UFT Election Report: What I learned - Don't Eat the Cauliflower

Lots of infighting at the ballot count. Claims of paper thickness and other stuff is causing paper jams.--- 3:15 PM, April 18 - message from UFT vote count

The UFT should ask the American Arbitration Association for a rebate. I'm actually glad my wife had me on Passover readiness duty all day today in prep for our 27 guest tomorrow night so I wasn't able to give in to any temptations to go back after a wasted day yesterday -- though I did ask Amy Arundell to  write me a pass just in case I got the itch- she rightly said NO. Let me recount what happened yesterday.

The AAA serves dinner

April 17 - Dinner was served at around 7PM at the American Arbitration Association a few blocks from the UFT after a day of mostly wasteful vote counting. I wouldn't leave until I had this "wonderful dinner" but I finally gave up the ghost at around 8PM with literally no results. With every election cycle the process gets worse. And rumors are the UFT gives the AAA around a half a million bucks to run the election. I think even some of the top officials who were there with us to witness the fiasco might begin to rethink how UFT elections are run, though I wonder why they even bother anymore. I would give the half a million to a fund for an ATR bye out . As James points out, no one would notice anyway -- ICEUFT Blog: UFT ELECTION MERCIFULLY ENDS. 

Here is where the situation stood when I left at 8PM Wednesday when they were still tabulating the functional votes which were in the range of 10,000 and they were up to about 8,000 when I left. They expected to have slate results by 11 PM or later but based on the speed I didn't see how. There were still about 10,000 elem votes (based on how many in 2016, 4500 high school and 2500 middle school. They expected to begin again at 8AM this morning.

I got to the AAA, located in the basement of 120 Broadway at around 12 PM. In the room observing were Mike and Mark from New Action, Erik from Solidarity (Lydia came to relieve him later), Myrie from MORE, an alternating crew of Leroy/Dave Hickey/Howie from Unity, Amy as chair of the election committee, Yasmin who was in charge of the election process

Only about 10,000 retiree votes were counted using two scanners that seemed to come to a stop every minute. We were able to watch the ballots as they were scanned on a big screen. The process was so slow I left and went uptown to pick up some library books, drop them off at my apartment and since I didn't  have an ed notes leaflet prepared for the Delegate Assembly, I took my stash of the April edition of the Indypendent, which I distribute for them down to hand out at the DA. But it was 2:30 and I went back to the vote count and it was still crawling along with the retiree vote which at this point was around 18-20,000 with more to go. 

Then they did the functional which went by like molasses.
From what I saw on the big screen, Unity looked like it was winning the retiree vote by at least 10-1, with New Action pulling some votes and Solidarity too - MORE pulled very little from what I saw in the retirees.

In functional, Unity again was also winning very big -- maybe a little less than 10-1. MORE pulled some more votes here and so did Solidarity while New Action did very little.

At this point I left and finally wrote this up tonight -- and in the midst some real results came in -- reports later in a follow-up.

Mark and Mike from New Action

Mike Schirtzer on How Unity Caucus Votes - Nov. 2017

UPDATE: I've gotten some feedback on why I published these pieces by Mike and Arthur - Unity Fiddles While High Schools Unrepresented - Oct. 2017.

I wanted to show that they have both evolved - or devolved. One reader summed it up: Good to remind them both, who I support and voted for as individuals, what brought them to serve.
And to remind them that it was MORE/New Action, not themselves, who put them on the Ex Bd and that this time it is Unity who put them on the Ex Bd. One of our fights in MORE was that while they should have adherence to the MORE program they were also free to be individuals, which seemed to enrage some people in MORE. The same here- they owe some allegiance to the Unity program and the question is will they also be free to be individuals? If they are not then they won't be asked to run again.

No matter how good your argument is, no matter what our chapter members want, Unity members are required to vote what the party says. You cant change minds, your arguments don't matter because it has already been pre-determined how the members of the majority party will vote. It can become demoralizing.  ... Mike Schirtzer, Nov. 2017

With Mike Schirtzer's election on the Unity slate today, it is worth sharing some comments from Mike on ed notes a year and a half ago. Even though Mike hasn't been required to join Unity will be exhibit signs of the Stockholm Syndrome and vote the same as Unity?

{Look for a companion piece coming in a half houd on Unity from 2017 from Arthur Goldstein who is also elected today on the Unity line.}

Sunday, November 12, 2017

Mike Schirtzer on How Unity Caucus Votes

Mike, with over a dozen years in the system, ruminates on his experiences with the Unity Caucus machine. He is over 30 years younger than me but I expect when he reaches my age he will still be going to UFT DAs to hand out our newsletter, Another View in The UFT - Our New DA Newsletter.

Six years ago I was nominated as a UFT delegate from my school. That means I attend the UFT Delegate Assembly with chapter leaders and delegates from around the city once a month. The job of a delegate is  to hear a report from our union president on the state of our union, public schools, and what the latest news is from our relationships with politicians. Delegates also have time to ask questions and raise resolutions about the direction our union should take. Often the UFT leadership raises resolutions that dictate the direction of our union and polices we will advocate for.  These proposals should result in vigorous discussion and debate. After-all we're deciding on the direction  of the largest teachers union in the  USA. Whatever we decide has ripple effects throughout the country. However, I learned rather quickly the debates are far from honest.

The leadership of the UFT and close to 2/3 the 700 of the delegates that go to DAs are part of an inner political party, known as Unity caucus.  The Unity caucus members follow party lines, meaning they all vote the same way, every time, no matter what!.

When I showed at my first DA and I heard a chapter leader raising a resolution that any new evaluation system the union agrees to should go the membership for an online vote. It sounded like a rational argument to me, but then speaker after speaker got up and spoke against it. Finally someone from the DA stood up and said "I call the question" which meant debate ended without ever hearing an additional speaker in favor of the resolution.

It seemed weird to me. Why were fellow delegates, fellow teachers voting against and even speaking harshly in opposition to this resolution that all my friends at my school and every other school would vote in favor of? Seems obvious we should have a say in what our union negotiates that will impact our careers. When Mulgrew called on speakers he asked them for their names and schools. They all presented themselves and then spoke against it.

The resolution was voted down. It all seemed so strange to me. In the next few months there were resolutions raised against common core, against high stakes testing,  supporting parents that opt their children out of testing, and for sports programs in all schools, all voted down. They all were resolutions that would have been voted for overwhelmingly in my school and by my friends and family that are teachers. Yet they were all voted down.

