truthout--2020-11-12--New Data Lays Bare Massive Inequalities Between Schools Within Same District

Marguerite Roza , an economist at Georgetown University and the director of its Edunomics Lab , has studied how spending choices play out in district budgets .
“ Those are very much district choices , but districts would say , ‘ What ?
We never made an intentional decision to give more money to the wealthier schools , ’ “ Roza said .
The enrollment and staffing patterns that district leaders allow can have a major impact on children ’ s outcomes .
Magnet schools tend to skim districts ’ highest-performing kids and most-engaged families , pulling them from elsewhere @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to building stronger schools .
Teachers with more than five years of experience tend to be more effective and more likely to stay in the field for the long-term , boosting student performance in schools where they dominate the teaching force .
And small schools tend to offer more attention to individual students , giving their populations a better school experience , overall .
Ary Amerikaner , vice president for P-12 policy , practice and research at The Education Trust , which fights for more equitable spending in schools , has long sought @ @ @ @ @ @ @ per-student spending within school districts .
“ People are less aware of the inequities within districts and less aware that children attending high-poverty schools in relatively high-poverty districts can get hit twice — first by inequities because their district doesn ’ t have the revenue and then unfair spending within their district , ” Amerikaner said .
In Elgin , where Ronald D. O ’ Neal is located , the median home value is nearly $ 100,000 less than in Bartlett , where Centennial is .
The poverty rate is three times higher @ @ @ @ @ @ @ born in Elgin and graduated from School District U-46 .
He had no idea an elementary school his constituents attend was getting so much less in per-pupil funding than a school in a wealthier portion of the same district .
But he ’ s not surprised .
He has long taken issue with the “ broken ” way our country finances its schools : primarily with local property taxes that unfairly advantage students from wealthy communities , which are often also majority white because of the U.S. ’ s long history of segregation @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Centennial ’ s students are white .
Five percent of O ’ Neal ’ s are ( the vast majority , 85 percent , are Latino ) .
Dixon has three daughters in the district .
He is Black and has always known that students who look like his own children are on the losing end of glaring achievement gaps nationwide .
Now he sees they ’ re the victims of school funding disparities within individual districts , too .
“ That ’ s broken , ” Dixon said .
“ That ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that it ’ s not ?
” Besides basic ideas about fairness , spending inequities are a problem because having more money matters when it ’ s used well .
Although researchers — and elected officials — have debated the value of increased educational funding , new evidence suggests that when schools serving low-income students do spend additional money in key ways , they greatly boost student success .
Rucker Johnson , an economist at the University of California , Berkeley , studied the connection between school spending and long-term student outcomes , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the incidence of adult poverty .
He and his colleagues found that children from low-income homes , in particular , benefited from state policies in the 1970s and 1980s that increased school funding – and that the effects were cumulative .
The longer students attended schools that got more money , the better they did .
More recently , Johnson and his team have also been able to draw a line from per-student spending to better standardized test scores and graduation rates , findings they think bolster the argument that more money makes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , higher spending led to significant increases in student outcomes and narrowing of achievement gaps by race and poverty status , ” Johnson said his forthcoming paper will show .
Still , even in districts that don ’ t systematically spend less on high-poverty schools , overall , inequities remain .
In Indianapolis Public Schools , for example , the Center for Inquiry School 84 has a lower portion of kids getting free or reduced-price lunch than any other school in the district , at just 8 percent .
The school is a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the city and although it is technically open to students across Indianapolis , neighborhood kids get preference , meaning that children whose families can afford to buy a home near the school have a greater chance of getting in .
A school of basically the same size , the William McKinley School 39 , has a student population in which 76 percent of students get free or reduced-price lunch and many more get services as English learners or students with disabilities .
McKinley gets a “ C ” rating from the state for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ gets an “ A ” and far surpasses state averages on standardized test scores .
Yet McKinley gets $ 9,794 per kid in state and local funding , and the magnet school gets $ 11,303 .
In Algonquin , Illinois , Community Unit School District 300 Superintendent Frederick Heid has prioritized school-level spending as a route to educational equity since he took over the position six years ago .
Beyond the needs of kids from low-income homes , Heid said the district allocates extra money to schools serving large populations of students with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ English .
The district also provides more funding to schools with preschool programs and to a pilot program for students with four or more “ adverse childhood experiences , ” including exposure to abuse , neglect and household dysfunction .
“ It does result in different funding amounts going to different schools , but we believe that is the best way to get to equity for our students , ” Heid said .
Still , even in a district with such explicit spending priorities , inequities between individual schools remain .
Golfview Elementary @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 550 students , 86 percent of whom are considered low-income , 69 percent of whom are English learners and about 13 percent of whom get special education services .
Algonquin Lakes Elementary School serves about 425 students , with less than half its students in poverty , less than one-fifth English learners and about the same proportion in special education .
Yet Algonquin Lakes gets more than $ 2,000 more per-pupil than Golfview .
Susan Harkin , District 300 ’ s chief operating officer , said this can largely be attributed to Golfview @ @ @ @ @ @ @ force and Algonquin Lakes ’ shrinking special education population .
She said the spending across each school should normalize in the next few years as the teachers at Golfview gain seniority and special education funding drops at Algonquin Lakes .
In the meantime , however , Algonquin Lakes students , who are wealthier overall , and most of whom don ’ t face the challenges of learning English , get to enjoy that extra $ 2,000 per pupil .
Similar spending inequities have shocked district leaders around the country .
Many have had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they prepared and reported their per-school spending data to the state for the first time because of the new federal requirement .
The transparency mandate was tucked into the 2015 update of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act but didn ’ t require states to report that data until June 30 of this year .
Some districts have defended spending less on higher-poverty schools .
Certain special education programs can drive up costs , for example .
Yonkers Public Schools in New York said it spends more on wealthier schools because its intensive @ @ @ @ @ @ @ campuses , where there happens to be room for them .
In U-46 , in Illinois , Tony Sanders , the superintendent , also pointed to costs associated with special education services as a reason that some schools in higher-income communities end up becoming the most expensive .
The elementary school that receives the most state and local money per student in U-46 , Wayne Elementary School , represents a perfect storm of factors driving up per-student spending on a student population that doesn ’ t seem to need it , when considering @ @ @ @ @ @ @ education programs , it is a small — and under-enrolled — school , serving just 368 students in a building that can fit twice as many .
It has a veteran teaching staff commanding higher salaries .
And it is in a wealthy , suburban portion of the district where all children take buses to school , something that is free for them , but costly for the school ’ s budget .
Wayne gets $ 12,980 per student in state and local funding .
If the Ronald D. O ’ Neal Elementary @ @ @ @ @ @ @ add nearly $ 2.1 million to its budget .
Sanders doesn ’ t see a way for the district to get around Wayne ’ s expenses , given its location and enrollment .
But over the last year , he and his staff have found ways to address spending equity in the face of the data that made clear the district has room for improvement .
“ We are inequitable , ” Sanders said .
“ And we are working on that.
” This past year , with extra money from the state @ @ @ @ @ @ @ U-46 placed more assistant principals in its high-poverty schools .
