BMORE/CEDE Caucuses declared winners in Baltimore by AFT

Two social justice caucuses united to win the Baltimore election against an 8 term incumbent.
Baltimore Movement of Rank-and-File Educators Baltimore Caucus of Educators for Democracy and Equity

I reported on the election:

• Social Justice Activist Ousts Randi Ally, 21-Year Incumbent as Baltimore Teachers Union President - Antonucci
• Why Can't MORE B more like BMORE? - Radical Teachers’ Movement Comes to Baltimore

BMORE is affiliated with UCORE, the national social justice network of union activists. MORE is a charter member but BMORE decided not to be like MORE and actually ran to win and aligned with another group to do so, unlike MORE here in NYC which fundamentally destroyed the opposition to Unity here in NYC.

Frankly, I didn't expect this outcome but it indicates that Randi is covering her flank from the left social justice caucuses inside the AFT. It certainly helps that there in no threat from a social justice caucus in New York to the Unity machine, which is the key element in the entire AFT/NYSUT/UFT structure. In this report Antonucci predicts come stormy weather ahead since Randi ally and eight-term incumbent Marietta English had her appeal rejected. 
“This decision does an injustice to our union,” said English.

Get it how the AFT machine works -- you fall in line or get dumped. (See former NYSUT leadership). English is still president of AFT Maryland and if she causes trouble she might find herself out of that job.

Antonucci reports:

It’s Official: Baltimore Teachers Union Has a New President

The American Federation of Teachers ruled that the disputed election for the presidency and executive board of the Baltimore Teachers Union would stand. Challenger Diamonté Brown will take over as president of the 7,000-member union, replacing eight-term incumbent Marietta English.

“This decision does an injustice to our union,” said English.
AFT judged that while some minor violations had taken place, “We cannot conclude that this activity could have affected the election.”
The election may be settled, but trouble still looms for the union. Brown’s slate controls the teacher positions on the executive board, while English’s slate holds all the paraprofessional seats.

English also remains president of AFT Maryland, which portends a lot of internecine squabbling in the near future.

Baltimore Sun
https://www.baltimoresun.com/education/bs-md-ci-union-elections-20190711-nyl2jv4yr5fy5mlyuf4yztkqf4-story.html

After election review, Diamonté Brown poised to be confirmed as new president of the Baltimore Teachers Union

An investigation into the Baltimore Teachers Union election found that a few members of the newly elected president’s caucus used some school resources to promote the campaign, but ruled the violations were “minor” and didn’t change the results.

The American Federal of Teachers affirmed Diamonté Brown as the winner on Thursday, rejecting losing candidate Marietta English’s challenge and petition to hold a new election. The AFT report, obtained by The Baltimore Sun, cited violations by the Union We Deserve caucus, which Brown is a part of, such as using employer email and facilities for campaign purposes.

In one instance, the report said, a member of Brown’s caucus sent out a notice promoting a union campaign event on her school email. The AFT report also found the that Brown’s caucus sponsored two events on school property. The third violation involved two delegates of Brown’s caucus participating as an observer in the balloting process.

“While the [the Union We Deserve] caucus did commit violations of the election rules,” the report said, “we find that these violations did not affect the outcome of the election.”

The AFT concluded that, “these violations appear minor in their scope."

The report marks an end to a contentious election season between Brown and the incumbent, English, who has held the position for more than 20 years.

English issued a statement before the results were officially announced and called the decision to not pursue a re-election “an injustice to our union.” She said the AFT report “clearly lays out that egregious violations took place during the election process and I strongly disagree with the conclusion that even with these violations a new election would not be held."

English lost the election held in May by a vote of 901 to 839. At the time, she claimed the election was riddled with rules violations and said she could not concede.

In May, the Progressive caucus, which English is part of, wrote to the BTU Nominations and Elections Committee, accusing Brown’s caucus of election misconduct.

The letter included a number of complaints, but only a few were found to be violations in the AFT’s final investigation. The AFT concluded that the other accusations, such as early campaigning, criticizing other candidates and house visits were all permitted under the AFT and BTU constitutions.

'I'm doing this for my students': Diamonté Brown elected next Baltimore Teachers Union president »

 

When asked about how this election would affect her relationship with English, Brown said, “We have a good relationship, and I hope to continue to work with her.”

Brown will lead a divided union. The executive board is split between teachers and paraprofessionals. Her slate captured the majority of teacher positions, but the English Slate took all the paraprofessional spots, according to the preliminary results. The English Slate’s teacher candidates are all also challenging the election results.

“There have been a number of challenges to the election process with each side demanding fairness,” Brown said at a news conference Thursday, “and the challenges reaffirm that we are committed to the democratic process.

“Now we will work together to advance members’ interest,” Brown said.

As the new president, Brown told The Baltimore Sun, her top goals will be to increase membership engagement, fight for equity and increase partnerships between the teaching professions, such as teachers and paraprofessionals.

Brown said her first action will be to speak with the entire paraprofessional slate one-on-one to “listen to what they have to say and use that to guide us toward being a united front.”

“Even if we’re not on the same page, everyone deserves to be heard,” she said earlier this spring. “I don’t think people have to be on the same page to get work done. Everyone has the same goal” of bettering the lives of teachers, students and families.

Is Randi After Trumpka's Job? Would that make Mulgrew AFT President? No Way I say

If she wants to be AFL-CIO president, she's going to have to break Trumka's kneecaps.... A source

Mike Antonucci reports on a piece in Bloomberg Law
that Randi Weingarten is considering challenging Richard Trumpka for leadership of the AFL-CIO, a position I have always believed Randi had her eye on and back when people speculated she was after Secty of Education I pointed out that she had more power as head of the AFT. And in fact she still has more power now than she might as AFL-CIO head. But I always believed Al Shanker coveted this position but in those days the idea of a public service union head, especially a teacher, would lead the heavier industrialized AFL-CIO was not a reality.

My sense has always been that Randi wanted to go further than Shanker did and the AFL-CIO is a place that would accomplish that.

