Episode 9: Charter Schools
Shortly after completing his last episode, Discord found himself busy with trying to research the next topic he wanted to tackle. The idea for the topic that was on his mind was based on a couple of different observations. One, it was back to school season in Ponyville and with it, came the groans of several ponies who wished that summer could last a lot longer. Two, when it came to schools, there was one kind of school that… he had not even heard about until when he started looking into it and what he found was rather eye opening and that most of the public was rather… split on the issue. Some ponies were for it, while others were against it… and a LOT of ponies had been affected by it.
So with that in mind, he thought that this important of a subject should be addressed as soon as possible. And the timing was pretty good since school had recently come back into session. In fact, he was so invested in the subject throughout the week that he found out so much information that wouldn’t really be necessary to cover in this particular session. But instead of covering whether or not it was good or bad at all, he decided to take a look at the system in practice to see if it really meets the expectations that some of them claim to have.
With that in mind, he was now ready to begin the next piece as he looked back at the camera and after the show’s animated introduction came his first statement. “Summer… the one thing in which ponies claim will last forever… other than this.” The clip that played afterwards showed a collection of villains throughout Equestria’s history, including Nightmare Moon, who have claimed that what they were going to achieve was going to last forever. “Yes, the cliche of something lasting forever is just as old as these guys. So, next time you hear Nightmare Moon shouting “It shall remain Eternal Night forever!!”, she really means “It shall be Eternal Night for roughly ten minutes before I get rainbow blasted again".”
The coinciding image that played of Nightmare Moon before making her claims and then getting blasted by the elements of harmony really set well with the joke. Especially when the second image had the caption ‘TRIGGERED’ underneath it in a bold typeface. “Now, the main reason why I bring this up is that with the end of summer, it means that a lot of ponies are going back to school. Whether it’s elementary school or going to college, a lot of ponies are going to be hitting the books soon. Both figuratively… and literally whenever you can’t understand one of the toughest problems in advanced Calculus.” More laughter echoed throughout the set as an animated image of Twilight Sparkle banging her head against a textbook was shown for roughly ten seconds before Discord turned back to the camera.
“Now, with it being back to school season this year, millions of ponies across Equestria would be attending the one thing that I just found out about a week ago… despite the fact that I have been out of stone for more than three and a half seasons so far… Charter Schools. Which is rather surprising because I think most of the population at this point can agree with me when I say that I originally had no idea what it was…” Discord said before clearing his throat and speaking up. “And upon researching about them, it’s apparently one of the things that nobles and politicians love to praise.”
“I believe in public charter schools.”
“I throughly believe in charter schools. They are fantastic!”
“Charter Schools work and they work really well.”
“Charter Schools are so successful that almost any politician can find something good to say about them. Period.”
When it got back to Discord, he then spoke up and then began to pick up from that last point. “Yes, Charter Schools can apparently unite both sides of the aisle more quickly than when the DJ at a family anniversary or wedding puts on a groovy dance song,” That was followed by a brief image showing what looked like Granny Smith dancing with a bunch of Apple Family members in the middle of a dance floor, shortly before the draconequus’ head shifted to take on Applejack’s appearance as he spoke in a southern accent. “Hey, look at Granny dancin’. We can’t tell her what this song is about, ya hear?” The crowd was laughing even more hysterically at this point as Discord changed his head back to normal.
“So before we get into the subject, let’s answer one of the main questions we all might have… First, what the heck are Charter Schools? Well, to put it simply, these schools are institutions that are taxpayer funded, but privately run. The first one that was made was actually Princess Celestia’s school for gifted unicorns and back then, it was initially made in order to not only provide many unicorns with the chance of getting a good education, but it allowed for those who were teaching to test out better teaching methods and educational approaches. It was so successful to the point that other soon emerged later and within the last fifty years, they exploded to the point where they were all across Equestria like what happens when you feed a parasprite,” That was followed by a graphic of where they were in most of the country, symbolizing the schools as Parasprites as the Draconequus made an important point. “Some even have celebrity backers like Suri Polomare and even the wonderbolt captain, Spitfire.”
