When the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) was signed by a bipartisan group in Congress, there were high hopes that it would improve education for all public school students.
What people didn’t anticipate, as far as this retired teacher knows, is the way that public schools would be warped into ATMs for the greedy. From profit based Charter schools to the curriculum and testing market , the private sector is sucking millions from the education of our children.
It isn’t only the open market that is squeezing the bucks out of the schools, either.
Georgia’s Republican Governor Nathan Deal has been pushing an amendment to the state’s constitution. That amendment would allow the state to intervene in the running of underperforming public schools. They would be allowed to shut those schools, or to take them over.
Not such a bad idea, I guess, if the local school district isn’t up to par.
Here’s the problem.
Governor Deal is pushing the amendment hard. So is his daughter-in-law, who just happens to run a company called Southern Magnolia Capital. That company is raising money for a non-profit group that is behind the amendment and advertising heavily for its passage. Ms. Deal and her company earn five percent of everyt dollar that they raise.
That has already added up to several millions.
So. The Governor of Georgia is all gung-ho for a constitutional amendment. He says that he is pushing the proposal for the sake of the children.
He doesn’t mention the millions that his own family is raking in just for pushing the amendment.
Bryan Long is the executive director of a liberal advocacy group called Better Georgia. He was furious about the situation. He called the proposed amendment “another pay-for-play scheme to move money from the schoolhouse to Deal’s house.”
This is the kind of twisted nepotism that has kept so many inner city public schools in the dark. Every time there is a serious effort to improve public education, those in power manage to squeeze out benefits for themselves. The hell with the kids. Screw the teachers. Who cares?
Certainly not Georgia Governor Nathan Deal, who has his eyes firmly focused on his own family’s bottom line.
Watch, and gag.
Featured image via YouTube Screengrab.
