Yesterday, newly-elected Governor Jerry Brown made major changes to the California State Board of Education, including removing Ben Austin, the primary advocate of the parent trigger law. You can read all about it at a post by John Fensterwald. Here’s an excerpt on Mr. Austin’s removal (I wonder if some “school reform” advocates will ever learn that self-righteousness does not help their cause?):
Sure enough, Ben Austin, the number one target for ouster by the Ed Coalition, did not go silently. “Unfortunately, in the Governor’s first full day in office, he chose to stand with the state’s most powerful interest group that spent millions to elect him, rather than the parents and children of California,” he said, referring to the state’s two teachers unions, in a statement Wednesday.
Austin is executive director of Parent Revolution, a nonprofit group that has been pushing the “parent trigger,” a mechanism adopted by the Legislature last year that permits a majority of parents at a school to demand a takeover by a charter school or other dramatic reforms. Knowing that Brown could replace most of them, the Board had hurried the parent trigger regulations along. I wouldn’t be surprised if the new Board takes a longer look and puts off their adoption next week.
This quote from Los Angeles teacher spokesman Randy Childs fits the bill as a response to Austin’s PR hype:
“The richest and most powerful people in the U.S. are cast as a plucky band of selfless rebels fighting for the civil rights of poor children of color, while dedicated and overworked teachers who can’t afford a house or pay for their children’s college tuition are imagined to be the greedy overlords of the old order.”