Retro Video: Eva Moskowitz Success Academy Bund-Like Rally - March, 2009

This ad for a March 28, 2009 conference to save public schools at John Jay College in NYC, illustrates a prime example of the manipulation of the community by charter school advocates. The Harlem Success Schools led by Eva Moskowitz has pushed its way into public school spaces with the support of the NYC Department of Education. The push by Bloomberg and Klein to support charter schools is an admission of their failure to solve the problems that exist in public schools.... Ed Notes, March 26, 2009

Almost 6 years ago this was a scary event - chanting and hectoring - the future of the death of public schools.



http://youtu.be/fEp7rg_L5JI

I taped this event and made this ad on for a conference we were planning the eve of the founding of the Grassroots Education Movement - in fact, this conference was the event that made GEM a viable organization. Kudos to the amazing Angel Gonzalez whose organizing abilities came to the fore.

Angel and I went up to Harlem for a rally Eva was holding where they were giving away food and prizes and it drew a thousand people, including the corporate and political scum like Joel Klein and Bloomberg and Walcott.

At this point the group that turned into GEM was still an offshoot of a committee ICE had formed to address the issues of ATRs, high stakes testing, closing schools and the charter invasions - the 4 basic pillars upon which GEM was built. This group was the first time people from various NYC ed orgs like ICE and NYCORE had worked together. And we can't forget ISO (International Socialist Organization) which jumped on board early on and whose members helped organize meetings and events.

I had a lot of footage but in the process of switching computers seemed to have lost it. Luckily I salvaged this bit for the ad.