{"id":3223,"date":"2011-11-22T16:25:22","date_gmt":"2011-11-22T21:25:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/?p=3223"},"modified":"2011-11-29T20:20:28","modified_gmt":"2011-11-30T01:20:28","slug":"article-rebuts-assertion-that-online-learning-companies-bought-americas-schools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2011\/11\/22\/article-rebuts-assertion-that-online-learning-companies-bought-americas-schools\/","title":{"rendered":"Article Rebuts Assertion That Online Learning Companies Bought America&#8217;s Schools"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_3226\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 204px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2011\/11\/virtual-school-204x192.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-3226\" title=\"virtual school\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2011\/11\/virtual-school-204x192.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"204\" height=\"192\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">darlington.k12.sc.us<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\"> <\/p><\/div>\n<p>A recent article in <a href=\"%20http:\/\/www.thenation.com\/\">The Nation<\/a> magazine accused business leaders of using legislative tactics to hide their true intentions, which include privatizing<a href=\"http:\/\/www.thenation.com\/article\/164651\/how-online-learning-companies-bought-americas-schools?page=0,1\"> virtual public schools<\/a>. Writer Lee Fang talked about Florida as a leader in the pursuit of privatized education through <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/tag\/vouchers\/\">vouchers<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/tag\/charter-schools\/\">charter schools<\/a>. But another writer says Fang got it wrong.<\/p>\n<p>Fang cited <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/tag\/jeb-bush\/\">former Governor Jeb Bush<\/a>\u2019s \u201cfar-reaching ten-point agenda for virtual schools and online coursework.\u201d\u00a0 He wrote that a key to Bush\u2019s success included a requirement that Florida&#8217;s public school students take some classes online.<\/p>\n<p>The article quoted Patricia Levesque, who runs two education foundations chaired by Bush. At a retreat last year, Fang said she urged education reformers to spread the opposition thin by keeping them busy with legislative proposals.<\/p>\n<p>Now, writer Bill Tucker takes the original article to task for what he sees as<a href=\"http:\/\/educationnext.org\/the-nation%E2%80%99s-online-learning-omission\/?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EducationNext+%28Education+Next%29\"> some serious flaws<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->In the journal <a href=\"http:\/\/educationnext.org\/\">Education Next<\/a>, Tucker makes the case that Fang had an agenda and did more than just incorrectly equate virtual courses with private operators. Fang, he says, repeatedly suggested that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.flvs.net\/Pages\/default.aspx\">Florida Virtual School<\/a> is private. Florida Virtual School is actually a state-run, public institution that offers a K-12 education. Tucker calls the school \u201ca poster child for public sector innovation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Tucker acknowledges there are concerns about online learning programs, including mixed outcomes for students. But he suggests that a lot of good programs shouldn\u2019t be lumped in with a few bad ones. He ends by saying that strong oversight \u201cis essential. So, too, is knowledgeable and objective reporting.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>So, who&#8217;s right? Let us know what you think.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A recent article in The Nation magazine accused business leaders of using legislative tactics to hide their true intentions, which include privatizing virtual public schools. Writer Lee Fang talked about Florida as a leader in the pursuit of privatized education through vouchers and charter schools. But another writer says Fang got it wrong. Fang cited [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18],"tags":[1009,1026,1060,1020],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3223"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3223"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3223\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}