So happy to have everyone here. Of course we are here to listen to Diane Ravitch. I have a couple housekeeping items, can a retired social studies teacher from San Francisco talk here at one time, is passing out cards on which you can write questions. So our format will be diane and i are going to talk for a little while. And then we will open the floor to questions from the audience. And the questions will come from the cards and that way we will know if a lot of people are asking the same question we have the cards and will know to ask that question. So i would like to give a little introduction i know a lot of people have been following Diane Ravitch for long time. Diane ravitch as a champion for schools around the country drawing on over 40 years of research and experience ravitch is one of the nations leading advocates for Public Education. Her years of experience, working in the government shaped her approach to education and gave her a unique and powerful perspective which she brings into all aspects of her work. A prolific writer and Renowned Research professor of education at New York University ravitch has published more than 500 articles and reviewed for scholarly and popular publications. Her blog is one of the primary destinations or make it educators and more than tens of millions of views since 2012. That would be more. 34million is a lot of millions. Ravitch produces solutions she doesnt just admire the problems. In her books ravitch provides a clear plan for how to preserve and improve our Public Schools. Her New York Times bestseller, reign of error, the hopes of the Privatization Movement and the danger to American Public schools, begins her previous book the death and life of the American School system left off. Ravitch continues to show the crisis in American Education is not the result of a crisis of academic achievement. But a result of the destruction of Public Schools. In a chapter by chapter breakdown, ravitch teaches what is working in u. S. Education and how policymakers are failing to address the root causes of educational failure. Finally, ravitch shows readers how it can in fact be fixed. Ravitch shares the hard message that we as educators enter students families and our communities need to support Public Schools or else basically society ultimately will fail all children. She is a Public School graduate herself, and developed a powerful argument against the privatization of Public Schools so we, as united educators of San Francisco, are excited and honored to have her in San Francisco tonight to discuss our collective next step to protect and promote quality Public Education for all. Slow start with the first question, so, dan, why did you write this book and why now . Guest i thought i had finished my job and i was working on my memoirs, which i was about a third of the way through, and then it became february of 2018. And of every 202nd, every teacher in West Virginia walked out of their schools. And every school in West Virginia was closed down because the teachers went on strike. Its illegal to go on strike in West Virginia. There are 50 districts there are 50 districts in every superintendent close the schools so the teachers were actually not on strike because the schools were closed. They had made arrangements for the children and Community Organizations and churches and different kinds of agencies to make sure the children were cared for, and they marched on the state capital. Their action, their strike was incredibly energizing, not just to me but to teachers all across america. And so as i watch the movement moved to oklahoma to colorado, to arizona, i ended up just last january at marshall with utla in the rain. I felt this tremendous energy. It was very exciting and i realized i had another book i had to write. And that book was the red for ed movement has changed the national narrative. The national narrative, the one weve heard since a nation at risk in 1983 was our schools are failing, theres a rising mediocrity, and we have to do something about the failure of our schools and bad teachers. And so weve heard this refrain again and again and it has led to really destructive government policy. Our secretary of education said we have failing government schools. In fact we have failing government policy. And the failing Government Policies have hurt our schools, hurt our children, hurt our communities and hurt families. This is been going on for a long time. So what happens in the spring of 2018 and continued to the full and into the next year . I think it is not over. It is the teachers showed that they have power, and teachers demanded respect. And teachers were, turns out to be immensely popular. People like teachers. I felt this. [applause] [cheering] when i joined the strike, picket line last january, in los angeles, there were a number ever was carrying signs and i cant member what mine said but everybody had signs and some of them said honk if you love teachers. Honk if you support the strike. Everybody is honking. There are these big 18 wheelers going by with big horns and little sedans going both little horns. Every way shape and form of transportation, people were honking to say im with you. And you could feel the energy was very exciting. I think teachers everywhere understood that. And what happened was all of the negative publicity of the previous 20 years started shifting we began to see the Mainstream Media change its tune. I was thinking back to the covers of lets a Time Magazine, back in 2008 when they had a photograph of michele rhee in washington d. C. Looking very mean and saying michele rhee knows how to fix American Schools and the implication wishes going to sweep out all the bad teachers. Shes gone. She is gone. [laughter] [applause] she retired to sacramento. Then they had another cover on Time Magazine for this at a Silicon Valley investor has figured out how to fix American Schools. Evan seems to be having this idea they know how to fix American Schools. This Silicon Valley investors. If you could take away teachers due process rights, dont take away teachers due process rights. If you could take away their tenure, their seniority, the right to a fair hearing, then no one would get low scores and everybody would have high grades and so forth. So that was another case. The illustration on the cover of time was for apples. One of which was rotten. The cover said something about broughton apples in the classroom. This is all very discouraging, as saying kids get low scores because teachers have due process rights. This is insane because there are teachers with tenure in high school highscoring districts in lowscoring districts. There is a cover where they showed a black border or a white board covered with the phrase he must fire bad teachers, we must fire bad teachers over and over again. This is been a long period of blaming teachers for whatever the problems of the schools were. And all of this change, with the