This post is written by Parrish Rabon, founder of our new affiliate, Sumter Education Task Force (SETF) in Sumter, SC.  She can be reached at parrishgrabon@gmail.com. Corporate education reform and its responsible parties (Broad and Gates) were introduced to Sumter, South Carolina, in a fast and furious manner last year.   Sumter County’s two former school districts consolidated to form the Sumter School District and our new school board hired Mr. Randolph Bynum, a 2007 Broad Superintendent’s Academy graduate. He began … →

Louisiana’s Governor is the radical right-winger Bobby Jindal, and its State Superintendent John White,  trained under the Voldemort of education reform, Joel Klein.  It has a state board of education whose most recently elected member is the state director of TFA, who ran a campaign funded by billionaire Bloomberg. Today, Diane Ravitch wrote about the philosophy behind Jindal and White’s privatization effort, a massive and hurriedly-approved voucher program to throw government funds at private schools, seemingly at random, no matter … →

Parents Across America is proud to have a new affiliate in Chicago; 19th Ward Parents.  Their website is www.19thwardparents.com and their email is 19thwardparents@gmail.com . Becky Malone wrote the below post, about their fight to preserve and improve Chicago’s public education system – for all students,  and their campaign for an elected school board. 19th Ward Parents is a grassroots organization of Chicago public school parents.  We stand together with parents, teachers and community groups across Chicago in support of quality public education … →

Parents Across America is proud to have a new affiliate in Chicago; 19th Ward Parents.  Their website is www.19thwardparents.com and their email is 19thwardparents@gmail.com . Becky Malone wrote the below post, about their fight to preserve and improve Chicago’s public education system – for all students,  and their campaign for an elected school board. 19th Ward Parents is a grassroots organization of Chicago public school parents.  We stand together with parents, teachers and community groups across Chicago in support of quality public education … →

By Caroline Grannan Parents Across America founding member, San Francisco Blogger Alexander Russo raised some questions about happy-talk PR by a K-12 charter school in Lodi, Calif., which put out a press release announcing that its first cohort that started at the school in kindergarten is now graduating — with only eight of the original 60 kids still at the school. Russo questioned whether that attrition rate at Aspire Benjamin Holt College Preparatory Academy should be discussed. Well, I’m the … →

We received this message from Melissa Abdo this morning.  For more on this abominable violation of parent and student rights by Janet Barresi, the OK State Superintendent of Education, see Education officials post records of all students with appeals online and commentary by Diane Ravitch, Outrage in Oklahoma.  Unmentioned in the below is that all the students with appeals before the state board also had their appeals denied, while having their personal information posted online — a clear attempt to … →