Learning From Lois (Weiner): Social Justice Unions, Restorative Justice, and Caucus Building

Lois talked about how Restorative Justice can only work in a democratically run, collaborative school environment with a non-abusive, instead of a top-down principal.  ... AMEN

I was at Lois Weiner's very interesting presentation last night, Urban Education & Teacher Unionism Policy Project. MORE co-sponsored it.

This is an exciting venture that, in addition to the goals listed below, will also focus on the various movements within unions rather than the current leaderships. As Lois pointed out, many of these movements like MORE and WE in Philly were inspired by CORE Caucus in Chicago.

Lois pointed out that forming a strong democratic caucus with a large school base is the key. She contrasted cases like Milwaukee. Bob Peterson of Rethinking Schools won election pretty much on his own without a caucus and now leads a union where people are not especially active. That is problematical - trying to build a caucus without a firm school base AFTER winning.

As Lois talked I felt she was affirming the rough strategy MORE has been following - building enough of a base of schools which in NYC with 1800 schools and a Unity machine that battles for every single one, is the biggest challenge. When people say MORE doesn't want to win they are distorting reality. MORE can't win UNTIL it establishes enough of a base to win. Why can MORE challenge in the high schools and why did New Action win the high schools for over a decade? There is enough of a base in the high schools to win.

Lois emphasized the school as the organizing tool. And she is a board member of Teachers Unite, which also emphasizes the school unit. Where I  differ somewhat is that she doesn't focus attention on building geographical clusters of schools on the district level. NYC is a special situation due to size and the massive Unity control of the schools. District level clusters of K-8 schools must be built to begin to challenge Unity in the middle and elementary schools before any caucus has a chance to win.

Lois emphasizes that the social justice component is a key to building an alliance that goes beyond narrow teacher interests, which is proving to be a dead end no matter how much people scream and yell about teacher rights. Without building a community component that supports the teachers, a hostile press will kill them. The teachers walking out in Detroit, even if unorganized, can do so because parents are not killing them for doing it. Imagine if there were gangs of people outside schools screaming at them on days when they do come to school. That hasn't happened.

For me one of the most illuminating parts of her presentation was about restorative justice, which Teachers Unite has made a key part of its operation.

MORE supports restorative justice and has come under criticism for doing so. MORE supports RJ WHERE IT CAN WORK. MORE has to make that clear.

We know that some principals use RJ as a cover - and as a way to suck up to Carmen Farina - "see, we have an RJ program" - while they screw the teachers.

I have not always been comfortable with simply saying we support RJ without qualifying the RJ language used. She talked about how RJ can only work in a democratically run, collaborative school environment with a non-abusive, top-down principal. I pointed out that there are complaints about MORE's support for RJ from people who have such principals and RJ is just used as public relations crap to put the blame on teachers. Lois pointed out that the very idea of RJ is children and teachers taking control and if a principal has total control it just doesn't work.

She made it clear. If you have an autocratic or abusive principal, fuhgetaboutit. Well we know that leaves out the majority of schools in the system and MORE should clean up its RJ platform language to make that clear. Jia Lee was present and I hope that she makes this clear when she talks about RJ which she knows would never work with her old abusive principal but works in her current school - as long as the principal is supportive. But things can turn on a dime once an ego-driven principal takes over a school that was progressive.

Lois also addressed the issue of institutional racism, a term which seems to rub some (white) people the wrong way. I will deal with this in a separate post.

One thing I would have liked to address was the special situation of Unity Caucus being able to dominate the city, state and national unions and set policy for all of them through their autocratic rule.

Here is description of the Teacher Unionism Policy Project:

The aim of the New Jersey City University's Urban Education and Teacher Unionism Policy Project is to apply research, explained in accessible language, to address those very hard issues that divide teacher unions from communities of color and support strong alliances.

Dr. Lois Weiner, Project Director of the Urban Education and Teacher Unionism Policy Project, is an internationally-known scholar in urban teacher education and teacher unionism.

This event is sponsored by the GC Urban Education Program, GC Critical Psychology Program, Public Science Project, Joseph S. Murphy Institute for Worker Education and Labor Studies, Professional Staff Congress (PSC) Graduate Center Chapter, Teachers Unite, and the Movement of Rank and File Educators (MORE).

Can Restorative Justice Be the Key to School Discipline Reform?