At that point, some of the audience were rather surprised to find out about this… then Discord added on to what he was trying to say before. “It even got to the point that before I was reformed by Fluttershy, many ponies were once lead to believe that Prince freaking Blueblood was opening up his own school… Only to realize two things. One, the announcement was on April Foals Day… and two, there was the name for the school itself. And I’ll let the adopted douche take it from here…”
“… The Blueblood Institute for Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Ethics…”
Once it got back to Discord, he then began to clear a few things up. “For one thing… he has no experience in any of those areas… and second, the initials of that said school stood out to spell, and this is true… BITE ME,” That had surprised a lot of the audience and got some to gasp and break out into laughter in response. “That’s the kind of statement you would find on a sweatshirt worn by Janice in Accounting during Hearth’s Warming or by a pony who lives on the streets of Detrot rather than the name of a proper institution to teach children.” Even more laughter roared from that statement, leading to Discord having to calm down the entire crowd before he could actually continue.
“Now, supporters of charter schools would normally point towards stories in which ponies were rather successful later on in life and had gotten to top universities. But critics of those same schools claim that they overstate their successes, cut off talented students from the program and even divert precious resources. So let me state off the top here that instead of looking into whether or not Schools like these are good in principle,” The draconequus told his audience. “Instead, we are going to look at how they perform in practice. Because like with many things, it may sound good in theory, but may not be so good when you actually do them… like trying to get your cutie mark in chemistry.” That was followed by a before and after shot of Sweetie Belle attempting to get her cutie mark in said area… only to accidently burn off her mane, tail and fur as a result. “You may think that it’s a good idea… but you should always check with an adult first.”
For that, Discord got out some of the notes that he had taken while the crowd was laughing hysterically at those pictures. “Now, compared to public schools, one study group found that Charter Schools had a slight edge when it comes to reading and was a bit higher in math. But they also pointed out that these results are different depending on the city you live in because charter quality is uneven across Equestria. Which is personally scary… If I was a father and I were raising a child, I would want them to have the best quality education that I could be able to get them. But unfortunately, many charter schools don’t even make it through the school year, leaving many ponies feeling abandoned as these news stories explain.” That was followed by three news stories and an interview with one of the parents that was affected.
“A local charter school suddenly closed it’s doors almost two weeks into the school year in the middle of the day.”
“A Seaddle Charter School shocked many parents and students by closing it’s doors this afternoon, without any form of notice whatsoever. It was the only one within trotting distance of the city-”
“A local charter school is suddenly and unexpectedly closing it’s doors.”
“My two kids left these notes on the table this morning. This one says… ‘Dear Mom, is the school going out of bisnose?’.”
Discord put up a paw for a moment, pointing at the image of the kids note in the last story as he looked back at the crowd. “Yes… that kid wrote business as bisnose. Which, personally to me, seems like a much better way to spell it if you were his age.” That was followed by what looked like a young Princess Luna holding up a index card that read “Woona’s Cuddle Bisnose” and the card was for one free snuggle on her. “Now to be fair, that school that was mentioned in the last segment of that montage was shut down three weeks into the school year, so I guess they should’ve been a lot better at bisnose… and for schools in some areas of Equestria, they have an alarming failure rate. A couple of years ago, in the city of Pi-ami, a local newspaper found that ever since first implementing the school’s four years ago, over a hundred of them had closed there and fifteen in which never even finished their first year. Leaving many families feeling betrayed and angry at the ponies who helped set up and organized them. And you would think that there was a proper way in order to make sure that one of these institutions was properly stable. However, that is not always the case…” At that, he paused for a moment to catch his breath again, just as he soon pointed out an example of what he was talking about.
“Take for example, Chivey Academy. One of the fifteen schools that was originally shut down in Pi-ami. One of the reasons for it being the lack of… and you’re not going to believe this… an actual school.”
“… The Schools were repeatedly kicked out of their buildings and moved between locations every three to five days. This included a reception hall, two local churches, a recreational center and a local park. Some teachers even had to resort to daily field trips because some of the locations they went too did not have enough room for all the students or to run multiple classrooms…”
That shocked a LOT of the viewers and made Discord even shocked… by one particular detail. “Daily… field trips. How does such a concept even work out? You gotta think that by doing field trips so many times that you run out of ideas for where to go and just let them run loose in the park… Or even take some of them with you to go return some clothes at a department store!” That was followed by two images. One that looked like the students of Ms. Cheerilee’s class running around in a park while she was sleeping under a tree, while the other one looked like the showpony named Trixie trying to get some kids excited by going to a store to return a gag gift given to her on her birthday.
