Charter Schools: Bedfellows Revealed

Focus on the Family and the RAND Corporation would like to have the citizens of Washington State and other states believe they are working for their good. Yet, they are provably working for the implementation of GOALS 2000. During the 1998 legislative session in Washington State, I had occasion to find on the Internet the record for a legislative hearing on a charter school bill I had been following. The names of people or organizations giving pro and con testimony were openly stated. Two names caught my attention: Jeff Kemp of the Washington Family Council*, a state affiliate of James Dobson’s Colorado Springs-based Focus on the Family, and Paul Hill from the RAND Corporation.** According to the legislative report, both Jeff Kemp and Paul Hill had spoken in support of the charter school legislation.

Jeff Kemp's father is Jack Kemp, the co-director of Empower America [EA] and a 33º Freemason. EA's main luminaries are William Bennett, Jeanne Kirkpatrick [CFR], Lamar Alexander and Vin Weber, who is also co-director of the Aspen Institute’s Domestic Strategy Group. The President and CEO of Empower America until March, 2000 was Josette Shiner, a high-ranking Unification Church member and former editor at the Sun Myung Moon-owned Washington Times newspaper. William Bennett is a Fellow on the staff of Hudson Institute where he served on the GOALS 2000 Modern Red Schoolhouse Design Team with Dennis Doyle, Chester Finn, Jr., Pierre du Pont IV and Lamar Alexander (former Education Secretary under George Bush). The board of Empower America is composed almost entirely of CFR members and/or high ranking Freemasons, including Jack Kemp [33º Mason], Jeane Kirkpatrick [CFR], Michael Novak [CFR], Trent Lott [CNP] [33º Mason], Ward Wood [CFR], Theodore Forstmann [CFR] and past board member Newt Gingrich [CFR/33º Mason].

Jack Kemp is also a Distinguished Fellow at the Heritage Foundation. Washington Family Council [WFC, Jeff Kemp] first entered the campaign for charter schools in 1995. At that time, the WFC's Washington Citizen magazine [published in partnership with Dobson's Focus on the Family and circulated to citizens of Washington state] published a front page article supporting the sponsors of the WA Charter School initiative, Jim and Fawn Spady. Jack Kemp appeared for a media event in Seattle. The Seattle Times [June 6, 1996] stated that the elder Kemp was, “visiting from his conservative public policy think tank in Washington D.C.,” and described him as “a prominent backer” of charter schools. The Seattle Times and other newspapers played an important role, adding momentum to the Spady Charter School Initiative.

Having observed the activities of the Washington Family Council over the years, I was aware that it had originally been established by Focus on the Family during the 1980s. Although the connection continues, the link has been blurred to promote the perception that Washington Family Council is an autonomous, grassroots organization. Washington Family Council requires substantial funding to sustain the high visibility and extensive influence it has enjoyed over the years in Washington state. How is it that such an organization has weathered the years? Support by Washington citizens, or the power bloc behind the charter school initiative, which uses the grassroots image to conceal its presence? Is this the convenient role played by Dr. James Dobson?

In other states, FOTF is actively, albeit stealthily, working through their Family Policy Councils to establish charter schools: “In Colorado, Cheyenne Mountain Academy, a charter school, sparked controversy when it used a mailing list from the Rocky Mountain Family Council, an affiliate of James Dobson's Focus on the Family, to advertise for students. The academy's principal is Linda Page, FOF's former manager of education policy.” 1.

Paul Hill*, Senior Social Scientist for the RAND Corporation, is the co-author of the foundational guidelines for GOALS 2000, The Essential Components of a Successful Education System: The Business Roundtable Education Public Policy Agenda. Hill’s co-author was David Hornbeck, the Senior Education Advisor of the National Business Roundtable. In 1994, Paul Hill arrived at the University of Washington's Graduate School of Public Affairs to head up the Center for Reinventing Public Education. The February 16, 1994 issue of Education Week announced:

“[The] new center [will] explore alternatives to the current system of governance…, [and] ….Mr. Hill and his colleagues plan to explore how school boards could create contract schools that would be legal entities... The Center for Reinventing Public Education is supported by RAND Corporation's Institute for Education and Training, Exxon Educational Foundation, the George Gund Foundation, the Mann-Paller Foundation, and the Medina Foundation.”

Actually, many more foundations are financing the Center for Reinventing Public Education, and untold numbers of foundations are funding the charter school movement. Hill’s book titled, Reinventing Public Education: How Contracting Can Transform America’s Schools, gives us a clue that the education financing system, as we know it, is about to be changed. This book, co-authored by Lawrence C. Pierce and James Guthrie, was published in 1997 by the University of Chicago Press. Investigative journalist, Suzanne Rini, explains the University of Chicago’s interest in the privatization of education:

“The University of Chicago is of course one of the main centers of Rockefeller power in the United States. Already in 1918, the specially appointed congressional Walsh committee ascertained that the Rockefeller Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation controlled U.S. education from kindergarten forward. 2. Just two of many of the University’s important contributions to the burgeoning new order were the work in the early part of the century on the animal-driven school of behaviorism, led by J.B. Watson, and the psychological method behind the term ‘population control’; and more recently, in the late 1950s, Social Darwinism re-cast as the hyper-free market economic theories of Milton Friedman and his associates, who are colloquially known as ‘the Chicago boys.’ As it turns out, Friedman has developed a burning interest in Charter Schools as an embodiment of his proselytization of the free market uberalles. And no wonder that Friedman shows up on the wide screen of school privatization, since his particular free market ideology’s centerpiece is privatization of entire nations’ economies, which is the instrument of the end of national sovereignty and the shift to faceless globalist management.”

