Parent Trigger is the "Parent Tricker"..not the "coup" they expect it to be.

[madfloridian]

That really is a good way to describe these new laws called the Parent Trigger laws. The backers manipulate the parents into believing that schools are failing their children and that only the teachers are to blame.

They urge the parents to start a coup against the teachers and the school. Except it's really not a "coup" at all...it's a way to get a school turned into a charter school more quickly. The parents find that out later.

That tactic like nearly all of the education reform methods find teachers unions to be a real problem. This excellent article at Truth-Out defends teachers unions and tells how the movie promoting the parent trigger laws came to be part of the DNC convention.

In all the education reform policies, teachers' unions get in the way. This article at Truth-Out shows how even the DNC convention took a stand with with the reformers by pushing a pro-parent trigger movie.

At the podium, speakers like Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and former North Carolina Governor Jim Hunt praised the Obama administration's willingness to embrace such change, singling out the controversial Race to the Top program for special attention. The program requires states to link teacher evaluations to student standardized test scores and pushes charter schools and 'turnarounds'—in which at least 50 percent of teachers are fired—to replace struggling public schools.

The program fits perfectly with the corporate reform agenda of destroying job security for teachers, privatizing public schools, testing everything, and turning whatever can be quantified into a statistic, no matter how disconnected from the realities of teaching children.

It mentions the presentation of the pro-parent trigger movie, Won't Back Down, at the DNC convention.

The film shows "bad teachers" locking students in closets, making personal phone calls during class, forbidding bathroom breaks, and refusing to help students after school, citing fictitious "union rules" that prohibit them from doing so. The union, in turn, is cast as these teachers' self-interested protector, with one union official attributing a made-up quote to teachers union leader Albert Shanker, saying she'll start caring about children when they start paying dues.

...Despite the mismatch with reality, the Democratic National Committee showed the film, which also played to a standing ovation at the Republican National Convention last week. The White House declined to weigh in on the decision to screen it. Reports say DNC Executive Director Patrick Gaspard, who spent nine years at SEIU 1199, made the call to show the film.

That last sentence may tell why teachers and their unions have such an uphill battle. No one in either party wants to upset the the big money donors behind such reforms. It may not have seemed like a big decision at the time, but to teachers caught in the middle of all this it was a very big deal.

However, when other unions support policies to harm teachers' unions, it's gotten pretty out of hand. Someone in leadership somewhere should be speaking out that this is not a grassroots movement, it was started by charter groups.

Eli Broad, Green Dot charters, SEIU, and the Parent Revolution...connected.

“Steve Barr noticed that at one of Green Dots’ high schools, a large proportion of students has parents who were members of Local 1877 of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). From this observation, a partnership evolved between Green Dot and SEIU’s national organization, as well as its Los Angeles affiliate. While most professional unions have opposed charter schools, SEIU has embraced LAPU’s reform agenda because their members’ children are the main victims of failing urban schools. For almost a year, SEIU has formally worked with Green Dot and LAPU, providing LAPU with both funding and technical assistance from experienced organizers. In turn, SEIU is interested in exploring how Green Dot’s model and LAPU’s organizing efforts can drive school reform in other urban districts across the country.”

..."One place to start looking at the tremendous growth of these seemingly grass-root groups of parents is in the city of Los Angeles where not only 250 schools have been given the bums rush out of the corridors of public management, but they are due to be thrown into the laps of non-profit outfits like Green Dot Public Schools or Alliance Public Schools, to name just a few. It is truly astounding, for in the case of the non-profit school systems that are emerging, these non-profit EMO’s are bent on creating a new, national retail chain of charter schools with outlets in as many states and school districts they can possibly get their hands on and their tactics are not unlike the ‘grass-root’ town hall health care meetings.

One of the crew members of the movie, Won't Back Down, recently admitted discomfort with the theme of the movie. A little late of course.

Crew Member of “Won’t Back Down” speaks of regret, disagreement with theme.

Hi, um, I had the… good fortune of working on this film that, at its heart, is fiction. Notice the careful phrase “based on real events” rather than “a true story.” It is a STORY that is being hijacked by political people to support a cause that many of us, now that we are watching this disgusting spectacle unfold, are conflicted about the film. We are in the business of telling stories, human stories about relationships that have an emotional effect on audiences. We are certainly not told, from the beginning, that our work will be used to support a position we oppose… in the end, honestly, we are just grateful to have a job in a HIGHLY competitive market.

..What is needed is more voices rising up and disrupting these carefully staged events – voices which support the position that public education is a cornerstone… a vital foundation upon which democracy is built. To surrender it to corporate greed and financial motivations is to decimate the future of this country, the equality of its citizens, mobility between classes, and our very freedom.

Make noise, be heard, make sure that this debate does not go the way of health care reform that gave us no single payer system but, instead, a gift to insurance companies.

The strong-arm tactics are indeed very much like the "grassroot town halls." Rick Scott himself funded much of that movement.

In a California district the parents are learning that they really don't have that much power. A judge is involved now, and that seems to be just the beginning. Doesn't sound like a situation very conducive to learning right now.

That fight wound up in court, and on July 18, San Bernardino Superior Court Judge Steve Malone handed the parents a victory when he upheld the validity of the parents' petition. Malone ordered that the school district and board "allow the petitioners to immediately begin the process of soliciting and selecting charter school proposals."

Soon afterward, the parents headed down that path. They invited charter school operators, as well as district officials, to submit letters of intent to manage the school, and four organizations did so. According to the parents, two were existing nonprofit charter operators: LaVerne Elementary Preparatory Academy and the High Desert Partnership in Academic Excellence Foundation. Two came from "non-charter school improvement consulting firms," identified by the parents as Iwa Rere Educational and Technical Engagement, and School Improvement Solutions. The parents invited three of those four applicants to submit full applications, but not School Improvement Solutions, because it is a for-profit company, a type of operator the parents did not want, Austin said.

But as the parents made plans for a charter school, Adelanto's board evidently had other ideas. At its meeting, the board decided not to approve a charter, but rather the creation of a "community advisory committee" that will oversee changes to Desert Trails and report to the superintendent, Mendoza said. He maintains that the board's plan is superior to that of the parents, in that it will allow the district to make changes to the school immediately, rather than waiting until the fall of 2013, the parent group's preferred date for opening a charter, he argued.

California 'Parent-Trigger' Effort Thrown Back Into Turmoil

Chicago teachers are speaking for so many in education right now, putting everything on the line. They just went on strike. The lack of support from political leaders must be truly bothering them right now, especially seeing Rahm Emanuel speaking at the convention this week.

If you want to show your support for them, you can go here.