Gates’ millions go to IEA’s reform group.
Yesterday the Illinois Education Association announced that the Gates Foundation has awarded some of a $2 million grant to the Consortium for Educational Change. The CEC was established by the IEA to work with school districts, both boards of education, administration and union locals, on collaborative projects.
Some of the Gates money is also going to TURN, a network of AFT and NEA locals which also works on issues involving union and management collaboration.
My own local has been a member of CEC for years. As a condition of membership, both the board and the local must join and we have split the cost of membership.
Our experience with CEC has been decidedly mixed. At times in the past they have helped us work through difficult conversations between the Association and school administrators. At other times, their representatives ignored the Association and seemed to side with administration.
Both Jo Anderson, former Executive Director of the IEA and now senior adviser to Education Secretary Arne Duncan, and present IEA Executive Director Audrey Soglin were heads of the CEC.
One wonders what Bill Gates found funding worthy?
IEA/CEC should never have applied for the money and should not accept it. This is just another example of how corporations are infiltrating toward the goal of controlling every aspect of our educational systems. Shame on IEA.
He continues to co-opt education thought leaders in order to secure a rich ed market for his and related tech companies for the foreseeable future.
He used many millions to promote that stupid one-sided movie in order to malign teachers as mostly incompetent. Then he and others assert that technology, using scripted curriculum and frequent standardized testing — can do the job much better.
There is no dearth of folks wanting to make money from public education.