In January, I facilitated a 90-minute post-suspension circle to repair the harm following a fight involving three Bronx Lab students. Community-building sometimes involves restoring relationships through conflict resolution. Participants in this circle included six staff members, three students, and four parents, and it delivered as promised. By the end, one parent expressed that she felt like she'd "been to church," and the parents told all three students that any of the kids could reach out to any of them for support.... by Sarah Marcy, principal of South Bronx Lab School May 18, 2015, Gotham Gazette

This is written by a principal, so I am always wary. And I imagine the

school is a small high school. I want to see how this would work in a large high school. But through my long-term connections to Teachers Unite I am a supporter of the concept of restorative justice. 

At the recent ICE meeting the subject of restorative justice came up. Yes discipline in schools is often chaotic and the only choice seems suspension - but those kids don't change and they come back. Some admins just blame the teacher - well, maybe most admins. There is little support for teachers and often defense of students. Some use phony restorative justice to make it look like they are trying something but in reality don't put any real resources into it.

Teachers Unite helps set up real and functioning RJ systems where the issues that create friction between teachers and students are worked out in some orderly fashion.

Mike Schirtzer who was at the meeting gave a passionate defense of RJ - he is even leading a Teachers Unite workshop in a few weeks. He cited stats in schools that had high suspension rates and saw them drop drastically. He also pointed out that there is punishment for transgressions - some of it meted out by decisions of peers.

I know that in my own classrooms I was pretty good at discipline and one of the reasons was that I held no grudges - a kid did something, was punished and we start over. I also used peer pressure and even trials with witnesses. I like the idea of a circle better than a trial and would be an advocate of RJ today.

I was being fairly reasonable - I never had a child suspended or asked to have one suspended. I tried not to call admin for help as I thought it showed me to be weak - as an activist I was engaged in a struggle with admin so why give them something to hold over me? I think most of my kids would say I was fair -- in fact I can think of maybe 4 or 5 that I felt I lost - and probably due as much to my actions -- though some of them seemed to be sociopathic and no matter what you do it won't help.

I get that things have changed. But when I heard someone at the ICE meeting who I won't mercifully name, go after RJ because it "coddles" kids I was disgusted - and not the first time at this individual who has used his travails as a teacher over the past decade to engage in bombast verbal attacks on students - despite that some people say he was once a good teacher. How many times did I hear people come into the teacher room and say "they're animals?" I get the frustration but to me that attitude is revealing. What I miss about teaching is the kids and that will never change for me.

Restorative Justice is Key to School Discipline Reform

http://www.gothamgazette.com/index.php/opinion/5729-restorative-justice-is-key-to-school-discipline-reform

Since the founding of Bronx Lab School in 2004, "student discipline" has been an ongoing topic of discussion. Students, staff, and parents are continually debating the merits and efficacy of suspensions, detentions, and mediations in addressing the realities of student conflict and non-adherence to school policies and values. What we know for sure after more than a decade of these conversations is that there are no simple answers. What we have learned is, though, is that Restorative Justice supports our community's mission and values, and offers a humanizing approach to the ever-present "discipline" question.

Sally Lee on Resorative Justice

This comment from Sally deserves a post of its own. I was arguing in my original post that the contract is the only way to solidify and codify things so the current and future DOE can't as easily shirk issues like discipline. The Dignity in Schools Campaign is asking for full-time Restorative Justice Coordinators in 20 schools -- do you think this might be more useful that the money spend on PD? Guess what Carmen, do all the PD in the world. If there is no system of control in the schools it is like spitting in the wind. And let's look at it this way -- PD is not only about curriculum. It is about how a teacher can deal with a class beyond curriculum - and how to deal with some kids who are having difficulty in that environment. So let's look at a Restorative Justice coordinator as a variation of PD.


Sally Lee has left a new comment on your post "UFT Contract - What's Missing - How About Discipl...":

Thanks for the shout-out Norm! Just so your readers are clear: Teachers Unite is the only educator organization in the Dignity in Schools Campaign-New York (DSC-NY).

The DSC-NY, a youth-led coalition, has been meeting with DOE to discuss the need to mandate guidance interventions before suspensions, provide trainings to staff, and end suspensions for defying or disobeying authority—a minor misbehavior that is the second most common reason for suspensions and, as you can imagine, results in an alarming disproportionate punishment of Black and Latino students as well as those with disabilities.

