School Closing Poison Pills: Jane Addams Under Attack and Columbus HS Doomed?

COME TO THE GEM CLOSING SCHOOLS MEETING TO START TO FIGHT BACK: OCT. 26

The school closing, reorganization, reconstitution, turn-around - whatever you want to call it - game is starting up early this year. Brian Lehrer had Beth Fertig and Gotham's Maura Walz and Anna Philips on this morning with their new joint project of following 3 schools for the year. They're calling it The Big Fix when it should be called "The Fix Is In". Just listen to what they has to say about Columbus HS which Anna is covering as the DOE starves it of resources and squeezes it to death like a Python's prey.

Or Inside Job if you want to see what the Ed Deform mentality did to the economy.

See the WNYC web site and leave comments.

This morning we heard from old pal Glenn Tepper at Jane Addams HS
 

Please forward:

Chancellor Klein and the rubber-stamping DoE deliberately force-fed Jane Addams a series of poison pills, over a period of several years, all with the intended outcome of causing the school to implode over time.  And now all the band-aids in the world can't stop the hemorrhaging.  All along, the plan was to destroy the school.

Right to the end, the DoE continues to get the name of the school wrong:  It's Jane Addams High School for Academics and Careers, not Jane Addams High School for Academic Careers (which makes no sense).  Although I brought this to the attention of several DoE honchos, over several years, the error has continued.  Why admit fallibility?  Why bother to fix something when the plan has been to cause the school's slow demise?

-Glenn

Friends,
From a teacher at Jane Addams HS where I worked from 1980-2007. The best and most compassionate teachers in the world taught at Jane Addams, for decades an oasis  in the infamous south Bronx, a school my colleagues and I truly loved.

The DOE is indeed going mad.
Dana Lehrman

Hello Dana,
They are coming after us...  The superintendent came to school on Thursday and Friday. The report below is what they plan for us.  They are blaming the teachers. . .  it is crazy. This week we are having both the quality review and people from the state to look at our school and decide what to do.  But, they pretty much have their minds made up.  They know that the parents won't speak up.  We only had 3 parents at the meeting.  It was supposed to be at 3pm and we had 6 parents.  But, the superintendent said she was told it was 5pm.  So the 3 of the parents left.  We are an easy school to close because parents aren't going to fight.

Anyway, please forward this information on to people who care because we need to speak out.
We need to be heard.

Thanks - a teacher at the school

FACTS? 
http://schools.nyc.gov/community/planning/changes/bronx/addams
 
If you look at the numbers - that despite the fact that we have 500 fewer students in the last 5 years. . . we have more special ed students.  We also now have more ELL learners with IEPs and about the same number of overage students.  In 2006 we had 19 kids in temporary housing, last year we had 105.  

http://schools.nyc.gov/documents/oaosi/cepdata/2009-10/cepdata_X650.pdf
http://schools.nyc.gov/documents/oaosi/cepdata/2008-09/cepdata_X650.pdf
http://schools.nyc.gov/documents/oaosi/cepdata/2007-08/cepdata_X650.pdf
 
They are comparing our results to a "peer group."  If you look at the demographics of the schools below it's crazy that they consider these schools equal to Jane Addams.  

One of the schools they are comparing us to is New World High School
http://schools.nyc.gov/documents/oaosi/cepdata/2009-10/cepdata_X513.pdf

Belmont Preparatory High School
http://schools.nyc.gov/documents/oaosi/cepdata/2009-10/cepdata_X434.pdf

Thd New Mareketplace report predicted what would happen as Bloomberg and Klein started shutting down schools.

http://www.newschool.edu/milano/nycaffairs/publications_schools_thenewmarketplace.aspx

GEM Focuses on Closing Schools

The Grassroots Education Movement is holding a meeting focused on the closing schools on Oct. 26.
Last year the UFT never tried to organize all the closing schools into a strong body of resistance but took each case individually, arguing that some schools should be closed no matter what poison pills were fed to the school.

