Trailer for KILLING ED

Trailer for KILLING ED from Visual Truth Projects on Vimeo.

Profiteer Caprice Young, the secretive Gülen Cult, and California Charter Schools Association's worst nightmare is here.

Trailer for KILLING ED

Gülen cult’s corporate charter chain’s Magnolia Science Academy

http://charterschoolfacts.tumblr.com/post/139009172833/gülen-cults-corporate-charter-chains-magnolia

Gülen cult’s corporate charter chain’s Magnolia Science Academy

Schools Matter: Open letter to Dan Woods regarding the Gülen Network's Magnolia Charter Schools

First published on Schools Matter on February 2, 2016

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"The Walton family, founder of Wal-mart, the worldwide retail giant, has donated millions of dollars to schools considered to be associated with the Gülen community." — Charter School Scandals

From: *****@ucla.edu
Subject: Open letter to Dan Woods regarding the Gülen Network's Magnolia Charter Schools
Date: February 02, 2016 14:22:46 PST
To: d.woods@mpglaw.com

Mr. Woods:

Just read your heavy-handed letter [1] to Arthur M. Pakowitz, Esq.

As a courtesy I wanted to address some of your concerns, which are clearly based in your ignorance regarding both privately managed charter schools, and the shadowy Gülen cult that your client is associated with.

Regarding your insistence that the Magnolia corporate charter school chain's financial information is transparent. This simply isn't the case, and it wasn't until the public school district called for an audit that one was conducted. Said audits revealed millions of "missing, misused funds" [2]. These were public dollars, squandered under the private management of your client.

You then make the absurd assertion that "Magnolia's eleven charter schools are public schools…" In case you actually believe that misrepresentation, let me disabuse you.

Generally charter schools are not public schools. Both existing case law and public policy have long established this. The Washington State Supreme Court (2015) held that charter schools are not "common schools" because they're governed by appointed rather than elected boards. The 9th Circuit US Court of Appeals (2010) ruled that charter schools are not "public actors." The California Court of Appeals (2007) ruled that charter schools are not "public agents." The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) joined many other government agencies in unequivocally determining that charters are, in NLRB's words, "private entities."

By definition if a charter school is run by a for-profit company, or a (501c3) non-profit corporation (e.g. Magnolia Educational and Research Foundation), then it is not a public school. The United States Census Bureau frames this issue best: "A few "public charter schools" are run by public universities and municipalities. However, most charter schools are run by private nonprofit organizations and are therefore classified as private." [3]

Because these lucrative charter schools are not public, and are not subject to even a modicum of public oversight, they are able to get away with violating the constitutional rights of their students. The decision in Scott B. v. Board of Trustees of Orange County High School of the Arts saw Rosa K. Hirji, Esq. write: "The structures that allow charter schools to exist are marked by the absence of protections that are traditionally guaranteed by public education, protections that only become apparent and necessary when families and students begin to face a denial of what they were initially promised to be their right." [4]

Lastly, there is ample documentation tying the Magnolia corporate charter school chain to the Gülenist Movement, namely through their intertwinement with the Los Angeles based Pacifica Institute—a Gülen organization which denies the 1915-1918 Armenian genocide. [5] Moreover, Fethullah Gülen's ties to the Magnolia charter schools was reported to Turkish readers as early as 2010. [6]

Far be it for me to do your research for you, but as a courtesy I offer the following footnote [7] as starting point for your own additional discovery.

I understand that the model rules of professional conduct call upon you to vigorously represent your client's interests, but one would expect an attorney of your standing to at least base your arguments in a modicum of reality. I suppose in a way I owe you and your firm a debt of gratitude inasmuch as you provide examples of the type of attorney I don't want to be—seemingly ones that hold billable hours more important than the public interest.