red for ed movement. I will take Time Magazine as an example. They had in one issue three different covers and is three different teachers one teacher said my salary is slow i have to sell my blood plasma to make ends meet, i am a teacher in america. Another said i live in a onebedroom apartment and sherbet of my child, i cant afford anything more, im a teacher in america i carried the third covered was but teachers are not paid enough theres many stories of teachers working two and three jobs, sometimes more. Im shaking the tin stand for American Schools. We began seeing studies saying at least the states have cut their budgets on 2008 because of the recession had never restored the budget, even to the level of 2008 or had not raised it in a decade. The whole story change, people stop saying its bad teachers and sing underinvestment. To me that was huge. At the same time, we began seeing over these past two years a pushback against Charter Schools, against vouchers, and i think betsy devos had something to do with that. She has presented her case so starkly she forgets that about 90 of kids in Public Schools. And even in red districts, people like their teachers and they like the Public Schools. They did not like the idea of putting down the schools that the children go to. So i think we have seen a seachange, and i wanted to celebrate the reasons for this. Not just the teachers straight, but the examples of people, ordinary citizens who stood up and said no you will not close my school. And so i have lots of stories and their about parents with no funding standing up to billionaire funded organizations who are pushing either Charter Schools or vouchers. Host it sounds like youre moving into telling us what you hope to accomplish. Youve laid the groundwork weve seen a change in the last couple of years what you hope to accomplish by writing this book . Guest id two goals one was i wondering hope and encouragement to teachers who are in the trenches. I have always been impressed by the incredible dedication, the hard work, the education, the caring about children that i have seen in the teachers i have met. And i have met teachers all across the country in my travels. I am always impressed by how smart they are and how hardworking they are. I wanted to say to them the tide is turning and you are turning it. You have the power to turn it even more. And when you stand up and fight, you win. Thats an Important Message to put across. The other message i wanted to put a cross which is slightly more subtle, is that i wanted to say to the people who are funding all of the attacks on Public Education, that they have lost. And they have not stopped. [applause] so when i called the book slaying goliath, i didnt mean to say goliath is dead. I meant to say goliath is braindead. [laughter] its up important distinction. I have a whole chapter devoted to the billionaires and the corporations and the very right wing organizations want to privatize education. They are not giving up they are still there. They dont have anything they are putting forward that works and improves education and in particular improves the lives of children and family. So lets move into that so first of all the full title of the book is slaying goliath the passionate resistant to privatization and the fight to save americas Public Schools. The first cast of characters you describe are the disruptors tell us who they are and what do they want . Guest i dont read go to the Reform Movement for this reason. Reform is a very honorable word and at least the last ten years ive been writing about the subject it has bothered me that people who want to destroy Public Education and to undermine the teaching profession called themselves reformers. Because if thats an honorable word and i think to myself they mustve had a meeting with the high powered branding organization and they figured i would love to find the book where they have all of the words that they agreed to use that made them sound progressive. When they are not progressive at all. To me, when i think of reform and im a historian of education, i think of people who wanted more funding for Public Schools, who wanted more public support, who wanted to make sure class sizes are small enough and reasonable enough for teachers to do the job, who wanted better prepared teachers, they wanted better and more. They wanted integrated schools, they fought against the penny pinchers who wanted to undermine the schools. Those were real reformers. And throughout the course of the book i wrote about Reform Movements and they were always meant to make the Public Schools better. So this current crop of socalled reformers, now led by betsy devos, dealt with to make schools better they want to replace him with privately managed schools which are charters. I knowing california theyre called public charters i do not believe that charters are Public Schools they are privately met schools. There also these reformers went vouchers. That is something that divides the line between church and state. As a graduate of i strongly believe it Public Education does is it brings committees together. Its an opportunity for parents had their First Experience of any Political Action and Community Action and they learn about working with other parents and children learn with children who are different from themselves. They are not with just people who are exactly same race, religion, or economic background. So i call these people disruptors, because that is in fact what they do. They disrupt the communities, they disrupt School Districts, and they seek to they will say i want to disrupt the schools. I would to reinvent the schools. Im always amused when i see story to business magazine about a Hedge Fund Manager who is to reinvent the schools or billionaire wants to reinvent the schools. All these people have never taught have never been in the Public Schools i know a little bit about how to reinvent a school and they have no reasonable basis to put these plans forward other than for disruption purposes. In the Business World disruption is considered a very good thing. I remember some years back i was about to be interviewed on a tv program, actually was a charlie rose show and the person right before me was the ceo of a big tech company. I heard him say to charlie rose we reinvent ourselves every two years. And i thought thats fine, but you dont do that to children and families. When the child goes to school, they want to know the person who is her teacher yesterday is still there today. And the person who was their teacher last year is still in the classroom they were in last year end they can go in and say hello. There certain value to stability. [applause] we have a lot of family problems yet no one says we should take the children away and rotate families. But that would be reinventing families i suppose. We just dont do that. Children need to know they are stable adults in their lives to care for