“So that leaves us with a question… How do those schools get approved? Well, like most cities, the process begins with a lengthy application and the one for Chivey Academy was a doozy. It was over 400 pages long and written by Mr. Chivey, the founder of the school and contained passages that explained that the goals of the schools were to provide support for all students with the end goal being to increase individual independence. Which seems alright… but strangely…” At that point, Discord took out what looked like another stack of paper that was just as big as he continued where he left off. “When we had a look at the application for this school, Ironhide Academy, and got to the passage on the school's goals, it was almost EXACTLY the same way!! They looked similar, but with a few differences… like Flitter and Cloudchaser,” At that point, it showed the two twins that were on the Wonderbolts looking at one another shortly before a big race for the team. “You all know that one of them came first, but then Cloudchaser just basically plagiarized her face.”
More laughter echoed throughout the room as the draconequus took a moment to calmly continued where he left off. “Now, that behavior… oddly enough, is not illegal... but definitely unethical. There’s even a passage in the Chivey Academy Handbook saying the exact definition of what plagiarism is. So the application for Mr. Chivey’s school could be used on the same grounds of getting him kicked out of that same school,” That coincided with an image of the pony they were talking about getting thrown out of a building that was labeled ‘school’ on the front. “And incidentally, that’s not the only thing in which he’s been accused off. He’s also been accused of spending funds for the school on himself and is awaiting trial for grand theft. Much like Spoiled Rich with her husband’s bank account… except with no courts getting involved on that case.”
Discord snapped a talon to have the application that he was holding disappear as he now decided to move past the schools down in Pi-ami and instead focus on something else. “But there is a lot at stake for charter schools and a major problem when it comes to schools being approved this quickly. Take the Silverwing Institute all the way in Filly-delphia for example. They, like other Charter Schools, get paid on a per student basis, roughly to where it’s 7000 bits a student and that adds up. Especially that it’s your taxpayer money that are funding them. Well, strangely enough… it was around the time that they were getting off the ground that this story broke out.”
“... By day, the Sliverwing Institute in Filly-delphia would house 450 foals and teach them in classes ranging from Kindergarten to the Eighth grade… But by night, the school cafeteria was soon transformed into Tailwind, an adult themed club and bar that authorities say that is unlicensed and also illegal. In fact, parents called for an investigation into the staff members and the school when they say that their kids accidentally consumed wine instead of grape juice and found suspicious items within the facilities trash bins.”
That immediately got a LOT of ponies gasping at that… including Discord. “Holy Sh*t! Are those ponies out of their minds?! A club like that in a freaking elementary school is a recipe for complete and utter disaster… and I’m sure that the custodians would really want a better paycheck if they had to clean up whatever messes they find throughout the facility!” After that, Discord looked back at the camera as he had everyone calm down before speaking. “Fortunately, that school is under new leadership now and the students that happened to accidentally ingest wine are also okay. But in the city of Filly-delphia, the other schools that are there are in really bad shape… Not just for facilities, but what they are being taught. Some classes even skip very important subjects like that of World History or even Geometry, which are vital for understanding how our world works… but don’t take it from me. Take it from the mayor of Filly-delphia herself.”
The next clip that followed was of a brown maned unicorn with a sand colored coat of fur as she was beginning to speak in front of a press conference.
“I will say this once and I will say this again… Filly-delphia has the worst charter school laws in the county… and perhaps in Equestria too.”
“It’s true. In fact, the original pony in charge of Silverwing Institute is no longer there anymore after pleading guilty to fraud and embezzeling nearly 90,000 bits from the school itself. In fact, in that city itself, there has been an ongoing trend of several different school administrators and advisors pleading to similar crimes within the last decade! Not to mention that there’s no way to tell whether or not a school can actually be good or not for children, which is why one magazine even advised parents to ‘research the owner of the schools to see if they had not pleaded guilty to fraud or theft’. Which is insane!” Discord continued, before pausing for a second and lifting up a talon. “Although, to be fair… and no offense to anyone who lives there, it’s not entirely new for Filly-delphia to have the worst of something… Think of it, they have the worst Buckball fans, the worst bell and finally, the worst regional delicacy.”
The images that coincided with that included ponies that tried dressing up like birds to celebrate their Buckball team, a large bronze bell with a crack down the middle, and the last one being what looked like hay on a rectangular bun that was later smothered in cheese. “If I had wanted cheese whiz splattered all over my hay sandwich, I would go to Cutie Cafeteria, the restaurant run by the Cutie Mark Crusaders!” Now the image of Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle, and Applebloom in aprons holding a cheese smothered sandwich was what was getting the crowd to laugh uncontrollably as the draconequus straightened himself up shortly afterwards.