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[1] https://twitter.com/GooseNetworkUSA/status/694588816066121728
[2] http://www.scpr.org/blogs/education/2014/07/21/17031/audit-finds-missing-misused-funds-at-la-charter-ne/
[3] US Census Bureau. (2011). Public Education Finances: 2009 (GO9-ASPEF). Washington, DC: US Government Printing O ce. Print. vi
[4] https://apps.americanbar.org/litigation/committees/childrights/content/articles/winter2014-0114-charter-schools-upholding-student-rights.html
[5] http://articles.latimes.com/2011/sep/30/local/la-me-0930-ottoman-band-20110930
[6] http://gundem.milliyet.com.tr/walmart-tan-gulen-okullarina-bagis/guncel/gundemdetay/27.08.2010/1281603/default.htm
[7] Compendium of Magnolia/Pacifica/Gülen resources:

• Gulen charter schools 101 + webinar video http://charterschoolscandals.blogspot.com/p/gulen-school-characteristics.html
• Gulen charter school lists http://charterschoolscandals.blogspot.com/p/list-of-us-gulen-schools.html
• The Gulen Movement & its schools in the news http://charterschoolscandals.blogspot.com/p/the-gulen-movement-and-its-schools-in.html
• Gulen Charter School Enrollment in 2013-2014 http://charterschoolscandals.blogspot.com/p/blog-page.html
• Mónica García champions the Gülenist Charter Movement in LAUSD http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2012/08/monica-garcia-champions-gulenist.html
• Financially malfeasant charters run by shadowy religious cult escape LAUSD scrutiny http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2015/03/financially-malfeasant-charters-run-by.html
• Turns out Caprice Young has been working for Gülen's charter network all along http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2015/02/turns-out-caprice-young-has-been.html
• What are Ref Rodriguez's ties to the Gülen cult, and why is the Armenian community supporting Bennett Kayser? http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2015/04/what-are-ref-rodriguezs-ties-to-gulen.html

Advocating Public Education and Social Justice

Robert D. Skeels
Juris Doctor Candidate
UCLA '14, PCL '18
*****@alumni.ucla.edu

"Problem posing education does not and cannot serve the interests of the oppressor" — Paulo Freire

Schools Matter: Open letter to Dan Woods regarding the Gülen Network's Magnolia Charter Schools

Protest against Eli Broad's charter putsch by Voices Against Privatizing Public Education

The activists comprising Voices Against Privatizing Public Education, whose efforts were recently highlighted on Professor Diane Ravitch's blog, are holding a rally/protest in front of the Broad Foundation's headquarters. This is in response to Broad and his fellow reactionaries' announcement of plans to privatize more than half the Los Angeles Unified School District within the next few years. Given the money these plutocrats have dumped into their profitable privatization projects, the Broad/Walton threat to eliminate public education is a clear and present danger. Join the rally/protest, sign the petition, and get involved with turning back the tide of school privatization by helping overturn avaricious billionaire Reed Hasting's 1992 California Charter School Act. For more on Eli Broad and school privatization, see the section entitled "The Neoliberal Emperor of Los Angeles" in this essay. — rds

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ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

Join us in showing your support for public education. Public schools are OUR schools, not Eli Broad's

SAVE OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS RALLY

Sponsored by Voices Against Privatizing Public Education

PROTEST LOCATION: Broad Foundation Headquarters (in front of building only) Avenue of The Stars Los Angeles, CA

MONDAY, AUGUST 17, 2015 AT NOON

The LA Times announced that the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation, along with the Walton Family Foundation and the Keck Foundation met to discuss plans to have half of Los Angeles students attending charter schools over the next eight years. http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-lausd-charters-20150808-story.html

We say no more billionaire and corporate takeover of our public schools!

Charter schools cherry pick students, falsify records, commit enrollment fraud, close down public schools in predominantly low income areas, destroy jobs, bust up unions, appoint private school boards unaccountable to the taxpayers, and segregate student populations based on income and race.

Separate but equal has no place!!