Things have clearly changed as industrial unions declined and the public service unions have risen to the top in the union movement. So Randi making a move is feasible. (Remember how Al Shanker made a move on his former mentor Dave Selden at the 1974 convention in Toronto (I was there)).  Shanker's move was partially inspired by then AFL-CIO head George Meany who was very pro-VietNam war, as was Shanker, and Selden was opposed to the war.

Selden did not go quietly and wrote a book with some heavy criticism of Shanker.

Maybe a lesson for Randi. But if Trumpka doesn't want to go it won't be as easy for Randi as it was for Shanker, who had Unity Caucus domination of the AFT to rely on. There is no Unity Caucus in the AFL-CIO.

And then there's this point from Antonucci:

I can think of at least one good reason she wouldn’t want the job. She made $405,793 last year as AFT president. Trumka made $261,779. 

Well, maybe the AFT/UFT Unity Caucus machine can supplement her salary to make up the difference.

If Randi should make the move and be successful, that leaves the AFT presidency open and since 1974 UFT presidents have occupied the position since then except for the 4 years between Sandy Feldman and Randi.

From what I saw of Mulgew at AFT conventions he didn't distinguish himself and Randi didn't give him much of a role while elevating former St. Paul teacher union head Mary Cathryn Ricker who I would put my money on as her successor.

There is some danger in not having a loyal base in NYC from the Unity Caucus people and that might be a factor.

But this is all fun speculation, and with the 2020 AFT convention coming to Houston where an endorsement of Joe Biden will take place, Randi may just stay put and wait for Trumpka to retire. But they are the same age so all balls are in the air. My money is on the status quo- Randi makes too much money and has a lot of power over her fiefdom.

Is Randi Weingarten Really “Sniffing,” “Swirling” and “Flirting?”

Posted: 14 May 2019 09:43 AM PDT

Bloomberg Law runs a column called the Daily Labor Report, and this week the lead item is about who is waiting in the wings to challenge AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka.

The timing of the piece is curious, to say the least. Trumka has more than two years remaining in his current term, and the AFL-CIO doesn’t practice term limits. Trumka has been president for 10 years and, leaving out the short tenure of one interim president, previous presidents have served for 14, 16 and 24 years.
But, okay, let’s roll with it:

Trumka still has more than two years left in his third term at the helm, but that’s not stopping some of his possible successors from sniffing out potential support for a run if and when the seat opens. Three names are swirling as likely candidates to eventually replace Trumka, and at least two of them are making calls behind the scenes to try to build a backing, according to sources.
…Randi Weingarten: The American Federation of Teachers president flirted with challenging Trumka in the last AFL-CIO election and has since been a prominent voice in highly publicized school house strikes. Weingarten is taking a page from the Paul Ryan for Speaker of the House playbook: She will publicly say she’s not interested in the job, while remaining open to the option behind the scenes if sufficiently urged to do so by others.

Weingarten’s name has been floated in the past as a U.S. Senator and a Secretary of Education. I have no idea if she is interested in being president of the AFL-CIO. Clearly, neither does Bloomberg Law, but it didn’t stop them from posting a column about it.
I can think of at least one good reason she wouldn’t want the job. She made $405,793 last year as AFT president. Trumka made $261,779.

Randi's Choice: Kamala Harris - Make it so democratically

New York noted that “the union’s executive council could theoretically endorse someone against the majoritarian wishes of its rank and file.” I’ll go a step further. If Hillary were to run again in 2020, AFT would endorse her again.... Mike Antonucci

UPDATE:

https://www.blackagendareport.com/freedom-rider-kamala-harris-fix

https://www.blackagendareport.com/kamala-harris-first-won-office-law-and-order-candidate

When Randi Weingarten announced a new "democratic" process for the AFT to choose its presidential candidate I laughed out loud (I've been doing a lot of that lately). Practically simultaneously came the big news from candidate Kamala Harris as reported by James Eterno:

How Education Reform Ate the Democratic Party - Clintons Led the Way in Attack on Teacher Unions

This article is so good I want to print it out and eat it. Thanks to Patrick Walsh for sending this along.

Jennifer Berkshire in an in depth exposure of the Clintons' role and neo-lib Dems in leading ed deform attack on teachers and their unions, which was also chronicled as a positive by the Richard Kahlenberg book on Al Shanker (Tough Liberal), who was a Clinton partner --- instead of opposing he had the AFT/UFT work with them. [See Vera and my review in New Politics of the book where we refer to Shanker as a Ruthless Neocon].

To begin to chronicle the origin of the Democrats’ war on their own—the public school teachers and their unions that provide the troops and the dough in each new campaign cycle to elect the Democrats—is to enter murky territory. The Clintons were early adopters; tough talk against Arkansas’ teachers, then among the poorest paid in the country, was a centerpiece of Bill’s second stint as Governor of Arkansas.

.... as America ponders the mounting economic disequlibriums that gave rise to the Trump insurgency, concerned plutocrats can all agree on one key article of faith: what is holding back the poor and minority children who figure so prominently in the glossy brochures of charter school advocates is not the legacy of racist housing policy or mass incarceration or a tax system that hoovers up an ever growing share of income into the pockets of the wealthy, but schoolteachers and their unions.... Jennifer Berkshire, https://thebaffler.com/latest/ed-reform-ate-the-democrats-berkshire

This is a must read article -- for a decade we have been talking about the Clinton role in opening up the war on teachers back in Arkansas - as I said but can't say often enough, Al Shanker, head of the AFT and UFT joined them as a partner and led the way for teacher unions to walk into the world of ed deform for 30 years instead of opposing it and Randi followed along in spades -- the classic frog being boiled. Unfortunately Jennifer doesn't go the role the union played in this article. [Note to Randi haters who call her a sellout and who wish for the days of Shanker -- she was chosen by Shanker and Feldman for that very reason.]

The disappearing black teacher linked to ed deform [one third of NYC public schools have no black or Latino teachers today.]

Civil rights groups fiercely opposed the most controversial feature of the Clintons’ reform agenda—competency tests for teachers—on the grounds that Black teachers, many of whom had attended financially starved Black colleges, would disproportionately bear their brunt.

