Eli Broad

Billionaire Education Reformer Dead, Thank God!

By Jim Vail

 

Eli Broad, our public school nightmare!

Ding dong the Witch is Dead!

Who would be the male equivalent to the Wicked Witch of the West?

Eli Broad, a billionaire, who the mainstream media raved about, was our public school nightmare. 

He died last week. 

In the eyes of the rich he was a philanthropist, an arts collector and a self-made man who became a great contributor to civic society.

To the world of public education, he was a rapacious capitalist who set out to destroy public education by forcing education reform via privatization, charter schools and standardized testing.

He and billionaire Bill Gates apparently thought they had the answers to solving society's ills.

They went to work after President Barack Obama was elected and implemented Race to the Top to privatize public education. They made it a mission to destroy as many public schools and public school teachers unions as possible so they could to build a brave new marketplace of education.

Broad's efforts are particularly remembered here in Chicago when the Broad Foundation funded a principal training program called New Leaders for New Schools to force down our throats rapacious administrators who were trained in the market place on how to run schools. 

How? Focus on standardized test scores, fire as many teachers as possible, outsource services and help close as many public schools to be turned into charter schools. In other words, turn our schools into cold, unfeeling corporations.

I divide my teaching career into 2 parts:

1)  Before Race to the Top - When our school was a family where we built relationships with the children outside punitive standardized tests. When we were not under intense pressure to be evaluated and threatened to be fired every minute. When people were joking around, not stressing out!

2)  After Race to the Top - When our school was no longer a family but a revolving door of staff, new faces just about every year. When we were running around being Reach evaluated constantly. When more & more bureaucrats from the network were walking around with pens and scowls. When one former colleague stated, "I just feel numb." 

That is the legacy of Eli Broad and others who funded the education reform movement.

The warm, children laughing schools we know & remember were turned into cold, unfeeling corporate offices where you test & fear.