Mike Klonsky responds to Noguera who I thought took some cheap and dishonest or ignorant shots at the CTU

I’m a big fan of Pedro but his latest criticism of the union is not only ill-timed, but dead wrong as well. The union’s approach to a longer school day moves well beyond and improves upon the mayor’s top-down imposition of more seat time on teachers, students and parents. It is true that union has opposed the idea of a longer school day and year without any added compensation for teachers as mandated by the board. -- Mike Klonsky

Unlike many others I am not a fan of Pedro Nogeura who often talks a good game but always seems to straddle the fence at crunch time. I saw him challenge Walcott at the NY Times "Build a Better Teacher" all day event on Sept. 13 (they didn't manage to build one, by the way). And I tweeted good things. Then Walcott got aggressive and fought back and Pedro backed off -- "oh, you guys did so many good things too." Retch time.

I know I am wearing subscribers out will all the stuff I'm posting. Believe me I can do 10 more a day but I want Ravitch to keep holding the record.

Well here is Diane Ravitch's link to Noguera comments on the strike.

What’s Missing in Chicago Debate

by dianerav

Pedro Noguera knows that closing public schools and shifting kids to charter schools is not a remedy to the huge economic and social problems of Chicago.

What else is needed?

What else is needed is someone to confront Noguera just like Klonsky does below in his comment on Diane's blog.

Mike Klonsky responds to Noguera on Diane Ravitch's blog. I thought Noguera took some cheap and dishonest or ignorant shots at the CTU.

Pedro Noguera claims that the CTU, “has not been willing to acknowledge that more learning time and a clear and fair basis for judging teacher effectiveness are legitimate issues that must be addressed.” 

I’m a big fan of Pedro but his latest criticism of the union is not only ill-timed, but dead wrong as well. The union doesn’t oppose “more learning time” for students as Pedro Claims. From the start, they supported the idea of a longer, better school day (see the Ward Room (http://www.nbcchicago.com/blogs/ward-room/CTU-Contract-Longer-School-Day-163588976.html) including more art, music, physical education and recess, similar to the school day at the private school where Rahm and board member Penny Pritzker send their children. 

The union’s approach to a longer school day moves well beyond and improves upon the mayor’s top-down imposition of more seat time on teachers, students and parents. It is true that union has opposed the idea of a longer school day and year without any added compensation for teachers as mandated by the board. 

Pedro’s other poke at the CTU for supposedly not offering an alternative approach to improving “teacher effectiveness” is also misleading. The union, with research support coming from the CReATE group of researchers, has put forth important ideas for transforming the current inadequate evaluation system (See CReATE member Isabel Nunez’ commentary in the Sept. 12 Sun-Times http://www.suntimes.com/news/otherviews/15107882-452/standardized-test-scores-are-worst-way-to-evaluate-teachers.html). 

What makes Pedro’s criticism so unfair, particularly at this time, is that the union has taken on both the more-seat-time issues as well as new approaches to teacher evaluation at great risk during the current contract negotiations. Perhaps he isn’t aware that since the passage of Sen. Bill 7, Chicago teachers are legally barred from negotiating over anything except wage/benefit issues. 

Pedro would do well to read the union’s excellent document, “The Schools Chicago’s Students Deserve” to better understand where the CTU is coming from. The report can be found at http://www.ctunet.com/blog/text/SCSD_Report-02-16-2012-1.pdf
-------Mike Klonsky