At the same time resolutions for political endorsements that should have had discussion and debate were overwhelmingly voted on and spoke in favor of by all the same people. I began to realize each month it was the same people speaking against resolutions. Each month the same people were called on to ask softball questions. Each month Mulgrew called on the same people as if he never met them before.

Soon I learned all these people are in the same party or caucus, all are required to vote the same as Mulgrew, and are required to follow the party line whatever that might be. (This is known as democratic centralism.)

If Unity said common core and test based evaluations were great, then every Unity member would say the same. When the leadership reverses itself everyone in Unity goes along with the party line.

No matter how good your argument is, no matter what our chapter members want, Unity members are required to vote what the party says. You cant change minds, your arguments don't matter because it has already been pre-determined how the members of the majority party will vote. It can become demoralizing.

Now that I have  been elected to the UFT Executive Board as one of the seven MORE/New Action High School reps (Unity has the other 93 positions), I am finding the experience of the Unity wall the same as a DA, just on a smaller scale. Out of 100 members that are supposed to be discussing and debating the position and direction of our union, 7 are left to challenge the union leadership. While there is more debate than at the DA, decisions are already made behind closed doors.

While we almost always support the leadership positions, anything we bring up is automatically opposed or amended to take the teeth out.

If our group, MORE/New Action  says the sky is blue, the Unity caucus will say it's red. When members vote as a block and cannot be convinced to change their minds that is not in the best interest of our union.

Showing up to vote as a block and not identifying yourself as a member of Unity falsely leading everyone to believe you're speaking for yourself or the people who elected you in your school when in reality you're taking the party position and no one can can convince you otherwise.

Unity Caucus, which has exercised total power over the UFT since its founding, in theory functions internally in a democratic manner. But in reality, the top leadership decides and everyone follows along. So there is little real debate internally in the caucus and a narrow point of view and agenda becomes the operating feature. This leads to bad decision making and bad policy and ultimately causes harm to the membership. 

Arthur Goldstein - Unity Fiddles While High Schools Unrepresented - Oct. 2017

The frustration I don't really get is that of being in a union with leadership that treats us like garbage. I mean, we pay the same dues as everyone else. We pay UFT leadership. We pay NYSUT. We pay AFT. But we have absolutely no representation in any of it. We have more members than the entire Philadelphia teacher union, and just about no say in the decision making. Leadership has engineered it that way.... Arthur Goldstein, NYC Educator, Oct. 2017

Both Arthur and Mike were elected today as high school ex bd members on the Unity line. I thought it interesting to post some of their comments from a year and a half ago. Mike's went up before this post which was from Arthur on his NYC Educator blog. Since this post, Unity people have seemed to bend over backwards to be responsive to Arthur. Everyone in the UFT should establish a well-read blog if they want attention of the leadership.

Both of them believe the landscape has changed drastically, especially given the situation in the MORE caucus and their disillusionment with them and the opposition in general.

I am pretty sure that if the opposition had gotten together on the high school level there was a chance both Arthur and Mike may not have won despite their popularity since Unity has lost the high schools in almost every election since the late 80s.

Now to be fair, Arthur and Mike both believe there has been some movement for change inside Unity and they feel they have been recruited to help push for some changes in the UFT. Most of us vets believe that is sugar coating but with the addition of Mindy who did join Unity even a nudge will be better than nothing.

Saturday, October 28, 2017

Unity Fiddles While High Schools Unrepresented

It's kind of frustrating being a high school teacher in New York City. Some people will tell you that the kids we teach are difficult, but I always think as long as we can be crazier than they are, we'll be OK. I've got a difficult class this year, with widely varying levels of ability, but all of them are kids, and all of them are learning one way or another. The frustration I don't really get is that of being in a union with leadership that treats us like garbage.

I mean, we pay the same dues as everyone else. We pay UFT leadership. We pay NYSUT. We pay AFT. But we have absolutely no representation in any of it. We have more members than the entire Philadelphia teacher union, and just about no say in the decision making. Leadership has engineered it that way. Around the time I first started teaching, Mike Shulman of New Action was elected high school vice president. I knew nothing of union politics, but from the crap that showed up in my mailbox, he appeared the underdog. That was good enough for me.

UFT Unity contested his election. They kept him from office for a while. Then they ran another vote, and Shulman won by a larger margin. I voted for him again. I vote every chance I get. Unity was not happy, so as soon as they won the seat again, they changed the rules. Now high schools are not allowed to choose their own vice president. All VPs are chosen "at large," which works for monopolistic Unity. After all, it was only the high schools who challenged them.

This is like Donald Trump saying New York is too liberal when they choose governors. Maybe Trump will decide to have Oklahoma and Texas help us choose, thereby preventing our own choice. It would be an outrage, and what Unity does is an outrage. In the last election, high school teachers chose James Eterno as their Vice President. And yet, Eterno has no voice at AdCom. Thus we don't either.

Yesterday, a Unity rep who went behind my back to arrange an event in my school told me he was sorry that I "felt" high school teachers have no representation in NYSUT and AFT. Here's the thing--it's not something I "feel." It's something, period. And when UFT Unity ignores elected chapter leaders to do any damn thing they feel like, it's counterproductive and stupid on multiple levels.

For one thing, there's no need to run around backstabbing people and doing things surreptitiously. We can get things done that benefit all of us by communicating directly. I can't speak for everyone, but I'm not really big on dirty tricks. I don't see the point in cooperating with people who deliberately deceive me. I'm busy, I have priorities, and I'm not wasting time playing juvenile games.

I hear some suggestions that high schools can go another way, and I usually reject them. I've been trying pretty hard to see what we can do hand in hand with leadership. I've taken flack from a lot of my friends for supporting COPE in the face of the Constitutional Convention. Sometimes people in leadership say things that make sense to me. Sometimes they persuade me.

Other times I wonder just what in the hell we need some of these people for.

Today is Election Day at the UFT - Look at 2016 Outcomes

Francesco Portelos posted the outcomes from 2016 and since we will have results by tonight or tomorrow, it will be worth doing a comparison. Will this election break the pattern of the past 15 years where outcomes were fairly predictable? There are always lessons for the future.

