Something has changed in education politics, and Robert Schneider has
seen the shift. Twelve years ago, when he first ran for District 7 in
the Austin Independent School District, "It was the PTA folks who ran
for the board." That means, a decade ago, a candidate like former Austin
Council of PTAs president Monica Sanchez would have romped home in
District 6. Instead, this time she was third in a three-horse race, not
even making the run-off. In part, Schneider ascribes such upsets to
changing demographics in the electorate. He said, "We have more tech
folks, we have more younger folks." That change has an unintended
consequence. "It's an opportunity for people with very deep pockets to
buy seats in the school district."
He should know. Schneider has always faced stiff competition in his
southwestern district. But this time around was a little different.
Education advocacy group
Austin Kids First doubled down on his opponent,
Yasmin Wagner, dropping roughly $40,000 in contributions and in-kind
expenditures into her challenge. Why target the veteran trustee? Wagner
always said on the campaign trail that it was because he was
unresponsive to his community. Maybe that was what motivated her, but,
Schneider thinks there's another reason why Austin Kids First came after
him. "They've got a political agenda, rather than an education agenda,"
he said. "I'm not a big radical reformer like they are."
Before we proceed, there are three organizations you need to know –
starting with Austin Kids First. Founded in 2012, its declared purpose
is to get voters engaged in AISD board elections, and encourage
high-quality candidates to run.
Leadership for Educational Equity does
basically the same thing, at the national level. And then there's
Teach for America, the national organization that puts recent college grads
into struggling schools.
It all seems quite noble. Great teachers. Great schools. Enthusiastic
young people, doing a couple of years of energetic teaching,
simultaneously becoming more rounded citizens. But, according to Ken
Zarifis, president of Education Austin, the school employees' union,
there's a big catch. "It's all the same vague comments about 'the best
schools' and 'the best teachers' – the broad strokes that everybody
wants, but they never define what a good teacher is or a good school or a
good trustee."
There's a line in
The Usual Suspects: "The greatest trick the
devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist." In the case
of the pro-charter, pro-voucher, anti-union coalition known as the
"education reform" movement, the greatest trick was grabbing a suitably
nebulous name (or group of names), and promoting their cause through
equally nebulous, feel-good terms. Zarifis is far from sanguine about
their intentions. "When I hear 'reform,' the first word that comes to
mind is destruction," he said. "They want to take public education out
of the hands of the public, and control it themselves. It comes from
billionaires like Michael Bloomberg, who don't understand what it's like
to be in a classroom with 35 kids for 90 minutes, and spending every
one of those 90 trying to make sure they learn something."
The suspicion is that there's a game plan, and groups like AKF, TFA,
and LEE all play a role.
Reformers push metrics like school
"accountability" standards that serve to make perfectly acceptable
schools appear to be chronic failures. Groups like TFA air-drop student
teachers into the neediest school districts and claim that they're
"saving schools" – with the implication that existing teachers, with
their contracts and experience and training and union protections – are
just serving their self-interests. Then charter groups and voucher
advocates gin up talk of "school choice," and cream off the best
students, leaving public schools with the most struggling students,
diminishing finances, and demoralized teachers.
Invest Nationally ... Vote Locally
How does a candidate get the Austin Kids First endorsement? According
to Executive Director Stephen de Man, the process is utterly
transparent, "with the purpose of getting trustees who are about putting
kids first. Thus the name." Candidates fill out a questionnaire, then
meet with board members, and an endorsement – with resulting
contributions – is made. "Everything's super-transparent. But we look
for certain qualities that go beyond litmus-test issues."
In the At-Large Position 9 race, AKF backed Kendall Pace. She now
faces UT program director Hillary Procknow in the run-off, and she has
the AKF blessing and cash to help her. Pace said she modeled her
campaign on that of Trustee Gina Hinojosa in 2012, even using the same
commercial firm for her TV spots. When it came to AKF, she filled out
their candidate form, and then met with de Man and John Armbrust, the
executive director at charter group
Austin Achieve Public Schools, at
Cherrywood Coffeehouse. After that, AKF donated $35,000, which she used
to pay for her TV time. However, that was not the end of their
assistance. "People came up to me afterwards and said, 'Oh my god, I
like your flier.' I'm like, 'what flier?'" AKF had actually paid for two
different mailers on her behalf and, in keeping with state campaign
"non-coordination" laws about such dark money expenditures, they had
never informed her that they existed.
