Charter schools a gravy train for US wealthy. Also path to citizenship for foreign investors. EB-5

[madfloridian]

As TeacherKen at Daily Kos pointed out last year....all you have to do is follow the money.

Just follow the money

Our democracy is being sold off, one piece at a time.

The idea of local control of public functions is disappearing.

And remember that the restrictions imposed upon government agencies with respect to rights protected in the Bill of Rights and elsewhere do not necessarily apply to corporate entities. No pubic school could fine a parent for a child's behavior, nor expel a child without due process, but charters are known to do both, often with regularity.

Perhaps it is hard for people to understand how much the profit motive is driving the expansion of charters - which I might note is only one part of the corporate attempts to control the hundreds of billions in tax revenue intended to fund PUBLIC education. The traditional media organizations have done a horrible job in covering this aspect of what is happening in American public education.

Also last year there was an important article at Forbes on how the EB-5 visas are now involving charter school investment.

Charter School Gravy Train Runs Express To Fat City

It’s not only wealthy Americans making a killing on charter schools. So are foreigners, under a program critics call “green card via red carpet.”

“Wealthy individuals from as far away as China, Nigeria, Russia and Australia are spending tens of millions of dollars to build classrooms, libraries, basketball courts and science labs for American charter schools,” says a 2012 Reuters report.

The formal name of the program is EB-5, and it’s not only for charter schools. Foreigners who pony up $1 million in a wide variety of development projects — or as little as $500,000 in “targeted employment areas” — are entitled to buy immigration visas for themselves and family members.

“In the past two decades,” Reuters reports, “much of the investment has gone into commercial real estate projects, like luxury hotels, ski resorts and even gas stations. Lately, however, enterprising brokers have seen a golden opportunity to match cash-starved charter schools with cash-flush foreigners in investment deals that benefit both.”

I am bringing this gravy train thought down to what is going on in Florida. The Chinese are very involved in this here, except we can't know the charter schools in which they are investing. They like their privacy, you know.

From 2012

Chinese investing 90 million in FL charter schools by next year. Remain anonymous.

Chinese funding Florida charter schools

Chinese investors are taking advantage of the EB-5 investment visa program, the so-called "green card via red carpet," by putting millions into Florida's charter schools and an aquaculture farm in Central Florida.

Under the EB-5 program, through investments of at least $1 million — or $500,000 for "targeted employment areas" — foreign nationals are able to obtain legal residency in the US so long as the money they invest will help secure or create at least 10 full-time jobs.

A group of Chinese investors have put $30 million into the state's charter school program to date and are looking to invest three times that amount in the next year, Ilona Vega Jaramillo, director of international business development for Enterprise Florida, the state's economic development arm, said in a US-China roundtable discussion last week.

She would not name any of the investors, citing confidentiality.

Just in case you were wondering how successful Florida charter schools have been...take a look at this list of charter schools that have closed here.

I have not counted them, but I hear there are 250 on the list...dating from 1998 until this summer.

[madfloridian]

1. FL League of Women Voters lists FL legislature conflict of interest re charter schools. From May

Breaking News: Florida League of Women Voters Releases Bombshell Charter Study

FLORIDA LEGISLATORS WITH A DIRECT INTEREST IN CHARTER SCHOOLS:

Conflict of Interest Concerns

 Senator John Legg Chair of Senate Education Committee is co-founder and business administrator of Daysprings Academy in Port Richey.

 Senator Kelli Stargel from Orange County is on board of McKeel Academies. She is on the Education Committee and sponsored the Parent Trigger Bill.

 http://www.theledger.com/article/20130429/EDIT02/130429282

 House Budget Chairman Seth McKeel is on the board of McKeel Academy Schools in Polk
County.

 Anne Corcoran, wife of future House Speaker Richard Corcoran has a charter school in
Pasco County. http://www.tampabay.com/news/education/k12/pascos-classical-prep- charter-school-delays-opening-for-a-year/1276912. Richard Corcoran is Chair of the House Appropriations Committee.

 Senator Anitere Flores of Miami is president of an Academica managed charter school in Doral.

Just a few.

[madfloridian]

2. Morning kick.

Stuff still going on, just not much about it since last year.

[TBF]

4. I found a few recent articles about China overwhelming

the program.

Some of this is new to me (the Chinese piece especially) - but I did know about the Turkish investments because Harmony schools are huge in Houston: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/07/education/07charter.html?pagewanted=all

[TBF]

3. I don't think many folks really know about EB5

and it's huge because there is apparently a big incentive for some foreign investors to move to the US. Passed in 1990. Foreigners bring in their money and "invest" in a business in the US that will employ at least 10 people full-time. It has nothing to do with students - if they happen to do well in these "charter" schools it is purely incidental. The goal is to stimulate economic growth in the US. Some more articles for you -

EB-5 Immigrant Investor
Visa Description

USCIS administers the Immigrant Investor Program, also known as “EB-5,” created by Congress in 1990 to stimulate the U.S. economy through job creation and capital investment by foreign investors. Under a pilot immigration program first enacted in 1992 and regularly reauthorized since, certain EB-5 visas also are set aside for investors in Regional Centers designated by USCIS based on proposals for promoting economic growth.
http://www.uscis.gov/working-united-states/permanent-workers/employment-based-immigration-fifth-preference-eb-5/eb-5-immigrant-investor

China overwhelming the program:

Any foreigner willing to commit at least $500,000 and create 10 jobs in America can apply for an investor immigrant visa -- also known as an EB-5.
The demand from mainland Chinese eager to move abroad has already led the U.S. government to warn the program could hit a wall as early as this summer.

But there are plenty of critics, too. Some argue that the program is a way for the global elite to buy U.S. citizenship. Others say the scheme has too much red tape, and believe parts of it are mismanaged to the point of fraud.

http://money.cnn.com/2014/03/25/news/economy/china-us-immigrant-visa/

And the charter school piece - again the goal for these foreign investors is to get permanent VISAs for their own families (places like China now have over a million millionaires but it is crowded and poor environmental conditions - smog etc - so they move their families over to the US to live):

A federal program known as EB-5 allows foreigners to invest at least $1 million in certain job-producing projects — or $500,000 if the project is in a rural area or one with high unemployment — to win immigration visas for their families. So much for students first in education.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/02/15/why-wealthy-foreigners-invest-in-u-s-charter-schools/

[madfloridian]

9. China will have spent over 90 million just in FL on charter schools by end of last year....

and we are not allowed to know which ones.

That is scary stuff. I heard foreign investors were gobbling up real estate in Florida while it was cheap, but then we can't really know that either.

I missed the CNN article. Thanks for the link.

[Octafish]

5. Charter Schools -- the Piratization of Public Education

Not just because that's where the money is, but because a smart citizenry is a dangerous citizenry. Ask the French in Haiti what happened when Toussaint Louverture learned about Epictetus.

[madfloridian]

10. Good word for it.

China spends 90 million on Florida charter schools, and we can't even know which ones.

[Octafish]

11. Is it on tee vee?

I don't recall hearing this important news.

[madfloridian]

13. Exactly right. I wonder how many would care if they knew?

90 million from China being put into charter schools in FL. And we can't know the names.

Why are people not more concerned?

[theaocp]

6. Where are the Morans to protest

the foreign influences in their own backyard? *crickets* I despise charters, and I speak from personal experience. Ugh.

[marmar]

7. A nation in which children become nothing more than a money-making opportunity ......

...... is in deep, deep trouble.

[progressoid]

8. Rec!

[KamaAina]

12. "No pubic school could fine a parent for a child's behavior"?!