In Part 2, found here http://www.dailykos.com/... , former White House senior education advisor Sandy Kress was said to be hopscotching across the nation, cheerleading on behalf of his creation, No Child Left Behind, and doing his part to bring corporate interests into close contact with federal funds available to them through NCLB. Through 2004 and 2005, a few reporters and researchers were catching onto the sudden flow of money to several large corporations and their lobbyists, particularly to those corporations specializing in standardized testing and in "supplemental education services." The same corporations and lobbyists, by the way, are lining up to expand their profit margins during the next six years, as NCLB is being re-authorized by this Congress.
At the center of the action during round two: Sandy Kress, whose turn from public service to corporate lobbyist was first detailed in the Dallas Morning News on March 6, 2005.
(To review the series from the beginning, click here http://www.dailykos.com/... )
THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS HEADLINE read, "Lobbyist a go-to guy on school policy, but some question his motives." Sandy Kress, the article read, had now become one of "the most influential players in the education-industrial complex." In the most comprehensive look at Kress’s record to that date, reporter Scott Parks went so far here http://texasedequity.blogspot.com/... as to identify George W. Bush as "the man [Kress] once tutored on education policy." Heady stuff.
Parks described Kress’s situation like this: "On the one hand, Mr. Kress is a leading advocate of using test data to hold schools accountable; he says his motivation is to make education better for children. On the other, the accountability movement that he espouses benefits the clients who have made him wealthy."
Carolyn Boyle, another lobbyist, cut through the happy talk to lay out the facts for Parks: "One of the things that irritates people is that he wraps George W. Bush around his neck like a mink stole, and he is really this highly paid hired gun who opens up education markets for big companies," she said.
Kress didn’t see it that way in his own conversation with Parks; Kress said people ought to pay more attention to "bad schools" than who was paying his salary. "I’m a radical education reformer. That is who I am. That is the definition of Sandy Kress," Kress told Parks.
But that definition excluded other simple facts that Parks found elsewhere: "Mr. Kress is a partner at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, which describes itself as one of the world's largest law firms," Parks wrote. "His schedule keeps him hopscotching across the country as a cheerleader for No Child Left Behind, the sweeping federal education law that enshrined test data as the centerpiece of school accountability."
He continues, "...[Kress] is the paid lobbyist for conservative businessmen intent on imposing more accountability on public schools in return for increased funding. He consults for companies that sell products and services to state education agencies and school districts. And he advises corporate chief executives under the banner of business groups such as the Business Roundtable."
"Rarely mentioned publicly, however, are Mr. Kress' connections to powerful companies and business associations that have a stake in a $500-billion-a-year public education machine fueled by a politically volatile mix of federal, state and local taxes."
When asked about the services he provides to corporate clients, Kress invokes "attorney-client" privilege with Parks. "I don't want to talk too much about what I do for my clients because I don't think they like that," he said.
But Parks learns that among Kress’s clients is "Pearson Education, one of the world's largest education companies."
Parks writes,
Pearson, among other things, publishes textbooks and runs high-stakes test programs for state education agencies. The company holds a $57 million contract to run the TAKS test program for 2004-05, according to the Texas Education Agency. The Government Accountability Office, a watchdog agency that reports to Congress, says states will spend $1.9 billion to $5.3 billion to implement tests mandated by No Child Left Behind. So what is Mr. Kress' value to a major player in the textbook and testing industries?
A January 2003 meeting of Pearson executives and their investors shed some light on that question. Mr. Kress was the featured speaker. Marjorie Scardino, the Texarkana-born chief executive of parent company Pearson PLC (which also owns The Financial Times and Penguin Books), introduced Mr. Kress as one of "the leading advisers on education policy in America."
"He also is our adviser," she said. "He talks a lot to us about how NCLB is going to change things for us and what kinds of products and services might be appropriate for that kind of change."
Mr. Kress spent 20 minutes guiding Pearson investors through his encyclopedic knowledge of federal law, helping them understand No Child Left Behind's requirements and their effect on the market: more money for English language learners, new mandates for science testing beginning in 2006-07 and a hundred other details.
During a recent interview, he talked about how he sees himself and his work. The word "lobbyist" was not prominent in his self-analysis.