them. And who are there for them day after day. Host a few years ago here in San Francisco, our unions what we did is our campaign for contract was for stable, safe and supportive schools. To your point thats exactly what we want to provide. Guest when you ask the other half your question who are the disruptors . First about the book i wrote in 2010 the death and life of the American School system, i described the billionaire boys club. At that time there were three foundations that were part of the boys club. The Walton Foundation, which owns walmarts bill and Melinda Gates foundation and the eli Rhodes Foundation is made a lot of trouble in los angeles and throughout the country for that matter. So those were the big three. What i discovered in writing this book was i began researching and discovering there were dozens more members of the billionaire boys club. Making it a boys and girls club. The waltons are still number one, they are worth 150 billion. The three of them collectively. There is also charles and david coke and david coke recently died so theres charles cook. There are many other billionaires besides them. Some of them are democrat most are republicans. And they have behind them a particular is not even a think tank its called the bill mill called alec and i think everyone should be what it is. Being informed is a crucial part of being part of the resistance. The alecs the American Education exchange council. It was formed in 1973, basically to push a very far right wing agenda. Enter put government in the bathtub and drown it. They are against gun control, they are against environmental controls, they are against Public Schools, they are against unions, they are against any standards for teachers. They are against certification you can list all the since they are against and what therefore is deregulation and complete freedom for profit making. And the only Government Program that i know of they support his government aid for religious schools. The one thats interesting exception to be made. Guest and there are many corporations who support that so ive listed those corporation some of the biggest ones in america because they stand to benefit by having lower taxes. The whole point of this of the right wing agenda is lower taxes, therefore fewer Public Services. Of course who does his heart of the most . And harms those who have the least because this rely on government services. Host that is indirect plug for school and communitys first. Here in california if youve not signed the petition to get on the ballot, there are several people here who have this petitions. If your california voter, there are the petitions. It is exactly the kind of fight we are in right now to make sure the corporations began to pay their first share of taxes. Enough about disruptors for now, what about talking about us. Whats your favorite story of the resistance. It just so happens the tshirt is about organizing and resisting. So its very we are very happy that word is in your book. We are the resistance. So tell us more. Guest there so many wonderful stories, its hard to choose one. I do love a group called the bats, are there any bats here . The bats are called the bad teachers association. And they are people they are 50000 teachers probably more by now who have organized across the country to push back against being blamed for societys problems. Being unfairly blamed and they fight for children, and they fight for the otani of teachers, and for more funding for schools. They are a Favorite Group of mine. One of the stories i love best, to show you how the resistance can work, comes from chicago. Rob emmanuel was the mayor of chicago the time and had complete control of the schools. He decided in his lack of wisdom to close 50 Public Schools in a single day. Which caused tremendous havoc and harm to the children of chicago. I should say that a lot of what he did was to benefit Charter Schools, and Charter Schools are part of a gentrification process. The city of chicago, between the years of 2,002,016, plus 200,000 africanamerican citizens. Projects were torn down in our place. Neighborhoods were gentrified and Charter Schools were built that would appeal to white middleclass families moving in to what had previously been black neighborhoods. And he announced an intention having close 50 schools, to close the last open Enrollment High School in brownsville, which was the heart of the black community. It was called the walter H High School and g2 brown who is a hero in my book, is a civil rights leader. He led a group of allies and they pestered mayor emmanuel wherever he went and said dont close it save it. They weighed the signs in his face they protested and all the conventional ways and he simply ignored them. And then one day they had an idea and they set up lawn chairs on the campus of the high school which is now been emptied out and was ready for doing whatever he wanted to do. Probably to turn into a Charter School. They set up their lawn chairs and they said we are on a hunger strike. And for the first week no one noticed them. There were only 12 people in plastic launchers. And they stay to second week. And the third week, and in the Chicago Press began writing about them. And then the National Press came around and on the 34th day, rob emmanuel capitulated and said we will not close this high school and im going to invest 50 million in reopen it as a school for the arts. It was a complete victory in which g2 brown and 11 friends managed to defeat a very powerful mayor. And they won their battle. That was an example or people with no money and not even a lot of people managed to resist and win. Another of my favorite stories as a parent who is a friend of mine. She is a parent activist in new york city. She was very upset by invasion of student privacy. Shes a huge advocate for reducing class size. Shes banging her head against the wall trying to get class sizes reduce and see no progress. She saw on the issue of student privacy very powerful issue that would solve problems. She was in colorado and rachel became very upset because they put up a hundred Million Dollars to create a data gathering Organization Called in bloom and the idea was they would gather every point of data about every student in the district. And it would be managed with software owned by a murdoch corporation. And that put into a cloud managed by amazon, and 400 data points about every student in what could possibly go wrong with that . They did not like it one bit and they reach out to parents and every district that had signed on to surrender their data to bill gates and the corporation and one by one they dropped out. Last day to drop out as new york state and when new york dropped out in bloom in which they put 100 million simply collapse. And lanie hanson and rachel stickel and had no money. To parents who organized other parents reaching out to them with concerns about the privacy of their student