Washington Family Council's David Sinegal and The Washington Business Roundtable's James Sinegal

· The President and CEO of Costco is James Sinegal. James Sinegal appears on the Washington Business Roundtable's Education Committee, representing Costco. The Business Roundtable has played/plays a significant role in the implementation of GOALS 2000 and in the promotion of Charter Schools (a component of GOALS 2000). Washington Family Council's Jeff Kemp [affiliate of James Dobson's Focus on the Family] was a lobbyist for Charter Schools and Faith-Based Welfare Reform.

Mr. Hill is also identified as a Senior Fellow at the CFR-affiliated Brookings Institution as well as being a research professor at the University of Washington's Graduate School of Public Affairs, where the Center for Reinventing Public Education, mentioned above, is located. His recent book It Takes a City Getting Serious About Urban School Reform is published by Brookings Institution Press.

Charter Schools, and Choice (vouchers & tuition tax credits) have been incorporated into the GOALS 2000 legislation:

Public Law 103-227GOALS 2000: Educate America Act [1994] SEC. 308 State Use of [GOALS 2000] Funding-(b) Each state that receives an allotment under this title shall(2) use the remainder of the assistance...to implement the State improvement plan, [for activities] such as ...(I) promoting... public charter schools and other mechanisms for increasing choice among public schools...(J) supporting activities [where] schools contract with private management organizations to reform a school.

It is important to note that the above sub-section (J) suggests a plan to move public schools under “private management.”

In 1996, Jeff Kemp and Paul Hill worked together on a failed Washington State charter school ballot headed by Jim and Fawn Spady. The campaign also enjoyed the support of three other Washington state public policy think tanks, the Washington Institute for Policy Studies [WIPS], Evergreen Freedom Foundation (EFF), and Discovery Institute. The Discovery Institute’s Annual Spring Luncheon of May 27, 1998, featured Congressman Henry Hyde (R-IL). Among those listed on the Discovery Institute’s Luncheon Host Committee were:

John Carlson of the Washington Institute for Policy Studies (Now Washington Institute Foundation. Carlson was the Republican candidate for governor, 2000.)

See: upcoming Charitable Choice: Religious Origins chart, U.S. Commission for International Religious Freedom

In 1995, Jeff Kemp had been the Discovery Luncheon’s Master of Ceremonies. That luncheon was billed as a celebration of the re-publication of featured speaker, George Gilder’s book, Visible Man, described as “document[ing] the cruel legacy of the modern welfare system.” Gilder’s book was co-published by ICS Press and Discovery Institute. Bruce Chapman is President of the Discovery Institute, whose stated mission is:

“…[T]o make a positive vision of the future practical. The Institute discovers and promotes ideas in the common sense tradition of representative government, the free market and individual liberty.... Mr. Chapman was a fellow of the Hudson Institute in Indianapolis from late 1988 to 1990, when he became director of the Seattle branch of the Hudson Institute. In 1991 he helped found Discovery Institute in Seattle and became its first president. 6.” [emphasis added]

Seattle: The Plan for Change

Seattle has been a major pilot program for the implementation of GOALS 2000 and the NASDC design teams.

“...By attacking educational reform in the context of a truly comprehensive plan. City Hall was able to enlist strong support for educational reform among many segments of the Seattle community -- parents, teachers, administrators, and the business community. Early in 1995 the Mayor appointed a blue ribbon commission including both local and national authorities on education, psychology [?], and new technologies. With the aid of financial backing from Boeing and the Annenberg and Mott Foundations, Seattle was able to afford one of the strongest and most creative teams of local and national experts ever assembled to think and acy on educational reform. John Goodlad* brought his national reputation home to Seattle. Paul Hill head of the Program on Reinventing Education, joined the team, along with George Gilder [CFR and Discovery Institute], author of the ‘Issaquah Miracle’*... Once it was clear that Seattle was serious about educational innovation, Seattle's public education system assumed a key role in the...plan for change*...” 7.

[Author Ogilvy is looking into the future of education as he writes...]

“By the end of this scenario, Seattle schools are almost unrecognizably different from what they had been in the early '90s. Sweeping changes revolutionized the entire education industry in the late '90s, to a degree that few could have imagined at the beginning...”

[A chart: "Technological and Social Synergies for the Reform of Education," pg. 32, shows various streams feeding into what is termed "Wide Ranging Systemic Reform." Choice/Privatization is one of the seven streams.]

Notes: The source document, Four Scenarios for the Future of Public Education in Seattle, was handed out by Jim Spady to a leadership meeting for his Charter School ballot initiative, held at the headquarters of the Washington Institute for Policy Studies [Heritage Foundation affiliate] 1995. See Pew Charitable Trusts, Pew grants to GOALS 2000, Center for Educational Renewal, John Goodlad, University of Washington.

The Issaquah Miracle’ - Found on the Discovery Institute/George Gilder web page:

Gilder is very stimulating even when I disagree with him, and most of the time I agree with him."-Microsoft CEO, Bill Gates

Global Business Network: As a worldwide membership organization, GBN engages in a collaborative exploration of the future, discovering the frontiers of knowledge and creating innovative tools for strategic action. Since 1987, we've been privileged to work, learn, and co-create with our members. Together, we've explored the future through scenario thinking and planning, rich experiential meetings, Learning Journeys, online conversation, and connections with the most remarkable minds of our time. [emphasis added]

The above quote reveals that the futurist think-tank, the Hudson Institute, spawned the Discovery Institute.

