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Nonprofit group releases emails which depict connection between ALEC, education reform and corporate investors

Posted in ALEC, American Legislative Exchange Council, BESE, Charters, Education, Ethics, Governor's Office, Lobbyist, Privatization, Public Records, Vouchers on January 30, 2013| 14 Comments »

Any lingering doubts about the connection between public education, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and for-profit education providers may have been erased once and for all with the release of thousands of emails that demonstrate that an educational foundation begun by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush is “distorting democracy” by molding state education policies to benefit the foundation’s private corporate donors.

Stories about the emails were published in Wednesday’s Orlando Sentinel http://www.orlandosentinel.com/features/education/os-bush-foundation-criticism-20130130,0,7386113.story but no Louisiana newspapers had picked up the story.

Donald Cohen, chairperson of the nonprofit In the Public Interest, http://www.inthepublicinterest.org/blog/jeb-bushs-education-nonprofit-really-about-corporate-profits?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+itpi-blog+%28ITPI+Commentary+Feed%29 released the emails, which included correspondence between Bush’s Foundation for Excellence in Education (FEE) and a second group Bush founded called Chiefs for Change, whose members are current and former state education leaders who support Bush’s education reform agenda.

He said the emails “conclusively reveal that FEE staff acted to promote their corporate funders’ priorities, and demonstrate the dangerous role that corporate money plays in shaping our education policy. Correspondence in Florida, New Mexico, Maine, Oklahoma, Rhode Island and Louisiana paint a graphic picture of corporate money distorting democracy.”

That agenda includes school choice, online education, school accountability systems based on standardized tests, evaluating teachers on the basis of student test scores and giving schools grades of A-F on the basis of those test scores.

Louisiana Education Superintendent John White is a member of Chiefs for Change.

Some of the emails released by Cohen included correspondence between FEE and White and White’s predecessor, Paul Pastorek.

The emails provide conclusive evidence that FEE staff promoted their corporate funders’ interests in Florida, New Mexico, Maine, Oklahoma, Rhode Island and Louisiana. Those interests coincide with the agenda promoted by ALEC’s pay-for-play operation. Corporate donors work closely with state legislators and state education policy makers at ALEC conferences, seminars and annual meetings, according to the nonprofit Center for Media and Democracy.

The emails between FEE and state education officials show that FEE, at times working through its Chiefs for Change affiliate, wrote and edited laws, regulations and executive orders in such a way as to enhance profit opportunities for FEE’s corporate funders.

Bush’s organization is supported by many of the same for-profit school corporations that also provide funding for ALEC. Those corporations vote as equals with ALEC legislators on templates to change laws governing America’s public schools.

FEE also receives financial backing from many of the same conservative foundations striving to privatize public schools that also bankroll ALEC. FEE and ALEC lobby for many of the same changes to state laws, changes which benefit their corporate benefactors.

FEE and ALEC also have many of the same “experts” who serve as members or staff employees and the two organizations also collaborate on the annual ALEC education “report card” which grades states’ allegiance to their policies.

FEE acted as a conduit for ALEC model legislation for Maine Gov. Paul LePage which removed barriers to creating online K-12 schools and in some cases, required online classes.

LePage’s agenda was eerily familiar in its call for eliminating class size caps, student-teacher ratios, eliminating the ability of local school districts to limit access to virtual schools and allowing public dollars to flow to online schools and classes.

The emerging importance of education as a corporate cash cow was underscored in 2010 when Rupert Murdoch, who has his own education division called Amplify, said, “When it comes to K through 12 education, we see a $500 billion sector in the U.S.”

Amplify is one of FEE’s corporate donors, as are K12, the Pearson Foundation and McGraw-Hill.
Last February, FEE CEO Patricia Levesque urged state education officials to introduce StubHub, a communications tool, into their states’ schools. Jeb Bush is an investor in StubHub.

An April 26, 2011, email indicated that FEE, through Chiefs for Change project, had engaged John Bailey, a director of Dutko Grayling. Levesque wrote to Pastorek only two weeks before his resignation as state superintendent:

“John Bailey, whom you met over the phone, will be on the call to provide an update on reauthorization discussions on the Hill. He is going to be on contract with the Foundation to assist with the Chiefs’ DC activities in light of Angie’s departure.