“But Filly-delphia isn’t even the worse of the cities with a lackluster plan for Charter Schools… the city of Colt-umbus in the middle of Equestria has even been called out by Charter School Supporters as ‘the wild west’,” That was followed by an image portraying the schools as buildings like in the town of Appleloosa and some of the folks looking like cow-ponies and desperados. “And the one in charge of the school districts there… may seem a bit disturbingly familiar.”
The next clip showed a very particular icon in the food industry trying to explain his philosophy on how schools are like that of ‘pizza shops’ and that through competition and choice amongst schools by comparing it to how much toppings you get on a pizza. All in which caused the crowd to laugh and Discord to facepaw himself. “Okay… first off, nopony has ever called them ‘pizza shops’. Secondly, I doubt Zesty Gourmand here would really give a crap about choice after despising and threatening to defund an entire row of restaurants in Manehattan. Third, you can actually get extra toppings by paying for them like a normal pony! Lastly… this pony is talking about schools like the whole thing is just about business. Which, again, sounds rather unethical… especially when you hear about the fact that a lot of the schools in that county have a huge problem in the lack of proper oversight. One agency even found that charter schools misspend money close to four times more than any other taxpayer funded agency in that city.” That revelation had caused some of the ponies in the audience to gasp as they looked amongst each other and looked back at Discord as he allowed for that moment to sink in.
“Some of these cases are rather extraordinary.” The draconequus explained as he snapped a finger and another case file soon emerged in his paw along with a pair of reading glasses. “One superintendent had even misspent funds which were suppose to go to supplies for classes like World History and Science on spa’s, transportation, plays, vacations and also to see Countess Coloratura in concert… but that’s not the craziest thing.” By now, Discord had dismissed both the file and the glasses as he kept on speaking. “What’s crazier is that there are some cities across Equestria, including Colt-umbus and Las Pegasus where you can actually profit off of Charter Schools legally and with no strings attached. Just look at this news report from fifteen years ago for a moment and you can see exactly what I’m talking about.”
“By law, charter schools must remain non-profit… but the schools can hire an educational management company, or EMO, and they too can try to make a profit.-”
“Pause for a moment,” Discord spoke up as he looked back at the crowd. “You know that something is not technically good if the abbreviated name for it makes the company look like a social stereotype.” More laughter echoed throughout the room as it showed what looked like a model by the name of ‘Moonlight Raven’ looking rather depressed and emotional in a dimly lit room. “But that’s not all… because if you continue watching, things get even more concerning.” That was shown once the CEO for one of the management companies was shown on screen and said a very specific and rather chilling statement.
“Education is first, last and always a business. If it’s run like a business… it can be done for profit.”
“Yes… and I bet you that in their next equish class, kids will be learning that if you take the L away from learning, you get earning,” The Draconequus said before stating the problem with that. “But schools like these should not be run like a business because your focus should be on the children, not the cash. It’s probably why that ponies company has a very bad track record in the city with managing over 30% of the failing schools there. Plus, a management company like his is not authorized to have the same level of transparency as… a school district. Which means taxpayer money could be used wrongly without them knowing it.”
That and the image of some ponies going on a shopping spree while the pony being symbolized as the 'taxpayer' gets the receipt for the expenses had a few ponies gasp, laugh and murmur among themselves, shortly before the spirit of chaos then mentioned something completely different. “Now, you may be thinking… that these schools were left with no supervision whatsoever, but that’s not entirely the case. Some of the schools in the region that they are in are approved and overseen by ‘authorizers’ and while many cities sharply limited who could be one, some cities like Colt-umbes weren’t exactly the case and allowed for many groups, including non profits to do it…” Discord now thought of an analogy for him to use as he took a deep breath and had a look back at the camera.
“Say for example that Princess Twilight decided to set up a school called… Princess Twilight Sparkle’s school for fantastic foals,” The image of Twilight proudly standing in front of her castle sized school building caught some of the audience off guard and got them laughing too. “While I have an existing non-profit called ‘Chaos Kids’... that could’ve overseen her school if she was on board with it… And some of these cases occur all over the country and I can’t even get into detail on all of them. But what I can mention is that… for some ponies, not every two schools are the same when it comes to what they learn in the classrooms… remember when I mentioned that some of the schools don’t even teach world history? Well, onepony brought it up to a schoolboard leader and this is what he said.”
“I personally believe that there are some subjects like this one that are better to be left off being taught at home.”
