Support Teachers/Parents of PS 123, Harlem Against Eva Invasion; Monday, Apr. 12, 5pm

The parents, students, staff, educators, administrators, and community supporters at PS 123 were able to get Eva Moskowitz's HSA II to leave their building but now the privatizers are threatening to move Moskowitz's HSA V in. We all need to be at PS 123 on Monday April 12th to defend our sisters and brothers against this second threatened charter school invasion.

Please support our Sisters and Brothers at PS 123!!!

Attend the Public Hearing, Stand Up, Speak Out and Wear Red!

Monday April 12, 2010

Please arrive at 5pm so that you can speak.

Public School 123 (Mahalia Jackson School)

301 West 140th Street

Harlem, NY 10030

Trains: A,B,C to 135th Street Station; Buses: Bx19, M2, M3, M10

or use hopstop.com

Contact: Ernestine at (646) 262-9052 or email: queenteenie45@aol.com

Next GEM Meeting: Tuesday, April 13

Come to the GEM Meeting
to Discuss and Plan Next Steps For:

The fight Against School Closures and Co-locations
Setting up School-Based Committees
Literature Needed to Help Build our Movement

Grassroots Education Movement (GEM) is a group of mostly educators that has been fighting against the charter take overs, school closings, high stakes testing, mayoral control and all other forms of the attack on and public education and the push to privatize.

Where: CUNY grad center. 34/35th on 5th ave. N, R, D, F, Q, B, W, V, 6, 2/3 trains. Room: 5414

When: 4:30 - 7

We are meeting next Tuesday to talk about next steps in the fight against charter take overs, school closings and to find concrete ways for all those concerned with education to get involved in this growing nation wide fight back. One important aspect of our work will be to build school based committees to involve educators and families in the process of educating ourselves, building a collective vision of what we are fighting for and developing a strong base of active citizens that will hold our government and corporate entities accountable for this unprecedented attack on our work, our students and their families.

If you think you might be interested in getting involved with this work, if you are curious about what it will take to win this fight, or if you just want to listen, please come on Tuesday.

Hearing Teacher Voices? NOT!

At the Manhattan Institute luncheon for Diane Ravitch last week, I was raising my hand (in vain) as policy wonks and others were called on. It took Diane's intervention - let Norm Scott, a real teacher, ask a question - to for me to get the floor. I said I know how to fix so-called failing schools. Start with a drastic reduction of class size. You would have thought I dropped a stink bomb on the joint. Diane's antagonist, Rick Hesse, practically dripping venom, went off on how class size reduction has been proven not to work (a lie), studies this, studies that, blah, blah, blah. Almost the entire audience kept nodding in approval, while throwing darts at me. Leonie Haimson was in the audience but this was not a forum where she could get up and tear Hesse's head off with real facts.

The funny thing was that Hesse had previously talked about the 3 and a half million teachers in this country and how to reach them with good technology and lesson plans and more blah, blah, blah. I was tempted to call out, "Why don't you ask these millions of teacher what they think about class size? Then you wouldn't need no phony stinkin' research." But the dessert was pretty good and I wanted to be asked back.

Not so with my buddy and GEM colleague Antoine Bogard, a chapter leader in Harlem, who got up as they tried to end the meeting and insisted on asking a question. "I have the most important question," Antoine said. "Why are the voices of teachers, the MOST important voice, never heard?" Diane offered to take on that one. "They don't want to hear union voices," she said, a response I was very unhappy with and one of the major flaws in her book. Union voices were at the table for NCLB (Sandra Feldman and Randi Weingarten) and that is not what Antoine was asking. Union leaders are not the same as classroom teacher voices. In fact, quite different.

Many of us were not fooled about NCLB and its predecessors as Diane was. If instead of selling NCLB to their members and worse, keeping them in the dark as Sandy and Randi did, they had led a charge against it, we might not be in the position today. But Diane let's them off the hook.

There were two other teachers I knew at the MI Luncheon. Both are 20 plus year ATRs and we chatted as lot. What wonderful people and teachers (I am keeping them anonymous for obvious reasons.) These are the voices that should be heard but are not. By the ed deformers and by our union.

When teachers go to MI luncheons and identify themselves as a "real" teacher who is not a union hack, they are treated as a pet. Wow! Someone who actually spend 30 years teaching in the inner city. What an oddity to show up here!

When I checked out one of my fave bloggers, It's Not All Flowers and Sausages, I was pleased to see this relatively young teacher, the type of teacher the ed deform crowd holds up as the savior of the system, raise this same issue. Here are a few excerpts. Note how she trashes national standards, one of Diane Ravitch's pets.

I saw the following question, "Are educators' opinions factored into reforms?" and my immediate thought was, "NO. Duh." I know, my knee jerk reaction is to utter words of brilliance. It's a gift.

You see, I was reading this piece in EdWeek about how much or how little the opinions of real teachers factor into decisions made by policy makers. The article begins by saying that "...at no other time in the history of American education has there been more publicly available information about what teachers think about their profession, their students and the conditions under which they work."

Really? I mean, yeah, I guess we have blogs, and books (buy mine!), and surveys and things, but really? Who is looking at those? Other teachers? And who is listening? Because while I heart my readers, don't you feel like sometimes we're all just talking to a wall???? Just because we're saying it doesn't mean that the Powers That Be are listening, taking us seriously or think that we have anything intelligent to offer. I've worked at educational research organizations and more often than not, the concerns of Real Teachers are met by eye rolling. EYE ROLLING! By people who claim to care about education...

Later in the article, a few recently compiled teacher surveys are referenced. You know, like the one done by the Gates Foundation? But everyone who has a brain knows that you need to consider the source when reading reports of that nature..Can we just hear and listen to the voices of teachers? No surveys, no filtering, no compiling, no bubble sheets...just real, honest voices of the people doing the work that EVERYONE ELSE seems to have so many opinions about.

I mean, do we really even need to debrief on this whole situation where teachers get to weigh in and comment on the proposed National Standards? Does anyone else think that this feels a bit like flushing a twenty down the toilet? Like the proverbial tree in the forest? If a teacher posts a well thought out response to the National Standards but nobody listens, did she even make a noise?

