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#schoolvouchers — Public Fediverse posts

Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #schoolvouchers, aggregated by home.social.

  1. 92% of private schools already enrolled in Texas’ voucher programs serving kids beyond kindergarten are religious. @TexasObserver found many of these exclude non-Christian and LGBTQ+ kids. #TxEd #TxLege #TexasSchools #ProtectPublicSchools #SchoolVouchers texasobserver.org/texas-vouche

  2. 92% of private schools already enrolled in Texas’ voucher programs serving kids beyond kindergarten are religious. @TexasObserver found many of these exclude non-Christian and LGBTQ+ kids. #TxEd #TxLege #TexasSchools #ProtectPublicSchools #SchoolVouchers texasobserver.org/texas-vouche

  3. 92% of private schools already enrolled in Texas’ voucher programs serving kids beyond kindergarten are religious. @TexasObserver found many of these exclude non-Christian and LGBTQ+ kids. #TxEd #TxLege #TexasSchools #ProtectPublicSchools #SchoolVouchers texasobserver.org/texas-vouche

  4. 92% of private schools already enrolled in Texas’ voucher programs serving kids beyond kindergarten are religious. @TexasObserver found many of these exclude non-Christian and LGBTQ+ kids. #TxEd #TxLege #TexasSchools #ProtectPublicSchools #SchoolVouchers texasobserver.org/texas-vouche

  5. 92% of private schools already enrolled in Texas’ voucher programs serving kids beyond kindergarten are religious. @TexasObserver found many of these exclude non-Christian and LGBTQ+ kids. #TxEd #TxLege #TexasSchools #ProtectPublicSchools #SchoolVouchers texasobserver.org/texas-vouche

  6. @TexasObserver @josephinelee

    >So far, 48 charter operators—which are required to be nonprofits, governmental entities, or higher education institutions—have received at least $735 million in state and federal funds (passed through the school districts) under the program SB 1882 inaugurated, which came to be called “Texas Partnerships.” These operators largely control the budgets and operations of the public schools they helm.

    The nonprofit distinction is pointless when those nonprofits are permitted to funnel the vast majority of their income to for-profit entities that do the actual education work.

    >Under most Texas Partnership contracts, school districts retain the responsibility to maintain facilities, furniture, and equipment, offer transportation and meals to students, and provide special education services, but they give up control over administration, curriculum, and budgets.

    Textbook case of privatize the profits and socialize the costs.

    >In response to an Observer question about the Beaumont school’s academic performance, a spokesperson for Green Dot Public Schools noted via email that its related organization, Green Dot Public Schools Southeast Texas, ran the school and was dissolved in June 2024, adding: “We do not have additional background or context that we can provide.”

    Its *shell company*. Call it what it is.

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    An interesting thought experiment: what if teachers collectively chose to form these non-profits themselves? And ran the schools as they saw fit? Education co-ops, perhaps.

    >Shelly Haney, a longtime educator, turned Midland ISD’s Goddard Junior High from an F-rated to a C-rated school as principal from 2013 to 2019. That’s why, in 2019, then-superintendent Orlando Riddick asked her, while she was still Goddard’s principal, to start a nonprofit and apply for a Texas Partnership contract to run the school in addition to Bunche Elementary School and later other elementaries, Haney said. The charter organization would be called the REACH Network.

    Yay! So it's been tried at least.

    >But Haney ran into the same obstacles that her predecessors at Bunche had faced: community poverty, low teacher retention, and then COVID-19. There were early signs of trouble when Bunche’s new principal quit in September 2019, four weeks after the school year started. Three more principals left during the four years REACH was in operation. Amid teacher shortages that got worse during the pandemic, Midland ISD waived certification requirements —as allowed under state law—and there were fewer experienced teachers available in the district’s hiring pool to help carry out reforms, Haney told the Observer.

    So there is no Stand and Deliver magic formula to addressing poverty, I take it. For this approach to work, the co-op will need broader political and economic support.

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    >There’s also no record that School Innovation Collaborative applied for federal tax-exempt status in the Internal Revenue Service database. San Antonio ISD terminated its contract early with the organization in 2023. CEO Doug Dawson did not respond to the Observer’s request for comment.
    >
    >Colbert described those kinds of paperwork issues as red flags. “These are public tax dollars that are going to pay these people, and there are requirements of the law that they’re not meeting,” he said.

