Ed Notes Online: Flushing HS

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Sunday, November 10, 2013

Flushing HS Update #4

Flushing HS teacher Seung Ok's battle over DOE hypocritical grading policies appears to be bearing fruit. Seung is an old pal from the early GEM days -- one of the most energetic, principled people I've met over all my years of organizing. He was a teacher at Maxwell HS in Brooklyn when he helped form GEM in its earliest stages in 2009 while fighting off the attacks of the Unity slugs in his school led by slug of all slugs, district rep Charlie Turner. Seung spoke out passionately at the closing school hearings at Maxwell (it never did close but there was lots of excessing) and he went to many other closing school hearings around the city with other GEMers. He and Julie Cavanagh were the only teachers to sign onto the lawsuit over the rally at Bloomberg's house we held in January 2010.

Here is a great piece from the always reliable Rachel Monahan in the Daily News (when the Post approached Sueng my advice was stay away -- they are not to be trusted. I don't trust many DN reporters either but if Rachel is involved I say go for it.)

Anthony DelMundo/New York Daily News

'How are you able to diagnose the kids who are barely not getting it versus really not getting it?' Flushing High School science teacher Seung Ok says of the grading policy that sets students' lowest possible scores at 55.

or click below the break

Previous Ed Notes reports on this story:

Flushing HS Report #3: Letter to Madame Tisch as Grading Saga Continues

Ms. Hansen,
While I await response from the NYSED, let me try to illustrate to your office why your interpretation of the High School Academic Policy 2013 concerning grades is ridiculous. The new teacher evaluation system currently in effect uses a scale of 1 - 100. Suppose principals had the option of using only a part of that scale.
Mr. Seung Yong Ok

Seung is replying to the nonsense response (See Flushing HS Report #2: DOE Tepid Response to Principal Violation of DOE Rules) he received from Shael assistant, Tweedie Katie Hansen of the Office of Academic Policy and Systems - OAPS? Or OOPS?
Here was our original report: Flushing HS Report#1: Teacher Questions Principal's Grading System as Violation of DOE Rules

Seung is not finished yet. We expect to do quite a few reports on Flushing HS and their thug interim principal as info from him and others at the school comes in. Here Seung emails Chief Slug Merryl Tisch.

Dear Chancellor Tisch,
I am a teacher who is deeply concerned about the DOE's Office of Accountability's refusal to check Principal James Brown's obvious flouting of New York's City and State academic grading polices.
Not only has Principal Brown proposed a policy that mandates teachers give no grade lower than a 55 on report cards, but also calculate 33% of that grade towards the final course mark.

Teachers have met with Principal Brown, Children First Network's Niancy DiMaggio, and have emailed Mr. Suransky numerous times to no avail.

We believe the DOE is breaking their own policy in the 2013 High School Academic Reference Guide, which states that the numerical scale to be used is 1-100.

Essentially, the proposed new policy is illegally instituting a new scale of 55-100, which is not the spirit, intent, nor letter of the stated policy.

More disturbing is the attempt to make teachers complicit in grade inflation, which adds to the rampant practice occurring in many of our NYC public schools today.

I know that as a proponent of higher standards and a rigorous curriculum you may be alarmed that with Mr. Brown's policy, a student only only needs to obtain a grade of 85 only one marking period, and disappear for the other two, and still average a passing grade. That culminates in only a 28% mastery of course curriculum.
Mr. Suransky's office merely replied that a principal has the power to choose their school's grading policy. To quote their response," While STARS offers a variety of grading scales, schools are not required to use the entire 1-100 point scale in their grading policies."

I hope you agree that this is either a flagrant flouting of DOE policy or an extreme confusion of the terms grading policy versus grading scale.

The principal can alter policy: choosing letter grades and their numerical values, Pass/Fail, or numerical grades; the number of marking periods, and whether the policy is set per course, per department, or school-wide.

However, it is against policy and common sense, to allow a principal to choose their own numerical scale.

What will stop a principal from mandating that a grade of 64 be calculated as the minimum real average for all students, even those who have cut classes a majority of the marking period.

The teachers of Flushing High School plead with you to look into this matter or refer this matter to the appropriate NYSED department.

Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Mr. Seung-Yong Ok
Science teacher at Flushing High School.

Flushing HS Report #2: DOE Tepid Response to Principal Violation of DOE Rules

While STARS offers a variety of grading scales, schools are not required to use the entire 1-100 point scale in their grading policies.... Katie Hansen Office of Academic Policy and Systems

Dear DOE administrators,

Either you are flagrantly flouting your own grading policy or you are horribly confusing the terms: grading policy versus grading scale.

Hurricanes are categorized in a scale of 1 to 5. Weather stations, in an attempt to make sure people always prepare adequately in case of sudden storm strengthening, mandate that all storm broadcasts have category 3 as the lowest possible scale reported. Makes sense?...

So if Principals can choose to use any of the 1-100 scale as you have argued, is it okay if our school uses 64 as the lowest possible grade? Please respond.
Have a nice day.
Mr. Seung-Yong Ok

Hey, why not make the lowest score you can give "90"?
Follow-up to: Teacher Questions Flushing HS Principal's Grading System as Violation of DOE Rules

Office of Shael Polokow-Suransky responds:

Dear Mr. Ok,
Thank you for your email. We appreciate your concern and your attention to these topics. Shael shared your message with me and asked me to respond on his behalf. I am writing to reiterate the information shared with you by Superintendent Mendez. It is the right of a school principal to set the grading policy, including the number of marking periods per term and the grades awarded to students who are excessively absent. While STARS offers a variety of grading scales, schools are not required to use the entire 1-100 point scale in their grading policies.
I hope this addresses your concern. Please continue to work with your principal, your school’s Network Leader, and Superintendent Mendez if you wish to discuss this matter further.
Best,
Katie Hansen Office of Academic Policy and Systems

Dear DOE administrators,
Either you are flagrantly flouting your own grading policy or you are horribly confusing the terms: grading policy versus grading scale.

I will give you the benefit of the doubt that it's the latter. The former would mean the DOE are a bunch of data manipulating bureaucrats who put themselves ahead of children first. That would be too depressing of a thought.
Principals are allowed to choose their own grading policy - # of marking periods, Letter grades and their numerical equivalents, Pass/Fail, and whether the policy is relates to courses, departments, or school-wide.
However, it is absurd to interpret that as to mean principals can choose their own numerical scale. That scale is stated as 1-100 in your DOE policy.
So, here is an analogy to help you understand.
Hurricanes are categorized in a scale of 1 to 5. Weather stations, in an attempt to make sure people always prepare adequately in case of sudden storm strengthening, mandate that all storm broadcasts have category 3 as the lowest possible scale reported. Makes sense?

Seung Ok

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"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 Online

Ed Notes Extended