That had Discord straighten up in response and look at his audience for a moment before mentioning something else. “Okay… here’s an exchange that I don’t think anypony’s heard at all… ‘Wow, how did you do so well on that essay on history?' I was homeschooled…” That had some more ponies in the audience laughing before Discord looked back at them. “Now, here’s where some you need to pay attention. With the way society is changing now, our kids need a quality education more than ever… especially when we got ponies who feel abandoned when a charter school closes it’s doors on them. I could go on and on about other flaws that I have come across. And you might say that some of these charter schools closing is just seeing accountability in action, but there’s a real problem there. This isn’t a ‘pizza shop’ that you open up, serve your food, you close it if it doesn’t go well and you move on… this is f*yay*ing education! And when these schools close, they leave kids with nowhere else to go for a school. But don’t take it from me… take it from a former charter school employee.”
“I think there needs to be some filter as to who is actually opening up these charter schools.”
“And that I agree, one hundred percent,” Discord added on, “Because something that the assholes who run those management companies, like the one you saw earlier, is that the problem with letting the marketplace decide when it comes to kids is that kids change faster than the market… and get scared at the word ‘essay’ much faster than when you say any other word with five letters… like the word clown.”
That was stopped by an image of a very particular clown who lives in a sewer before Discord groaned. “No… just no, you’re not having anyone here float to anywhere, go back to where you came from!” The image soon disappeared as the Draconequus began to make his final point. “To sum things up… by the time parents realize that a school system is failing, futures may have been ruined… So let me summarize it in a way that even Zesty here could understand. If you give a kid a crappy pizza, you f*yay* up their day… treat a kid like one and you can f*yay* up their entire future. Because the quality of the education that we give our kids should come from qualified instructors who aren’t just doing it for the money and all children should get good education and not be limited to only just a few subjects because the school thinks that it’s better for a student to learn that on their own.”
Next Morning
“Sister, are you busy this morning?” The question that Celestia heard from her sister shortly after raising the sun was one that the alicorn honestly didn’t expect. Especially since around now, Luna would take the time in order to sleep in on some mornings. But nevertheless, there really wasn’t a way for her to try and avoid this conversation, so the solar alicorn decided to go along with it.
“Not necessarily… Why do you ask, sister?”
“Well… I wanted to talk to you about a couple of things…” She mentioned before clearing her throat. “First… and this is just out of curiosity… why did you adopt Blueblood?”
That was… something that the sun princess did not expect to hear from one such as her sister, but nevertheless, she then replied. “Blueblood’s parents were originally members of the royal guard. Some of the most highly decorated soldiers in the guard to this day… However, both of them were killed in a train car accident and it left him with no one to look after him. So… I felt as if I should do so in order to keep their memory alive… Of course, I did not think that it would lead to how he is today.”
“Did you ever tell him the actual story?” Her sister then asked. “And why the name Blueblood?”
“I wanted to… but over the years, it got increasingly harder the more he stayed here.” Celestia replied. “And the name Blueblood was something his parents decided. Back in Manehattan, where they first met, Blueblood was used as a term to describe those who served on the police and protectors of the law. To be more of a gentleperson and a peer to others… However, the ideology of Blueblood meaning ‘one of the upper class’ had gotten into his head at a rather young age when he was still learning at school.”
At that point, was when Luna looked back at her and then said something else. “Funny you should mention that… Discord’s most recent piece on his show actually talked about charter schools. Didn’t you and I wanted to develop some kind of policy in order to provide education for everypony?”
“Why yes, that was what I actually had on the agenda today.” The princess of the sun commented. “Why? Did something on that show of his catch your attention?”
“Oh, more than something…” Her sister replied as she had Celestia follow her. “A lot of things… but don’t take my word for it… I think you should see it for yourself.”
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8433575
Pretty Much yeah
A good take here. Very well done. I remember the episode like this made me furious, almost as furious as the episode on dialysis.
8434266
Same here
I'm not going to ask, I'm not going to ask, I'm not going to ask...
)
...I'll bite, what happened?
(CURSE MY CURIOSITY! CURSE IT!
8435248
I mistook the Wine for Grape Juice at a family get together when I was four and got a severe headache that night... to make matters worse, it was caught on home video
And when my parents told me this was around nine years later when I was having 'beer cheese soup'
and then Twilight actually built a school
8778271
Hopefully with keeping this in mind (Again, hopefully)
The add under this chapter was an advertisement on getting a degree at a college!