Romero

by Gloria Romero

Diane Ravitch, are you listening?

This is former state Sen. Gloria Romero calling.

I am the author of California’s first Parent Trigger law, the first parent trigger law in the nation. Since I first wrote that law, some 15 other states have seen some version of the law introduced in their states.
I wanted to reach out to you since we have never met, and I look forward to meeting you so we can one day talk directly with each other. Woman to woman.

In one of your recent blog posts on Education Week, you wrote that the parent trigger came from the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). On the blogosphere, I now read many claims that ALEC wrote the law. This is completely false, and I ask you to correct this.

Please, stop saying that some organization I had never met until just this year gave me the idea and somehow, miraculously, turned it into law without me not knowing about it. ALEC happens to like the law and encourages other states to write similar laws. That is true. But that does not mean it developed either the idea or the law. That’s preposterous!  Quite frankly, it’s also a bit sexist and ethnocentric to assert my work actually came from someone else - that somehow the Latina senator from East Los Angeles couldn’t think on my own, or figure out how to write a bill and turn it into law.

To be fair, you are not alone in failing to acknowledge my role, or the role of other strong individuals (mostly women of color) in getting the bill passed. I always recognize Ben Austin from Parent Revolution for suggesting the idea. Unfortunately, the materials Parent Revolution distributes make it sound as if parents cascaded on the state Capitol and forced this into law. It seldom concedes in its materials that someone actually had to write a bill and argue and negotiate for its enactment. While it sounds romantic to say parents demanded this and descended on the Capitol to force this into law, that is too much Hollywood.  In fact, we did have parents in Sacramento. But many of them were from organizations that were not affiliated with Parent Revolution, and they are seldom acknowledged.

One day I will write the full story of how the Parent Empowerment Act (its official title) became law. In the meantime, let it suffice to say that both you and Parent Revolution and anyone else who writes about the law should know that once the idea was discussed with me, I chose to expand and develop it in a bill. I developed a strategy. I worked with my legislative staff to write language. I assembled a “rag tag” army of civil rights activists who understood that this was our moment to enact the change in which I so strongly believed. And I never saw an ALEC representative. (more…)

As is routine with school choice proposals, the parent trigger bill in Florida - defeated in March after a dramatic 20-20 vote in the state Senate - was portrayed by critics as another front in a systematic campaign to privatize public schools. So it was fascinating today to hear more detail about the history and motivations behind the bill from Gloria Romero, the former California state senator - and Democrat - who sponsored the original trigger bill in that state.

“This is a law that’s so simple, it’s revolutionary," Romero told participants at the American Federation for Children summit in Newark. "This law has the power to really shift paradigms, to give true power – not just lip service, no longer window dressing – to parents who are sick and tired of failing schools.”

“I wanted to have a law for parents based on the most basic foundations of our democracy," she also said. "Think back. Petitioning our government. We the people. And if we could change that from we the people to we the parents, with the power of our signatures, our Johnny Hancocks, to collectively sign a petition, present it those of us who are supposed to be looking out for our interests, and basically saying, 'If you won’t do it, then basically, get the hell out of the way and we will.' "

We've attached a recording of Romero's remarks below. They followed a passionate speech about vouchers by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, which you can read about here and here and here. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal is the keynote speaker tonight. Stay tuned and follow us on Twitter at @redefinEDonline.

Two weeks ago, Gloria Romero, the former California state senator who wrote the original parent trigger law, wrote in this redefinED piece that the "status quo" killed the parent trigger bill in Florida. Today in this op-ed for the Los Angeles Times, Romero uses much tougher language - and singles out a specific foe - to describe the parent trigger battle in two California locales. Some excerpts:

In both Adelanto and Compton, parents trying to exercise their rights felt the full onslaught of a "sweep and destroy" mission launched by the California Teachers Assn. and its affiliates. What had taken weeks to build was destroyed in a few days of heavy-handed lobbying. Parents have reported being told outright lies about charter law and about their rights. Some parents reported that they were even threatened with deportation if they didn't rescind their signatures ...

A recent survey by California Common Cause revealed that the top lobbying force in the state in 2011 was the 300,000-plus membership of the California Teachers Assn. In other words, the massive teachers union is the top political force in the eighth-largest economy in the world. The union has made it clear that it wants to take the trigger out of the hands of mothers and fathers. Parents who attempt to lobby for their children now find themselves on a collision course with this powerful organization ...

So what can we do to help parents actually see things clearly without biased interference? We need to direct attention to failing schools, so that parents understand the situation and understand that they are not alone. And when they send out cries for help, we should defend their right to occupy a political arena previously dominated by vested interests.