Institute of Religion and Democracy is recipient of grants totaling: $3,064,000 for years 1987 - 1999 from: Sarah Scaife Foundation, Scaife Family Foundation, Bradley Foundation, Olin Foundation, Carthage Foundation [Scaife]. [Source: Media Transparency ]

Robert Crittenden, in his book, Two Studies of Public Policy in Washington State: The Elite Planners and Salmon at Risk, describes his investigative mission, one that also bears on the invasion of Washington State by outside, elitist forces:

“The Elite Planners describes the power groups affecting public policy in Washington state. It provides lists of the membership of several interrelated elite planning organization in Washington state. The book also places these organizations into the context of national and international politics, history and philosophy.” 8.

The same author also reveals a fact about the Discovery Institute that has stunning implications:

“The Discovery Institute [working out of the offices of the Perkins and Coie law firm]…bills itself as a conservative forum addressing public policy issues and providing leadership.” 9.

A key piece of information in relation to the Perkins and Coie law firm was revealed in “Euthanasia and the Struggle for Culture,” by Suzanne Rini, investigative journalist whose pioneer research on fetal research unearthed solid evidence that the medical establishment is laying the foundation for a massive Nazi-style eugenics program. In her article, Rini documented that the Perkins and Coie law firm -- venue of the Discovery Institute whose board of directors includes James Spady, sponsor of the Charter School Initiative in Washington state, and whose adjunct fellows includes Edwin Meese, president of the Council for National Policy in 1996 – represented Compassion in Dying, a powerful but quiet pro-doctor assisted suicide organization, in cases leading up to the Supreme Court’s 1998 hearing of the case in doctor assisted suicide:

“When it was announced that the Supreme Court would hear the doctor-assisted suicide cases, Kevorkian was the plaintiff [sic]. Instead, it was Dr. Timothy Quill, a family practitioner who represented the brief for doctor assisted suicide. Quill is laced into the euthanasia underground railroad run by the very quiet Compassion in Dying. It is they who have admittedly supplied physicians to hundreds of people who have already succumbed to physician assisted ‘death.’…

“Compassion in Dying supplied one of the attorneys for the Supreme Court Case. She is Kathryn Tucker of the influential Washington State corporate law firm, Perkins Coie. Perkins Coie has many connections, including one lacing back into ‘conservative’ channels pushing charter schools, that include Christian right organizations such as Focus on the Family, which in turn is linked to another charter school advocate, the Heritage Foundation. Heritage works for big business’ push to privatize all former government sectors. Heritage’s money in great part comes from huge transnational corporations, and foundations based on fortunes made in the private sector. Coors Brewing is one major part of Heritage’s funding. The larger share is given by foundations controlled by Richard Mellon Scaife, the Gulf Oil and Mellon Bank heir. Neatly demonstrating the well known link between the corporate and eugenics sectors, Scaife is a longtime abortion rights and population control funder. Therefore, it is no wonder that the Perkins-Coie law firm, pushing the same type of privatization of death, also performed services in the charter school privatization takeover by libertarian freemarket interests.” 10.

See also: Compassion in Dying: Chronology of Lawsuits: The Constitutional Challenges to State Laws Regarding End of Life Decisions

“[Discovery Institute’s] conservatism may be merely the flipside of the same coin. Several individuals and organizations which are members of the Institute are also members of one or more of the other elite organizations discussed in this book: that is, the [Business] Roundtable, the Nature Conservancy, or the Northwest Renewable Resources Center. The Institute’s policies aren’t materially different from the policies of other groups. All three organizations are better described as authoritarian rather than liberal or conservative.

“The Board of Directors has a familiar appearance to it. It contains the usual principle corporations: that is, Weyerhauser, Boeing, SeaFirst Bank….

“The Institute has heavy representation from the information industry (that is, from communications, computer, and media sectors); it has considerable representation from academia; and it has considerable representation from government and law firms. The Institute’s board of advisors includes some retired judges and generals and also professors from the notoriously authoritarian Jackson Institute of International Studies at the University of Washington.” 11.

“More than noteworthy in the above quotation is Crittenden’s use of the word, ‘authoritarian.’ The word’s dictionary meaning corroborates the theme of this article on charter schools, namely that highest level elitists with global revolutionary agendas mask their machinations by working through cronies who present themselves to the ordinary citizen as leaders of genuinely grassroots movements. But then, one of the apt injunctions of the new order shaping up is: Think globally, act locally. Returning to Crittenden’s deftly chosen word, ‘authoritarian,’ Webster’s Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary (G&C. Merriam Co., Springfield MA, 1967) defines the adjective as follows: ‘… relating to or favoring a concentration of power in a leader or an elite not constitutionally responsible to the people.’ Crittenden obviously discovered the definition in the flesh, as is clear from his next set of facts and analysis.” 12.

‘The Fellows (that is, the people who will actually construct their programs) are an interesting collection. Surprisingly few of them are from Washington state, but a lot of them come from Washington DC, and there is an emphasis on communications, high technology, ethics, religion and sociology.

‘The Institute’s composition is what would be expected if this [were] a group of local magnates and their cronies from Washington DC, who came to study Washington state as an experiment in New World Order Sociology. The Institute’s composition suggests that the problem they are addressing may be the application of the Preceptorial System in the computer age in an economic system based on international trade without tariffs.

