California to Modify Parent Trigger Law (Maybe)

Trigger Happy Ed Pirate (by Alberto+Cerriteno)

In its first meeting with the new Gov. Brown-appointed majority, the California Board of Education moved to restrict the Parent Trigger law that allows parents to shut down a low-performing schools, fire its teachers and reopen as a private charter school. Board of Ed officials said that the law, as written, was too vague and would be difficult to enforce, thus requiring “cleanup” legislation.

While Parent Trigger cheerleaders are saying that the move is an attempt to derail the law, the Board of Education is merely attempting to fine-tune the law, not do away with it. They did not even take any concrete actions on the law, but simply set up a working group to study it. They say they want to continue supporting parental choice, which sounds like a capitulation to proponents of the parent trigger law, as well as vouchers, charter schools and other anti-education schemes.

The Parent Trigger law was first implemented at McKinley school in Compton. In this case, there were numerous complaints of coercive techniques and intimidation to get parental support for the takeover. Some parents were threatened with deportation if they didn’t vote for the closure. Others were harassed at home or work. The group behind the takeover, Parent Revolution, is a front group for Green Dot charter schools, a private Educational Management Organization (EMO) that stands to profit from the Parent Trigger law.

Much in the same way that the anti-health reform hysteria has been bankrolled by Tea Party funders, like the Koch brothers, the Parent-Trigger movement has been funded by corporate Ed Deformers. Parent Revolution was bankrolled by Eli Broad, a billionaire who has no kids in k-12 public schools anywhere, and by Green Dot, a private, for-profit charter organization. Parent Revolution is headed by Steve Barr, former CEO of Green Dot and had eight paid staffers working on the campaign to take over McKinley, hardly a grass-roots, parent led movement.

There are many problems with the current law. As written, the law does not require that accurate independent information be provided to parents, nor does it require any independent analysis of the propaganda that is provided (which in the McKinley case came primarily from a group seeking to benefit financially from the decision). The law also does not require transparency, which allows groups like Parent Revolution to pretend to be a truly parent-led organization, thus disguising their profit-motive. Another problem with the parent trigger is that it cannot solve the make a low-performing school become a high-achieving school. As long as the clientele remain the same, generally low income students, simply swapping teachers or bringing in some corporate raiders is not going to miraculously close the achievement gap for them, anymore than it will put food in their mouths, a roof over their heads, income for their parents, healthcare, summer enrichment activities, etc.

Is it really parental empowerment to give parents the power (with only a 51% majority) to fire teachers or relinquish control and decision-making (and possibly profit-making) to an unaccountable private company?

Nearly One-Third of Working Americans are Poor

According to a new report by the Working Poor Families Project, nearly one-third of working families are now considered low-income (earning less than 200% of the official poverty level). This means that even many who have jobs are struggling and barely able to make ends meet. The report also found that there were over 10 million low income workers in the U.S. last year, with 45 million Americans (22 million children) living in low income homes (an increase of 1.7 million from 2008). Meanwhile, the richest 20% of families took home 47% of all income.

It is clear that the recession has impoverished many through job loss. The ranks of the working poor, however, have remained largely invisible while growing larger. Corporations have used the recession as a justification to cut pay, benefits and hours of employment, implement furloughs, and hire short-term temps. More than half (55%) of adult workers have suffered unemployment, a pay cut, a reduction in hours, or have been forced to work part-time, since the recession began in 2007. As a result of corporate cut backs, productivity has risen, and corporations have earned record profits, giving the illusion that the economy is healing, while workers’ income is actually declining.

Concurrent with this immiseration of working families has been an orgy of money grubbing by the wealthiest Americans. In addition to the billions of dollars in year-end bonuses to bankers and stock brokers, there were billions more in tax breaks. The estate tax was set to rise from 0 to 55% for estates worth over $1 million, before a small cabal of 14 billionaires (including Gallo, Koch, Walton, Mars) convinced congress to raise the ceiling to $5 million, and only charge 35% for anything above that.

Tax cuts, bail outs and endless war, have all contributed to an increasing federal budget deficit, which will soon be reduced by cuts to social programs that benefit the poor and working class. These cuts will no doubt come from medicare, education, and social security.