Update 3/8/16 – Friends in Ohio and Florida have confirmed that this exact bill (elimination of elected school boards) is being pushed there. Watch the “greedom-over-freedom” ed-tech lobbies, such as Jeb Bush’s Foundation for Excellence in Education, Global Silicon Valley investment group, Bill Gates, Marc Tucker’s National Center on Education and Economy, and Pearson, whose investments benefit from the streamlined elimination of voter input.
The bill in Utah has passed the Senate and is being considered in the House with a (pointless) amendment that would add to the appointed dictator-superintendent, an appointed-not-elected board. Several House members are opposing the bill right now. One rare senator who voted against the bill said in an email, “I couldn’t believe this may pass with no input – I like that the voters will determine if this goes to the ballot, but it’s a lot to explain to voters.” Yes, it is!
I’ve added contact emails for senators and representatives below.
SJR16, Senator Jim Dabakis’ bill to abolish the voice of voters in Utah education by abolishing the elected State School Board, passed the Utah Senate this week.
An article in the Salt Lake Tribune states: “Dabakis argued that the change would empower voters”.
Dabakis’ claim is a ridiculous lie. The very short bill (SJR16) has only two elements, as it slashes at the Utah Constitution: 1) to eliminate the elected board, and 2) to have no election and no representation at all. A solitary, governor-appointed superintendent would supervise all of Utah’s education system by him/herself.
This bill puts voters dead last, of course– because no vote will ever select the governor-appointed, solo-flying, unremovable superintendent.
An email from a Utah legislator who supports SJR16 argued: “Think of the current state board as a school bus with fifteen different steering wheels all driving in different directions….if one person is in charge, it’s harder for them to pass the buck.”
If he applied that reasoning to his own seat in the legislature, then there should be no legislature, but a king instead. And if the Senate gets the House to agree, and if the voters agree, then there will be an Education King of Utah.
It is up to the members of the House of Representatives to kill this awful bill that the Senate has approved. If they don’t, voters get one chance to end it. But will they? Will we all take the time to look at the history surrounding this long-planned effort?
This bill may have been sponsored by the notorious Democrat Jim Dabakis, but he didn’t come up with the idea of eliminating elected school boards. Blatant enemies of local control came up with the idea years ago and their ploy is ticking along even better than they’d planned. See the GSV’s graphic below. The “battle plan” of this investment company started with Common Core, and about ten years later, it planned to eliminate school boards. Utah’s leadership is listening to and acting on these plans —because of investment. Because dollars speak more loudly than children do.
Look at two movers and shakers from outside Utah, who are shaping Utah policy in this direction. One is a socialist and the other is a corporate hog. Both are instrumental in changing Utah’s formerly representative system: Meet Marc Tucker and Deborah Quazzo.
MARC TUCKER, THE SOCIALIST
To know Marc Tucker, simply peruse his report on Governing American Education, which says: “And the United States will have to largely abandon the beloved emblem of American education: local control... much of the new authority will have to come at the expense of local control.”
You can also study his infamous 1992 letter to Hillary Clinton, which was made part of the U.S. Congressional Record. The letter outlined Tucker’s vision of a communist-styled pipeline of education and workforce that would control individuals from early childhood through life.
It is a vision indistinguishable from Communism. It is a vision that Dabakis’ SJR16 consummates.
Tucker was invited recently by Utah legislators to speak in Utah at a statewide joint legislative/school board/USOE conference held at Southern Utah University. He’s also spoken at countless national venues, some of which are radical left-wing institutions: the Annenberg Institute, the Public Education and Business Coalition, the Aspen Institute, and state education conferences in various states.
Less that a year ago, Salt Lake City sponsored an education-tech conference co-hosted by GSV Advisors (an investment group) with Arizona State University. Bill Gates paid for it, of course. Former USDOE Secretary Arne Duncan was a featured speaker. Ms. Deborah Quazzo, founder and CEO of GSV Advisors, headed the conference, and was listed as “a prolific angel investor” who “leverages technology in the global $4.9 trillion education and talent technology sectors”.
She charged people $2,795 per person to attend this conference– just to walk in the door.
Above, you saw the graphic of Quazzo’s “Strategic Battle Plan” for GSV (and Utah politics). Keep in mind that Quazzo is an investor, not an educator. Her battle plan has nothing to do with what you or I as teachers and parents know is best for our children. It is her openly, repeatedly stated desire to eliminate local control by eliminating elected school boards.
[As an aside, here is some context: Forbes christened Salt Lake City the “tech mecca” of America, so now, ambitious, hungry eyes are on Utah’s ed-tech industry and school system and taxpayers’ votes. Those hungry eyes care deeply about whether Dabakis’ bill passes. From their point of view, voters and teachers and parents and children are a necessary annoyance, but they feel that our elected school boards are not: so, if Utah eliminates “messy” debate and gets rid of the old time-consuming elected representation business; if Utah streamlines decision-making for the entire state, we will have created an ed-tech dictatorship. It’s so very profitable to those (inside and outside Utah) who invest in the Common Core-aligned education system that Tucker and Quazzo promote. If it’s hard to wrap your brain around socialism now bedding with corporate America, or of socialism taking over the Utah legislature, just revisit how this “elimination of boards” policy –espoused by the GSV investment group that is repeatedly in our state preaching to legislators– perfectly matches the communist “human capital pipeline” agenda of Marc Tucker. Utah’s not utterly clueless, either; remember that Tucker and Quazzo were invited to this state to advise the once conservative legislators and businesses of Utah.]
