What/Who Is First State Educate/First State Action Fund, And Why Have They Hired A Convicted Felon As Executive Director?
Oh, and not just any convicted felon, but one who ran afoul of the law while destroying Puerto Rico’s public schools? All in due time…
It looks like First State Educate and First State Action Fund were set up to grab as many COVID education $$’s as possible:
Over the past two years, every district and charter school in our state has received federal relief funding ranging over $635 million. This funding known as the American Rescue Plan, is the largest amount of COVID education money given to public education – and the most in a generation!
While the money has some restrictions, districts and charters have a lot of autonomy to determine how it will be spent. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to be bold. And what does that mean? It means we must:
unapologetically speak up, show up, and act together on behalf of Delaware students
fiercely shun the status quo and making small tweaks to an existing system that doesn’t work
courageously acknowledge that it’s time to do things differently, no matter how daunting it may seem
Please use the following tools to help guide your advocacy and social media activity about the federal relief funds and don’t be afraid to add your own flair. We can’t wait to hear your stories, see your photos, and learn from your experiences!
Anybody anywhere care to disabuse me of the notion that they’re all about the money grab? Please speak up. They describe their mission as to ‘catalyze radical change by activating the power of Delawareans’. Fair enough. Now, I encourage you to go through the entire First State Educate website, and determine whether, how, and to what extent, First State Educate supports public education. I’ve tried, and I can’t.
Meaning, I believe it’s best to start with the educational philosophy, background, and approach of the newly-hired Executive Director. You know, to give us some sense of the organization’s direction. If you deem that unfair, please speak up.
Because–HOLY SHIT!! If you deem the use of profanity objectionable, sorry, you’re on the wrong blog. Might I suggest Parents For Fascism as an alternative?
First State Educate and First State Action Fund, linked organizations aimed at improving education in Delaware, have named a new executive director.
Julia Keleher, a Philadelphia native and leader in education for nearly two decades, will succeed founder Laurisa Schutt, the nonprofits announced in a press release this week. Keleher spent seven years leading technical assistance and risk management initiatives at the U.S. Department of Education, worked as educator and administrator in the Red Clay Consolidated School District in the early 2000s and served as secretary of education in Puerto Rico from 2017-2019.
She also spent time in federal prison on fraud charges.
But First State Educate didn’t sweat that history, having landed on Keleher after a nationwide search.
“Julia’s combination of experience, well of compassion and empathy, and commitment to educational excellence is unmatched,” said First State Educate Board President Thère du Pont in a statement. “We could not be more excited for her to work with our partners to build a cohesive and inclusive ecosystem that drives continued improvement in Delaware schools.”
Just happened as this is the issue from August 3, 2023.
Then, this (required reading in its entirety, I’ll excerpt as much fair use as I can):
There was a time when Julia Keleher was just a girl from South Philly who’d made it big. She went from Philly’s most prestigious university to the U.S. Department of Education to her own consultancy — which delivered her to Puerto Rico, the site of her greatest challenge yet.
There, she became the government’s most powerful education official, installed by the island’s governor to overhaul Puerto Rico’s troubled public schools. “Break the system and rebuild it again,” the governor instructed her.
Just six years ago, Keleher was hailed as an education rock star. She charged into Puerto Rico with a bold vision to disrupt one of the country’s most challenged school systems. Her supporters likened her to a storm — the kind needed to bring transformative change. But during her two-year tenure, Keleher closed hundreds of schools and pushed to bring charters and private-school vouchers to the island, enraging families and teachers who accused her of privatizing their public education system.
They called her the Betsy DeVos of Puerto Rico. They called her Hurricane Keleher — the kind of storm that causes irreparable damage.
I’ve deliberately left several links intact to help you to flesh out the story.
Then, in the summer of 2019, three months after she resigned due to what she called a toxic political environment, federal agents arrested her and another top government official. The indictment sparked the first protests that would eventually bring down her champion, Gov. Ricardo Rosselló.
“Public corruption continues to erode the trust between government officials and our citizens,” said U.S. Attorney for the District of Puerto Rico W. Stephen Muldrow in a statement after Keleher’s second indictment. “Defendant Keleher exploited her government position to benefit herself and other private individuals.”
Keleher initially said she was innocent. Two years later, after the government dropped some of its initial charges, she pleaded guilty to a slimmer set of charges — two felonies involving conspiracy to commit fraud.
She admitted to approving a road-widening project on school property in exchange for a deal on a luxury apartment — $1 to rent the unit for three months, and later, a $12,000 incentive to buy it. She also pleaded guilty to knowing that a former gubernatorial candidate’s campaign manager would get paid as a subcontractor on a contract that did not allow subcontractors.
Now, nearly a year after her sentencing, Keleher stands by the disruption she carried out. “It was working,” she says, “which I think is why everybody got upset.”
You just have to read the rest of it, how she portrays herself as a victim, how she tries to rebrand herself as an advocate for prisoners. But she’s not. She gleefully destroyed public education in Puerto Rico:
When Hurricane Maria devastated the island in 2017, Keleher saw an opportunity.
She had already shut down nearly 200 schools, what she described as a necessary response to low school enrollment and a massive budget deficit. But after Maria wrecked school buildings and drove more families out of Puerto Rico, she forged ahead, closing an additional 250 of the roughly 1,100 schools.
Some believe justice has yet to be served. “The massive school closures that she led are something for which she will never serve one day in jail,” said Mercedes Martínez Padilla, president of the Teachers’ Federation of Puerto Rico, after Keleher was sentenced. “That was a crime against the children of our country.”
So, she attended one class with the Delaware ACLU and now claims to ‘understand’. Excuse me if I’m not buying. Let’s go back to the ‘well of compassion’ that Eleu’There’ spoke of. From that Inquirer article:
She did not consult the people who would be affected by the closures. Her actions forced families and teachers to travel long distances across the island, sometimes over dangerous mountain roads, to get to their new schools. And she introduced the island’s first charter, likening her plan to the response in New Orleans after Katrina, where nearly no non-charter public schools remain.
As for the thousands of parents and teachers who marched in the streets, protesting Keleher’s charter push and demanding for schools to be reopened? “Yo no voy a responder a las manifestaciones!” she said in 2018. I do not respond to protests!
That’s Compassion, DuPont Billionaire Style. None of them know shit about public education other than that privatizing it affords them yet more money-making scams. Which is what the idle rich do since they don’t have to legit work for a living.
Pretty much anybody who knows anything about education in Delaware can see what’s happening here: The same moneyed folks who tried to take over running Delaware charters have hired her to (a) carry out her one noted skill–getting grant money; and (b) further destroying public education in Delaware. Yes, another DuPont, this time There (accent ‘grahv’, short for Eleuthere), who’s the Board President when he’s not running the Longwood Conservancy. Say, I’ve got a legislative proposal for you: Legalize polygamy so that all these layabout DuPonts and Copelands can marry multiple cousins and perhaps find something to keep them busy in the afternoon. Either that, or swap antique furniture amongst themselves. Or cousins.
There’s a reason why this organization hired someone committed to destroying public education while pushing for vouchers and charter schools has been brought in–and it’s not to strengthen public education in Delaware. It’s to line their pockets. Given that, Keleher’s prowess at getting grants might stand them in good stead. Perhaps the money can go to fund the Caesar Rodney Institute if the remaining Koch brother dies.
I note that the First State Action Fund lobbied the General Assembly on one bill this year dealing with school boards.
I can’t tell you WHICH legislators they lobbied because Bobby Byrd, who somehow (the name ‘Nancy Cook’ comes to mind) was allowed to help craft our current statute, made sure that lobbyists did not have to reveal which legislators they were lobbying.
That change should be introduced in January.
YEAH, when the Markell crew was forced to set up a committee to run through the Veasey Commission recommendations, they (Manlove etc.) committed disgraceful cherry-picking.
I vied to include the governor agency leg hall liasons as persons needing to register and report their activities around lobbying (liaison = lobbyiest) to the legislative branch. Would still like to see it.
The inclusion of NAMED legis contacts is certainly welcome. You don’t have to reveal if the convo was for or against the bills which is usually obvious anyway.
Oh, you neglected to mention that Keleher’s predecessor, Laurisa Schutt, who was responsible for hiring her, married into the du Pont family (Porter Schutt), so she’s a cousin-in-law (once, twice or thrice removed) from Ben and There.
First State Educate was created when Laurisa burned out of her job running the Delaware unit of Teach for America. She was looking for a way to create a niche for herself in the amorphous Delaware “education reform” community. Still hasn’t found it.
One of the organization’s noble early experiments was to try to identify parent advocates from disadvantaged communities and train them to ask probing questions at school board meetings and in conferences with administrators. Good idea, but little evidence that it produced anything.
Cannot totally accept the assertion that the organization was set up to grab COVID money. In fact, it did attempt to monitor how districts and charters were spending the funds they received. Nice idea but, again, little evidence that its monitoring led to districts and charters doing anything bold with those bucks.
Bottom line: this is an organization that talks more than it acts, and it doesn’t talk very much. Strongly suspect that Keleher’s food will land inside her mouth the second or third time she opens it in public. Meanwhile, would be wise for There to keep her hands away from the agency’s checkbook.
Seems even more like a DuPont family enterprise than I initially thought…
One more thing … Schutt sends her daughters to private boarding schools, so it’s not like she’s had much first-hand experience with public education.
And is the product of private boarding schools herself, though I suppose that was her parents’ doing. FSE did find a niche helping recruit and train school board candidates who did not want to ban books, bring prayer into public schools, or whitewash history. They actively fought the right-wing attempt to infiltrate school boards with bible-thumpers and history-deniers, so I give them props for that. Here’s hoping they stay in that lane.
