What Could Be Bad about Community Schools?

Dear Parents, Guardians, Tax Payers, Teachers and School Staff,

I am sharing some resources here to consider as the media reports the end of the Obama-era, bipartisan love affair with high stakes standardized testing and charter schools. What could be even more profitable for investors who know nothing about educating children? As we await the decision of the Biden administration's pick for Secretary of Education, we need to familiarize ourselves with the concept of  Community Schools. Odds are they are coming to a school district near you. Maybe even yours, even if you live in the suburbs.

What are Community Schools? What are social impact bonds?  What do they have to do with education in my community?

Reading list of resources that answer those questions:

Supporters of Community Schools always seem to mention the good, but not the Wall Street/venture capitalist connections... or the way that the quality of education of our children has been impacted by the push to make everything measurable... or the fact that weakened HIPPA & FERPA laws have made family and student data privacy extremely accessible to outsiders (known as stakeholders).

The National Education Association and American Federation of Teachers seem to love the concept of Community Schools, but most members have never heard of them.

NEA & Community Schools

AFT & Community Schools 

Brookings Institution 

Philadelphia School District & Community Schools

Coalition for Community Schools    

The Center for American Progress 

Using "full equality for all" to sound progressive... 

Pittsburgh Community Schools 

You best believe all of these things will be measured and gambled on by venture capitalists.

The United Way: Community Schools represent a strategy, not a program.

Watch the video below to see an example of a partial explanation of Community Schools. Private partnerships are briefly mentioned, with no explanations of how social impact bond investing works and how it's insatiable hunger for data effects the education of our kids.

 

CASE STUDY BY PA TEACHER BLOGGER & FORBES CONTRIBUTOR, PETER GREENE:

Social Impact Bonds for Dummies  - Read this and ask yourself if market-driven "solutions" for public education are ethical? 

 

Who funds Community Schools and is it ethical?

 No surprise, there’s more to this funding than meets the eye

The Downside of Social Impact Bonds

I was surprised to re-read this 2017 post of mine that mentions the hybrid model of teaching, long before COVID-19. It's all about data mining, not really helping children.

Bonded Life: Technologies of racial finance from slave insurance to philanthrocapital: 

Social Impact Bonds Are About Greed, Not Good 

Social Impact Bonds (Pay for Success): Yet Another Privatization Scam  

What everyone else knows about your child

Social impact bonds are unique public-private partnerships that fund effective social services through performance-based contracts.

Social Impact Bonds (SIBs) are a social policy tool that claims to solve complex policy problems, such as homelessness, unemployment, and recidivism, through the scientific methods of financial modelling. 

If you are a teacher, chances are you have been asked to write measurable objectives. You have been entering benchmark data into websites multiple times a year. Chances are you have been asked to focus on outcomes. Bet you have had to write SMART goals ( SMART is an acronym for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound. Perfect goals for social impact bond investing.) It is more than likely that your district's strategic plan is connected to the concept of sustainable communities and Community Schools. There is so much jargon involved with this "shift" in public education that there are now dictionaries to help you smell the danger before you step in it. Maybe buy some copies for your local school board. And please share this post with them, too.