Ed Notes Online: Inside Report: The Agony and The Agony

Monday, July 25, 2011

Inside Report: The Agony and The Agony

My fellow patient

Minutes before operation, July 19

Monday July 25, 8AM

I figured I would peck out an update before heading off to the doctor.

If you don't know, I had a bike malfunction on Thurs July 14 mangling my right wrist so badly I needed an operation with plate, etc. In brief, spent day in emerg room at Penninsula Hospital, was admitted overnight for operation next day - Friday July 15 at 1pm but got bumped from OR minutes before, got sent home till Tues with splint but without setting wrist - too unstable- but with lots of Percacet pain killer. Immediately called hand surgeon I had seen the last time I fell off my bike and broke stuff 8 years ago and made apptmt for monday July 18. Resplinted me for comfort till operation next day - July 19. They loaded me wth morphine etc all night at my request. Out of hospital Weds. - pain, discomfort, blech. Thursday was worst day due to reaction to meds. Since then slow improvement.

I haven't been total recluse. Got out both Saturday eves. July 16 to Rockaway Theatre Co great production of Annie Get Your Gun which I managed to tape by setting up tripod. This past Saturday got to go out with college pals visiting from Washington - one couple were supposed to be our house guests but opted for hotel in city rather than listen to me whimper for 4 days. Another local couple have an apartment in Williamsburg (where 2 of the guys grew up - talk about culture shock) and we ate Italian on N.6th and Berry a few blocks from where I spent my last assignment in District 14. When we left reataurant at 9:30 the streets were packed. Really an astounding scene if you knew the area just 15 years ago.

Gotta go get ready to go to doctor. Check this out. I haven't yet but see what you can glean about what uft is not telling.

Info to principals on new atr agreement - video format

Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/. And make sure to check out the side panel on right for news bits.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...: Hope all goes well today-BTW, great shot of you in hospital attire, you never looked so good. Keep the headwear, you can always work in a kitchen.; Monday, July 25, 2011 at 10:55:00 AM EDT
Schoolgal said...: Wishing you a speedy recovery. R u still going to Washington?

So my question here, did the UFT agree to all these provisions which essentially they can make up any reason not to hire an ATR for a long-term assignment? In fact, they can go back to hiring F-status friends??

Looking fwd to an response-- of course if and when you can type one.; Monday, July 25, 2011 at 1:01:00 PM EDT
Music Lover said...: You are better not check out the audio recording of David Weiner's shpiel on the ATR agreement.

Its going to make you take some more Percoset.

This is just another way of screwing over the ATR's and giving principals power to hire anyone they want as opposed to an employee already in the system.
However, there may be some ATR's who could benefit from this but I doubt that it will be many.; Monday, July 25, 2011 at 2:31:00 PM EDT
ed notes online said...: Tracie- can you give us details pro and con?

Schoolgal - wasn't going to go to SOS due to injury but just back from doc and got ok if i want to. putting transportation together if i'm not in too much pain rest of the day -Percoset is no longer an option for me beacuse i dont like effect - look for gem at 14th and Penn Ave at 10:30 or email or call for where we are if you want to march with us. 917-992-3734; Monday, July 25, 2011 at 2:37:00 PM EDT
Anonymous said...: If anyone wants to ask questions about the ATR agreement, the DOE set up an email box. They are in the process of setting up a space so everyone can see the questions that will be sent to the inbox. I wonder if all questions will make it on the internet or they are going to moderate. Send all queries to:

ATRAgreement@schools.nyc.gov

Will do, I can write something up on the pros and cons. To be honest, not sure how many pros there will be on this list though. Some of this sounds very hectic and confusing, specifically for school secretaries and HR personnel. But is anyone really that surprised?; Monday, July 25, 2011 at 2:57:00 PM EDT
Anonymous said...: http://chaz11.blogspot.com/2011/07/doe-informs-principals-how-to-use-and.html

Chaz summed up the ATR agreement pretty well actually. I am catching up on my blog reading now and I just read this post.; Monday, July 25, 2011 at 3:03:00 PM EDT

"A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

What media call "philanthropy" for the public schools are actually seed monies to establish a private "market" in publicly-financed education - an enterprise worth trillions if successfully penetrated by corporate America. Cory Booker, one of the "New Black Leaders" financed by the filthy rich, is key to creating a "nationwide corporate-managed schools network paid for by public funds but run by private managers.

"Ed Reformers" want to cash in on public education and to control its content and outcome, not improve it. Provide great education? Baby boomers had as close as this country has ever gotten to it when we were growing up. The Ed Reform Movement has no interest in seeing such a well-educated, democratically astute population ever again.

http://blackagendareport.com/content/cory-booker-clear-and-present-threat-public-education

History of the UFT Pre-Weingarten Years

This award-winning series of articles by Jack Schierenbeck originally appeared in the New York Teacher in 1996 and 1997.

Naturally, from a certain point of view. But, despite certain biases, Schierenbeck, a great guy, was one of the best NY Teacher reporters so this is worth reading. Jack suffered a debilitating stroke many years ago (I used to get secret donations to ed notes from him through a 3rd source.)

This chapter looks interesting:

Class struggles: The UFT story, part 3

“The schism in the union over radical politics [is] a major reason for stalling the growth of a teacher union for decades.” Revolutionary politics and ideology take center stage, as the original Teachers Union becomes a battlefield, pitting leftist against leftist and splitting the union.

Clarence Taylor's "Reds at the Blackboard" focused on the old Teachers Union which disbanded in 1964 after suffering from anti-left attacks.

Of course for another view, check out the review at New Politics of the Kahlenberg Bio on Shanker by Vera Pavone and me: Albert Shanker: Ruthless Neocon

Effective Union Organizing

A video series put together by Jason Mann from the British Columbia Federation of Teachers about social media and how to use it for effective union organizing.