Beyond legal restrictions, the group has pretty strict rules about
contact with candidates. No donor that contributes more than $500 can
take part in the endorsement process, and then the group has no contact,
beyond normal board operations and meetings, with trustees outside of
the election. That's not their purpose, de Man said. "We're not
issue-driven: 'Are you pro-this or anti-this?' Two years ago, it was
hard for people to understand. How can a group have this money, spend
this money, and not have an agenda?"
Austin Kids First at least appears indigenous. But there's nothing
local about Leadership for Educational Equity – the D.C.-based group
that spent almost $6,000 on District 1 candidate David "D" Thompson,
who's in a run-off with UT-Austin department chair Edmund "Ted" Gordon.
Thompson's platform is laudable: "Having incredible teachers in East
Austin, focus on gaps [between] our low-income and high-income
students, and between our white students and students of color." But
that's the kind of bland rhetoric that drives critics of the reform
movement (like Zarifis) crazy. Doesn't everyone want all of that?
Moreover, doesn't it imply that the current advocates for schools aren't
doing everything they can to reach those goals? During the first round
of this election, eyebrows were raised that Thompson – co-founder of the
Austin branch of KIPP Charter Schools and a TFA alum – suddenly wanted a
spot on the AISD board. Thompson countered that this was less fox
guarding the hen house than poacher turning gamekeeper.
And now, the revelation that LEE systematically supported his
campaign with about 60 in-kind contributions – from software expenses to
email costs to candidate coaching – has become fodder for the run-off.
Why would a D.C.-based 501(c)4 nonprofit get engaged in an Austin
school district election? Thompson says it's simple: He's a TFA alum and
a LEE member, and they take care of their own. "Leadership for
Educational Equity is an organization made up of current and former
teachers, educators, and leaders who care about educational equality."
The group is not dedicated to any set policies, just to candidates who
"are dedicated to putting kids first." There's one addendum: All those
teachers, educators, and leaders are TFA alums.
AKF's de Man described LEE's relationship to TFA as like "an alumni
society for a university." He should know. Before joining AKF, he was
LEE's Texas regional director. Yet while LEE denies any ideological
bent, its backers may have other ideas. In the last year, there have
been only three donors to its Texas operation: Wal-Mart heir Steuart
Walton, tech investor Arthur Rock, and former New York mayor Michael
Bloomberg. All three are stalwarts of the "reform" movement, all three
major advocates for the charter movement.
It's a similar story over at AKF. For the past two AISD board
elections, their major donors have been Professional Janitorial Company
owner and Republican donor Rex Gore, Silicon Labs co-founder David
Welland, and former Dell CTO Eric Harslem (plus John Armbrust who gave
$1,000 in the last cycle). That trio alone has infused tens of thousands
of dollars into an organization that wants to be a major player.
Backbone and Boiler Room
LEE and AKF: two seemingly separate entities – but the connecting
tissue is Teach for America. LEE's stated aim is "empowering Teach for
America corps members and alumni to grow as leaders in their communities
and help build the movement for educational equity." Meanwhile, AKF was
founded by TFA alumni Ben Maddox and Sean Flammer, and its current
board is comprised of all TFA alums. Moreover, in 2012, when the group
first appeared on the scene, it faced immediate accusations that it was
little more than AstroTurf, a local variant of the near-identical
Dallas Kids First, for which Maddox was a registered lobbyist (see "We're All
About the ... Kids!" Oct. 19, 2012). Its leadership is uniformly TFA
alumni, and with charter operators like Armbrust interviewing
candidates, there are obvious links between AKF, LEE, charters, and the
reform movement, all stretching back to TFA. Former Education Austin
president, now secretary-treasurer for statewide teachers union Texas
AFT, Louis Malfaro said, "Teach for America is the backbone, the hiring
room, think tank, and boiler room for the charter movement."