How about we say enough with the surveys? How about we actually invite a REAL TEACHER (or better yet a WHOLE BUNCH OF TEACHERS) to the table when these policies and decisions are actually being made?!?!?

(insert jaw dropping on the part of policy makers everywhere)

(Close your mouths boys, you'll let all the flies in.)

I know that the article states that it is difficult to get teachers to donate their time to take a survey but maybe JUST MAYBE if someone offered to REALLY LISTEN and not just count our bubbles on a survey, I think the Powers That Be, who are so superficially concerned with the opinions of teachers, would find themselves with a line out the door.

Make sure to head on over and read her entire post:

Bitter and Cynical, Party of Two? Your Table Is Ready...

Additions:
I posted one of her wonderful pieces on the Rhode Island Central Falls Massacre where she said "You can't fire poverty." Diane Ravitch loved this line so much she linked to Flowers and Sausages in an article and used the line in her MI presentation.

Going to Court to Close the Rubber Rooms

Are Union Mines Safer?

This was the question asked on NPR's Diane Rehm show Weds. night in the light of the West Virginia mine accident, a non-union mine by the way with massive safety violations. The response was that union miners are extremely outspoken if they see safety problems while workers in non-union mines fear raising complaints. "You can't imagine how many anonymous calls I get from people in non-union mines who are afraid," said a guest. The protection the union affords miners automatically creates an environment where owners can't get away with violations as easily.

Which reminds me of tenure. Are school districts with tenure educationally safer environments for children because teachers can speak out more freely when an idiot principal or superintendent comes up with a stupid idea? What about the union in this case, you ask? Why do you need tenure if you have a union? Have you checked out conditions in the schools lately? Do UFT teachers dare complain when they don't have tenure? I can't tell you how many teachers say they are waiting for tenure before speaking out. And even then most of these people don't speak out anyway. Hmmm. Is the United Mine Workers looking to organize teachers?

Tweed and the Mob - Will Joel Klein End Up With a Horse Head in Bed?

We interrupt the vote reporting with a funny item from the NY Post which I posted on Norms Notes.

Tweed and the Mob - Will Joel Klein End Up With a Horse Head in Bed?

More from Leonie's list:

For some interesting historical reading (1990), go to: http://www.nytimes.com/1990/12/26/nyregion/school-buses-unions-mob-special-report-school-bus-pacts-go-companies-with-ties.html?scp=3&sq=dominic%20gatto&st=nyt&pagewanted=1

Pretty incredible! Dominic Gatto of Atlantic Bus Co., the man with the gun in the 2010 school bus and the mob story, is also in the 1990 school bus and the mob story Warren has forwarded. 20 years later and they are still talking to this guy.

There was a story in the nat'l. papers a while ago that the USDOE was purchasing heavy guns. Turns out it was for its Inspector General folks who do criminal investigations. I've suggested a bunch of them attend the NYC DOE's "negotiations" with these lovely people in the future to provide federal protection to them while they negotiate corrupt contracts with mobsters, using our tax dollars and endangering our children.

Ellen wrote: This makes for a great film....Bullets Over Long Island City? Gunfight at the OPT Corral?
John Houston, Raoul Walsh or John Ford would laugh out loud!

Blow by Blow: Preliminary UFT Election Returns- Updated

Update: Sat, Apr. 10, 9am

Gotham has the results posted here. Thanks to Anna Philips for all her hard work.

11PM

Elem
Total sent 36,907
Ret 10,292 28%
Unity 7761 75.4%
New Action 978 9.5%
ICE 703 6.8%

Non slate 712


Retirees
Ballots sent Returned %
53,560 24,978 46.6

Slate
Unity 20,744 83%
New Action 2,234 8.9%
ICE-TJC 1,037 4.2%

Non slate 867

2010 Prorated .72
Unity 14,934
New Action 1,608
ICE-TJC 746


7:30PM
The % is skewed because I am using the total returns and not subtracting the non-slate votes. Will recalculate another time.

Things have really slowed up. Here are functional totals:

Ballots sent out: 45,889
Ballots ret: 10,629 - 23.2% ret
Slate
ICE 708 6.7%
Unity 7337 69%
New Action 1175 11.1%

Non-slate: 1332


3PM
Middle School vote:

Total ballots-11,697
Returned -2,881 18.6%
Unity 1,981 68.8%
NA 421 14.6%
ICE-TJC 248 8.6%
Non-Slate - 207


1:45pm
High School vote:

Ballots sent: 19,931 Returned: 5203 26%
Slate:
Unity 2595 49.9%
ICE-TJC 1369 26.3%
New Action 774 14.9%
Non-slate: 424 to be tabulated by individual vote

Prelim anal:
Unity vote up around 300, ICE down about 200, New Action up around 200 from 2007.
Looks like big endorsement of Mulgrew.


It's 11am and all we have are percentage of returns. I'm a novice excel user and my formulas may be off so take heed. Totals seem to indicate that around 30% voted all together including retirees which is not much more than last time. But the in schools the vote went up from 22% return to around 27%.

Ballots sent Returned %

Elementary (up from 24% on 07)

36,907

10,292

0.28%

Middle Schools (Up from 18.6% in 07

2010

11,697

2,881

0.20

High Schools (Up by over 700 - from 23% in 07

2010

19,931

5,203

0.30

Functional (Dropped to 20% from 21.4%

2010

45,889

10,629

0.20

Retirees (50% up from 44.7% in 07)- Only 18,000 count so figure around .7 a ballot.

2010

53,560

24,978

0.5

Totals

2010

167,984

53,983

0.30

Totals Elem+MS+HS
68,535 18,376
0.27%

ICE-TJC Totals Will Affect UFT Reaction to RTTT

Did you see the NY Times story today about the NY State disaster in the Race to the Top competition?

Confusion, Chairs and Charters Helped Doom Bid for Grant

A review of the state's application for Race to the Top money, and of the judges' comments, reveals a number of ill-fated moves.

It illustrates an important point. David Steiner said the focus will be on union support. And there is no RTTT without the union agreeing to charters galore and teacher ratings based on test scores. The pressure on the UFT will be intense.