A recent report entitled “Fraud, Waste and Lies: Charter Schools Cheating Communities out of Millions of Dollars” cited hundreds of millions of public education dollars being wasted due to fraud and other abuses in the charter school sector. Read here: http://www.commondreams.org/news/2015/04/29/fraud-waste-and-lies-charter-schools-cheating-communities-out-millions-dollars

The charter school industry is a cancer on our public education system. The only solution is to repeal the charter school laws in California once and for all.

Come to the rally - defend our public schools against the attack by greedy profiteers.

Please show your support for placing a statewide ballot initiative to repeal charter school laws in California by signing petition here: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/repeal-charter-school-act-of-1992-in-ca-ballot

Please read more at: https://notocharterschools.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/defend-public-ed-statement.pdf For more information about this rally call us at: (415) 282-1908

Make your voices heard and be part of the solution to save our public schools!

Protest against Eli Broad's charter putsch by Voices Against Privatizing Public Education by Robert D. Skeels

Protest against Eli Broad's charter putsch by Voices Against Privatizing Public Education

Schools Matter: 2015 Week 21 Education Odds and Ends

First published on Schools Matter on May 22, 2015

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“We believe that this recognition has come about because of the “blatant” move by corporations to take over public education and the creation of these charter schools who are limiting the rights of teachers and the type of education that our children are receiving.” — Juan Orozco

Professor Antonia Darder this weekend in Los Angeles

Dr. John Fernandez writes:

Roosevelt High School and the Boyle Heights community have a long and proud history of fighting for social justice, from the election of Ed Roybal to the Los Angeles City Council in 1949, to the fight against Prop.187, and to the current struggle against the scheduled layoffs of 23 RHS teachers and the struggle to dump PLAS. This video was taken when the Great Recession began and when PLAS came in. In June of 2008, when this video was produced, there were about 240 RHS teachers, now there are only 110 and dozens of classes have been cut. This Saturday, May 23, 2015 at 8:30 a.m., RHS will be having a youth conference. Dr. Antonia Darder will be presenting. Antonia is a world renowned writer on critical education theory, Latino education, and Paulo Freire. I am sure that Antonia will connect theory and practice to the situation at RHS. Please attend this important event. La Lucha Sigue

Charter billionaires buy L.A. school board election

Professor Mike Klonsky's post Charter billionaires buy L.A. school board election is worth the read. I left the following comments:

Thank you for this Professor Klonsky. Poverty pimp Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez has spent his entire career viewing and utilizing school children as ATM cards. Now that the billionaires have installed him at #LAUSD, he has the combination to the entire bank vault.

Karen Wolfe on LAUSD election fallout

Public school parent and member of the Venice Neighborhood Council Education Committee Karen Wolfe wrote an excellent piece looking at the May 19, 2015 Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) Board elections entitled LA Election Lessons: Anatomy of a Shakeup … in the LAUSD Board Races. I made the following comments:

Thank you for this excellent analysis Ms. Wolfe. Charter profiteer and poverty pimp Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez has spent his entire career viewing and utilizing school children as ATM cards. California Charter Schools Association (CCSA) boasted that they "generated 30% profit margins in subsequent years–with 20-30% lead generation and 20-50% close ratios" when Rodriguez was a CCSA board member. Meanwhile he ran Lakeview Charter in the red for the better part of decade, and oversaw Jacqueline Duvivier Castillo's self-dealing with the now breaking Better 4 You Meals scandal. Now that these right-wing billionaires have installed him at #LAUSD, he has the combination to the entire bank vault. We can only hope that the LAUSD OIG and LA District Attorney's office will indict Rodriguez, but a cover-up is more than likely since José Cole Gutiérrez was one of Rodriguez's employees when Rodriguez sat on the CCSA board.

Professor Julian Vasquez Heilig testifies on Parent Trigger

Professor Julian Vasquez Heilig traveled to Texas to speak truth to Walton Family Foundation funded Parent Revolution's attempts to place a loaded "Parent Trigger" gun in corporate charter hands. Best quote from his testimony: "SB14 is parent empowerment without the empowerment. Parental involvement without the involvement."