The links run deep into the personnel. Prior to replacing Flammer and
Maddox as AKF's head, de Man was TFA's recruitment director, its
director of Alumni Affairs, and then Texas regional director for LEE.
Beki Bahar-Engler, LEE Texas' treasurer and vice president of its D.C.
office, was previously TFA's vice president of strategy.
Then there's Thompson's former employers at KIPP. At its highest
level, the charter group and TFA are in bed together – literally. TFA
founder and CEO Wendy Kopp is married to Richard Barth, president of
KIPP. And that's where the real purpose of TFA and LEE becomes clear. In
2011, Kopp declared that TFA is a "leadership development organization,
not a teaching organization." That makes LEE the next step in that
leadership trail.
Yet there are undeniable differences between LEE and AKF. Moreover,
it's hard to paint AKF's endorsed candidate list as strictly
pro-charter, pro-reform. In 2012, it was easy, since they primarily
backed the candidates that voted to hand Allan Elementary over to IDEA.
This time, they're supporting Pace in the At-Large race, who is running
on a platform of more aggressively countering charter recruitment of
AISD students. They e ven endorsed two of the same candidates as
Education Austin: Gordon in District 1 and Julie Cowan in District 4.
Moreover, LEE and AKF found themselves on opposing sides in District
1. AKF formally endorsed Gordon, while LEE effectively ran its Texas
office as a second campaign office for Thompson. Since midsummer, LEE
hasn't spent a red cent in Texas except on Thompson. And this wasn't a
one-off contribution. Instead, it was a series of small expenditures,
from candidate training to email expenses and software costs.
But Zarifis wonders how serious AKF was about backing Gordon. All
told, the group dropped roughly $40,000 into Wagner vs. Schneider, but
only $2,500 into Gordon's campaign. That's the same as they spent on
Julie Cowan, although her District 4 win was a foregone conclusion.
"Austin Kids First had minimal involvement in the Ted Gordon race, even
though they endorsed him," said Zarifis. "While they have a lot of
money, they haven't spent much to counter the out-of-state money coming
into that race."
Ask de Man, and it's a question of priorities. First off, his group
decided to take a knee in District 6. Then, considering that both Gordon
and Cowan were sweeping the endorsements, and had the support of both
AKF and Ed. Austin, it seemed that they were foregone conclusions – a
conclusion that, at least in Gordon's race, he admits was woefully
premature. That just left the At-Large Position 9, and District 7. "So
that's why Yasmin got so much support."
Revolving Bedfellows
Is this coincidence, or is there really some grand conspiracy? De Man
is quick to defend his old bosses at LEE as strictly non-partisan.
"Even when I worked there, I could not gauge my support for candidates
according to some litmus test. If Hillary Procknow was a TFA alumnus,
she'd get just as much support as D." He points to LEE's support for Los
Angeles Unified School District board member Steve Zimmer: a TFA
alumnus so opposed to charters and vouchers that Bloomberg et al. threw
almost $2 million at his opponent. Zimmer is "probably the most
outspoken critic of the reform movement, but he got more support than
D."
Political consultant Mark Littlefield met with or worked in an
informal capacity with several candidates, including Cowan, Pace, and
Paul Saldaña, and is actually a friend of Wagner's since high school.
However, he was one of the big recipients of AKF cash, pulling in
$15,700 in consultancy fees. He countered any suggestion that the AKF
endorsement came with any strings. "Yasmin has no corporate reform
agenda. Her agenda was: I'm a parent out here, and I never see Robert."
As for LEE's involvement in District 1, he concurred with de Man's
analysis, saying, "If any TFA person runs for a school board seat
anywhere in America, they're going to back you with everything they've
got, and that's their sole criteria. ... They don't have an interest in
Austin, and would have backed [Thompson] if he ran in Round Rock or
Portland. At least, that's what I'm hoping."