It also reduced class sizes in the early elementary grades in some of those buildings and bought more mobile devices for schools that didn ’ t yet have enough for every student .
And Sanders said administrators are brainstorming ways to spread out access to the district ’ s best teachers , perhaps virtually , so that students get more opportunities than the ones available to them in their assigned neighborhood schools .
Nationwide , few districts have made changes to deal with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ data .
But Montgomery County Public Schools in Rockville , Maryland , is well on its way — and it ’ s paying close attention to how spending is tied to student outcomes .
For many who advocated for this financial reporting requirement in the first place , making the connection between resources and results is the whole point of teasing out per-student spending by school .
“ The end goal is taking this opportunity to leverage our dollars to get the greatest outcome for our students , ” said Roza , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Public Schools hired an educational consulting firm to do a financial audit in advance of the federal reporting deadline .
The firm found that the district spends more on its higher-poverty schools , but also identified troubling inequities : Overall , Montgomery County ’ s high-poverty schools perform worse , and Black and Latino students from low-income homes perform particularly poorly , whether they are in high-performing schools or not .
In exploring what might contribute to these results , the district found , among other things , that it concentrates its novice @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Diego Uriburu , executive director of Identity , a nonprofit in Montgomery County that serves Latino youth and families and has teamed up with the NAACP of Montgomery County to lead the newly formed Black and Brown Coalition for Educational Equity and Excellence , said the findings were not necessarily surprising , but that it was striking to see the data so clearly .
“ We as Black and Brown folks have always felt it was hard for us to prove our points because we could only speak about our experience and anecdotes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ data that was clearly saying what we have been experiencing , ” he said .
Jack Smith , the superintendent , came to the district with the explicit goal of improving educational equity .
He knew Montgomery County had a long history of high performance for most students , but not all of them .
The work he has overseen to root out inequities has caused some angst among families for whom the status quo was working well .
“ There ’ s a belief somehow , always , that if someone gets @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” Smith said .
He has worked to dispel that notion and win more support for the idea that improving performance for all students is in the best interests of the entire community .
Budgetary uncertainty thanks to the coronavirus pandemic will leave Montgomery County Public Schools with fewer resources to do things like create new incentives to get more experienced teachers into high-needs schools .
But Smith said there ’ s no reason to “ sit on our hands and do nothing because there ’ s less money now than there @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” “ We ’ re not in a position to do a major incentive program across all 135 elementary schools , but we can start , ” he said .
“ You can start with the idea that this is scalable.
” Uriburu believes this latest push for equity may truly result in long-term changes for the district and its students .
District administrators are committed , as is the school board , and even the county government has embarked on an equity mission for the broader community .
And , of course @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said this is the first time the Black and Latino communities have teamed up to advocate for better schools , and they are very clear about their right to make demands .
“ By bringing the Black and Brown communities together , we make up 54 percent of the student body of Montgomery County Public Schools , ” Uriburu said .
“ It ’ s a different ballgame.
” While federal law has only recently demanded transparency around school funding disparities for every district in the country , equity battles have played out @ @ @ @ @ @ @ over the years .
Sometimes they have been spearheaded by district officials , as in Montgomery County , and sometimes by community groups .
Longtime advocates of this federal transparency mandate hope the new data will spur more widespread advocacy .
But Rochester , New York , offers a lesson in how hard it can be not only to make major changes , but to make them permanent .
Jean-Claude Brizard took over as superintendent of the Rochester City Schools in western New York in January 2008 .
( He is now a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation , one of the many funders of The Hechinger Report . )
Soon after he started , he hired a consulting firm to follow the dollars in his district and identify inequities , which , it turns out , were striking .
“ We saw schools of similar size , similar demographics , but one school got 50 percent more per pupil , ” Brizard said .
The budgeting system in Rochester until that point was one in which well-connected principals could advocate for more money for their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
He started out by sharing the data internally and with the school board and then held community meetings where he aimed to spur enough demand for change that the district would be able to justify going against the wishes of the small but vocal populations of the schools that had gotten more than their fair share of district spending .
Brizard orchestrated a three-year transition to a student-based funding formula that clearly laid out how much money schools would get for students with different needs .
But when Brizard left the district @ @ @ @ @ @ @ funding formula was fully in place , he said a group of affluent , mostly white , parents succeeded in lobbying the school board to dismantle the new system .
“ The board is often elected by a handful of people , and they will respond to that pressure , ” Brizard said .
His current work focuses on coalition-building across communities , which he says can help overcome pushback .
“ When you have a community that is galvanized around these equity issues , it brings the stakes beyond a single protagonist.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ though , there are cases in which funding decisions have been taken out of the hands of school districts .
In Los Angeles Unified School District , a lawsuit brought by the ACLU of Southern California forced the district to revise its methods of allocating spending among schools .
California distributes $ 61 billion through its Local Control Funding Formula , a portion of which is set aside for foster youth , English learners and students who qualify for free or reduced-price lunch .
In LAUSD , the formula generates an extra billion @ @ @ @ @ @ @ those three groups .
The ACLU sued the district , arguing that it wasn ’ t directing those dollars to the right students , and LAUSD settled , giving $ 151 million to a group of schools that had been shortchanged and revising its spending patterns moving forward .
Victor Leung , deputy litigation director for the ACLU of Southern California , said his team filed similar complaints against the Long Beach and Fresno school districts and threatened a complaint in Pomona but hasn ’ t had to resort to litigation because the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the equity battles in Montgomery County , Rochester and Los Angeles have all played out differently , they share one common thread : clear data .
In Montgomery County and Rochester , district leaders produced their own analyses and shared the data with the public .
In California , outside researchers tracked the state dollars to the school level and gave advocacy groups a smoking gun .
There is a chance that clear , public data won ’ t make a difference , of course , and some supporters of the transparency mandate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ West Aurora School District 129 , another district that spends a statistically significant amount less on its high-poverty schools , according to the Hechinger analysis , the funding disparities have gone largely unremarked upon .
Angie Smith , assistant superintendent for operations , said there are no plans to redistribute funds because district leaders believe the spending differences are justified .
She pointed to wealthier suburban schools ’ transportation costs , more expensive staffing in smaller schools and the costs of specialized programs as reasons for the district ’ s spending trend .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ spending disparities will surely remain .
In School District U-46 , the financial data has been tucked into the online state report cards — in a tab labeled District Environment — since last October , but conversations about it have mainly been among school officials .
Traci Ellis is a former U-46 school board member , Elgin native and chief equity officer at the Illinois Math and Science Academy , a public magnet school in Chicago ’ s northwest suburbs .
The Ronald D. O ’ Neal Elementary School is named for her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ district .
While she no longer lives in Elgin , she has made educational equity her life ’ s work , and was disappointed to learn of U-46 ’ s spending trend .
The district ’ s slogan is “ academic success for all ” and a frequent tagline is “ all means all.
” “ Budgets speak to where priorities lie and if the district is going to have equity as a priority , and it says that it does , then we should be able to see that borne out in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said .
Disheartening as U-46 ’ s first-year data is , along with the knowledge that similar spending trends exist all over the country , Ellis sees a silver lining : “ So many of the problems in school districts with respect to resolving equity issues require some outside third-party intervention , ” she said .
