Citizens for Public Schools

Dec. 24, 2013 — Longtime Executive Director Marilyn J. Segal has retired. “Marilyn has been Executive Director for more than 20 years, helping CPS transform from a coalition that was a committee of the Jewish Alliance for Law and Social Action (JALSA), to an independent organization in 2008,” said CPS President Ann O’Halloran. Prior to becoming CPS executive director, Segal was the legislative agent for the coalition.  CPS came together in 1982 to oppose a Massachusetts ballot question seeking to divert public tax dollars to private and religious schools.   → Read More

Citizens for Public Schools members joined hundreds in Boston and thousands across the country in a Day of Action to Reclaim the Promise of Public Education. Boston’s event,   “The Future of BPS: A Town Hall to Transform the Public Education Agenda in Boston,” was held at Madison Park High School, with 250 students, parents and teachers talking about what’s working and what can be improved in Boston Public Schools. The Day of Action was covered by NBC’s Andrea Mitchell in this segment.   → Read More

For anyone who missed Diane Ravitch’s powerful talk at Memorial Church in Cambridge on Oct. 24, we are pleased to say that Robert Lamothe’s video is now available online in three parts. Go to Bob’s YouTube page to watch and listen: Diane Ravitch video.   → Read More

Education and Civil Rights

Join us at University of Massachusetts Boston to hear the education scholar and author Pedro Noguera speak on education and civil rights in the 21st Century on Monday, Dec. 2. Education is frequently described as the civil rights issue of the 21st century by politicians calling for policy changes and reform. However, the most important civil rights issue involving education in the 20th century, school segregation, remains largely unresolved, and despite the controversy it once generated, it is rarely mentioned as an important social issue that should be addressed.   → Read More

With a rousing defense of public education and a scathing critique of those who seek to privatize it, Diane Ravitch drew a diverse audience of 800 to Harvard’s Memorial Church on October 24^th. Citizens for Public Schools sponsored the event as part of its Mary Ann Hardenbergh annual lecture series.

Ravitch, a historian and former U.S. assistant secretary of education, pulled no punches when explaining what corporate-driven “reform” means for public education: budget cuts, elimination of jobs, harming of children, and turning over schools to hedge fund managers.    → Read More