Parents at five public schools handed privatization a stunning defeat in March as they resoundingly rejected a city plan to turn over management of the troubled schools to a private company.

In the weeks before the balloting, parent voters received a strong message from Local 372, DC 37 and community groups about the dangers of handing public services to private firms.The takeover bid by Edison Schools Inc., a for-profit corporation endorsed by Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and supported by the Board of Education, was overwhelmingly defeated. Only 20 percent of the voting parents at the five schools (453) voted for Edison, while 80 percent (1,833) turned down the plan.

Edison’s defeat loomed large, because the five targeted schools were the point of the company’s wedge for bringing privatization into the nation’s largest public education system.

“Our opposition to the Edison takeover was not just a matter of the local’s self-interest,” said Veronica Montgomery-Costa, the president of Local 372. “Over 420 of the affected parents are members of Local 372. We wanted to insure that those members and all the other parents involved were fully informed before they cast their votes.”

Local 372, which represents more than 25,000 school employees, launched an information campaign focused on the failures of privatization and the fundamental political mistake in handing over the responsibility for educating school children to a for-profit company controlled by its shareholders.

“We believe that the Board of Education has a responsibility to educate all its children. This public board should not look toward private industry to solve the problems of New York City students,” said Ms. Montgomery-Costa.

She led a multi-pronged drive to stop the privatization effort:

• Local 372 worked with the community group, Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), to set up meetings with parents and plan strategies for organizing to get out the vote against the privateers.

How the union beat privateers

• Volunteers at union telephone banks called more than 3,000 parents.
  
  
• DC 37 and Local 372 printed fliers, posters and buttons, and the local coordinated parent groups that distributed the anti-Edison materials around the five schools and visited voters at home.
  
  
• Local 372 negotiator Anne Downes testified against the plan at a well-publicized hearing held by the Education Committee of the City Council.

As the vote approached, the parents’ common response was one of confusion and disappointment with the Board of Education for “giving up” on their children. Parents also felt that they had been excluded from the decision making process and had been given too little information about Edison’s methods. Many were angry that Edison representatives led parents to believe that if they voted down the takeover, the schools would be closed.

The five schools the city wanted to hand to Edison are low-performing schools with predominantly African American and Latino students; three were in Brooklyn, one in Harlem and one in the Bronx. Parents from two of the schools were upset that they had been chosen despite showing improvements in grades in the last year.

With 113 schools in 45 cities across the nation, Edison Schools Inc. is the largest private firm operating public schools. The opposition was fueled by recent reports of Edison’s failures elsewhere:

• As the election was under way in New York City, the San Francisco Unified School District voted to revoke a contract with Edison. The school board there charged Edison with “shuffling out” students who perform low on standardized tests to artificially inflate their improvement statistics.
  
  
• A study by the American Federation of Teachers revealed that the teacher turnover rate at Edison schools is higher than in most public schools. Seventy percent of the San Francisco teachers, despite an offer of wage increases, did not report back to work for this school year.
  
  
• Local 372 was also concerned over Edison’s ability to implement improvements at the five schools. According to financial analysts, Edison is operating at a deficit. The company has lost over $200 million in the last five years. “The union and many parents had a legitimate concern about what happens to the children if a company like this goes under,” said Ms. Montgomery-Costa.

Because of Edison’s defeat, Chancellor Harold Levy has pledged to pour more money and resources into these schools. “My ultimate goal at the end of two years is that parents will be knocking down doors to get their children into these schools,” he said.

Opponents of the privatization bid are already organizing to hold him to his promise.