We saw the classic of ed deform was a disappearing of black teachers, many from the communities and their replacement by temp TFA white inexperienced people. In NYC alone thousands of teachers of color were fired 20 years ago over licensing issues related to the test teachers had to take. I knew some excellent teachers in my school who fell into this category.

We know ed notes readers so pissed at the Dem party role in ed deform they wouldn't vote for Hillary even though it will be proven that was also suicidal. Reason? The Dem Party centrists are being forced to back off ed deform -- witness Cuomo - even though if given a choice of him or Trump I would have a very hard time.

Here is another quote about a leading Dem:

Osborne told an interviewer that teachers unions belong in the same category with segregationist Alabama governor George Wallace. “They’re actually doing what George Wallace did, standing in the schoolhouse door, denying opportunity to poor minority kids.” To document their perfidy, Osborne cited the opposition of teachers unions in Massachusetts last year to Question Two—a ballot initiative proposing dramatic charter school expansion. Voters rejected the measure by nearly two to one—the same ratio, as it happens, by which wealthy pro-charter donors dwarfed the union spending that so upset Osborne.

Jennifer ties other leading Dems into the neoliberal deform movement

By the early 1980s, there was already a word for turning public institutions upside down: neoliberalism. Before it degenerated into a flabby insult, neoliberal referred to a self-identified brand of Democrat, ready to break with the tired of dogmas of the past. “The solutions of the thirties will not solve the problems of the eighties,” wrote Randall Rothenberg in his breathless 1984 paean to this new breed, whom he called simply The Neoliberals. His list of luminaries included the likes of Paul Tsongas, Bill Bradley, Gary Hart and Al Gore (for the record, Gore eschewed the neoliberal label in favor of something he liked to call “neopopulism”). In Rothenberg’s telling, the ascendancy of the neoliberals represented an economic repositioning of the Democratic Party that had begun during the economic crises of the 1970s. The era of big, affirmative government demanding action—desegregate those schools, clean up those polluted rivers, enforce those civil rights and labor laws—was over. It was time for fresh neo-ideas.

The link to the union capitulation is that Shanker endorsed the Nation at Risk in 1983 and unions stopped calling for lower class sizes and other real reforms -- that education can be reformed by getting more competent teachers and getting rid of so-called bad teachers -- and also -- using test scores to judge kids and teachers.

One more quote from Jennifer for those who don't get to the entire piece below -- something all of you should send out to everyone you work with and beyond.

Today’s Democratic school reformers—a team heavy on billionaires, pols on the move, and paid advocates for whatever stripe of fix is being sold—depict their distaste for regulation, their zeal for free market solutions as au courant thinking. They rarely acknowledge their neoliberal antecedents. The self-described radical pragmatists at the Progressive Policy Institute, for instance, got their start as Bill Clinton’s policy shop, branded as the intellectual home for New Democrats. Before its current push for charter schools, PPI flogged welfare reform. In fact, David Osborne, the man so fond of likening teacher unions to arch segregationists in the south, served as Al Gore’s point person for “reinventing government.” Today the model for Osborne’s vision for reinventing public education is post-Katrina New Orleans—where 7,500 mostly Black school employees were fired en route to creating the nation’s first nearly all-charter-school-system, wiping out a pillar of the city’s Black middle class in the process.

How Education Reform Ate the Democratic Party

The problem is that the Democrats have little to offer that’s markedly different from what DeVos is selling.

Read it all and tell me how it tastes: https://thebaffler.com/latest/ed-reform-ate-the-democrats-berkshire

2003 Redux -- AFT Executive Council Supports U.S. Action to Disarm Iraq.

jd2718.orgSaturday, August 19, 2017 at 9:27:00 AM EDT

In 2010 in Seattle, Leo Casey motivated (probably wrote) a before-the-fact justification for US military action against Iran. The AFT may jump on-board some antiwar campaigns, after the entire political mood has shifted in that direction, but at its core it's still pro-war.

https://www.aft.org/resolution/iran-and-trade-union-rights
Jonathan

I added the above comment to this original post as an intro to the cold warriors and war hawks still running our national, state, and local union....

For decades my colleagues in a certain segment of the UFT opposition have tagged our union's support for the war machine, which is part of the Democratic Party mantra. Like you hear them talk about underfunded education but never about vastly over funded military, which chews up the budget. I once told Al Shanker at a DA in 1976 that when it came to guns or butter our union chooses guns.

Mike Antonucci is on vacation and is posting from the vault -- this one is a goodie about our union leadership's support for the war machine and the invasion of Iraq -- history they continue to try to bury. Is there a statue of Randi we can bring down?

From the Vault: January 27, 2003

https://www.the74million.org/article/analysis-teachers-union-adds-40000-offshore-members-while-labor-rolls-stagnate-at-home

AFT Executive Council Supports U.S. Action to Disarm Iraq. In a noteworthy display of contrariness, the American Federation of Teachers Executive Council passed a resolution supporting U.S. and international efforts to disarm Iraq. The AFT resolution came as something of a surprise, since there is a concerted effort among activists nationwide to promote anti-war resolutions among the public education establishment. AFT reported that the resolution passed “by an overwhelming margin,” but since most Executive Council resolutions pass unanimously, it is clear that the resolution faced some strong opposition. This most probably came from the California Federation of Teachers, which already has its own resolution in place condemning any contemplated action against Iraq and denouncing the “so-called war on terrorism.”

The AFT resolution takes several swipes at the Bush administration, but it places the onus of possible military action squarely on Iraq itself. “Through its actions and ambitions,” the resolution states, “this regime has demonstrated that it poses a unique threat to the peace and stability of the Middle East, to the peaceful world order promoted by the ideals of the United Nations and, therefore, to the national security interests of the United States.”

The resolution also notes that AFT, “along with the AFL-CIO, recognizes that the U.S. may at times have to act unilaterally in defense of its national security.” The resolution similarly concludes, “For its part, the AFT believes there can be no equivocation. The Iraqi regime must disarm. It must comply fully and completely with appropriate United Nations resolutions or face military action.”

