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A controversial Bedford-Stuyvesant charter school that parents charge is shortchanging students on supplies and services is being audited by the state controller's office. Parents at the Brooklyn Excelsior Charter School on Quincy St. said school administrators aren't doling out the cash to pay for textbooks or extra help after school.

The owners of a scandal-plagued consulting business defrauded the city of millions of dollars, flagrantly violated contracts and lied about its dealings, probers charged Wednesday. The city's special schools investigator, which launched its probe of Future Technology Associates after Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez wrote a series of articles on the computer-services firm, found serious violations of contracting rules:

Roy Roberts, a former GM executive, says his first few months on the job as emergency manager of Detroit's public schools have been "like drinking from a fire hose." "I had five weeks to pull together a budget for 2012," he said in an interview. "That's not a simple process." So far, his tenure has entailed cutting salaries across the board by 10 percent; imposing $81 million in wage concessions; and announcing a new state-run educational authority to oversee Michigan's lowest-performing schools that will pilot in Detroit next year. He has also faced several lawsuits and seen 11 people charged with stealing from the city's schools.

Misinformed charter punditry doesn't help anyone. It doesn't help the public to make more informed decisions either about choices for their own children or about policy preferences more generally. It also doesn't help charter operators get their jobs done and it doesn't help those working in traditional public schools focus on things that really matter.  This post is in direct response to the irresponsible and unjustified statement below from a recent editorial in the NJ Star Ledger

Folks, generational warfare is here. As Congress's "super committee" begins its deliberations with an eye towards its November deadline, and as the debate for 2012 heats up, it's time for those in the education space to pick a side. You're either with the kids or with those rushing to the ramparts to defend retiree entitlements. So, which is it?

I've previously written about the growing number of rigorous peer reviewed and other studies which tend to show positive effects of state school finance reforms. But what about all of those accounts to the contrary? The accounts that seem so dominant in the policy conversations on the topic. What is that vast body of research that suggests that school finance reforms don't matter? That it's all money down the rat-hole. That in fact, judicial orders to increase funding for schools actually hurt children?

Forty-nine million or so American children have returned to public school classrooms that are, according to many critics, ever more boring. Preparation for increasingly high-stakes tests has reduced time for social studies and science. Austerity state and federal budgets are decimating already hobbled music, art, library and physical education budgets.

As for the poor academic performance of low-income and minority students in the U.S., there are many reasons for this -- most beyond the control of schools. There is no doubt that children from troubled communities and families, in which few people have completed high school, much less college, are a challenge to educate. So let's be clear: parents and family background matter -- a lot! So much so that today, sadly, demography is destiny for most children.

The union representing nearly 700 public school employees who were laid off at the end of the school day on Friday held a last-minute lunchtime rally on the steps of City Hall, calling the layoffs a political vendetta and threatening possible legal action. But for all of the chanting and sign waving by District Council 37, the layoffs went through as planned. At the end of the day, Sungmi Kang, 47, a school aide at Stuyvesant High School, was out of work, along with 638 other school aides, parent coordinators, community associates, and other school support staff. They are the city's lowest paid employees and the latest victims of budget cuts.

The ring of the last school bell on Friday could be heralding the beginning of unemployment and uncertainty for more than 700 employees in 347 city schools - school aides, parent coordinators, health aides and other support staff to whom pink slips went out two weeks ago.

"Here's a quick data driven post on Governor's state aid cuts - or aid changes. So far, I've been able to compile data from a few states which make it relatively easy to access and download data on district by district runs of state aid (and one state that does not, but I have good sources of assistance). Here, I compare changes in state aid to K-12 public school districts in Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York."

THE United States supports schools in Afghanistan because we know that education is one of the cheapest and most effective ways to build a country. Alas, we've forgotten that lesson at home. All across America, school budgets are being cut, teachers laid off and education programs dismantled.

Most school districts in the state would get additional aid under bills proposed by the Democratic majority, but the Legislature also would have to increase taxes on the wealthy to pay for it.

While all eyes were on the rallies for and against same-sex marriage last Friday, the Assembly carried on a quintessential - but much less glitzy - debate about education policy.

The age of accountability should be renamed the age of blame, when teachers wear the scarlet letter for the failings of a nation. We send teachers into pockets of poverty that our leaders can't or won't eradicate, and when those teachers fail to work miracles among devastated children, we stamp 'unacceptable' on their foreheads.

After several years of state and local budget cuts, thousands of school districts across the nation are gutting summer-school programs, cramming classes into four-day weeks or lopping days off the school year, even though virtually everyone involved in education agrees that American students need more instruction time.

Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg made quite a splash last year when he donated $100 million to help fix Newark's troubled schools not only because of the size of the gift but its promise of involving Newark residents in deciding how the money would be spent-funds that the city would match.  According to Joan Whitlow of the Star-Ledger's NJ.com, that promise of "citizen-centered" involvement has fallen by the wayside with the announcement that the Foundation for Newark's Future will be dispensing Zuckerberg funds.  Whitlow reports that the foundation's board has three voting and one nonvoting members, only one of whom is from Newark, and that's Mayor Cory Booker.  The only way to get on the board, according to Gregory Taylor, the foundation's president and CEO, is to donate at least $10 million because the foundation has to "raise enough to match the original $100 million."  

Emily Sirota, candidate for Denver Public School Board District 1, appeared on MSNBC's Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell to discuss the unprecedented amounts of corporate cash flowing into the school board race to try to defeat her. Emily supports reinvesting in our neighborhood schools and opposes vouchers - and that's why Huge Money is trying to defeat her.