While some Hartford voters turn their attention to tonight's Achieve Hartford! "education" debate between Mayor Pedro Segarra and Luke Bronin, the truth is finally coming out about Bronin and his ties to the charter school industry and their pro-Common Core testing, pro-charter school, anti- teacher and anti-public school agenda.
As anyone who has been watching the mayoral campaign in Hartford knows, Luke Bronin has been attacking Mayor Pedro Segarra for not getting more education funding from Governor Malloy for Hartford's public schools.
However, what has remained relatively secret is that Bronin's PR person is a well-paid adviser for Families for Excellent Schools, the New York based charter school industry group that spent more than $1 million lobbying Connecticut legislators on behalf of Governor Malloy's proposal to divert millions of dollars in scarce state funds so that Bridgeport and Stamford could get new, privately owned, but publicly funded charter schools -- one of which will make former Capital Prep Principal Steve Perry very rich.
Now, with days to go until Hartford's Democratic Primary, the truth is finally coming out.
Bronin's Communications Director, Andrew Doba, who served as Governor Dannel Malloy's mouthpiece until this past January, is behind an expensive, glossy mass mailing that is being sent to voters across Connecticut to "thank" Connecticut legislators for successfully funding the new charter schools while utterly failing to adequately fund Connecticut public schools, including those in Hartford.
Doba, who is both Bronin's PR person and the hired gun for the charter school industry has been on Twitter regularly attacking Segarra on Bronin's behalf.
In one Tweet, Andrew Doba @AndrewDoba wrote;
Will the layoffs of teachers and other staff that's going to happen because of your budget help Hartford Public Schools? #AskSegarra
In another, Doba, who works for a New York based public relations company said;
With strong push from @GovMalloyOffice, Leg. made the right call in meeting its financial commitment to charter schools
And Doba also retweeted his client's tweet which cheered;
Thank you to our state leaders who showed a strong commitment to ensuring access to great school #ForEveryChild.
Now, in a mailing that looks surprisingly similar to the glossy campaign pieces Luke Bronin has been sending out to Hartford voters comes a expensive lobbyist-funded brochure telling state legislators that they did a great job when they decided to fund privately owned charter schools... rather than doing what they should have done and provided Hartford and Connecticut's other cities and towns with the money needed to adequately fund local schools.
The Charter School Industry mailing is going to voters all over Connecticut, including voters in Hartford.
As CT Newsjunkie explains in today's article entitled, Special Interest Group Sends Mailing To Thank Lawmaker For Charter Funding
State Rep. Brandon McGee, D-Hartford, is being thanked with a glossy mailer from a special interest group that has spent more than $1.1 million this year lobbying lawmakers and Gov. Dannel P. Malloy to make sure two new charter schools were included in the state budget.
The mailer was sent to constituents in McGee's district, which includes the northend of Hartford and parts of Windsor, by Families for Excellent Schools.
"More kids now have access to a quality education, which means more opportunity and a brighter future," the mailer reads.
It asks constituents to call McGee and thank him for his commitment to Connecticut kids.
It's unclear still how much money was spent on the mailers because the filings are not due to the Office of State Ethics until the next quarter. It's also unclear exactly how many other lawmakers may have benefited from the mailers by the pro-charter school group.
"The mailer thanked a number of legislators for their support for great schools for every child," Kara Neidhardt, a spokeswoman for Families for Excellent Schools, said in an email. "The cost of the entire campaign will be disclosed in the next filing."
McGee, who works in the Capitol Region Education Council's school choice office, said Wednesday that he's not offended by the mailing. He said he supports choice programs and participated in the school choice program when he was a child.
[...]
This isn't the first time a pro-charter school group has expended funds on McGee's behalf. In 2012, when he first ran for his seat, a school reform group with ties to StudentsFirst, the organization founded by the controversial former chancellor of the Washington school system, poured nearly $32,000 into his race.
The budget approved by the legislature in June included $4.6 million to open two new charter schools in Stamford and Bridgeport. Malloy insisted the two schools remain in the budget despite complaints from some of McGee's colleagues in Hartford and Bridgeport.