“ This is not one of them .
… It does not require laws changing and getting legislators to understand that schools need more money.
” Districts already have the power to reshape their own budgets .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ to do so .
After a flurry of equity-minded initiatives last school year , Sanders had hoped the district ’ s spending trend would be different in time for the 2020 update to the state report cards .
The changes weren ’ t enough , and according to the latest state data , released Oct. 30 , U-46 still spends fewer state and local dollars on its higher poverty schools , overall .
Sanders said in a written statement that the district was disappointed its investments last year didn ’ t change its @ @ @ @ @ @ @ year of data in mind , we will work to be more deliberate about addressing school funding decisions as we develop our Fiscal Year 2022 budget , ” he said .
Ellis and Dixon , the city councilman , will be among those watching .
This story about school funding disparities was produced by The Hechinger Report , a nonprofit , independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education .
Sign up for Hechinger ’ s newsletter .

Marguerite Roza, an economist at Georgetown University and the director of its Edunomics Lab, has studied how spending choices play out in district budgets.
“Those are very much district choices, but districts would say, ‘What? We never made an intentional decision to give more money to the wealthier schools,’” Roza said.
The enrollment and staffing patterns that district leaders allow can have a major impact on children’s outcomes. Magnet schools tend to skim districts’ highest-performing kids and most-engaged families, pulling them from elsewhere in a district where they might contribute to building stronger schools. Teachers with more than five years of experience tend to be more effective and more likely to stay in the field for the long-term, boosting student performance in schools where they dominate the teaching force. And small schools tend to offer more attention to individual students, giving their populations a better school experience, overall.
Ary Amerikaner, vice president for P-12 policy, practice and research at The Education Trust, which fights for more equitable spending in schools, has long sought to draw attention to the variation in per-student spending within school districts. “People are less aware of the inequities within districts and less aware that children attending high-poverty schools in relatively high-poverty districts can get hit twice — first by inequities because their district doesn’t have the revenue and then unfair spending within their district,” Amerikaner said.
In Elgin, where Ronald D. O’Neal is located, the median home value is nearly $100,000 less than in Bartlett, where Centennial is. The poverty rate is three times higher. Elgin City Councilman Corey Dixon was born in Elgin and graduated from School District U-46. He had no idea an elementary school his constituents attend was getting so much less in per-pupil funding than a school in a wealthier portion of the same district. But he’s not surprised.
He has long taken issue with the “broken” way our country finances its schools: primarily with local property taxes that unfairly advantage students from wealthy communities, which are often also majority white because of the U.S.’s long history of segregation and racist policies. Sixty-five percent of Centennial’s students are white. Five percent of O’Neal’s are (the vast majority, 85 percent, are Latino). Dixon has three daughters in the district. He is Black and has always known that students who look like his own children are on the losing end of glaring achievement gaps nationwide. Now he sees they’re the victims of school funding disparities within individual districts, too.
“That’s broken,” Dixon said. “That’s a problem. Who could argue that it’s not?”
***
Besides basic ideas about fairness, spending inequities are a problem because having more money matters when it’s used well. Although researchers — and elected officials — have debated the value of increased educational funding, new evidence suggests that when schools serving low-income students do spend additional money in key ways, they greatly boost student success.
Rucker Johnson, an economist at the University of California, Berkeley, studied the connection between school spending and long-term student outcomes, including educational attainment, adult wages and the incidence of adult poverty. He and his colleagues found that children from low-income homes, in particular, benefited from state policies in the 1970s and 1980s that increased school funding – and that the effects were cumulative. The longer students attended schools that got more money, the better they did.
More recently, Johnson and his team have also been able to draw a line from per-student spending to better standardized test scores and graduation rates, findings they think bolster the argument that more money makes a difference.
“At every stage, higher spending led to significant increases in student outcomes and narrowing of achievement gaps by race and poverty status,” Johnson said his forthcoming paper will show.
Still, even in districts that don’t systematically spend less on high-poverty schools, overall, inequities remain. In Indianapolis Public Schools, for example, the Center for Inquiry School 84 has a lower portion of kids getting free or reduced-price lunch than any other school in the district, at just 8 percent. The school is a magnet school in a wealthier part of the city , and although it is technically open to students across Indianapolis, neighborhood kids get preference, meaning that children whose families can afford to buy a home near the school have a greater chance of getting in. A school of basically the same size, the William McKinley School 39, has a student population in which 76 percent of students get free or reduced-price lunch and many more get services as English learners or students with disabilities. McKinley gets a “C” rating from the state for its below-average student performance while the magnet gets an “A” and far surpasses state averages on standardized test scores.
Yet McKinley gets $9,794 per kid in state and local funding, and the magnet school gets $11,303.
In Algonquin, Illinois, Community Unit School District 300 Superintendent Frederick Heid has prioritized school-level spending as a route to educational equity since he took over the position six years ago. Beyond the needs of kids from low-income homes, Heid said the district allocates extra money to schools serving large populations of students with disabilities and students who are still learning English. The district also provides more funding to schools with preschool programs and to a pilot program for students with four or more “adverse childhood experiences,” including exposure to abuse, neglect and household dysfunction.
“It does result in different funding amounts going to different schools, but we believe that is the best way to get to equity for our students,” Heid said.
Still, even in a district with such explicit spending priorities, inequities between individual schools remain. Golfview Elementary School, for example, serves about 550 students, 86 percent of whom are considered low-income, 69 percent of whom are English learners and about 13 percent of whom get special education services. Algonquin Lakes Elementary School serves about 425 students, with less than half its students in poverty, less than one-fifth English learners and about the same proportion in special education. Yet Algonquin Lakes gets more than $2,000 more per-pupil than Golfview.
Susan Harkin, District 300’s chief operating officer, said this can largely be attributed to Golfview Elementary School’s early career teaching force and Algonquin Lakes’ shrinking special education population. She said the spending across each school should normalize in the next few years as the teachers at Golfview gain seniority and special education funding drops at Algonquin Lakes. In the meantime, however, Algonquin Lakes students, who are wealthier overall, and most of whom don’t face the challenges of learning English, get to enjoy that extra $2,000 per pupil.
Similar spending inequities have shocked district leaders around the country. Many have had a reckoning over the last year as they prepared and reported their per-school spending data to the state for the first time because of the new federal requirement. The transparency mandate was tucked into the 2015 update of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act but didn’t require states to report that data until June 30 of this year.
Some districts have defended spending less on higher-poverty schools. Certain special education programs can drive up costs, for example. Yonkers Public Schools in New York said it spends more on wealthier schools because its intensive special education programs are concentrated on those campuses, where there happens to be room for them.
In U-46, in Illinois, Tony Sanders, the superintendent, also pointed to costs associated with special education services as a reason that some schools in higher-income communities end up becoming the most expensive.