data. There are dozens of stories like that. I will tell you one other because of the name. A group of parents in texas were very upset because legislature decided in its lack of wisdom, to have five tests for graduation high school. The student should have to pass 15 test to graduate high school. And so a group of mothers were very upset by this. And they formed an Organization Called tam as a nobody could member the name so they were called moms against drunk testing. [laughter] and they were very effective. In fact the legislature drop that plan altogether. One more texas door because this is very powerful. There is an organization in texas called pastors for texas children. They are baptist ministers who believe strongly in the separation of church and state. This organization, led by baptist minister who is become a very dear friend of mine, is advocated session after session against vouchers. The most powerful people in texas the most right wing powerful governor and Lieutenant Governor want vouchers passionately. But the pastors for texas children have been able to create a coalition between urban democrats in rural republicans who understand that Public Schools the heart of their community. And that coalition, for three consecutive sessions has blocked vouchers. Now the other thing the pastors for texas children have done is they have formed a chapter in oklahoma called pastors for oklahoma children and they have reached out and created similar groups in other states. And their goal is to stop vouchers because they believe in the separation of church and state. So again, munn nobody in their money, just people who have a passionate belief that Public Education is the foundations of our democracy we have to protect it. Spewing all these Inspiring Stories are in the book. I want to read a couple short passages from your book, then follow up with the question. Let me just find, for those of you who brought your book, page 269, that sounded a little bit about like get your hymn books. So heres what i wanted to read. Oh it may not be. Have to get the real now although this ones all marked up in dogeared were needed to be. Okay so nothing that the disruptors have champion has succeeded unless one counts as success closing hundreds, perhaps thousands of community Public Schools in low income neighborhoods. The disruptors have succeeded in demoralizing teachers, and reducing the number of people entering the teaching profession. They have enriched entrepreneurs to open Charter Schools and develop shoddy new products and services to schools. They have enhanced the bottom line of large testing corporations. Their fling with the common core cost states of billions of dollars to implement, but had no effect on national or International Test scores. An outraged many parents, child advocates, lovers of literatures and teachers. The disruptors tried to encourage the collection of personallys identifiable student data and monetized it. But this was stymied, at least temporarily by wellinformed parents who block the intrusion of big brother into their childrens lives. And then the next section, the most important lesson to be learned from this account of the past decade is that reform doesnt mean reform. Thats a big yard a little art. It means the demoralization gas in turmoil. It does not protas better education. There is no quote Reform Movement. The disruptors never try to reform Public Schools, they wanted to disrupt and privatize the Public Schools and americans have relied on for generations. They wanted to put Public School funding in private hands, they wanted to shortcircuits democracy, they wanted to cripple not improve the schools, they wanted to replace the Public Service with the free market. The disruptors dont care about growing racial segregation in the school, they dont care that charters are more segregated than Public Schools are. They remain willfully ignorant of research that demonstrates the value of integrated schools. So you had touched on that in your earlier comments, but heres my question. What they say, is that they are trying to improve education in our country. I am wondering if there real goal is it possible its not to improve Public Education for all, but it could be a very deliberate attempt to guarantee and under educated populace made of those people, and People Living in poverty. Guest i am always reluctant to attribute bad to people is there trying to make a profit that diverts money from reducing class sizes and paying teachers at a good salary and i think people make a profit in education by selling pencils, bicycling paper, that sort of thing is always going on. But we have now for the first time entrepreneurs looking at education as a profit making opportunity and i think that is something that is frightening and new. Because years ago, i sort of wellknown when i worked in the george h. W. Bush administration i worked in the Hoover Institution with these right wing think tanks and im still other email lists. So i get these notices about annual meetings where entrepreneurs and Hedge Fund Managers are invited to discuss how to make a profit from Public Education. They are not selling pencils. What they are out to do is to create charters that are not regulated at all. Or not accountable, and california now has more charters than any other states. I think about 10 of the kids in california arent Charter Schools up until this recent change in the law which is not yet taken effect. Charters were unaccountable and unregulated. In california has had some of the biggest charter scandals in the entire country were momandpop charters have skimmed off millions of dollars. Usually the charter scandals are unrealistic, but not always. The biggest charter scandal in history, was announced last year with an indictment in san diego where online Charter Corporation called a3 was indicted along with several districts that was facilitating their scam. They are gathering the nays of students for what was basically an online charter operation where the children were not actually getting services. The scam amounted to 50 million diverted from the states coffers. The main scammer had absconded to australia and we didnt know whether he was going to be repatriated to the United States for trial. If you lose 50 million to somebody who has a big idea, its not even an educator. How terrible deer laws have to be to allow somebody to steal that much money from children . Which is what it amounts to. In my book i recount a number of stories like this shocking number of them come from california. Charter operators who have made money from real estate. Its just a switch from california back to texas for a minute, theres a company theyre called i dea which is now one of the biggest and most successful charter chains in the nation. They have assets of over 1 billion. Now thats public money. Betsy devos over the last couple of years has given them over 2 million. They run a very Successful