NY Post: Celebrate Mother's Day With School Choice And Eva Moskowitz!

You can't make this stuff up.

Here's a Post editorial today:

Today is Mother’s Day, when across the nation we honor the women who gave birth to us, fed us and took us to school.

And if a new survey by the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice is right, two-thirds of American mothers with school-age children want more options about where they can send their kids to school — including vouchers.

No doubt, New York moms want the same for their kids. Although the state’s teachers unions make vouchers politically impossible at the moment, the rise of charter schools has introduced a hopeful element of excellence, choice and accountability into our public-school system.

Just ask Carmen Melendez, whose two daughters — Camilla, 9, and Catalina, 7 — attend Success Academy 2 in Harlem. Melendez says that even though her daughter Camilla qualified for a gifted-and-talented program in the traditional public schools, she decided to stay with the charter because “Success has a clear vision of what they want to do with the children.”

Khadijah Pickel is the mother of twins Idris and Ruqayah, 10, who are also Success Academy students. “I went to District 5 public schools, but you want better for your kids,” says Pickel. “I wasn’t willing to gamble with my children’s future.”

Pickel notes that friends with kids in district schools are amazed that her children have science five days a week, with projects beginning in kindergarten. She’s especially gratified that Success mainstreams kids with special needs, like Ruqayah, who has autism.

To give a hint of the demand, last month Success held its annual lottery for admission, attracting 12,500 applicants for a mere 1,400 slots. That means disappointment for thousands of moms who were not as lucky as Melendez and Pickel and their kids.

Sadly, as Success CEO Eva Moskowitz points out, if some mayoral candidates get their way, mothers will have less choice and more disappointment in the future. These are the politicians working to make life more difficult for charters. Their current tactic is to oppose co-locating charters in existing public-school buildings. Charters need co-location because, unlike public schools, they get no money to finance buildings.

The way Pickel sees it, “Nothing’s worse than telling a parent that they can’t send their kids where they want to.”

The way we see it? Mother knows best.

The charter school/privatization community must be feeling a lot of anxiety these days to feel the need to trot out the "School Choice Is What Mothers Want!' meme for Mother's Day.

Notice that the survey firm that the Post uses for this meme is the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice.

That firm would be named for Milton Friedman, the neo-liberal economist who promoted the privatization of every part of the public sphere, not Thomas Friedman, the NY Times columnist who promotes the privatization of every part of the public sphere.

But either way, it's no wonder that the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice found two-thirds of mom's wanted "choice" for their kids.

You see, that's what the foundation was founded for - to promote and propagate choice all over this land.

The Posties quickly pivot from the self-serving survey from the Friedman Foundation to glowing statements from a couple of moms with kids in Success Academy charter schools.

They even manage to find one mom with a daughter who is autistic and has been mainstreamed by Success!

Wow - wouldn't every mom want this kind of education for their kids?

You bet, say the Posties, which is why we should all celebrate Mother's Day by making sure all those bad Democratic candidates for mayor don't get their way and cease the cancering of the public school system with charter school co-locations.

That Success Academy has a strong reputation for filtering out children with special needs and counseling those children out of their schools when they do slip through the filter is never mentioned in the Post editorial.

Nor is it mentioned that when they are "stuck" with children with special needs in their schools, they treat them like second class citizens.  

It's a shame the Posties couldn't speak to these parents of children with special needs who attend Success charters.

Brooklyn parents with kids at two charter schools in Cobble Hill and the Upper West Side are furious over the shoddy services they say their special needs children are getting.

Instead of making sure a teaching assistant is shadowing the students as mandated by law, the kids have been repeatedly suspended from the Success Academy Charter Schools for rowdy behavior, the parents charge .

“I don’t want my child to be ostracized. He has needs that need to be met,” said Crown Heights mom La-Tarsha Williams of her son Amani Smith, 6, a student at the Success Academy Cobble Hill.

The schools are part of the chain founded and run by former City Councilwoman Eva Moskowitz.

Williams said her son had been suspended 20 times since the start of the school year for hitting other children, calling out in class, and throwing objects. He’s missed 50 days of class, according to Williams who attributes the behavior problems to a change in the child’s Individualized Education Program (IEP) in October when his school aide was taken away.

“When they have zero tolerance, I totally understand that. But this is definitely extreme for him to miss that many days of school,” said Williams.

Success officials deny the claims and say no child had been suspended for that length of time.

"While federal privacy law prohibits us from talking about these individual cases, parents must consent to any change to a child's IEP, and every child at Success Academy Cobble Hill whose IEP requires (an aide) has one," said SCA Spokeswoman Jenny Sedlis.

City Councilwoman Letitia James (D - Clinton Hill) blasted SCA for the suspensions and asked state officials to investigate. “A zero tolerance policy for special needs children is a bad one,” said James.

“Suspending 5,6 and 7-year old’s with IEP’s is setting them up for failure.”

Other parents also blasted the practice.

“He’s a 5-year-old who gets impatient in a classroom setting. That’s what ADHD is,” said Carroll Gardens dad George Mazzella about his son Vincent.

Mazzella’s child had been suspended multiple times totalling 31 days for throwing a piece of cinderblock near students and hitting a teacher in the arm with a plastic band.

Mazzella said his son has had five different paras who have all left the school. Now, the dad is sitting with the boy in class.

“This is outrageous, idiotic and it shouldn’t be done,” said Mazzella, who is missing work to be with his son.

Fatima Geidi, of East New York, said son Jamir, 7, who attends the Success school on the Upper West Side is afraid the boy will get more suspensions for acting out.

“No parent wants to see their child lose out on things they’re entitled to,’ said Geidi, who was promised but never got daily reports on Jamir’s behavior. She also had to hire a lawyer to get the school to give Jamir mandated occupational therapy. “The school dropped the ball.”

Maybe the Success Academy charters aren't the wonderland depicted in the Postie editorial.

Maybe if your child has special needs, you don't want to send him/her to Success or other charter schools where they have "zero tolerance" policies.

Too bad the Posties couldn't give us the more complex and accurate view of the Eva Moskowitz/Success Academy juggernaut.

Too bad they had to use Mother's Day to try and sell their public school privatization movement.

Nice thing is, they're doing buyouts and layoffs at the NY Post, which bleeds over $110 million dollars every year and is reported to be on its last legs.

Maybe once the Posties lose their jobs writing privatization propaganda for the Post they can join the Success Academy juggernaut and write it directly for Eva Moskowitz.