That is the focus behind the meeting - to try to bring this year's target list together before the ax falls.
We are developing a fightback toolkit modeled on the toolkit developed last year to fight back against charter school co-locations.

We are flyering as many of these target schools as we can get too - yours was on our list.

GEM General Open Meeting on School Closings:
Tuesday, Oct. 26

**** please forward widely ****


School Closings
An Educational Solution or a Political Attack on Public Education?

Tuesday, October 26 4:30-7 pm
CUNY Graduate Center
34th and 5th Ave. Room 5414 (Bring ID)
Trains:  N, R, D, F, Q, B, W, V, 6, 1/2/3
Grassroots Education Movement
gemnyc@gmail.com
www.grassrootseducationmovement.blogspot.com

·            What is the impact of closing schools on students, parents and teachers?
·            How is closing schools being used to dismantle and undermine the public education system?
·            What is the effect of closing schools on our educational system?
·            Can schools under threat band together to fight back en masse?
·            How can GEM and others work within the UFT and schools to create an effective fightback movement?
·            Help put together a toolkit that schools can use to fight back. See a draft at the GEM blog.

President Obama has called for the closing down of 5000 supposedly failing schools nationwide. Here in NYC the Bloomberg/Klein administration has closed over 100 schools, with dozens more slated to get the ax. Smaller public schools or charters have replaced many. In both instances, there is some proof that through various means students with the most intense needs are not accepted with the same frequency as the traditional public schools.

School closings, reorganizations, reconstitutions, and "turn arounds" have become a mainstay of the so-called education reformers, code words used by edubusiness free marketeers. Are the educational needs of students the main consideration? Or, lurking in the background, is this merely a tactic to empty school buildings of tenured, unionized, and higher-cost more senior teachers, as well as the most at risk students, and to replace these schools with charter schools run by privatized interests with the right political connections?

What can schools in NYC do to fight back? The UFT has shown it can be a force in mobilizing thousands of people (PEP, Jan. 2010) and win the high ground, but has relied on a court case which was won based on narrow procedural grounds instead of the broader issue of whether closing down schools is sound educational policy. While the 19 schools were ordered kept open for one more year (Klein has made it clear he will attempt to close them this year) the DOE undermined attempts to recruit entering freshmen.  Meanwhile, the UFT and the DOE agreed to allow new schools to open in some of these buildings, thus further undermining them.

In Chicago, the actions of teachers, parents and students managed to reverse decisions to close six schools. Can an alliance between schools under attack be forged to create a strong response? Bring your experiences and ideas to a discussion with the Grassroots Education Movement (GEM).  Join with others in attempting to analyze what is behind the mania for closing down public schools and destabilizing education in low-income neighborhoods.

Klein Violates Court Order By Shunting Kids Away From Jamaica HS AS UFT Makes Backroom Deals

From Day 1 I said the UFT law suit was more PR than reality. And here is proof.
Click to enlarge. Email me for a pdf.

Jamaica HS admissions letter 

This is the letter which Mr. Forrestal sent to Michael Mulgrew on June 11th: 

HILLCREST ESTATES CIVIC ASSOCIATION

Mr. Michael Mulgrew

President

United Federation of Teachers

Dear Mr. Mulgrew:

I am the president of the Hillcrest Estates Civic Association and a member of Community Board 8.    Our association is zoned for Jamaica High School.       The civic association and the community board have, through various means, advocated against the arbitrary phase-out of Jamaica High School.    To your organization's credit, you have taken successful legal action to stop this injustice.

Since the March 26th ruling by Judge Lobis, the Department of Education has been consistently attempting to thwart her ruling.    I am chagrined that the UFT has failed to return to Judge Lobis to seek satisfaction through a restraining order.     It appears to me, as a non-lawyer, that their actions to co-locate two new schools in the Jamaica High School building, without compliance with the Mayoral Control legislation enacted last summer, is flagrantly illegal.

