Queens Metro HS Update - DOE Swarms In, Programs After Thanksgiving

Breaking: The principal “can’t find” a physics teacher so she is using a special ed teacher to teach physics with packets prepared by another physics teacher. Parents don’t know this.

There has been some action since yesterday on this story: Growing Scandal at Queens Metro Tech that illustrates that Tweed couldn't give a crap until a story break in the press.

I really think I broke the news that Walcott's daughter teaches gym at this school where the kids don't get gym - I even got a call from a reporter asking me if that was true.

I've gotten some email and comments and there is so much that is indicative about the failures of ed deform in this one school alone. Unfortunately, teachers  - both young and not as young are getting some of the splash from administrative incompetence. But as the parent letter I posted on Norms Notes indicates, the lack of accountability goes right to the top. If I were running a school system and even 2 weeks into the school year I heard of these scheduling problems I would send in as many people needed to straighten it out. But the WalBlackBloomKlein is hands off the schools they are supposed to run, managing from looking at data from afar and limiting their managing to closing schools and opening others, especially charters - my facetious line yesterday that in their world the solution lies in offering choice.

UPDATES
The pressure since the story broke about the City Councilwoman’s children at the school and the Chancellor’s daughter proved too much for the DOE and the network and Tweed types swarmed the building. They allegedly completed student programs and there is a special plan to disseminate it with scripted statements read by each teacher to their students explaining why the programs had to be changed again. The principal is feeling the effects of the pressure; lost weight, keeps to herself behind her office door.

The program rollout will not take effect until after Thanksgiving. There will be three days where administration will answer parent questions after school. Next Tuesday is PTA meeting where much of this will be announced.

After tabulating seat time it was determined by the network that many students will have to attend classes during vacation to receive credit for their classes. Also the teacher schedules were so screwed up the principal will have to hire 3 new teachers to make up for the extra classes assigned to many teachers without compensation.

The principal had ideas that theoretically may have been good but in practicality ended up with some teachers teaching extra long periods while others sat around with less to do. Did this cause some resentment? Maybe a bit. The UFT Queens HS District Rep was told that the teacher schedules were too long a year ago and did nothing about it, supposedly saying "the principal is new, give her a chance." According to sources, no sign of him today.

Letter from a parent:

Good Morning Mr. Scott, 

I read your blog this morning about QMHS and I am writing to sincerely thank you from the bottom of my heart. As a parent of a 10th grader at QMHS I appreciate what you are doing for our children. These issues have been going on at this school since day 1 and nothing has been resolved. I've personally discussed half the issues you talk about in your blog with the principal, the assistant principals, advisers and get no "real" answers, nothing is done to solve ANY of the problems. This is my son's first year in the public school system as he has attended private school since 1st grade and I can not tell you how disappointed I am. I had to take him out of private school last year because I simply could not afford it, and it really saddens me to have to now send my son to a school that is basically not teaching him anything. 

10th grade is an extremely important grade, the students need to prepare for the SAT exam, regents...and unfortunately this school is doing nothing to help them in those areas. At this point they can barely teach the basic classes let alone prepare the students for any future exams.

I am willing to help in any way possible to try and resolve this issue or bring it more to light. Feel free to contact me and again thank you for your time. 

 a concerned parent!   

And to show that the top people at the DOE were informed about problems with the principal:

I raised red flags about the Queens Metro principal beginning months before the school opened in September, 2010 - to Marc Sternberg of Portfolio and Chancellor Klein, among others. I thought she was too pie-in-the-sky about the Physics First curriculum for 9th graders and using on-line only teaching of foreign languages with Rosetta Stone software. (Correction though about her background - at a public meeting she stated she taught for 5 or 7 years at Packer, a private school, so I'm not sure about the business background Norm claims she comes from - she seemed pretty young to me to have had 14 years of business/teaching experience.)

After the school's first year, apparently only a handful of students (out of 400-plus 9th graders) were able to take the Physics Regents and the Rosetta Stone language instruction was abandoned (after the software was received, I believe, a couple or several months into the last school year). I have been told that this year's 9th graders are not getting foreign language instruction at all, though since I don't have a kid in the school, this is hard to confirm.