Today's UFT election vote will have an impact on how the union responds. If Mulgrew wins overwhelmingly - in the sense that there is little change from the last election or any signs that ICE-TJC has not gotten any traction - then there will be less reason for Mulgrew to resist this pressure. Think of the UFT leadership as a balloon being squeezed from two directions. The opposition vote is a counter force in that if the trend would be a threat to Unity control at the school level (they are much more insulated at the top due to the distorted election process) would force the leadership to take heed before caving in.

Early Returns - Some Young, Some Old

I got a call from one of my retired colleagues last night, an 80 year old. "I voted for your slate," she said. I would bet that even though I have been gone from my former school for well over a decade, the people still there who knew me voted ICE-TJC.

Earlier in the day, I was told by young woman in her early 20's that one of her teacher friends had told her she and her colleagues in a small school housed in a large closing school had voted for ICE-TJC, mainly because of the ICE member who is chapter leader at the large school.
So we got at least a few votes from the 20-somethings and the 80-somethings.

These stories illustrate an important point. Wherever we have active people, we get votes. Most of our candidates are highly respected for a number of reasons, not the least of which is they are good teachers. Our problem? Not enough active people in enough schools. But that is an issue for the future.

I have no way to predict results but I will say right now a few hours before results come in that based on previous numbers and my sense of how far we were able to reach out, the chance to win even the high school Executive Board seats is very slim. We would need to at least double our vote from 1550 last time to around 3000 to have a chance. In the last election Unity had around 2200 and New Action had 550. A key issue is whether their votes will rise at all this time. I think that there are enough people wanting to give Mulgrew a chance to get Unity/New Action over.

With the fragmentation of large high schools and our limited reach to the younger teachers who occupy the new schools (compare that to the UFT ability to flood every school with their lit and also UFT officials visiting so many schools) I am not expecting us to come close to reaching that number.

I find it pretty ironic that the best we can do is win 6 seats on the EB out of 89. That's the real joke of this election. The opposition will never win without some structural change in the UFT (and that will never take place until the number of active - and I stress this word - active - people there are standing up to Unity). But an explanation of why this is so and what has to be done to change it is also for another time.

Today's vote count is the culmination of the UFT election process, a process that started for some of us ICEers with a meeting with TJC where we decided to work together over a year ago. I hope to write a lot more about the process we went through as a guide for people in the future. But that's also for another time.

If you are interested in early returns through the day, email me at normsco@gmail.com. I don't tweet or whatever but I do burp.


By the way, did you know that the Wall Street Journal now has a NYC beat ed reporter? She contacted me yesterday and we may meet up for coffee later today. That coverage should be interesting to watch. Wouldn't it be funny if it turned out more fair and balanced than the NY Times? Shouldn't be all that much of a stretch.

Seniority and Pakter Non-Hearing

UPDATED (see below):

I attended the David Pakter 3020a "hearing" today but there was no hearing (search this blog for background if you don't know about this case as I'm too lazy to get the links). Or at least while I was there. I left at 2 when they broke for lunch. David will update us soon.

We had quite a cast of characters. The wonderful hearing officer, Douglas Bantle - who is such a decent guy the DOE is getting rid of him. The NYSUT lawyer, Chris Calegy, who whenever I see him in action is impressive. Betsy Combier, who is always there for people and her sidekick Polo Colon. I alerted Gotham's Anna Philips about the hearing and unfortunately she showed up and wasted 3 hours waiting for a hearing that never took place. I owe her lunch - or at least an ice cream. But I did give her an earful for classifying New Action as an opposition caucus instead of bottom-feeding weasels. (See my recent post: UFT election figures for New Action Over the Years)

Ken Hirsch tagged along with Anna. Ken is the most likable ed deformer, some kind of hedge fund guy who helps fund scuzzy charter schools like HSA and Girls Prep and who knows what else. He also helps fund Gotham, which is a good thing, despite the fact some people feel they tilt (I am not yet convinced of that.)

I always have very deep discussions with Ken. He is a guy who while may not be convinceable about the errors of ed deform, is always willing to engage and listen - which with me around is just about all you can do. So we had a brief discussion on a number of issues and touched on the seniority issue. I pointed out how the longevity of teachers in one school creates a certain level of stability and teachers make strong connections to families over time. I'm talking about the elementary school level. Of course, with charter schools parachuting kids and teachers in from all over the place and the destruction of the neighborhood school concept by the deformers, this concept become irrelevant.

I get home and low and behold find that Diana Senechal wrote a great piece at Gotham on this very issue. Accountable Talk linked and wrote his own piece.

The Other Argument for Seniority

There's a nice piece in the Community section at Gotham Schools that lays out the case for seniority, especially in light of possible upcoming layoffs. I won't repeat any of the author's arguments here; you can read them for yourself and decide if they are compelling. I think they are. I'd like to address an argument for seniority that I rarely hear, but it warrants discussion. I believe that ignoring seniority as it exists now would ruin education in the future, and here's why.

Head over and read both pieces and all the comments.

After Ken left, who should show up but blogger South Bronx School, one of my faves – he goes even lower than I do. He's not happy that Gotham doesn't link to him and told Anna so. She defended herself. This was better than the hearing that wasn't taking place. I love SBS but I can understand them not linking. He was promising Anna not to be so raunchy while I begged him to keep it up. What would Whitney Tilson and Thomas Carroll do if he toned it down?

If you dig beneath the crust of SBS, you find the instincts of a teacher who gets it and gives a crap. I'd rather have the fun crusty stuff than see links on Gotham, which often links to Ed Notes. What am I doing wrong?

UPDATE:
Since I posted the above a few minutes ago, I have been in touch with 2 former students who friended me - my 4th grade class in the early 80's and -listen to this - the son of a former student from 1976. His mom brought him to my house when he was one month old and we put him on a blanket on the floor and my cat came over and was bigger than him. Look at him now. His mom was one of my favorite kids of all time and we stayed in touch.

In the small world department, his dad's (his parents never were together) sister was the mom of a couple of kids I had and she was a parent who I always like a lot and I got to know a lot about the family. One day I was at the UFT and I see someone familiar and she said, "Mr. Scott." It was her daughter who I had in my computer classes. She has been working at the UFT - now in the tech department (think those Apple IIe's got her ready for the job market?) - for many years and we run into each other every so often and she fills me in. She has kids herself and her mom is doing fine.

