Emergency Manager 'inflates' numbers

By Eric T. Campbell
The Michigan Citizen”

DETROIT — Detroit Public Schools (DPS) emergency manager and Educational Achievement Authority (EAA) board chairman Roy Roberts is “inflating” his administrative success, according to a new study. Despite promises otherwise, the EM is directing more resources to his administration than the classroom.

Roberts has consistently criticized DPS bureaucracy, saying it directs only 55 percent of its revenue to the classroom. He further promised to increase that number to 95 percent in DPS and the state-mandated reform school district, the EAA.

A new report by the Detroit Data and Democracy Project contradicts Roberts’ numbers, indicating that Roberts has used differing formulas to support his claims.

The report, entitled “Emergency Manager Roy Roberts Pledges 95% of Funds to Classrooms: Ambition or Deceit?” was authored by Dr. Thomas C. Pedroni, Wayne State associate professor of Curriculum Studies and director of the Detroit Data and Democracy Project.

“Roberts greatly inflates his success in the area of classroom dollars and achieves the 90 percent figure by calling every expense category, except administration and debt service, ‘school based costs,’” the report states.

Using the same formula utilized by the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES), the one that Roberts uses to disparage DPS’ recent classroom expenditures of 55 percent, Roberts is actually putting even less into DPS classrooms.

Pedroni estimates that number to be 48.3 percent.

“Roberts was using a much more generous assessment for his own performance,” Pedroni told the Michigan Citizen. “And it’s not just that his numbers are wrong … remember this is the whole basis for his existence.”

Pedroni says that, in general, charter schools use the same tactics that Roberts employed. National studies conclude that charter schools dedicate more money to administration than to classrooms compared to public schools.

Roberts appeared before City Council July 17 to give his 2012 report on the state of DPS. During his statements, he announced that the DPS budget deficit is now only $72 million.

Detroit Board of Education President Lamar Lemmons says that number is also skewed to fit the appearance that Roberts has led the district out of financial despair.

Lemmons told the Michigan Citizen that DPS is really $272 million in debt if you include the long-term payments associated with the $200 million deficit elimination bond negotiated by Roberts in November 2011.

“You can show anything if you change the formula to get the results you want,” Lemmons told the Michigan Citizen. “He’s certainly done that before.”

To read Detroit Data and Democracy Project’s report on Robert’s classroom expenditures, visit https://sites.google.com/site/detroitdataanddemocracyproject/

Contact Eric T. Campbell at ericcampbell@michigancitizen.com

Mackinac Center — “Our goal is (to) outlaw government collective bargaining in Michigan”

From: We Are The People, Michigan.

In case you missed it, this morn­ing the Grand Rapids Press posted a story about a secret email exchange between the corporate-backed Mack­inac Cen­ter for Pub­lic Pol­icy and the new House Edu­ca­tion Com­mit­tee Chair, Rep. Tom McMillan.

In the mes­sage, the Mack­inac Center’s senior leg­isla­tive ana­lyst, Jack McHugh, said, “Our goal is (to) out­law gov­ern­ment col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing in Michi­gan, which in prac­ti­cal terms means no more MEA.”

As a reminder, it was two weeks ago today that Gov. Rick Sny­der head­lined a glitzy $150-a-plate fundraiser for the Mack­inac Cen­ter with Indi­ana Gov. Mitch Daniels. At the fundraiser, Sny­der said “he keeps a copy of the Center’s ‘101 Rec­om­men­da­tions to Revi­tal­ize Michi­gan’ on his desk and refers to it often.”

The doc­u­ment includes rad­i­cal pro­pos­als like repeal­ing state teacher cer­ti­fi­ca­tion require­ments, pri­va­tiz­ing state parks, elim­i­nat­ing State Police road patrols, elim­i­nat­ing Med­ic­aid spend­ing, allow­ing for oil drilling in the Great Lakes, repeal­ing the min­i­mum wage, and pri­va­tiz­ing the Uni­ver­sity of Michigan.

It’s clear the Mack­inac Cen­ter is noth­ing more than a front group for big cor­po­ra­tions that are deter­mined to out­law unions for teach­ers, nurses and fire­fight­ers. It’s time for Lans­ing politi­cians to stop pan­der­ing to these cor­po­rate spe­cial inter­ests and start work­ing together to invest in edu­ca­tion and cre­ate good jobs that pay a fair wage.

Michigan Teachers Could Go To Prison Just For Sending an Email

This is ridiculous.  Any Republican who tells you they’re for small government is full of shit.

From the article:

Conservatives who rail against “small government” ought to take a look at what the Republican Party of Michigan has been up to this past year. Allowing dictatorial “Emergency Financial Managers” to override the decisions of local governments – including invalidating union contracts – seems very much like “big government” to me.

In addition to attacking local democracy, the state of Michigan has been particularly brutal in its treatment of teachers. This is just the latest:

Michigan educators could face a year in prison for conducting union or political business over public school e-mail servers under a bill advancing in Lansing.

State House Bill 4052 was reported out of committee last week, and would prohibit a public employee from using public e-mail for political campaigning, union activities, union recruitment, and fundraising.

Violators could be found guilty of a misdemeanor, which would carry a fine of up to $1,000, up to one year in prison or both in the bill’s amended version.

Organizations found guilty would face up to a $10,000 fine.

If you’re a Michigan teacher and you’re thinking about the possible passage of this bill, there are probably many thoughts running through your head. Who gets to decide what counts as political campaigning? Is the mere mention of a union, or a union meeting, grounds for a conviction? Is there something in my account right now that could get me thrown in jail?

Putting aside the free speech issue for a second – what teachers don’t need is another distraction. Michigan legislators should be giving teachers the tools, resources, and autonomy they need to effectively educate students, not playing “Big Brother” on their email accounts.

But more importantly, putting someone in jail for expressing a political opinion isn’t something that should happen in the United States. Period. Not to mention that these same legislators spent all of 2010 railing against “big government” and the imagined “government takeovers” of various parts of their lives.

Michigan teachers don’t need to imagine government intrusion. From the prospect of their contract being revoked by an EFM to the possibility of imprisonment for writing an email, the very real government intrusion into their livelihoods is upon them.

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The most insane part of this bullshit law is that FOIAing for emails may not be legal and able to be used against teachers.  So they actually expect public employees to spy on one another. Check this article out: http://www.livingstondaily.com/article/20110925/NEWS01/109250323 “Pscholka said the bill would be enforced without the FOIA through self-reporting of public employees”  So these assholes think that public employees are willing to play 1984 Orwellian fun time?  Rather than create jobs, republicans would rather create a surveillance state.

Editorial: Unions, Michigan have no time for a right-to-work brawl

The only plus side of a “Right To Work” (for less) fight is that we (the unions) would prevail, and Rick the dick would for sure be a one term governor.  However it would be very costly to the state, and one hell of a battle.  Good article by the freep.