Another point: this is supposed to be a 1,000 seat school (250 students per grade), but last year it had well over 400 9th graders which was a surprise to the administrators and caused some havoc last year as well. I would agree with the comment that there have been failures at many levels by DOE. If you have a brand new school with someone who has never been a principal before, it seems to me the network leader should be all over the situation to make sure things were going well. I even accused Portfolio of not taking any responsibility - how do you approve a theme and a school leader and then not take stock of how that works out?

This year another large new high school opened in the same Metro facility - Maspeth High School (which will move into new construction next September). I have no idea how that school is doing, but wonder if we'll be hearing of similar problems there come this time next year...

MK

P.S. City Councilmember Liz Crowley has one or both of her kids at Queens Metro, so I agree that this school will most likely get attention (which it needs) while many other schools with similar problems will not. So sad...

Another story about scheduling problems at a Queens High School this year
http://origin.ny1.com/content/top_stories/150243/federal-program-blamed-for-long-island-city-high-school-scheduling-chaos
 
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DOE Networks, Especially New Visions, at the Center of Increasing System Failures

Last Update: Friday, Nov. 18, 2011, 9pm.
NOTE: If you arrived here from a link at Gotham Schools, the link was supposed to be here.

My post on Queens Metro Tech yesterday (Growing Scandal at Queens Metro Tech Exposes All the Ills of Bloomberg Ed Deform - Another Leadership Acad Principal Set to Take Fall) where we broke the story that Walcott's daughter was a gym teacher there even though the kids never really got to do gym type stuff (not her fault my spies tell me) touched on the role (often negative) that the 'noying networks play.

In Joel Klein's continuous reorganizations of the NYC school system, the goal of which was to ultimately remove any real accountability and management responsibility for running the system at the top, we went from district (32 form k-8 plus HS and a few others) to regions (10 plus one or 2 others) to some cockamamie system that I can't even name to non-geographically organized networks. Of course, Bloomberg and Walcott were privy and part and parcel of all these changes.

Insiders have been warning me about these networks from their earliest days - that the people they were bringing in to run things and supposedly offer schools important services often didn't have a clue. But networks serve the function of allowing WalBloom to say, "heads will roll" when things go sour (as they have a Queens Metro Tech which I reported on yesterday.

Here is a comment from a recently retired teacher on that post that is worth putting up:

The role of the network organizations MUST be investigated! New Visions, one of the biggest, I believe, of the Children First networks, also runs charter schools in NYC and advertises constantly for new teachers with no credentials in a program that looks just like Teach for America. This is a clear conflict of interest. I taught at a small school in a poor minority neighborhood and even though students were without mandated classes or teachers (don't get me started on how the special ed kids were shafted)nothing was done to correct the situation. The school is still being run by a totally incompetent Leadership Academy principal with little teaching and no administrative experience. He was backed totally by New Visions. We banded together as a staff, grieved everything we could, got OSI to investigate, filed a formal "No Confidence" petition that went all the way up to City Hall, but still nothing was done to help those kids, whose parents were either not aware or unable to do anything. If a middle class (i.e. white) parent body can't get satisfaction, our kids can't either. I am constantly frustrated by the fact that the public is totally unaware of these network organizations, that bleed funds from the system and are actually trying to turn their schools into charters with no regard for union contracts, students' rights, students' needs, etc. The network people that deal directly with teachers are retired administrators who are getting full pensions and then being paid by the networks to circumvent the double dipping rules. My "assistant principal" (really just a consultant with administrative powers) only came into my building one day a week for meetings and had no clue what the students needed or who they are. He only pushed the robotic agenda of the network. All of this pushed me into an early retirement, lest I suffer the same fate as some of my colleagues, being targeted, U'd unfairly, being forced to teach out of license, etc.

There is going to be some interesting stuff coming out, including possibly networks that condoned high level cheating - and would we expect anything less with bonuses to earn in the world of corporate ed deform?

More on Queens Metro Tech tonight.

Afterburn
Check out Phil Kovacs video questioning TFA performance -
http://youtu.be/8p2yAsnVTNw

UFT Wastes Member Money as Jim Callaghan Forced to Take UFT to Small Claims Over $400

Today at 6PM in Small Claims Staten Island - 927 Castleton Ave.

Categorize this story as Occupy the UFT.

I've been tracking this story since last spring. When Mulgrew fired NY Teacher ace reporter in July 2010 (here, and here) he refused to reimburse Jim for expenses incurred over the use of car service to cover certain stories.