The elementary school that receives the most state and local money per student in U-46, Wayne Elementary School, represents a perfect storm of factors driving up per-student spending on a student population that doesn’t seem to need it, when considering only poverty rates. Besides its special education programs, it is a small — and under-enrolled — school, serving just 368 students in a building that can fit twice as many. It has a veteran teaching staff commanding higher salaries. And it is in a wealthy, suburban portion of the district where all children take buses to school, something that is free for them, but costly for the school’s budget. Wayne gets $12,980 per student in state and local funding. If the Ronald D. O’Neal Elementary School got that much, it would add nearly $2.1 million to its budget.
Sanders doesn’t see a way for the district to get around Wayne’s expenses, given its location and enrollment. But over the last year, he and his staff have found ways to address spending equity in the face of the data that made clear the district has room for improvement.
“We are inequitable,” Sanders said. “And we are working on that.”
This past year, with extra money from the state thanks to a revised funding formula, U-46 placed more assistant principals in its high-poverty schools. It also reduced class sizes in the early elementary grades in some of those buildings and bought more mobile devices for schools that didn’t yet have enough for every student. And Sanders said administrators are brainstorming ways to spread out access to the district’s best teachers, perhaps virtually, so that students get more opportunities than the ones available to them in their assigned neighborhood schools.
***
Nationwide, few districts have made changes to deal with the inequities laid bare by the new data. But Montgomery County Public Schools in Rockville, Maryland, is well on its way — and it’s paying close attention to how spending is tied to student outcomes. For many who advocated for this financial reporting requirement in the first place, making the connection between resources and results is the whole point of teasing out per-student spending by school.
“The end goal is taking this opportunity to leverage our dollars to get the greatest outcome for our students,” said Roza, the economist at Georgetown University.
Montgomery County Public Schools hired an educational consulting firm to do a financial audit in advance of the federal reporting deadline. The firm found that the district spends more on its higher-poverty schools, but also identified troubling inequities: Overall, Montgomery County’s high-poverty schools perform worse, and Black and Latino students from low-income homes perform particularly poorly, whether they are in high-performing schools or not. In exploring what might contribute to these results, the district found, among other things, that it concentrates its novice teachers and principals in higher-needs schools.
Diego Uriburu, executive director of Identity, a nonprofit in Montgomery County that serves Latino youth and families and has teamed up with the NAACP of Montgomery County to lead the newly formed Black and Brown Coalition for Educational Equity and Excellence, said the findings were not necessarily surprising, but that it was striking to see the data so clearly.
“We as Black and Brown folks have always felt it was hard for us to prove our points because we could only speak about our experience and anecdotes, but then suddenly there was the data that was clearly saying what we have been experiencing,” he said.
Jack Smith, the superintendent, came to the district with the explicit goal of improving educational equity. He knew Montgomery County had a long history of high performance for most students, but not all of them. The work he has overseen to root out inequities has caused some angst among families for whom the status quo was working well.
“There’s a belief somehow, always, that if someone gets something, I must be losing something,” Smith said.
He has worked to dispel that notion and win more support for the idea that improving performance for all students is in the best interests of the entire community.
Budgetary uncertainty thanks to the coronavirus pandemic will leave Montgomery County Public Schools with fewer resources to do things like create new incentives to get more experienced teachers into high-needs schools. But Smith said there’s no reason to “sit on our hands and do nothing because there’s less money now than there was six months or a year ago.”
“We’re not in a position to do a major incentive program across all 135 elementary schools, but we can start,” he said. “You can start with the idea that this is scalable.”
Uriburu believes this latest push for equity may truly result in long-term changes for the district and its students. District administrators are committed, as is the school board, and even the county government has embarked on an equity mission for the broader community. And, of course, there is the coalition. Uriburu said this is the first time the Black and Latino communities have teamed up to advocate for better schools, and they are very clear about their right to make demands.
“By bringing the Black and Brown communities together, we make up 54 percent of the student body of Montgomery County Public Schools,” Uriburu said. “It’s a different ballgame.”
***
While federal law has only recently demanded transparency around school funding disparities for every district in the country, equity battles have played out in a handful of districts and communities over the years. Sometimes they have been spearheaded by district officials, as in Montgomery County, and sometimes by community groups. Longtime advocates of this federal transparency mandate hope the new data will spur more widespread advocacy.
But Rochester, New York, offers a lesson in how hard it can be not only to make major changes, but to make them permanent. Jean-Claude Brizard took over as superintendent of the Rochester City Schools in western New York in January 2008. (He is now a senior advisor and deputy director at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, one of the many funders of The Hechinger Report.) Soon after he started, he hired a consulting firm to follow the dollars in his district and identify inequities, which, it turns out, were striking.
“We saw schools of similar size, similar demographics, but one school got 50 percent more per pupil,” Brizard said.
The budgeting system in Rochester until that point was one in which well-connected principals could advocate for more money for their schools. Brizard wanted to change that. He started out by sharing the data internally and with the school board and then held community meetings where he aimed to spur enough demand for change that the district would be able to justify going against the wishes of the small but vocal populations of the schools that had gotten more than their fair share of district spending.
Brizard orchestrated a three-year transition to a student-based funding formula that clearly laid out how much money schools would get for students with different needs. But when Brizard left the district in 2011, just after the new funding formula was fully in place, he said a group of affluent, mostly white, parents succeeded in lobbying the school board to dismantle the new system.
“The board is often elected by a handful of people, and they will respond to that pressure,” Brizard said. His current work focuses on coalition-building across communities, which he says can help overcome pushback. “When you have a community that is galvanized around these equity issues, it brings the stakes beyond a single protagonist.”
Even without widespread community attention, though, there are cases in which funding decisions have been taken out of the hands of school districts.
In Los Angeles Unified School District, a lawsuit brought by the ACLU of Southern California forced the district to revise its methods of allocating spending among schools. California distributes $61 billion through its Local Control Funding Formula, a portion of which is set aside for foster youth, English learners and students who qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. In LAUSD, the formula generates an extra billion dollars per year to serve students from those three groups. The ACLU sued the district, arguing that it wasn’t directing those dollars to the right students, and LAUSD settled, giving $151 million to a group of schools that had been shortchanged and revising its spending patterns moving forward.
Victor Leung, deputy litigation director for the ACLU of Southern California, said his team filed similar complaints against the Long Beach and Fresno school districts and threatened a complaint in Pomona but hasn’t had to resort to litigation because the districts have already made changes.
While the equity battles in Montgomery County, Rochester and Los Angeles have all played out differently, they share one common thread: clear data. In Montgomery County and Rochester, district leaders produced their own analyses and shared the data with the public. In California, outside researchers tracked the state dollars to the school level and gave advocacy groups a smoking gun.
There is a chance that clear, public data won’t make a difference, of course, and some supporters of the transparency mandate fear just that.
In Illinois’ West Aurora School District 129, another district that spends a statistically significant amount less on its high-poverty schools, according to the Hechinger analysis, the funding disparities have gone largely unremarked upon. Angie Smith, assistant superintendent for operations, said there are no plans to redistribute funds because district leaders believe the spending differences are justified. She pointed to wealthier suburban schools’ transportation costs, more expensive staffing in smaller schools and the costs of specialized programs as reasons for the district’s spending trend. With no one demanding change, the spending disparities will surely remain.