RBE: The UFT is a Company Union

RBE [Perdido Street School] has left a new comment on your post "Attacks on ATRs is Spear at All Teachers Plus Why ...":

Klein didn't run rings around Randi. The givebacks from Randi were intentional. They're on the same team - both Clintonistas out for the destruction of a unionized workforce. It's WWE shit. They play adversaries in public, but it's all a show and behind the scenes they yuck it up while they strip workers of rights, compensation, protections, etc. They may not have liked each other personally, but make no mistake that personal animosity puts them on separate teams.

The UFT is a company union. We see this even more so with de Blasio, where they don't even bother to mount a defense as the DOE goes after veteran teachers, ATR's, etc. The big giveaways started under the "hostile" Bloomberg, they continue unabated under the "friendly" de Blasio. It will be interesting to see what percentage of the rank and file flee the UFT post-Janus. UFT leaders will call for "unity" and "solidarity," but that's just empty, meaningless Orwellian rhetoric from a union leadership that has sold out its membership time and time again. 

I agree that the UFT/AFT/NYSUT complex has been complicit, especially in the early decades of ed deform going back to Al Shanker. Joel Klein and Randi are both centrist Democrats and thus...

Our union(s) are fundamentally neo-liberal in outlook. They do believe in the free market and when deformers apply it to education and charge that public schools are a monopoly, even if they don't agree, they have a hard time framing an adequate response and a campaign to counter this view. 

When it comes to guns and butter issues where defense eats up a massive amount of money, they always support those expenditures. Same with jingoistic foreign policy. 

And then there are the ties to the centrist wing of the Democratic Party and its policies that enforce the above -- I mean who is calling for a new Cold War against Russia, which is a fairly weal country in many ways?

These outlooks in essence turn our unions into a company union - if we view "company" in broader terms.

Randi and Betsy - Giving Cover to a Monster -

Randi is a committed corporate liberal who has faith in the good intentions of corporate power brokers and profiteers and her ability to get them to do the right thing if only they give her a seat at the table. Here, I'm thinking back to the union's brief flirtation with Bill Gates or Randi's flights to Chicago to support Rahm's Infrastructure Trust or to London to sit in on Pearson board meetings ... If some WaPo ink is all Randi was after, all well and good. But if she's providing some union cover for DeVos in exchange for some credibility with the Trump administration, she's playing a fool's game. .....Mike Klonsky, Mike Klonsky: What Was Gained by Randi’s Visit with Betsy?

Diane Ravitch won't openly criticize Randi but she does offer her platform for others to do so by posting Mike Klonsky's comments.

Mike Klonsky: What Was Gained by Randi’s Visit with Betsy?

By dianeravitch

April 23, 2017 //

Mike Klonsky says: Nothing.

You cannot turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse.

I think Mike is too nice to Randi, who is providing cover for DeVos. But I never see Randi as playing a fool's game. She plays everyone else for fools. Her game is all about positioning -- "you see how reasonable and willing we are to deal - read - sell out my members -- What does Randi have to gain? Some feel a piece of the choice action - if you can't beat them join them. Maybe make a few bucks to cover the loss of union members to right to work.

The union's $62M loan for 50 Broadway helps them morph into real estate. Become an agent of teacher training. They failed at the charter school approach but maybe there are other options out there.

A comment on Diane's blog from a Norwegian Filmmaker
gets us closer to the root.

April 23, 2017 at 9:10 am

And the ruling class are counting on “right to work” as a way to capitalize upon union members’ legitimate discontent with their union leadership and its willingness to compromise for almost 2 decades.

Beware, because this is a perfect storm. These are American unions, not European ones. I fear that is might be better to have union power and prominence – albeit horribly corrupt as Weingarten – than to have mere patches of unionism throughout the workforce.

Which brings me to my own contemplation: Would right to work status help create newer, better unions though sheer demand and market reactive forces (ones that would hang Weingarten in public and derive democratically structured unions) or is it just better to have a closed shop?

Teacher turnover means nothing to Weingarten, as she gets her union dues paid no matter who fills the position. Yet union dues keep unions more than afloat to do what they are supposed to do: fight for educators, children, and families.

The United States is such an amazing country . . . it shines SO more brightly than Norway in many aspects. Yet, Weingarten et al are an example of how deplorable the culture here really can get to be. She’s not a real union leader, nor is her governance militant, forceful, or effective. It’s just there to keep her $500,000+/year salary in tact. She is a master triangulator . . . Either that, or Amerians are not paying attention to her governence.

Something tells me that this is not my European lens talking here, but that more than 75% of Americans would agree about the corruption behind the AFT, NEA, and UFT. I could be wrong.

Randi's Folly, or How We Got Colorado's Teacher-Evaluation Reform Wrong - Education Week

May 6, 2010 -- Denver Post... AFT's Randi Weingarten weighs in
Wednesday’s endorsement of Senate Bill 191 by the American Federation of Teachers did not phase many in Colorado but caused quite a stir around the nation.

Nevertheless, AFT President Randi Weingarten said her organization’s support of the bill shouldn’t come as a surprise.
In January, Weingarten made a speech urging her 1.4 million members to accept a form of teacher evaluation that takes student achievement into account.

In that speech Weingarten called for more frequent and more rigorous evaluations and said she wanted standardized test scores and other measures of student performance to be part of the process.... http://blogs.denverpost.com/coloradoclassroom/2010/05/06/afts-randi-weingarten-weighs-in/318/

Back in 2010, Randi Weingarten, apparently to the surprise of the world -- but not to us here in NYC and other cities on her sellout tour (Newark, Detroit) -- endorsed the Colorado teacher evaluation plan.

Now skip ahead to today's Edweek article with this little nugget:
all of Colorado’s 238 charter schools waived out of the system.

Read this and then go back and read the full article on Randi's endorsement plus these other links to Randi back in 2010. You won't hear a peep of mea culpa from our Unity leaders.

How We Got Colorado's Teacher-Evaluation Reform Wrong

Colorado's missteps on teacher evaluation is a cautionary tale for other states

By Van Schoales

April 4, 2017

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2017/04/06/how-we-got-colorados-teacher-evaluation-reform-wrong.html?cmp=eml-enl-eu-news2

Commentary

Back in May 2010, hundreds of the nation’s education foundation, policy, and practice elites were gathered for the NewSchools Venture Fund meeting in Washington to celebrate and learn from the most recent education reform policy victories in my home state of Colorado and across the country.