Operation because they make a promise if you put your child in our schools they will be admitted to a Fouryear College. What they dont tell people is you dont graduated until you have been admitted to a Fouryear College. To everybody gets admitted to a Fouryear College it happens there are colleges that accept everyone. And so that they find Podunk University that takes everyone and they say see all of our students were admitted to Fouryear Colleges. They just got into a little bit of trouble because they decided to lease a private jet for 2 million a year. And that was not seemly for School Organization have a private jet. The amount of money being paid to their executives was a little bit embarrassing. But this kind of thing is going on all over the country. Florida is rife with charter scandals and voucher scandals. Florida pays out a billion dollars a year to religious schools to get vouchers. It is totally unregulated. They have teachers who are High School Dropouts in the florida voucher schools. The kids that have the vouchers dont take the state test because they are not accountable. The state of florida gives out to billion a year to Charter Schools. The 3 billion a year is underfunded Public Schools. This despite the fact the constitution says there shall be no vouchers despite the fact there is a referendum in the public said we dont want vouchers and the Legislature Just does it anyway because a lot of people in the legislature seems to be connected in some immediate way to a Charter Corporation. There are some religious Group Getting money from this freeflowing public funding. Be wanted so hard to hear about these hundreds and hundreds of millions and billions of dollars not going to our schools. There is so much we could do with that money. I find myself often now quoting jonathan coastal when he said how people say you cant throw money of the problem, of course you can. Rich people do it all the time. You just have to know how and where to throw it, right . And you have to be in the right place to get it. You have to catch it i guess. With that, are there questions ready for Diane Ravitch . Does anybody have cards . Alright so while were waiting for the questions i just want to point out something that the funding in california a couple of years ago, maybe last year i wrote an article for capital in maine, and i started doing research into the federal data about how much money california spends compared to other states. In california, which is one of the richest states in the country is right about the National Median. Little bit below the National Median spending. It spending. Pupil is about the same as south carolina. Theres got to be something wrong with this picture. There something wrong this picture. Alright so the first question is from jonathan how do you explain betsys current popularity as a saget for trump campaigning for him in pennsylvania . What betsy devos speaks to a particular kind of zealous evangelical because she is one herself, and wed never had a secretary of education who absolutely despises Public Schools as she does. And so for people who want public money to be used to pay for the private school tuition, she is a rock star. For people who want public money to pay for religious schools, shes a rock star. I think she is still for people who want Public Schools and they want American Kids and have their kids in Public Schools. And seem to be quite happy with them every time i see a poll people like their teachers they love their teachers if you ask americans education is in the seo terrible ive seen this documentary and things are just awful. How do you feel about the school your child goes to . My Childs School is great my child teachers wonderful. So there is that dichotomy and i think i am very happy trump is sending out betsy devos as a spokesperson because i always picture her with a certain kind of billionaire snarl. Which says the rest of us are not as good as she is and she does not matter that somebody untied one of her yachts and settlers, has nine others. See mexico so gross so i wanted to mention jonathan with sano State University this question comes from an Elementary School teacher also ubs member. The educational trends are trending toward Elementary School students being expected to master more and more abstract concepts at younger and younger ages. Educators know this is setting children up to fail, what can educators do to take back our authority as experts on education . This is a very important question and to a large extent it is a result of common core. You have to bear in mind that there people he who wrote the common core, did not include any teachers who knew anything about Early Childhood education. It did not include any teachers who knew anything about english language learners it did not include special education teachers of the common core was written primarily by people who are in the testing industry. And so there is a lot in my book about why the common core is not working, and california for reasons i still dont understand, is one of the few states that fully endorse common core. I think common core, from everything ive heard from my own reading of it is developmentally inappropriate. Its certainly not right for Young Children and i remember when i was reading the early drafts of it i said why would you care if firstgraders have correct punctuation . You would expect his children get older but having exact right grammar and punctuation when youre in first grade is pretty ridiculous. The first thing you want them to do is learn you want them to care about reading to become engaged in learning and to have a zest for learning. That is more important than the form. And yet the common core had a lot of stuff for early children which did not make any sense. And when you see who is on the writing committee you can understand why. They really did not know much about Young Children i think common core has been especially devastating to Young Children and the pressure to bring testing down to first grade and even kindergarten is ridiculous. Thats very important for teachers to keep in mind whats right and whats wrong. Because you know children, and the people telling you to do this dont know children. And so you have to keep inside your head and inside your heart and understanding of what your professional duty is a watcher professional ethics are. Be prepared to resist. Thank you, music to our ears. Host and next question is from clarendon Elementary School and im going to preface it with just noting that Michael Bloomberg is one of the star disruptors in your book. So with that, ill ask this question. Which 2020 president ial candidate do you think will be most helpful to Public School teachers, students and families. Let me say that politically i am a member of what i consider the toothbrush party. And what i mean by that is a side tweet one day a few weeks ago that said i would vote for toothbrush over donald