Jeez. The more I am hooking up on facebook, the more the memories come flooding back. One of the students is a NYC teacher and we are getting together soon - the first time I will see him in over 25 years and next week I am meeting a student from the late 70's for lunch - I haven't seen her since she was in high school.

Sorry, but this is my "data."


Some former 4th graders had an elementary school reunion in Feb. I can recognize 4.

TFA Alum Trashes RTTT, Lawhead Comments

Listen to the words of teachers to get the real scoop on how the ed deform agenda is damaging kids. Heather Kim, a TFA alum, has a very good article in the SF Chronicle showing how the test taking agenda can destroy the ability of students to read in a constructive way.

We teach students who didn't pass the Analytical Writing Placement Exam, and our task is often to undo these habits so students can learn how to really, truly read. They're employing test-taking strategies they've learned all their No-Child-Left-Behind lives. When standardized test scores come attached with high stakes, teachers are forced to arm their students with speedy decoding in lieu of critical thinking. Unfortunately, such teaching will only be perpetuated under the Obama administration's Race to the Top program. Faced with tests that could determine whether our students graduated, my panicked administrators encouraged me to teach tricks. "If a writing prompt is three questions long," my department head told me, "make students turn each question into a statement. Statements should become topic sentences." If the students followed the format, the essays would read like a series of nearly identical paper dolls. Passing paper dolls. Under such pressures, students can't be prepared for college-level work.

John Lawhead (ICE/GEM), sent this comment to the GEM listserve:

[The article] mentions college teachers trying to undo what's been taught in high schools that are obsessed with teaching test-taking strategies. Truly it's making idiots of us and getting worse.

In New York many teachers counsel students to agree with the critical lens statement no matter what (in Session Two of the ELA regents). The model student papers provided by the state rarely do otherwise. That means the critical lens essay involves parroting a statement you've never read before, agreeing with it and earnestly supporting your interpretation of it with two works of literature.

The theme of the essay is determined by the statement. In 10 years there's never been a critical lens with the word justice or even happiness.

Over the last two years about half of the statements had to do with appreciating heroes or characters with uncommon virtues. They've included phrases like "the strongest man on earth" (June 09) "the real hero" (August 08) "greatness" (January 08) "what does it mean to be a hero" (June 07). This may or may not be an invitation for teachers to assign books about great men, rugged individuals (free-market enterpreneurs?),etc. Maybe it's just a softball theme to improve the scores. But calling the critical lens critical is hypocrisy!

Ohanian Does Tennyson, Schmidt Does Ravitch

In the middle of the night I got a poetic inspiration: Tennyson's Charge of the Light Brigade." I scribbled it on a scrap of paper in the dark. And this morning I wrote a parody for our times. Some lines do not change:

Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die.
http://susanohanian.org/outrage_fetch.php?id=667

Maybe I should have stopped there, but I decided to read the Appendix for the Delaware RTTT grant submission. This has just about done me in. I mean this quite literally. In the middle of writing this I went to the doctor for asthma relief. I could not breathe. Turns out I have bronchitis too.

I hope you'll read the Commentary. Delaware is being rewarded for a horrifying plan. And considering April 15 is near, we should all stop and think about the fact that they are doing it with OUR TAX DOLLARS.
http://susanohanian.org/show_commentaries.php?id=794

Miracle of modern medicine: I'm already better. No thanks to Delaware.
Susan


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Broad Alumni Making It Big in Corporate Takeover of American Education
Jim Horn
Schools Matter
2010-04-04
http://susanohanian.org/show_atrocities.php?id=9266

It is critical that people who care about public schools, people who know the importance of public schools, see the links here. What is happening in large urban districts today has been carefully orchestrated by vulture philanthropists. Here's the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

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Race to the Top: Delaware's Application for Initial Funding
Susan Ohanian

2010-04-05
http://susanohanian.org/show_commentary.php?id=794

Whew. Ohanian takes you through Appendix A of the Delaware application. Appendix a goes from Appendix A-1 to A-123. And then there are Appendices B through F.

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MORE THAN A BOOK REVIEW NEEDED: A closer look at Diane Ravitch's book 'The Death
and Life of the Great American School System'
George N. Schmidt

2010-04-04
http://susanohanian.org/show_commentary.php?id=792

In his review of the Ravitch book, George Schmidt acknowledges that it's an important book but also insists that we not forget history.

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To the editor
Alan Ettman
New York Times
0000-00-00
http://susanohanian.org/show_letter.php?id=1195

This letter breaks the myth that The Times never prints criticism of editorials. In this fine letter a teacher effectively shows the odds facing a high school teacher for influencing students.

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To the editor
Jane Watson
Time Magazine
2010-04-01
http://susanohanian.org/show_letter.php?id=1194

Jane Watson notes the lack of transparency, something that letter writers should continue to note, as they point out that Race to the Top is even worse than NCLB.

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To the editor
Stephen Krashen
Newsweek
2010-04-03
http://susanohanian.org/show_letter.php?id=1193

We must follow Stephen Krashen's lead in describing the Obama plan as radical.

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The Charge of the Obama/Duncan Plan
Susan Ohanian
with some apologies to Alfred, Lord Tennyson
2010-04-05
http://susanohanian.org/outrage_fetch.php?id=667



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Mass Closures of Public Schools, Promotion of Charters Raise Fears of Privatized
Detroit Education System
Amy Goodman and Nate Walker
Democracy Now!
2010-04-03
http://susanohanian.org/outrage_fetch.php?id=666



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States Skeptical About ‘Race to Top’ School Aid Contest
Sam Dillon
New York Times
2010-04-05
http://susanohanian.org/show_nclb_atrocities.php?id=3942

Governors of states not receiving Race to the Top funds in the first round whine. Some claim to be reconsidering joining the second round. None admit the error of their ways. Ohanian comments on the way quoted people are identified.