Note in slide 4- over 24,000 retirees votes out of 60,000.
Total non-retiree votes: 28,000 - out of 110,000.
That's the election in a nutshell. Retiree votes always go up -- in fact the 2016 election they topped the limit and were a bit prorated.

Contract impact: There was a lot more unhappiness with the 2014 contract than the 2017 -- will that impact the vote?

The breaking of the opposition: Last time there were two choices on the ballot -- Unity and MORE/New Action - with Solidarity running as individual candidates. This time there will be 4 choices. Will that lead to bigger turnout or less?

The high school vote: Will the total of the 3 opposition votes in the high schools add up to more than the Unity vote? This is complicated somewhat by MORE not running any candidates in this category.

There are probably more issues to dissect but I am going to head in to the AAA at 120 Broadway to check on the vote count. Today is also a delegate assembly and I didn't bother to prepare a leaflet so if I get bored I may just go to a movie.

Here is what Portelos posted on FB:

The Black-White Testing Gap Is Real, and It’s a Disgrace - The Daily Howler

With respect to Stuyvesant, the Times responded with an ugly and stupid propaganda campaign designed to suggest that the achievement gaps in New York City actually aren't real.
It's all a matter of "test prep," this dumbest of all Hamptons-based newspapers said. Test prep, and the fiendish amounts of money spent on same by Those People, Gotham's devious Asians.
In weeks of insulting, ridiculous work, the Times used "test prep" as the way to prove that those very large achievement gaps aren't real. Last Saturday, the Times swing into action again, this time with a lengthy, front-page version of a favorite press corps novel.
The press has been pimping this heart-warming novel for at least the past fifty years. Though the novel can take on many forms, they all share a Platonic form. The name of this brain-dead novel is simple:

The Little School System That Could

The upper-end, liberal world has been typing this heart-warming novel at least since 1967. In that year, Herbert Kohl published his high-profile memoir, 36 Children, in which a nice guy shows up in a sixth-grade classroom in Harlem and the kids start writing novels.

However these pleasing tales may be intended, they promote an obvious fiction. They seem to say that those apparent achievement gaps really aren't real—that the gaps can quickly be erased by a nice guy who doesn't hate the kids, or by a hard-charging principal with some magic solution.

The Howler is always ready to flame liberals even though he claims to be one. But he also tells truths, and the fact he was a teacher in the inner city gives him some creds on education.

THE LITTLE SCHOOL SYSTEM THAT COULD: Kevin Drum published a sensible post!

http://dailyhowler.blogspot.com/2019/04/the-little-school-system-that-could.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheDailyHowler+%28the+daily+howler%29

 

Members First announces leadership team for May CTU election - Substance News

http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=7065

I've included the article from substance below - but first some commentary from me. The thing to watch is how Members First will come under attack from the left and how that will play in the vote.

CORE Caucus, which has run the Chicago Teachers Union since its surprise election in 2012, is facing its first challenge since that election by a new caucus made up of many people, some of whom had left CORE.

This first challenge to the leadership in Chicago - the election will take place May 17 -- will be more interesting to watch than the UFT election. The process in Chicago is more democratic than here in NYC and no Unity type power structure has survived, as opposition groups won power in 2001 and 2010. There is room for a run-off if more than two caucuses run and also I believe it is easier to elect a broader variety of people.

If CORE trounces Members First it will be a sign that they have done an effective organizing job. If the election is close, even it they win, it means they have a lot of work to do in repairing internal and external relationships.

CORE is a caucus with similarities to MORE - except it actually was able to organize effectively a decade ago with the aim to win power and managed to do so. There seems to have been some turmoil within CORE as there were two slates running to represent CORE in this election -- I reported on that in February - Chicago CORE Caucus Holds Internal Election - it seemed the leadership slate didn't win - so there was some unhappiness internally -- but since then there has been radio silence.

The late George Schmidt reported on Members First events in Substance and came under attack from CORE people -- one of the charges against him when they attempted to purge him was that he attended Members First meetings - which he didn't -- but posted reports from others. A clear division in CORE was over that attempt to purge George -- CORE Attempted Purge of One of Founders George Schmidt Failed in Chicago - Eight Women of Color Speak on George's Behalf.

I reported this in April 2018 based on a report received from George in Feb. 2018 -- which so resonated as at the same time MORE was engaging in similar actions. My comment a year ago in which I predicted the attempt to purge me from MORE for reporting on ed notes:

The ideological roots of the people who urge purges in CORE and MORE are similar and the tactic is a standard one in certain circles on the left. George was also charged with publishing reports on CORE in Substance. There are already hints that some people in MORE, closely associated with the same political forces in Chicago, are criticizing my publishing info coming out of MORE and at some point I would not be surprised to see attempts to expel me from MORE. Recently there was a suggestion from a prominent MORE leader to expel someone from MORE over a nasty email that was sent. In the background are the same vague charges of sexism directed at certain males. I am trying to avoid contact and private conversations with some of these people because anything I say or do can be distorted.... April, 2018

The views of George and many of us in ICEUFT corresponded pretty closely -- what I would call rationally, not ideologically driven progressive social justice. George was in town and met with a group of pre-ICEers at my house back in the summer of 2002, a year before ICE was founded.

The reaction of the ideologues is to brand such disagreement as right wing. Thus there are already signs of CORE people trying to brand Members First as right wing or attractive to right wingers. And we have seen internal ISO memos branding some of the people pushed out of MORE as being right winger - as ridiculous a claim as claiming George is a right winger. At least CORE gave George a chance to defend himself publicly at a meeting. The faction led by ISO in MORE just purged and suspended without even letting its own membership. I don't think ISO members functioned in CORE like they did in MORE according to what George told me - some ISO people supported him.

This is a debate I would love to have and every attempt within MORE to do so was deflected -- does a caucus exclude and then brand people who disagree? If in power like CORE there is something essentially wrong with that. In a caucus like MORE which supposedly wants to challenge Unity, I would welcome the debate.

