Mamie Till Mobley

"There was an important mission for me, to shape so many...young minds as a teacher. God took away one child but...(gave) me thousands. And I have been grateful for the blessing." Mamie Till Mobley

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

School board president Hernandez wants DPCC to tell them first before lobbying for the parent trigger law in Albany


The legislative session ends in four days on Monday, June 20. But that's not stopping BuffaloEd Reform and the District Parent Coordinating Committee from traveling to Albany  Wednesday to lobby the Western New York Delegation to pass the trigger law, a bill allowing parents to force school districts to implement one of the federal government turnaround models by collecting the signatures of a majority of parents.    
They have two things on their side from Assemblywoman Crystal Peoples-Stokes, D-Buffalo, introducing the legislation in the Assembly in May and Mark Grisanti, R-Buffalo who sponsored it in the Senate to  Buffalo ReformEd director Katie Campos tapped this week to the post of secretary of education in the Cuomo administration.
When he ran for attorney general back in 2006, Cuomo  two years earlier invested campaigns money into hedge funds run by his biggest financial backers. And members of the hedge fund crowd were there to donate again  "Charter Schools' New Cheerleaders: Financiers." Ms. Campos worked in development for Democrats for Education Reform the political action committee Joe williams heads and who Cuomo met while campaigning for governor of New York.
So a parent trigger law  has been in the works in Buffalo for some time now  with Buffalo ReformEd drawing the District Parent Coordinating Committee into its web, trying to garner up votes for them to push it through  the end of the legislative session in Albany next week.
 Although the law passed in California in January it has been stalled by the new governor in office Jerry Brown and the  state Board of Education many his appointees.
But the political tide is different in New York State and the trigger law might just make it through if not this time next session, adding more chaos to a beleaguered public school system.
 The only problem is  Board President Ralph Hernandez directed the DPCC  to present the trigger bill  to the Board's student support committee that Florence Johnson chairs before lobbying for it  on Wednesday in Albany. And Park District Lou Petrruci is concerned about the DPCC mixing political advocacy with their district role as parent advocates funded through the auspices of a federal grant.

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Whitney Tilson (3rd background)

Whitney Tilson (3rd background)
"Let’s be honest: we need a lot more well-off, well-educated white folks with a personal stake in both charter schools and education reform in general if we’re going to take reform to the next level, both politically and operationally.Whitney Tilson, hedge fund manager and major funding angel for the school privatizing Democrats for Education Reform, thinks there’s not enough rich, educated white folks.( Preaprez) click photo to his blog.

Arne Duncan

Arne Duncan
U.S. Secretary of Education, click photo