The disregard of law that is being shown by the Department of Education, as illustrated by the attached letter, is outrageous.   This letter at least borders on contempt of court.

This is an issue that goes well beyond Jamaica High School and other organizations.   If the UFT allows this disregard of law to succeed, the future will bring even further totalitarian rule.   For the sake of the students, the teachers and staff, and the entire community, I urge you to return to court to seek compliance with the laws.   As a teacher, you are well aware that the actions of adult leaders speak louder than words and have a greater impact on students.

Thank you for your consideration of this matter.

Sincerely,

Kevin J. Forrestal

President

Hillcrest Estates Civic Association

The UFT/DOE Agreement on School Closings

People have been asking for commentary on the agreement between the UFT and DOE yesterday on the closing schools. I was at the Gotham Schools office yesterday providing background on the AFT convention when I heard. I'll get to it later, but from what I know of the UFT and how it functions, people are screwed over the long run. I can't think of one agreement they have made over the last 10 years where people aren't screwed- of course the Unity flacks will talk about money. Which is exactly the point. The UFT sells people off for money. People are always willing to take the money because they don't see the long-term consequences, especially when the union uses a total full court press to convince them while the voices opposed are drowned out even if they eventually prove to be right.

People are horrified at what has been allowed to happen to the public education system. No matter how bad in the past, the current deforms have cut a path of destruction. What horrifies people even more is how much the UFT/AFT has cooperated when they could have led the forces of resistance.

I'll have more from James Eterno later.

Commentary from
NYC Educator: UFT Listens to Gates, Gives Up

Gotham links:
The city and union agreed to a plan for housing new schools. (GothamSchools, Daily News, NY1, Times)

Tweed's Shameful Performance at Beach Channel High School Closing Meeting

There is so much to say about the meeting last night where Tweed sent people who had few answers to parents, teachers and students. I was there with Howie Schwach, editor of The Wave (#10 in NY Magazine's Reasons to Love Living in NYC) to cover and have about an hour of tape. Here are 3 students. Chris wants answers and asks "why didn't you fix us?" Ingrid says there will be more dropouts if they close the school, especially with the loss of free transit for students. Another student wants to know why the PEP meeting to decide the fate of the school will be held in Staten Island. Oh, the hypocrisy. Michelle Lloyd-Bey who played a big role in closing down Far Rockaway is all about data and stats. Clearly, human issues don't count, but she talks about the "concern" for the students.

I have some good stuff from politicians and teachers and Howie and I. More over the next few days.

UFT Resolution on Closing Schools: Is it all talk?

UPDATED 1pm:

When the announcement to close Lafayette HS in Brooklyn was made a few years ago, Randi Weingarten said it was right for the school to be closed. That was despite the fact that a known incompetent principal who was often laughed at in the Leadership Academy was appointed as principal. Sources say that even within the Academy, people were incredulous and knew that she was purposely appointed to kill the school.

But this happens so often as to make almost seem a policy. Some of the schools being closed have such awful leadership appointed by Klein that the teachers don't even want to fight to keep them open.

You're on your own kids

Thus in the context of UFT policy in the past of putting up weak objections and little real fight against closing schools (the national credibility as partners in the ed deform movement must be upheld) we have the recent announcement of over 20 school closings as an in your face move by BloomKlein towards the UFT. "We dare you to do something," they are saying.

The UFT has never used any real political capital to fight for keeping schools open, saying the fight has to come from within the schools. But philosphically, the union has been willing to agree to join in the judgement that some schools are bad without holding the managers of the school system truly accountable. Nice work. Help BloomKlein dig the hole (2005 contract) and stand by while they shovel in the dirt.

We must also factor in the numerous ATRs that are being created as a factor, all of whom have to be paid even when their schools are closed. The school closings are part of the assault as a way to create so many ATRs that public pressure will build for the UFT to give them up. Maybe declare a fiscal emergency as a way to get the dysfunctional legislature to take some action to force the issue. Who knows what they have up their sleeve, but they seem to have left the UFT like a whirling dervish spinning itself into the ground. What you get from always playing defense.