Members First announced its existence as a push back to CORE.
See: https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2018/08/update-on-chicago-teachers-union-las.html

Some excerpts from George in an ed notes piece on the attempted purge: https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2018/04/core-attempted-purge-of-one-of-founders.html

2. LIES, DAMNED LIES, AND CORE STEERING COMMITTEE CLAIMS... The attack on me (and it included an attack on Substance) was based on lies, some ridiculous and some repeated enough to sound plausible to people without the time to pay attention. The facts included the fact that I had not "left" CORE to "join" Members First and that the claims (by a handful of CORE people now hiding out) that I was a "racist" and a "sexist" (among other things) had to be proved by citing certain specific actions, not by "feelings."
More than a dozen people spoke eloquently about the work that I've done on behalf of the union, CORE, and justice. It was nice to be there, but sad that it had to have been fought out. Now it needs to be discussed how the majority of the CORE "Steering Committee" could try to lead the caucus into what amounted to a Purge Trial (or, as one speaker said, to turn CORE into something out of Orwell's Animal Farm). Were I asked I have suggested that the "steering committee" resign and schedule a new election, since one of the main points of the discussion was that CORE is evading the issues facing the members in the schools and instead murking around in stuff like this attempted purge.
3. A couple of the CORE leaders (Craig and Drew most loudly) claimed that Substance has been unfair to CORE by publicizing Members First meetings with announcements and reports while ignoring CORE meetings. I've already called one of those and offered him a change to report for Substance, with editing (as we all face). As you know, for months I've been begging for SUBSART about Chicago's schools and the mounting problems facing the rank and file in the schools, at times to no avail. I know that everyone (including those I love most) are facing enormous pressures at the local level, from poor security and discipline to raging "Network" attacks at the classroom level, but I can only post at substancenews.net what we get in accurate reportings. Let's see how this works out in the future. 

George was critic of the direction CORE was leading the CTU -- that the membership wasn't being organized and that rallies became substitutes for that essential step - and along the way on the social justice train - the membership was being neglected.

Members First is somewhat akin to Solidarity here in NYC ---- and in essence the election in NYC which ends today with Unity winning everything comes down to a similar battle between Solidarity and MORE. I've heard behind the scenes whispers that the real reason MORE and New Action leaders didn't want to run with Solidarity was that Portelos appeals to right wingers. Maybe so - I know one right winger for sure running with them -- but I also know left wingers running with them. What about the middle wingers?

Members First! I don't like the name
While I do agree that a union leadership must take care of the essential needs of the membership I don't like the name Members First because there is something about saying to a world where you deal with children and parents who are crucial to your chances of winning any gains for the membership that they don't really count. I think here in NYC, the Solidarity name makes more sense because it is inclusive.

But similar issues in both NYC and Chicago are on the table, issues that have arisen in MORE and in CORE. A feeling that the faction leading MORE have pushed out the ICEUFT people -- who also feel that there must be a balance between social justice and fundamental union protections.

Here is the Substance article on Members First - or MF - written by Susan Zupan who is running on their slate.

http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=7065

Members First announces leadership team for May CTU election

Susan Zupan - February 26, 2019

Inside the International Socialist Organization’s Dissolution After a Rape Cover-Up

Why did the ISO implode so quickly, especially when the new leadership took many of the right steps to deal with the grenade that was dropped in their laps?

... ISO Leaks, Apr 11

I hope this ISO Leaks person is not taking asyslum in some embassy. Lots of stuff coming in from the left with a lot of insight and providing a deeper understanding for insiders like me as to how ISO operated in MORE.

I've heard long-time leftists wonder why some of the smart people they meet from ISO would chose to be in an organization - in some cases for their entire adults lives (many are recruited in college) which has had the same people on steering committee for 35 years. ISO leaks reports:

As far as anyone knows, the ISO’s last competitive SC election was in 1983 when the group’s founding leaders, Cal and Barbara Winslow, were ousted in an effort driven by the British Socialist Workers Party — then the ISO’s “mothership.” Ahmed Shawki and Sharon Smith were installed in the Winslows’ place on the SC where they (and a handful of close allies like Paul D’Amato) would remain for the next 35 years.

Michael Fiorillo, one of the ICEUFT founders and a life-long independent socialist comments:

it’s the Leninist/Vanguardist thing that’s in their DNA, combined with their bourgeois backgrounds/organizing strategies, which make them incapable/uninterested in actually talking with people who are different from them (as in, working people), the resulting insularity (always an occupational hazard on the Left) and a how-many-revolutionaries-can-dance-on-the-head-of-a-pin kind of scholasticism...

We saw the subversion of democracy in MORE led by the ISO faction which was dominated by white men. Very interesting.

While many left articles give credit for people inside ISO for pushing for reforms, they went along with a top-down fundamentally undemocratic organization which dictated policy from the top which was carried out by the apparatchiks in ISO in their union work which often engaged in attempts to suppress dissent in their caucus work - just as dissent was suppressed in ISO for 4 decades. The leaf doesn't fall far from the tree.

Why is this stuff important? Because the ISO faction in the UFT which has not always been a constant as new people kept showing up as others left, has played a major role in opposition politics. Thus I will be posting many articles and making the links to UFT politics. The refusal to run with other caucuses is directly related to the ISO decision making policy. I will expand in future articles.

ISO Leaks

Apr 11

https://medium.com/@isoleakss/inside-the-international-socialist-organizations-dissolution-after-a-rape-cover-up-b954e354143

UPDATE - Rally Monday - NY1: Some Parents Don't Want Charters Marketing to Them This Way

NYC Public School Parents

Come to rally on Monday to protest the Mayor letting charters access student information to help them recruit students - *Please come and show your support and share with others. Don’t let the Mayor chicken out on this important issue because he is more scared of the chart...

Charters which believe in choice don't believe in giving people the choice not to get their marketing crap. Parents with more than one child find that their child with higher scores get the mailings.

This NY1 piece features Naomi Pena of CEC1.

https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/politics/2019/04/13/nyc-considering-ending-policy-that-allows-charter-schools-to-use-private-contractor-to-market-to-public-school-parents

The WAVE - School Scope: The Smell of Socialism is in the Air

School Scope: The Smell of Socialism is in the Air
By Norm Scott

Submitted for print publication for April 12, 2019 - www.rockawave.com

There’s been a lot of talk about socialism. Bernie and AOC plus at least two other members of Congress, Brooklyn State Senator Julia Salazar and five just elected Chicago city council members identify themselves as members of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). The DSA has its roots in the Socialist Party of America (SPA), whose most prominent leaders included Eugene V. Debs, Norman Thomas and Michael Harrington. DSA has grown exponentially from 5 to 60 thousand members since the election of Trump in 2016.

