"Won't Back Down" Film Pushes ALEC Parent Trigger Proposal

[midnight]

"Well-funded advocates of privatizing the nation's education system are employing a new strategy this fall to enlist support for the cause. The emotionally engaging Hollywood film "Won't Back Down" -- set for release September 28 -- portrays so-called "Parent Trigger" laws as an effective mechanism for transforming underperforming public schools. But the film's distortion of the facts prompts a closer examination of its funders and backers and a closer look at those promoting Parent Trigger as a cure for what ails the American education system.

While Parent Trigger was first promoted by a small charter school operator in California, it was taken up and launched into hyperdrive by two controversial right-wing organizations: the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and the Heartland Institute.

ALEC brings together major American corporations and right-wing legislators to craft and vote on "model" bills behind closed doors. These bills include extreme gun laws, like Florida's "Stand Your Ground" law implicated in the Trayvon Martin shooting, union-busting legislation, Arizona style anti-immigrant legislation and voter suppression laws that have sparked lawsuits across the nation. The organization's agenda is so extreme that in the last few months 40 major U.S. companies, including Wal-Mart, Coca-Cola, Kraft, and General Motors, have severed ties with ALEC."

"Hollywood Fiction vs. the Facts on Parent Trigger

What is a Parent Trigger law? The proposals have varied from state to state, but they generally allow parents at any failing school, defined by standardized testing, to sign a petition to radically transform the school using any of four "triggers." Parents can petition to: 1) fire the principal, 2) fire half of the teachers, 3) close the school and let parents find another option, or 4) convert the school into a charter school. While the details of how the school can be "restructured" vary from state to state, the charter school option is always present. Charter schools are privately managed, taxpayer-funded public schools which are granted greater autonomy from regulations applicable to other public schools, ostensibly in exchange for greater accountability for results, but they have been criticized for uneven and mediocre track records."

http://www.prwatch.org/node/11763

[xchrom]

1. Du rec. Nt

[fasttense]

2. I saw the film advertised and wondered if it was just another

propaganda film for the private school industry.

What do you know? It was.

[midnight]

3. I have not seen this advertised yet, but it does sound like an Alec marketing tool....

[midnight]

4. New group ALICE to counter ALEC’s influence

I posted this in Wisconsin group a couple of days ago...I'm hoping teachers and parents will use this to filter out the ALEC speak...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10844991

This afternoon, the American Legislative and Issue Campaign Exchange (ALICE) announced the launch of its groundbreaking new website. ALICE is a one-stop, web-based, public library of progressive law on a wide range of issues in state and local policy.
ALICE Director Joel Rogers explained that “ALICE is an open, public, transparent resource that relies on the knowledge and goodwill of a network of professors, students, activists, researchers and others. The website we are launching today provides a starting place for activists, policymakers and others interested in progressive model law. We hope that others will join us in the important work of building a one-stop shop of progressive best practices.”

ALICE might be understood as a partial antidote to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), the corporate-backed group that has for nearly 40 years provided model state law and connection to corporate lobbyists to its nearly 2,000 state legislator members.

Like ALEC, ALICE is a values-based nonprofit that offers model legislation over a broad range of state and local issues. But it’s easily distinguished from its counterpart. ALICE aims to promote, not destroy, economic fairness, environmental sustainability, and effective democratic government. Its model laws are public, not secret. They’re written by public interest advocates and volunteers, not paid corporate lobbyists. They cover local, not just state, policy. They include law originating from the executive branch and directly from citizens, as well as from legislative bodies. And ALICE only provides such model law and written supports for its persuasive communication.

As Rogers said, “ALICE is not a corporate-funded juggernaut – nor do we aspire to be one. Unlike ALEC, we don’t plan to subsidize junkets for state legislators. As we get underway, we aim simply to supply a small, if vital, piece of a broader infrastructure: progressive model and exemplary laws that everyone should know about.”

For further information please visit our website at www.alicelaw.org, or contact us at 608.890.4879.

ALICE (American Legislative and Issue Campaign Exchange), is a project of the Center on Wisconsin Strategy (COWS), a nonprofit think-and-do tank, based at the University of Wisconsin-Madison that promotes “high road” solutions to social problems.

http://bloggingblue.com/2012/09/26/new-group-alice-to-counter-alecs-influence/

[Squinch]

8. You should post this as an original post on a general forum. I've been hoping for a group like this

[midnight]

18. I can do that....

[Cooley Hurd]

5. Apparently, Holly Hunter plays a corrupt Teachers Union official...

[midnight]

7. ALEC's message is loud and clear.... Unions are in the way so they are evil... Once we remove them

and accountability via privatization they own our schools.... Is this the last public hold out?

