I think the article misses a lot of the historical context of DC.

DCPS had enrollment of over 150,000 in the mid-20th century, and has had dramatic declines each decade since -- however, since mayoral control in 2007 DCPS enrollment has stabilized around 45,000, and actually grew last year.

Over the decades, the low quality of school options led DC families to leave the public system or the city entirely. Charters did not cause these problems -- they are a recent addition that have contributed to the resurgence of enrollment in public schools overall. Charter public schools have grown steadily over the past 15 years, but their recent growth has not been at the expense of DCPS -- public charters and DCPS have both grown enrollment in the past few years, leading to substantial increases in public school enrollment overall.

As someone else mentioned earlier, Walton has given millions to DCPS as well. If you want to avoid their money, you might need to leave DC (or go private).

I can't believe this is the first time I'm thinking about it, but does anyone know the difference in pay for teachers at charters vs. DCPS?

I feel there's a need for both charters and a strong public school system. We're not going to have real "choice" until they're both equally viable.

But if the flexibility that charters have comes at the expense of teacher compensation, that gives me pause. It's one of those super-critical occupations, where we expect someone to invest in high quality education and training and then trust them with our kids, but ask them to accept really pathetic wages and benefits. I can't support any movement that keeps that trend on a downward spiral.

Want to challenge the Walton Foundation-

-Advocate for higher minimum wage
-Support labor rights at charter schools (it will come soon enough given the burn out rate)
-Advocate for affordable housing

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thank you to the Walton Foundation for helping provide educational opportunities that our elected leaders failed at for decades.

Oh, wow. You do realize that a lot of the problems with education in DC are related to the enormous task that is overcoming poverty, right? And you do get that the Waltons/Walmart are basically the face of feeding off of said poverty, no? Shall we also praise McDonalds for bringing healthy eating options to Wards 7 and 8?

So Walmart and MacDonald's should leave Wards 7 and 8 immediately! That'll keep them from "feeding off of said poverty"!!!

Yeah, you're missing the forest for the trees. DC has huge problems with our education system. Many of those problems are directly related to not being able to end the cycles of poverty that have taken over many parts of the city. Part of the problem is that many in our society is not truly invested in ending poverty. For example, we have companies like Walmart which refuse to pay their employees a living wage and drain government funds by using the government as a health care system. By draining these government funds, there are fewer funds available for things like education programs or anti-homelessness programs - you know things that relate to poverty. But, whatever, let's just forget all that and shower them with praise for helping out a few charter networks.

Yup like boycotting Walmart and charters that get funding from their foundation is going to do squat for ending the cycle of poverty.

The charters would not need money from Walmart et al if DC provided equal funding for all their PUBLIC schools.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thank you to the Walton Foundation for helping provide educational opportunities that our elected leaders failed at for decades.

Oh, wow. You do realize that a lot of the problems with education in DC are related to the enormous task that is overcoming poverty, right? And you do get that the Waltons/Walmart are basically the face of feeding off of said poverty, no? Shall we also praise McDonalds for bringing healthy eating options to Wards 7 and 8?

So Walmart and MacDonald's should leave Wards 7 and 8 immediately! That'll keep them from "feeding off of said poverty"!!!

Yeah, you're missing the forest for the trees. DC has huge problems with our education system. Many of those problems are directly related to not being able to end the cycles of poverty that have taken over many parts of the city. Part of the problem is that many in our society is not truly invested in ending poverty. For example, we have companies like Walmart which refuse to pay their employees a living wage and drain government funds by using the government as a health care system. By draining these government funds, there are fewer funds available for things like education programs or anti-homelessness programs - you know things that relate to poverty. But, whatever, let's just forget all that and shower them with praise for helping out a few charter networks.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thank you to the Walton Foundation for helping provide educational opportunities that our elected leaders failed at for decades.

