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# Charter School Movement: ‘Insidious Plan’ to Take Over Public Education
November 07 2016
Written by Susan Lee Schwartz.
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GUEST COMMENTARY--David Leonhardt says: “Charter schools -- public schools that operate outside the normal system -- have become a quarrelsome subject, alternately hailed as saviors and criticized as an overrated fad.” There is no such thing as public charter school. Period. And, they are certainly no “fad,” but rather, a ploy to end our public school system.
It is propaganda about “public” charter schools that confuses the public. Our citizens are unaware of the plan and the ploy by the [Educational Industrial Complex ](https://greatschoolwars.files.wordpress.com/2015/10/eic-oct_11.pdf)to end public schools by starving their budgets, using bogus tests to label them failing and then hand them over to those who want to do so much more than just make a fortune.
I read and admire the writing of David Leonhardt, but it is outrageous, that once again, the *New York Times* perpetuates the absolute false notion that there are *Public* Charter Schools.
Giving taxpayer’s money to charter schools that lack transparency and regulations does NOT make them PUBLIC SCHOOLS, and yet, this[ ploy is on the ballots](https://dianeravitch.net/?s=Massachusetts+ballot) in Massachusetts, Georgia, Pennsylvania and many states.
Do not pretend that your paper is printing all the “news that is fit to print,” when you consistently promote the end of public education instead of printing the stories that could make our schools strong again. Make America great again by bringing back our schools so an ignoramus like Trump will face a nation of educated, skilled, working people who love democracy!
I have been an educator for four decades and I now write at *Oped News* and on the Diane Ravitch blog about the takeover of the *institution* of Public Education.
Dr. Ravitch wrote, *“*[*How Not to Fix Our Public Schools*](https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/book-reviews/reform-reform)*-*[*Reign of Error: The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America’s Public Schools*](https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/book-reviews/reform-reform),” and you \[LA Times\] have published her editorial, but you have learned nothing about the plan to takeover our democracy by doing what every dictator (and even the Saudi’s know) get the children when they are young -- because they are not kids for long; soon they will be citizens who vote.
The insidious plan is to let people like these guys rewrite history. “Get ’em young”… as they are doing in North Carolina, where the Koch Bros want [to ](http://dianeravitch.net/2014/12/05/north-carolina-plans-to-adopt-koch-funded-social-studies-curriculum)write social studies curricula.
Read the Ravitch blog: *“[Civics Lessons Financed by the Koch Brothers” | Diane Ravitch’s blog](http://dianeravitch.net/2014/12/07/civics-lessons-financed-by-the-koch-brothers/)* and you will see the end of public education.
They also know that Democracy depends on shared knowledge, and they know how to end real knowledge by simply taking over the 15,880 school systems, and make sure the newspapers and media spit out lies.
Fifty-two states and almost sixteen thousand separate school systems make it so easy for the puppet-masters who own all the media in this nation *to hide this assault on American democracy, and the only road to income equality.*
We saw how privatizing heath care affected our people while enriching the corporate big pharma!
There is a ton of money to be made when the salaries and benefits of experienced professionals are removed from the budget. Take the experienced professional out of a hospital and watch it fail, too.
Yes, the hedge funds love charter $chools. Look at what the California Billionaires are doing to privatize education and be aware that this is a worldwide takeover of education by the oligarchs who know that taking over the education system wins the battle to take over any nation. [This article by Justin Miller in the American Prospect](http://prospect.org/article/hedging-education) seeks to demystify the strange confluence between hedge fund managers and the charter school movement.
This is a great [discussion](http://www.democracynow.org/2015/3/11/new_york_hedge_funds_pour_millions), in which Amy Goodman of *“Democracy Now”* interviews Juan Gonzalez of the *NY Daily News* about the big money pushing charter schools. The discussion is based on [this article.](http://m.nydailynews.com/new-york/education/hedge-fund-execs-money-charter-schools-pay-article-1.2145001)
Look at the scam of “virtual” charter schools. Ariana Prothero[ writes in *Education Week*](http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2016/11/03/outsized-influence-online-charters-bring-lobbying-a.html?cmp=soc-edit-tw) about the “Outsized Influence” of lobbyists for the virtual charter industry.
Or, go to my [series](http://www.opednews.com/Series/legislature-and-governorsL-by-Susan-Lee-Schwartz-150217-816.html) on [privatization](https://dianeravitch.net/?s=PRIVITIZATION), using information that Diane Ravitch provides about the state legislatures which are taking over the local schools, with nary an educator on board, and giving them to charters, with not a shred of oversight! Here is a link to Diane’s posts on charter school corruption.
*(Susan Lee Schwartz has been an award winning public school teacher for decades. She is currently a freelance travel writer and photographer, but I also write widely, about real education reform in order to change the national conversation to where it needs to be. This was originally published as a letter to the Los Angeles Times.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.*
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