data-sharing had ended.”

—Excerpt from Melinda Deslatte’s Associated Press story of June 20 in which White told the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) that he had terminated the Jan. 13 contract with inBloom.

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John White could take lessons from Mark Twain on telling the truth vs. trying to remember what lie was told to whom

Posted in BESE, Contract, Contracts, Education, Public Records, Transparency on June 24, 2013| 13 Comments »

Mark Twain is generally credited with saying, “If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything.”

State Superintendent of Education John White could take a lesson from that great writer because he appears to have trouble remembering what he said to whom these days.

Take, for instance, the AP story by reporter Melinda Deslatte that ran last Thursday (June 20).

The story was an account of a meeting of the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) which focused on the controversial attempt by White to enter into a contract to provide sensitive student information to a non-profit data-storage company called inBloom.

inBloom, the brainchild of News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch and controversial New York education executive Joel Klein, is funded primarily by a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and seeks to create a national database of student information.

The Department of Education (DOE) entered into a memorandum of understand (MOU) on Jan. 15 for the state to provide personal student data ranging from addresses and test scores to medical history and information about learning disabilities. White has assured BESE that the information was protected in secure servers and behind computer firewalls.

inBloom, however, said that while it would do its best to protect the data there was no guarantee that the information would not be compromised by hackers.

But buried deep in Deslatte’s story, White apparently becomes confused about what he has told various people.

In response to former DOE employee Jason France who said the contract was still in force, White said he would send a certified letter to inBloom. But then he added that he had already sent several letters notifying the organization that Louisiana’s data-sharing agreement was terminated.

But wait.

On April 22, LouisianaVoice sent the following public records request to White and DOE legal counsel Joan Hunt:

• “Please provide me with the opportunity to review the official letter or email that you sent to inBloom to cancel the data storage agreement as per the lead paragraph from the Monroe News-Star.”

A copy of the News-Star story was attached to our request.

On May 9, we received a response in the form of a letter from DOE attorney Troy Humphrey which said:

• “Our public information office has requested that I inform you that the Department is not in possession of any public record(s) responsive to the above-written request.”

Wait. What?

Is White really trying to make us believe that between May 10 and June 20, he sent “several letters” of cancellation to inBloom but as of May 9, there was no such letter?

Quite frankly, we have a lot of trouble accepting that scenario.

You may remember we were forced to sue White and DOE a couple of months ago over his refusal to provide public records in a timely manner. We settled for $100 per day per request that DOE was late providing. The final tab was $3,500, plus court costs and attorney fees.

Well, as of today (Monday, June 24), it’s been 45 working days since our request for the letter(s) of cancellation.

The state public records law says that any request for public records must be honored immediately unless the record is in use and unavailable. In such case, the custodian of the record(s) must immediately respond in writing to the requestor as to when the record(s) will be ready for inspection within the next three working days.

At $100 per day, White has already run up a $4,500 tab on just that one request—and the meter’s running.

But there are others that also are pending.

For example, on May 20, we made a follow-up request:

• “…In the public records you provided my attorney, J. Arthur Smith, you included photocopies of several checks to the Louisiana Department of Education from David Lefkowith but you neglected to provide photocopies of the backs of the checks that would indicate whether or not the checks were actually negotiated or deposited. Please provide copies of the backs of those checks.”

Call us jaded or skeptical, but we believe the checks may have been written and never deposited—a clever ruse to satisfy public records requests and hope there was no follow up as to the checks’ final disposition.

Sorry, but like Elvis, we have suspicious minds.

On May 22, Humphrey wrote us that “the Department will identify and locate any public records in its possession that are responsive to the above written request. After any responsive items have been identified, the Department will segregate and set aside those public records that are available for your inspection.”

To date, we have heard nothing further even though DOE had already located the checks and photocopied the fronts of the checks.

Let’s see, that request was made on May 20. Discounting weekends and Memorial Day, that is 25 days—and counting: $2,500.

And then there’s that other May 20 letter in which we made six separate requests:

• Any communications in any form or contracts relative to the “shared Learning Collaborative” or SLC, a project of the Gates Foundation;

• Information regarding Louisiana’s participating in Phase I of the above project;

• Any communications with or information relevant to Wireless Generation, a subsidiary of News Corporation;

• Any communications with or information relevant to Louisiana’s association or business conduct with any corporation or entity owned, led or associated with Iwan Streichenberger;

• Any communication or discussion relevant to the sharing of confidential student information for the purpose of developing and marketing “learning products” or for any other purpose;

• All communication and/or contracts relevant to current or future association with Gates Foundation or its subsidiaries.

