Ed News you can use: Cuomo Adopts Bloomberg Ed Model, Astroturf groups rally to support him, UFT Rally Today at City Hall

United Federation of Teachers president Michael Mulgrew, Assembly education chairwoman Cathy Nolan and others will hold a press conference on the Campaign for Fiscal Equity this morning at City Hall a 11AM.
COMING UP: The U.F.T. is planning a citywide rally, in partnership with Class Size Matters and the Alliance for Quality Education, to protest Cuomo’s education proposals on Thursday, March 12. 

The Northeast Charter Schools Network is launching a charter school “myth-busting” campaign in an attempt to dispel common criticisms of charters. The group is starting with the claim that charters are not public schools. The Network joined both Families for Excellent Schools and StudentsFirstNY yesterday in pushing for Cuomo’s education agenda. See the campaign here: http://bit.ly/1E6Jcfs .. Capital Education

Sure - they're public schools to get the money but not public schools when it comes to teacher qualifications or accountability equal to public school teachers or on issues such as discipline codes. See Raging Horse blog for more on AstroTurf: When is a “Grassroots” Organization a Front?

Here are selections from today's report from Capital Education, which you ought to subscribe to: jbakeman@capitalnewyork.com

CUOMO’S JOEL KLEIN EDUCATION AGENDA—Capital’s Eliza Shapiro: “Governor Andrew Cuomo’s ambitious, yet controversial education reform agenda picks up many of the loose threads left by former mayor Michael Bloomberg and former chancellor Joel Klein, two of the governor’s most direct ideological predecessors on education policy. Merit pay for teachers who help raise their students’ test scores, stricter teacher evaluations with more weight on exams, support for charter schools and little patience for struggling schools are national reform initiatives ushered into New York City during the decade Klein served as chancellor. Now, Cuomo is elevating those proposals to the state level, and assuming the mantle of education reform for New York as Bloomberg and Klein have disappeared and teachers' union-friendly de Blasio administration directs policy out of City Hall.”
—Their policies overlap in several key areas: on merit pay, Cuomo is proposed a $20 million “teacher excellence fund” to furnish $20,000 bonuses for “highly effective teachers.” Klein’s deal on merit pay with the union ultimately fell through. Bloomberg recommended linking teacher tenure with student test results in 2009; Cuomo has doubled down on that idea by recommending tenure be linked with teacher evaluations and that those evaluations be 50 percent comprised of student exam results.
—Klein and Bloomberg ensured the creation of New York City’s charter school sector, which has grown so quickly that the cap was extended by 114 schools in 2010. Cuomo has proposed to raise the cap, again, by 100 schools this year. Both Klein and Cuomo have embraced a no-excuses stance on failing schools and struggling teachers. Klein and Cuomo have also used almost identical language about the obstacles to removing teachers accused of ineffectiveness or misconduct. http://bit.ly/19ydwUy

PRO-CHARTER GROUPS MOBILIZE PARENTS ON CUOMO’S REFORMS—Capital’s Eliza Shapiro: “StudentsFirstNY held a rally in support of Governor Andrew Cuomo's education reform agenda today, as the well-organized, well-funded pro-charter sector attempts to answer the teachers' unions' criticisms of Cuomo. Several hundred parents, largely from district schools around the city and almost exclusively black, attended the rally at Medgar Evers College in Crown Heights on Wednesday evening, where Assemblyman and future Cuomo official Karim Camara and City Council member Robert Cornegy Jr. spoke. Cornegy, one of the few council members to show public support for Cuomo or the charter movement, got an energetic standing ovation from the audience on Wednesday.
After Cuomo outlined his education proposals in his State of the State address last month, much of the reaction has been provided by the teachers' unions and from the United Federation of Teachers in particular. Now, the pro-charter sector, which has been increasingly focused on failing schools and accountability over the last six months, is debuting a series of its own advocacy efforts, all of which are intended to mobilize parents, rather than teachers, in support of Cuomo's ‘opportunity agenda.’”
http://bit.ly/1vYKKqH

And here's another little gem pointing to how easy it is to bait Randi and put her on the defensive due to her constant waffling on the fence of ed deform.

CUOMO V. WEINGARTEN ON RECEIVERSHIP—Capital’s Jessica Bakeman: “Cuomo on Wednesday challenged American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten's position on state takeovers of failing schools, questioning why she would support a receivership model that has been implemented in Massachusetts but oppose a similar program in New York. … ‘The union, national union, supported the model in Massachusetts, because they said enough was enough and if Randi Weingarten can support it in Massachusetts, Randi Weingarten should support it in New York,’ Cuomo said.
“In a statement Wednesday, Weingarten said the receivership in Lawrence, Mass., a small city northwest of Boston, works well because the implementation has promoted collaboration. ‘I'm for parents, educators and communities having real voice in their children's public schools—the opposite of what the governor has called for,’ Weingarten, former president of New York City’s United Federation of Teachers, said.” [PRO] http://bit.ly/1yYW7t3