The opening speeches highlighted the recent passage of Colorado Senate Bill 10-191—a dramatic law which required that 50 percent of a teacher evaluation be based upon student academic growth. This offered a bold new vision for how teachers would be evaluated and whether they would gain or lose tenure based on the merits of their impact on student achievement.

Colorado would be one of several "ground zeros" for reforming teacher evaluation in the country. Many, including myself, thought these new state policies would allow our best teachers to shine. They would finally have useful feedback, be differentiated on an objective scale of effectiveness, and lose tenure if they weren’t performing. Teachers would be treated like other professionals and less like interchangeable widgets.

Colorado’s law and similar ones in other states appeared to be sound, research-backed policy formulated by education reform’s own "whiz kids." We could point to Ivy League research that made a clear case for dramatic changes to the current system. There were large federal incentives, in addition to private philanthropy fueled by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, encouraging such changes. And to pass these teacher-evaluation laws, we built a coalition of reform-minded Democrats and Republicans that also included the American Federation of Teachers. Reformers were confident we had a clear mandate.

And yet. Implementation did not live up to the promises.

Colorado Department of Education data released in February show that the distribution of teacher effectiveness in the state looks much as it did before passage of the bill. Eighty-eight percent of Colorado teachers were rated effective or highly effective, 4 percent were partially effective, 7.8 percent of teachers were not rated, and less than 1 percent were deemed ineffective. In other words, we leveraged everything we could and not only didn’t advance teacher effectiveness, we created a massive bureaucracy and alienated many in the field.

What happened?

Antonucci: The Strange Disappearance of 69,000 AFT Members

I hate linking to the Campbell Brown faux journalism site The74
but Mike Antonucci is one anti-union journalist who does a degree of honest, though biased reporting. (You will rarely read a positive report on a teacher union.) His report below is loaded with some

juicy info on the AFT - Mike covers the NEA more extensively.

I did some editing to focus on the AFT - if you must go read the entire article at the - ugh - 74.

Why are numbers of AFT members pertinent? A good chunk of UFT dues goes to the AFT, which is run by Randi Weingarten in the same vein as, oh say, your average dictatorship. But also once the national attacks come on the teacher unions, especially post-Friedrichs, these numbers will be a base point.

Mike after doing research has not found what happened to the drop in 69,000 AFT members over the past year.

When I started work on the article I thought I'd be able to determine where AFT lost the members, but no affiliate reported losses of that magnitude (except for WV). I think maybe they miscounted in 2015 and corrected in 2016. But they'll never tell me.

Maybe given that we may see big drops in membership over the next few years as non-union charters and vouchers decimate public schools, they decided to adjust the numbers so the losses don't seem to come so fast?

Here are the key bullet extracts from Mike's piece with some appended Editorial Notes.

• AFT routinely claims it has 1.6 million members.
• AFT reached a record-high 1,613,448 members in 2015.
• [L]ast year - 2016 - the union reported 1,544,143 members.
• More than 600,000 working AFT members belong to merged NEA/AFT local and state affiliates. Though their dues and representation rights are split between NEA and AFT, both national unions count them as full members.

[Ed Note: So when you add up the NEA and AFT totals -- subtract 600,000].

• Almost 41 percent of AFT’s members live and work in New York and so belong to New York State United Teachers. But NYSUT reported a 13,000-member increase in 2016.

Now you can see why NYSUT is so crucial to the Unity machine. Check out Arthur's report on the talks between Stronger Together and Unity -- Stronger Together Brings a Stop Watch to a Long Game

I'll have my own comments on the Unity/Stronger Together talks, maybe later today or tomorrow. People ask me what ST brings to the table and I say - the mere act of running against Unity is an existential threat. All dictatorships see elections as a threat even if they expect to win by 90%. I guarantee that Putin is concerned that 10% votes against him. Randi won re-election in the AFT last summer with well over 90% of the vote. And we know that does not reflect reality.

• 357,000 AFT members are retirees, who pay no dues 
• 330,000 AFT members are part-time employees.
  AFT’s 1.6 million members equate to a dues-paying equivalent of 854,000 full-time employed teachers.  

[Ed Note - I questioned Mike on this point since we pay dues in the UFT though not sure if any of that goes to AFT-  Also - 60,000 of the retirees are UFT. What about the nurses and home daycare workers and any other AFT members who are not teachers? And then in NYC there are over 40,000 UFT members who are not teachers per se -- social workers, paras, guidance -- functional chapters.In NYC the numbers of classroom teachers are less than 70,000 in a union of around 170,000.In the last contract around 106,000 people voted - over 90% - retirees didn't vote.In the election all UFT members could vote -- around 170,000.]

Mike replied:

AFT says, "Retiree Members are members for life and pay no dues during retirement." It's UFT alone that's charging you. NEA charges $30/year, which might help explain why they have fewer retired members than AFT even though they're twice the size.

Nurses and other certificated employees pay the teacher rate. Full-time support workers pay about two-thirds of that. Part-timers pay according to whether they work 1/2 time, 1/4 time or 1/8 time. This is all just the AFT portion. Local dues vary greatly.

Here is most of Mike's analysis:
Analysis: The Strange Disappearance of 69,000 AFT Members

Detroit Redux? Syracuse Union Suspends President - Looking for Randi's Fingerprints

"The Syracuse teachers union president says she was suspended after she uncovered a fellow officer’s inappropriate use of a computer during an audit.”

The Syracuse Teachers Association situation is escalating. President Karen Fruscello apparently discovered another union officer was routinely surfing for porn on an office computer. The executive board, consisting entirely of members from an opposing caucus, suspended Fruscello, reportedly for conducting an unauthorized investigation, but has yet to take action against the unnamed porn surfer.... Mike Antoucci at Intercepts/Educational Intelligence Agency.... 