So Jim took them to small claims court.

Today is the 4th time in this court on this issue and the UFT is apparently using their law firm - Stroock and Lavan, that wonderful law firm that spat out Randi like one of those tee-shirt shooting guns at ball games into the bowels of the UFT over 20 years ago.

Strook bills at $500 to $1000 an hour. Let's do the math even at the lower end: they leave Manhattan at 5-billing clock running- spend 6 to 9 pm in the court room-billing clock running and get home lets say at 10 pm -billing clock still running.

5 hours times 4 appearances is 20 hours even at the low end of $500 per hour --has cost the members $10,000 already. Well, maybe they're giving a hometown discount.

In addition there are reports they will have CFO Dave Hickey who makes $230,000 and staff lawyer Adam Ross (Jeff Zahler's nephew) at around $180 grand to argue with Jim over $400, most of which they are not disputing? They are claiming Jim didn't list the  exact mileage from his home to a chapter leader retreat in Connecticut.

In addition to the big march today the UFT is  preparing their appeal on releasing teacher data.

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Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/. And make sure to check out the side panel on the right for important bits.

Growing Scandal at Queens Metro Tech Exposes All the Ills of Bloomberg Ed Deform - Another Leadership Acad Principal Set to Take Fall

Last Update: Sunday, Nov. 20, 11:30 PM

See our follow-up article:  Queens Metro HS Update - DOE Swarms In, Programs After Thanksgiving where we reveal:

Breaking: The principal “can’t find” a physics teacher so she is using a special ed teacher to teach physics with packets prepared by another physics teacher. Parents don’t know this.

See Patrick Sullivan report on the PEP meeting of Nov. 17. Bloomberg DOE Mismanagement of Queens High School at November PEP Meeting

"Although the children are getting Gym, they are not having a gym lesson.  Instead they sit in the gym without changing into uniforms and do nothing."

Guess who the gym teacher is? Chancellor Walcott's daughter. This is not her fault according to sources but you think he doesn't know what's going on?

Read the story at Gotham (and the comments) which focused on the scheduling issue. Oh, it goes so much further than there.

Rumor: There was a special faculty conf scheduled (I think for today)  but word is it has been cancelled due to issues raised about whether teachers are expected to attend on their own time or get paid.

Ed Notes Exclusive
See a dynamic parent letter I posted at Norms Notes exposing Queens HS Supt. Juan Mendez and network incompetency. Shael supposedly now involved - not because things were wrong there but because of the Gotham article and the bad PR the DOE will be getting. You know the real problem to the DOE is that there is not enough "choice". I know, shove a charter school in the building.

Where to start on this one? The principal is Leadership Acad from business background with no clue on how to run a school - put this in the "you mean there's gambling going on here" category.

Now Queens Metro is a white middle class school so the stuff that happened there is getting out while this goes on in some neighborhoods forever.

Teachers of course, mostly younger - you know Lead Acad people want to hire people they can control - are afraid to speak out publicly but complaints to the union have gone nowhere (see my note at the end of this post about the union response) - but the main focus here is on DOE incompetency and lack of accountability from the principal - who sources says lies continuously and is so over her head she is about to drown - there might even be a leadership change. But the HS Queens Supt. Juan Mendez and the Network Leader Gillian Smith - more disasters.

Some noted excerpts:

"Many parents were speaking out to Principal Levy-Mcguire and no one was happy with her responses to the various questions.  She either denied knowledge of said issue or she blatantly lied."

Supposedly she lies all the time. But she is in the process of melting down so let's be kind - though the arrogance of people with these visions of how schools should be run but have no clue is galling.

The letter from the parent has a response from Mendez' assist:

"After two weeks of no reply back I followed up with her to be told “The claims are being investigated by the Network leader. All allegations are being addressed at this time.”  There is no evidence of this and I asked her for further details and she has declined to respond."  

(I confronted Mendez at the Beach Channel closing school hearing a year ago where he spouted nonsense about failing schools and how as principal he raised grad rates - but didn't mention he did it by creaming. The ultimate hypocrite.)

Another quote:

"When I voiced my concerns with Vice Principal Lambert, upset that I took off of work to attend, I was given an indigent reply that Kim’s e-mail was self explanatory.  Her tone implied that I was stupid to think I would meet with teachers during Parent-Teacher Conferences."