To date, DOE has responded only to the first request on this list. That leaves five requests that have been outstanding now for 25 days. Five outstanding requests times 25 days times $100 per day comes to $12,500.

That brings the total for all outstanding requests to $19,500 as of today. Add attorney fees and costs of court and suddenly DOE is knocking on the door of $25,000.

We have already instructed attorney Smith to file suit—again—but that this time he seek sanctions against White and monetary damages over and above the $100 per day for his making it impossible for our sister company, Capitol News Service, to file stories to our client newspapers (about a dozen publications) in a timely manner.

These are unnecessary expenditures—all because White either doesn’t care about the public’s right to know or, as with the case of the letter(s) of cancellation to inBloom, he’s simply a liar.

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Jindal’s criticism of IRS investigations of conservatives is more of the same notoriously lame, hypocritical hyperbole

Posted in ATC, Education, Governor's Office, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Lobbyist, Politicians, Public Records, Transparency on May 30, 2013| 6 Comments »

It was with more than a little amusement that we read a couple of weeks ago that Gov. Bobby Jindal had called for jail time for any Internal Revenue Service officials found to have unfairly targeted conservative groups to be put in jail.

As usual, Jindal made his indignant, self-righteous proclamation at an out-of-state forum. This time, it was in a speech to Virginia Republicans in yet another stop in his 2016 presidential campaign that would be better suited for a Saturday Night Live parody skit than serious political discourse.

Oh, it’s not that we don’t agree with Jindal on this one point. The IRS certainly is far too powerful and is a force to be feared if one happens to be on the wrong end of a tax audit.

But coming from Jindal, it is simply yet another example of the “reform” governor’s façade of pseudo-transparency—hypocritical at worst, the subject of stinging ridicule at best.

“You do not take the freedoms of law-abiding citizens, whether you disagree with them or not, and keep your own freedom,” the Boy Blunder opined. “When you do that, you go to jail.”

But here’s the thing, Guv: It was only last March 11—not even three months ago—that we learned that one of Bobby’s boys, one Troy Hebert to be precise, director of the Office of Alcohol and Tobacco Control (ATC), had ordered a background investigation on LouisianaVoice editor Tom Aswell (that would be me). Here is the link to that post:

https://louisianavoice.com/2013/03/11/atc-director-troy-hebert-orders-background-investigation-of-louisianavoice-publisher-tom-aswell-but-did-we-pass/

Normally, we would not hold Jindal accountable for the actions of a rogue department head. But now the question must be asked if Hebert’s investigation was truly the action of a rouge department head, of someone who went “off the reservation,” or if the investigation may have been ordered by higher-ups.

Hey, even Henry Kissinger once said paranoid people sometimes have real enemies and recent events and revelations may well justify that paranoia. Read on.

On May 11, we sent a public records request to Superintendent of Education John White and we copied Department of Education (DOE) General Counsel Joan Hunt as is our practice when seeking records.

The request was straightforward enough: we asked for correspondence between White and his old New York boss Joel Klein dating back to July 1, 2011. Specifically, we were attempting to learn what communication the two had conducted relative to InBloom, the company Klein is now affiliated with and which was founded by News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch to serve as a “parking place” (in White’s words—a computer data bank, in more formal terms) for sensitive personal information on Louisiana students and teachers.

Hunt, subsequent to our request, fired off an email that same day to White, DOE attorney Willa LeBlanc and Hebert that said, “Troy, we need to reply and say that.”

But Hunt, most likely inadvertently, copied us into the reply as well.

Curious as to why Hebert would be included in the loop since he is about as far removed from DOE as possible (he’s under the Louisiana Department of Revenue) and equally curious as to what was supposed to have been said, we sent another public records request for all correspondence between DOE officials and Hebert.

The response to that request was even more puzzling:

“No Documents. Attorney-client privilege.”

Okay, first there are no documents but if there were, they would be privileged. That’s like the attorney who responded to a claim that his dog had bitten a passerby: “My dog does not bite. My dog was confined in the yard that day. I don’t own a dog.”

Really puzzled now, we sent another email on May 26 reiterating our request for correspondence between DOE and Hebert: “Inasmuch as you took the liberty to send your email to Troy Hebert, director of ATC and who is not an attorney nor is he a client of you or DOE, there is no client-attorney privilege.”

We also told Hunt that her provision of information about me to a non-involved third party constituted a “serious breach” that I was willing to report to the Louisiana Supreme Court’s Attorney Disciplinary Board.