I’ve been looking at options since I’ve pulled back from organizing in the UFT. One was to get involved in Democratic Party politics. A leader of a Manhattan political club told me to find a local club to join. Then I saw Lew Simon getting petitions signed to get current Queens borough president Melinda Katz on the ballot so she can run for Queens DA and the thought of having to do that made me gag. The DSA candidate is Tiffany Cabán who seems so much more akin to my politics.

So, I started to attend some DSA meetings to learn more about the organization The NYC group has 8 branches located geographically in all boroughs and a citywide labor branch for those in unions.

About 60 people attend the monthly meetings of the South Brooklyn branch. They are very well organized and have working groups organizing for housing, health care, climate and just about any other issue you can imagine. The idea is to activate people at the grass roots level but they also include lobbying and running for office on a Democratic Party line. At this point DSA is not interested in putting itself forward as a third party. The national organization and its local branches have already endorsed Bernie Sanders and are going full bore to support his getting the nomination.

There is a lot of internal debate inside DSA over which direction it should go. While avowedly socialist, DSA is a big tent for people with socialist ideas from revolutionary Leninists to social democrats along the lines of Scandinavian countries which are capitalistic, albeit with a lot of controls and high taxes. The key issue is who own the means of production, the state or private interests. I’m not ready to jump into full-bore socialism with absolute state control since that has not turned out so well. The China miracle can be attributed to the willingness to allow private interests to operate. But I do believe in heavy duty controls over free-reign capitalism where the profit motive will overrun everything and everyone and lead to immense wealth gaps. An extreme example are attacks on the public school system as being “socialist”, which the “choice” charter school movement has tapped into and has lead to one scandal over another. I believe in the neighborhood school and if you don’t like it go pay for a private school.

The closest this country has come to socialism was during FDR’s New Deal during the depression in the 1930s which gave us social security and other protections which Republicans and some Democrats opposed and have been trying to undermine since then, with some success. There are so many socialist brands inside DSA, including some New Dealers and other critics who say the Democratic Party is a dead end. I imagine Democratic centrists would be very happy if DSA just stayed away, given the threats to primary incumbents or to run people like Tiffany Cabán against machine candidates like Melinda Katz.

It was not that long ago where talk of socialism would cause most people to break out in wild laughter in this, the least socialistic nation. And Trump is going to make that his main attack on the Democratic Party. He may be successful in 2020 but over time the younger generation does not seem to have the same fear of socialist ideas, mostly due to the rampages of capitalism. No one wants to opt for the China model and it may take another severe depression to even bring us back to the New Deal, albeit with universal health care, something FDR had in his program but abandoned, fearing his going too far would endanger his entire program. Imagine if Roosevelt had succeeded then. What would Bernie have to talk about?

Norm runs a proletarian dictatorship at his blog, ednotesonline.com.

Sectarians Connections to UFT current and past history

Sectarianism is circling the drain. Schemes to turn the left into a larger version of a tiny little group of smart alecks are dropping dead. Please stop trying to make it work. And now a moment to reflect on the death of the purest and most successful sectarian of our time, James Robertson, founder of the Spartacist League.

...their [Sparts] arrogance and delight in pissing on their opponents - the old 'political monopoly' fetish that characterized Trotskyism that they made their key ideological feature - was [James Robertson's] gift to the left.

The Sparts consistently have the highest amusement value of any of the sects...

Aren't the Sparts set up and paid just to stir the pot among lefties?

Also, pour one out for the recently departed ISO.

--------Comments on FB on the death of the Spartacists' founder James Robertson.

I've always been on the periphery of the left. Over the decades one of the most sectarian Trotskyist groups has been the Spartacists --- A few were/are still in the UFT at some point but left the Sparts. There has always been some disdain toward Sparts.

There is are some interesting points made about sectarians on the left - and with the breakup of the sectarian ISO (the subject of attacks from the Sparts over the years) in recent weeks, independent leftists have also been posting "good riddance" comments. There may have been a rape but no one died in ISO.

I will continue to focus on the sectarian left because even with the breakup of ISO, the former members still have the same sectarian gene and will bring that to any group they join, especially as they pile into the non-sectarian Democratic Socialists (DSA) and form sectarian blocks. Yes, they also are the major block that intentionally created a split in MORE and took the new DSA people along with them.

I have a lot of stories to tell of the activities of sectarians inside UFT caucuses over 45 years of personal experience. That is one reason there has never been and never will be an effective opposition to Unity Caucus -- not the only reason, but a significant factor. I issue these declarations as a cautionary note to future UFT activists -- I've been fooled a number of times in the past - ICEUFT was formed partially as a block to left sectarianism.

Below is a section of the wiki on James Robertson --- a key note is mention of Max Schachtman a key influence over the founders of the UFT -- his wife Yetta was an advisor to Al Shanker. Yes, Virginia, the UFT was fundamentally founded by people with a deformed Trotskyist mentality - who turned into right wing social democratic neocons.

As you read more about ISO in upcoming posts, you will note the similarities with Unity Caucus and the controls over the UFT they exert.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Robertson_(Trotskyist)?fbclid=IwAR0gu1hDis5vNaVpoo8CQ6uodo
YrlNR4bVy6ugIlIwZjdfq8nwxLgxizpLc

UPDATE: Rally Monday - DOE Give Student Data to Charters: Did Charter Industrial Complex Get to Di Blasio? Where is UFT?

Monday Rally:

NYC Public School Parents

Come to rally on Monday to protest the Mayor letting charters access student information to help them recruit students - *Please come and show your support and share with others. Don’t let the Mayor chicken out on this important issue because he is more scared of the chart...

This morning [Thursday] at Tweed, Chancellor Carranza spoke about his opposition to the long-standing DOE practice of allowing charter schools to use the DOE mailing lists.  He said no final decision has yet been made to change this practice– contrary to what reporters had already been told about this as late as last night and parents this morning.  He asked for parents to make their voices heard about whether they wanted this practice to continue or not. 

For more on this issue, see our press release here, with quotes from parent leaders, which among other things points out that DOE is the ONLY school district in the country that provides this info to charters voluntarily, helping them recruit their students, take their space and their funding, which is now costing our schools more than $2.1 billion per year.  See also Diane Ravitch's blog, which hypothesizes that the Mayor chickened out when the news leaked out prematurely and he got blowback from the wealthy and powerful charter lobby.

