 |
| Why is this man smiling? |
NJ Gov. Chris Christie announced a pilot program today that will create a "public-private partnership" (translation: corporations looting the government) to run some schools in the state. The governor's cronies have a vested interest in selling off the state’s education system. The Star-Ledger reports:
Christie’s acting education commissioner, Christopher Cerf, has experience in public-private school partnerships. He previously led Edison Schools, a for-profit company that became the largest private-sector manager of public schools.PammieAnn posted a great comment about the Edison Schools below The Star-Ledger story:
No one thought anyone could run schools worse than the Philadelphia School System.
Then Edison came in.Christie himself had ties to the Edison Schools:
These won't be charter schools, or parochial schools, or private schools. These will be schools that eat up taxpayer dollars and operate outside the normal rules that public schools follow. And as soon as they rip your community's school apart, they will pull out, saying that it's not "cost effective" for them to continue to teach there, leaving the taxpayers of your town to foot the bill for what they have done to your children's education - if it can be fixed.
From 1999 to 2001, Christie was a registered lobbyist at a law firm that lobbied New Jersey government on behalf of Edison Schools, according to filings with the state Election Law Enforcement Commission. While the firm was representing the multinational education company, Chris Cerf was its general counsel.
The firm, Dughi, Hewit and Palatucci, also represented Mosaica Education, a for-profit charter school operator, and the University of Phoenix, a for-profit online university. At the time, the firm listed two lobbyists, Christie and William Palatucci, a longtime political ally of the governor who is a named partner in the firm.
During the 2009 gubernatorial campaign, then-campaign spokeswoman Maria Comella said the "overwhelming" majority — "over 90 or 95 percent" — of the firm's lobbying was done by Palatucci, who remains a close friend of Christie.Christie has a history of bad education reform attempts. In March, a New Jersey Supreme Court judge found unconstitutional Christie’s $820 million in cuts to state aid because they disproportionately harmed poor, urban districts.
The governor has also made no bones about his disdain for the teachers unions. He has called union leaders “bullies” while himself threatening to “take a bat” to his opponents. Christie has called the New Jersey Education Association (NJEA) a “political thuggery operation” that is “fat, rich and entitled.”
Think the mordibly obese, wealthy gov. is projecting?
We think so.
