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That’s a little heavy, no?

I don’t know much about Broad, but he addresses your first questions fairly directly:

“We don’t know anything about how to teach or reading curriculum or any of that. But what we do know about is management and governance.”

I don’t anyone is suggesting that we run the schools like any of the businesses that have plunged our financial system into crisis, but we’ve also seen a steady decline in standards and efficiency and we need to do something big to stop it. I think that’s what Broad appears to be saying (though I’m going to look more up on him).

We’ve got 21st century problems, and we need solutions. If that means experimenting with public-private partnerships for our schools, like some states use for fixing their highways, for instance, or more accountability, then so be it, because the old system isn’t working anymore.

I am a chemistry teacher at a low-income public school which has been horribly impacted by Broad’s interference.

Although Broad admits he doesn’t know anything about how to teach, the business model he imposes on public schools demands that his “trained” administrators come into our classrooms and force us to follow “standards-driven” teaching practices, supposedly to raise test scores. My district can’t provide working heat, light, or running water for my under-equipped lab, but we pay hundreds of thousands to the consulting businesses he promotes. The real drive behind his manipulations is the marketing plan for the useless “services” and products provided (at public expense) by his for-profit entrepreneurial “partners.”

Edubusiness entrepreneurs hide under a layer of fake non-profits set up by “philanthropists” like Broad and Gates. Broad brags he’s “not beholden to public opinion”, meaning that, because of his wealth and the political power it buys, he is not accountable to the public. Believe me, Broad won’t increase my pay at all. I get up at 5:30 every morning to dedicate my life, a day at a time, to teaching real chemistry. My students go to nursing schools, universities, state colleges and community colleges. When they enter the military, they do well enough on the ASVAB to qualify for specialist training. None of that is due to Broad’s business model, though, and I won’t promote his agenda. So my administrators have to decide that I’m not a leader.

It breaks my heart to see Duncan playing along. You should have seen my students when Obama won the presidency. Their eyes were shining. I tell them they will be the ones to walk across the stage, go on to the life they are supposed to live, and bring prosperity, health, security and life itself to their struggling immigrant families. Instead, it turns out Duncan owns his own his own stock in the Emperors New Schools Venture Fund.

I am an elected board member in a large urban district. I survived indirect attacks in my election from business based political Commitees funded by Gates, Broad and others who managed to keep their 501c3 status by using typical arms length techniques but managed active influence of their committees. Now I am opposed by many of the local union folks, who wer in the battle with the business interests and they (unions) now have taken control of the School Board. So we have gone from a business controlled board to a labor controlled board. I am proud to represent what I believe is and will be the solution for public education. That is a moderate middle ground that represents what the people want and what is good for children. School board wars that are currently raging in our country are symptomatic of this country’s political disintegration. I hope the people get the message that a victory of moderation is what will save America in both education and in its political survival.

Charter schools siphon public money, yet do not accept the public fairly. They hold “lotteries” to decide whether they want to accept students. The lotteries screen out undesirable students (i.e. students with special needs, behavior problems). Charter schools are not held to the same accountability as public schools. Charters are supported by venture capitalists who wish to undermine social programs such as public education and destroy teachers’ unions. Charters are “thin contracts” that disenfranchise teachers’ rights, seniority, pension, and health care. They wish to run schools by the same failed capitalist principles that destroyed this country’s economy. The media perpetuates the myth that public schools are failing because nobody asks or is allowed to ask the media’s pundits by which standard they are using to determine failure. If you ask most people how they know public schools are failing they won’t be able to tell you. Those that try will spout ridiculous speculation that they parrot from the mainstream media which is owned by corporations. We have no independent media to supply the public with the information they need to make an educated decision about charter schools. All they hear is that there’s more choice involved. A Stanford University study that researched charter schools this year found they had little or no effect in raising test scores. The testing industry itself is a huge racket. It has a vested interest in perpetuating the myth that standardized tests produce effective measurement of academics. Eli Broad is nothing more than a rich old man who despite economic indicators insists his way is the best; an old man who has lost touch with a world he no longer understands.

It gets worse, Mike. KB Homes ramped up to high gear during the bubble, and sold massively overpriced substandard homes to the working class families made eligible for loans by the Clinton Mortgage reforms (Cisneros went straight from the Clinton administration to KB homes).

The other half of his fortune came from his AIG stock – yes, he made another killing on those same defective mortgages, as AIG bundled them into derivitives. He donated most of his AIG stock at its peak to his own privately-controlled education foundation, which dumped the stuff. By the time the crash came, he was out and we educators are trapped under his billions. He also rebuilt New Orleans for Bush – you know how that went.

The housing stock is worse than underwater, now. He brought in cheap drywall from China for his developments, and the walls are now exuding toxic hydrogen sulfide gas which corrodes the wiring and poisons the occupants. The problem surfaced first in Florida, because of the heat and humidity. It’s hard to say how many houses are affected, because of course he lies to evade responsibility, but the number keeps going up.

Now go back and read his insufferably arrogant quote, “We don’t know anything about how to teach or reading curriculum or any of that. But what we do know about is management and governance.”