‘The difficulty with the Preceptorial System is that its purpose is to maintain a privileged class who rule for their own advantage. That is an inherently unstable structure and, therefore, needs to be actively maintained. Previously, control of the news media and printing had been effective in controlling the public. However, we are now in a transition to a new society characterized by high technology and free trade. The control system needs to be modified to suit these new conditions. The organization assigned that mission might have a composition very much like the Institute’s.’ 13.

And a mid-1990s article, “Cascadia, America Divided” by W. Tinsley, in the Sequim, Washington newspaper, Citizen Review, alerted readers to the Discovery Institute’s push for regionalism, an integral element in the new order’s aggressive philosophy against sovereign nations:

“The Discovery Institute promotes the concept of erasing political boundaries. According to Bruce Agnew, Director of the Cascadia Project, ‘We are finding borders and national government policies increasingly irrelevant and even crippling.’ Cascadia…would assume its own governmental policies…This region would stretch from Eugene, Oregon to Vancouver, British Columbia as seen in [Cascadia’s] published maps correlating to the Interstate 5 Highway corridor. …

“What could be the motivation behind such a move to regionalism? We wonder, what is the future of our land? If we don’t want to be like the Frenchman who does not know of his new European citizenship, we must pay close attention to the Discovery Institute’s Chairman, John Miller, the Cascadia Project Director, Bruce Agnew, and their two front organizations, The Cascadia Task Force and The Cascadia Economic Roundtable.” 14.

In 1995, a National Conference on School Choice was sponsored by the Education Excellence Coalition. The Excellence Coalition is a state affiliate of the Education Excellence Network [Chester Finn and Diane Ravitch, Fordham Foundation of the Hudson Institute, now affiliated with Manhattan Institute.] Finn was identified as a National Advisor to Jim and Fawn Spady, sponsors of the WA Charter School Initiative. [Note: Finn and Marc Tucker were identified as the 'chief architects of GOALS 2000' in the early '90s.] Conference sponsors included the Washington Family Council [Dobson's WA state affiliate, now re-named Families Northwest] and the three Heritage-linked think tanks -- Washington Institute for Policy Studies*, Evergreen Freedom Foundation and Discovery Institute. School Choice experts were imported from across the country to present their findings on school choice to the gathering made up primarily of state legislators. The public was discouraged from attending this event by the $175.00 admission fee.

The Education Excellence Coalition

Local Advisors

[partial listing]
Fawn & Jim Spady, Campaign Co-Chairs
Bill Baldwin, President, Washington Institute for Policy Studies [ALEC Liaison to business]
Nona Brazier [WA Family Council Advisory Board]
John Carlson, Chariman, Washington Institute for Policy Studies
Tom Isenberg, Ex. Committee Libertarian Party [Microsoft, WA Institute for Policy Studies, Advisory Board]
Wallace Rudolph, Prof. of Law, Seattle University
Bob Williams, President Evergreen Freedom Foundation

National Advisors
Lamar Alexander [Hudson Institute]
Jeanne Allen, Center for Education Reform
John Coons, Prof. of Law, University of CA
Denis P. Doyle [Center for Education Reform, the Brookings Institution, the American Enterprise Institute, Heritage Foundation and Hudson Institute]
Chester Finn [Hoover Institution, Manhattan Institute and Brookings Institution]
Eric Hanushek [Hoover Institution]
Terry Moe [Hoover Institution and Brookings Institution]
Grover Norquist, Americans for Tax Reform
Steve Sugarman, Prof. of Law, University of CA

• George Weigel [See Deeper Discovery, Discovery Institute Board of Advisors, George Weigel, above]

Among the speakers featured at the conference was Patricia Lines, Senior Research Analyst of the U.S. Department of Education and one of the nation's top experts on the related issues of school choice, charter schools and home schooling. Patricia Lines is/was also a Senior Fellow at Seattle’s Discovery Institute. Paul Hill of the RAND Corporation/ University of Washington, and Connie Koprowicz, the charter school expert from the National Conference of State Legislatures [NCSL], added to the choice/charter school dialogue. Koprowicz would later return to Washington state from the NCSL Colorado headquarters to offer her services to the legislators as a neutral consultant-resource on charter schools at the legislative hearing on the Spady initiative. Below is a partial listing of other organizations represented at the National Conference on School Choice:

Americans for Tax Reform has received grants totaling: $950,000 from the years 1994-1999: Sarah Scaife Foundation, Carthage Foundation [Scaife], Olin Foundation, Bradley Foundation [source: Media Transparency]

On November 20, 1997, Dr. Chan appeared at the Manhattan Institute's CCI* Public Charter Schools Forum sponsored by The Citicorp Foundation. Details of this forum were previously found at the web site of the Manhattan Institute, but have now been removed. [The Vaughn Charter School was also used as an example of a high-success charter school in the 1996 Focus on the Family radio broadcast where James Dobson interviewed NCSL's Connie Koprowicz on Charter Schools; again casting charter schools in a most favorable light. See Dr. Dobson and Focus on the Family: The 'Christian' Think Tank] [coming soon]

Manhattan Institute's CCI [Center for Civic Innovation] web page [January, 2001] states that Chester Finn, a former U.S. Department of Education Assistant Secretary, is working with the Institute. The web page continues:

Charter schools are another promising, choice-based reform. Charter schools are public schools that are freed from most regulations and mandates, giving school administrators, teachers and parents the opportunity to form innovative and productive schools. [Note how this recommendation of charter schools fails to mention corporate involvement and GOALS 2000 requirements.] Over thirty states have now enacted this reform and hundreds of thousands of children across the country are now enjoying enhanced educational opportunity because of these schools. Our experts will continue to study the performance of these schools and provide ideas on how the charter revolution can best be implemented.

So far this year, CCI has hosted two events highlighting the achievements of the charter school movement. A conference in March, co-sponsored with the Program for Education Policy and Governance at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, featured presentations of papers by over twenty noted scholars on what the current state of research shows about the effects of charter schools and voucher programs. [Of course the scholars' research on charter schools will be 100% favorable!] And Chester E. Finn, Jr., the John M. Olin Fellow at the Manhattan Institute, and Bruno Manno* of the Annie E. Casey Foundation* spoke at a luncheon to highlight the findings of their new book, Charter Schools in Action… [Emphasis and parentheses added.]

[Note: The above fails to mention that Manno is also associated with the Hudson Institute. The Annie E. Casey Foundation played a key role with the other strategists of GOALS 2000.]

Above-cited Connie Koprowicz’s National Conference of State Legislators [NCSL] discusses its work on charter school legislation and the NCSL Roadmap [blueprint]:

“NCSL has submitted a final draft version of the Charter School Road Map to the National Institute on Educational Governance, Finance, Policy Making and Management in the Office of Educational Research and Improvement at the U.S. Department of Education. This document, to be published by the National Institute soon, is meant to assist legislators and other policy makers in crafting and re-examining charter school legislation. Using a flow chart approach, options in such categories as petitions, finance, waivers and renewals are outlined and examined. Sample statutory language and a break down of all state charter statutes are included… Funded by the National Institute, NCSL has provided technical assistance to states using the Roadmap. Trips were made to Maine, Tennessee, Montana and Kansas. We hope to continue our ability to use the Roadmap in interested states.” 16. [emphasis added]

Further, the National Council of State Legislators [NCSL] identifies “successful reform models”:

“Successful reform models such as New American Schools and Core Knowledge have already been identified. Why not attempt these reforms in existing schools? If rules and regulation are so burdensome, they should be waived for all public schools.”17. [emphasis added]

New American Schools, which are the pre-determined design teams and the school models which will serve as the template for all charter schools, along with the Core Knowledge curriculum, are both components of GOALS 2000.

Mortimer J. Adler, Chairman, Director, Institute for Philosophical Research: Chairman of the Board of Editors, Encyclopedia Britannica

Jacques Barzun, former Provost Columbia University [Columbia Teachers College is a source of much of the GOALS 2000 teaching strategies]

Ernest L. Boyer [deceased], President , the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, Washington, D.C.

Dennis Gray, Council for Basic Education [Christopher Cross, GOALS 2000 strategist] [emphasis added]

[More info in upcoming report: Dr. Dobson and Focus on the Family: The "Christian" Think Tank; Focus Airs a Promotional For Charter Schools with the Experts, NCSL Connie Koprowicz]

Adding fuel to the charter school initiative campaign were well-placed articles in national newspapers such as the Wall Street Journal, featuring Jim and Fawn Spady, who were described as being just an ordinary couple. Highly touted letters of endorsement backing the statewide charter school initiative poured in from the usual suspects: William Bennett, of the futurist Hudson Institute, Empower America, and a Distinguished Fellow at the Heritage Foundation; Chester Finn of the Hudson Institute, and on the GOALS 2000's National Education Goals Panel; Denis Doyle, also of the Hudson Institute and Senior Associate of the GOALS 2000 entity, ACHIEVE, which specializes in advising corporate CEOs on the implementation of GOALS 2000. Further, Bennett, Finn and Doyle are members of the GOALS 2000/NASDC Modern Red School House design team. Additional letters came from Lamar Alexander of the Hudson Institute and Empower America; and Jeanne Allen, the Center for Education Reform. 19. Note that Allen and Doyle formerly were with the Heritage Foundation.

On cue, all of those listed above deployed their highest plaudits to the Spadys for their brave, path-forging charter school plan for Washington students. Spady literature revealed that all of those applauding were National Advisors to the Spadys’ Education Excellence Coalition. Considerable free air time was donated to the Spadys by the local conservative radio show to sell this concept to the public. KVI talk show host, John Carlson, is the same John Carlson who is Chairman of the Washington Institute for Policy Studies; now the Washington Foundation. (The re-naming of organizations and off-shoot affiliates makes investigation all the more difficult to follow.) Radio station 570 KVI, owned by Fischer Broadcasting and billed for its conservative hot talk, was also a sponsor of the National Conference on School Choice. Fischer Broadcasting's owner William Krippaehne, Jr. sits on the Washington Business Roundtable's Executive Committee.

Melinda Gates, wife of Microsoft's Bill Gates, highlights the existing bonds among players such as Microsoft [a member of the prestigious WA Business Roundtable], other high-level corporate giants named in this article, and the one-world design of Charter Schools/ GOALS 2000. Mrs. Gates was tapped by Washington state's governor Gary Locke to co-chair the Washington Task Force on Early Childhood Education with his wife Mona Locke. The taskforce represents another component of GOALS 2000.

