This week a federal judge subpoenaed the financial records of the privately controlled Mathematics, Civics, and Sciences Charter School in Philadelphia. Federal investigators are looking into possible theft of public funds. The school claims no wrongdoing. However, a similar investigation just last year, involving two private charter schools resulted in two fraud convictions and a suicide.
 Philadelphia students protest privatization. |
The late 1990s saw Philadelphia as ground zero for the debacle that is the privatization of the American classroom. The city decided to inject the capitalist spirit into public education by giving barrels of taxpayer money to private education management firms. Over the last 10 years, several of these privatized schools have come back under public control due to a combination of academic failure and fraud.
Fraud and corruption are a byproduct of the privatized education experiment. Private firms view each school as an investment opportunity. Therefore, the goal is to use as little taxpayer money on teachers and students as possible so investors can pocket what is left over. When profit expectations are not met, outright theft is often the last resort.
Despite the failure of school privatization, Philadelphia Superintendent Arlene Ackerman announced plans to privatize nine more Philadelphia public schools, which will likely result in many worker firings, more stolen tax dollars and many more children “left behind.”
Furthermore, President Obama and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan have made it perfectly clear that they intend to continue the Bush administration’s assault on public education as a matter of national policy. What can stop this assault? Teachers, students and families in the streets demanding that the right to a free, quality education not be sold to the highest bidder.