Grace Lovaglio streamed Carranza's remarks to CPAC on Facebook live.  He addressed the student privacy and charter school recruitment issue for about ten minutes at 36.25 minutes in.  A rough transcript of his remarks follows: 

Carranza says that he has not gone to any parent meetings where he has not heard about the “predatory nature” of charters and all the mailings.   He tells the story of one parent who told him that only one of her children not to get the mailings is the one who tested gifted and not the ones w/ IEPs.  The Mayor has spoken that this is not okay. …now somehow this has become that the district is going to cut this off. I cannot speak to whether or not this is going to happen.

The press release below came out earlier in the day but there seem to be some backtracking by the chancellor and Di Blasio.
A dividing line in progressive Democratic Party politics will be standing up to the charter industry. Reports on this story from Leonie Haimson and Diane Ravitch.

This morning, there was the announcement below the latest updates. Then the chancellor seemingly changed his mind.

Leonie writes:

The DN editorial which apparently scared de BLasio off and once again insulted parents by calling them mushrooms and by claiming the opposition to the practice of letting charters use student info was led by the teachers union, which as far as I know has never said a peep about this.

https://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/ny-edit-de-blasio-vs-charters-again-20190411-smbwzldlavhq5hncjkd3gvu7z4-story.html

NYC Public School Parents

The Chancellor says no final decision has yet been made on the issue of providing student information to charters for marketing purposes - *More on this fast-developing and changing story here from the Daily News here.* This morning at Tweed, Chancellor Carranza spoke about his opposition to...

NYC: Faced with Charter Pressure, DeBlasio Backs Down by dianeravitch

Memo from the RTC: Tenors in Duplex and RTC Gets to See Andrew in Evan Hansen

Memo from the RTC: Tenors in Duplex and RTC Gets to See Andrew in Evan Hansen

This is the final weekend to see Rockaway Theatre Company’s hilarious production of “A Comedy of Tenors.” I went back for the second time last Saturday night and laughed harder than I did at the opening weekend matinee performance. I expect I will bust my gut at the closing performance at this Sunday’s matinee where we expect an almost full house. Given the word of mouth and editor Mark Healey’s superb review in last week’s WAVE I was surprised at the small size of the audience Saturday night, as the theater was less than half full. But the laugher of the 80 attendees more than filled the house. Funny but the next day’s matinee had a full house. There must have been something going on last Saturday. I hadn’t known Mark was a professional actor in his prior life. As a former insider he was wowed by the RTC at this his first show. He pointed out just how difficult a play this is to perform and how without perfect timing it would be a disaster.

Bronx ATR Predicts Failure of Bronx Plans --- UFTJoins in as Distraction from Real Problems

I was talking today to some teachers about the idea that most of us went to our neighborhood schools through high school. And most teachers spent their entire careers in one school - all this was destroyed by BloomKlein. Here is a wise comment along these lines after I posted about the Bronx Plan, where by the way, all Queens schools happen to be in Rockaway.

Bronx ATR has left a new comment on your post "Caranza's Folly - Bronx Plan Schools Announced - $...":

I’ve met plenty of ATRs with those licenses and I’m sure this incentive isn’t truly open to them. This plan is ridiculous on several levels. Teaching for me (and most teachers I’ve known) is a vocation. A monetary incentive denigrates it to a job - something unpleasant you do only for money. This will not encourage stability in those schools or neighborhoods - it will do the opposite. I started my career in MS 301 then called JHS 120 - many of the teachers there attended it as kids and were originally from the neighborhood. I also grew up in the neighborhood - still one of the poorest and worst in the country. The older teachers there were teaching the grandchildren of their first students. Back then most teachers stayed in the same school they started, for their entire career. I ended up getting excessed and was placed down the block in Jane Addams. I had some of the same kids I taught in 120 as high school students. Many of the teachers back then still have lifelong friendships with their former students. Bloomberg ended these neighborhood schools with his business model. The business model destabilized not only the schools and their staffs, but also the heart of what a teacher should be. It created detachment in all facets of school governance and interpersonal relationships. That the Uft would present this, in the last contract, is an example of how oblivious they have become to the nefarious reality that Bloomberg has created. I don’t believe the chancellor actually believes this has any chance of working, it is just a façade. Otherwise, he actually is what the Post called him today - “a total pathetic twit”.

Caranza's Folly - Bronx Plan Schools Announced - $7500 Salary Differential - How Crappy are the Principals?

If there is a shit hole principal it won't mean crap. Look at the list of Queens schools: All in Rockaway -- guess why they are hard to staff? Well, the money will help cover tolls and gas.

QUEENS 

Elementary & Middle Schools 

P.S./M.S 042 R. Vernam 

P.S. 043 

M.S. 053 Brian Piccolo 

P.S. 197 The Ocean School 

Village Academy 

High Schools 

Rockaway Park High School for Environmental Sustainability 

Rockaway Collegiate High School

CHANCELLOR CARRANZA ANNOUNCES BRONX PLAN HARD-TO-STAFF SALARY DIFFERENTIALS

Initiative will include 10 Bronx District 75 schools in addition to 50 previously announced Collaborative Schools

UFT Adult Education Chapter to Mulgrew - Rose-Marie Mills is still a problem

We call upon our union to defend us. We call upon our union to stop the harassment of the senior Teachers of Adult Education....

This statement was read at the April 8th UFT Ex Bd meeting:

From: Working Group of the Adult Education Chapter of the UFT
To: Michael Mulgrew, LeRoy Barr, Anthony Harmon

Dear Brothers Mulgrew, Barr, and Harmon and members of the Executive Committee:

Due to the unceasing efforts of members of the Adult Education Chapter of the United Federation of Teachers, Rose-Marie Mills has been removed from the Superintendency of the Office of Adult and Continuing Education. Unfortunately, the Department of Education, rather than dismissing Ms. Mills, has merely moved her, and she now oversees instruction of Adult Education, of which she has shown herself to know nothing, as well as being involved with funding and data (whatever that may be taken to mean). Testing anomalies still abound, with, for example, ESL Students being emailed math packets in English then being tested as distance learners, increasing the EPE hours billed to the State, though the Students have not received instruction in the subject they came to study: English. Though paperwork issues were supposedly resolved, paperwork is increasing, with Teachers forced to do more and more data entry on their own time.

