Education
Blog
Teacher Unions’ Agenda Derailed by LA Parcel Tax Defeat
A funny thing happened on the way to teacher-union political hegemony: common sense kicked in and the people threw the unions for a huge loss with the defeat of the proposed parcel-tax increase in Los Angeles. In fight after fight across the country, and especially here in California, the teacher ...
Lance Izumi
June 6, 2019
Charter Schools
Lance Izumi Writes About Importance of Charter Schools in TeachThought
While most traditional public schools continue to adhere to a one-size-fits-all model of curriculum, instruction, and learning, sometimes dubbed the ‘McDonaldization’ of education, public charter schools have the flexibility to implement more individualized learning models that promote curiosity, inquiry, and critical thinking. In a recent article, Terry Heick observed, “in education as ...
Lance Izumi
June 5, 2019
Blog
Union Membership Doesn’t Mean a Job Forever
PRI has a helpful calculator that shows how much a union member could save throughout his or her working years from not paying union dues. In California, the average fee-paying teacher owes $650 a year while the average worker owes $1,000. A 45-year old teacher who leaves the union and ...
Rowena Itchon
June 3, 2019
Commentary
Common Core Has Failed America’s Students
Bill Gates, a key godfather of the Common Core subject-matter standards, wrote five years ago that the national standards “will improve education for millions of students,” but a groundbreaking new study shows that Common Core has actually decreased the level of student achievement. With irresistible prodding by Gates and then-President Obama, the ...
Lance Izumi
May 22, 2019
Charter Schools
PRI’s Lance Izumi Discusses NAACP & Charter Schools on Phil Cowan Show
Listen to Lance Izumi, Senior Director of PRI’s Center for Education, discuss his recent article on Southern California NAACP chapters breaking away from the state and national groups to support charter schools on the Phil Cowan Show on AM 1380 The Answer in Sacramento. The interview begins at the 1:50:30 ...
Pacific Research Institute
May 14, 2019
Charter Schools
SoCal NAACP Chapters Break with Unions Because Charter Schools Work
While a powerful front of liberal lawmakers and groups push for a moratorium on the creation of new charter schools in California, individual chapters of the NAACP have broken ranks to support charters that are improving the education for thousands of African-American children. To end teacher strikes in Los Angeles and Oakland, local school ...
Lance Izumi
May 10, 2019
Blog
Latest Evidence of California’s Pension Crowd-Out: Less Classroom Funding
My colleagues and I have written often about California’s pension crowd-out, or how state and local governments budgets are increasingly gobbled up by public pension payments. Last fall, PRI’s Wayne Winegarden released a new study showing that, using a more realistic accounting measure, California’s unfunded public employee pension obligations stood ...
Tim Anaya
May 6, 2019
Business & Economics
Educational Choice is Essential to a Skills-Based Economy
The skills and education of every American will form the basis of our nation’s long term success, as well as the solution to many of the most divisive issues in American politics. Issues such as wage stagnation, income inequality, unaffordable housing, and income mobility can be directly addressed through a ...
Damon Dunn
April 29, 2019
Charter Schools
School Riots Underscore Why Parents Prefer School Choice
Over the last two months, riots at public schools across the country have underscored why parents choose safer charter schools for their children. In April, ten Stamford, Connecticut high school students were charged with numerous crimes, including first-degree riot and assault on a police officer, after a riot that involved hundreds of ...
Lance Izumi
April 24, 2019
Blog
Left vs. Left Round 2: Teach for America and the Unions
When Right by the Bay heard that Assemblyman Kevin Kiley’s vigorous defense of Teach for America (TFA) landed him in the “dog house” (the smallest office at the Capitol), we couldn’t help but be intrigued, for nothing in politics is worse than being caught eating one’s own. But we don’t ...
Rowena Itchon
April 24, 2019
Teacher Unions’ Agenda Derailed by LA Parcel Tax Defeat
A funny thing happened on the way to teacher-union political hegemony: common sense kicked in and the people threw the unions for a huge loss with the defeat of the proposed parcel-tax increase in Los Angeles. In fight after fight across the country, and especially here in California, the teacher ...
Lance Izumi Writes About Importance of Charter Schools in TeachThought
While most traditional public schools continue to adhere to a one-size-fits-all model of curriculum, instruction, and learning, sometimes dubbed the ‘McDonaldization’ of education, public charter schools have the flexibility to implement more individualized learning models that promote curiosity, inquiry, and critical thinking. In a recent article, Terry Heick observed, “in education as ...
Union Membership Doesn’t Mean a Job Forever
PRI has a helpful calculator that shows how much a union member could save throughout his or her working years from not paying union dues. In California, the average fee-paying teacher owes $650 a year while the average worker owes $1,000. A 45-year old teacher who leaves the union and ...
Common Core Has Failed America’s Students
Bill Gates, a key godfather of the Common Core subject-matter standards, wrote five years ago that the national standards “will improve education for millions of students,” but a groundbreaking new study shows that Common Core has actually decreased the level of student achievement. With irresistible prodding by Gates and then-President Obama, the ...
PRI’s Lance Izumi Discusses NAACP & Charter Schools on Phil Cowan Show
Listen to Lance Izumi, Senior Director of PRI’s Center for Education, discuss his recent article on Southern California NAACP chapters breaking away from the state and national groups to support charter schools on the Phil Cowan Show on AM 1380 The Answer in Sacramento. The interview begins at the 1:50:30 ...
SoCal NAACP Chapters Break with Unions Because Charter Schools Work
While a powerful front of liberal lawmakers and groups push for a moratorium on the creation of new charter schools in California, individual chapters of the NAACP have broken ranks to support charters that are improving the education for thousands of African-American children. To end teacher strikes in Los Angeles and Oakland, local school ...
Latest Evidence of California’s Pension Crowd-Out: Less Classroom Funding
My colleagues and I have written often about California’s pension crowd-out, or how state and local governments budgets are increasingly gobbled up by public pension payments. Last fall, PRI’s Wayne Winegarden released a new study showing that, using a more realistic accounting measure, California’s unfunded public employee pension obligations stood ...
Educational Choice is Essential to a Skills-Based Economy
The skills and education of every American will form the basis of our nation’s long term success, as well as the solution to many of the most divisive issues in American politics. Issues such as wage stagnation, income inequality, unaffordable housing, and income mobility can be directly addressed through a ...
School Riots Underscore Why Parents Prefer School Choice
Over the last two months, riots at public schools across the country have underscored why parents choose safer charter schools for their children. In April, ten Stamford, Connecticut high school students were charged with numerous crimes, including first-degree riot and assault on a police officer, after a riot that involved hundreds of ...
Left vs. Left Round 2: Teach for America and the Unions
When Right by the Bay heard that Assemblyman Kevin Kiley’s vigorous defense of Teach for America (TFA) landed him in the “dog house” (the smallest office at the Capitol), we couldn’t help but be intrigued, for nothing in politics is worse than being caught eating one’s own. But we don’t ...