Someone at the ICE meeting Friday night said Mulgrew almost looks like Neville Chamberlain wanly holding up a "Peace in our time" sign. I thought more of Stalin who was shell shocked with the Germans invaded Russia in June 1941, thinking he had made peace with Hitler and could trust him to keep to his word. "Thompson for mayor," anyone? Remember how Mulgrew and Paul Egan at the DA said they couldn't endorse Thompson because they had to do what's best for the members. How's that working out guys?

Last night's UFT Exec Bd meeting passed a resolution on closing schools that will be discussed and voted on at the Delegate Assembly tomorrow. It has a lot to say and we can agree with many points. But lots of resos on closing schools have been passed and nothing has changed. No line in the sand is ever drawn. The UFT promotes and supports the actions of individual schools but does not tie them all together, which is were the critics of Unity Caucus stand. The TJC/ICE/GEM reso calls for a citywide rally, either at City Hall or Tweed before the Jan. 26 PEP meeting, no matter where it will be held. We even held a discussion about going to Bloomberg's home for a rally and a smaller ad hoc contingent may actually try and do that.

Whether the UFT supports a central rally or not, one will be held even if it is small as a way to give all the schools a chance to gather together and express their outrage. A proposed date has been chosen, though I am embargoed from releasing it until after the DA. The UFT leadership will be given an opportunity to get on board or be left behind.


UPDATE from Marjorie Stamberg:

A brief note about the discussion at the E-board last night.

They will present a resolution on closing schools. Many whereas-es, long, with detailed information on the DOE's phony statistics. Several "Be It Resolved" clauses, the last of which is a liquid formulation calling to mobilize the UFT membership in support of the schools which are fighting the closings.

What does this mean? The maximum they will go, as one of the ad com people said in the floor discussion, is a loose call for a "Day of Solidarity" which will be 5 separate boro rallies, i.e, diffuse, no citywide mobilization that would pose a real showdown with the DOE. .

Mulgrew's report centered on UFT "mobilizing" its members to call every elected official in the universe, because they will respond to the community's wishes, if they wish to be re-elected. He did stress strongly it must be with the parents, students, "the community"; that the UFT cannot act alone. True enough , but little said about the UFT mobilizing its enormous infrastructure in joint ACTION with parents, unless by action they mean keying up cell-phone numbers.

A remark by Leo Casey struck me as key to understanding their thinking. He said (this is a paraphrase) that we want to make the cost so high to them in closing the schools, that they will think twice before doing it again. I.E. -- they're going to let it happen, after making some noise.

As I've mentioned, I think the UFT bureaucracy has finally realized that mayor and the DOE is coming after them like a two-ton truck, and they have to do something. But they are clueless, and fearful, as to what any real mobilization would look like. Because they are beholden to their "partners" in Albany, and Washington.


You can read the full UFT reso at Norms Notes.
UFT Proposed Resolution on School Closings for Dec. 16 DA

The Save Jamaica HS Facebook page is up to 2293 members.

Behind the Beach Channel High School Closing

Did the Closing of Far Rockaway HS Turn Beach Channel Into the Next Target?
by Norman Scott

The recently announced closing of nine public schools, including Beach Channel, the only comprehensive high school in Rockaway, has raised questions as to whether school closings are part of an attempt to engineer space in public schools for pet charter school projects by financial and political supporters of Mayor Bloomberg.

Charges have been made that school closings are based on artificially manipulated educational factors and statistics in order to satisfy a politically motivated agenda to create a semi-privatized system using public funding. The focus has been on the privately managed charter schools which hunger for space in public school buildings. Are these school closings just real estate grabs for people connected to the Bloomberg administration? The decision to close Beach Channel is being examined by some in the context of the charter school interests of current and former Rockaway politicians like State Senate leader Malcolm Smith and former Congressman Floyd Flake. Smith is a founder and on the Board of Peninsula Prep Charter School, which is viewed as a potential occupant of a vacated Beach Channel building and Flake has been a long-time backer of charter schools.