TU’s presence in those meetings has been consistent, but always in a supporting role to young people of color. Dozens of our members, all UFT members, have participated in the campaign’s planning as well as the campaign’s discussions with DOE and UFT staff. I say this to be clear that “Sally and the gang” doesn’t really sum it up! I actually have never been to these meetings with officials, not only because I like to rush home to my young sons at the end of the day, but because it’s important that UFT members are the ones voicing their support of DSC-NY demands—and imploring UFT staff, who are accountable to the membership, to come around on this issue as an authentic ally to the youth who are most impacted by the racial injustice of policing and harsh punishment.

Also, there is a campaign demand that is particularly close to Teachers Unite’s heart for the very reasons you mention in your post. DSC-NY is calling on the DOE to fully fund and support implementation of the following five key elements of school-wide restorative practices starting at 20 schools this September:

1. A Full-time Position of Restorative Coordinator, with the sole focus of coordinating a positive, restorative climate and approach to discipline at the school, including overseeing implementation of the other four key elements below (in the case of campus schools where multiple small schools share the same building, the budget should allow for one coordinator per school, not one per campus).

2. A School-wide Strategic Plan with participation of all school stakeholders that integrates pre-existing behavior-related strategies, such as Fairness Committees, conflict resolution, peer mediation and peer mentoring, into a restorative framework and set of values, and integrates that framework into existing school structures, such as advisory periods, town hall meetings, after school programs, and School Leadership Teams.

3. Ongoing Training for All Stakeholders, including faculty, counselors and other school employees, School Safety Agents, and a core group of student and parent leaders who can develop the skills to train their peers.

4. Youth and Parent Leadership in the process of planning and implementing restorative practices in school, such as forming Student Leadership Councils, engaging students and parents to be a part of trainings for school staff, and engaging students in producing videos, skits, posters and other materials to promote restorative approaches among their peers.

5. Systematic Collection and Monitoring of Data in collaboration with administrators, faculty, students and parents to develop a common set of indicators and protocols for collecting data to help understand the implementation and results of restorative practices in the pilot schools.

You can read more about how we outline this kind of whole school support, and examples of it in action, in our case study found here: http://www.dignityinschools.org/files/DSC-NY_CaseStudy_2013.pdf

We are promoting and supporting the philosophy and practice of restorative justice school by school, because we know while it’s important to have support for these shifts come from the top—nothing’s going to work unless the rank-and-file educators, parents and students are making changes from the ground up. I invite your readers who are UFT members to join us at TU in order to augment the voices of educators speaking out against the damaging and racist impact of punitive discipline policies.

UFT Contract - What's Missing - How About Discipline?

The amount of short-sighted "trust" the UFT/Unity crowd is giving this administration is astounding. We have learned from almost 50 years in the UFT - if it's not in the contract, there are no guarantees -- even if it's in the contract, many have learned that the loose language and loopholes allows the DOE to drive truck bigger than Godzilla through.

Fariña said that she wanted to see schools reform their discipline policies to focus on restorative justice, not suspension.--NY Daily News, NY Post ....Chalkbeat

I cheer Farina for this initiative. BUT.....The contract with a golden chance to encode some permanent solutions on the discipline issue failed to address any recourse that would protect teachers and children for the day Carmen is not there anymore. Or de Blasio either.

Or even while they are there we have so many principals that blame the teachers for everything and provide no support, there is a need in the contract to protect teachers.

Read Laurel Sturt's "Davonte's Inferno" for a horror story of 4 principals over 8 years not lifting a finger. Here was the opportunity to give teachers some control over the piece of crap principal -- how about a contract item that if a certain percentage of the staff signs a petition on discipline issues in a school the DOE will send in people to monitor?

I'm not talking about harsh discipline but a system to manage discipline. [I was saved in my early days by an amazing AP named Norman Jehrenberg -- a hard ass guy who once he thought you were really trying provides support by removing any child I needed removed for a cooling off period - and it worked - for me. He would show up within 10 minutes - and once he did a few times I didn't have to use him again.]

The amount of short-sighted "trust" the UFT/Unity crowd is giving this administration is astounding. We have learned from almost 50 years in the UFT - if it's not in the contract, there are no guarantees -- even if it's in the contract, many have learned that the loose language and loopholes allows the DOE to drive truck bigger than Godzilla through.

One of the biggest complaints you hear from teachers is around the discipline issue - a lot of it about lack of support from administrators. On the other end we hear about the other end of the stick - harsh no excuses from the charter schools.

I have always opposed suspending students and never once asked a supervisor to do so. I felt that was a defeat. Since the kid always was coming back I knew I had to have a permanent solution - and I usually found one. But let's leave that for another time.