Families for Excellent Schools has lobbied hard this year for increased funding for charter schools. The group spent $1.1 million between January through June. It also hired public relations and political strategy firms that employ former Malloy staffers Andrew Doba and Roy Occhiogrosso.
Families for Excellent Schools held a rally on the New Haven green in December last year and one in May outside the state Capitol in Hartford. At the rally in Hartford, they spent $87,700 on transportation and $14,000 on food for the students and parents who attended.
You can see the complete MUST READ CT Newsjunkie article at: Special Interest Group Sends Mailing To Thank Lawmaker For Charter Funding
And meanwhile, let's get things straight when it comes to Luke Bronin and his campaign for mayor of Hartford;
Democrat Luke Bronin says it is Democrat Mayor Pedro Segarra's fault that Democrat Dannel Malloy and the Democrats in the Connecticut General Assembly didn't give Hartford more education funding. Bronin even blames Segarra for any tax increases that were necessary as a result of the state's failure to give Hartford the funding it needed. Bronin says he will cut taxes and provide more money for education...
At the same time Luke Bronin says that HE deserves a good chunk of the credit for Malloy's 2nd chance initiative because has Malloy's lawyer he was involved in the policy process in the Governor's Office, but none of the blame for Malloy's failure to properly fund public schools.
Meanwhile, Luke Bronin's spokesperson's New York based company received hundreds of thousands of dollars from the charter school industry for coordinating the lobbying campaign on behalf of the charter schools, a proposal that diverted Connecticut taxpayer money that should have been spent on public schools.
And behind all that is the reality that a number of the key players behind charter schools are among Bronin's biggest campaign donors... money that is so important to Bronin that he refused to give back those funds and thus lost the endorsement of the Hartford Federation of Teachers.
Yup, Luke Bronin has arrived from Greenwich and is ready to save Hartford....
Lets look at a quote from the GOP's choice for President and see why he's so popular with the lunatic fringe.
"I have black guys counting my money. ... I hate it. The only guys I want counting my money are short guys that wear yarmulkes all day." (USA Today, May 20, 1991).
Yup, that explains everything when it comes to the GOP's love affair with Trump.
The organizer of occupy movement's Torrington group says she plans to challenge U.S. Rep. Elizabeth Esty for the 5th Congressional District seat in 2016. Stephanie Piddock, who is also volunteering as 5th District coordinator for Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign, said via email that she intends to make her Green Party candidacy official in two weeks.
"The people need to be represented by The People, not by the moneyed elite whose wealth and self-interest profoundly disconnect them from our reality," Piddock said. "As the political system exists right now, the metallic clang of money is speech, and the sinister rustle of dollars is a poor substitute for the vigor of votes."
Two weeks remaining to this surreal Democratic primary for mayor that features a two-term incumbent seeking to become the second longest serving mayor in history, a former mayor trying to make history returning to the job he had for 11-plus years and a third candidate seeking history as the first Democratic female mayor. And it's possible, after all the charges, countercharges, give and take, mail pieces, commercials, door knocks, phone calls, all three, Bill Finch, Joe Ganim and Mary-Jane Foster, could continue on to the November general election irrespective of the September 16 primary result.
If he can't handle his own finances, how can anyone in Ansonia want this man overseeing their taxes?
The federal Internal Revenue Service has filed another tax lien against Ansonia Mayor David Cassetti.
The lien - filed by an IRS agent in City Hall Aug. 14 - says Cassetti owes the federal government $59,384.19 dating back to 2011, though the "date of assessment" listed on the document is July 6, 2015.
It is the fifth federal tax lien filed against Cassetti since January. The liens total $173,208.06.
[...]
In addition to the federal tax liabilities, Cassetti's business, Birm-1 Construction, was also late with several local property tax and sewer use bills totaling about $18,000.
The company's Riverside Drive property also faces foreclosure.
The top Republican in the Senate and one of the most vocal critics of Democratic budget policies, Minority Leader Len Fasano of North Haven, had bumped heads with Lembo -- also a Democrat -- last February, arguing the comptroller should have spoken out more vigorously against a growing deficit in the 2014-15 fiscal year.
