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Feb

6

For-profit charter operators call Strickland cuts “crippling”


Ya don’t think it’s the millions you’ve been spending on lobbying legislators and hiding from everyone, including State Auditor Mary Taylor that’s crippling you, huh?

The Columbus Dispatch reports:

Charter schools are getting $617 million this year, a number that would drop to about $497 million next year under Strickland’s proposal, before rising to $534 million in 2011.

“A double-digit reduction in the funding of charter schools is crippling,” said Bill Sims, president and chief executive officer of the Ohio Alliance for Public Charter Schools. “It’s a separate but unequal strategy for starving charter schools and their students to a slow death.”

About 82,000 Ohio students attend the state’s 332 charter schools.

The average per-pupil receipt for all Ohio public school children will be decreasing. Likewise, as for-profits, they can see like the rest of us what’s happening in every other industry – for-profit and non.

So let me just make sure I understand: Before these kinds of cuts, the free market was justification for their profit-taking and making in education. But now:

“The funding disparity is grossly disproportional to charter schools that serve high proportions of disadvantaged students,” Sims said.

Hmm – the distinctions about the kids never mattered before – it was always about the business model and a product – the education for the human child.

Of course, this is precisely why I’ve argued repeatedly against for-profit charters – because a kid’s education is not a commodity like other commodities produced in the for-profit world and shouldn’t be treated as such.  But the for-profits charters don’t all of a sudden get to press that.

Speaking of which, it will be interesting to see if my own state rep, Josh Mandel (R-Lyndhurst, 17th), pleads anyone’s case in the statehouse as it relates to education. In particular, will he plead the case of the numerous public schools in the district which will be flatlined and then have their funds decreased by 2% in 2011 (mine being just one) or that of the for-profit charters? From his campaign website:

Josh Mandel is committed to protecting our local schools from unfair schemes that send our property taxes to other parts of the state. Josh recognizes that strong schools are critical to revitalizing our area and giving our children a bright future. As our State Representative, Josh is working to protect our hard-earned dollars and improve the way schools are funded.

Why might this be a conundrum for him? Because he has taken $50,000 from David Brennan, the operator of the for-profit charter school management company, White Hat Management, over the last four years.

FYI – here’s a list compiled of the different ways in which charters are funded across the states that have them.

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 10:27 am February 6th, 2009 in Business, Economy, Education, Government, Law, Ohio, Politics, Statehouse, Ted Strickland 

Comments

4 Responses to “For-profit charter operators call Strickland cuts “crippling””

  1. 1 Anastasia P on February 6th, 2009 1:47 pm

    I’m less interested in how many disadvantaged students they serve than in the results they get. I am tired of onerous requirements and sanctions placed on public school systems but not on these for-profit charters. In fact, I think that any for-profit charter that is in academic emergency or academic watch should be forced to forego their profit and to put ALL money they are given into education. I know, I know, how on earth would Josh Mandel fund his ravenous political ambitions…

  2. 2 Jeff on February 7th, 2009 11:43 am

    Jill:

    You make an excellent point. Advocacy groups that spend gobs of money on lobbying are in no position to the objective observer to whine about government funding or perceived lack thereof.

    That said, I note that public employee unions – including teachers’ unions – are among the most ubiquitous of special interest groups in Washington and state capitals across the country. No?

  3. 3 Jill Miller Zimon on February 7th, 2009 2:48 pm

    Jeff – it’s a conundrum – I won’t deny that. The only reason I don’t pound on the unions about the money spent lobbying or giving to politicians is because I really don’t know campaign finance law at this point – I can only say that sure, if someone were to reveal what percentage of a DOE budget that ends up with teachers then also ends up with unions that then also ends up with politicians, I would be interested to see that.

    But this kind of thing is far easier to trace and track and see when we’re talking about a for-profit entity that does take millions from its profits and gives it to politicians to get more gov’t work/money and then complains about not getting enough money.

    Then again – this ENTIRE issue about groups of any kind giving money of any number to politicians in order to be seen and heard is, in itself, a real perversion of democracy – we call it free speech or a way of participating in political speech, but that’s really just a convenient excuse.

    I do not know what the answer is – I have always been interested in public financing – but it’s also chicken and egg: who said what first: I’ll only hear you if you give me money? OR If I give you money, will you hear me?

    Again – I’ve not studied this – I don’t know. But in general, I would like to believe that the fact that we 1) have a vote and 2) are supposed to be represented by these folks regardless of whether we voted for them or not and regardless of how much money we have is enough to make politicians do the right thing.

    Obviously I also think I like in la la land. :)

    Thanks for commenting.

  4. 4 Jeff on February 7th, 2009 3:12 pm

    Agree completely. Campaign finance laws are a disaster, seems to me they have been setup that way deliberately to protect the apparatus. The record seems to indicate as much, too.

    One idea I have always liked – which has a snowball’s chance – is to completely get rid of corporate- and union cash, pacs, party-, caucus committees, etc. and establish a “no dollar vote without a ballot vote” principle. Any individual can give in any amount to any candidate or issue organization, so long as that individual (contributor) is a qualified elector. Immediate internet disclosure too. Seems to me the simpler, the better – what could be more simple?

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