    What in the actual fuck? That's a red flag alright. But it's a red flag for the boards inking the contracts. We're talking absolutely basic, due diligence 101 shit here.

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    >Regarding Texas Partnership operators in general, Quinzi, the teachers union legal counsel, said: “They’re going to put as much money into their pockets and the least amount of money in the classroom.”

    At least the union rep knows how to tell it like it is. All of the trustees and politicians quoted in this article keep dancing around the core contradiction.

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    Finally: this article was very heavy in data. It needed graphs. Badly. But seeing as we're going to be implementing similar bad ideas on a much larger scale going forward here in Texas, the author is at least not going to be lacking in data for the foreseeable future.

    #Texas #txlege #vouchers #education #SchoolVouchers #SchoolChoice #txpol #CharterSchools #NPIC #501c3 #NonProfit #NonProfitIndustrialComplex

  7. Texas is almost certainly getting school vouchers — Senate Bill 2 has passed in the state’s House and is likely to have a fairly smooth passage to Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk. It’s the culmination of a 30-year battle that has until now been blocked by Democrats and rural Republicans.

    @TexasObserver takes a look at how it happened. Zeph Capo, the president of the Texas American Federation of Teachers, said in a statement: “Greg Abbott relied on a last ditch phone call from Donald Trump to bully Republican lawmakers to fall in line.”

    texasobserver.org/abbott-trump

    #Education #SchoolVouchers #SchoolChoice #GregAbbott #DonaldTrump #USA #Texas #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

    5/15

  8. Two key pieces of education legislation cleared preliminary hurdles in the Texas House on Thursday, but not before sparking spirited debate among lawmakers, including complaints about a lack of transparency around the process.

    houstonpublicmedia.org/article

    #Education #News #Politics #K12Education #SchoolFunding #SchoolVouchers

  9. The Texas House Public Education Committee was scheduled to meet on Tuesday to take up two high priority bills which would address school funding and the creation of a school voucher plan. But the meeting was canceled late Monday night.

    houstonpublicmedia.org/article

    #Education #EducationNews #News #PublicSchool #SchoolFunding #SchoolVouchers #TexasHouse

  10. Here’s your friendly reminder that #charterschools came about as a white reaction to #desegregation, which tells you all you need to know about the intended beneficiaries of #SchoolVouchers. But if there’s no #departmentofeducation there’s no one to ensure #IDEA and other #civilrights are being enforced in your new for-profit “#schools. Neither will there be a nonprofit group collecting #data to track #educational outcomes for #students attending for-profit schools.

  11. School vouchers sure are good for someone — but it’s not necessarily kids. Here’s @TexasObserver on how in the Lone Star state, the push for school choice could provide a huge payday for private contractors. These certified educational assistance organizations (CEAO) will act as middlemen between the state, parents and private schools — for a fee, of course.

    texasobserver.org/school-vouch

    #SchoolChoice #SchoolVouchers #Education #Texas #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

  12. One of Trump's executive orders boosts school choice by allowing public funds to go to private schools. But law professors warn vouchers drain public school budgets, especially in rural areas, and make hiring qualified teachers harder. And don’t improve student outcomes.
    theconversation.com/trump-orde #SchoolChoice #SchoolVouchers #education

  13. missionlocal.org/2024/10/see-h

    I just happened to come across this. It seems that #SanFrancisco hasn't been a #progressive bastion for years. #SFBA

    #DanLurieBILLIONAIREmayor #California #LevisHeirMayor

    'Moderate' means #rightwing to me. He had alot of Republican support as well. What's this #GOP group the #BrionesSoceity? They seem to be anti-homeless people, and for '#market-based solutions to housing' (Market-based anything is the last thing the public needs in the #UK, the U.S. or anywhere else. 'Market-based is the problem).

    They also believe in #schoolvouchers (believes in reallocating #SFUSD's budget to fund vouchers), #charterschools, so-called 'school choice', nothing about support for public schools, 'civic education, not political indoctrination' sounds like #righwing dog-whistle shit to me.

    Homeless: 'A hand-up, not a hand out ' sounds like the same old boomer nonsense from Tony Blair's era, reduce funding of #harmreduction programmes, lower threshold for #mentalhealth conservatorships (I suppose turn the homeless into #BritneySpears)

    Doesn't sound good.

    Also, #billionaires, #rightwingers and #farright scum have been trying to take cover cities known for a progressive reputation.

    So, it all sounds sus IMHO.

    America has a #BillionaireProblem.