This is the story of Gretchen Herrera, and her battle with her son’s charter school,  to allow him to opt out standardized testing. Her son Anthony attended the South Carolina Virtual Charter School, a branch of K12 Inc., one of the nation’s largest chains of for-profit charter schools. Here is a petition you can sign against imposing high stakes tests in South Carolina. Here is Gretchen’s personal petition you can also sign. She writes: “I want his story known because … →

Today’s column by John Young is the perfect antidote to the wrong-headed notions propounded by nearly all the panelists over the last two days at NBC’s Education Nation. John was the opinion page editor of the Waco, Texas paper for many years, in George Bush’s backyard,  till he recently moved back to his home state of Colorado.  John showed Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9?11 on the side of a barn in Waco when the local theaters refused to show it; for … →

Oregon Save our Schools is the newest affiliate of Parents Across America; for more information, please contact Susan Barrett at barrettpdx@gmail.com TESTIMONY TO OREGON’S SENATE EDUCATION AND WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE & HOUSE HIGHER EDUCATION COMMITTEE On behalf of OREGON SAVE OUR SCHOOLS, an affiliate of Parents Across America Dear Committee Members: Members of our grassroots coalition have carefully followed the work of the Oregon Education Investment Team (OEIT). The team’s work has now concluded, and their recommendations will soon be … →

PAA co-founder Pamela Grundy has a son in fifth grade in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. So we finally won the Broad Prize. After two stints as a finalist, Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools took home this year’s prize, which the Charlotte Observer termed “the nation’s top award for urban education.” CMS leaders celebrated. Our mayor called the prize “a huge shot in the arm.” I have mixed feelings. I don’t care for Eli Broad or the movement he is part of. His support for privatizing … →

An open message from a Kansas City teacher to the parents and  teachers of Michigan about John Covington’s reign of terror when he was superintendent of  her district’s schools. Covington drastically increased the class sizes of certain KC teachers following a model suggested by Bill Gates; this experiment ended, thankfully, when he left the district. Covington was recently appointed the head of Michigan’s new Education Achievement Authority to run that state’s struggling schools, with the power to cancel union contracts … →