Oh, wow. You do realize that a lot of the problems with education in DC are related to the enormous task that is overcoming poverty, right? And you do get that the Waltons/Walmart are basically the face of feeding off of said poverty, no? Shall we also praise McDonalds for bringing healthy eating options to Wards 7 and 8?

So Walmart and MacDonald's should leave Wards 7 and 8 immediately! That'll keep them from "feeding off of said poverty"!!!

Anonymous wrote:Thank you to the Walton Foundation for helping provide educational opportunities that our elected leaders failed at for decades.

Oh, wow. You do realize that a lot of the problems with education in DC are related to the enormous task that is overcoming poverty, right? And you do get that the Waltons/Walmart are basically the face of feeding off of said poverty, no? Shall we also praise McDonalds for bringing healthy eating options to Wards 7 and 8?

Anonymous wrote:Thank you to the Walton Foundation for helping provide educational opportunities that our elected leaders failed at for decades.

+1000

Gates foundation too!


If DC provided equitable funding for ALL it's PUBLIC schools and not just DCPS, private foundations would not be needed.

Thank you for allowing some of us to stay in DC and not move to the 'burbs.

Walton is probably the biggest source of charter money, along with Gates. How can you fault a charter school that needs money to pay people., do planning etc before eg get a single dollar in per student allocation?

So Walmart is funding the schools and the oversight board that is the only prayer of any accountability for what happens to our tax dollars. That's just great.

Pretty much like every other conservative thing that is happened to our government where industry takes over the regulatory apparatus so there is basically no accountably and no one looking out for the overall public interest instead of the narrow industry interest.

Indirectly all charter schools in DC are tied to the Waltons/Walmart. From the article:

"In Washington, for example, the group has given more than $5.8 million to the District of Columbia Public Charter School Board, whose members are nominated by the mayor to regulate the opening and closing of charter schools. The board has used Walton’s grants to help develop accountability measures for all charter schools in the city."

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would never send my kid to a school funded by Walmart/Walton. Shame on MV.

But it sounds like Walmart money is all over the DC charters, MV was just one of the schools that was named. Is that information available to the public?

And for that matter, there is lots of other money floating around the charters...THAT IS THE POINT...don't you think Abby Smith and Kaya Henderson know about ALL THAT MONEY?

The Walton Family Foundation lists all of its grantees on it's website. Here's are the lists from 2009-2013

http://www.waltonfamilyfoundation.org/about/2009-grants
http://www.waltonfamilyfoundation.org/about/2010-grants-report
http://www.waltonfamilyfoundation.org/about/2011-grant-report
http://www.waltonfamilyfoundation.org/about/2012-grant-report
http://www.waltonfamilyfoundation.org/about/2013-grant-report

And yes, Abby Smith and Kaya Henderson know about all that money. For one thing, Walton has been among a group of foundations that have funded the major DCPS teacher pay raises through the DC Public Education Fund.

http://www.waltonfamilyfoundation.org/grantees/d.c.-public-education-fund

And this is not really news, but it is probably the first time it has been highlighted on the front page of the New York Times. Below is an example of stories from 2011.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/how-walton-foundation-spent-157-million-on-ed-reform-in-dc-and-other-places/2011/06/28/AGhLy0pH_blog.html

Anonymous wrote:I would never send my kid to a school funded by Walmart/Walton. Shame on MV.

Is your child currently in a charter? If so, where is your child enrolled and someone on this board can tell you if your child's current school received a Walmart/Walton grant. If your child has not yet enrolled in a school, please let us know which schools, if any, did you try to lottery your children.

Anonymous wrote:Charters are definitely a mixed bag. Are these foundations going to continue to fund the charter movement forever or will they pull back once they sufficiently cripple their union opponents?

On the other hand, 9/10 of the kids at my Ward 8 church attend charters because their local school was bad and they didn't have the means to do the cross river or cross town commute every day.

As a charter parent, at a school that relies heavily on Walton grants and others, I also wonder if these grants will be around for the long haul.