Was Beach Channel "set up" for closure by the NYDOE? When the Gotham Schools blog announced the closing of Beach Channel High School this week it made this reference:

Beach Channel received attention in 2007 after students and teachers complained about a destabilizing influx of students who had not chosen to attend the school but were placed there. Those students included many who would have been zoned for Far Rockaway High School, a large school nearby that has since begun to phase out.

Beach Channel received this attention in Samuel Freedman's education column in the NY Times on Nov. 7, 2007 which was titled: A High School Struggles With Surprise Students. [The column is now defunct, with some charging its demise was due to his exposure of many of the flaws in the Bloomberg/Klein education agenda.]

Freedman described Beach Channel as a

"school [that] has been destabilized...by an unannounced influx of students from outside its attendance boundaries. Some arrived with histories of disciplinary problems or even criminal activity, school records show, while others had been in full-day special education programs. Others brought volatile gang allegiances from their home neighborhoods, according to school personnel. And in no case did Beach Channel receive advance warning...
[A] detailed memo written by two...assistant principals paints a vivid picture of an improving school rattled by the violent or criminal behavior of several dozen students that the memo says were foisted on Beach Channel...
....the department [of education] does not dispute that in the first month and a half of the [2007] academic year at Beach Channel, as the memo describes, there was a spike in disruptive incidents: drug possession, weapons possession, fighting, insubordination to school safety officers and an attack on a dean. The memo lays the responsibility for many of these episodes on the newly enrolled students. The net result, the memo said, was a 'crisis situation.'"

The Beach Channel closing was announced amidst a flurry of other large high schools closings. The fazing out of Jamaica HS and Maxwell Vocational School in East NY in Brooklyn has raised a stir. Maxwell has suffered some of the same issues Beach Channel has faced since nearby schools like Jefferson and Lane were closed and other area schools like South Shore and Canarsie are being fazed out. Small public and charter schools that add one grade at a time cannot absorb the influx of students from fazed out schools, in particular the students in special ed and ELL's (English Language Learners). As we went to deadline, a rally at Maxwell was to take place on the afternoon of Dec. 9, with teachers from schools around the city who are seeing a future of mass school closings and teachers being forced into becoming Absentee Teacher Reserves (ATRs) after their schools closed expected to attend.

Schools on the chopping block, theoretically, will have their day in court. Proposed school closures must now be given public hearings and approved by the Panel for Educational Policy [PEP], the current school board, which has functioned as a rubber stamp, since the new school governance law was passed during the summer. The PEP, however, has never rejected a DOE policy proposal. The January 26, 2010 PEP meeting at which many closings will be discussed will be held in Staten Island which has had no schools closed in this round of closings. Activists from some of the schools to be closed are trying to organize as many people to attend as they can.

The DOE's Educational Impact Statement announcing Beach Channel's closing stated that "Approximately 1,345 high school seats will be eliminated by the phase-out of Beach Channel. However, the majority of those seats will be recovered with the phase-in of new schools throughout the City." Note it does not say they will be recovered in Rockaway. Certainly not at Channel View serving grades 6-12, also occupying space at Beach Channel. Channel View's enrollment for 2010-11 is capped at 600 and will not have to suffer the same problems Beach Channel went through when Far Rockaway was closed.

With Rockaway being so isolated geographically, the closing of the only large comprehensive high school on the peninsula will have a major impact on students: those remaining at the soon to be closed school, those not accepted into the new small schools and the schools they do end up at. Schools targeted for closing suffer enormous deterioration as morale suffers from a sense of moving deck chairs on a death ship. The nearest large high school is John Adams in Ozone Park, which may end up being overloaded and destabilized by the Beach Channel influx. That a local school like Channel View is capped and John Adams will be forced to accept the Rockaway kids is one of the fault lines in the Bloomberg/Klein program.