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Why Obama's education reform plan can't work
Jim Horn
Washington Post: The Answer Sheet
2010-04-04
http://susanohanian.org/show_nclb_atrocities.php?id=3941

In a letter to President Obama, Jim Horn points out that teachers will work no harder when their tenure or their salary depends upon their students' test scores, but the kind of work they do, if such plans are adopted, will not resemble the work of the attentive gardener tending these tender tendrils of humanity that constitute our future.
----------------------------------------------------
Order the CD of the resistance:
"No Child Left Behind? Bring Back the Joy."
To order online (and hear samples from the songs)
http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/dhbdrake4
Other orders: Send $15 to
Susan Ohanian
P. O. Box 26
Charlotte, VT 05445

UFT election figures for New Action Over the Years

New Action Goes CURR
The non-Unity active membership has declared New Action a CURR (Caucus Under Registration Review). In dropping from 31 to 21% of the vote in 10 years ( a 32% decline) New Action has clearly failed to meet the standards. If there is no improvement in the next election, New Action will be closed and reorganized into a debating society.- ED NOTES, MAY, 2001

Wow. Call me Nostradamus or what?

I found some interesting stuff in the 1999 and 2001 election issues of Ed Notes.

Here are pages of the May 1999 edition of Ed Notes, along with the April and May 2001 issues, which contained Marian Swedlow's election analysis and comments and a report card from me on New Action. OK, I was pretty critical of them even at that time for the way they didn't seem to be building an opposition. (Click on images to enlarge.)

In 1999, New Action received 11,400 votes – 1700 coming from retirees, 1900 from non-classroom functionals, 2463 from elem, 1710 from middle schools and 3000 from high schools. (There was another opposition caucus that ran and got just over 1000 votes.) They won all 6 high school exec bd seats.

In 2001, the totals for New Action were pretty much the same but Unity went up as more people voted. The drop for NA from 1991 when they were getting about a third of the vote to around 21% was behind their move to become a house opposition under the control of Unity. How has that worked out for them?

Ed Notes, April 2001

In 2007, New Action received a TOTAL of 3520 votes: 1600 from retirees, 543 funct. 562 in elem., 273 in middle schools and 521 in high schools. With Unity endorsement, they received 3 high school EB seats and 5 at large seats for a total of 8. Thus, in the undemocratic UFT, you can lose 75% of your support in the schools and actually end up with more Executive Board seats.

Look at these numbers over a 6 year period from 2001 to 2007:

A drop from 3000 to 521 in the high schools, from 1700 to 273 in MS and from 2463 to 562 in elem. over 8 years. While they stayed consistent with the retirees, New Action's loss of support with working UFT members was awesome.

What will the 2010 numbers show for New Action?
Unless New Action makes a comeback this time, Randi Weingarten's brilliant legacy may turn out to be her destruction of the long-term opposition in the UFT.

You can see our spreadsheet comparing the 04 and 07 elections here.

Ed Notes New Action report card, May 2001.

UFT Elections: The Anti-Randi Factor

I was at dinner recently. "I didn't vote for ICE," said one of my friends. "I voted for Mulgrew. They say he's a nice guy. He should get a chance. He's a teacher. At least he's not a lawyer," she said with a sneer - an indication that the move from Randi to Mulgrew may give Unity some breathing room. Coming from a rank and file teacher who does not often show much union consciousness, the hostility directed at our former leader is another iteration of how deep RandiWear runs in the UFT.

The anti-Randi comments emanating from throughout the union - the rank and file and internally - I truly have not heard one positive comment said about her from within and without Unity Caucus- are an indication of the total sense of defeat people in the schools feel. When you talk about UFT policy errors to union officials, you get "Randi's not here anymore." You hear things like "Mulgrew doesn't take things personally like Randi did." A good thing. Who needs the angst? Randi seemed to read everything that people on the blogs said. What a waste of time. Mulgrew doesn't seem to give much of a crap what is said. Another good thing.

From the perspective of someone who is not involved in the daily machinations of the UFT as many of us are, the logic of my friend is not off the chart because she views Mulgrew as an individual and is not aware of the Unity machine and how Mulgrew is a product of that machine - a machine that endorsed and promoted and defended every single policy Randi espoused -and still espouses. Just watch all 800 Unity Caucus members traipse to Seattle to the AFT convention in July and cheer every word and awful policy she puts forth. We'll ask observers who are present to check the votes and watch 100% support for Randi from the NYC Unity crew.

The consciousness of Unity Caucus as an entity has not penetrated too deeply into the schools. Surprising you might think considering they have run the union for 50 years. That is part of the Unity strategy. Ask people in the schools if their chapter leader is in Unity and they often don't know. My sense is they are told not to tell their members. Or make much of a deal that many of them are going to Seattle this July to the AFT convention with our dues paying the freight.

It is the job of the opposition to make these connections and disseminate them far and wide and one of the failures has been to do this only every three years at election time, when there is easier access into schools. Now, if every UFT member read Ed Notes diligently, they would be fully aware of Unity and would see clearly that Mulgrew as a product of the machine will turn out to show cosmetic changes only.

So with the UFT election count just days away, the watch will be on to see whether Mulgrew is really more popular than Randi and if he is, does he have coattails for Unity as a caucus, which may take some hits for the conditions in the schools. Some people might show their dissatisfaction with Unity but vote for Mulgrew by choosing New Action. One chapter leader even told me some people in his school were voting for Mulgrew and the rest for ICE-TJC. That seemed pretty strange.

The drop in Unity votes over the last few election cycles is worth noting. I looked at the Ed Notes election report issues from 1999, 2001, 2004 and 2007 and will do some follow-ups over the next few days. The figures are fascinating to wonks like me.

Peter Lamphere on UFT Elections

http://socialistworker.org/2010/04/01/will-the-uft-stand-up-to-bloomberg

Comment: Peter Lamphere

Will the UFT stand up to Bloomberg?

Peter Lamphere, a high school teacher in New York, looks at the key issues in the union election that's drawing to a close. [Peter is a candidate for High School Executive Board on the ICE-TJC slate.]

April 1, 2010

THE 200,000 members of the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) received their ballots for the citywide union elections this March, in the midst of some of the fiercest attacks on our union in decades.

The state legislature is threatening between 4,000 and 8,500 layoffs, Chancellor Joel Klein is attempting to fire teachers for poor student test results and Mayor Michael Bloomberg is intervening in current contract negotiations by publicly pushing to eliminate job security provisions in order to lay off high-seniority--and better-paid--teachers.

The key question in the UFT elections is what strategy to take against this rising tide of attacks. The UFT has been dominated for decades by the Unity caucus, which has made major concessions in work rules and job security in exchange for pay raises. In opposition, a variety of groups have sprung up to challenge this concessionary agenda and demand a mobilization of the membership to resist the city's demands. Greater union democracy is also a key part of the opposition's platform.

