Suggested Answers to the First Short Quiz

[johnkarls]

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Suggested Answers to the First Short Quiz – Thomas Sowell vs. Stanford University



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Part A – Stanford University’s Indictment of Charter Schools

Question A-1

Did Stanford University undertake a national study of charter schools in 2009 funded by such pro-charter groups as the Walton Family Foundation and the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation?

Answer A-1

Yes.

Question A-2

Did the Stanford study analyze data from 2,403 charter schools in fifteen states and the District of Columbia -- about half of all charters and 70 percent of all charter students in the nation at the time?

Answer A-2

Yes.

Question A-3

Did the Stanford study find that 37 percent had learning gains that were significantly below those of local public schools?

Answer A-3

Yes.

Question A-4

Did the Stanford study find that 46 percent had gains that were no different?

Answer A-4

Yes.

Question A-5

Did the Stanford study find that only 17 percent showed growth that was significantly better?

Answer A-5

Yes.

Question A-6

Did the relatively-poor performance of charter schools occur despite their admitting only students of parents who were functional enough to apply and then expelling students who did not meet performance standards?

Answer A-6

Yes.

Question A-7

Did the relatively-poor performance of charter schools appear to be the result of inadequate governmental-regulation standards – many of their teachers had no qualifications and, indeed, quite a few charter schools were headed by former public-school janitors who seized their opportunities to leap from bottom to top?

Answer A-7

Yes.


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“Legal Brief for The Defense” – from Stanford’s Hoover Institution

Question B-1

Is our focus book for Oct 13 “Charter Schools and Their Enemies” by Thomas Sowell of Stanford’s Hoover Institution (Basic Books 6/30/2020 – 132 pages sans appendices-notes-index – Hardcover $18.69 + shipping or $18.99 Kindle from Amazon.com)?

Answer B-1

Yes.

Question B-2

Does Thomas Sowell recognize Stanford University and its 2009 study as the CHIEF ENEMY of charter schools?

Answer B-2

No – he studiously ignores it!!!

Question B-3

Does Thomas Sowell have more recent COMPREHSIVE STUDIES on the effectiveness of charter schools – or lack thereof?

Answer B-3

Absolutely NOT.

On pp. 3-4, Sowell confesses that he would only focus on charter schools meeting three criteria including – (1) a charter school and public school “serving the same local population,” (2) the students in each such pair of schools “are taught in the same building,” and (3) the students in each such pair of schools “have one or more classes at the same grade level in the same building.”

For anyone who knows anything about education, the second and third criteria regarding “the same building” are pure nonsense and represent nothing more than an UNADMITTED EXCUSE to avoid addressing the 2009 COMPREHENSIVE study of Stanford University.

The application of Sowell’s three criteria result in his focusing on SOLELY five charter-school networks in NYC!!!

Although Sowell claims (p. 4) that these 5 charter-school networks in NYC had 23,000 students in 2017-2018, it would probably be safe to assume that if the 2009 Stanford University COMPREHENSIVE study had been extended to include 2017-2018, all of those 23,000 students would be included in the MERE 17% OF CHARTER SCHOOLS THAT HAD “LEARNING GAINS SIGNIFICANTLY BETTER THAN LOCAL PUBLIC SCHOOLS.”

AND NOT INCLUDED IN THE 37% THAT HAD “LEARNING GAINS SIGNIFICANTLY WORSE THAN LOCAL PUBLIC SCHOOLS.”

[THE STANFORD STUDY SHOWED THE LEARNING GAINS OF 46% WERE NO DIFFERENT.]

Question B-4

Do any such COMPREHENSIVE STUDIES correct for the INHERENT BIAS of admitting only students of parents who were functional enough to apply and then expelling students who did not meet performance standards?

Answer B-4

Sowell had NO comprehensive studies.

And for the classic “censored sample” that he engineered, he did NOT correct for the INHERENT BIAS of admitting only students of parents who were functional enough to apply and then expelling students who did not meet performance standards.


