Ed Notes Online: Skewer the E4E Survey - let them know what you think about their ed deform agenda

Friday, October 9, 2015

Skewer the E4E Survey - let them know what you think about their ed deform agenda

--- do it often and show how you disagree with the pro-testing, pro-common fore, pro merit pay ed deform agenda of E4E. They call them selves a teacher driven organization without mentioning they are funded by ed deformers to create a 5th column to undermine the teaching profession under false pretenses. Screen shots below of sample questions below.

I'm betting they have a way of tracking people and the people who send the link will be wiped off their list.

Dear Member,

I am writing today on behalf of Educators 4 Excellence to ask your help with a confidential online survey about our organization. We want to better understand your reflections and thinking about how we present and communicate our work.
Your responses will be anonymous and confidential, which is why we are working with an independent market research company to conduct this study for us. Please feel free to be 100% honest.
As a special thank you for providing feedback, you may enter yourself in a drawing for one of three $100 Amazon gift cards. The deadline for the drawing is Wednesday, October 14 so the sooner the better. Please complete the survey at your earliest convenience.
Click on this link to begin the survey or copy and paste it into your Internet browser to begin:
http://www.amrsurvey.com/67008t
Thank you for taking the time to give us your opinion. We couldn’t do this without you.
Liz Utrup
National Director of Communications
Educators 4 Excellence

No place to write in anything to keep people to their message.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...: It's a rigged survey, Norm. You can't answer because the premise is dishonest. It reminds me of the prosecutor who asked the accused "when did you stop beating your wife?" Best to demur.; Friday, October 9, 2015 at 5:23:00 PM EDT
ed notes online said...: Do it to screw up their results like any standardized test -- pick random boxes to answer, etc. Take it a few times if you can.; Friday, October 9, 2015 at 5:26:00 PM EDT
Anonymous said...: I just took the survey as a charter school E4E teacher. Tomorrow I'll adopt a few other identities. Thanks for the chuckle, Norm. Roseanne; Friday, October 9, 2015 at 5:52:00 PM EDT
Anonymous said...: I tried to do the survey and after the first question asked me if I was a member of e4e I responded no and then it would not let me continue the survey..It said null. I tried it several times and each time it came up null and I could not continue. Finally I said I was a member and it let me continue, but I didn't complete it because I realized that since I lied and said I was a member of e4e they could somehow use that to boost the amount of teachers they claim are members of this bullshit organization!; Friday, October 9, 2015 at 6:14:00 PM EDT
Harris L. said...: Boy that was fun.

As to the comment about "boosting" membership, E4E will claim whatever it wants whenever it wants about membership. It's more important to f...k up the results of the survey. Hoping that if they were not smart enough to build in a security provision limiting participation to members they won't be smart enough to "clean up" bogus responses.

More than anything this reminded me of the "Special Member Survey" that you get all the time from the Democratic National Committee and others that accompany fundraising solicitations.

And the party-line, step-by-step "Borg-like" march through propaganda testing was quite exhilarating.

Today I was a union member from CT. Tomorrow I'll be a charter teacher from Minnesota.; Saturday, October 10, 2015 at 1:59:00 PM EDT
ed notes online said...: Great Harris. I was a 25 year old female teacher from the south. The key is that by doing this we disrupt their survey.; Saturday, October 10, 2015 at 6:56:00 PM EDT
Unknown said...: **** SPECIAL BULLETIN ***

**** WE INTERRUPT YOUR REGULARLY SCHEDULED PROGRAMMING to bring you the latest on the pedophilia scandal swirling around Kevin Johnson, the current Mayor of Sacramento and prominent proponent of school privatization and union-busting ... oh yeah, and the husband of Michelle Rhee.***

BELOW is the recently-released police interview video --- conducted during the 1996 investigation --- with the alleged victim Mandi Koba herself. Here she recounts the horror of being molested by Michelle Rhee's husband Kevin Johnson, the current mayor of Sacramento and a prominent proponent of busting teacher unions, and replacing public schools with privately-run charter schools.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7jPfoqYWmk

Scary stuff. (Mr. Huffman, if you're reading this, what are you going to do about this?)

Watch the video and judge for yourself.

Keep in mind, folks, that this is a sixteen-year-old girl, recounting events of a few months prior when she was just fifteen. The video is even dated July 19, 1996 ( "7-19-1996" )
----------------------------------------------------------------------
( 00:37 - 01:35 )
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkQvvvoWLHQ
( 00:37 - 01:35 )
PHOENIX P.D. DETECTIVE: "What ... what specific areas (of your body did Kevin Johnson fondle)?"

MANDI KOBA: "My stomach. My breasts. My butt... "

PHOENIX P.D. DETECTIVE: (almost whispering) "Anywhere else?"

MANDI KOBA: "As it progressed."

PHOENIX P.D. DETECTIVE: "Where ELSE did it progress?"

MANDI KOBA: "Between my legs."

PHOENIX P.D. DETECTIVE: "Okay, and what do we call that area?"

MANDI KOBA: "My vagina."

PHOENIX P.D. DETECTIVE: "And - and I know some of the questions sound stupid. Okay? And I apologize for it, but there are certain things I'm looking for. Unless I know these things, then...

MANDI KOBA: "I understand."

PHOENIX P.D. DETECTIVE: " ... then I don't know what's going on."
--- (PAUSE)
"He (Kevin Johnson) had HIS clothes off?"

MANDI KOBA: "Yes."

PHOENIX P.D. DETECTIVE: "What happened after the fondling?"

MANDI KOBA: "That's ... we didn't have intercourse... It was... just a lot of THAT. I don't know how long it lasted, and then... ummm "

CLIP ENDS
-----------------------------------

(ONE SIDE NOTE: what's up with choosing a male detective to conduct this incredibly sensitive and delicated interview? Wouldn't this be better handled by a female detective? Just askin'.)

There's so much to be asked here.

If this video were about the predations of a prominent teacher---especially one in the anti-corporate reform movement, or perhaps a prominent teacher union leader...

---what do think Campbell Brown would be doing in response to this video?

What would Ben Austin would be doing in response to this video?

What would Michelle Rhee be doing in response to this video?

The same question goes for Eli Broad, Mike Petrilli, Wendy Kopp, Richard Barth and the rest.

Before she went on her campaign to take away all teachers' rights and job protections, Campbell Brown first came to prominence with her accusations that among the unionized teachers of New York City were hundreds of pedophiles on the loose, thanks to their being protected by their union. When all of that was proven to be nonsense, she simply moved on to her current crusade.

Now that Ms. Brown and the rest of the corporate reform world have video proof that one of their pro-charter, union-hating allies Kevin Johnson (and also the husband of one of their most prominent allies) is a pedophile, the question must be asked:

What is Campbell Brown doing now? SILENCE

Where is Kevin Huffman doing now? SILENCE; Sunday, October 11, 2015 at 2:07:00 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

Friday, October 9, 2015

Skewer the E4E Survey - let them know what you think about their ed deform agenda

7 comments: