Duncan: Maine at 'disadvantage' for charters ban

[fight4my3sons]

States like Maine that don’t allow charter schools are putting themselves at a “competitive disadvantage” when it comes to applying for education reform funds, the country’s top education official said Monday.

The 10 states that do not allow charter schools and the 26 that put caps on the number they allow will endanger their chances for awards from a $4.35 billion education innovation fund that’s part of the federal economic stimulus package, U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan said.

"They put themselves at a competitive disadvantage for the largest pool of dollars states have ever had access to," Duncan said during a conference call with reporters.

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/newsupdate.php?updates/duncan-maine-at-disadvantage-for-charters-ban

[LWolf]

1. The stimulus money has nothing to do with economic stimulus.

It's a weapon and/or bribe to move the Obama/Duncan privatization agenda.

[Catshrink]

2. It's a weapon to get rid of teachers' unions

and reduce benefits. Charter school teachers don't pay into the state retirement fund either. I do believe in smaller schools, but not when they siphon off funds for the greater population.

Notice the similarity in the push for charter schools and the one of the proposed single payer plans? Both of them allow "smaller entities," the charters or the insurance companies, to take the non-sped, maybe higher performing students or the healthier patients. This leaves the students requiring more services or the sicker patients to fight for the remaining dollars in the public coffers. Does this make sense? Just like "they" say that the insurance companies must be forced to cover sick people, charters must be required to accept sped and other special needs kids.

[Dinger]

4. I, For One, Am Pushing Back

And I'll keep pushing too.

[LWolf]

5. Nice connection.

The invisible elephant in the room is this:

If smaller schools with more flexibility are superior, why aren't we insisting that ALL public schools be smaller, and allowing ALL public schools more flexibility?

We can do that without union busting.

But that wouldn't create the two-tier system that the agenda craves, and it wouldn't leave the bigger, standardized system behind to target as "failures" for political gain.

[fight4my3sons]

7. our public schools are pretty small up here

My son's 1st grade class has 12 kids. His Kindergarten class had 11 (we were in a different district last year). There is a lot of consolidation going on up here. My district refused to consolidate this year because it would have cost more money to do it and there would have been more administrative over site that they did not want. I LOVE the district that we are in right now. We went out of our way to find a rental in this district. My son has had numerous field trips, he has a foreign language, and the teachers are fantastic. My preschool twins attended the 'lab' preschool at the high school this year. I am just hoping that I am able to get a job within the district.

I don't know how big the schools are in Portland and Bangor. I would think those would be the places with the biggest schools. I moved here from NY. Obviously the schools there were much bigger.

[LWolf]

8. I don't know how big the schools are in Portland, either.

I'm on the other side of the Cascades, in a smaller district.

Our schools are smaller here, except for the high school, than all of the schools I worked in for 21 years in so cal.

The schools are smaller, as far as student population goes. Class size isn't any smaller. We still get 30+ in most classes.

We DID many field trips, etc., until the budget implosion this year. Field trips are on the "not going to happen" list for the duration of the economic "slowdown."

We still have advantages over big schools. We're a small K-8; I teach 5th - 8th. We said goodbye to our 8th graders for the last time today; when the bell rang, parents, teachers, and students were all crying. Tears of joy for their accomplishments, sadness for the inevitable ending.

We operate much like extended family, which makes it possible to interact with the whole student, and we like it that way.

[elmaji]

9. Of course they dont pay into the state retirement fund

They don't receive state retirement payouts when they retire either.

[YvonneCa]

10. And this is good...

...bad...or what? And welcome to DU. :)

[Dinger]

3. Fuck You arne

You prick. Is that supposed to be some kind of fucking threat? Again, fuck you arne.

[fight4my3sons]

6. those were my exact thoughts when I read the article

Our schools are pretty damn small up here (my 1st grader has a class size of 12). My school district has refused to consolidate because it would cost more to taxpayers if they did. I am a special ed teacher. I have been home for six years now with my kids, but am currently looking for a job since my twins are going into kindergarten in the fall. I'm still taking the PRAXIS exams (Maine does not do the reciprocity thing with NY). We moved to this district less than a year ago and it is one of the top in the state, but even the last one we were in was good. My son's Kindergarten class had 11 kids. We moved from NY and class sizes that small were unheard of unless they were a special ed self-contained classroom.