One of the consequences of the national educational reform agenda that Bloomberg and Klein have signed onto has been the death of many locally zoned neighborhood high schools, which are seen as obstacles to their plans. The closing of Beach Channel is one more domino to fall in a process that will leave few large high schools left standing.

------
Leonie Haimson a parent activist who heads Class Size Matters commented on the Beach Channel Educational Impact Statement, which can be downloaded at http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/BB6C514A-6B19-4FAA-B808-C407D693A972/73431/27Q410_BeachChannel_EIS1207091.pdf, commented:

"This is the worst EIS I have ever seen. These people clearly [at Tweed] don’t have any idea on how to run a school system; or maybe they just don’t care. Approximately 1,345 high school seats will be eliminated by the phase-out of Beach Channel. However, the majority of those seats will be recovered with the phase-in of new schools throughout the City……[where are these new seats? They do not say. The vast majority of HS are already hugely overcrowded.]

All current grades 9-12 students at Beach Channel will have the opportunity to graduate from the school, assuming they continue to earn credits on schedule. Current Beach Channel students enrolled in grade 9 for the first time will have the opportunity to participate in the citywide high schools admissions process so that they can begin in a different school for grade 10 in September 2010 (pending satisfactory completion of promotion criteria and grade 10 seat availability). Current Beach Channel grade 10 students and students who are repeating grade 9 are encouraged to meet with their guidance counselors to explore their options for the 2010-2011 school year.

Now according to the DOE many 9th graders aren’t accumulating enough credits; this is one of the reasons they have decided to close the school. What happens to them? God knows. Surely the discharge rate will go sky high at this school. The DOE is hoping no one will notice.

The city’s bullet-pointed reasoning behind the closure, taken from an e-mail sent to reporters by DOE spokesman William Havemann, is below:

Phase-out of Beach Channel High School (27Q410)

The Department of Education is proposing the phase-out of Beach Channel High School, a high school in Queens that currently serves students in grades 9-12. Under this proposal, the school would stop accepting new ninth grade classes starting in September 2010.
The graduation rate at Beach Channel has consistently remained below 50%:
In 2007-08, the graduation rate was 46.1%.
In 2008-09, the graduation rate was 46.9%.
Credit accumulation rates are also low:
In 2007-08, only 52.1% of first-year students accumulated 10 or more credits.
In 2008-09, that figure fell to 50.8%
Demand for the school is low and declining:
In 2008-09 1,522 students enrolled in the school.
In 2009-10 this number fell to 1,345.
Beach Channel received a C on the 2006-07 Progress Report, a C on the 2007-08 Progress Report, and a D on the 2008-09 Progress Report, including an F in the Progress and Environment sub-sections and a D in the Performance sub-section.
Parents, teachers, and students expressed widespread dissatisfaction with the school on the 2009 Learning Environment Survey:
Only 59% of students believe that their teachers inspire them to learn, and only 56% of students feel safe at school.
Only 56% of teachers believe that order and discipline are maintained at the school.
Only 68% of parents believe their child is safe at school.

In Response to NYCLU/UFT Lawsuit, DOE Announces it Will Keep Schools Open

Gotham Schools has a report.

NYCLU Press Release at Norms Notes.

Ed Notes commentary to follow soon.

Voices of Brownsville: The Rally at PS 150

Parents and teachers rallied at PS 150 in Brownsville Brooklyn on March 18, 2009 to protest the closing of the school and its replacement by two charter schools. Here are some of the people from the school community who spoke. There will be a follow-up edited version, A Tale of the Two Rallies - the scary Harlem Success event later that night and this home-grown event.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-z4FavNfUI

We Survived Jim Crow, We'll Survive Bloomberg/Klein

PS 150 rallies to save a neighborhood school from the invasion of the school snatcher charters.

Photos by Angel Gonzalez posted on Facebook.

Parents, Teachers at Ocean-Hill Brownsville's PS 150K Lied to by Tweed

Ed Notes first reported on the situation at PS 150 in Brooklyn's Ocean-Hill Brownsville on Jan 26, 2009 PS 150: The Real Game Behind Closing Schools

When the first parent meeting was held the DOE could not (and would not) answer their questions about the transition. All they said was we don't know. Parents were upset, but did not do anything immediately. The school - parents and teachers - were told that the "new school" was going to be a charter school with all that it implies. It was a small group of parents, but they found out their children will not automatically move from 150 to the new school. NOW they are angry and are planning some type of demonstration. (We will report the details in a follow-up post.)

The UFT will supposedly file a lawsuit today against the DOE based on the children being rezoned to other neighborhood schools illegally. (Of course, this is like shooting peas at Godzilla, but why not?)

The DOE is doing the same thing in Harlem by turning PS 241, the zoned school, over to Eva Moskowitz' Harlem Success and forcing the kids into the other neighboring schools. The local schools due to get the "rejects" (or the non-creamed) from the charter schools at both PS 150 and PS 241 are now upset and would join in some kind of action if there was an organizing force out there. Unfortunately .....

....the UFT is the gorilla in the room, but sits there eating bananas.

Law suits are not enough. The UFT should be organizing the parents and teachers at all the schools announced as being closed into a potent force. But we know the leadership really agrees with the policy of closing "failing" schools. Failing based on what? The DOE puts in a principal from the Leadership Academy who is a destroyer, not a builder and blames the teachers. We know the goal: replace as many public schools with charters as is feasible. Instead of a systematic approach to opposing this policy, the UFT opens its own charters schools and also looks to pick up pieces of the teacher training gravy train.

The Independent Community of Educators (ICE), despite being a tiny group, through its ASC-ICE Committee, has taken up the task of bringing people together from at least some of these schools to search for a means of resistance by holding a conference on March 28 at John Jay College.

A NYC Teacher/Parent Asks: Closing Schools - WHY?

In my social circles, I speak with a number of people that have children in both private and public schools. Many of the parents are completely dumbfounded by the fact that a public school can just be closed down by the DOE WITHOUT any consultation with the parents or the community.

Closing the schools in a neighborhood completely changes everything for the people living there. Children must be registered with new schools, education is disrupted, bussing schedules changed, life must be completely reorganized. Parents and children must change everything to scramble to get their children into new schools and start over again.

NOT that these parents WANT ther children to be sent to a school where violence is strife, or the atmosphere does not contribute to learning. The BIG question is this: WHY can't the existing schools be made more productive, without closing them, and turning them into other schools?


It would seem to me with all of the geniuses that hold Harvard and Yale degrees in the offices of the DOE,that rather than blaming the teachers, there would be some studies made at the schools where there are problems to pinpoint precisely why schools fail. The simple fact is this- the school is an extension of the community- if the people that most have a vested interest in education of their children are kept out and excluded from the educational process (parents, teachers, school administrators), how could ANY school have the opportunity to turn itself around? Aren't those of us most directly involved more aware of what makes a school work than some bureaucrat sitting in Tweed?

Still, we let these bureaucrats close these schools, and we just let it happen. My opinion- it's time to put the word PUBLIC back in education and in service. Call me naive, but, aren't these PUBLIC servants like Bloomberg and Klein supposed to be answering to US?

It's time to grow a pair, people, and not only speak up, but GET the control back to where it belong- the people that pay the salaries of the Kleins and Cerfs- US!

Can the UFT Be Forced to Act on School Closings?

I guess wearing blue on Tuesday, as the UFT is urging, is just not going to be enough.

The UFT calls school closings a fait accompli.

We are all going to have to try to stop the insanity on our own.

ICE has been distrtibuting leaflets at the schools slated to close.
If you are at one of these schools contact us.

School closings and the ATR situation are obviously related.