There are some implications - possible for NYSUT - in the story currently playing out in Syracuse where the STA board removed the recently elected president, as reported by Mike Antonucci,

• Syracuse Union Suspends President,
• Story Updates

• Lesson 1: NYSUT Elections
• Lesson 2: Unity or Unity like caucuses - will try to hold onto power even if it loses - a history lesson from NYC and Detroit
• Lesson 3: NYSUT's audience problem -- a per my post of an article the other day - NYSUT has an audience problem. They have lost touch with their members and their political beliefs

Lesson 1: NYSUT Elections

A NYSUT election is coming in April - remember that 3 years ago Stronger Together (ST) Caucus created a serious challenge to NY State Unity Caucus (which includes NYC Unity) and MORE was involved by running for 5 seats and Arthur Goldstein ran on the ST slate for NYSUT Ex VP against Andy Pallotta --- The Unity slate had the support of the big city 5  unions -- Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Yonkers and of course NYC. If there would be a break from some of the big 5 -- say Syracuse, Buffalo and Rochester, and ST could get close enough to create a serious challenge and Randi's control of he AFT, where NYSUT has one third of the membership, could be threatened.

So what's really going on in Syracuse and does the fact that an independent was elected as president without having the support of anyone on the Ex Bd in any way relate to the NYSUT election picture? According to Antonucci something about porn is involved -- now I know you all are going to keep reading.

Lesson 2:  Historical record

I've always maintained that if one day MORE won power in the UFT and it was close, Unity would protest to the AFT that there were irregularities and the AFT would find an excuse to overturn the election. Back in 1985 when Michael Shulman of the NAC coalition of multiple caucuses (New Action emerged as one caucus in 1995) won the high school presidency, Unity wouldn't seat Shulman, protested to some agency and got another election 8 months later while Shulman had to sit and wait. Shulman got even more votes but his term of office was cut short, meetings were held without him once he took office. Unity dumped one of the major UFT founders, George Altomare for daring to lose to Shulman and  mounted a campaign to make sure he lost in 1987, which he did.

The New Action coalition came back in force in the 1991 election, winning both the high and junior high Ex Bd seats -- 13 - the most ever for an opposition -- but won nothing in 1993, which gave Unity 100% of the EB -- and they immediately pushed through a constitution change to make all divisional VP elections at-large - which NYC Educator explains in today's post --  Downsides of Democracy.

What about Detroit and Steve Conn, anti-Randi who was elected while the Ex Bd was tied to the former pro-Randi president? Steve was removed as president. Rules called for a referendum which needed 2/3 to get him removed but came up short -- while still over 50%. They just ignored that rule and refused to re-seat him. This story was a big bone of contention at the AFT2016 convention, pretty much the only bone of contention given the union leaderships of Chicago and LA having a love affair with Randi.

Here are the EIA/Intercepts posts on the Syracuse story.

Syracuse Union Suspends President

Posted: 11 Jan 2017 10:45 AM PST

The lede in this story reads: “The Syracuse teachers union president says she was suspended after she uncovered a fellow officer’s inappropriate use of a computer during an audit.”
That doesn’t make much sense, and the details aren’t very illuminating either. Another story tells us what the inappropriate use was. But make your way down to the 12th paragraph and you see:

Fruscello first took office in July. She defeated six-year president Kevin Ahern in an election. The rest of the elected board ran with Ahern as part of the “Professional Partners” caucus. Fruscello ran as an outsider determined to disrupt business as usual at the union.

I don’t know if Fruscello is a crusader for transparency or another Steve Conn, but a careful examination of the Syracuse Teachers Association bylaws shows the union’s executive board has no authority to “suspend” anyone, much less the president.
It can recommend to the union’s representative assembly that the office be declared vacant if the president “has been grossly negligent.” It then takes a two-thirds vote of the RA to remove her.
How long before AFT sends in the paratroopers to restore order?

Story Updates

Posted: 13 Jan 2017 11:50 AM PST

* The Syracuse Teachers Association situation is escalating. President Karen Fruscello apparently discovered another union officer was routinely surfing for porn on an office computer. The executive board, consisting entirely of members from an opposing caucus, suspended Fruscello, reportedly for conducting an unauthorized investigation, but has yet to take action against the unnamed porn surfer.

Yesterday, acting president Megan Root released this statement:

The Syracuse Teachers Association deeply regrets that what should have been an internally handled personnel issue has become a salacious matter for the public. It is always STA practice to handle personnel matters in a way that preserves our members’ confidentiality and right to privacy.
The Association is disheartened that Karen Fruscello is so insistent in trying this issue through the press. Her statements and behavior do not serve the members or the Association and are regrettable. The Association needs to be able to conduct our investigations internally and privately to ensure that our members are given due process. Karen Fruscello’s actions are damaging, harassing, and interfere with the work of the Association.

The reference to due process is rich, considering the lack of due process for Fruscello’s suspension and the fact that STA’s bylaws do not authorize the actions the board has taken. The appeal to confidentiality and privacy is also a straw man, since the identity of the alleged perpetrator has not been disclosed.

Billy Shakespeare Message to Randi - Ed Notes Redux, October 2001

Billy S - needs certification in English

In 2001 when Randi was moving towards supporting merit pay - which she called "school based incentives", one of the essential planks of ed deform, I tried to get a resolution up at the DA calling for the UFT to refuse to support merit pay in any form. Up to this point Randi had called on me regularly but this time month after month she shut me out. She clearly didn't want this reso to come up. I would say that a veil lifted as I saw her constant manipulation in a new light.

Burying merit pay

Those were my creative days (I have no capacity to do this kind of thing now). I wrote this as the Marc Antony Caesar funeral oration was an apt way to express my thoughts where a discussion of merit pay- er -school based incentives - substituted for the dead Caesar. Reprinted from Ed Notes, Oct. 2001.

The following was written by Billy Shakespeare., a native of Stratford-0n-Avon, England, who is currently teaching chemistry at a high school in Brooklyn. Billy is uncertified, as he has not yet been able to pass the NY State certification exams in English, his specialty. 

