Stop Betsy DeVos & Campbell Brown before it’s too late!

January 6, 2017

1.   Senate hearings on the nomination of Betsy DeVos to become Secretary of Education will be held Wednesday, January 11. As I explain in this month’s Indypendent, she is the most unqualified person every to be nominated to this position and is out to wreck our public schools. Please call your Senators now to oppose her nomination; you can find their phone numbers here: https://www.senate.gov/senators/contact/. If their DC phones are busy, call their district offices- you can find them on their websites.

2. Meanwhile, even as Facebook has proliferated fake news and helped swing the election towards Trump, Mark Zuckerberg has now hired Campbell Brown to head his news team. Brown is a friend and ally of Betsy DeVos and has herself spread disinformation in an effort to attack schools and public school teachers. In short, Campbell Brown is the last person in the world who should be
hired to try to inject more objectivity and truth into Facebook’s news operations. Sign our petition now to demand Zuckerberg not hire her!

3. I have posted new research summaries on the wide-ranging benefits of class size reduction in the areas of achievement, teacher retention, discipline, non-cognitive skills and parent engagement. These fact sheet are useful to provide evidence to your state or district to urge them to use Title II funds to hire more teachers to lower class size. One of the summaries is most relevant for parents, teachers and advocates in NY state, the other nationwide.

Have a good weekend and keep warm,

Leonie