In School District U-46, the financial data has been tucked into the online state report cards — in a tab labeled District Environment — since last October, but conversations about it have mainly been among school officials.
Traci Ellis is a former U-46 school board member, Elgin native and chief equity officer at the Illinois Math and Science Academy, a public magnet school in Chicago’s northwest suburbs. The Ronald D. O’Neal Elementary School is named for her father, a longtime educator in the district. While she no longer lives in Elgin, she has made educational equity her life’s work, and was disappointed to learn of U-46’s spending trend. The district’s slogan is “academic success for all” and a frequent tagline is “all means all.”
“Budgets speak to where priorities lie and if the district is going to have equity as a priority, and it says that it does, then we should be able to see that borne out in how it spends money,” Ellis said.
Disheartening as U-46’s first-year data is, along with the knowledge that similar spending trends exist all over the country, Ellis sees a silver lining: “So many of the problems in school districts with respect to resolving equity issues require some outside third-party intervention,” she said. “This is not one of them. … It does not require laws changing and getting legislators to understand that schools need more money.”
Districts already have the power to reshape their own budgets. They just have to muster the will to do so.
After a flurry of equity-minded initiatives last school year, Sanders had hoped the district’s spending trend would be different in time for the 2020 update to the state report cards. The changes weren’t enough, and according to the latest state data, released Oct. 30, U-46 still spends fewer state and local dollars on its higher poverty schools, overall. Sanders said in a written statement that the district was disappointed its investments last year didn’t change its spending trend.
“With this second year of data in mind, we will work to be more deliberate about addressing school funding decisions as we develop our Fiscal Year 2022 budget,” he said. Ellis and Dixon, the city councilman, will be among those watching.
This story about school funding disparities was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for Hechinger’s newsletter.


truthout--2020-11-12--Obama Memoir Calls Trump’s Birtherism Lies “Elixir” for American Racial Anxiety

In the first volume of his memoir , A Promised Land , former President Barack Obama delves into the false claims about his place of birth , which were frequently made early in his presidency — especially by then reality-television star Donald Trump and echoed by right wing talk shows — that he was actually born in Kenya .
The claims , regularly referred to as the “ birtherism ” conspiracy theory , were patently false and it was known then as well as it is now that Obama was an American-born citizen from Hawaii .
In spite of that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ insinuate that Obama was illegally seated as president , as the U.S. Constitution requires that only “ a natural born citizen ” can become commander-in-chief .
Obama wrote in his memoir that Trump ’ s lies provided millions of white Americans with bigoted sentiments toward the former president an “ elixir for their racial anxiety.
” “ It was as if my very presence in the White House had triggered a deep-seated panic , a sense that the natural order had been disrupted , ” Obama said in his memoir .
“ Which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he started peddling assertions that I had not been born in the United States and was thus an illegitimate president.
” Obama also writes that a shift was also becoming more apparent within the Republican Party itself , as Trump and other right-wing figures like Sarah Palin , “ migrated from the fringe of GOP politics to the center — an emotional , almost visceral , reaction to my presidency , distinct from any differences in policy or ideology.
” For the first two years of his presidency , Obama tried to disengage @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in 2011 , as the baseless claim continued to be debated in the media , the president obliged many of his critics by releasing his long-form birth certificate , while chastising them saying : “ We do not have time for this kind of silliness .
We ’ ve got better stuff to do .
I ’ ve got better stuff to do.
” Despite Obama providing irrefutable proof of his birth in the U.S. , Trump continued making claims that he wasn ’ t convinced .
The business mogul even hinted that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ former president was involved in the death of a health official over the issue .
“ How amazing , the State Health Director who verified copies of Obama ’ s ‘ birth certificate ’ died in plane crash today , ” Trump wrote in a tweet in 2013 .
“ All others lived.
” In the fall of 2016 , as he himself was running for president against Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton , Trump finally acknowledged that the birther conspiracy was false .
But rather than apologize for his role in the matter @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , falsely claiming instead that it was a conspiracy created by Clinton campaign staff eight years prior .
Trump has yet to make any formal apology for suggesting Obama wasn ’ t born in the U.S. And in private , he has continued to push the claim , doing so several months into his presidency in 2017 , according to reporting from The New York Times .
Trump has made similar bigoted remarks toward other Democratic lawmakers since then .
In 2019 , he attacked members of “ the Squad ” — Congresswomen @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Tlaib and Ayanna Pressley — by tweeting that they ought to “ go back ” to the countries “ from which they came from ” — a long-established racist trope .
The remark was inaccurate in addition to being racist as three of the four representatives he attacked were born in the United States .
Rep. Ilhan Omar , born in Somalia , has lived in the U.S. since she was 12 , and has been a citizen since she was 17 .
On the campaign trail in 2020 , Trump suggested that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ may also have been born outside of the U.S. “ I heard today that she doesn ’ t meet the requirements , ” Trump told reporters in August , qualifying his remarks by saying he had “ no idea ” whether the rumors he was peddling were true or not .
Harris was born in Oakland , California , in 1964 .

Since Obama and through his own presidency, Trump has made numerous racist comments toward lawmakers of color.
In the first volume of his memoir, A Promised Land, former President Barack Obama delves into the false claims about his place of birth, which were frequently made early in his presidency — especially by then reality-television star Donald Trump and echoed by right-wing talk shows — that he was actually born in Kenya.
The claims, regularly referred to as the “birtherism” conspiracy theory, were patently false, and it was known then as well as it is now that Obama was an American-born citizen from Hawaii. In spite of that knowledge, however, Trump continued to insinuate that Obama was illegally seated as president, as the U.S. Constitution requires that only “a natural born citizen” can become commander-in-chief.
Obama wrote in his memoir that Trump’s lies provided millions of white Americans with bigoted sentiments toward the former president an “elixir for their racial anxiety.”
“It was as if my very presence in the White House had triggered a deep-seated panic, a sense that the natural order had been disrupted,” Obama said in his memoir. “Which is exactly what Donald Trump understood when he started peddling assertions that I had not been born in the United States and was thus an illegitimate president.”
Obama also writes that a shift was also becoming more apparent within the Republican Party itself, as Trump and other right-wing figures like Sarah Palin, “migrated from the fringe of GOP politics to the center — an emotional, almost visceral, reaction to my presidency, distinct from any differences in policy or ideology.”
For the first two years of his presidency, Obama tried to disengage himself from the conspiracy theory. But in 2011, as the baseless claim continued to be debated in the media, the president obliged many of his critics by releasing his long-form birth certificate, while chastising them saying: “We do not have time for this kind of silliness. We’ve got better stuff to do. I’ve got better stuff to do.”
Despite Obama providing irrefutable proof of his birth in the U.S., Trump continued making claims that he wasn’t convinced. The business mogul even hinted that he believed it was possible that the former president was involved in the death of a health official over the issue.
“How amazing, the State Health Director who verified copies of Obama’s ‘birth certificate’ died in plane crash today,” Trump wrote in a tweet in 2013. “All others lived.”
In the fall of 2016, as Trump was running for president against Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, he finally acknowledged that the birther conspiracy was false. But rather than apologize for his role in the matter, Trump refused to take any responsibility, falsely claiming instead that it was a conspiracy created by Clinton campaign staff eight years prior.
