Saturday, June 27, 2009

Protest Bloomberg/Weingarten Pro-Mayoral Control Sunday

Weingarten, Patterson, Bloomberg and others will be holding a pro-mayoral control rally Sunday in Harlem.

GEM, ICE, Parent Commission and others will be there to say:

REAL CHANGE to Mayoral Dictatorship -- OR LET THE LAW SUNSET!

Leonie Haimson to her list (this was also sent out to the Marine Park IS 278 list.)

1. There will be a rally tomorrow morning, planned by the Mayor and his allies to try to force the Senate’s hand to accept Mayoral control unchanged. More info below.

Please join members of the Parent Commission to have a dissenting voice. Bring your kids and signs.

REAL CHANGE to Mayoral Dictatorship -- OR LET THE LAW SUNSET!

If you can, please meet up with us at 10:30 AM Sunday June 28 (tomorrow) morning on the SW corner of 116 St. and Lexington Ave. And if you think you might be able to come, please RSVP at leonie@att.net.

2. Two stories today – about how the Mayor and his supporters are fear-mongering, in an attempt to convince the public that “chaos” and “confusion” will reign supreme if the law is allowed to sunset Tuesday night. See today’s NY Times, and the Daily News – which make it clear that these predictions of disaster are to try to force the Senate’s hand into acceding into the Mayor’s demands and accept the Assembly bill unchanged.

As Bloomberg has warned, if they try to change one word in the Silver/Padavan bill there will be riots in the street.

Nonsense! Remember how chaotic all the changes the school system have been under this administration? The destruction of the districts to make regions, the elimination of the regions to make SSO’s, the chaos created when preK and G and T admissions processes were centralized, the Kindergarten waitlists, the increases in overcrowding and class size, the attempt to close zoned schools and put charters in their place?

In fact, the philosophy of this administration has been to provoke as much “creative confusion” as possible, to enhance their lock on the system. Early on, Joel Klein told a reporter: “By doing the reorganization and actually causing some creative confusion in the system, it does make it harder for people to just rock back.”

What they fear is not chaos but the loss of total power. Riots in the street? Only if Bloomberg personally pays the rioters will this occur.

This was sent out to the NYCORE Listserve:

Hey NYCORE,

A call is going out to bring people out as a dissenting voice against mayoral control at this pro mayoral control rally. There is still a chance to get law makers to change their votes on this. . .so please come if you can tomorrow and please spread the word. 11 am east harlem, see below for details. Hope to see you there,
Sam

We should be there in force, with signs, to express a dissenting voice.
Who can come?

This Sunday Governor Patterson joined by Mayor Bloomberg, two Borough Presidents, AFT President Randi Weingarten and EVP of the CSA, Principals and APs union, Peter McNally along with local electeds will hold a press conference/rally at PS 57 in East Harlem (address below) at 11am to encourage the State Senate to vote on mayoral control and not allow the legislation to sunset.

When: Sunday, June 28, 2009
11am-12pm
Where: P.S. 57
176 E 115th St
Between Third and Lexington Avenues
MANHATTAN

2 comments:

Ms. Tsouris said...

Norm, neither you nor the blogging community are aware, as yet, of the hit that special education is taking this year. In two very good functioning high schools (confirmed so far) in the outer boroughs, new principals are eliminating the position of special ed AP, and in its place are creating teacher positions of coordinator and someone to oversee IEP's, both compensatory time positions. The instructional supervision for the special education teachers now falls on subject area AP's. Who will oversee the non diploma bound students, the most vulnerable and needy? More "reorganization" is leading to lack of oversight, and special ed kids are not perceived as needing any level of specialized instruction. "Collaborative team teaching" apparently buys considerably more funding for a school, so as many kids as possible end up in a general education collaborative program even if an existing IEP does not state it. An IEP can be modified without parent input for this type of program. The "new" special education label, ISS, or Instructional Support Services is just a label. The support services are apparently being phased out. Next school year will be chaotic for our most vulnerable and our most needy kids. Mayoral control has not done anything positive for kids who need special services. They are perceived as expensive burdens, and their programs are being collapsed into general education programs with impunity.

Anonymous said...

Ms. Tsouris,

AP.-- Spec. Educ. jobs are being phased out in elementary school too. In my school the AP for the Spec. Educ. department retiered but she was just 51. I wondered if the DOE just push her out.