The teachers, guidance counselors, secretaries, paraprofessionals, nurses, home child-care workers and other educational workers in the New York City school system must choose between current President Michael Mulgrew and opposition challenger James Eterno. Mulgrew, the candidate for the Unity caucus, has been president for a year, appointed in his position by the UFT executive board when previous president Randi Weingarten ascended to the presidency of the American Federation of Teachers.

Eterno, the chapter leader of Jamaica High School in Queens--which is slated for closure--leads an opposition coalition of two groups, the Independent Community of Educators (ICE) and Teachers for a Just Contract (TJC). This alliance is fighting to hold the line on seniority and tenure rights, reduce class size and end harassment by principals.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

ESSENTIALLY, THE opposition groups want the union to stop making concessionary deals with the city, and instead galvanize the membership to take a stand against the attacks from Bloomberg and Klein.

For example, when the union's contract with the city expired in October 2009, the UFT had the opportunity to publicize the city's draconian union-busting demands to its membership and the city at large amid a closely contested mayoral election. Instead, the union sat out the election and chose the passive option of going through a fact-finding procedure at with the state labor board.

The same fact-finding procedure resulted in major concessions in the 2005 contract. This time around, members were kept in the dark by a negotiating committee sworn to secrecy about the negotiations--that is, until the mayor trumpeted his contracted demands in a nationally publicized speech. To date, there has been no hint of action on the contract talks.

Meanwhile, the city has moved to shutter a number of high schools on the thinnest of educational justifications. This has forced the leadership to make some token mobilizations, including a series of rallies at individual hearings at schools and rally at the city's Panel for Education Policy meeting on January 26. Now that a successful lawsuit by the UFT and the NAACP has temporarily halted the closings, it is an open question whether mobilization will continue, or the UFT will continue to simply rely on the courts.

In this environment of increasing attacks on public education, new activists are joining the ranks of those who see the UFT leadership as an obstacle to struggle. Two new groups, Teachers Unite and the Grassroots Education Movement (GEM), have in particular made their presence felt in the past year, even though they are not directly involved in the elections.

Teachers Unite is a membership-based grouping mostly of younger teachers, organizing around a variety of issues. For its part, GEM has fought against the school closings and the encroachment of semi-private charter schools, particularly in Harlem, where they have been crowding out traditional public schools.

The opposition groups are in an uphill fight against the Unity machine, however. Unity has vast patronage resources at its disposal, including after-school jobs only open to caucus supporters and convention junkets to reward loyalists. Run on iron discipline-- members must forswear any external dissent--the caucus has maintained more-or-less absolute control over the union for decades.

However, there's growing anger and ferment among rank-and-file teachers as we see job security slipping away and no clear strategy from our union leadership to stop the erosion of our rights. Even if an opposition victory is almost impossible at the moment, a vote for ICE-TJC will help sent a message to our leadership and members across the city that fighting back is possible.

As ICE candidate for executive board Arthur Goldstein put it in a recent letter to his chapter:

We act in the interests of working teachers, and we don't fret over whether or not it will get us invited to the next convention or gala luncheon...We don't believe in dumping every gain we made over twenty years for a few points above the pattern. Nor do we believe in negotiating a 10 percent compensation increase for 10 percent more work and calling it a raise.

Wake-up Call: Susan Ohanian Tracks the Battle for Florida

[Comment from NYC Educator:
I think you ought to make clear that there is a bill in Florida that
will abolish tenure and make more than 50% of teacher salaries depend on
student test scores.  I'm not sure your readers will necessarily know
that.]

This looks like the Florida edition of my announcements.
But everyone should play close attention to what's happening in Florida.
YOU are likely to be next.
Susan

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Parents Bear Witness to Devious Florida plan
Parents
Fund Education Now.org
2010-03-31
http://susanohanian.org/show_atrocities.php?id=9265

Grassroots parents group makes video opposing Florida tenure legislation,
legislation everyone in the country should care about.

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Florida Gubernatorial Candidate Sen. Paula Dockery opposes Senate Bill 6
Sen. Paula Dockery
St. Petersburg Times The Buzz blog
2010-04-02
http://susanohanian.org/show_atrocities.php?id=9264

Florida gubernatorial candidate Sen. Paula Dockery, one of a few Republicans to
vote against the so-called teacher tenure bill speaks out against the bill. But
a teacher has first-hand info on the political process.

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Urgent Call to Florida Teachers
Florida teacher
Urgent Message
2010-04-02
http://susanohanian.org/outrage_fetch.php?id=665


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Massive protest targets education bill in Florida Legislature
Lee Logan and Cristina Silva
Miami Herald
2010-03-31
http://susanohanian.org/show_nclb_atrocities.php?id=3939

Florida teachers, parents and students turn into lobbyists as they make hundreds
of phone calls and send hundreds of thousands of e-mails to protest an education
bill.

Catching Up

I got a call yesterday from ICE colleague Julie visiting her daughter in LA asking why I wasn't blogging so she could keep up with the breaking ed news. (Check out her talented daughter Lucy's preview of the upcoming release of her next album.) Why does a retired educator still feels the need to take off for the break? When you think of it, we develop this habit from the day we enter school a 5 year old, so it is hard to break.

With wrapping up the UFT election distribution, dealing with the 25 people who invaded my house for a Seder on Monday - with an age range of 1.5 to 92, going to a friend's funeral, dealing with the loss of a cat, wrapping up the FLL robotics tournament and trying to control my 92 year old dad's interest in young women - which in his case means women in their 80's - it's been a busy few weeks and I haven't had much time for blogging. Or maybe it's all the Manischewitz Extra Heavy Malaga wine I swill all day. We still have an 18 and a half year old cat who is hanging in there and we're trying to decide whether to bring her in to the vet for a checkup or just let things lie. My hot yoga teacher, who has often cared for the cats, told me we were crazy and just let her be. As long as the cat keeps tearing up all those Staples bags, which my pals at the local store's copy center give me, I figure she is doing a OK.

(Here is Pinky feigning semi-indifference towards her late sister, Pippin, who she generally ignored when she was alive, but still is checking to find out where she went.)