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The Gold Standard For Educating The Children of America’s Permanent 30% Under-Caste

Question C-1

Did Eugene Lang promise students at Harlem P.S. 121 in 1981 their college tuition if they would stay in school?

Answer C-1

Yes.

Question C-2

Did he then provide a tutor and mentor for each student until high school graduation?

Answer C-2

Yes.

Question C-3

When in 1985 his “I Have A Dream”® Project was publicized on the front page of the New York Times and on CBS’ 60 Minutes, was Yours Truly one of 178 individuals (most of whom were CEO’s of major corporations) to step forward to replicate in 51 American cities what Eugene Lang had done?

Answer C-3

Yes.

Question C-4

Did I also serve as the volunteer national treasurer in the 1990’s for Gene Lang’s organization that oversaw the 178 programs which BTW transformed the typically-SINGLE DIGIT high-school graduation rates for the classes just ahead and just behind each “Dreamer” class to more than 90%?

Answer C-4

Yes.

Question C-5

Were the typical conditions faced by those 178 projects in 51 American inner-cities as I personally witnessed from visiting the overwhelming majority of those 178 projects and 51 inner-cities as national treasurer (in addition to reports from the remainder) –

• 95% of those Dreamers living in single-adult households headed by druggies!!!

• 75%-80% of whom turned over any receipts to the pusher so the kids had to steal just in order to eat!!!

• The children knowing by Kindergarten that they were NOT eligible for their dreams and that their only realistic career objectives were pusher or pimp, or girl friend of a pusher or pimp graduating to whore – none of which requires much education!!!

Answer C-5

Yes.

Question C-6

Did the early “I Have A Dream”® Programs match Eugene Lang’s success at Harlem P.S. 121 of transforming the SINGLE-DIGIT high-school graduation rates for the classes just ahead and just behind the “Dreamer” class to 65%?

Answer C-6

Yes.

Question C-7

In visiting the early programs among the 178 as volunteer national treasurer, did Yours Truly notice that 50% of the female “Dreamers” had become pregnant and, as a result, dropped out?

Answer C-7

Yes.

Question C-8

And did Yours Truly ask the sponsors of those early projects to ask their females who had become pregnant why – for which the typical response was that the female had NEVER had anyone who cared about her and by God, she was going to CREATE someone who did?

Answer C-8

Yes.

Question C-9

And did Yours Truly follow up by asking the sponsors of those early projects to ask their females who had NOT become pregnant why NOT – for which the typical response was that one of our tutors or mentors had become a surrogate parent and had expressed early and often that the Dreamer could make something of herself with the IHAD program AND IT WOULD BREAK THE HEART OF THE TUTOR/MENTOR SURROGATE PARENT IF SHE DIDN’T?

Answer C-9

Yes.

Question C-10

So when Yours Truly asked the sponsors of the later projects to have ALL OF THEIR TUTORS AND MENTORS express their hopes for their Dreamers EARLY AND OFTEN, did the later projects transform the typical SINGLE-DIGIT high school graduation rates for the classes just ahead and behind the Dreamer classes TO MORE THAN 90%?

Answer C-10

Yes.

Question C-11

BTW, did the national “I Have A Dream”® Foundation shift its focus after the 1990’s to serve suburbs whose ethnic mix was changing? And, in the process did IHAD-National lose all of its institutional knowledge about what made successful the 1990 programs that served the inner cities?

Answer C-11

Yes and Yes.


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Is Thomas Sowell Attempting To Get The Nation To Worship ANOTHER “FALSE IDOL”?

Question D-1

Could the “I Have A Dream”® GOLD STANDARD be taken to scale?

Answer D-1

Absolutely!!! [Please read on - Q&A D-2.]

Question D-2

For example, do Sections 4 and 5 of www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org entitled “Inner-City Holocaust and America’s Apartheid ‘Justice’ System (In Honor of Jonathan Kozol and In Memory of John Howard Griffin)” contain zillions of legal documents, etc., demonstrating how $84 billion of private funds could have provided IHAD- or IHAD-style programs for 10 million inner-city children?

Answer D-2

Yes.