For some, LEE's presence is yet another sign that Austin is no longer
a sleepy little college town, but a target of opportunity for
reformers. Position 9 candidate Procknow said, "They're setting the
stage right now. Austin looks like the kind of city they want to pick.
There's a large minority population, it's a charter-friendly state, and
there's a lot of money to be made."
Even in pro-reform Texas, vouchers face a powerful coalition of
opponents: Democrats, who see them as backdoor privatization, and rural
Republicans who fear that they would decimate their already struggling
ISDs. However, many Democrats have been swayed by charter proponents'
claims that they can cure all ills. Malfaro said, "I remember watching
Wendy Davis just gush over [KIPP founder] Mike Feinberg. 'Oh, we know
you guys know what you're doing, and you're doing it right.'
But
Feinberg more and more is opening up and admitting, 'Look, we don't know
how to run a whole school district. We're not good at that. We're not
even good at coming into a so-called failing school, a high-poverty
school where kids aren't doing well because of the tests, and take the
whole school over and turn it around.' " The end result, Zarifis said,
is "big money doubling down on strategies that haven't really proven
themselves out."
Malfaro is concerned that groups like LEE become political spin
machines. For Thompson, being able to say that he's been a K-12 teacher
is a powerful plus in this election. But that's a claim any TFA-er can
make, and Malfaro is dismissive of their classroom time being anything
but résumé-polishing. "It's two years, and off to law school."
The Money Trail
But AISD is pushing back. The first big sign that charters were not
welcome was the cancellation of the contract with IDEA Public Schools to
take over Allan Elementary and Eastside Memorial High. That's why
these elections are so important. Malfaro described the current trustees
as "the most progressive school board I've seen in the 20 years that
I've been involved." That makes Austin "a flash point for the
privatizers. But Austin is ground zero for the community schools
movement." He points to the community-led Travis Heights in-district
charter, and advocates like Allan Weeks, who created community
coalitions to support, not supplant, public schools. He said, "That
doesn't fit with [the reformers'] narrative that teachers are the
problem, teachers' unions are the problem, tenure is the problem."
But again, why should LEE care about AISD? According to Zarifis,
"Because we've been successful in drawing a line and saying we value
public schools, neighborhoods schools. We value the families that go to
those schools. We push back at charters coming into those schools. That
type of success just riles the reformers up because that's not their
vision. They want to sell public education to this charter and that
charter, upend neighborhoods, and limit choice for kids."
District 6 run-off candidate Saldaña concurs. "I think part of it may
be that they see some potential vulnerabilities in AISD," he said,
noting that AISD has already lost over 2,000 families to charters.
However, he added, with new trustees and a new superintendent, "We have
an opportunity to turn the page, to create a new legacy, and one way we
have to do that is create a better working relationship with the
community and serving the needs of the neighborhood schools."
Moreover, Austin is ground zero for community resistance to what the
charter movement has become. And it's that little twist – what the
charter movement has become – that is so important. Originally, charters
were supposed to be community-led engines for innovation. With a few of
the bureaucratic leashes and tethers removed, schools could experiment,
and then districts could apply what they had learned to all their
schools. Instead, Malfaro argues, they've become Plan B for venture
capitalists who thought they'd make a fortune off school vouchers. When
communities nationwide turned vouchers into political poison, they
changed tack. "Public education is this untapped opportunity for vendors
of all kinds," said Malfaro.
All observers expect the battle to continue at the state level. Last
session, Senate Education Committee Chair Dan Patrick pushed hard for
both vouchers and an end to the cap on the number of charters. It's a
foregone conclusion that, as lieutenant governor, he'll push even harder
for the same targets. However, he'll face the same opposition he faced
last time, both from Republicans and Democrats, as they seek to have
charters held to the same accountability standards as public schools.
Malfaro said, "If that happens, more charters will close, and it becomes
a worse investment. You're going to see these investors pull out of
charters. They're not doing this for some altruistic view of education.
They're doing this to make money."
AISD Board run-off elections are Dec. 16, with early voting Dec. 1-12. Click here for voting info and Chronicle
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