Trump has yet to make any formal apology for suggesting Obama wasn’t born in the U.S. And in private, he has continued to push the claim, doing so several months into his presidency in 2017, according to reporting from The New York Times.
Trump has made similar bigoted remarks toward other Democratic lawmakers since then. In 2019, he attacked members of “the Squad” — Congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib and Ayanna Pressley — by tweeting that they ought to “go back” to the countries “from which they came from” — a long-established racist trope.
The remark was inaccurate in addition to being racist as three of the four representatives he attacked were born in the United States. Rep. Ilhan Omar, born in Somalia, has lived in the U.S. since she was 12, and has been a citizen since she was 17.
On the campaign trail in 2020, Trump suggested that then-candidate and now Vice President-elect Kamala Harris may also have been born outside of the U.S. “I heard today that she doesn’t meet the requirements,” Trump told reporters in August, qualifying his remarks by saying he had “no idea” whether the rumors he was peddling were true or not.
Harris was born in Oakland, California, in 1964.
Tired of reading the same old news from the same old sources? So are we! That’s why we’re on a mission to shake things up and bring you the stories and perspectives that often go untold in mainstream media. But being a radically, unapologetically independent news site isn’t easy (or cheap), and we rely on reader support to keep the lights on.
If you like what you’re reading, please consider making a tax-deductible donation today. We’re not asking for a handout, we’re asking for an investment: Invest in a nonprofit news site that’s not afraid to ruffle a few feathers, not afraid to stand up for what’s right, and not afraid to tell it like it is.
Copyright © Truthout. May not be reprinted without permission.


truthout--2020-11-12--Grassroots Organizers Flipped Georgia Blue. Here’s How They Did It.

Georgia flipping blue may have caught some people by surprise , but to those organizing on the ground for the past several years , this moment was always a possibility .
As the media look for quick explanations to regain narrative control , the story of Georgia ’ s flip is best told through the experiences of organizers rooted in the community beyond presidential election cycles .
“ This work has been going on here for years , ” said Cliff Albright , co-founder of Black Voters Matter , a power-building organization focused on empowering Black civic participation .
Albright @ @ @ @ @ @ @ happened over the last several years that decreased the gap in the overall vote total between the two parties and reduced the margin of victory for Republicans .
“ That gap has been going down [ with each cycle ] .
And then to get to this point , it was just an incredible feeling.
” National media narratives center this moment as a part of the unfinished work from Stacey Abrams ’ s 2018 gubernatorial campaign and battle against voter suppression .
This is only part of the story .
Long before @ @ @ @ @ @ @ organizers focused on increasing voter participation and leveraging the shifting state demographics in Georgia .
Building on this work , Abrams founded the New Georgia Project with the goal of organizing previously disenfranchised voters , such as the 1 million voters removed from the voter rolls between 2012 and 2018 , and expanding political participation by recruiting new voters .
Recent lessons from organizers point to prioritizing specific issues affecting the communities they ’ re reaching out to , and developing entry points into political participation .
“ When I was just following @ @ @ @ @ @ @ barely talked about immigrant rights issues , ” said Aisha Yaqoob Mahmood , director of the Asian American Advocacy Fund .
“ They barely talked about issues that were relevant to the Asian American community.
” While she saw instances of targeted voter outreach in 2016 – for example , efforts to engage with Muslim voters — there just wasn ’ t enough attention to the needs of communities .
As a candidate for the Georgia State House of Representatives in 2018 , Mahmood experienced the power of community conversations informing campaign messaging @ @ @ @ @ @ @ than Georgia turning blue , she is energized about opportunities to move on issues important to the immigrant communities her organization represents .
“ We ’ ve got commitments from candidates , especially sheriff ’ s candidates around ending programs like 287 ( g ) , ” said Mahmood , referring to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement ( ICE ) program that creates partnerships between state and local law enforcement .
“ And [ they are ] really taking a look at how local communities are impacted by things like immigration enforcement.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the 287 ( g ) program won election bids in Cobb and Gwinnett counties .
Groups like Mijente and SONG Power ( the power-building and advocacy arm of Southerners on New Ground ) built on the work of Black and Brown organizers to sever the power of pro-deportation law enforcement .
Collective power-building opportunities like elections helps bring awareness to communities about potential points of advocacy .
When asked about other issues impacting immigrant communities , Mahmood highlighted the challenges facing undocumented students in the state .
“ If you ’ re @ @ @ @ @ @ @ able to attend school because there ’ s a lot of schools that you can not attend , but the schools that you are able to attend you have to pay out of state tuition , ” said Mahmood .
As conversations ramp up nationally about student loan forgiveness and the cost of higher education , Mahmood hopes people will begin to understand the additional burden placed on undocumented students and families to achieve the same educational opportunities .
“ We ’ re losing a lot of our students to other states , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to access than Georgia , she said.
” Another issue of focus and concern is making driver ’ s licenses available for undocumented people .
Driving without a license coupled with increased immigration enforcement and racial profiling puts some communities in greater danger .
In addition to connecting with communities on important issues , Mahmood stressed the value of having in-language organizing from trusted sources .
“ We had a team of community organizers that were doing ethnic specific outreach within their church groups , or their young adult groups , to make @ @ @ @ @ @ @ aren ’ t already engaged , ” Mahmood said .
She noted a Korean organizer who did a survey to find out people ’ s plans for voting and if they did not plan on voting , finding out why .
Being able to have conversations like this in the language people feel most comfortable speaking enabled organizers to address why people might not vote , and address uncertainty about the process .
Similar to the Asian American Advocacy Fund , organizations like Black Voters Matter utilize opportunities for collaboration as ways of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has focused on addressing bread-and-butter issues impacting individuals , and has also worked with groups such as 9to5 Georgia outside of metro-Atlanta around issues including utilities in southwest Georgia and police violence across the state .
“ One of the most important victories in this state isn ’ t the presidential , but it ’ s the fact that Jackie Johnson is no longer the district attorney that covers the region where Ahmaud Arbery was murdered , ” said Albright .
Part of that work involved election protection and providing pathways for combating @ @ @ @ @ @ @ its coalition work in Dougherty County , Black Voters Matter along with 9to5 Georgia , the Georgia NAACP , and several other regional organizations formed an election protection coalition .
Amna Farooqi , an organizer with 9to5 Georgia based in Albany , Georgia , and member of the election protection coalition , said voter turnout increased in 2018 as compared to the prior midterm cycle , but said that election also showed the need for better coordination to address election protection concerns .
The group made suggestions to the Dougherty County Board of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ absentee ballots and having more than one early voting location .
During early voting for the general election this year , Farooqi and other organizers were harassed by election officials for handing out pre-packaged snacks and water to early voters and members of the community at-large .
Volunteers were told they needed to be 150 feet or more away from the polling location , relying on a provision that prevents electioneering by partisan groups , campaigns , or candidates .
But the election protection team members are all a part of nonprofit nonpartisan @ @ @ @ @ @ @ electioneering under the current law .