Lembo is expected to close the books later this month on the 2014-15 fiscal year, a budget that is on pace to feature the first deficit of Malloy's administration, albeit a small one. The last projection from both the governor's budget staff and from Lembo placed that likely shortfall at $70.9 million, or just under one-half of 1 percent of the general fund.
Fasano, who said he's convinced the current budget also will fall into deficit before the fiscal year ends, challenged Lembo on Wednesday to a friendly wager. "The state will once again end in deficit," Fasano wrote to the comptroller. "I am so sure of this, in fact, that I am willing to bet on it, and whoever is right owes the other a dinner.
"I am typically not one to enter into a bet lightly and this will be the first bet I hope I don't win. However, in this case, when you look at the numbers, it will be (a) tough one to lose."
The comptroller replied that "I'm not one for wagers - not with my money and certainly not with the taxpayers. ... Let's just agree to meet up anyway and split the bill after a meaningful policy discussion (rather than gimmicky letters). I'm guessing that we will agree on more things than we disagree - like the need to bolster wages for Connecticut workers, the need to close the digital divide in Connecticut and reinvent our technological infrastructure so that all businesses and households can work in today's technology-driven world. I look forward to hearing about all of your big ideas as well, so let's put something on the calendar. But remember...I'm a vegetarian, so save the bull for someone else."
Over the past two years Connecticut taxpayers have dropped $32 million on the Common Core SBAC tests and another $12.4 million for implementation of the Common Core. The Connecticut state budget allocates another $43.1 million for the Common Core and Common Core SBAC tests for this year and next.
Add in the tens of million spent by local school districts on computers and internet expansion so that students can take the on-line tests, along with the substitute teachers who were brought in so that full-time teachers could be pulled out to "learn about the Common Core," and well over $150 - $200 million dollars (or more) in public funds have been diverted from instruction to the Common Core and Common Core testing disaster.
So what has all that money gotten the students, parents, teachers and taxpayers of Connecticut?
Public education advocate, commentator and educator Ann Policelli Cronin addresses the issue in her latest blog post entitled, SBAC: The Beginning Of The End
So what did we learn from the release of the SBAC scores? ...
Not much.
We did learn that the achievement gap has not been in any way affected by implementation of the Common Core. I have been in a position to analyze CMT and CAPT scores over many years, and the SBAC scores tell the same story as the CMT and CAPT scores. That story is that students in affluent communities score significantly higher than students in poor communities do. No administration of a test will ever change that fact. No set of national standards or standardized test on those standards will ever "close the achievement gap". First of all, high scores depend on the quality of the lives children have outside of school much more than what happens in school. Secondly, if the national standards and aligned testing did raise scores, then all scores would go up, both those of the students in affluent districts and those in poor cities. So the "gap" would be unchanged.
We did learn that charter schools, even with their cherry-picked student bodies, did not do better than many public school districts which do not restrict their student populations of special education students, English language learners, or students with behavioral issues. For example, SBAC 8th grade math scores for charter schools ranked 63, 67, 71, 74, 100, 103, 107, 119, 123,130, and 133 out of 133 reporting districts and schools. Of course, many of those charter schools had better scores than the districts from which their students came and should be expected to have better scores than the students' originating public school districts because the charter schools have siphoned off some students with drive and potential from those districts.
We did learn that the SBAC scores tell us nothing about the learning going on in Connecticut schools. We can't tell what schools just paid lip service to Common Core Standards and what ones focused almost exclusively on the Common Core. Without a doubt, the schools with scores demonstrating under 20% proficiency on the SBAC spent more time on test prep than the schools in affluent districts with higher SBAC scores. Yet we are told that schools must limit their curriculum to Common Core so that the school's test scores will improve. It makes no sense. Some districts which had curriculum dedicated to the Common Core and teachers who taught to it diligently had low test scores, and some districts that just about ignored the Common Core in curriculum and practice had good scores. High test scores and teaching to the Common Core had zero correlation.
We also learned that SBAC scores tell us nothing about students' real competencies. As anyone who has an understanding of how to teach students to be thoughtful readers, effective writers, and competent thinkers knows, the more a teacher teaches to the Common Core ELA standards, the farther away those students will be from being thoughtful readers, effective writers, and competent thinkers. So the actual achievement gap will widen between the students in the affluent communities and the students in the cities with their increased test prep due to the low 2015 SBAC scores.
