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| UFT bear in hibernation on SLTs |
In a recent post I asked: Why Does DOE Fight Open Meetings? What is Farina Hiding?
Also see Leonie Haimson's blog:
A busy day: Protesting billionaires pushing charter schools & then winning our lawsuit vs the DOE on School Leadership Team meetings
Michael Fiorillo had the answer:The DOE fought this because it doesn't want the public to see that SLT meetings are a sham, a way for the Principal to work her/his will on the school, with the ostensible (but largely meaningless) participation of parents, students and teachers.And James Eterno ties the UFT eternal support for whatever Carmen wants Carmen gets:
The UFT, in its recent "We don't publicly take on de Blasio-Farina-CSA" incarnation, did not join the parents in the 2014 lawsuit. However, the Union should now use its resources to teach parents and teachers on SLT's how to use their authority as part of the governance structure of schools.Good luck with that.
James continued:
As for the city-DOE, they can appeal again but their chances of prevailing cannot be that great now that five judges have ruled against them. We'll let Leonie have the last word:I'm waiting for the day when Leonie has had enough of the UFT bullshit and slams them publicly.
"The law is crystal clear that School Leadership Teams are public bodies, with an important governmental role to play. Parents and the public have a crucial stake in SLT decisions, when it comes to class size, the use of technology, or any other school-based policies. Both the Supreme Court and now the Appellate Court have ruled that these meetings must be open to the community at large. Any attmpt by the DOE or principals to ignore this decision, subvert it or appeal it to a higher court would be unwise, would further delay the public interest and would waste precious taxpayer funds that are far better used in improving our schools," concluded Leonie Haimson, Executive Director of Class Size Matters.
Does this mean charter schools in NYC will now have open SLT meetings? Charter schools do a lot more shady stuff with money than district schools.
ReplyDeleteOn the district level the district reps represent the uft on the DLT they know that the SLTs throughout the districts are either non functional or a shambles. They are and have been well positioned to speak to the lack of training, disfunction, and general poor state of the district's SLTs. Instead it's apparent that they are implicated and have a stake in things remaining just as they are and have been. They stand by with full knowledge and consent when principals set up fake "principal advisory committees" and such on the school level and such so they can continue to be in total control of all decision making. They don't say a word. Meanwhile the the district rep is only concerned with pleasing the superintendents and principals acting more like a CSA reps than UFT reps.
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