“ We should have a deeper bench of poll workers and poll managers , and better training , ” said Farooqi .
“ There have been a lot of complaints about poll worker training and poll managers , in terms of them not being that clear on the law.
” Farooqi said that counties must innovate and find solutions to barriers to ballot access .
“ Even beyond the runoff , we ’ re looking at a broader electoral justice package [ to ] find solutions around @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said .
While nationally some centrist Democrats have baselessly claimed a left-leaning agenda is to blame for losing House seats , Farooqi says Georgians need to be trusted to lead in their own communities .
“ All of Georgia is very determined in an organizing sense , ” said Farooqi .
“ The most progressive radical change and strategy come from people that work in rural communities and people that have been here forever .
”

Georgia flipping blue may have caught some people by surprise, but to those organizing on the ground for the past several years, this moment was always a possibility. As the media look for quick explanations to regain narrative control, the story of Georgia’s flip is best told through the experiences of organizers rooted in the community beyond presidential election cycles.
“This work has been going on here for years,” said Cliff Albright, co-founder of Black Voters Matter, a power-building organization focused on empowering Black civic participation. Albright pointed to the consistent organizing that has happened over the last several years that decreased the gap in the overall vote total between the two parties and reduced the margin of victory for Republicans. “That gap has been going down [with each cycle]. And then to get to this point, it was just an incredible feeling.”
National media narratives center this moment as a part of the unfinished work from Stacey Abrams’s 2018 gubernatorial campaign and battle against voter suppression. This is only part of the story. Long before Abrams ran for governor, civic engagement organizers focused on increasing voter participation and leveraging the shifting state demographics in Georgia. Building on this work, Abrams founded the New Georgia Project with the goal of organizing previously disenfranchised voters, such as the 1 million voters removed from the voter rolls between 2012 and 2018, and expanding political participation by recruiting new voters. Recent lessons from organizers point to prioritizing specific issues affecting the communities they’re reaching out to, and developing entry points into political participation.
“When I was just following campaigns in 2016 and 2018, people barely talked about immigrant rights issues,” said Aisha Yaqoob Mahmood, director of the Asian American Advocacy Fund. “They barely talked about issues that were relevant to the Asian American community.”
While she saw instances of targeted voter outreach in 2016 – for example, efforts to engage with Muslim voters — there just wasn’t enough attention to the needs of communities. As a candidate for the Georgia State House of Representatives in 2018, Mahmood experienced the power of community conversations informing campaign messaging and strategy.
Mahmood said that more than Georgia turning blue, she is energized about opportunities to move on issues important to the immigrant communities her organization represents. “We’ve got commitments from candidates, especially sheriff’s candidates around ending programs like 287(g),” said Mahmood, referring to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) program that creates partnerships between state and local law enforcement. “And [they are] really taking a look at how local communities are impacted by things like immigration enforcement.”
Candidates for sheriff promising to overturn participation in the 287(g) program won election bids in Cobb and Gwinnett counties. Groups like Mijente and SONG Power (the power-building and advocacy arm of Southerners on New Ground) built on the work of Black and Brown organizers to sever the power of pro-deportation law enforcement. Collective power-building opportunities like elections helps bring awareness to communities about potential points of advocacy.
When asked about other issues impacting immigrant communities, Mahmood highlighted the challenges facing undocumented students in the state. “If you’re undocumented in Georgia, you are not able to attend school because there’s a lot of schools that you cannot attend, but the schools that you are able to attend you have to pay out of state tuition,” said Mahmood. As conversations ramp up nationally about student loan forgiveness and the cost of higher education, Mahmood hopes people will begin to understand the additional burden placed on undocumented students and families to achieve the same educational opportunities. “We’re losing a lot of our students to other states, because it’s cheaper and easier to access than Georgia, she said.”
Another issue of focus and concern is making driver’s licenses available for undocumented people. Driving without a license coupled with increased immigration enforcement and racial profiling puts some communities in greater danger.
In addition to connecting with communities on important issues, Mahmood stressed the value of having in-language organizing from trusted sources. “We had a team of community organizers that were doing ethnic specific outreach within their church groups, or their young adult groups, to make sure that they were reaching voters who aren’t already engaged,” Mahmood said. She noted a Korean organizer who did a survey to find out people’s plans for voting and if they did not plan on voting, finding out why. Being able to have conversations like this in the language people feel most comfortable speaking enabled organizers to address why people might not vote, and address uncertainty about the process.
Similar to the Asian American Advocacy Fund, organizations like Black Voters Matter utilize opportunities for collaboration as ways of building community power. Black Voters Matter has focused on addressing bread-and-butter issues impacting individuals, and has also worked with groups such as 9to5 Georgia outside of metro-Atlanta around issues including utilities in southwest Georgia and police violence across the state. “One of the most important victories in this state isn’t the presidential, but it’s the fact that Jackie Johnson is no longer the district attorney that covers the region where Ahmaud Arbery was murdered,” said Albright.
Part of that work involved election protection and providing pathways for combating voter suppression. As a part of its coalition work in Dougherty County, Black Voters Matter along with 9to5 Georgia, the Georgia NAACP, and several other regional organizations formed an election protection coalition. Amna Farooqi, an organizer with 9to5 Georgia based in Albany, Georgia, and member of the election protection coalition, said voter turnout increased in 2018 as compared to the prior midterm cycle, but said that election also showed the need for better coordination to address election protection concerns. The group made suggestions to the Dougherty County Board of Elections about providing adequate drop boxes for absentee ballots and having more than one early voting location.
During early voting for the general election this year, Farooqi and other organizers were harassed by election officials for handing out pre-packaged snacks and water to early voters and members of the community at-large. Volunteers were told they needed to be 150 feet or more away from the polling location, relying on a provision that prevents electioneering by partisan groups, campaigns, or candidates. But the election protection team members are all a part of nonprofit nonpartisan organizations. Their presence is not considered electioneering under the current law. “We should have a deeper bench of poll workers and poll managers, and better training,” said Farooqi. “There have been a lot of complaints about poll worker training and poll managers, in terms of them not being that clear on the law.”
Farooqi said that counties must innovate and find solutions to barriers to ballot access. “Even beyond the runoff, we’re looking at a broader electoral justice package [to] find solutions around [voter suppression],” Farooqi said.
While nationally some centrist Democrats have baselessly claimed a left-leaning agenda is to blame for losing House seats, Farooqi says Georgians need to be trusted to lead in their own communities. “All of Georgia is very determined in an organizing sense,” said Farooqi. “The most progressive radical change and strategy come from people that work in rural communities and people that have been here forever.”
Tired of reading the same old news from the same old sources? So are we! That’s why we’re on a mission to shake things up and bring you the stories and perspectives that often go untold in mainstream media. But being a radically, unapologetically independent news site isn’t easy (or cheap), and we rely on reader support to keep the lights on.
If you like what you’re reading, please consider making a tax-deductible donation today. We’re not asking for a handout, we’re asking for an investment: Invest in a nonprofit news site that’s not afraid to ruffle a few feathers, not afraid to stand up for what’s right, and not afraid to tell it like it is.