The first series was called New Media For Union Activists Roadmap and it's still available on-line at:
http://www.newmediabootcamp.ca/welcome/
I watched some of them and need to rewatch as they are loaded with information.

The second series started last week and it's called "Online Campaigning for Union Activists"

You can sign up for this free series at :
http://act.bcfed.ca/online-campaigning-for-union-activists/

You Don't Have A Choice - Join the Revolt

Ex-Harlem Success Teacher Comments on Eva the Diva

Ex-HSA Teacher has left a new comment on your post "Fear and Loathing at Evil's Harlem Success Empire ...":

I am a former Harlem Success teacher. Not many people who work/worked for her like her very much. I once made the comment that she is very nice when I first was hired. Two of her closest colleague responded immediately almost in unison, "Eve is not nice!" Over time I realized that there was a lot of political games going on. Another colleague once said to me that he was tired of "being part of a political campaign." Sending out 15,000 applications for only 400 seats in a school is reprehensible. The money that paid for those mass mailings could have paid the yearly salary of another teacher not to mention the heartache of all those parents who applied but did not get a spot. She does good work trying to give disadvantaged students a quality public school education but at a great cost to staff AND the school's educational budget! school budget.

Davis Guggenheim Compared to Riefenstahl

“Waiting for Superman" is the second most intellectually dishonest piece of documentary work I have seen. It is surpassed only by Leni Riefenstahl's "Triumph of the Will," the pro-Hitler propaganda classic, in that regard. Uses personal narratives of adorable children to create narrative suspense that overrides public policy discussion with pure emotion in unscrupulous attack on teachers and their unions, among others

Timothy Tyson
Professor of African American Studies and History
Duke University

How Teaching Experience Makes a Difference

Even as New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Michelle Rhee and others around the nation are arguing for experienced teachers to be laid off regardless of seniority, every single study shows teaching experience matters. In fact, the only two observable factors that have been found consistently to lead to higher student achievement are class size and teacher experience, so that it’s ironic that these same individuals are trying to undermine both.
- Leonie Haimson on Parents Across America web site

Full article with charts here.

Weingarten/Gates Foundation announce drone-driven teacher evaluation

According to a press release issued by the Gates Foundation, the AFT and the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, these three have entered a ground-breaking partnership to evaluate teachers utilizing the drone technology that has revolutionized warfare in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. A bird-size device floats up to 400 feet above a classroom and instantly beams live video of teachers in action to agents at desks at Teacher Quality Inspection Stations established by the AFT and the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.

When asked if the drones were authorized to drop bombs on teachers who exhibit inadequacy, Chester E. Finn, Jr., president of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, replied, "Don't be ridiculous. Gates money puts other methods at our disposal."

Randi Weingarten, president of the 1.5-million-member American Federation of Teachers said the powerful union has signed on to the drone project...

More at Substance

The Real Reason Behind Push for Standardized Tests: It's All About the Adults

On standardized testing in our schools

A must read article about the standardized test industry.
Written by an insider who has worked as a test scorer, the article outlines a multinational industry based on an army of temporary workers paid by the piece at $0.30 to $0.70 per test, translated in the need to grade 40 tests per hour to make a $12 salary. The article goes on to show how the companies gauge the grading "results" based on the need to ensure new contracts to continue profiting off of our youth. The original article is from Monthly Review. Here it is on Schools Matter blog.

http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2010/12/on-growing-use-of-corporate-test.html

Parallels between America today and Germany in the 1920's and early 30's

"Resentment and obstruction are all the right wing in America have to peddle. Their policies are utterly discredited. Their ideology - even by its own standards - is a sham. They are so bereft of leaders, their de facto leader is a former drug addicted, thrice-divorced radio talk show host. That is literally the best they can muster. But they have built a national franchise inciting the downwardly mobile to blame the government, not the right, for their problems, exactly as Hitler did in the 1920s."

The US Is Facing a Weimar Moment

Published on Sunday, March 15, 2009 by CommonDreams.org

Chicago View of Unity/UFT on Charters

After many meetings and debates, the Chicago delegation succeeded in working with the New York United Federation of Teachers, Local 2 (UFT) to push the AFT to take stronger stands on charter school accountability and school closings — though many delegates from Chicago would have liked the language to have been even stronger.

Generally speaking, the New York delegation represented organizing charters as the best model for handling their role in reshaping unions, despite the fact that according to many reports few charter schools in New York have been organized as is the case in Chicago. This logic is the same touted by the Progressive Caucus of the AFT. The few that have been organized are a part of the UFT local though they have separate contracts negotiated with the help of UFT. The Chicago delegation reflection the mindset that allowing new charters to continue to proliferate while attempting to organize existing charters is an end game in which public schools and the union lose.

Jen Johnson, CTU, Local 1 in Substance

Ed Notes Greatest Hits: HSA Rally and Founding of GEM

SEE MY VIDEO ON HARLEM SUCCESS RALLY 2009:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEp7rg_L5JI

Angel Gonzalez and I attended that rally and used the footage to promote our conference on Mar. 28, 2009, which is where the concept of a group like GEM emerged. Until then we had basically been a committee of ICE working with the NYCORE high stakes testing group. The actions of Eva and crew helped spawn GEM. Mommie Dearest!!

I have more video somewhere. I was hoping to get Leni Riefenstahl to edit it but she died. We would have called it "Triumph of the Hedge Fund Operators."

Ed Notes Extended

Monday, July 25, 2011

Inside Report: The Agony and The Agony

Info to principals on new atr agreement - video format

6 comments: