Christie, Booker, Zuckerberg and Newark schools....questions of legality?

[madfloridian]

Governor Christie, Mayor Booker (who does not legally have mayoral control), and Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook fame...have made a deal to allow Zuckerberg to give $100 million to Newark schools.

However it is only if they do things his way...charter schools, merit pay, more TFA teachers. Some question the deal's legality, and one group has threatened to sue.

The deal was made public on the Oprah show.

Finally a reporter gets what is happening to Newark, NJ schools...and says it out loud. From Star-Ledger NJ columnist, Bob Braun.

Idea of failing N.J. public schools promoted by politicians, privatizers, celebrities

It’s a newly popular idea: New Jersey’s public schools fail. An idea promoted by politicians on the national prowl, privatizers who’ll sell anything for a profit, and clueless celebrities who live thousands of miles away and believe Tony Soprano really lives here.

New Jersey has some of the best public schools in the nation. Ask admissions directors of the most selective colleges — the Ivies and Stanford and MIT and liberal arts colleges like Amherst and Haverford. Check out results from national tests like the National Assessment of Educational Progress — New Jersey ranks in the top five.

Some of the best schools — because it has some of the richest communities in the nation. The state also has some of the worst public schools — because it also has some of the poorest and most racially segregated communities in America.

Wealth and achievement are inextricably linked. Give the College Board, the agency that produces the SAT Reasoning Test, your family income numbers and your race and educational level of your parents and it will predict your scores and almost always be right.

He quotes a Rutgers law professor about the dangers in what is happening to education now.

"This is a very dangerous moment for public education," says Paul Tractenberg, the Rutgers law professor who knows the link between money and schooling. "Instead of facing up to our responsibilities to support the schools, we are tearing them apart. We are destroying the very values that created the public school system."

I found an interesting comment as well on the wisdom of such a move done in secret and announced on a TV celebrity's show.

Interesting post in the comments after an article about Zuckerberg taking control:

What you fail to miss is that this is a governor and a mayor essentially allowing the takeover of a major public school district by a private enterprise. That alone is illegal and in my view immoral. Anyone who thinks that shutting down public schools by a governor at whim is not a major threat to our democracy then they need to take off the blinders. This act goes against the very grain and foundation of what this country stands for. He is violating the law and doing it with supreme contempt. Today it may be a poor and failing district but trust me they will attempt to do this statewide. I hope he is ready because there will be major repercussions from what this governor and mayor are doing. I truly hopes this opens the eyes of voters to the fact that both republicans and democrats in this state are corrupt to the core and will violate every law imaginable to enrich themselves and their friends.

Facebook CEO names head of foundation to control Newark Schools

Actually there are questions, serious ones, about whether Governor Christie has the power to give Cory Booker oversight of the city's schools.

Newark residents torn by Christie plan to give Booker oversight of city schools on Oprah

Oprah seems to be inserting herself right into the power structure of Newark schools. She even suggested on her show that they make Michelle Rhee the Newark School Chancellor.

But when Newark Mayor Cory Booker walks off the set of the Oprah Winfrey show Friday with a $100 million gift to bolster Newark schools, there will be no raptured audience waiting for him back home.

As news spread through Newark today that Gov. Chris Christie will give Booker oversight of the city’s schools, and that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg will help set up a $100 million educational foundation to support school reforms, political and community leaders here reacted with a combination of cautious optimism and outrage.

..."The outrage seems to be not about the $100 million deal, but about this backroom deal," said Wilhemina Holder, a longtime education activist, grandmother, and mother of current and former Newark schoolchildren. She said her phone began ringing Wednesday evening when news of the deal first broke on NJ.com and it hasn’t stopped since. "People are just outraged that the governor has ignored the Newark voters. Over and over again every phone call I got was about this."

In order to get full mayoral control over Newark’s schools, Christie would have to get approval from the Legislature. Newark residents would then get a chance to vote on whether the mayor should run the operation that has been under state control since 1995. The deal that will be announced today is seen by many in Newark as an end-run around the law. Christie needs no approval from voters to simply appoint Booker as his "special assistant" for Newark schools, thus transferring responsibility to the mayor while maintaining the ultimate right to veto any changes that Booker makes.

A group called The Education Law Center has threatened a lawsuit if Christie puts Booker in charge of the city schools.

Putting Newark Mayor Booker in charge of city schools will incite legal action, experts say

If Cory Booker even thinks of making a decision affecting Newark schools, he and Gov. Chris Christie will find themselves in a lawsuit faster than you can say Facebook, the head of the Education Law Center said yesterday.

David Sciarra, a veteran of numerous court battles involving public education, said it would be "improper and illegal" for Christie to formally offer Booker any authority to make decisions about the Newark Public Schools. Sciarra was lead counsel on the historic — and successful — Abbott suit filed in 1997 against the state to provide more funding for its neediest schools.

..."According to Sciarra and state law says Acting Commissioner of Education Rochelle Hendricks is the state official with true authority over school districts under state control. In Newark’s case, it’s elected advisory board also has some responsibility, but Booker and Christie do not. Newark schools have been under state control for fifteen years.