Copyright © Truthout. May not be reprinted without permission.


truthout--2020-11-12--4 Weeks of Lockdown Could Stop COVID Flare-Up, Boost Economy, Says Biden Adviser

One of President-elect Joe Biden ’ s coronavirus advisers suggested this week that the pandemic could be stemmed significantly , resulting in reduced hospitalizations and lower daily COVID-19 case counts and deaths , if the country dedicated itself to a four-to-six weeks long nationwide stay-at-home order .
Michael Osterholm , the current director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota , was just named to a list of coronavirus advisers to Biden on Monday .
Speaking to Yahoo !
Finance on Wednesday , Osterholm suggested that a nationwide “ lockdown ” could ease @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pandemic in the U.S. Osterholm explained that the nation is heading toward a “ COVID hell ” this winter .
He acknowledged that a “ pandemic fatigue ” was partly to blame , as Americans grow weary of wearing masks and adhering to social distancing guidelines .
Despite that , however , a nationwide stay-at-home order for a month or so could stabilize or even reduce the number of new cases being witnessed daily .
Such a plan , if supported by the federal government , could restart the nation ’ s economy @ @ @ @ @ @ @ could pay for a package right now to cover all of the wages , lost wages for individual workers , for losses to small companies , to medium-sized companies or city , state , county governments , ” Osterholm said .
“ We could do all of that .
If we did that , then we could lock down for four to six weeks.
” Doing so at a time when a potential vaccine may be made available could be doubly beneficial , he added .
“ We could really watch ourselves cruising @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and second quarter of next year while bringing back the economy long before that , ” Osterholm said .
While several states issued similar stay-at-home orders in the spring of this year to quell the spread of the virus , Osterholm , writing in an op-ed in August alongside Minneapolis Federal Reserve President Neel Kashkari , had noted that those orders were not successful because they lacked standardization .
“ The problem with the March-to-May lockdown was that it was not uniformly stringent across the country , ” the pair wrote in their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ New York Times this summer .
“ For example , Minnesota deemed 78 percent of its workers essential .
To be effective , the lockdown has to be as comprehensive and strict as possible.
” The stay-at-home order Osterholm has proposed would be similar in scope , he explained , to what New Zealand put in place earlier this year .
That nation ’ s response to coronavirus is widely regarded as the gold-standard for how to contain and eradicate COVID-19 .
The plan proposed by Osterholm , if implemented by Biden ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ departure from what President Donald Trump has done — or rather , not done — since the beginning of the pandemic .
Trump campaigned hard against the idea of issuing stay-at-home orders , or of listening to health experts in general , in order to slow the spread of coronavirus .
Instead , his administration has opted for adopting an approach that endorses the idea that “ herd immunity ” could eventually reduce the spread of the virus — a plan that many have criticized as being cruel , and tied to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a plan from his health experts in March that encouraged social distancing .
But after a mere eight days of promoting that idea , he grew visibly impatient with it , and started demanding that states , which had issued their own stay-at-home orders in adherence to the principles of his plan , reopen their economies .
The president , it was said by sources with knowledge of his thinking , was worried that the shutdowns would be harmful to the economy , which in turn would be detrimental to his reelection prospects @ @ @ @ @ @ @ March , close to 242,000 Americans have died from coronavirus .
Daily COVID-19 cases being reported are regularly reaching new record highs , with more than 142,000 new cases being announced on Wednesday .

One of President-elect Joe Biden’s coronavirus advisers suggested this week that the pandemic could be stemmed significantly, resulting in reduced hospitalizations and lower daily COVID-19 case counts and deaths, if the country dedicated itself to a four-to-six weeks long nationwide stay-at-home order.
Michael Osterholm, the current director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, was just named to a list of coronavirus advisers to Biden on Monday. Speaking to Yahoo! Finance on Wednesday, Osterholm suggested that a nationwide “lockdown” could ease the economic burdens created by the coronavirus pandemic in the U.S.
Osterholm explained that the nation is heading toward a “COVID hell” this winter. He acknowledged that a “pandemic fatigue” was partly to blame, as Americans grow weary of wearing masks and adhering to social distancing guidelines.
Despite that, however, a nationwide stay-at-home order for a month or so could stabilize or even reduce the number of new cases being witnessed daily. Such a plan, if supported by the federal government, could restart the nation’s economy too, he added.
“We could pay for a package right now to cover all of the wages, lost wages for individual workers, for losses to small companies, to medium-sized companies or city, state, county governments,” Osterholm said. “We could do all of that. If we did that, then we could lock down for four to six weeks.”
Doing so at a time when a potential vaccine may be made available could be doubly beneficial, he added.
“We could really watch ourselves cruising into the vaccine availability in the first and second quarter of next year while bringing back the economy long before that,” Osterholm said.
While several states issued similar stay-at-home orders in the spring of this year to quell the spread of the virus, Osterholm, writing in an op-ed in August alongside Minneapolis Federal Reserve President Neel Kashkari, had noted that those orders were not successful because they lacked standardization.
“The problem with the March-to-May lockdown was that it was not uniformly stringent across the country,” the pair wrote in their op-ed, which was published in The New York Times this summer. “For example, Minnesota deemed 78 percent of its workers essential. To be effective, the lockdown has to be as comprehensive and strict as possible.”
The stay-at-home order Osterholm has proposed would be similar in scope, he explained, to what New Zealand put in place earlier this year. That nation’s response to coronavirus is widely regarded as the gold-standard for how to contain and eradicate COVID-19.
The plan proposed by Osterholm, if implemented by Biden’s administration, would be a stark departure from what President Donald Trump has done — or rather, not done — since the beginning of the pandemic.
Trump campaigned hard against the idea of issuing stay-at-home orders, or of listening to health experts in general, in order to slow the spread of coronavirus. Instead, his administration has opted for adopting an approach that endorses the idea that “herd immunity” could eventually reduce the spread of the virus — a plan that many have criticized as being cruel, and tied to the idea of eugenics.
Trump reluctantly accepted a plan from his health experts in March that encouraged social distancing. But after a mere eight days of promoting that idea, he grew visibly impatient with it, and started demanding that states, which had issued their own stay-at-home orders in adherence to the principles of his plan, reopen their economies.
The president, it was said by sources with knowledge of his thinking, was worried that the shutdowns would be harmful to the economy, which in turn would be detrimental to his reelection prospects.
Since the pandemic began in early March, close to 242,000 Americans have died from coronavirus. Daily COVID-19 cases being reported are regularly reaching new record highs, with more than 142,000 new cases being announced on Wednesday.
Tired of reading the same old news from the same old sources? So are we! That’s why we’re on a mission to shake things up and bring you the stories and perspectives that often go untold in mainstream media. But being a radically, unapologetically independent news site isn’t easy (or cheap), and we rely on reader support to keep the lights on.
If you like what you’re reading, please consider making a tax-deductible donation today. We’re not asking for a handout, we’re asking for an investment: Invest in a nonprofit news site that’s not afraid to ruffle a few feathers, not afraid to stand up for what’s right, and not afraid to tell it like it is.
Copyright © Truthout. May not be reprinted without permission.