Keeping up with Ref Rodriguez's possible crimes

Charter industry mogul Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez is under investigation by a number of authorities including the LAUSD Office of Inspector General and the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office. Keeping up with all of the financial scandals and possible felonies by this Rodriguez charter is difficult, the following articles should help.

• LAUSD CHARTER GROUP GAVE FOOD CONTRACT TO AN EMPLOYEE’S FIRM: School Board candidate Ref Rodriguez’ PUC Schools partnered with Better 4 You Meals, a company partially owned by one of its employees
• L.A. UNIFIED WILL INVESTIGATE FOOD-SERVICE CONTRACTS AT PUC CHARTERS

Whitney Tilson does rape culture!

Right-wing hedge fund manager and school privatization pusher Whitney Tilson was quick to jump on the blame-the-victim bandwagon. An email to his cult of fellow neoliberals said "I question her story" of Emma Sulkowicz.

Scott M. Folsom on student mental healthcare

Suing a school district for failing to provide mental healthcare may seem, at first blush, to be a stretch. What part of the 3Rs is mental healthcare? But this is a stretch that is needed – like those stretches people who exercise do before they exercise.

Education is about stretching our little grey cells. It’s about being safe and well and healthy. Maslows’s Hierarchy of Needs: Food, Comfort, Safety.

• You can’t learn if you are hungry.
• You don’t learn if you don’t have a place to live.
• You won’t learn if you don’t feel safe.

Then and only then can we get down to the Rs.

In Compton and in most of the brink o’ th’ apocalypse they inhabit the school nurse is most students’ primary-and maybe-only healthcare professional and medical provider. The school nurses’ office has become the Health Office has become the School Wellness Center – even as the School Nurse has become a vanishing species, repurposed to paperwork shuffling and IEP Compliance Officer – often traveling from school-to-school on a one-day-a-week rotation.

This has all worked out because school health crises: The flu outbreak, the second grader who falls out of a tree, the incident of diabetic or anaphylactic shock – these only occur on the days the nurse is at the school and is otherwise available. I have spent some of the last month reading essays by middle-schoolers about the impact of violence and trauma on their lives. Most need additional instruction on narrative storytelling  (and grammar+punctuation) …but the far more pressing need is for mental health professionals to begin to have the conversation with them about their lives.

LAUSD in planning to eliminate some psychiatric social workers in next year’s budget. The bad-news masquerading otherwise is that the District is not going to eliminate as many as first proposed. Nobody in their right mind is proposing to rehire mental health workers previously laid off.  But I am.

Post Traumatic Shock Disorder is not just for returning warriors anymore. This is not John Boy’s America. This is not the Bobsey Twins’ America. Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm graduated decades ago and doesn’t come back for the alumni meetings ‘cause she’s scared of the neighborhood. Today’s narrative was written back in 1969: “Oh, a storm is threat'ning / My very life today / If I don't get some shelter / Oh yeah, I'm gonna fade away.”

By ‘75 Bob was feeling better about it than Mick+Keith in ‘69:

“Come in,” she said, “I’ll give you shelter from the storm”

It’s an apt metaphor to duck in under.

Alliance Charter's Judy Burton still union busting

Right-wing extremists Antony Ressler, Richard "Dick" Riordan, and Judy Ivie Burton are still turning children into profit centers, and union busting at the Alliance Corporate Charter Chain. The ongoing struggle for their beleaguered educators to organize themselves continues. Community activists are taking the struggle to the streets, and posted this and other photos on facebook with the following caption:

Attending the Lincoln Heights Neighborhood council asking them to adopt our resolution calling on Alliance to let teachers form their union without harassment ([i]t passed unanimously!)

I left the following thoughts on the photo:

I document Judy Burton's mind-boggling salary in this piece about her fellow charter school profiteer Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez. https://www.laprogressive.com/charter-school-profits/ That obscene $330,400.00 doesn't include the additional six-figure income she gets from CalSTRS+CalPERS. She will go to any length to prevent educators from exercising their lawful right to organize. Any movement to put students and educators ahead of executive salaries and board member sweetheart deals at Alliance Charter Corporation will be resisted with extreme prejudice, as you are already experiencing.