There's so much to write about with the ed news that has been coming in from all over the place. In election news, here is a message from the UFT's Ray Frankel, who has run the elections for almost 40 years:

The ballot count will take place on Wednesday, April 7, at the Park Central Hotel, 870 Seventh Avenue (55th Street), the Manhattan Skyline Room. The count is scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. with the opening of two envelopes.

This count is done by the American Arbitration Association and we will be there observing. Anna Philips from Gotham promises to be outside to pick up tidbits she can report. I told her I will trade tidbits for food.

No matter what the results, it is always fun to watch the process, especially with Unity and New Action always taking the results so much more seriously than ICE and TJC. Unity wants to keep ICE and TJC off the Exec Bd even it only the 6 HS people where we have the best chance. New Action is even more desperate to stop their slide and if they lose the high school seats, they will still have 5 EB seats handed to them by Unity, but they will be even more inconsequential than they are. There are still people who vote New Action thinking they are an opposition and Mulgrew's total will reflect the Unity plus New Action count and so will be higher than Unity alone. There is hope he can beat Randi's numbers which if it happens will make her cry.

ICE and TJC see the election as part of a building process from the ground up and most of us were more involved with the grassroots activities of GEM than with the elections. Most GEMers did run and were active in promoting the elections in their schools. The numbers of activists - the true test of building an opposition - are still small but the greater interest and outpouring of people handing out lit, while it may not translate into votes, is a sign of building up a new infrastructure (which was lost when New Action sold out to Unity). As some of our younger activists pointed out, this was a learning process for them. Thank goodness. Next time I can just put my feet up and enjoy the show.

The court case and school closings are at the top of the list of news here in NYC. Leonie's listserve has been active as usual and there's so much good stuff I want to save and publish, I just can't keep up, though I did put up a load of stuff on Norms Notes (which you should check out even over the past week for some great articles), which is where I try to throw up as many interesting articles and posts from others as I can. One of the most interesting was an advance copy of Rethinking Schools' article on Teach for America, which led to this comment:

Alice Mercer said...

THANK YOU! Our district is looking at bringing in TFA even in the face of what was originally 700 layoff notices. I had "heard" about this piece and I'm glad we will have it in time to share with board members before the next meeting.

There was the NYCORE conference a few weeks ago and my appearances at some schools to talk about the elections. Steve Conn from Detroit has been in touch and is urging a group from NYC to go on the march in Washington on April 10 calling for Arne Duncan's resignation. I attended the Diane Ravitch Manhattan Institute luncheon on Wed. which I will write about later and met up with ICE-TJC Elementary school candidate Yelena Siwinski afterwards for a few hours of good ed chatting, followed by an evening robotic year end wrap up at Credit Suisse. I wore a jacket and tie for the Ravitch event and actually looked like a teacher for a change. I ended up in a dumpy pizza joint at 9pm for some greasy pizza.

My attempt to diet has really suffered in the midst of all this. Lucky I had my physical a few weeks ago at my low weight. The doctor, who is now treating almost all of our friends, does not take kindly to fat, cholesterol laden people. I better jump off that Snickers bandwagon real fast before my next blood test.


Follow-ups:
I am working on dealing with the anti-Randi factor in the elections - does anyone in Unity and without have something nice to say?

Also some thoughts on the Ravitch event and some issues I have to take with where she is coming from. I am in the midst of the book and may do chapter by chapter summaries and comments.

Guest Editorial: Comment on March UFT DA

Dear Ednotes Community,

Was I the only one at the Delegate Assembly yesterday afternoon that noticed Mulgrew essentially told the Union, "best case scenario, budget cuts will have us laying off 4,000 people." Question from the floor: How are they done? Answer: "By license and seniority." Then silence. Guess no one in the room was in the bottom 4,000.

What was Unity's plan to fight the budget cuts? Send faxes and post cards!

There are either 4,000 UFT members about to lose their jobs due to budget cuts or 8,500, depending on whether the Governor or the Legislature's budget goes through in Albany. Shouldn't the alarms be going off? And then they had the audacity to compare themselves to the brave teachers who "showed real solidarity" to form the union. An apolitical 50th anniversary: perfect thinking from the Unity caucus. Let's not mention, let's try to downplay as much as possible, the very real politics that our predecessors believed in enough to get out on the streets and fight for it - the evidence of which was displayed in black-and-white enlargements of the strikers all along the stairway.

Let's agree on this: faxes and post cards won't be enough to stop layoffs, budget cuts, pension cuts, teacher quality and charter school reforms. The only power great enough to halt these attacks is the hands of the workers themselves, through organizing themselves at the school level. But you'll notice there are no plans to mobilize the membership (except for mass-mailings). Mulgrew and Unity's strategy is to just start apologizing now - luckily the election results will be in before the lay-offs are announced.

You heard it here first. Meeting, December 2010: "LAID-OFF TEACHER? Organize! Educate! Agitate!"

Don't despair though! Like Rafael Feliciano, head of the FMPR (Puerto Rico's national teacher's union) said on Tuesday:

"You get together with your co-workers during lunch and you conspire. Yes! That's what you do, because that's what they say you're doing. So you conspire and [from this comes a committee]"

Batten the hatches mates, it's about to get stormy.

Alex Tronolone
Product of NYC public schools, a victim of the dreaded 'd' (The Dreaded "D" and the UFT) and member of the International Socialist Organization"!

Will Court Victory Stop Tweed's Relentless March to Close Schools?

by Norm Scott for The WAVE, April 3, 2010

I received the news of last Friday's court ruling by judge Joan Lobis preventing the DOE from closing 19 schools, including Beach Channel HS, in an exuberant phone call from BCHS student leader Chris Petrillo. Skeptical of Joel Klein's adherence to the law, I asked Chris what would happen if the court decision is appealed or if Klein finds ways around the decision. "We will keep fighting," he answered.

No sooner did we hang up than it was revealed that Klein would send out 85,000 acceptance letters to 8th graders, which were blocked by the court until the decision was rendered. Even if they chose the closing school that choice would not be listed but a note would be attached informing them they could revert to the closing school "if it remains open." The cries of outrage forced Klein to send out a modified version.