Dutko has been accused of working with industry front groups in the past,” Levesque wrote. “For example, Dutko worked with AIDS Responsibility Project (ARP), an industry-supported effort described by an HIV/AIDS policy activist as a ‘drug industry-funded front group.’”

Cohen’s organization also uncovered FEE documents indicating the foundation reimbursed Pastorek and White, the two men who have led the state’s education department under Gov. Bobby Jindal, for their travel to Orlando and Washington, D.C., for events sponsored by FEE and the Chiefs for Change.

Dutko Grayling a K Street lobbying firm in Washington which has been struggling to maintain its position as one of the top firms in the nation’s capital.

“These emails show a troubling link between Jeb Bush’s effort to lobby for ‘reforms’ through his statewide Foundation for Florida’s Future, his national Foundation for Excellence in Education, and the powerful corporations who want access to billions of our tax dollars by re-shaping public education policies just to create markets for themselves—none of which are in the best interest of our children,” Public Interest quoted a Florida parent as saying.

“Testing companies and for-profit online schools see education as big business, said Cohen. “For-profit companies are hiding behind FEE and other business lobby organizations they fund to write laws and (to) promote policies that enrich the companies.”

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‘Oh my God! They cloned Kenny!’ (with apologies to South Park) and other lowlights from past LA. legislative sessions

Posted in Education, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators on January 24, 2013| 9 Comments »

Sometimes we miss a good story but with the help of our readers we usually catch up—even if it does take a year—or two.

Normally, we’d let a story this old slide into oblivion and chalk it up as one we missed. But this is just too bizarre not to go back and pick it up, thanks to a reader’s sending the slate.com link to the story our way.

The apparent ignorance of one state senator on the subject of evolution can only be described as surreal while the arrogance of a former state senator can serve to make us thankful she’s not around any longer.

During last year’s legislative session, Baton Rouge native Zack Kopplin, now a student at Rice University, was testifying before a state Senate committee on a bill to allow supplemental materials to be used by teachers in science classrooms.

The bill, SB 374 by Sen. Karen Carter Peterson (D-New Orleans) was just what the creationist legislators did not want because it provided for the teaching of evolution and global warming.

Kopplin, 19, describes himself as a Christian but opposes the teaching of creationism to the exclusion of traditional science. During the hearings, he was testifying about the Louisiana Science Education Act (LSEA) that allows the teaching of creationism when Sen. Mike Walsworth (R-West Monroe) asked for a specific example of evolution.

Science teacher Darlene Reaves, responding to his request, described an experiment involving E.coli in which different samples were separated, and after several generations, one of the strains mutated and gained the ability to metabolize—an actual demonstration how the bacteria was able to evolve.

That’s when things got a little weird. Walsworth, ever alert for anything that might undermine the holy grail of creationism (if not overly enlightened about the bacterium that causes diarrhea from raw milk, undercooked meat and contaminated water), asked an incredulous question: “They (the E. coli bacteria) evolve into a person?”

Just in case you believe we’re making that up, here is the link to the exchange: http://www.youtube.com/embed/hQObhb3veQA?autoplay=&wmode=transparent

Ignorance on a scale of this magnitude is frightening enough but when that person is one of 39 senators who make laws that affect the rest of us, it’s downright terrifying.

Almost as bad was the haughtiness displayed by then-Sen. Julie Quinn (R-Metairie) during hearings on SB 70 by Peterson in 2011. (Both SB 70 in 2011 and SB 374 in 2012 were identical in calling for the repeal of LSEA and neither passed.)

Kopplin is again testifying when he is interrupted by Quinn. “That wasn’t what I asked,” she said, “and I am an attorney and I listened patiently to all the accolades that everyone has, all the little letters behind their names, doctor, etc. So, as an attorney, I am asking a question and I would like an answer to that question: do you support a law that prohibits the teaching of religion in the classroom?”

(First of all, when you are sitting on a Senate committee, Ms. Quinn, you are not an attorney; you are a state senator, no better or worse than the senator sitting beside you who might be a plumber or a horticulturalist. And your twice referring to yourself as an attorney while disparaging witnesses who went to school far longer than you to earn advanced degrees by referring them as having “little letters behind their names” is beneath contempt.)

Again, she asked Kopplin, “Do you support the promotion of religion in English class?”