Refugio just dumped gallons of toxins on Santa Barbara for profit. Another Refugio (Rodriguez) is about to do the same to #LAUSD

— Robert D. Skeels (@rdsathene) May 22, 2015

Schools Matter: 2015 Week 21 Education Odds and Ends

Schools Matter: Financially malfeasant charters run by shadowy religious cult escape LAUSD scrutiny

First published on Schools Matter on March 17, 2015

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"The Walton family, founder of Wal-mart, the worldwide retail giant, has donated millions of dollars to schools considered to be associated with the Gülen community." — Charter School Scandals

The largest chain of privately managed charter schools in the United States is that of those affiliated with the cultish Gülenist Movement. Proving that no scandal is too large for the combined financial and political power of the revenue hungry charter school industry, the Los Angeles based Magnolia branches of the Gülen Network have essentially committed the crime, but will not do the time. The Los Angeles Times outlines the scale of Magnolia's crimes:

"An audit performed last year for the district’s Office of the Inspector General found that Magnolia was $1.66 million in the red, owed $2.8 million to the schools it oversees and met the federal definition of insolvency. The Palms academy also was insolvent, the audit found."

One cringes thinking of all the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) public school libraries that could have been reopened with those millions "missing" from the privately managed Magnolia Gülen Charters.

Last time millions of dollars went "missing" from a huge Los Angeles charter chain was during the massive Inner City Education Fund (ICEF) scandal. Their former "CEO" Mike Piscal is still at large somewhere in the country. Steve Poizner's partner in the crime of establishing the California Charter Schools Association (CCSA), Caprice Young, was brought in as the spin-spokesperson for that staggering squandering of taxpayer money. Once more Young is brought in to provide cover for mind-boggling charter school impropriety, this time at Magnolia. Turns out Caprice Young has been working for Gülen's charter network all along documents the connections between Young and her new employer.

The intrepid Scott M. Folsom gathered all the news on this issue, and added his salient thoughts on the matter. I do differ with Folsom on one point—this has everything to with "Fethullah Gülen involvement", and anyone aware of the cult's well documented undue influence over LAUSD board members like Monica Garcia, knows how much power these malfeasants have.

The allegations against Magnolia are of Misuse of Public Funds. Plain and simple.

No amount of “great schoolage” and kids on waiting lists forgive this. Ultimately this is a matter of law enforcement - and the LAUSD Board – as public trustees and empowered with enforcing the charter law and protecting the public purse – have blinked/waffled/whatever.

I hate to be “zero intolerant” – but there are no waivers or mulligans for malfeasance.

The Man Behind the Curtain has nothing to do with the case: This has nothing to do with with the Fethullah Gülen involvement with Magnolia; to bring that up is a bit of misdirection.

Parental Choice does not give the right to parents to choose to send their kids to a bad school -- whether the school is bad because it does a crummy job of teaching students or managing the public’s funds. I consider Caprice Young a friend – but she has been brought in to save the day and impose order amidst fiscal chaos while framing and spinning and charming the story of the chaos as something less than egregious.

The biblical metaphor of pouring oil upon the waters comes to mind – but ask the folks on the Gulf Coast – or in Alaska: Oily waters are not necessarily a desirable outcome!

The Board in its role as charter authorizer and overseer moved to suspend the three charters. It may have dodged a public vote earlier – but it had authorized the superintendent to act in its behalf. That’s what superintendents and Boards of Ed do.

Then the Board of Ed went into closed session and changed their mind and/or had their minds changed.

The process of granting, suspending and reviewing charters is supposed to occur in Mr. Justice Brandeis’ “Disinfecting Sunshine”. Instead it happened behind closed doors in the guise of settling a lawsuit.