1) Thanks Delaware Liberal for giving this air time.
2) The charter ecosystem in Delaware reeks like a cesspool. Its populated by a cast of shady characters looking for handouts, jobs, and influence. The ppl leading the charge are more interested in building their own bona fides in the Delaware political ecosystem than improving outcomes for kids.
3) Speaking of outcomes, let us ask a simple question. In the years since then Gov. Carper signed the charter law have outcomes, in the aggregate, improved across the state?
4) It would be unbecoming of any member of the General Assembly to take a meeting with Felon Keleher, let alone leadership and/or committee chairs. Looking at you Sokola.
People are asking WTF of ACLU Delaware over this, too. They apparently put out a press release that whitewashed her record.
I’m a member of the Delaware ACLU. But since when have they had the power to offer absolution to someone who acted as shamefully as Keleher?
A bad, bad look.
A certain Democratic subdivision chair got on her high horse and was adamant that this person deserved another chance!
I would pay the lunch tab for this lady and the aforementioned Dem Chair to share the “compassion” This woman supposedly deserves!
“The massive school closures that she led are something for which she will never serve one day in jail,” said Mercedes Martínez Padilla, president of the Teachers’ Federation of Puerto Rico, after Keleher was sentenced. “That was a crime against the children of our country.”
To me, the issue isn’t whether she deserves a second chance. Of course she does.
But her convictions were tied to her efforts to destroy education for the children of Puerto Rico and to take advantage of her position. The very idea that the Greenville Rethugs view her as just the person to carry their charter and voucher grievances is what I find so offensive.
Sure, a job in anything that does not involve her continued and stated desire to destroy public education.
What is VERY interesting is their Facebook page. “First State Educate limited who can comment on this post.” Want to know who does that? Usually Republican led groups like this who don’t want anyone posting stuff who doesn’t agree with them. What is it with “First State” groups on Facebook that censor their pages like that?
I’ve seen Delaware Live quickly jump onto First State Educate. Guess who runs that little website? Chris Kenny…
While news of Ms. Keleher’s conviction would normally shock the hell out of most readers, we all know that Republicans have this uncanny ability to forgive even the most egregious of crimes if it fits their political narrative. But in most cases they sugarcoat it and don’t even want to admit it’s a crime even when the law says it is.
I would not underestimate Keleher and this little outfit. They have a way of worming their way into the General Assembly and getting laws passed that do NOT benefit kids, teachers, or schools (traditional school districts that is).
The ACLU of Delaware tweeted and posted on Instagram congratulating Kelleher on this new role and touting her time as one of their “smart justice ambassadors.” What followed was hundreds of responses from teachers and families in Puerto Rico who suffered under her policies. I see they have since removed those posts. Good.
Not surprised. I followed this story in real time and the public outcry that led to the governor’s resignation. Of the 200,000 plus that took to the steps of the capital and the Governor’s mansion a large number were outraged teachers.
They should do a full RETRACTION and make more noise in general about this horror.
The new castle county Democratic chairwoman took to social media defending her. It was a terrible look for her. The aclu has some personal relationships apparently and another bad look. They went the second chance route and it backfired terribly.
Sometimes a crooks a crook. Even liberals think that.
It’s not that sometimes a crook’s a crook. I’d hire an embezzler, but not to keep my books.
Truth be told I have a greater problem with the entire project than with the specific hiring of this crooked official.
Everything I can access about this outfit sets off alarm sirens.
Their online presentation talks a lot about “radically” disrupting education without explaining why or what the goals are. If they aren’t willing to say what problems they have with the current situation or how they aim to engage them, they are lying by omission, QED.
We can make educated guesses about what’s going on here, but I want these cowards to come clean. Have the courage (heh) of your convictions instead of sneaking around trying to fool people into supporting your non-union agenda.
POS outfit from the start. AGREED.
Nice write-up on this, thank you!
Caught wind of this recently from a post on Daily Kos, and after perusing First State Educate and First State Action Fund’s websites, couldn’t nail down from either site’s word salads what they were really about, but picked up the odor of self-congratulatory, solution in search of a problem, charter school/school choice grift.
Agreed. The language on their site is designed to obfuscate, not to illuminate.
Perfectly said. Lots of education reform buzzwords, no substantive solutions. Based on their social media output, they seem to exist solely to remind us of how terrible our schools are–based on a single very flawed metric–standardized test scores. We know who benefits from convincing everyone our schools are horrible: corporate ed reformers who want to sell the cure in the form of new curricula, training, et al. FSE is opening the door wide open for them to swoop in and convince the Gov and Sec of Ed that they can fix what’s broken. They make millions, teachers have to jump through a bunch of new hoops so their evaluators can check all the new boxes, children’s standardized test scores barely budge, rinse and repeat in 5 years.