Without missing a beat, Kopplin responded, “The Bible is always used in most English classes because it’s a classic piece of literature.”

Quinn throws up her hands at this point, scooting her chair back and shaking her head in apparent condescension as Peterson, seated at the witness table to testify on behalf of her bill, explained, “Promotion would be the key word in response.”

But then Peterson had her own rejoinder that again had Quinn, an ardent proponent of creationism, sneering in good, Christian derision.

“I don’t think Senate Bill 70 deals specifically with creationism in science classes and that’s why you see the plethora of people with ‘little letters behind their names.”

“I wasn’t trying to be disrespectful,” Quinn said somewhat defensively.

“I’m very respectful of over 40 Nobel laureates,” Peterson said. “I’m very respectful of the Association of Biology Teachers.” (Quinn rolls her eyes here and, mouth open, looks at her colleagues on the committee as if asking for help in shutting Peterson up.) “I’m very respectful of the Louisiana Association of Biology Educators,” Peterson continued. “I’m very respectful of the (unintelligible because the committee chairman attempted to cut Peterson off) Science Teachers Association, I’m very respectful of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and I’m respectful of the American Institute of Biological Sciences, as well as American Society for Cell Biology, and the Society for Vertebrae Paleontology and lastly, the American Association for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.

“And yes, they have little, medium and big letters behind their names and they’re all suggesting that we repeal the act,” she said.

Here’s the link to their exchange. Watch the body language of Sen. Quinn. http://www.youtube.com/embed/3e2zPfsNe-w?autoplay=&wmode=transparent

Even though Peterson has twice failed to gain passage of her bill, word is she’s going to try again this year.

We can’t wait to watch and listen to the testimony to see which legislator will play the lead buffoon this time.

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Notable Quotables (in their own words)

Posted in Attorney General, BESE, Charters, Education, Ethics, Governor's Office, Lobbyist on January 20, 2013| 9 Comments »

“Thomas Ratliff’s presence on the State Board of Education is not legal because of his being a registered lobbyist.”

—Opinion by the Texas Attorney General’s Office on the legality of a Texas registered lobbyist’s serving on the State Board of Education. Louisiana lobbyist Steve Waguespack was appointed by Gov. Piyush Jindal on Friday to membership on the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education even though his law firm advertises on the web of its expertise in working with charter schools and school reform advocates. Louisiana has no such ethics laws prohibiting such appointments despite Jindal’s claim to having the most ethical administration in Louisiana history.

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π-yush appointment of lobbyist Steve Waguespack to BESE appears to be rife with ethics questions, conflicts of interest

Posted in BESE, Education, Ethics, Governor's Office, Lobbyist on January 19, 2013| 6 Comments »

When Gov. Piyush Jindal named his former chief of staff and executive counsel Steve Waguespack to the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) on Thursday, he may have created something of an ethical dilemma—if this were Texas.

It’s not, of course. It’s Louisiana and in Louisiana, anything goes with the most ethical, most transparent, most accountable administration in Louisiana history.

Waguespack resigned as Jindal’s chief of staff last October to join the New Orleans law firm Jones Walker. He also registered with the Louisiana Board of Ethics as a lobbyist, listing as his clients Jones Walker, LLP, Periscope Holdings, Inc. of Austin, Texas, and Loop Garou Entertainment of New Orleans.

For the first two, he is registered as a lobbyist of both the legislative and executive branches of state government while for Loop Garou, he is registered only to lobby the executive branch, or governor’s office.

His employer, Jones Walker, meanwhile, is also registered with the Ethics Board as a lobbyist firm and lists is sole representative as one Stephen Michael Waguespack.

A visit to the Jones Walker web page raises the specter of an ethics gray area for Waguespack.

“Jones Walker represents universities and other educational institutions, both public and private, with enrollment ranging from several dozen students to more than 50,000 students,” the web page boasts.

The text below the bold-face heading “School and Education Advocacy Group” on the web page provided the real eye-opener, however.

It noted that Jones Walker’s work in the area of education “has extended to charter schools and other secondary education institutions” (emphasis ours).

The firm’s relevant experience, it said, “includes representing local school boards and charter school operations and management organizations before the Louisiana Department of Education and the Louisiana Board of Secondary and Elementary Education.”