trump. Good dental hygiene is very important. [laughter] which is to say i will vote for anybody who is on the democratic line. As a new yorker i found bloomberg had some very good qualities he cares a lot about Public Health hes something of a nanny mayor he even banned smoking in public parks and on beaches. He just cant smoke. Fine with me, i never smoked and never liked it. But he was good on Public Health, hes very good on the environment, he was not a good mayor in education. He was no child left didnt trut educators he brought in a lawyer to be a chancellor, he was extremely corporate, very datadriven very focused on testing testing testing. And he closed many, many schools and he opened lots of small schools. Some of which failed and as soon as they fail they replaced with more schools. So he loves disruptions, he loves Charter Schools. And he is the only democratic candidate who is openly pro Charter Schools. Having said all that if he is a candidate but i think from an educational point of view, he has the worst positions. In terms of who has the best positions i would have to say it would be Elizabeth Warren and bernie sanders. [applause] and i want to add the two of them are the only candidates who have pledged that they would eliminate the federal Charter School program. This is a Program People know very little about but it was started during the Clinton Administration in 1994 and a time when there very few charters the idea was lets have this experimentation. Lets see what happens. I people are trying to start a charter and they have innovative ideas, looks for the innovation. It was a Small Program for small number of charters is grown into a 44 milliondollar your program and its now totally at the discretion of betsy devos. She is using it primarily to fund large charter change laughter she gave 89 million to cap over 100 million over 200 million of the last two years to the ide a charter chain that i described. And she gave i think how many millions to new york citys notes six excuses Success Academy which is a very harsh discipline particularly for black and brown children. So i think this is a program that should be eliminated. One of the things i have done is work with anthony cody he used to be in the oakland schools, and thing i created an Organization Called network for Public Education i urge you all to join. Membership is free and we have almost 400,000 members. I dont think there is a Single Organization or disruptor organization in the country that has even a thousand members. What they have is paid employees. But our organization last or did two studies of the federal charters program. On the first study found that of the thousands of Charter Schools that had been opened by the federal Charter Schools program, tween 2006 and 2014, this is predivorce, more than a third of them, 36 of them neither opened or closed right after opening. A billion dollars of federal funding was wasted on nonexistent Charter Schools. Then we did a second report, the report is called sleep at the wheel. Second report was called still asleep at the wheel. I was a statebystate breakdown in california has one of the worst records of Charter Schools that receive federal findings either never open or close soon after opening. So there is a lot of loose money around and its not going to children. It ends up in the somebodys bank account. And it never gets return. Theres a lot of federal money, and its going to these large corporate chains which replace local community schools. The other points i want to make which is sort of a sideways addition to this, the whole question of state takeovers i know in california you had a state takeover of oakland, which was then put into the hands of the foundation for one superintendent after another, after another, after another, after another. As a very good book that im in the middle of reading by a professor at Brown University called takeover in which he says there has not been any successful state takeovers. Takeovers are not about improving schools, they are about race and power. Its about white legislatures taking power away from black and Brown School Boards. And then cutting off their access to the first step in gaining political power which is to be elected to the school board. If you can no longer be elected to the school board, you dont have a first step. The only time you find these takeovers, this one going on now in Providence Rhode island, a black and Brown School Board being replaced. Its an attempt to take over in houston texas, my hometown were texas has a law saying if one school the entire city is persistently failing, the entire School District can be taken over by the state. So houston which has 280 schools, its a very highly rated urban district, and has a black and Brown School Board is on the verge of being taken over by the state of texas. Which has a very rightwing government. Host terrifying. Some of the goals and narratives supporting privatization can be found even within the textbooks we find in our schools. How do we work to break up the textbook and testing monopolies nationwide . Guest while i wrote a book about that some years ago called the Language Police in which i said the best thing that could happen if teachers chose their own textbooks instead of having the state choose them. The problem with the state decisionmaking is it leads to a lot of Pressure Group activity that sells textbook publishers you cant say this you cant use this image this a lot of censorship that goes along. Whats happened in the textbooks industry is theres been tremendous consolidation. they will be able to develop more creative materials because they are basically a monopoly and to say it leads to creativity is beyond me because standardization has exactly the opposite standardization leads to more standardization and less creativity. How do educator unions advocate for the elimination in Public Schools . We were talking about this before the program started. We agree about teacher americana. First of all the young people are very smart and very idealistic they want to do the right thing and they really want to devote themselves to children but they are unimpressed they think they can do that with five weeks of training. Five weeks of Summer School does not a teacher make. Some of them get burned out very quickly and some of them fulfill their commitment and that they are guaranteed a place at j. P. Morgan chase like putting it on your resume like getting a job in the financial industry or law school but those who stay around to make a career of teacher america or stay in education have all too often go one or two paths some are some really rotten horrible right wing School Systems advocating for charters through the Privatization Movement taking a different turn from teacher america and seattle and teaching america and then to apologize for his background and said i learned about corporate reform and i understand i made a mistake