9486 in the collection
Contact the Media!
Ohanian Comment: Pass this resource list on to members of the media. We need to keep pushing back.
Follow Sharon's lead and help break the silence!
From: Sharon Higgins
sharonrhiggins@yahoo.com
Subject: At Amy Goodman's instruction
To: producers@democracynow.org
Date: Monday, November 16, 2009, 4:31 PM
Dear DemocracyNow producers,
Amy Goodman instructed me to email you. I spoke with her this morning at the UC Berkeley School of Journalism. The topic of our brief conversation was the largely unknown presence of corporate forces who are in the midst of conducting a total transformation of K-12 public education in order to remove the public's control of public schools and shift the schools toward privatization.
There is a lack of mainstream coverage about the nature and impact of these forces, and thus a total lack of public awareness. Ms. Goodman admitted to me that she did not know much about what is occurring, and consequently suggested I send you a list of information leads.
This information will be timely for your program since, after a lengthy delay, the renewal of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (currently known as No Child Left Behind) will likely to take place in 2010. I fully anticipate that DemocracyNow will be covering that story.
In a nutshell: over the past few decades a dominant, corporate-backed faction has gained more and more power over the sphere of public education. Its aim is pro-privatization, pro-charter school, pro-national standards, pro-more student testing, and anti-union. Many of those involved with public education feel absolutely betrayed by the education agenda of Secretary of Education Arne Duncan under President Obama.
One can trace the origin of this movement back to the activities of the Business Roundtable in the Reagan years. This faction largely works via a process called venture philanthropy as well as the usual political, money, and power connections.
Naomi Klein, in the first few pages of her introduction in The Shock Doctrine, which is not even about public education, gives readers a tiny taste of how this "reform" movement operated on the public school system in New Orleans after Katrina. For the reformers the destruction was a dream come true.
Not surprisingly, the media has been playing favorites to the corporate reformers who are driving these massive public education changes. Those of us who study this issue are very aware how mainstream newspapers and television stations are acting as gatekeepers to block the public's access to vital information.
Here are several sources to help you become more acquainted with this serious, increasingly anti-democratic situation:
Susan Ohanian, former school teacher, author and activist, has been researching and documenting this topic for many years. She co-authored Why is Corporate America Bashing Our Public Schools? (2004). Her Web site is http://www.susanohanian.org
Jim Horn, Associate Professor at Cambridge College, records the day-to-day effects of the corporate "reform" movement on his Web site, Schools Matter @ http://www.schoolsmatter.info
His knowledge on this topic is extraordinarily broad.
He may be reached at ontogenyx@gmail.com.
Gerald Bracey is very recently deceased, but his writings are a treasure. His most recent book is Education Hell: Rhetoric vs. Reality (2009). In addition, The Bracey Report, was released post-humously just last week. You may also read some of Bracey's columns on the Huffington Post.
David Berliner, Regents' Professor in the College Of Education at Arizona State University, released a stunning report last spring called Poverty and Potential: Out-of-School Factors and School Success. Of course, this important information wasn't discussed on the mainstream press. You can read a summary and access the full report at http://epicpolicy.org/newsletter/2009/03/blame-school-achievement-gap-misplaced.
Dr. Berliner's email address is
dcbasu@asu.edu.
Philip Kovacs, Assistant Professor in the Department of Education at the University of Alabama, Huntsville. Kovacs has been monitoring the heavy influence of the Gates Foundation and will release a book about that in 2010. You may read one of his pieces, Bill Gates and the Corporatization of American "Public" Schools, at http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0406-31.htm . An additional article he wrote is at http://www.wce.wwu.edu/Resources/CEP/eJournal/v003n001/a011.shtml.
Kovacs' email address is philipkovacs@yahoo.com.
George Schmidt has been keeping track of what has been going on in Chicago Public Schools for many years and makes his reports on a Web site at http://www.substancenews.net. Chicago is of particular importance because it is the hometown of both President Obama and Arne Duncan. Duncan likes to boast about his accomplishments when he served as CEO of Chicago Public Schools.
Schmidt knows the unvarnished story and can be reached at Csubstance@aol.com.
Norm Scott follows the effects of the Bloomberg/Klein regime in New York City. In addition, he specializes in local teachers union issues. His blog is Education Notes Online @ http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com.
His email address is norscot@aol.com.
Monty Neill is Director of the National Center for Fair & Open Testing (FairTest), an organization which closely follows and attempts to counter the movement for continually increased student testing. The Web site is http://www.fairtest.org.
Neill can be reached at monty@fairtest.org
I feel it would be useful for you to tap into any, or all, of these people. Over the past couple of years I have had a limited number of brief email exchanges with each of them, but we don't actually know each other, nor have we ever met. I am referring them to you because I have knowledge about the work they do.
I also want to mention that in the course of my activism I maintain a blog where I post information about these issues. I definitely consider myself to be an amateur and view my role in this whole process as a grassroots activist trying to help get the word out about what is happening.
Please don't hesitate to contact me if I can be of additional help to you.
Sincerely,
Sharon Higgins
Oakland, California
http://www.perimeterprimate.blogspot.com
— Sharon Higgins
e-mail
2009-11-16
INDEX OF OUTRAGES
Pages: 380
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