[Squinch]

10. In New York State, they tried to farm public preschool special education through private agencies.

Recent audits by the state have uncovered millions upon millions of dollars worth of scams perpetrated by the private companies. They are now moving toward making the private companies more answerable to the state.

It would make a lot more sense, and cost a lot less money if they would just administer the program through the state, but noooooooo... We must privatize, no matter what it costs.

[midnight]

15. Like the scandal, Scott Walker, being investigated in Wisconsin, there is always more... We already

know privatization costs more and we know that i.e.. medicare does a better job... so profit for a few at the expense of the most is going to stop being accepted and the real jig will be up... Not sure what it is, but I got a feeling it's more than we know...

[Frustratedlady]

6. They are trying to get the public to force public schools to close.

Beware, beware, beware.

By having charter schools, they can do whatever they want, charge what they want, teach what they want and discipline as they want. The public will only be able to control where their child goes. These scare the beejeebers out of me.

The public schools must take all students, so they cannot be compared to charter schools which can pick and choose. The public schools were doing fine until No Child Left Behind screwed them all up. Get out of the way and let the communities run the schools.

Sorry, but I get livid on this subject. I see what the teachers in my family have to go through, the dedication they have to their students and how they get the parents involved in their children's public school education.

This Parent Trigger will have parents fighting teachers rather than cooperating in their child's education. This is a bad situation and must be stopped before it is instituted. Haven't they done enough?

[Squinch]

9. This movie is a joke! Maggie's learning disabled kid would be rejected by a real charter school!

The premise of the movie is that Maggie's character starts up the charter school for the love of her learning disabled child.

The fact is that charter schools usually reject kids with learning problems. If a kid with a learning problem gets in by mistake, they are strongly encouraged to leave (by a variety of distasteful means) before "testing season" each spring so that the school's scores don't suffer as a result of that child's existence.

In real life, after Maggie's character had won her "victory" and gotten her charter school, her child would be booted within a few months. And now that the local public school is a charter school that won't accept Maggie's kid, the kid will be bussed out of the neighborhood to go to a public school that welcomes children with learning disabilities.

In real life, the other parents who thought the charter school was a keen idea, would find that they had no say in how their child is treated in that charter school, and if they are unhappy with their child's treatment, there is no place they can go to get help.

In real life, the children in the charter school have a 37% chance of doing worse than they did in the public school, and a 17% chance of doing better than they did in the public school.

Charter schools are a freaking scam!

[midnight]

11. ALEC Accountability Act brings transparency of gifts/lobbing of our legislators has been stalled...

"The influence of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) has not diminished despite recent corporate defections, Bill Moyers said Friday, or attempts to curb it with legislation like the ALEC Accountability Act.

The bill, Moyers said in a report on Moyers and Company, “has gone nowhere. ALEC, on the other hand, is still everywhere. Still hiding in plain sight. Watch for it. Coming soon to a statehouse near you.”

The group has earned a reputation as a “bill mill” that puts together legislation friendly to corporations and handing it to associated state lawmakers for them to pass off as their own. In the report, Lisa Graves, executive director of the Center for Media and Democracy, showed Moyers a box full of more than 850 bills to be used.


Graves said the bills, given to her by an inside source, covered everything from voter suppression to blocking climate-change regulation to restrictions on unions."

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/09/28/bill-moyers-alec-is-still-everywhere/

[liskddksil]

13. The reviews are really bad and the box-office so far is equally so.

"Won't Back Down performed terribly, and is on track for one of the worst openings of the year."

http://boxofficemojo.com/news/?id=3535&p=.htm

[midnight]

14. Awesome.....

I hope this means that AlEC loses their grip on getting parent to hand over their schools to these private entities...

[Squinch]

16. "One of the worst openings ever in a movie in 2500 theaters." EVER. Suck it, Kochs!

[midnight]

17. PBS commentator Bill Moyers says the Koch supported ALEC bill mill is everywhere.. and this movie

shows how varied their message and targeting audience is getting.. Our class rooms, our theaters, our legislators, our pharmacies, etc....