Schools Matter: Financially malfeasant charters run by shadowy religious cult escape LAUSD scrutiny

Education Opportunity Network: “Parent Triggers: Another Reform Misfires"

Education Opportunity Network: “Parent Triggers: Another Reform Misfires,” youtu.be/HtTGMqHYaJk #LAUSD #parenttrigger

— Robert D. Skeels (@rdsathene) March 16, 2013

Education Opportunity Network: “Parent Triggers: Another Reform Misfires"

Parent Trigger - False Promises, Divided Communities and Disrupted Young Lives

Thank you for this thoughtful and informative video exposing The Heartland Institute, Parent Revolution, and ALEC's corporate charter trigger law. We're hopeful that videos like this will counter the lies the trigger proponents promulgate, and that communities will resist when these outsiders come to steal our schools. — rdsathene

The video tells the story of Adelanto, California where a well-funded, outside group "Parent Revolution" came to town and instead of working to improve the schools tricked parents with false promises, bitterly divided the community, and disrupted the education of young children.

"The video makes clear that that parent trigger laws, pending in 14 states, are not a magic wand that improves education -- there is no magic wand," said Roger Hickey of the Education Opportunity Network. "Schools need better resources, engaged parents, good teachers and a supportive community. What schools do not need is divisive campaigns that mislead parents and disappoints parents," he said.

The Education Opportunity Network is part of a new movement that is building in America aimed at assuring that all children and youth have the opportunity to learn. The Education Opportunity Network is a project of the Institute for America's Future, in partnership with the Opportunity to Learn Campaign.

"We need to work together for student success. Let's give our teachers and students the tools and resources they need to succeed," said Jeff Bryant -- education writer and editor of the Education Opportunity Network. "We also need to invest in the priorities that build the foundation for student learning: small classes, early childhood education, up-to-date textbooks and computers, and classes like history, art, PE and music," he said.

Parent Trigger laws are about pitting parents against each other instead of everyone in the community working together on real solutions for educating all children," said Bryant.

Parent Trigger - False Promises, Divided Communities and Disrupted Young Lives

ALEC/DFER's Gloria Romero Stands Her Ground on Won't Back Down

ALEC/DFER's Gloria Romero Stands Her Ground on Won't Back Down

"The idea of “choice” has been manipulated by the corporate reformers and spread by groups like ALEC, who seek to use methods such as the Parent Trigger to turn public schools over to privately-managed charters. This is not real choice; nor is it parent empowerment." — Parents Across America.

My commentary in response to: Gloria Romero: 'Parent Trigger' fight hits the big screen. First published on Schools Matter on 2012-10-04.

Photo by Mark Warner (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The corporate charter trigger film is a shameful farce, and it isn't just film critics that have realized that the Murdoch/Anschutz financed propaganda piece is a joke. Daniel Barnz's Won't Back Down holds the dubious distinction of having the WORST opening weekend for a wide release (2,500-plus screens) in the last 30 years. Audiences aren't interested paying to see such strident and insulting nonsense.

Ms. Romero, who discusses "special interests," should be taken very seriously on that issue. She is an expert in special interests after all. As a politician she enjoyed a constant flood of campaign funds from the lucrative charter school sector to craft pernicious legislation like SB 592, which hands public school property over to private corporations.

Romero and Austin's corporate charter trigger law, which she forgets to mention had plenty of input from Bill Lucia of Reed Hastings' EdVoice (one of Romero's favorite corporate contributors by the way), and Friedman acolyte Arnold Schwartzenegger. These fringe-right forces made sure the trigger law would be amenable to The Heartland Institute and The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). The former is the trigger law's biggest promoter, the latter turned the commons robbing idea in ALEC template legislation.

When her billionaire special interest backers couldn't buy her the State Superintendent job, they gave her the next best thing: a quarter million dollar a year gig with the hedge fund supported DFER. In other words, Romero went from taking money from special interests while she was in Sacramento, to being one of the deep pocketed special interests influencing her former colleagues to push through more revenue streams through school privatization.

ALEC/DFER's Gloria Romero Stands Her Ground on Won't Back Down