Question D-3

Was the “question presented for review” in the final appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court (which they refused to hear) –

“Can state court judges order their decisions which they know are diametrically-opposed to well-settled law, not to be published or cited (a strategy labeled ‘the segregated toilet’ in correspondence with 51 inner-city clergy who represent the 10 million inner-city children who have been disclosed from the outset as the ‘real parties at interest’ in this law suit) in order to flush away the rights of the 10 million inner-city children without disturbing the rights of first-class American citizens -- without violating the ‘Equal Protection of the Law’ requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution?”

Answer D-3

Yes.

Question D-4

Even if Thomas Sowell can cite COMPREHENSIVE STUDIES since the 2009 COMPREHENSIVE STUDY BY STANFORD UNIVERSITY that charter schools ARE NO LONGER INFERIOR to local public schools despite admitting only students of functional parents and expelling students who do not meet performance standards, IS THOMAS SOWELL STILL “SELLING SNAKE OIL”???

Answer D-4

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

Question D-5

After all, didn’t Thomas Sowell CONFESS in his “Discrimination and Disparities” (our focus book for our last meeting – Sept. 8th) that he believes the problem with inner-city schools are “bad apples” who need to be “weeded out”?

Answer D-5

Absolutely!!!

Question D-6

And that charter schools do precisely that – condemning all of those students who were not accepted by charter schools to what we have always called “a fate worse than death”? In other words, what 5-year-olds in our inner-city ghettos already know is their fate – that their only realistic career objectives are pusher or pimp, or girl friend of a pusher or pimp graduating to whore (none of which require much education)?

Answer D-6

Unfortunately!!!

Question D-7

After all, didn’t the IHAD programs of the 1990’s adopt EVERY student in the third grade of an inner-city school OR EVERY child in the third-grade cohort of a public-housing project??? NO EXCEPTIONS!!!???

Answer D-7

Yes!!!

Question D-8

Does Thomas Sowell even discuss THE GOLD STANDARD or does he treat it with “studied ignorance”?

Answer D-8

He treats it with studied ignorance!!!

Which should be viewed as the height of anti-intellectualness!!!

Question D-9

Why does the title of this Section D speak of ANOTHER false idol?

Answer D-9

Our 9/12/2012 meeting resulted in a Six-Degrees-Of-Separation E-mail Campaign based on –

(1) the tragedy that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation led the nation away from “The Promised Land” (our terminology at that time for THE “I HAVE A DREAM”® GOLD STANDARD) “to worship for 10 years the ‘false idol’ of breaking up inner-city schools into smaller units” --

AND AFTER ADMITING THAT FAILURE –

(2) the tragedy that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation led the national away from “The Promised Land” of THE “I HAVE A DREAM”® GOLD STANDARD to worship the "false idol" of school choice.

Our 9/12/2012 Six-Degrees-Of-Separation E-mail Campaign to President Obama concluded –

By citing the 2009 Stanford University study of charter schools and then requested President Obama –

“Since the reckless behavior of Bill and Melinda Gates are ‘Crimes Against Humanity’ as defined in the Rome Statute establishing the International Criminal Court at The Hague, it is respectfully requested that you petition the U.N. Security Council to provide the ICC with jurisdiction to prosecute the Gates. After all, they are condemning more inner-city children to a ‘fate worse than death’ than the number of victims involved in all of the prosecutions at the ICC combined.”

[NB: Citizens of the handful of countries that are NOT signatories of the Rome Statute are NOT subject to the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court UNLESS the U.N. Security Council, in which the U.S. has a veto, provides the ICC with jurisdiction. This was the procedure followed for providing the ICC with jurisdiction to prosecute Serbs for war crimes in the Bosnian War.]

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The 9/12/2012 e-mail campaign is available at viewtopic.php?f=23&t=979&sid=1ea998e89a ... 92b41c5b71.

More details are available in the voluminous materials posted on www.ReadingLiverally-SaltLake.org for the 9/12/2012 meeting which can be accessed by scrolling down past the first 8 sections of that website which are numbered, to the unnumbered sections which comprise clusters of 4-5 dealing with each meeting in reverse-chronological order.