there is a blogger named Gary Rubenstein who is fantastic and he has become a career teacher and he calls him a critical friend but he watches a very closely teacher america presents itself as a charity they have 300 million in the bank they are not in need of contributions the executives are highly paid and it is a business and is very successful the greatest gripe i have with teacher america they have devalued the teaching profession selling the idea to the American Public anyone can teach with five weeks of training and all of those years to become good at your job with that Knowledge Based on your studies it Means Nothing because if you come from the Ivy League College with five weeks in the summer you will be even better than the experienced teachers. That is nonsense and undermines the teaching profession. Also teacher america as an organization has abetted the most right wing forces in america most comes from the Walton Foundation giving them to put together a fund of 100 million of his foundation and several others they have worked with the organizations most intent on privatizing schools so you have to know with the charter sector 90 percent or 9 million to one of the messages i hope to get across and not just because im speaking to you in San Francisco is that unions play an Important Role to revive and improve American Education is at the dream of every right wing pennypinching governor because no one will be at the table to speak up they dont want to have the Union Representatives say we are not spending enough in california we are not spending enough in oklahoma we need to increase the budget or we will sacrifice our future the union provides that voice ive never been a member of any union but i believe unions play an important part of democracy and they have to be strengthened and you should be proud of your membership. [applause] in San Francisco what we did to get teacher america out of our schools if we campaigned for elected School Board Members who also didnt like teach for america and they are not here anymore. Teacher america is a second wing of equity l ee as it is known trains members who want to go into politics to prepare a run for Political Office to raise money for them and has three trustees one is Michael Bloombergs daughter another is the california billionaire. I didnt mentioned while listing the disruptors the full Destruction Movement of privatization and charters is heavily supported by wall street. Its the Campaign Money that make such a big difference and there is an organization with a deceptive name those for names they will list the candidates around the country and then send your contributions it could be 1000 but if you get 100 people that can make a big difference in the danger of democracy is there are districts where people could run for a local school board but when you have 200,000 coming into your opponent and you can only raise 30 you are overwhelmed. One of the heroes in my book is a woman in nashville who decided to run for the National School board she that she can make a difference in the school board and the woman she was out running against without raising her five one and most of it was coming from other states. This is happening all over the country where the wealthy disruptors are pouring money into elections and other states in order to elect people to support privatization. And she won overwhelmingly but then when she ran again she faced again the stand for her children money and that is another organization that used to be good but turned because depending on how much their money there was and she wanted a second time she has been in an outspoken invoice and defense of Public Education. Yes you can be the forces but it requires organization and dedication and the reason i very helpful one hopeful those fighting for Public Schools are doing it because they believe passionately in Public Education and the disruptors do it because they are paid and if the money ever stopped i dont think they would have any organizations at all unfortunately there so much money to encourage them to say that they failed with these enterprises. So can you explain how charters are a mechanism for justification . In many places they have become highly segregated but more often than not one of the biggest appeals that they are for black and brown children and so i tell a story in the book how the waltons decided we dont need to win california because Governor Brown is a charter supporter we have Governor Cuomo depending on wall street money the one blue state that has eluded us is massachusetts so they started a referendum in the spring of 2016 with the idea they could raise the Charter Schools at the dramatic expansion with 12 new charters per year for ever anywhere and pulling in the spring of 2016 it would pass easily because it was cast as a civil rights issue if you care about black and brown children so 50 or 60 percent of the people would vote yes but what they didnt count on was the Massachusetts Teachers Association had a brandnew president they thought it was a terrible idea and she persuaded her organization to put up 210,000 members and they raise 9 million and when november 2016 came around barbara from massachusetts to mobilize parents and they mobilize local School Boards and civil rights organizations of the key endorsements and Parents Trust teachers and the referendum went down 62 38. [applause] the waltons commissioned a secret analysis about why they lost in the number one reason was people trust their teachers those were the most powerful communicators if you vote to preserve the Public School then vote against the charter so what can we do . Try to get the referendum because the public doesnt want vouchers overwhelmingly they vote against vouchers arizona is a very red state at this point despite that Koch Brothers many but they blamed the union and that barbara was communist and said she even tweeted real democrats failed to support Public Schools but she won forgot i will be in boston in a couple of weeks to have this discussion with barbara. I wish i could be there. So now to abolish the profit of education which you already mentioned. You will hear all the Democratic Candidates maybe even bloomberg to say i am against four profit charters theres only one state in the country that allows for profit and that is arizona and the scandals there is almost worse than california there are legislators there who felt money for their own charters. But in the other 49 states there are charters that are nonprofit but run by forprofit Charter Companies so you have no profit charters but a whole block of charter Management Companies but there are no for profit charters that 80 percent are run by forprofit Management Companies so you have to listen carefully when a democratic candidate says im abolishing the four profit charters so then followup how that forprofit Management Corporation those that drain off millions of dollars get involved