Two days later we received another letter from the DOE legal office which said:

“As was indicated in the Department’s response dated and emailed to you on May 15, 2013, the Department has no public records responsive to your request. Any communications between the Legal Staff of LDOE and Troy Hebert would be privileged (attorney work product/privilege) and not subject to being released pursuant to a public records request. In addition, the Department is not in possession of any emails between Troy Hebert and John White.” There it is again: My dog doesn’t bite; I don’t own a dog.

We remained perplexed as to why Troy Hebert was brought into the conversation about our initial request. As the director of an agency completely removed from DOE, we knew there was no way possible that Hebert could be a client of either DOE or any of its legal staff and that fact only intensified our determination to learn what was going on.

Then we had occasion to interview Sen. Bob Kostelka (R-Monroe) Tuesday night about the Senate and Governmental Affairs deferral of a bill to protect state employee whistleblowers which had passed unanimously in the full House.

In that interview, Kostelka, a remarkably candid public servant, intimated that the committee had killed the bill to protect employees from supervisory reprisals for revealing official wrongdoing because one Troy Hebert had personally contacted each of the committee members to convey the message that the administration, i.e. Jindal, was not in favor of the bill. Kostelka, seeing the proverbial handwriting on the wall, did not object to the motion by Sen. Greg Tarver (D-Shreveport) to defer the bill.

It is not entirely clear why Hebert would be interjecting himself into legislative matters given the somewhat watery thin theory (in the case of Louisiana, at least) of separation of powers under which our state government proclaims to function.

He is, after all, a member of the administration, or executive branch and should not be lobbying the legislative branch. In fact, he is not even a registered lobbyist. And his dog doesn’t bite.

But at least we can now connect the dots as it all comes together. Hebert is one of those hangers-on—kind of like the new kid in town who hangs around the fringes of the playground hoping to make friends with the locals. He will do anything to curry favor with his boss—not exactly a wise career move at this point—including serving as a go-between messenger boy between the governor’s office and legislators.

…And between the governor’s office and DOE.

And Jindal now has the cajones to vilify the IRS for spying.

We bet Jindal doesn’t even own a dog.

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House approves DOE reorganization—10 months after John White does it his way: bill goes to Senate for consideration

Posted in BESE, Education, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Politicians, State Agencies, Vouchers on May 28, 2013| 11 Comments »

Our brain-dead legislature just doesn’t get it.

The House earlier this month approved and sent to the Senate HB 650 which calls for reorganization of the Louisiana Department of Education (DOE).

The vote was 57-39 (with nine not voting), with an assortment of oblivious characters who have their collective heads where only their proctologists can find them.

Why, you ask?

Simple. Superintendent of Education John White has been illegally running DOE since he arbitrarily “reorganized” the department nearly a year ago—months before House approval of the reorganization bill.

Apparently it’s not enough that sweeping educational “reforms” were approved last year that sent the entire department spiraling into the depths of scandal (see Course Choice, FastPath, Fast Start, Rod Paige, etc.), botched teacher evaluations (see Value Added Model), failure (see RSD school grades), potential violations of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (see InBloom, Agilix, Bill Gates, Rupert Murdock, News Corp., Wireless Generation, etc.), six-figure salaries for out-of-state appointees with little to no educational experience and no willingness to even register their cars in Louisiana or get Louisiana driver’s licenses (see past, present and future John White appointees), and numerous legal setbacks (see voucher funding, public records lawsuits).

White came into office nearly 18 months ago preaching failure and he has certainly illustrated that concept in crystal clear, unmistakable clarity.

Last July 9, White issued a DOE news release in which he announced the appointment of a team of District Support and Network Leaders—a major reorganization implemented a month after adjournment of the legislative session and which put the proverbial cart well ahead of the horse.

And apparently few in the legislature took notice, not even on April 11 of this year when Deputy Superintendent of Policy Erin Bendily told the House Education Committee that the department was still operating under the old structure as approved by previous legislation as Senate bill 80 (Act 302) of 2011.

Among those either blissfully ignorant (as in the case of Ruston Republican Rob Shadoin, who declined to comment on the DOE violation of student and teacher privacy laws or on the fraudulent Course Choice registrations because he did not know enough about the issues) or who simply did not care were 14 members of the House Education Committee.

The only Education Committee members voting against HB 650 were Democrats John Bel Edwards of Amite, Edward Price of Gonzales, Pat Smith and Alfred Williams, both of Baton Rouge.

Among the changes implemented by White sans legislative approval:

• A new organizational chart which has been in place since Sept. 10, 2012;

• Abolishment of the offices of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM), Literacy, College and Career Readiness, Departmental Support and Innovation;

• Addition of five Network Leaders at salaries of $130,000 and up (not part of the DOE organizational chart approved by the legislature during the administration of former Superintendent Paul Pastorek).