Last year, in order to promote the activities of the WA Task Force on Early Childhood Education Commission, Mona Locke led an entourage of 60 U.S. educators to China for the purpose of “encouraging a cross-cultural exchange on early education.” (Both the Governor and his wife are of Chinese descent.) The Public Broadcasting Company [with their Seattle PBS affiliate KCTS] produced a documentary titled “Precious Children,” describing the wonderful discoveries the delegation had made while in China; the Chinese model of early childhood education would greatly benefit the developing American model. Funding for the documentary was supplied by the Boeing Company, another active advocate of charter schools. Boeing plays a central role in the Washington Business Roundtable and GOALS 2000. Just at the time that Mona Locke was about to depart for China, a woman called in to the Seattle KVI radio talk show, saying that she had visited China via the same ‘People to People’ organization that had organized the trip for Mrs. Locke. Based on her experience, the caller said that the ‘People to People’ program amounted to what she termed propaganda; adding that the young children in the day care centers her group had visited were terrified of the American guests. Throughout all their short lives, these children have been told that Americans are devils. The children visibly shook when presented with the U.S. visitors in her party.

Note: William Gates, Sr. is a founding partner in the Seattle law firm of Preston, Gates and Ellis. Since 1995 he has served as a trustee of the Seattle Foundation. In 1991, the University of Washington Law School presented Mr. Gates Sr. with their Distinguished Alumnus award. In 1997, Governor Gary Locke appointed him to the University of Washington Board of Regents. William Gates Sr. is father of Microsoft Bill Gates III.

Preston, Gates & Ellis is represented on the Board of Trustees of the World Affairs Council [WAC]. A World Affairs Council brochure states that its role is to “foster dialogue on the broadest range of international issues, while promoting no policy position or national agenda.”

A WAC Global Classroom conference brochure [1994 - Seattle, WA] listed numerous corporate members on the WAC Board of Trustees including: Seafirst Bank [now Bank of America, The Boeing Company, Weyerhaeuser Company, Microsoft Corporation,* Preston, Gates & Ellis.* WAC Benefactors listed include: Boeing Co., American Airlines, The Seattle Foundation,* SAFECO Corporation, Seafirst Bank [now Bank of America], Starbucks, Perkins Coie [home at that time of Discovery Institute], US West [now QWest]

“On Wednesday , April 5, the Washington Institute for Policy Studies and the World Affairs Council sponsored a lunch featuring Heritage Foundation President Ed Feulner. Heritage is perhaps the leading and most respected conservative policy research institute in the nation.”

Note: In 1992, Ravitch [OERI, U.S. Department of Education] was a featured speaker at “Educating in a Multicultural World” [Philadelphia, PA], which was co-sponsored by the World Affairs Council. Other featured speakers were Ernest Boyer of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. One of the Pre-Conference Clinics was entitled " 'Funding Opportunities for Global and International Education' - Covers where to go for funding and the ‘how tos’ of funding; presentations by representatives from federal government, foundations and corporations. [emphasis added]

Richard M. Scaife Heritage Foundation Trustee since 1985, Vice Chairman
“His enduring commitment to the free society is evident in his role as a director with the Pittsburgh World Affairs Council and his service on the boards of the boards of the Hoover Institution... During the Reagan and Bush administrations, Scaife served as a presidentially appointed member of the U.S. Advisory Commission for Public Diplomacy, which oversees the U.S. Information Agency. One of the Pittsburgh areas leading philanthropists-- he chairs the Sarah Scaife Foundation, The Allegheny Foundation and the Carthage Foundation...”
[source: Heritage Foundation web site, 1998]

      1994- 1995 Speakers to the Seattle World Affairs Council included:
      Winston Lord [CFR/T/B/S&B], Asst. Secretary of State to East Asia & Pacific Affairs
      Brent Scowcroft [CFR], National Security Advisor
      Sandra Kristoff, United States Ambassador to APEC
      His Excellency Soo Gil Park, Korean Ambassador to the United Nations
      Ben Bradlee, Ex. Editor, The Washington Post
      Robert McNamara [CFR], former U.S. Secretary of Defense
      Hedrick Smith [CFR], author
      Rigoberta Menchu Tum, Nobel Peace Prize Winner

Bill & Melinda Gates’ Landmark Gift to Population Control

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the International Planned Parenthood Federation announce $8.9 million grant to improve women's health

A grant of $8,865,000 will go towards improving reproductive health care services to women around the world through International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) programmes, it was announced today. The fund, from The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, will be spread over five years.

The money will go towards a programme that targets improvements to reproductive health care provided by IPPF's member family planning associations (FPAs) in over 180 countries worldwide.

The project takes into account recommendations from an evaluation undertaken in 1999 that focused on the work of the IPPF Medical and Technical Unit and the International Medical Advisory Panel (IMAP) - a group of internationally recognised health experts who volunteer their time to provide essential technical expertise to the Federation and its affiliates.

There are three main goals:

* A system of quality-of-care accreditation of FPAs. Including updating standards for the provision of reproductive health care putting into place protocols for quality self-assessment and external assessment.

* Improving the quality and availability of medical and technical information.

* Enhancing medical and technical training for health care providers, improving attitude, motivation, knowledge and skills.

"This grant will allow IPPF to translate the quality of care concept into reality", said Dr. Carlos Huezo, the director of the IPPF Medical and Technical Unit. "Thanks to IPPF's links and advocacy activities, the benefits of this project will have an effect not only within the IPPF network, but well beyond."

For further comment contact Fiona Salter, Media Officer, on 020 7487 7892.