And the network? Jeez.

"From what I understand, Gillian Smith - the network leader- from the Children's First Network was brought in the week of November 7th to work on fixing the schedules.  The schedules Gillian arrange were just as full of errors as all of the other schedules that have been produced thus far."

And one more thing about newer, younger teachers: note how they can't and won't speak publicly - even tenured teachers often don't do that - but tenure at least gives them the protection to do so. When teachers speak out it is often to defend students. That is the penalty when we have mostly young staffs, not necessarily bad teaching. More experienced teachers feel competent to take charge of situations when the administration falters in schools with a teaching body with experience not only in the classroom but in how a school should be run.* The loss of that knowledge in so many schools, esp with Lead Acad principals without much experience themselves will be one of the many negative legacies of the Wal/Bloom/Blacl/Klein years.

One more thing: the UFT. Where has it been? When complaints were received from teachers the Queens HS District Rep. would respond: The principal is new, give her a chance. When some teachers were being given outrageous assignments the complaints were ignored/ Grievances? Always the response was - we missed a deadline.

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*Afterburn
I can remember a few times where we had no supervisors in our school for health and other reasons and we just all pitched in and ran the school - mostly due to great secretaries. I knew more secretaries who could run a great school than principals.

In Case You Missed it - Keith Olberman Compares Bloomberg to....

.....well, he didn't include Stalin.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoG9PmdGaT8&feature=email

And then head over to The Awl for Dana Goldstein's piece, not all of which I agree with but with lots of food for thought.

Why Not Occupy The Schools? The Failures Of Bloomberg's School Reform Agenda

http://www.theawl.com/2011/11/why-not-occupy-the-schools-the-failures-of-bloombergs-school-reform-agenda

(Brian Jones and I have her a copy of our movie at Education Nation when we sat with her in the press section for the screening of American Teacher and I do know she moderated a discussion of our movie at The Nation recently which from some reports was looked at as just a counter propagand film to WFS - I don't agree but no time to get into that now.)

And great news - Perdido School rejoins the fray - I knew I was right to leave PS on my blog roll.

Perdido Street School

Wasted Away In Cuomoville...
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International Day of Action - Nov. 17

OccupyWallStreet

The revolution continues worldwide!

International Day of Action

On Thursday November 17th, the two month anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street movement, we call upon the 99% to participate in a national day of direct action and celebration!

Calling All Parents and Children!!!



November 17 is a a national day of action in solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street movement.

The Children's Brigade will join with parents, teachers, and community members from around NYC at 4:30pm in Union Square.



Come out and help us EDUCATE the 1% on OUR demands:



ALL children must have the RIGHT to a FREE, QUALITY EDUCATION!

"We are marching today for a better tomorrow." - 5th Grader from PS 261

BRING SIGNS, PLACARDS, SCHOOL BANNERS, THOUGHTS FOR A MIC CHECK, VIDEO CAMERAS 

New York City

BREAKFAST: Shut Down Wall Street - 7:00 a.m.

Enough of this economy that exploits and divides us. It's time we put an end to Wall Street's reign of terror and begin building an economy that works for all. We will gather in Liberty Square at 7:00 a.m., before the ring of the Trading Floor Bell, to prepare to confront Wall Street with the stories of people on the frontlines of economic injustice. There, before the Stock Exchange, we will exchange stories rather than stocks.

LUNCH: Occupy The Subways - 3:00 p.m.

We will start by Occupying Our Blocks! Then throughout the five boroughs, we will gather at 16 central subway hubs and take our own stories to the trains, using the "People's Mic".

• Bronx
  • Fordham Rd
  • 3rd Ave, 138th Street
  • 163rd and Southern Blvd
  • 161st and River - Yankee Stadium
• Brooklyn
  • Broadway Junction
  • Borough Hall
  • 301 Grove Street
  • St Jose Patron Church,185 Suydam St, Bushwick
• Queens
  • Jackson Heights/Roosevelt Ave.
  • Jamaica Center/Parsons/Archer
  • 92-10 Roosevelt Avenue, Jackson Heights
• Manhattan
  • 125th St. A,B,C,D
    
  • Union Sq. (Mass student strike)
  • 23rd St and 8th Ave
• Staten Island
  • St. George, Staten Island Ferry Terminal
    
  • 479 Port Richmond Avenue, Port Richmond

DINNER: Take The Square - 5:00 p.m.