BloomKlein are counting on a court reversal and will engage in dirty tricks even if they don't get it. Last year when they tried to close PS 241 in Harlem and PS 150 in Brownsville to make room for favored charter schools, the UFT sued and won on the grounds that the DOE was removing the only zoned schools in the neighborhoods. Klein attempted to undermine the schools by sending out a letter to parents asking why they would want to send their children to "failing" schools.

Expect the same kinds of attacks on the schools even if they remain open for another year, which given the time frame seems inevitable. The question is how many 9th graders they will have and how deep the DOE will cut services to make sure these schools fail. And given the hostility to these schools by the people managing them, one would expect the parents of 8th graders to think twice about sending their kids to schools that are under assault.

And that is where I have a problem with the UFT strategy. Sure, go ahead and sue, but let's not declare pyrrhic victories without a follow-up strategy. The suit did not oppose the concept of the DOE's closing of these schools but argued that Tweed violated the modified mayoral control law passed in August that put a few roadblocks (fairly minor) in the way of the juggernaut. Now BloomKlein have to provide educational impact statements that describe the effect on students and the surrounding schools. Naturally, in their arrogance, Tweed did a slapdash job. The NY Times reported that the Judge agreed with the plaintiffs’ contention that the department had issued boilerplate statements, which she found lacked “the detailed analysis that an impact statement mandates.” She found other procedural violations, including insufficient public notification before hearings.

So, the next time they will just do it better. But close the schools they will. The root cause of the Tweed plan has not been addressed: the desire to close down public schools using whatever excuse they can find - and if they can't find any, they will squeeze their targets until there is a reason - to make room for semi-privatized charters. And the demand to fix schools they consider broken rather than close them.

Let me go into some detail on what I mean by "fix" schools. The ed deformers start out with the premise that the basic fault lies with the teachers. The only way around union seniority contracts is to close a school and reopen it with new (and cheaper) teachers. Oh, that we can go back to the days when I started teaching and took home $98 a week. Though they claim they want to pay teachers based on performance of students, BloomKlein's ultimate dream is to keep the bulk of teacher salaries low. Real education reformers believe that schools with students who are struggling can improve their prospects by adding the kinds of teaching and support services they need while finding a way to make teaching into a career with some guarantee of longevity with a decent salary.

The problem with the limited UFT fight back is that it doesn't include a mass movement organizing people from the closing schools and teaming that movement with the charter school invasion of public schools. Pulling out people only at the January 26th PEP meeting (I'm betting that outpouring had an impact on the judge) was not enough. In addition, the DOE has targetted another 37 schools with closing - and bet that they will make sure to not violate procedures next time. People in the streets backing up a movement can effect court decisions. But the UFT just stopped mobilizing there and had zero presence at the February and March PEP meetings.

Kudos to Channel View School for Research student Celine Anderson for standing up for her fellow students at Beach Channel in her excellent My Turn piece on the Beach Channel closing in the March 19 edition of the Wave where she castigated the DOE: The DOE does not listen to what we have to say, nor do they care; in their eyes they are right and we are wrong. Their minds are made up and it’s either their way or the highway. In other words, the academic future of millions of NYC kids is in the hands of a group of “adults” with the same maturity level, if not less, of a high school freshman. Celine has done a better job covering the story than most ed reporters at the major newspapers in NYC.

Both Howard Schwach and I are admirers of educational historian Diane Ravitch, but from different angles. Howie wrote a strong column in The Rockaway Beat called "Diane Ravitch – My Education Hero" on Ravitch's new book, "The Death and Life of the Great American School System." In the book, Ravitch does a mea culpa about her getting sucked into the market based concepts of ed deform. Both Howie and I admire her for that. Howie likes her positions on standards and curriculum. Ravitch has been viewed as a conservative by the left, which has softened in recent years but has continued to criticize her for her call for national standards, which would only end up with some kind of test that people would be forced to teach too. Some charge that Ravitch doesn't tackle the bigger issues related to poverty that impact on schools. I'm holding my opinion in reserve until I finish the book.

After I finish this column I am off to a Manhattan Institute luncheon at the Harvard Club featuring Ravitch and her book. This is conservative territory and when a leftie like me walks in alarms go off. Ravitch doesn't expect the friendliest reception at the MI since abandoning the free marketers and all they believe. My leftist friends have given me some questions to ask her. I'll wait until all the rolls are eaten to avoid a barrage.

Here's a last reminder to vote in the UFT elections. Ballots must be in by April 6. If you like what I've had to say, consider voting for the ICE-TJC slate.

Reasons to Vote ICE-TJC from John Elfrank-Dana

Hi,

As you enjoy your break consider finding that pink envelope the American Arbitration Association sent you. If you do, I recommend you vote for the ICE/TJC slate.

(As a disclaimer, know that I am running for one of the at-large positions, my name is buried deep in there somewhere, but if you vote the slate it will count for me).

My reasons for joining ICE/TJC are the following:

1. ICE/TJC are for democratic unionism. Unity is machine politics and back room deals with the mayor. Now that the mayor has spit in their faces they are in a state of shock.

2. ICE/TJC have a vision for democratic schools where teachers have rights as professionals. Unity believes in nothing other than more dues, double pensions for their staff and patronage jobs.

3. ICE/TJC are for digging in and preparing for confrontation. Unity has been the "if you can't beat 'em join'em" party. Randi was way too cozy with Bloomberg. Mulgrew is all chest-beating. HE HAS NO PLAN.

Unity has painted us into a corner with one accommodating contract after another. We cannot postpone the day of reckoning, for every year we do our position only gets worse and worse.

We need to call these so called ed reforms like Charter Schools and NCLB and Race to the Top for what they are: UNION BUSTING. And union busting is CLASS WARFARE.

We must show other working New Yorkers that our fight is theirs. That, if they want a future for their children with rights on the job and a decent standard of living, the fight must start now. We are the standard bearers. If we collapse there will be no organized group out there to replace us.

Voting for ICE/TJC is taking that first important step to moving forward.

For more information about ICE/TJC and James Eterno, candidate for President of the UFT, go to:

http://uftelections2010.blogspot.com/2010/02/james-eterno-ice-tjcs-candidate-for.html

--
John Elfrank-Dana
UFT Chapter Leader
Murry Bergtraum High School
www.Elfrank.com/UFT