Note to editors:

IPPF is the world's largest non-governmental organisation in the field of reproductive health & rights, including family planning, working in more than 180 countries worldwide. Founded in Bombay in 1952, IPPF works through national FPAs to promote and provide reproductive health services, as well as develop public support for sustainable population, environment and development policies. IPPF tackles all the sexual and reproductive health challenges such as reducing maternal deaths, meeting the unmet demands for contraception, prevention of STI/HIV/AIDS, and pioneering quality services.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is dedicated to improving people's lives by sharing advances in health and learning with the global community.

Led by Bill Gates' father, William H. Gates, Sr.,* and Patty Stonesifer, the Seattle-based Foundation has an asset base of $21 billion. [emphasis added] 20.

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Grants

The Foundation accepts letters of inquiry from tax-exampt, nonprofit organizations working in the areas of global health, especially common diseases, public health and nutrition in developing countries; education and life-long learning, including the use of modern information technology. The Foundation is interested in family planning and reproductive health efforts in the developing world and also funds a variety of organizations in the Pacific Northwest, especially those working in the areas of learning and health and human services. Interested applicants should submit a letter of inquiry; after reviewing the letter, the Foundation may invite the applicant organization to submit a proposal. 21. For complete information, visit www.gatesfoundation.org

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Policy on Reproductive and Child Health

“The 1994 International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo was a watershed for global population and development initiatives. Nations affirmed reproductive health as a human right and an essential element of sustainable development. The forum called for a comprehensive approach that emphasizes improved reproductive health care as well as better education and economic opportunities, particularly for women in developing countries. Consistent with the aims of the Cairo plan, the foundation makes grants for a range of programs that address reproductive health needs throughout the life cycle.” 22.

When the work of the Early Childhood Task Force ended in 2000 it was decided that the creation of yet another foundation would implement the work outlined by the Early Childhood Task Force:

…In April 2000, [the Commission on Early Learning] created the Washington Early Learning Foundation, a nonprofit corporation, to help every child in Washington State go to school eager to learn and ready to succeed…

* Scholarships to help child care workers earn credentialed degrees in early learning.

* Education classes for parents, grandparents, neighbors, baby-sitters, and others on how to encourage brain development in children from birth to three.

The Foundation will be funded by gifts from individuals, private foundations, corporations, governments, and other public charities. [emphasis added]

This writer attended a meeting of the Early Childhood Task Force where the idea of setting up a private foundation was discussed. Following the meeting I asked a task force member to define the population which the commission was targeting; certainly it was those infants born into families identified as ‘At Risk.’ I was corrected. No, the policies established by the task force are intended to apply to every infant born in Washington State.

The Early Childhood Task Force is an outworking of GOALS 2000. As the federal GOALS 2000 law states, “All children.” All obviously means All; no exceptions. Just how can public policy be administrated by a private foundation? The public /private partnership in education is the coup d'etat for corporate control of the next generation.

In a discussion at that time with President Bill Baldwin of the Washington Institute for Policy Studies [WIPS, now renamed the Washington Institute Foundation], I learned that the charter school ballot initiative campaign had been organized in Washington D.C. at the Heritage Foundation headquarters. The Spadys, WIPS’ Baldwin, and Williams of the Evergreen Freedom Foundation* were all present. As it turns out, Baldwin is also the American Legislative Exchange Council's [ALEC] liaison between Washington businesses and ALEC-member legislators. (One Washington legislator explained that ALEC serves as the conservative union for legislators, while the National Conference of State Legislatures [NCSL] serves as the liberal union for legislators.) The widespread ‘conspiracy theory’ that there are not really ‘two sides’ finds its verification. Few citizens are either aware of this connection, or aware of the influence on legislation emanating from these offices.

Washington Institute has been a recipient of grants totaling: $222,500 between the years 1990 to 1999: Olin Foundation, Bradley Foundation [source: Media Transparency]

Evergreen Freedom Foundation has been a recipient of grants totaling: $233,000 between the years 1997 to 1999: Sarah Scaife Foundation, Bradley Foundation

See upcoming Charitable Choice Report, Evergreen Freedom Foundation's role in Faith-Based Welfare Reform

Spady's Charter School Campaign Regroups

After the charter ballot failed, with only 33% of the voters supporting it, Jim Spady directed his enthusiastic supporters to contact the Washington Business Roundtable's Phil Bussey or Paul Hill [RAND/ Center for Reinventing Education at the University of Washington] to continue the work they had begun. 23. Washington Business Round-Table’s Phil Bussey and Steve Mullin have worked on the GOALS 2000/ Washington 2000 issues from back in the early 90s. Last year, Steve Mullin, representing the Business Roundtable, appeared at the legislative hearing along with Kemp and Hill, to support charter school legislation. Bussey and Mullin now head the Partnership for Learning which is the very network Hill envisioned, that is, “a national network of local business, civic and political leaders who are interested in changing the governance of their schools....” The momentum and coalitions for Charter Schools continue to build.*

Licking his wounds, Jim Spady issued a “Memo to Charter School Enthusiasts”:

I'm sorry to report to you that Washington’s bid, to become the 30th state in the nation to pass a charter school law, died today in the Senate Ways & Means Committee…

The last-minute hope of charter school supporters was that Seattle Public School Superintendent John Stanford (a former Army General who last year stated that he wanted to “convert all of Seattle’s 100 schools to charters”) would join the Governor in publicly supporting the bipartisan compromise….

Until then, we can still cheer on our friends in the 29 states that have already authorized charter schools. Knowing that almost 200,000 kids are living the charter school dream in other states helps everyone “keep the dream alive” in WA.