At 5 pm, tens of thousands of people will gather at Foley Square (just across from City Hall) in solidarity with laborers demanding jobs to rebuild this country's infrastructure and economy. A gospel choir and a marching band will also be performing.
Afterwards we will march to our bridges. Let's make it as musical a march as possible - bring your songs, your voice, your spirit! Our "Musical" on the bridge will culminate in a festival of light as we mark the two-month anniversary of the #occupy movement, and our commitment to shining light into our broken economic and political system.
Resist austerity. Rebuild the economy. Reclaim our democracy.

Portland

• Occupying steelbridge in morning
• Rally afterwards
• Subsequently occupying banks

International Actions

Spain

General Strike

A general strike of university students will be taking place in the following cities: Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, Tarragona, Palma, Sevilla, Santiago de Compostela, Murcia, Madrid, Valencia, Castello, Alicante, Zaragoza

17:00: Demonstration in Madrid

Place: From Nuevos Ministerios to Puerta del Sol Square
Call: Assembly UAM-CSIC / 15M
http://tomalafacultad.net
http://madrid.tomalaplaza.net/2011/11/08/17n-manifestacion-estatal-por-los-servicios-publicos/

Belgium

Occupy University and School

Germany

Massive student strikes, flash mobs, rallies, and other actions will be taking place in dozens of cities: http://ism-global.net/germany_education_strike_nov17

Posters

High-quality, print-ready versions (11x17, 15x24, 23x36) are available as a freely downloadable .zip file.
Let's get these posters everywhere! The artist's only stipulation is that they cannot be sold, only given away. Props to r.black for his amazing work!

Video Report: Eviction Reinforces OWS Determination

20,000 people marched on Wall St. on May 12 and no one noticed. At OWS a few hundred people camping in has captured the attention of the world.

This is a great point made by Nathan Schneider in Jaisal Noor's video summing up the actions yesterday (one reason I no longer feel it necessary to race around to every event to film is because of real film makers like Jaisal.)

Nathan points out to the disruptive nature of OWS which is so different than the non-disruptive actions of the unions like the UFT which often wants to partner (collaboration it is called) with the very powers they are supposedly protesting against. You know, that seat at the table they so hunger for.

In the video Justin Wedes talks about the big demo tomorrow which on the surface may look like the May 12 event which was mainly under the control of unions like the UFT. They are also involved in the event tomorrow but are they any longer in a position to control the direction of the movement? One aspect to watch will be the Occupy DOE group that meets up on the steps of Tweed at 4:30. See my report earlier today: Calling all future Occupiers of the Department of Education!

This is the OWS ed spin-off that disrupted Walcott's PEP Common Core standards scam a few weeks ago followed by the General Assembly on the steps of Tweed on Nov. 7, both events ignored by the UFT leaders - similar to their boycott of our movie. When it comes to educators applying the lessons of OWS, they UFT is not interested.

I think if you watch carefully over the next few months as the DOE escalates the closing of schools and co-locos of charters and pushes teacher evals and common standards down our throats - and if the ODOE teachers can really build something - you will see the UFT leaders in a quandary as to how to react - of course co-opting the movement would a major part of their strategy and they may succeed as they have in the past - I see all too many people who still hunger to partner with the UFT even when they understand exactly what they are doing.

ODOE will meet again on Sunday at noon at 60 Wall Street if you are interested in moving that forward - in case you can't make the 4:30 meet-up at Tweed tomorrow.

The Real News Report on OWS protestor eviction, protestors' return!
http://youtu.be/iL6HgtwWrTA




Also video from Tues. AM arrests at Canal and 6 on her blog from Leonie.

http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2011/11/video-of-arrests-this-morning-of-occupy.html

Calling all future Occupiers of the Department of Education!

Occupy the DOE will meet on the steps of the Department of Education to remind the public that 1% that crashed our economy, have have also hijacked and systematically destroyed our public schools through mayoral control. We will also remind the DOE, chancellor, and mayor, that we will no longer standby while resources are bled out of our schools and the right for all students to receive a quality, equal, and fair education are stripped away. Our voices, no longer silent, will continue to be heard in the fight to take back control of our schools.