The articles in the Post and News doesn't give Restorative Justice its due. I instinctually used some of the concepts in my classes to resolve things. I taught in a high poverty area and I was lucky - discipline was easy for me. But the administrations I had were supportive - except in my 3rd year of teaching when we had a fairly new principal who didn't have a clue -- and I left that school partially because I didn't feel he supported teachers on discipline.

I hope that Farina works with the Teachers Unite crew on this initiative. Sally Lee and the gang have been doing fabulous work on restorative justice and the DOE should consider funding them to expand their work. [I am very proud to have been one of the first 5 people to join TU].

Support Teachers Unite "Growing Fairness" Film on School to Prison Pipeline

Talk about school to prison pipeline? I once got a Thanksgiving Day collect call from an upstate prison from one of my favorite former students serving 15 to life (he got out after 28 years) who after a brief conversation handed the phone over to another fave who then told me there were 9 guys from the same buildings in the cell block.

I guess I didn't know it at the time but with some of my toughest kids I must have been doing some restorative justice given that generally I had good relations with these kids, I think because I wasn't judging them, only a specific behavior.


 

Not to preach once again, but there is some value in a teaching career working in one neighborhood school (in my case for 27 years) and learning lots of lessons over time. The ed deform destruction of neighborhood schools and the promotion of a teacher turnover corps (don't be dumb and stay in the classroom, go into ed policy) is making that impossible. Enough preaching.

Sally Lee of Teachers Unite uses the video below to present a project aimed to reverse the trend of turning schools into prison-like atmospheres full of police and metal detectors. TU has re-focused its attempts towards restorative justice, which can help change the climate in the relationships between teachers and children with difficult behavior patterns.

I know that some teachers want more police, suspensions, metal detectors, etc. and I know that things are often out of control. But we do not have rational people running the school system and many schools. Throwing kids out or using extreme punishment on damaged kids has no long term benefit to society or to individual teachers. I felt like a total failure when I failed with some kids and I soared when I was successful -- sorry, I never defined success as raising a test score but as being able to move child emotionally in a more positive direction -- which by the way often --- though not always -- moved the test score too.

Sally's husband Josh Heisler writes of his experience:

I am convinced that working with students and adults to resolve the daily problems that arise in the course of a week in a just and caring way is so much better than a authoritarian, top down approach that you see in most schools. The community that can exist in school is really special and practices like fairness go a long way to build these communities. I've learned that this all takes a lot work, caring communities are hard to build and even harder to maintain. It can get messy and complicated. One thing is for sure, you have to reestablish fairness at a school year after year. Students and teachers have to experience this alternative discipline model before they can see its benefits and appreciate the community it builds.

So give Teachers Unite a hand with this project and one day you might find yourself in the role of Androchles facing an angry lion who has been told of your kindness (I know, I know, this was a stretch).

There are only 16 days left to raise the $20,000 and they are a quarter of the way there. I've already sent in my hundred bucks so I can get the tee-shirt.

Here is the donation web site: http://www.indiegogo.com/GrowingFairness?c=home

And check out this infographic:

Growing Fairness is a short documentary film and companion guide for educators and community members looking to change their school climate for the better. Featuring teachers and students, Growing Fairness will tell a story about school climate, restorative practices and their real impact on young people in New York.

We're so excited about this project that we've already started filming interviews, and before this Indiegogo campaign is through, we will have developed a storyboard for the documentary and outlined the companion toolkit, which will provide concrete resources developed by teachers for school communities to use in making a transformational shift away from suspensions and policing and toward student leadership and community empowerment.

The success of this Indiegogo campaign will determine the quality, scope and impact of Growing Fairness. Your donation will give us the ability to gather more interviews and resources from across the country to give an inspiring look at how whole school districts have taken action and introduced restorative justice to public education. Your donation will also enable us to host screenings and teacher-led workshops with communities across the country, expanding our distribution as well as the impact of the project.

Please help us make our vision a reality. Teachers Unite is a 501(c)(3) organization, so your donations will be tax deductible.

campaign? http://www.indiegogo.com/GrowingFairness/x/1696300?c=home

Quick Update: Michael Fiorillo just sent this:

"Isolation Rooms" in Elementary Schools: Are They Treatment or Punishment?
Take a look at the photo in the story and you'll see that the question posed by the title needn't be asked.

http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/isolation-rooms-elementary-schools-are-they-treatment-or-punishment