An open letter to state senators written “on behalf of concerned DOE employees” said the department “has recently seen an explosion in the number of unclassified staff.”

The letter said a large number of the new hires have “minimal experience” in the education field and bring little practical experience and seem not to be committed to long-term stays in Louisiana.

“At the same time, DOE is systematically eliminating classified personnel with substantially more experienced, more local knowledge, and more local commitment. This strategy costs the state significant money, as new unclassified hires have frequently been paid substantially more than classified staff that have performed largely the same work,” it said.

“The classified staff (who) have been affected are primarily Louisiana citizens who have served the people of this state competently and are actively registered voters in their respective communities.

“They are being replaced by persons, primarily from out-of-state, with lesser experience, fewer credentials, and less dedication, diligence and competence. We do not believe that this personnel strategy will serve the long-term best interests of Louisiana schools and districts and we urge the (Senate Education) Committee to seek further information on the number and responsibilities of unclassified staff before proceeding with this bill,” the letter said.

The letter also expressed “serious concerns” regarding the number of educational functions and initiatives which are being stricken from the previous legislation and not specifically enumerated in HB 650.

“These include dropout prevention, federal programs, nutritional programs, teacher certification, required subject matter content and professional development.

“The only thing being added is the Office of District Support. Yet, its responsibilities are very vaguely worded and do not seem to explicitly include the programs being removed,” it said.

Moreover, it said, the functions of the Office of District Support are defined as serving districts’ lowest-performing schools. “Is DOE saying that services will be cut to all schools that are not the lowest-performing?” the letter asks. “The responsibility for supervising the quality of all programs in every school district is a duty of the Louisiana Department of Education.

“We urge the committee to look very closely at what DOE is hoping to achieve with this reorganization and that the Legislature hold DOE to strict accountability. DOE has not always acted in good faith during reorganization,” the letter said.

House members voting for HB 650, largely regarded as a power grab attempt by White and Gov. Jindal, were:

Speaker Chuck Kleckley (R-Lake Charles); Bryan Adams (R-Gretna); John Anders (D-Vidalia); Jeff Arnold (D-New Orleans); Taylor Barras (R-New Iberia); John Berthelot (R-Gonzales); Robert Billiot (D-Westwego); Stuart Bishop (R-Lafayette); Wesley Bishop (D-New Orleans); Chris Broadwater (R-Hammond); Richard Burford (R-Stonewall); Henry Burns (R-Haughton); Timothy Burns (R-Mandeville); Thomas Carmody (R-Shreveport); Stephen Carter (R-Baton Rouge); Simone Champagne (R-Erath); Charles Chaney (R-Rayville); Patrick Connick (R-Marrero); Gregory Cromer (R-Slidell); Michael Danahay (D-Sulphur); Gordon Dove (R-Houma); Jim Fannin (D-Jonesboro); Franklin Foil (R-Baton Rouge); Raymond Garofalo Jr. (R-Chalmette); Jerry Gisclair (D-Larose); Hunter Greene (R-Baton Rouge); Lance Harris (R-Alexandria); Lowell Hazel (R-Pineville); Cameron Henry (R-Metairie); Frank Hoffman (R-West Monroe); Paul Hollis (R-Covington); Mike Huval (R-Breaux Bridge); Barry Ivey (R-Baton Rouge); Patrick Jefferson (D-homer); Nancy Landry (R-Lafayette, who likes to know if teachers take annual or sick leave to come to Baton Rouge); Christopher Leonard (R-Belle Chasse); Joseph Lopinto III (R-Metairie); Nick Lorusso (R-New Orleans); Jay Morris (R-Monroe); Stephen Ortego (D-Carencro); Kevin Pearson (R-Slidell); Erich Ponti (R-Baton Rouge); Stephen Pugh (R-Ponchatoula); Steve Pylant (R-Winnsboro, who wants to force high school seniors to take at least one Course Choice course as a prerequisite to graduation—30,000 graduating seniors at $700 to $1200 tuition per course; do the math); Eugene Reynolds (D-Minden); Jerome Richard (I-Thibodaux); Joel Robideaux (R-Lafayette); Clay Schexnayder (R-Gonzales); John Schroder (R-Covington); Alan Seabaugh (R-Shreveport); Rob Shadoin (R-Ruston); Karen St. Germain (D-Plaquemine); Julie Stokes (R-Metairie); Kirk Talbot (R-River Ridge); Major Thibaut (D-New Roads); Jeff Thompson (R-Bossier City), and Lenar Whitney (R-Houma).

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