.."Yesterday, on the Oprah Winfrey show Christie said Booker will be the point person leading his effort to reform Newark’s schools, but did not offer any more explicit details about Booker’s role in the restucturing.

Here's how the three came together to take control of Newark's school system.

Newark's $100M grant is a result of collaboration, preparation and fate


Aristide Economopoulos/The Star-LedgerNewark Mayor Cory Booker, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and NJ Gov. Chris Christie have joined forces to form a powerful, and unexpected, team.

In early July, Newark Mayor Cory Booker was among the guests invited to get together with a bevy of billionaire media moguls at the annual summit held by Allen & Co. in Sun Valley, a week of biking, hiking, tennis, rafting, and frank talk behind closed doors between media executives, world leaders, politicians and famous athletes.

And it was there after Booker filled his plate at a buffet that he found himself seated at a table with a boyish young man by the name of Mark Zuckerberg, the 26-year-old founder and chief executive of Facebook, one of the richest men in America. Over dinner with Zuckerberg, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and other heavies, Booker turned the conversation to his thoughts on education. And Zuckerberg listened.

Booker, who had made public safety a central focus of his first administration, was now looking to change the subject, as murders began to pile up during a hot Newark summer.

Zuckerberg knew a movie damaging to his image, "The Social Network," was about to be released, although he said it had no role in his decision to invest in New Jersey’s largest city.

And from the very start, their discussions were all kept in a cone of silence.

Mark Zuckerberg has made it clear that Teach for America grads will play a big role in Newark.

From an interview he gave to Tech Crunch.

Zuckerberg interview on 100 million dollar education donation.

Mark Zuckerberg: Yeah. Also, TFA is – one of the things that’s pretty interesting is around this. So my girlfriend wanted to be a teacher after she graduated from Harvard. And one of the things that I saw that was interesting was socially the response that she got. Where, everyone was kind of, “this is such a nice thing that you’re doing it”. But it was like she’s doing charity. It’s clear that she could have gotten paid more doing some other job. She’s really smart and she was clearly foregoing the real economic value for her to do something that was socially valuable. So the question is, how can you make it so that a lot of the people who would go do other things, teaching is a respected and valued enough job that people actually go into it. Given that it has a lot more impact than what these people are being compensated at today. And I think of that – that is a big problem. One of the things that’s been pretty interesting about TFA is they’ve actually gotten a lot of really good college students to go into teaching but it’s only for a short period of time.

Michael Arrington: So is it a government organization?

Mark Zuckerberg: No, no. It’s a private charity. Yeah. And now, the woman who founded it is starting – this woman, Wendy Kopp, is starting an international version Teach For All.So it’s cool, but in doing research for this, a lot of the educational issues in the U.S. are pretty different from international. So I’m not sure how much we’re going to be able to learn from this experience to do it internationally but maybe for the next one we’ll think about something like that. A lot of this really just comes down to though — I spend all my time running this company, you know. So for a lot of people who are later in their careers when they start this stuff, they can spend more time on it like running a foundation and I really couldn’t. So for me this is more like a venture capital approach where it’s like you pick the entrepreneur, the leader that you believe in and then you really like try to give them a lot of leverage.

..."Michael Arrington: So what happens after five years if this works out really well?

Mark Zuckerberg: Well, a lot of the data on reforming school districts shows that it actually takes eight to 10 years really to turn the thing around. But what the real goal is here – is just to show that it’s working. I mean, I don’t have much of a connection to Newark. I grew up in New York, right outside the city. So Newark is just close by and it’s going to – I hope that this helps the 45,000 students who go to school there. But the long-term goal would be to make Newark into a symbol that you can do this. So that way, a lot of the results can get replicated in other places and I – I hope that we can do that on the three to five-year period and that there will be more work after that. But hopefully a lot of it will get put in motion in the first year or so, and a lot of stuff that they need to do is just close down certain schools, make sure that there’s room for good schools to come in and join, set up programs. And then, a lot of this is going to be operating it and just going to take a long time to change.

Another one who thinks closing down schools will work.

He got the chance to announce the winners of Start-Up America, the group that will be run by Zuckerman. Sounds like he is exercising his power.

Facebook CEO names head of foundation working with Newark schools

Jennifer Holleran, a 20-year educator and former director of New Leaders for New Schools, has been chosen to lead Start Up: Education, the $100 million project funded by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in partnership with Newark Mayor Cory Booker and Gov. Chris Christie.

Zuckerberg made the announcement about an hour ago during a news conference at Newark's Robert Treat Hotel.

At a documentary screening before the event, Christie had stern words for groups that have called the partnership between he and Booker potentially illegal, and threatened to sue the state.

“I have a message for politicians who think their careers are more important than our children – I’m coming,” Christie said. “I have a message to the lawyers who have made a lifetime out of suing us into failure — I’m coming.”

Sounds like these three men have taken powers on themselves that were not intended to be. Zuckerberg sounds like he intends to use his money to get the schools to function the way he wants, and might close them if they don't produce.