The Common Core Standards for English Language Arts lack any research base whatsoever and have no evidence that they will produce "college and career readiness", yet we restrict our neediest students to that Common Core regimen due to our misplaced reliance on the SBAC scores. Just because a PR firm was hired to promote the Common Core Standards and that PR firm, through focus groups, determined that "rigor" was the word that would sell the standards to the American public does not make the standards or the SBAC test rigorous. Neither of them is. The Common Core ELA standards teach a discredited way of reading and an inadequate way of writing, and the SBAC test is an exercise in "Gotcha".
We did learn from the 2015 SBAC test that opting-out is going to be an influential part of the narrative about assessing learning in the future. For example, in West Hartford, Conard High School had an opt-out rate of 5.5% and Hall High School had a 61.4 % opt out rate. What then can we tell about the two schools in the same town? Does Hall have more students who have applied to competitive colleges and do not want their excellent records of good grades and SAT scores hurt by a test designed to produce low scores? Does Hall High have parents who are more savvy than Conard parents and who are making a statement about their values and the kind of learning that they want for their children? Is learning richer and deeper at Hall than at Conard so that students and their parents seek other kinds of demonstrations of student achievement?
Also, are Westbrook High School, North Haven High School, Hartford Public High School's Law and Government Academy, Daniel Hand High School in Madison, and E.O. Smith High School in Storrs places where the emphasis is on real learning because more than 85% of the juniors in those schools opted-out of the 2105 SBAC math test? School by school, parent by parent, district by district, those questions will be explored now that Connecticut has completed its first year of SBAC testing, and, if we can judge by what is happening in New York where implementation of the Common Core and the taking of a Common Core aligned test is a year ahead of Connecticut, it seems reasonable to believe that opting-out will increase.
Over this past year of SBAC testing, some told the story that we need SBAC to close the achievement gap. That story is wrong. Closing the achievement gap will never happen with standardized tests. Some told the story that we need SBAC to gather data in order to compare schools and districts. That story is wrong. SBAC data is same-old, same-old; we had it all along with our state tests. Some told the story that we need SBAC to gather data about individual students and the skills they need. That story is wrong. SBAC doesn't address students' learning needs; teachers do. Some told the story that SBAC measures what students need to learn, but that story is terribly wrong. Those telling it must not be educators. They must not know what real learning is or what students need to be prepared to do.
It is time to end SBAC. It is time for a new story. A true one.
After the Malloy administration pulled a Friday afternoon dump with the release with the less than impressive SBAC test results, the Connecticut Education Association released the following statement:
Governor Dannel Malloy's administration is finally ready to release the 2015 SBAC results!
Two months after parents in Washington State and Oregon were informed about how their state's children did on the unfair, inappropriate and discriminatory Common Core SBAC tests, Connecticut will finally get the news today about how our children "performed" on the absurd testing fiasco.
The first rule of modern government and politics is that when you don't want people to know something, release the information on a Friday. If possible, a Friday in August is best time to make something "public" if the goal is to make sure the public doesn't actually hear about it. The technique is an "art form" and strategy that the Malloy administration has used repeatedly over the past five years.
So now, after the spending more than $50 million dollars in state funds over the post two years on the new Common Core standardized testing scheme, and local school districts spending millions more, the Connecticut State Department will be revealing the test results this afternoon... A Friday afternoon in August.
In addition, apparently the wait for the CMT/CAPT Science test is finally over as well. While the Common Core and Common Core testing scheme has obliterated the usefulness of the Math and English Language tests, the traditional testing process is still being used to measure whether students are learning the state's science curriculum.
Unfortunately, the education reform industry's definition for being "college and career" ready only applies to Math and English so other important subjects, like science, go unaddressed. If policymakers were really concerned about the "whole child," the science results would have been released long ago so that schools and parents could be focusing on the full array of subjects that allow student's to acquire the knowledge and skills needed to live fulfilling lives.