Kentucky Mom "Goes Rogue" in Red State (By Siding with Teachers Instead of Union Leaders)

Right or wrong, the [Kentucky] sickout teachers voted with their feet. This is a big problem for school districts, but also for unions. The stated purpose of exclusive representation is that it brings labor peace because such differences are handled internally by the union and a single position is agreed upon. If a minority of teachers can shut down a district against the directives of their union, then there is in fact no exclusive representation.
Neither school districts nor unions seem to be contemplating the ramifications.... Mike Antonucci, EIA, Vox Populi?

Yes, labor peace -- we have seen that time and again - there is a partnership between a teacher union and the city and DOE -- they will stop sickouts and other wildcat actions. But when unions are weak, as they are in the red states, shit happens. In fact the unions tried to argue this to stop Janus -- that a weak union can lead to chaos from the ranks. Someone like me with Anarchist/libertarian tendencies, tend to have mixed feelings. While supporting a strong union, I also chafe under the yoke of a Unity Caucus dominated union. For those calling for change in the way the union is run there is often a contradiction in how far to go in being critical.

The situation in Kentucky is intriguing -- we have a revolt from below not only against the anti-union forces but also against their own official union leadership -- and both the left and the right are taking an interest. Here was my first report based on Antonucci on the sickouts in early March -- Kentucky One-Day Wildcat Sickout - Some want to co...

Here is a laugh out loud point from Mike:

Several large school districts shut down after the sickout was called by KY 120 United, identified as a grassroots organization of teachers, but one that apparently has some pull with district superintendents.
If that isn’t confusing enough, both the union and KY 120 United announced that teachers would return to work today, but a smaller wildcat faction rejected the idea. 

I posted another Anonucci story about the wildcat actions - Kentucky Unions Attempt to Undercat Wildcat Action...
-- of course, the anti-teacher union Antonucci loves to post bad behavior about teacher unions even if highlighting the actions of teachers in revolt against their own unions which often lead to more fragmentation and a weakening overall.

But then again we have Randi and Mike and other bureaucrats who are running teacher unions. The left also goes after the leadership and hopes to build rank and file movements against them from below -- but that also gets complicated because even when they win power they get sucked into the political fray.

The Kentucky situation is interesting because the left critics of organized labor may be inserting itself on behalf of the wild-cat sick-outs ---- Antonucci reported the other day:

Yesterday I ran a column about the Kentucky Education Association and other union affiliates in the Jefferson County school system and their efforts to get a handle on the “rogue groups” that were organizing teacher sickouts. Their primary argument was that a small number of people were making decisions affecting the livelihoods of thousands of school employees.
“It’s 800 people deciding for ultimately 6,500 teachers and then all the rest of the employees,” said one union president.

Oh, the problem with a small number of people making decisions for the many, something we never see in the UFT/AFT.

Those rogues must be driving the Randis of this world crazy. Imagine if a school in NYC with an abusive principal that is being ignored by the UFT suddenly had a sick-out? I can't imagine --but I say to my friends who constantly remind me how bad things are in the schools -- why hasn't something like this happened? They often answer it is the fault of the UFT who don't mobilize people. Well, who has mobilized the rogues in Kentucky? Sometimes teachers have to take actions. And by the way, who mobilized the founders of the UFT when there was no union? My retired pal has dubber NYC teachers as New York's Meekest.

I came across this interesting podcast on the Kentucky wildcats from the left - What's Left. Here's what they say in the intro:

We interview Gay Adelmann, parent of two and co-founder of "Dear JCPS", a grass-roots parent/teacher alliance built to fight racist policies in education and the erosion of public education through charter schools and privatization. Gay describes her involvement in the recent fight to bust the teachers union and the attack on teachers pay and pension which has produced a recent wave of sick outs in Kentucky. This put her group on the firing line from politicians looking to sneak shady policies past the pubic and union leaders who would rather cut backroom deals than lead fightback. Her story of struggle and transformation is inspiring.

What’s Left? Website: https://what-s-left.webnode.com/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YoloZGh2To&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR3k8-5D10VyowEe5VDLaLRPjjmoIt7l2M63znQAr5aYMsZ_cH9KPtLxwNQ

Mike Antonucci followed up with a critique of the union leaders who are attacking the wildcatters ---  (http://www.eiaonline.com/intercepts/2019/04/05/vox-populi/)

Vox Populi?

School Scope: UFT Election Votes Will Be Counted April 17

For The WAVE - April 5, 2019

School Scope:  UFT Election Votes Will Be Counted April 17

By Norm Scott

I’ve been getting emails from UFT members asking me for suggestions on how to vote in the UFT elections and ballots must be received by April 16. They ask because they are aware that I’ve been deeply involved in internal UFT politics for decades and know all the players. In the past I would recommend the slate I was working with. This year I have no such recommendation for the first time in decades.

Two hundred thousand (a rough estimate) UFT members began receiving election ballots the week of March 24.  In my 52 years of UFT membership, 49 of them part of active minority parties, I can’t remember four parties (caucuses) running independent campaigns. Unity Caucus has run the UFT since its inception in the early 60s and due to the divisions among the three minority parties is guaranteed to win every single position, thus making the election outcome a foregone conclusion. The overwhelming majority of members (75%) toss the ballot away. The 60,000 retirees can vote for the majority of positions, including all officers and three quarters of the Executive Board and 750 delegates to the state and national conventions.

Retirees have the highest return rate (they have the time) and also vote Unity by 85% (they are the happiest people in the UFT). The winning slate, which will be Unity because the other three slates will split the anti-Unity vote, will serve a three year term. The other slates are New Action, Solidarity, and MORE. If you are a UFT member and still have your ballot, is very easy to vote for a slate – just put an X in the box on the front page, tear it off and mail it in. I am not doing that but am voting for individuals from all four slates, a tedious affair as I have to wade through pages of candidates.  Let me explain.

The reasons I am no longer voting for a slate are convoluted. In order to have a chance to win any of the all three parties needed to unite and run a massive campaign with hundreds of candidates. Despite entreaties to do so, it didn’t happen and each of the three opposition slates are running limited campaigns with less than 50 candidates each. A losing proposition and from my perspective a total waste of time, energy and money. I don’t have the space here to define the differences between the groups but do so on my blog. I’m fundamentally sitting this election out for the first time since 2001.

