I think it’s safe to say I underestimated just how sleazy John White and his TFA toddlers were capable of being. When confronted from multiple sources with evidence of Shadow Schools (unreported schools or formerly reported schools no longer reported for the purposes of altering accountability scores) rather than crack down on districts like St James and Iberville, who are using unreported magnet schools to raise the scores of terrible schools in their district above the academically unacceptable threshold, John White has chosen to change BESE policy to allow these situations – knowing full well:
- they will lead to falsely raised scores
-
fewer schools in AUS status
- thus more kudos for him and his team
- and more faux feathers for the DOE peaCock to proudly fan in the faces of his next employer.
This excerpt comes from a Louisiana Believes summary document circulated by LDOE before a BESE meeting on October 16th where John White made numerous proposals to tweak various scores so his “reforms” would look like they were working and so his paycheck and prestige could get even larger.
The following extract is from the precise agenda that was passed by BESE on October 16th allowing school districts to decide what a program was and what was a school.
If districts “decide” to declare they have a school; that “school” must report its own test scores and will get assigned its own SPS score. If a district decides they would like to define any of their schools as “programs” they can do that. There are no questions or requirements. They can route those students from that program anywhere they want. If I was one of the larger districts like Jefferson, Caddo, or EBR that was told no before and has been enduring a plague of school takeovers I would immediately stop reporting all of my schools. If your district is above 70 SPS you can report your entire district as a single “school” now. You can define one district school and all the other schools as alternative programs that route to this school. If you want to start small, just declare a few of your high performing magnets as alternative programs and route those students to the school in your district in danger of being taken over.
Don’t worry, about parents. You can still report the data accurately on your website like St James and Iberville; this is just about making sure John White has a decent legacy and spiffy credentials for his next education heist.
This Reform [Bowel] Movement that John White, Michele Rhee, Joel Klein and TFA are pushing down throats locally and nationwide was never about students or achievement. It was about money and power. It was about smoke and mirrors. It was about making you “Believe.”
Crazy Crawfish 
It really makes me mad that White is able to pull the wool over our eyes so easily even for those of us who openly distrust and question him. It had never occurred to me that shadowing existed so when this proposal was presented (via the agenda published only a few days before the BESE meeting,) It seemed to make sense. I want to know now whose idea it was for St. James and Iberville Parishes to do this. Don’t they think it brings distrust from those of us trying to save public education legally and ethically? On th other hand, why should educators and district administrators and school boards give in to White and follow his destructive agenda. It is time to say no and for qualified educators and school boards to tell the public how they feel about White’s destructive agenda like St. Tammany has done. As for Jefferson Parish, their superintendent and board are in bed with White and they probably have their own subterfuge going on like their Jefferson Community school.
They’ve been doing this since 2008 in Iberville and longer in St James with magnet type schools. Dozens of alternative schools of the credit recovery/behavior type have been dropping off the radar through various means. We held off reporting SPS scores for a few years to give LEAs a chance to hide them. This should accelerate that process. That will also allow districts to ignore IEP placement settings for SPED students. It obscures all sorts of other data like discipline rates, attendance rates, HQ teacher percentages, poverty, and allows school districts to engage in segregation with impunity. (Just to name a few implications other than simply making more of a mockery of our unaccountability system)
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