MORE first post-election meeting June 11
I was on a conference call the other night to plan MORE's first post election meeting on June 11 (anyone can attend MORE meetings). And what a pleasure to hear words of wisdom from the only two MORE presidential candidates has had - Julie Cavanagh (2013) and Jia Lee (2016), 2 amazing ladies.
As Ed Notes readers know, Julie Cavanagh has focused on her work in her school and on raising her almost 3-year old son, who was about 3 weeks old when we came a-calling to ask her to run for UFT President in 2013. So after the 2013 election Julie has been active only in the background. In that time Jia Lee has risen to play a major role in MORE.
So seeing Jia and Julie working together to help MORE figure out the next steps speaks well for the immediate future of MORE. Both have had a big influence on my thinking - and many others too - about a lot of issues. Both are superb leaders in a way that does not intrude on people.
The MORE June 11 meeting will spend the first hour analyzing the election results.
If we should happen to win the high school seats on the UFT Exec Board there will be a discussion on how to make use of those seats to work in the interests of all UFT members. I have mixed feelings about winning these seats since having some of our key people spending time in a sea of Unity slugs every 2 weeks just may not be very productive. If I had the chance I certainly would not have done it.
In fact many of our people just did not want to spend time doing that work and finding the 5 MORE people (New Action has 2) involved some deep discussions. That we came up with such a top-level list of people is what makes winning these seats an interesting proposition.
MORE analyzes election outcomes at June 11 meeting
MORE will also do some analysis of the election campaign itself. What seemed to work, what didn't. (Ie - how effective is it to stuff mail boxes with tens of thousands of leaflets?) Dan Lupkin will report on the outcomes of the social media campaign he ran - which I think was fantastic - and it will be interesting to see if that moved the needle. You know my feelings are that it takes face to face to move people -- even yesterday I met a guy at the mailboxes of a middle school who voted Unity because his chapter leader said they were the lesser of 2 evils - I guess MORE is more evil than Unity. We spoke for 10 minutes and I knew I moved his needle enough so that he would have considered MORE if we had met before he voted.
The June 11 meeting will also focus on the way forward for MORE - long-term and immediate. Coming up will be an exciting MORE summer series with some new twists - some book clubs and also some usual things dealing with contract and chapter leader training and also some UFT history.
In other news:
Monitoring the vote count
I and Jia and Ellen Fox and maybe a few others will be spending the day at the AAA on Thursday to monitor the count. I will ask why we can't get access to the same data Unity has in terms of who voted.
ICE meets May 27 to analyze election
ICE - yes we are still around - will be doing a longer and deeper election analysis on the day after the election - Friday May 27 - at 4PM in midtown Manhattan. We expect a small group of people, all of whom bring decades of experience to UFT politics. We will produce a report for the June 11 meeting. (If any ed notes readers are interested in joining us email me.)
Using DOE Email for Campaign Material
One unnamed caucus (not Unity or MORE) used the DOE email system to send out campaign material, a violation of DOE internet policy. Probably nothing will come of it - but if the DOE has people targeted it could be a weapon for DOE Legal to use if it wanted. Unity already has access to most teachers so in this situation MORE is more disadvantaged.
MORE/New Action Election Party - all invited
And the best news of all is the MORE post-election party on Thursday May 26 starting even before all the results are in. I will hang out at the vote count until the bitter end so save a beer for me. But if it gets to 8PM - and we got pretty close last time -- I am out of there. Actually I expect more votes this time and also more booklets being sent in which means they have to take them apart and scan the entire booklet - which takes hours. I am only interested in the slate votes so I hope they do that last so I can leave.
MORE and New Action are co-hosting an election night party. We are getting together to share some drinks, food, laughs, and find
out who won. This is our time to celebrate! Bring your friends too!
Please RSVP
Thursday 5/26
6:00-9:00pm
Dark Horse Pub
17 Murray St, Downtown NYC near City Hall
Petitioning, get out the vote, organizing, all our hard work-now it is time to have some much needed FUN!
Please do your very best to come out-the MORE the merrier.
We have rented the bottom floor, it will be a cash bar and order your own food. Dinner and appetizers there are great!
Unnamed caucus? C'mon Norm, you can say it. Solidarity. Say it..."Solidarity sent emails to union members' employee accounts pertaining to improving education by improving the union."
ReplyDeleteWhat section of the DOE policy was violated? We asked Unity the same question multiple times. They never responded. Don't sound like Unity.
If MORE is disadvantaged here it's because of MORE itself. Email DOE members. If someone is disciplined, then by all means point the finger at us and say "Look, that unnamed caucus did it."
more Could have done it and decided not to spam people. Maybe it will get you votes. Good luck.
DeleteUnion literature in a physical mailbox...union literature in an electronic box.
ReplyDeleteTrust me, the response tells us it got us votes.
Who wouldn't trust you?
DeleteMass texting people who don't want to hear from MORE is OK though?
ReplyDelete