As a founder of the MORE caucus in 2012 I was very active in the 2013 and 2016 elections and helped engineer a narrow victory for the seven high school executive board seats – a drop in the bucket, given there are over 90 seats controlled by Unity. The reason we won was due to an alliance MORE made with the New Action caucus. Solidarity did not get on the ballot last time due to not reaching the required 40 candidates for slate status. This time Solidarity is on the ballot, thus creating the four ballot lines.

I am no longer associated with the MORE caucus because MORE refused to work with anyone else or run a serious campaign, thus helping strengthen Unity Caucus’ control of the UFT. I am now a free agent in the UFT political scene, free to alienate everyone. I have been thinking of getting involved in other political work, especially locally. There is standard Democratic Party politics – both the machine and the progressive Dems, community board work and some intriguing work with the current hot item on the left – the Democratic Socialists (DSA) of AOC fame who so terrorizes Republicans and centrist democrats. I have been going to some South Brooklyn DSA meetings, which I will report on in the future.

You can read about Norm’s choices for candidates at his blog, ednotesonline.com.

Memo from the RTC: I Give Up March Madness for Tenors and Have more fun

Memo from the RTC:  I Give Up March Madness for Tenors and Have more fun

I missed one of my rare opening nights of the Rockaway Theatre Company’s production of  “A Comedy of Tenors” (see my School Scope column for why) but received texts later that night about how funny and well-done it was. I wanted to see the show before this column was due on

ISO’s opponents on the Trotskyist Sectarian Left: it’s a middle class Identitarian coup

Michael found this piece with this comment:

ISO’s opponents on the Trotskyist Sectarian Left: it’s a middle class Identitarian coup...

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/04/02/inte-a02.html

Some excerpts

A March 20 post by Elizabeth Wrigley-Field, titled “What Socialists Can Learn From #MeToo,” exposes the hysterical psychology, akin to a lynch mob, that prevails among ISO members recruited on the basis of middle-class identity politics.....
In the statements issued by the ISO, there is no explicit reference to or discussion of the political differences within the organization’s leadership that underlay the crisis that erupted during the week of March 11, 2019. Readers are expected to believe that the alleged mishandling of an accusation of sexual assault, which occurred six years ago, has caused the political collapse of the International Socialist Organization.

This is preposterous and will be believed only by those who are either hopelessly naïve or hopelessly stupid.... Some are boasting that out of the wreckage of the ISO a “new model of revolutionary socialism” will emerge. They are whistling as they pass by the graveyard. Their quest for a “new model” is leading them squarely into the Democratic Party. .......World Socialist web site

Aside from my laugh out loud reaction to the name Wrigley-Field, this anti-ISO article from the faaar left 4th International has some interesting nuggets, though be careful if you read it to filter some of the hyperbole. Some of my friends on the left do not even think I should publish it because they can be so beyond the fringe - like Pluto. But --- as I say, there are some nuggets here.

For those interested in the past, current and future direction of the UFT opposition and its relationship to the membership, you must pay attention to what has occurred in the breakup of ISO and the control ISO UFTers exerted over MORE Caucus right through this faction's takeover (along with its allies) of the caucus and driving out those (mostly from ICEUFT) who pushed back. We have internal ISO documents written by this MORE faction about how they executed this takeover and purges and will publish them selectively over time.

I myself was shocked at the speed of the breakup of ISO and have felt there is more there than a coverup of a rape charge -- purges? Who ever heard of purges? I'm shocked, just shocked.

Another excerpt which raises the same point:

In the statements issued by the ISO, there is no explicit reference to or discussion of the political differences within the organization’s leadership that underlay the crisis that erupted during the week of March 11, 2019. Readers are expected to believe that the alleged mishandling of an accusation of sexual assault, which occurred six years ago, has caused the political collapse of the International Socialist Organization.

This is preposterous and will be believed only by those who are either hopelessly naïve or hopelessly stupid. The unleashing of a sex scandal in a political organization is aimed invariably at generating hysteria, stampeding the membership and preventing an open and rational discussion of program, perspective, strategy and the interests of conflicting internal factions and social forces. Only in the aftermath of the organizational massacre, as the smoke begins to clear, do the political interests and aims that precipitated the crisis begin to emerge.

Well, anyway, there's a good portion of the left that is rejoicing at the end of ISO but everyone knows you can't kill that zombie and in some form or other they will be back. For the forseeable future, MORE will remain under the control of the former ISO block, unless there are splits among them or splits between them and the block they recruited from the Democratic Socialists.

Insiders have been telling us they will enter full force into the DSA and attempt to do unto them as they did unto MORE. Beware the jabberwocky...... it may come at you from any direction.
Norm

Factional provocation, middle-class hysteria, and the collapse of the Internation

By the Political Committee of the Socialist Equality Party (US)
2 April 2019

The International Socialist Organization is collapsing just over a month after its national convention, amidst factionally instigated denunciations of sexual assault and cover-up.

Kentucky Unions Attempt to Undercat Wildcat Actions They Can't Control - Antonucci

Mike posts this at the god-awful anti teacher union the 74. But he is covering an interesting story: what happens when the union leadership loses control of its members? I one of Mike's reports he said that Labor Notes had a rep working with the wildcatters. That's an interesting story if it is so. I won't get into the weeds but Labor Notes has played a major role in the national UCORE social justice caucus movement around the nation, including MORE, though to a lesser extent.

Intercepts

Kentucky Unions Join Up to Try to Subdue ‘Rogue Groups’ Staging Teacher Sickouts
by Mike Antonucci

As spring arrives and the weather improves, we can expect more teacher protests to spring up as well. Many of these will be the traditional type of mass rally engineered and financed by the established teachers unions. The North Carolina Association of Educators has one scheduled for May 1, and the California Teachers Association will descend upon the state capitol on May 22.

It is much more difficult to know if other protests, organized by teacher activists outside union purview, will also occur. Last year, these wildcat groups were largely able to act in concert with unions in places like Oklahoma and Arizona, though not without some friction. While their goals concerning school funding and class size are the same, there isn’t agreement on when, where and how job actions should be deployed.

This was thrown into stark relief in Jefferson County, Kentucky, where groups of teachers have been staging sickouts that shut down the school district on six occasions in late February and March.