The Offical Website of the PJSTA

Posted on November 2, 2012 by thepjsta

Initiative 1240 in Washington State

Washington State is another place where public education is under attack this coming Election Day. On November 6th its citizens will vote on initiative 1240, which would authorize up to 40 privately operated, but taxpayer-funded charter schools, exempt from many of the laws governing existing public schools.

Diane Ravitch has the list of the many groups opposed to the intiative and the handful of familiar people backing the initiative.

Gates alone has donated $3 million to the campaign to pass this intiative. Another one of the initiative’s big supporters is Stand For (Against) Children. Surely you remember them.

People For Our Public Schools, a group who”represents a coalition of parents, teachers; education, community, civil rights and labor organizations; elected officials and local school leaders across Washington State” made the video below titled “Charter School Fairy Tales”…

1 Comment

Posted on November 2, 2012 by thepjsta

Bravo UTLA!

Kudos to the United Teachers of Los Angeles who refused to give in to pressure from LA’s public schools. The district attempted to use the the Race to the Top application to strong arm the UTLA into accepting a new teacher evaluation system based on high stakes standardized testing scores.

As a result the Los Angeles Unified School District lost out on $40 million in federal funding. Of course we know from experience that RTTT money actually isn’t used for anything useful in school districts. It seems the UTLA’s president Warren Fletcher knows that too. “Race to the Top costs more than it brings in,” Fletcher said. “You’re essentially setting up a system with a lot of bureaucracy, and those pieces have to stay in place after the grant period.”