"Hedge funds are always looking for ways to turn a small amount of capital into a large amount of capital. A wealthy hedge fund manager can spend more than $1 million financing a charter school start-up. But once it is up and running, it qualifies for state funding, just like a public school... It is extremely leveraged philanthropy" — Predatory Hedge Fund Manager Whitney Tilson in bold, rest of quote is Joe Nocera
Don't know if people caught the evil princess of privatization's latest fact free op-ed on the Daily News, but I had some choice words in response to her mendaciousness:
Classic Gates Foundation employee propaganda: "...trumps the research that seniority does not guarantee effectiveness." A single peer reviewed study that backs your wild and specious claim?
Ms. Aguilar, when brave people like Martin Terrones, Julie Van Winkle, Sean Leys, and Jose Lara held a hunger strike to protest the layoffs at schools including John Liechty Middle School, YOU GLEEFULLY RIFED (LAID OFF) THE VERY SAME TEACHERS YOU ARE NOW SAYING SHOULD HAVE BEEN RETAINED — ALL THE WHILE KNOWING THAT LAUSD HAD OVER A HALF A BILLION DOLLARS IN RESERVE!
A craven act so despicable, I lack the vocabulary to describe it adequately. No teachers should have received RIFs when the district had so much funds on hand — that's true "intransigence." Furthermore, had LAUSD continued to comply with the Rodriguez v. LAUSD settlement, we never would have arrived at this point! Since that settlement didn't serve the interests of the Broad/Gates/Walton Triumvirate, you and the Mayor's other board allies came up with quite an underhanded deception.
Here's a great quote from one of my readers: 'Yolie Flores Aguilar once said to me and others during the hunger strike that the threat of "recall" was not going to work on her, that not passing the budget would put the many progressive programs this school board has put into effect in jeopardy, like "all day kindergarten", and that her passion for public education cannot be questions. [sic]' In other words, as you say, a "disproportionate number of their teachers, nearly two-thirds, were laid off in a period of two years" because you voted out of political expedience rather than in the interest of anyone's "civil rights." By the way, whatever happened to all day kindergarten?
You can tell yourself that you're meeting "needs of children" all you want, but the checks you're cashing from the plutocrats whose agenda you serve demonstrate the only motivation you've ever had.
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1 comment:
Great post. The whole episode has been full of disgusting mendacity. I'm shocked this lawsuit was even allowed to go forward if the $ was there to keep on the teachers who were RIF'd. How wasn't that made known in court?? This case has huge and far-reaching consequences for public education and takes square aim at unions. What the hell was the ACLU even thinking? So many questions here.
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