During the time that the Spadys were traveling Washington state, holding charter school promotional meetings, bits and pieces would fall out here and there about this just-your-ordinary couple. Jim and Fawn claimed that, because they so deeply believed in charter schools, they had invested $200,000 of their own money into their charter ballot initiative cause. The Washington Family Council [Focus on the Family/James Dobson] was giving the Spady's their official “green light,” by publicly endorsing their project in their widely circulated Focus on the Family Citizen magazine. Of course, this generated a lot of PR for the Spadys.

Another interesting discovery was the Spady's Forum Foundation which Jim's father Richard [Dick] Spady runs, with Jim and Fawn holding positions on the advisory board. The foundation markets their own very special Fast-Forum Technique…The what Technique?

Not only was the Forum Foundation marketing their technique to local governments, Jim and his father have been reportedly seen in Olympia on a regular basis over the years, during the legislative sessions, lobbying for their Citizen Councilor Bill, which was modeled after their Fast Forum Technique. So what exactly was the technique?

In a KVI 570 radio interview [mid-90s], father Dick Spady [also owner of a well-known Seattle hamburger joint, Dick's Drive-In] explained in discussing his Citizen Councilor Bill [then being considered by the Washington state legislature] that the Fast-Forum Technique, aka People-to-People Communication, was styled similarly to the Delphi Technique.

The Delphi is a scientifically designed technique for achieving a pre-determined outcome; otherwise known as dialoguing to consensus. If the Spady's bill were to pass, Washington would reorganize under a new form of governance, closely akin to government by focus group. And again, that old theme surfaced in the bill's text: “It is the intention of the legislature that donations and gifts be solicited from public-spirited individuals [i.e., the Paul Allens of WA state who funded the Charter Schools Initiative 25.], businesses, and foundations for the purpose of funding the [Citizen Councilor] program.” [emphasis added]

According to one Forum Foundation Opinionaire: “Participants are assisted in becoming aware of their own beliefs as well as of those intellectual and moral beliefs of others at a point in time--the ‘Zeitgeist,’ or ‘Spirit of the Time’…Nor will the views expressed necessarily represent those of the same participants at a later period of time; as humans we each have the ability to receive new information, consider it, and change.” The brochure goes on to describe the Fast Forum Technique as “an informed, theological approach…in community and civilization building.” By participating in the Forum’s questionnaire one is helping to contribute “guidelines for the future.”

The coup de grace on this ordinary-people Spady scenario -- discovery of their spheres of influence -- was the news that Jim and Richard had been presenters at a World Future Society meeting in Atlanta, Georgia [July1995]. Their presentation was entitled “Many-to-Many Communications.” Final Program reads:

“The speakers will present the theory of many-to-many-communications and its implications for the future of administering systems democratically, from families to nations…The process generates data useful for diagnosis (the first step in the administrative process), helps inform citizens about problems and indicates their preferences for solutions, and leads toward peace by enabling citizens to pursue their own happiness.”

The ‘Special Event,” slated for 2:00 July 19 at the World Future Society's annual conference, was the presentation of the Earl Award from the WFS's affiliate “node”… the World Network of Religious Futurists. “Each year the award is given to an individual who has made significant contributions to the study of the future of religion.”

New Ager Barbara Marx Hubbard, co-founder of the Foundation for Conscious Evolution, would receive the World Future Society's Earl Award for 1995. Michael Maus, director of communications for the National Council of Churches, would appear with Marx on a panel discussing “the role of religious futurists.”

[See upcoming report: Dr. Dobson & Focus on the Family: The Christian Think Tank for additional information about the WFS's Earl Award and the World Network of Religious Futurists.]

The World Future Society

“[Don] Bell wrote, in part, of an...association of social, behavioral and other professors of the inexact sciences who actually believe that it is their duty to PREDICT the shape of the world of tomorrow and then set down to the task of making their predictions come true...! (Emphasis added.) Needless to say, the ‘association’ Bell was referring to was the WORLD FUTURE SOCIETY (WFS)! Stanley Ezrol of New Solidarity - official organ of Lyndon LaRouche, Jr.’s ‘New World Economic Order’ - was considerably more blunt. Commenting on the ‘Fourth General Assembly’ of the World Future Society, held in Washington D.C. during July of 1982, he wrote:

“...While at first glance the conference seemed to be a dizzying four-day psychedelic brainwashing session with the purpose of recharging the human rubble produced by the 60's and 70's psychedelic drug and sensitivity training cult movement -- the environmentalist-terrorist movement of today -- it was, in fact of more interest. Radical kookery was being retooled to an explicit fascist ideology capable of leading a racist, fascist campaign...in favor of a post industrial society dominated by pre-Christian animistic and magical cults...!

“Ezrol went on to note that among the attendees were Presidential ‘hopeful’ United States Senator Gary Hart of Colorado; United States Representatives: Charles Rose of North Carolina; Barbara Mikulski of Maryland; Newt Gingrich of Georgia; and United States Senators Claiborne Pell of Rhode Island and Packwood of Oregon! Ezrol concluded that ‘LaRouche’ ‘leaflets’ were distributed at the conference, stating ...that Ferguson’s ‘Age of Aquarius’ was nothing but a rehash of the Nietzschean Aquarian movement which spawned Hitler as a response to the last Great Depression... Ezrol noted that these ‘leaflets’...were popular among the large minority of Futurists who are disgusted by the blatant occultism preached by Ferguson, Hubbard...and Willis Harmon...!” 26.