The ASC-ICE (ATR/School Closing committee will be meeting on Wed. Feb. 28 at the Skylite Diner on 9th ave and 34 st at 5 PM. Open to all interested parties as we try to develop a strategy to force the UFT to act in our interests.


"Rain, hail, lightning, thunder, 72 won't go under."
There was a demo at PS/IS 72 in the East NY section of Brooklyn, 605 Shepherd Ave on Friday, Feb. 6. The UFT had an official - Bob Astrowsky - and a PR person to observe. ICE's John Lawhead covered it and took lots of pics of this spirated protest attended by City Councilman Charles Barron.

John reports:
Speakers condemned the destruction of the well-functioning school and declared that Chancellor Klein was "unqualified" to be their judge. Parent leaders are outraged by the erratic series of evaluations that have run from a "school in good standing" in 2007 to a grade D in 2008.

See more of John's great pictures at the ICE web site: http://www.ice-uft.org


Brandeis Protest: Tuesday, Feb. 10
SAVE OUR SCHOOL

The Brandeis High School Leadership Team strongly protests the Department of Education's decision to phase out our school. WE call on all Brandeis parents, students, teachers and staff to join us in a protest rally on 84th Street, Tuesday, February 10th at 4:30 pm. Together we will speak out to explain why we believe our school should remain open as a large comprehensive high school serving the needs of New York City students. Mayor Bloomberg, Save Our School!!
Resolution Adopted by the Brandeis SLT on February 5, 2009

PROTEST AND PICKET
FEBRUARY 10th
Meet on 84th Street in front of Brandeis at 4:30 PM

Representatives of Brandeis Parents, Students, Teachers and Staff Will Speak Out On Why Brandeis High School Should Remain Open as A Large Comprehensive High School Serving New York City Students


MS 399X Protests DOE Closing Threat Thurs. Feb. 12
Blogger jd2718 has some comments and urges support.
Attend the Rally to
Save MS 399!!
February 12th at 5pm
In front of Middle School 399
120 East 184th Street
Middle School 399 is Working

MS 399 had a previous rally on Dec 17 -
MS399 Protest against closing/phase out designation
ICE's Angel Gonzalez made a video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PqGPK_kK3MA&feature=channel_page

PS 150K Update

Our correspondent reporting on the situation at PS 150K, a school slated to close, sends this follow-up to a previous report.

There was a union person sent to 150K today to talk to the teachers about their rights and what to do as the year closes. Well, she was unaware that the school was getting a charter school. She then had little to say to the staff. The only thing they were told was that the current principal could only select folks to stay in the phase out school based on grade level seniority. Most of the teachers in the 7th and 8th grades, which are staying, are not fully licensed and would have to be let go.

A woman from the neighborhood said several folks had heard from others outside the school neighborhood that a charter was set to go in there even before the school staff were informed.

Next week someone from the DOE is scheduled to visit and speak with the staff.

Some Thoughts

From Loretta on ICE mail:

When I saw the photo of the pilot and noted the gray hair, I thought that if Joel Klein ran American Airways the pilot's 40 years of experience would have landed him in the pilots equivalent of the teachers' rubber room– not safely on the Hudson. How lucky those 154 people were to be in the hands of experienced people.

Comment: Pilots are unionized. They have work rules. And seniority. Are there calls for 6 week summer training programs for pilots? In the heaps of praise from the press, these facts get lost by the wayside.


From Michael Fiorillo on ICE-mail in response to this headline:

16 Chicago schools to be closed, consolidated or relocated

It's the Shock Doctrine at work: the economic crisis being used as an opportunity to implement the plan to close, reorganize, charterize, privatize and de-unionize schools.

Not exactly what we thought we were voting for in November, although some of that was our own - meaning those of us who voted for Obama, myself included - self delusion, since Obama has never hidden his intentions to expand charters.

"Change We Can Deceive In"

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Chicago Fight Back on School Closings