Delegates, Teachers, Fellow Unionists
Lend me your ears!
I come to praise Randi, not to bury her.
The evil that union leaders do lives after them;
The good is oft interred within their speeches.
Come I to speak at the funeral of the merit pay---er---school-based incentives--- discussion.
The noble Randi hath told you that opponents of merit pay--er--- school-based incentives--- were ambitious.
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath we answer'd it.
Randi is an honorable union leader. They all are honorable union leaders. 

We dreamed of discussing this issue in Dec. ought ought.
Randi says that was ambitious and Randi is an honorable union leader.
An attempt was made to bring the issue up in January but Randi hath decided we were in a dearth of time and cancelled such opportunity.
You didst all see that in Mar, April & May thrice were attempts made to discuss merit pay--er----school-based incentives-- And thrice wust we refused.
Did this seem ambitious? Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
In March prepareth were we all to speak on merit pay--er---school- based incentives.
Yet, you all did see that on the dais were comptroller candidates Billy T. and Herbie B who doth speaketh for 30 minutes
And we runneth out of time as the bell tolled for automatic ad- journment at 6.
Randi said extending the time was ambitious and Randi is an honorable union leader. 

Thus cometh April and expecteth us to see the merit pay---er---- school-based incentives--- discussion reach fruition.
And saw the honorable Tom Pappas put on a fabulous festival of fashion shows of arm bands and tee shirts
Whilst the merit pay--er--school-based incentives---- discussion issue fell like sands of time.
And we raiseth a question about these wasting sands and were quickly chastised by the wise Randi.
Were we ambitious? Randi says we were and Randi is an honorable union leader.
I speak not to disprove what Randi spoke
But I am here to speak what I do know.
That the April merit pay discussion began at 6:15 to the sounds of stomachs growling and Unity Caucus revelrers departing for the palace of the Hilton to celebrate their great and noble victory over the Goths of Shulman.*

What cause withholds you then, to mourn for the death of the merit pay---er---school-based incentives--- discussion? O judgement! thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And Unity caucus men and women have lost their reason. Bear with me; 

Doth came May:
Avi of Lewis placed the battle of District 23 in proper context: That booty doth seem fairly inconsequential Unless shall be granted across the board increases
By the mean God Giuliani.
Yet we watched the minuscule 15 minutes of discussion time trickle away
Oh! What will come of such discussion, which lacked depth and magnitude
As was left many speakers deserted at the alter?
I fear I wrong the honourable union leaders
Whose daggers have stabb'd the merit pay---er--school- based incentives discussion; I do fear it. 

Good friends, sweet friends, let me not stir you up To such a sudden flood of mutiny.
They that have done this deed are honourable:
What private griefs they have, alas, I know not,
That made them do it: they are wise and honourable, And will, no doubt, with reasons answer you. 

I come not, friends, to steal away your hearts: I am no orator, as Randi is;
But, as you know me all, a plain blunt man, For I have neither wit, nor words, nor worth, Action, nor utterance, nor the power of speech, To stir men's blood; I only speak right on;
I tell you that which you yourselves do know;
Show you sweet merit pay---er--school-based incentives discussion’s wounds, poor poor dumb mouths,
And bid them speak for me.
But were I Randi, And Randi I, there wouldst ruffle up your spirits and put a tongue
In every wound of the merit pay---er--school-based incentives discussion that should move
The stones of the UFT to rise and mutiny. 

O masters, if I were disposed to stir
Your hearts and minds to mutiny and rage,
I should do Randi wrong, and Tom wrong,
Who, you all know, are honourable union leaders:
I will not do them wrong; I rather choose to wrong the dead merit pay-- er----school-based incentives--discussion, to wrong myself and you than I will wrong such honourable union leaders.
My heart is in the coffin
With the merit pay--er---school-based incentives--- discussion. 
 

*The 2001 UFT election victory over New Action had been completed by April and Unity was heading to the Hilton for a celebration ("The Goths of Shulman"). 

Will Joel Klein Return in Clinton Admin Through His Wife/ AFT Worried Joel Klein Was Helping Hillary Clinton's Campaign

On Aug 19, 2015, at 1:31 PM, Nikki Budzinski < > nbudzinski@hillaryclinton.com > wrote: > > > > Hi-I wanted to flag a panicked call I just received from AFT about Joel > Klein, former Chancellor of New York City Dept of Education. Is he joining > the campaign in any capacity? Reporters have been contacting AFT for > reaction. AFT has flagged this as a really big issue for them. I would > expect that Randi is going to reach out to John on this today. > > > > Anything additional you can share with me would be appreciated. Thanks. > > > > -- > > Nikki Budzinski > > Labor Outreach Director > > Hillary for America

[Joel Klein's wife] Nicole Seligman gained early acclaim as a lawyer with her representation of Lt. Col. Oliver North in a congressional hearing into the Iran-Contra scandal. She later acted as the legal adviser to President Bill Clinton when he testified before a grand jury in the Monica Lewinsky scandal and also helped defend him at his impeachment trial in the Senate. ... Variety

Did Randi's seat at Hillary's table manage to kill any Joel Klein involvement in the Hillary campaign? Let's give Randi a temporary star if she managed to thwart Uncle Joel's ambitions to get on the Clinton bandwagon. Now that doesn't mean that on Nov. 9 we hear that Klein has been added to the transition team on education.

Remember that Klein's wife Nicole Seligman is a major corporation and Clinton player. She left as head of Sony Corp back in Feb.

Seligman said in a statement that she was “excited and eager to explore new opportunities” and thanked Sony for a “deeply rewarding” run with the company.

Hmmm, I wonder whether those opportunities might be in a Clinton admin? Since she stepped down in March there is not much out there on her plans. Does being Klein's wife create a stir from Randi? I'm thinking not - so look for Joel to worm his way back in through the back door.

Don't be surprised at some point when we see Uncle Joel back in action in a Clinton admin, at which point we will take Randi's star back.

Share

The American Federation of Teachers made a "panicked" call to Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign in August 2015, to check on what it considered an alarming rumor, according to an email recently uncovered by WikiLeaks.

The union had heard that Joel Klein, the former New York City School chancellor, was working with the campaign. And it was not pleased.