How many mecca attendees last spring had read Quazzo’s creepy GSV document, entitled American Revolution 2.0, which echoes Tucker’s call for the removal of local control and local school boards? How many agree with it now– other than virtually the entire Utah Senate? The GSV calls for the promotion of Common Core and the elimination of elected school boards. What a strange coincidence that the Tucker-featured SUU conference also called for the same things.
In the GSV document’s “Strategic Battle Plan” Quazzo and company say: “We eliminate locally elected school boards, recognizing that the process by which they are elected doesn’t correspond with either strategic planning or longer term results.”
Strategic planning for whom? Longer term results for whom? WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN? And what about the taxpaying voters who are to foot the bill without a voice in it? What about the reasons we fought the American Revolution 1.0? We wanted representation. We wanted a voice in our own lives, not dicatorship by Mother England. Do we want a dictatorship led by Mother Quazzo or Mother Dickson or Father Gates?
This bill of Dabakis, the consummation of Quazzo’s and Tucker’s long-term scheming, must be stopped.
Please, please, please contact the Utah House of Representatives immediately.
Immediately!
https://house.utah.gov/house-members/
UTAH STATE REPS:
bgreene@le.utah.gov
mroberts@le.utah.gov
mike@utahlegalteam.com
anderegg.jake@gmail.com
ssandall@le.utah.gov
jeffersonrmoss@gmail.com
jeffersonmoss@le.utah.gov
valpotter@le.utah.gov
curtwebb@le.utah.gov
eredd@le.utah.gov
justinfawson@le.utah.gov
corymaloy@le.utah.gov
sbarlow@le.utah.gov
gfroerer@le.utah.gov
vpeterson@le.utah.gov
jeremyapeterson@le.utah.gov
dpitcher@utah.gov
kmiles@le.utah.gov
pray@utah.gov
mikeschultz@le.utah.gov
karilisonbee@le.utah.gov
bradwilson@utah.gov
stevehandy@utah.gov
thawkes@le.utah.gov
beckyedwards@le.utah.gov
dougsagers@le.utah.gov
rayward@le.utah.gov
sduckworth@le.utah.gov
shollins@le.utah.gov
rchouck@le.utah.gov
jbriscoe@le.utah.gov
angelaromero@le.utah.gov
briansking@le.utah.gov
leeperry@le.utah.gov
mikewinder@le.utah.gov
lavarchristensen@le.utah.gov
elizabethweight@le.utah.gov
chall@le.utah.gov
kkwan@le.utah.gov
parent@le.utah.gov
markwheatley@le.utah.gov
csmoss@le.utah.gov
ehutchings@utah.gov
jdunnigan@utah.gov
lhemingway@le.utah.gov
kimcoleman@le.utah.gov
cacton@le.utah.gov
seliason@le.utah.gov
mariepoulson@le.utah.gov
kstratton@le.utah.gov
rspendlove@le.utah.gov
greghughes@le.utah.gov
jknotwell@le.utah.gov
susanpulsipher@le.utah.gov
loganwilde@le.utah.gov
tquinn@le.utah.gov
scottchew@le.utah.gov
kchristofferson@le.utah.gov
derrinowens@le.utah.gov
brad@braddaw.com
keithgrover@le.utah.gov
tseegmiller@le.utah.gov
adamrobertson@le.utah.gov
normthurston64@gmail.com
fgibson@le.utah.gov,
mnelson@le.utah.gov
christinewatkins@le.utah.gov
carlalbrecht@le.utah.gov
blast@le.utah.gov
jwestwood@le.utah.gov
vlsnow@le.utah.gov
mnoel@kanab.net
wbrooks@le.utah.gov
UTAH STATE SENATORS:
lescamilla@le.utah.gov dipson@le.utah.gov,
evickers@le.utah.gov,
dhinkins@le.utah.gov
kvantassell@le.utah.gov
lhillyard@le.utah.gov
rokerlund@le.utah.gov
tweiler@le.utah.gov
jsadams@le.utah.gov
hstephenson@le.utah.gov,
jwstevenson@le.utah.gov,
achristensen@le.utah.gov,
gbuxton@le.utah.gov
pknudson@le.utah.gov, curt@cbramble.com
mdayton@le.utah.gov
janderegg@le.utah.gov
dthatcher@le.utah.gov
dhemmert@le.utah.gov
wniederhauser@le.utah.gov
lfillmore@le.utah.gov
bzehnder@le.utah.gov
dhenderson@le.utah.gov
wharper@le.utah.gov
kmayne@le.utah.gov
jiwamoto@le.utah.gov
gdavis@le.utah.gov
–and our endangered state school board:
Board@schools.utah.gov
COMMON CORE 