Charter School Leaders Love Quinn for Mayor - So Does the UFT

This article below by Anna Philips has to scare you. The big battle is coming over mayoral control and even though there will be lots of rhetoric from the UFT they will not take a stand against because to them the alternatives (local control) are not acceptable. Interesting in that one of the calls for local control include lots of teacher influence at the school level along with parents. The UFT doesn't trust teachers at the school level - the leadership wants all the power in their hands. I got this right from the horse's mouth when 12 years ago I posed to Randi Weingarten the idea of teachers taking over schools (I am for teachers electing principals - we would get the best principals that way). She began her response with, "How can we trust...." before realizing what she was about to say. Thus I got an early inkling of where she really stood.

Many of the advocates believe the charter school movement cannot survive without Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg‘s policy of having charter schools share space in public school buildings. Without this policy, the schools would have to seek out and pay for private space on their own, leaving some of them with fewer dollars to spend on students than traditional public schools.

Michael T. Duffy, a former city education official and now managing director of Victory Education Partners, figured that at the least, he would begin by putting all of these people in the same room with the candidate he is enthusiastic about, City Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn.
On Wednesday night, members of the charter school world, as well as the technology start-up world, gathered in a honey-colored apartment on the Upper East Side to query Ms. Quinn, raising more than $15,000 for the candidate. Ms. Quinn’s remarks, her aides insisted, remain off the record. But the advocates in attendance spoke more openly on Thursday in interviews, expressing what is on their minds as they look ahead to 2014, when they will lose a mayor who has given them space in public school buildings at no cost and hardly questioned their raison d’être.

Charter School Leaders Hunt for Their Mayoral Candidate

http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2011/12/16/charter-school-leaders-hunt-for-their-mayoral-candidate/?partner=rss&emc=rss

And I hope you noticed this on the ed notes side panel:

Regents agree to give NY student and teacher data to limited corporation run by Gates and operated by Murdoch's Wireless Gen
This work will be guided by participating states and informed by input from a panel of expert advisors, including Randi Weingarten, President of the American Federation of Teachers;

Teachers in the UFT have to wake up and take action - I don't mean blogging and leaving comments on blogs - your bodies are needed. If you don't see the connections here you are missing the boat. You should be doing everything you can to wake up the people you work with. The UFT is aiming to support Christine Quinn even though she is anti-LIFO (but I think our leadership is also against LIFO though they try to hide it).

Connect the dots by reading this post on Ed Notes from the other day: AFT/NEA: More Sellouts to Ed Deform. 
Note how slick the UFT, sending Leo out to make it appear they are opposing ed deform. Here is an excerpt from my post:

Leo Casey and Pedro Noguera are both hypocrites; talking out of both sides of their mouths. Supporting charter proliferation, and at the same time spouting progressive BS denouncing privatization etc.-----anon. email comment on below

Netroots conference Dec. 19 at Pace

http://www.netrootsny.org/schedule

Privatize, We’re Watching You: Fighting Privatization UFT VP Leo Casey, Ken Bernstein

  Watching who? The theme should be: We are watching you... And not really doing anything about it.

 Or: We're making it look like we're watching you but really working with you - but don't tell our members.

They (NEA) explicitly embraced the notion that teachers should be responsible for student learning. - Rick Hess

This was posted on the NYCEdNews Listserve:
AFT local to authorize Minn. charters, as supported by AFT innovation fund; NEA supports merit pay and end to seniority protections for teachers. Rick  Hess (and I’m sure Bill Gates etc. approves.) NEA: seniority should only be a factor in teacher retention or assignment when all other factors are equal…   “The need for tenure is replaced by a peer review program that provides opportunities for improvement or, when improvement is lacking, ensures due process throughout dismissal."

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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 the right for important bits.