Jones Walker formed a School and Education Law and Advocacy (SELA) Group which it claims “has the resources, reputation, knowledge and experience to serve as a valuable resource to charter schools, charter school management organizations and to non-government organizations at the forefront of the education reform movement.”

In Texas, Subsection 7.103(c) of the Texas Education Code “precludes certain registered lobbyists from serving on the State Board of Education.”

Specifically, that statute says, “A person who has been retained to communicate directly with the legislative or executive branch to influence legislation or administrative action in or on behalf of a profession, business, or association on a matter that pertains to or is associated or connected with any of the statutorily enumerated powers or duties of the Board is not eligible to serve on the Board.” Thus, a registered lobbyist who has been paid to lobby the legislative or executive branch on a matter relating to Board business is ineligible to serve on the Board.”

So, in essence, what we have is a former high-ranking member of Piyush Jindal’s inner circle who is now employed as a lobbyist for a law firm that specializes in working with school boards, charter schools and non-government organizations “at the forefront of the education reform movement” who has just been appointed to serve on the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, which is “at the forefront of the education reform movement” and has among other things, the responsibility of acting on charter school applications.

There is no law in Louisiana such as exists in Texas, so while there may be a moral obstacle there is no legal prohibition to Jindal’s making such an appointment—even if it does smack of questionable ethics and downright arrogance. It’s in-your-face politics at its worst by a man who hides behind a cloak of self-righteousness, sanctimony and piety.

One nagging question: is Piyush’s tendency to recycle the same tired old names in and out of his revolving door indicative that his circle of loyal supporters is contracting in size to such an extent that he now finds it impossible to reach out to new names he can trust to fill vacancies?

The resignation this week of executive counsel Gary Graphia may also reveal cracks in the foundation of the House of Jindal. Graphia resigned after only about three months on the job but his sudden departure is most significant in the spin the governor’s office tried to put on it.

It was almost as if Piyush spokesman Kyle Plotkin was trying too hard to make nice in his announcement to Press Release Central.

Plotkin, ever true to his boss, insisted—perhaps too sincerely—that Graphia’s leaving was “amicable,” adding for good measure that he was “leaving on good terms.”

Finally, making one last stab of convincing those who never asked, Plotkin said Graphia’s brief stay was attributable to “a transition period” for the governor’s office.

Well, silly us, we thought the “transition period” for the governor’s office was that three months between Jindal’s first being elected way back October of 2007 and his inauguration in January of 2008.

And remember, it was Jindal who called a special session of the Legislature immediately upon taking office in 2008 for the purpose of adopting those so-called sweeping ethics law changes and it was Jindal—and Waguespack, Teepell, et al—who directed the drafting, introduction and passage of Piyush’s radical education reform package last year.

If those education “reforms” turn out to be as big a joke as the ethics reform, well then perhaps, as someone once said, we really do get the government we deserve.

Many years ago Walt Kelly’s beloved Pogo told us, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”

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BESE to take up Bulletin 741 revisions that would eliminate accreditation, school librarians, counselors; encourage fraud

Posted in BESE, Education on January 14, 2013| 20 Comments »

It’s 87 pages long and typical of last year’s education reform package rushed through the legislature by Gov. Piyush Jindal, the proposed changes to Bulletin 741, otherwise known as the Louisiana Handbook for School Administrators, was first introduced to the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) at the Dec. 4 meeting of the Academic Goals and Instructional Improvement Committee.

BESE member Holly Boffy of Baton Rouge offered a substitute motion at the time to defer committee action until January because, she said, she was hungry. The committee report, however, was approved and on Tuesday, Jan. 15 (tomorrow) the full board will take up the proposed changes that, among other things, will:

• Not require school systems to participate in a school accreditation program every five years and receive a certification classification (The proposals, in fact, call for the scrapping of Section 311 of the bulletin, which deals with accreditation, in its entirety.);

• No longer require certification of teachers;

• Strip Section 2313 for Elementary Program of Studies of its suggested outline of content areas, meaning any school can design any curricula it deems appropriate (so much for uniformity);

• Gut summer schools of their requirements, including minimum instructional hours and class size limits;

• Allow a single person with no valid teaching certificate to teach hundreds of students in one class taught for one week;

• Allow local educational agencies to use state money to purchase textbooks not approved by BESE;

• Do away with the requirement of taking roll for virtual (course choice) classes, thereby eliminating any assurance of a student’s attending the course;

• Allow for the elimination of the positions of school counselors, physical education teachers and school librarians.

Allow for the elimination of the positions of school counselors, physical education teachers and school librarians.

Board member Lottie Beebe of Breaux Bridge said there will be no public hearing per se on the proposed changes. Instead, if the proposals are adopted by BESE the legislative auditor must attach a family impact statement (statement of family values) and fiscal note (cost). Following that, the proposed changes are uploaded in the State Register which then triggers a 90-day public notice. Citizens beginning at that point, have 30 days for public (online) comment before the new rule becomes final after 90 days.

Beebe said many of the proposed changes are rationalized by State Superintendent John White and department staff as offering flexibility to school systems.

But at a time of increased focus on school bullying (both physical and electronic) and concerns about student mental health and safety, “cutting counselors and replacing them with untested teams is contrary to good public policy and a danger to our kids,” Beebe said.

She said because counselors are needed for college preparation, cutting those positions is also contrary to White’s stated goals of promoting college readiness.

“I have never before received so many emails,” Beebe said. “The LDOE is proposing the elimination of many of the structures we have had in place in traditional systems. Some will say this is good because it gives districts autonomy. I disagree,” she said. “I believe in having a framework, or structure.

“It appears (that) traditional systems have been given a lethal injection and will slowly expire unless our legislators derail this train. If you want to see what the state takeover of schools looks like, visit the Recovery School District in New Orleans and interview parents and students.

“I attended a meeting in New Orleans in November where students appealed to BESE for assistance. Students voiced concerns relative to the lack of certified teachers, lack of textbooks, etc. If you visit the DOE website to check on the RSD school report cards, you get a diagnostic comment: ‘This page is not available for display.’”

Mike Desehotels, a retired teacher and retired executive director of the Louisiana Association of Educators, said he has several concerns about the proposed changes to Bulletin 741 but that he is most concerned with the potential for abuse and fraud in the Course Choice program.

Course Choice is a new program whereby students are allowed to take online courses from providers approved by BESE. The Course Choice allows operators to set their own tuition and to provide their own curricula but are not required to take roll to ensure that students are attending the virtual course.

Moreover, Desehotels said, Course Choice providers are allowed under Act 2 of 2012 to be paid 50 percent of their tuition upon a student’s registering for a course and the remaining 50 percent upon the student’s completion of the course.

“Since there is no provision for taking roll, I wanted to know what safeguards were in place to assure…that the proper instruction had been provided,” Desehotels said. “The answers I got from DOE can be summarized as follows: the provider can confirm that the student has completed the course by just stating that either the student has passed or has completed the required portfolio of work.

“Apparently the discretion for awarding course credit is totally in the hands of the providers and they have every incentive to do so because they get paid in full as soon as they say the student has completed the course. So the provider can be paid and the student can get credit for a course when he may not have received adequate instruction.

“I believe this is fraud and a waste of taxpayer dollars,” he said.

Desehotels said he posed that question to White several months ago. “He promised to review the matter and get back to me. He never did.

That should not be too surprising given the mindset of this administration.

BESE President Penny Dastugue of Mandeville instructed St. Tammany teacher Mercedes Schneider to cease emailing her with concerns about BESE policy and BESE member James Garvey of Metairie emailed White relative to a public records request from a Louisiana citizen, “…try to find some way to charge her for the cost of responding.”

Garvey attempted to explain his email which was inadvertently sent to the individual requesting the public documents by saying he had been informed that DOE has not been recovering the costs of documents. “I was focusing on the part of the job that they have not been doing well.”

It’s generally outside the scope of BESE members to micromanage day-to-day department operations by counting paper clips and making sure citizens are charged for information—even information transmitted electronically by a simple keystroke of a computer.

Had he simply been watching out for the fiscal well-being of DOE, he might well have said something along the lines of “Be sure that the costs of responding are recouped” instead of “Try to find some way to charge her.”

Garvey tried again to say he had heard complaints about the large “chunks of time” dedicated to responding to public records requests.

With John White and DOE, however, the biggest “chunks of time” are dedicated to denying information and withholding records from the public under the guise of “deliberative process” or by simply ignoring the requests.

Apparently there is no charge for those services.

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