Check back later for the numbers and the political spin from Governor Malloy's administration and the Corporate Education Reform Industry.
U.S Sen. Chris Murphy, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, says he will vote for the controversial Iran deal next month.
In a telephone interview on Monday with The Middletown Press, the junior senator from Connecticut said he will support the agreement because of its import.
"This is one of the most important votes I'll take during my time in Congress," he said. "You've got to make sure you'll sleep at night depending on the way you voted."
he Hartford Federation of Teachers has rescinded its endorsement of mayoral challenger Luke Bronin after he refused to return campaign donations from charter school advocates, the union said Wednesday.
Just three weeks ago, union President Andrea Johnson told The Courant that the 2,250-member union was backing Bronin after he expressed robust support of neighborhood schools, and "the need to have monies being pumped into those community schools."
On Wednesday, Johnson said the union's executive board, which picked Bronin over Mayor Pedro Segarra after interviewing five candidates this summer, decided to pull the endorsement after confronting Bronin and asking him in a face-to-face meeting on Monday to return the campaign money.
"He chose not to do so," said Johnson, a vocal opponent of publicly funded charter schools. "We just couldn't in good conscience - we didn't want to be hypocrites and say, 'Well, it's OK, you can believe in something and you could be part of something'" that the union stands against.
"We are just so far away from charter schools and what they do to public education," Johnson said. "Money is lost to our regular public schools because monies are going from the state to these charter schools."
GGeorge Gallo, former top Republican staff member in the state House of Representatives, could be imprisoned for 15 months on Thursday when he is sentenced in federal court in Hartford for collecting $117,000 in kickbacks by steering political business to a direct-mail consultant.
Federal prosecutors accused Gallo, 47, of using his position as a senior Republican campaign adviser to subvert the state's toughest-in-the-nation clean-election law and to use it as a secret source of illicit income. The reform law, written to clean up the electoral process, gives substantial public campaign grants to candidates, some of whom are first-time office seekers with little notion of running for office.
As chief of staff to the House minority leader, Gallo advised novice candidates on the law, the Citizens Election Program. Prosecutors said he steered candidates to a Florida direct-mail company in return for 10 percent of whatever the Florida firm collected from Connecticut candidates.
Vice President Joseph Biden runs slightly better than former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton against leading Republican contenders in the 2016 presidential sweepstakes, and has the best favorability rating among top Republican and Democratic candidates, according to a Quinnipiac University National poll released today.
[...]
Clinton leads the Democratic field with 45 percent, down from 55 percent July 30, with U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont at 22 percent and Biden at 18 percent. No other candidate tops 1 percent with 11 percent undecided. This is Sanders' highest tally and closest margin.
Clinton tops the Democrats' "no way" list with 11 percent.
"Liar" is the first word that comes to mind more than others in an open-ended question when voters think of Clinton. "Arrogant" is the word for Trump and voters say "Bush" when they think of Bush.
[...]
"On the Democratic side, Secretary Hillary Clinton continues her slide while Sen. Bernie Sanders continues to narrow the gap," Malloy added. "But the real news is the man who isn't there - yet. Vice President Joseph Biden has the best appeal in general election matchups against top Republicans.
"Note to Biden: They like you, they really like you, or they like you more than the others.
"If he is sitting on the fence, his scores in the matchups and his favorability ratings may compel him to say, 'Let's do this.'"
Three former allies now political enemies on Wednesday night squared off with some sharp elbows and barbs in the first mayoral forum in a packed Holiday Inn ballroom fronting the hotly contested September 16 Democratic primary.
[...]
One of the highlights of the debate was a crackling exchange between Finch and forum moderator CT Post reporter Ken Dixon who snapped at Finch for the lack of crime information from the police department. Finch shot back "I have three opponents" (Ganim, Foster, Dixon), asserting no such order was given to withhold information. The exchange drew hoots and laughs from the audience of more than 300 that Dixon warned on several occasions to suppress reaction.
The debate featured three very different personalities that at one time worked together on city projects but also had a falling-out over different issues: Finch the outspoken two-term incumbent, Ganim measured in his approach and Foster the business women and University of Bridgeport executive urging a break from the past and present.
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