"Is he joining the campaign in any capacity?" asked Nikki Budzinski, the Clinton campaign's labor outreach director. "AFT has flagged this as a really big issue for them. I would expect that Randi is going to reach out to John [Podesta, Clinton's campaign chairman] on this today."

You can read the whole exchange here.

It turns out that no, Klein wasn't a campaign aide at the time, said AFT President Randi Weingarten, in a Monday interview.

And she was pretty relieved, she said.

"That's the kind of rumor we just wanted to track down," Weingarten said. "Joel may have been incredibly good in Bill Clinton's Justice Department but he has a toxic reputation when it comes to education." (Klein also served as an assistant attorney general for Clinton from 1997 to 2000.)

Klein and Weingarten had an especially difficult relationship during the more than half a dozen years he served as chancellor of New York City public schools, and she served as president of the United Federation of Teachers, which represents New York City teachers.

Klein does have some big fans in K-12 policy circles, especially among proponents of education "reform" who credit him with bringing about bold and much needed improvement to the city's schools through policies like a serious expansion of charters.

Wikileaks, a group that publishes communications it says point to government and corporate misconduct, recently hacked into emails sent to Podesta, going back to at least 2008.

Randi Spends Dough on Clinton Projects While AFT Affiliate in Newark Runs Go Fund Me Campaign

The Newark Teachers Union (NTU) an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) opened a gofundme.com account as reported on Bob Braun's Ledger Facebook page on Friday.  Donated funds are to be funneled through ERC Foundation. Repeated Google searches, however, have unearthed no information on the mysterious charity. Requests for clarification from the NTU have not been returned.
To make matters worse, the AFT is flush with cash. Opensecrets.org totaled up $1,273,694 in 2016 AFT federal campaign contributions. Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton raked in $22,880 while former Democratic candidate Senator Bernie Sanders got a measly $8,229.  Unfortunate Democratic Senator Corey Booker was only granted $15. Back in 2015, watchdog.org detailed AFT donations to Clinton affiliates as $250,000 to Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Foundation, $250,000 to Clinton Global Initiative and $100,000 American Bridge 21st Century (a Clinton allied research group).
The AFT has plenty of money to spend on political candidates and politically aligned organizations with questionable agendas in regard to the future of public school education, whereas the teachers the union purports to represent have to resort to begging.
Abigail Shure, Newark Teacher

UPDATE FROM THE RIGHT:

Newark Teachers Union Goes Begging

Written By: Mike Antonucci - Sep• 19•16

GoFundMe is an online fundraising site usually reserved for people with steep medical expenses or charitable causes, but now it’s the home of an effort by the Newark Teachers Union to “stop the war on teachers.”
The union of about 3,000 members has a goal of $100,000 for its campaign, but after the first four days it has raised zero. The union claims this unique project is necessary because “we don’t have access to the same funding sources as those who want to destroy our public schools.”
That might be literally true, but NTU has an annual budget of about $3.4 million and is affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers, a parent organization whose budget is $188 million. The idea that it requires a GoFundMe campaign for $100,000 is laughable.
It’s possible this is merely a PR stunt to rouse the zeal of activists in the state, or perhaps AFT refused to fund this particular scheme. But if you have a few extra bucks, I suggest you bypass NTU’s page and instead donate to Bonnie’s bullet removal surgery.

Education Notes Publishes Again - Addressing Fair Student Funding, Abusive Principals and MORE

• “Fair” Student Funding Unfair to Students AND Teachers

• The Hit Job: Farina’s Crew Found the Right Bitch for the Job

• Unity-UFT Leaflet Attacking MORE on Opt-Out Could Have Been written by Cuomo, King, Gates. Slammed by Parent Group

• MORE captures almost 1/3 active teacher vote and majority of high school votes but has NO AFT/NYSUT delegates 

 Ed Notes Returns to Publishing

 Last week, for the first time in a decade, I put together and distributed an edition of Education Notes for the September 14 UFT Chapter Leader meeting. The pdf is available - download if you feel it worth sharing. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8qnFCTQLOqoSVNneHdZRGtTQjA/view?ths=true

I know, I know -- so many of the people at these meetings are in Unity and basically talking to most of them is like spitting in the ocean. I don't even bother giving it to many of them - why waste copies?

I published an edition for almost every Delegate Assembly from 1997-2004. I was a chapter leader and was frustrated at the fact that getting the floor at the DA was totally dependent on getting called on - so Ed Notes was my proactive response -- I would hand out my point of view in advance of the meeting to try to influence the debate. In the early years Ed Notes was geared to trying to use logic to appeal to Unity and the UFT leadership. This was the point where Randi Weingarten replaced Sandy Feldman - and she and her minions reached out to me, telling me Randi was ushering in a new day for the UFT, promising reforms. I was critical but not on the attack. The state of the opposition consisted of 3 caucuses and I found none of them satisfactory all of of them narrow in their vision. I raised issues that none of them had any interest in - mayoral control, testing, abusive principals, protection of chapter leaders. Ed Notes was critical not only of Unity but also the other opposition groups. At one point it seemed everyone at the DA was reading Ed Notes. I began to meet like-minded people.

I guess it was when it became clear that Randi was making changes that made the UFT less democratic while also aiding and abetting ed deform that made it clear that Unity would never change -- that holding and consolidating power was the mantra, with the blatant briber offered to New Action, the leading opposition, being a final straw in 2003-4. Old and new Ed Notes supporters felt it was time for an opposition caucus that tackled issues in depth, thus leading to the birth of ICE (Independent Community of Educators), followed by the spin-off GEM (Grassroots Education Movement), not an opposition caucus but a joint effort of teachers and parents, and finally the realization in 2011-12 that an attempt must be made to bring together the various stands of activists in the UFT into one organization - MORE. I moved Ed Notes to a blog in 2006 and devoted time to the various groups I worked with. While I had some influence I was also no longer using UFT meetings to put out  my own point of view using my style of writing -- group leaflets and newsletters often get neutered in the group process. So I decided that this year I will occasionally bring Ed Notes back to union meeting when I feel I have something to say that goes beyond the blog. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8qnFCTQLOqoSVNneHdZRGtTQjA/view?ths=true