in most complex real estate deals i cannot even begin to understand myself to buy the property, sell it release and sell it and then the public pays twice for the same property and the profit goes to the operator. So can you Say Something about Donald Trumps often repeated derogatory responses to government schools . Yes. The problem is in government schools the problem that government is failing schools by imposing the past 20 years policies that clearly dont work in government refuses to change those policies. We have failed Government Policies not failing government schools. And the appropriate response to this is very far right wing statement and i thought to myself should we also get rid of government highways while we are at it . Why should each of her own highway . What about Government Police correction we have a voucher for our own Security Guard and whose will not cover any protection at all you can think of the Public Services whether the National Transportation safety board, faa, fda and you think these are things that protect that they try to get rid of Environmental Protection i was going to say National Parks but he Just Announced he wants to have drilling and mining in National Parks. So we have a government that is the dream of the farthest right extremist fringe of american politics. The most important thing we can do is to encourage voting in november. [applause] this is about San Francisco but could apply to others as well. What steps do educators need to take to start a movement to opt out . Line of the stories is the opt out movement which was very successful. It started with common core testing and in long island to realize her son was coming home every day to say i hate school i want to go anymore and she understood using that overheard drilling of schooling previously he expressed so she started a Facebook Group long island opt out she had members then weeks later 23000 then looked at other parents who had many thousands of member starting an Organization Called new york state allies for Public Education. They are all volunteers because they have no money they go to hearings before the state board of education they meet with their legislators and get active in local political campaigns to elect state senators to support their cause. Through their constant agitation they could get 20 percent of the eligible students to opt out of state testing. That had a dramatic impact. You cant make judgments of districts were 80 percent of the kids do not take the test. You cannot rank or rate districts when 50 or 40 percent opt out. That screws up the state statistics and they tried threats and nothing stop them. Its a constant battle because every year the eighthgraders leave at a new crop come in so i have to constantly get new parents to understand the damage that standardized testing is doing. I go into great detail in the book why standardized testing is a very bad measure of children and why they are so much more creative and original and have so much more potential they can possibly be measured by standardized test. I have lost all faith in standardized test as a measure of what kids can do and what they can be. There something i want to read before we close. I will give it back. But in the very beginning of the book this is from one of the people involved in the massachusetts fight a professor at the university of massachusetts who is a specialist in dark money. A lot of education is funded by dark money which means you dont know where its coming from and you may never find out. Money never sleeps. Follow the money. Very important. The second is from albert einstein, i believe in standardized automobiles i do not believe in standardizing human beings. The third one which may surprise you was coming from doctor Martin Luther king everybody can be great because everybody can serve you dont have to have a College Degree to serve or make your subject or verb agree to serve you dont have to have the second theory to serve. To serve. To serve. Sometimes people say to me that is anti academic anti educational to say youre a good person that you are not educated but what it really says this does not define you as a human being with a high test score but im not better than people with low test scores every child regardless deserves the best we can give them. Every child. [applause] and by accepting this theory in which was a hoax that we could test every child every year and judge children and teachers and schools we have become locked into a way of thinking thats very destructive which forces us to rank and rate children from best to worst based on scores of social construction there are on many children with brilliant capacity not recognized by standardized test. What we want to do is teachers and parents is love every child to pieces and give them the best that we have. [applause] so with that superintendent that was trained this comes out of richmond. Superintendents have a terrible record going from district to district usually reaching distraction once in a while they will say i really am a decent person. But for the most part to be trained in a management philosophy that says close and we will replace it with a Charter School they have been trained in a management philosophy destructive to children who believes in no child left behind to sorting and ranking is stigmatizing children a very negative philosophy. And as teachers, be vigilant and be firm to bring any educator even if the school of management institute. I did not know about that one. They gave 100 million at the leadership institute. It sounds like they are throwing money at the problem. [laughter] please with the startup funding. None of the missing funds were ever returned over 1 billion were thrown out the door if you talk about throwing money at schools they were thrown out at the charter operators but they were never open and never gave back the money. Do you have any Closing Remarks . I think it said everything i have to say except that i hope you will all join the network for Public Education consider sending a delegation. Joined the resistance realize we are in a battle for the future of Public Education understand it is a Vital Foundation and that when people attacked Public Education they are in fact attacking democracy. Believe in what you are doing. Believe in yourself and your professional ethics and stand by your children. Thank you and also your community. [applause] a very small token of our appreciation which is a commemorative pin celebrating united educators 100th anniversary. Unions have been around for a long time and they will be and we are fighting the good fight right along beside you. Thank you so much teeten. [applause] [inaudible conversations] i have a tendency to read multiple books at a time so it takes a while to finish currently reading three different books reprogramming the American Dream this is a book that is focused how ai could be changing Rural Communities across