What he really does, he said, is use a unique blend of knowledge about public education law and education research to chart the future for his clients. He reads research. For example, he knows what middle school math textbooks should contain and who should be hired to write them.
"I may say, 'Here's what I think' or 'Here's what I see.' "
In his report, Parks charted Kress’s path through the 1990s, including his "tutorial" service to then-gubernatorial candidate George W. Bush in 1993, and his presidency of the Dallas school board, calling it "an extraordinarily divisive period" and "four racially charged years." When Governor Bush became President Bush, Kress "turned up as a temporary government employee in Washington. With his bipartisan pedigree and education expertise, Mr. Bush saw him as the perfect choice to shepherd No Child Left Behind through Congress."
In the slickest note of Parks’s report, Kress says he’s "post-partisan," noting that he never switched parties to work for Republicans.
Then Parks turns to Kress’s representation of a group of Texas businessmen called Texas Business for Educational Excellence. "The group advocates a tightly controlled industrial model for education called standards-based accountability," he writes. Rice University education professor Linda McNeil criticized the "business model for public education."
"The idea is that teachers don't work hard and that they need to be shaped up by business people," McNeil told Parks. He writes, "The focus on a uniform statewide testing system, she argued, shifts public attention away from the poor school environment that many lower-income students endure each day – inferior libraries, too few textbooks, no running water in science classes."
Accompanying Parks’s report was a sidebar listing the highlights of Kress’s career and his known clients as of March 2005:
KRESS: HIS CLIENTS AND HIS ACTIVITIES
Education adviser to President George W. Bush in the 2000 and 2004 campaigns. Played key role in helping Mr. Bush push the No Child Left Behind law through Congress.
Consultant to Council of Chief State School Officers, an association of state education commissioners. Mr. Kress advises them on how to implement No Child Left Behind's requirement that all states set up accountability systems based on high-stakes test scores.
Consultant to the Business Roundtable, a Washington D.C.-based consortium of chief executives of major American companies. The organization has been active in education issues for many years.
Co-founder of the Texas Education Reform Caucus. TERC was created as an advisory committee for state Rep. Kent Grusendorf, R-Arlington, chairman of the Public Education Committee in the Texas House of Representatives.
Adviser, consultant and lobbyist for Pearson Education, a worldwide company that publishes textbooks and runs high-stakes test programs in Texas and other states.
Lobbyist for Kaplan, a division of The Washington Post Co. Kaplan provides a wide range of educational products and services. It first made its mark in the test-preparation industry.
Lobbyist for The Teaching Commission, a New York-based think tank started by Louis V. Gerstner Jr., chairman of The Carlyle Group, a private global investment firm. The Teaching Commission advocates more rigorous teacher-training programs and paying them based on merit rather than seniority.
Consultant to the Governor's Business Council, a group of Texas business leaders that have recommended a wide-ranging list of changes to public education law in Texas. Charles McMahen, a retired Houston banker, chairs the council.
Lobbyist for Texas Businesses for Excellence in Education. The group hired Mr. Kress to help get the Governor's Business Council recommendations into Texas law. It advocates stricter sanctions for schools that are judged "low-performing" based on high-stakes test scores. Houston investor Charles Miller and San Antonio businessman H.B. Zachry Jr. are involved in this group.
Former lobbyist for K12, which in 2003 unsuccessfully pushed the Texas Legislature to publicly fund so-called virtual charter schools. K12 sells curricula that home-schoolers can get over the Internet. William J. Bennett, a former U.S. secretary of education, is a director of the company. Mr. Kress says he no longer works for K12.
Former lobbyist for Community Education Partners. Under contract with school districts, the company runs alternative campuses for problem students who have been kicked out of regular classrooms. Mr. Kress says he has not worked for CEP since 1999.
SOURCES: Texas Ethics Commission, Sandy Kress and Dallas Morning News research.
The Dallas Morning News wasn’t the last paper to catch onto the bag of tricks Kress incorporated in NCLB and his aid to large corporations in turning on the funding stream – nor was its report the most comprehensive yet to come. That report – an excellent and extensively researched text – would come from a freelance writer two months later.
(Stay tuned for Part 4.)