Gaslighting 101: Senator Diaz Edition

Senator Manny Diaz Jr.’s recent op-ed, published in the Miami Herald on 5/31/2019, is a perfect example of how Diaz, and his school choice/privatization colleagues, are gaslighting the citizenry when it comes to their support of public education.

Gaslighting is a form of emotional abuse, where one person attempts to overwrite another person’s reality. The technique, similar to brainwashing and interrogation techniques used by intelligence operatives for decades, consists of an individual (the abuser) frequently and systematically withholding factual information from their victim and replacing it with false information. Gaslighting can result in a person (or, in this case, the voting public) questioning their thoughts, memories, and, even, the events occurring around them. Ed Reformers, like Diaz, are very good at it.

The term “gaslighting” comes from a 1938 stage play called Gaslight, in which a husband attempts to drive his wife crazy by dimming the (gas) lights in their home, then denies that the lights change when the wife asks him about them. In the play (later made into a film starring Ingrid Berman) the husband manipulates and torments his wife, to convince her she is going mad.

Diaz’s op-ed, titled “New scholarship will continue to strengthen public education in Florida” starts gaslighting with its title. Parents, educators, informed citizens know their local public schools are under attack. It is difficult to imagine how another voucher will strengthen our schools. Since the institution of Governor Bush’s A+ plan, we have watched corporate education reform attack public schools while encouraging escape to “choice” options. Parents have watched their neighborhood schools, even the “A” ones, suffer under a system that ranks and punishes students, teachers, and schools based on the questionably valid use of standardized tests. Testing and test preparation has taken over the classroom.

Communities have seen “choice” result in increased racial and economic segregation in our schools. Our 8-year-olds are being retained based on standardized test scores. Teachers are evaluated based on the test scores of students they might not even teach. Mental health problems and suicide rates in children are increasing. High quality teachers are leaving the profession in a “silent strike” resulting in classrooms taught by uncertified substitutes. Students, despite being shoved into insane numbers of Advanced Placement classes, are graduating unprepared for the rigors of college. Our children are hurting.

School choice privatizers, like Senator Diaz, insist everything is going just fine. Let’s look at a few of Senator Diaz’s op-ed statements. Is he “systematically withholding factual information from his victims and replacing it with false information?” Is this gaslighting?

1. “According to Florida Tax Watch, the tax credit scholarship is worth 59 percent of per-pupil funding for students in district schools, which is why every fiscal impact study has concluded it saves taxpayer money. “

Tax Watch’s 59% number might have been true in the past. School Choice/Privatizers have long claimed that vouchers were good because they were cheap. However, due to legislative changes this session, such savings will definitely be smaller moving forward:

• Previously, Florida’s Tax Credit scholarship was worth 88% (grades K-5), 92% (grades 6-8) and 96% (grades 9-12) of the state average per pupil spending amount (called the FTE).
• Also, there was a sliding scale that provided “full” scholarships only to the lowest income qualifying students (those at 200% the federal poverty level, or below), providing only 50% of the scholarship value to students at the highest level of qualifying income (those at 245-260% of the federal poverty level).
• This session’s SB7070, funds all state voucher/scholarships (FTC, Hope and the new Family Empowerment Scholarship) based on 95% of the district’s FTE, regardless of the student’s grade level, AND eliminates the sliding scale.
• Some elementary students will see their voucher increase in value from 44% of the state FTE to 95% of the district FTE! In some counties this will amount to an increase of more than $5,000 per student!
• The elimination of the sliding scale all but guarantees that, without significant increases in corporate tax contributions, fewer students will be able to be served by these programs.
• As a result, fewer students will be funded so we can expect waiting lists to persist, creating the illusion of “more demand” next year, which will result in calls for even more funding for these programs.
• Finally, even if the vouchers do save taxpayers money, that savings has not been re-invested in Florida’s public schools, whose inflation adjusted funding (K-12) remains 22.7% below pre-recession 2007 levels.

2. “Test score analyses show those students were typically the lowest performers in their prior public schools, yet the Urban Institute found they’re 43 percent more likely to enroll in four-year colleges and 20 percent more likely to earn bachelor’s degrees.”

The Urban Institute Report results have been misrepresented by school choice/privatization advocates in Florida since the day it was published. It is important to note that the study was funded by such corporate ed reform giants as the Walton Family Foundation and Jeb Bush’s Foundation for Excellence in Education. The report Senator Diaz references is the 2019 followup to the original 2017 report. The data he reports has been cherry picked and exaggerated.

• The “43 percent more likely to enroll in four-year colleges” refers specifically to students who first enrolled in FTC in high school (those enrolling in elementary or middle school saw smaller effects) and reflects an increase from 19% of non-FTC students to 27% of FTC students enrolling in a four year college. The majority of the 8% increase (which is 43% of 19%) was due to more FTC students enrolling in private (also religious?) 4 year colleges, while public school students tended to enroll in public universities.
• The “20 percent more likely to earn bachelor’s degrees” again refers only to students who first enter FTC in high school. It reflects an increase from 10% of non-FTC students attaining a bachelor’s degree to 12% of FTC students doing so. This 2% difference is being reported by Senator Diaz as “20% more” because 2% is 20% of 10. Twenty percent more definitely sounds more impressive than a 2% increase… still only 12% of the students are finishing their degree suggesting they, as well as their low income public school peers, are ill prepared for higher learning.
• Other important data from the Urban Report has been essentially ignored. For instance, 37% of students entering the FTC program stay for only one year. Another 24% leave after 2 years. These students saw essentially no increase in college participation and often returned to their public schools academically behind.
• In 2017, Urban Report author Matthew Chingos also published a report, titled “Are low-quality private schools on the rise in Florida?“, which found Florida has seen a more rapid expansion of the types of FTC voucher schools that had shown the smallest positive impact on college enrollment. The private schools most effective at getting FTC students into college, were not expanding their programs.

3. “The Legislature also set aside $285 million for the bonuses and proposed a per-pupil spending increase of $248.”

• Yes, the Legislature provided $285 million for teacher bonuses. This is despite the overwhelming calls from teachers and administrators (for years) that “bonuses are NOT raises” and the money would have been better spent in the Base Student Allocation where districts would have flexibility to either increase salaries or award bonuses.
• In an accounting maneuver, the bonus funding was moved from the General Fund into the state funding formula (the FEFP) so will now be calculated as part of the per-pupil spending, giving the illusion of a greater increase in per-pupil funding.
• Because the bonuses are funded within the per-pupil spending formula is it NOT accurate to say there was BOTH $285 million set aside for bonuses and a per-pupil spending increase of $248.

Of course, not all of Senator Diaz’s claims are misleading. Florida has made some gains in graduation rates and some NAEP scores can be cherry picked to proclaim successes as well. But at what cost?

For 20 years, Florida’s public schools have been under assault. Senator Diaz lumps the recent attacks into just “another in a series of calibrated expansions” of school choice. Citizens beware. School choice, it has become clear, is a euphemism for “privatization.” Suggesting to parents, teachers and taxpayers, that these obvious assaults on our schools, clearly intended to disrupt and privatize our established system of public education, are somehow “good for them” defies the reality in front of our eyes. This is what gaslighters do.

It is time for Floridians to stop allowing the victimization of our schools. Stand up to the privatization assault that hides behind well chosen rhetoric and manipulated “facts.” We can no longer allow them to convince us that the damage they have done to our schools, with their test focused accountabaloney designed to advance their agenda, has “strengthened” our schools.

Our schools will be strengthened when public education is valued.