When: 4:30 - 7:00

Where: New York City Department of Education (Tweed)

52 Chambers St.

NYC, NY

(look for the Occupy the DOE banner in case we are not on

the steps!)

This call is for educators to gather as part of the more massive demo and march together.

This event was planned for a long time.  The breakup at Zuccotti Park will only fuel this. But we have had many of these before - see May 12. Usually people demonstrate, feel good about it and go home. That has certainly been the  mantra of the UFT, which is strongly supporting this event: Demonstrate and go home.

So what makes this different? I'm focused on the growth of the Occupy DOE movement which has sprung out of OWS and has started meeting every Sunday in the Wall Street Ave in an indoor public space. (I wonder how long before the Bloomberg thugs work on the people who own that space to get them to put restrictions? Well, there are lots of public spaces and resourceful people will find a way.)

I don't think change can come until masses of teachers are activated as organizers in their schools and school communities. Activated in the context of building a democratic movement where people have a say in making policy, not only at the educational policy level but within their own union.  I wonder, do you think the UFT leadership really wants to see a growing number of people who look at how the 1% make decisions for the 99% generally in this country and increasingly in education policy (Arne Gives Gates a Contract to Microsoft - Surprise, Surprise), put the lens on how policy is made in their own union?

Here is the full announcement:

You are cordially invited to join Occupy the Department of Education in afternoon of mass demonstrations in support of the Occupy Wall Street movement...
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

When: 4:30 - 7:00

Where: New York City Department of Education

52 Chamber St.

NYC, NY

(look for the Occupy the DOE banner in case we are not on

the steps!)

Why:
Even though the mayor and the other 1% think that they can break the movement of the 99% by clearing Zucotti Park, this Thursday we, the 99% will show them that they ARE WRONG!


As scheduled, Nov. 17th will be a full day of non-violent mass demonstrations throughout the city to celebrate Occupy Wall Street's two month anniversary, and the birth of a movement that has inspired people locally and globally.


In honor of the occasion we will be gathering again on the steps of the Department of Education to celebrate our growing movement to reclaim our democracy and rights, while continuing our fight for economic and social justice.


Occupy the DOE will meet on the steps of the Department of Education to remind the public that 1% that crashed our economy, have have also hijacked and systematically destroyed our public schools through mayoral control. We will also remind the DOE, chancellor, and mayor, that we will no longer standby while resources are bled out of our schools and the right for all students to receive a quality, equal, and fair education are stripped away. Our voices, no longer silent, will continue to be heard in the fight to take back control of our schools.


We will celebrate this historic day through sign making, speak outs, teach ins, and a march across the Brooklyn bridge. This will be a family friendly event, with activities for children. Feel free to bring cupcakes, art supplies, and a whole lotta noise!


A better future on the horizon and we celebrate it this Thursday. Why? Because we are unstoppable and another future is possible!!!!!


ALSO, PLEASE SPREAD THE WORD!!!! Resend this email spread our Facebook event @ https://www.facebook.com/#!/event.php?eid=164709760292053!

UFT and DC 37 Should Provide Sleeping Space to OWS

With the threat OWS is facing, two major city unions, the UFT and DC 37, which are claiming to support the movement in various manners, should step up to the plate and provide sleeping quarters so the protesters can go back to the park every day.

Can you imagine an OWS General Assembly taking place in the same space where the UFT Delegate Assembly and Executive Board meets regularly to affirm that they are a rubber stamp of the Unity Caucus?

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GEMATR Meeting Nov. 16, 5PM - YES, We ATRs Know What to Do

Today was the first time I felt like a teacher and would gladly stay with this class for as long as it takes, even though I was warned they are really bad from the other teachers ----Posted by an ATR taking pride in his abilities

I just came home from parent/teacher conferences. The regular teacher has been out for weeks with a few more coming. The Principal has hired day to day subs instead of an ATR like myself for the entire time. I was asked to do the conferences because a sub couldn't handle the report cards, parents and explanations of the standardized tests. Well, the parents were really upset that their kids at are not learning with different subs in every day. they seemed to like me cause their kids were excited about working in class with me and having fun. Yes, we ATRs know what we do.
 

No kidding! It took me two hours to get control of this class which has been partying for 3 weeks. I had them doing real work for the first time. And they liked it after they realized I am a teacher not a sub. I went to the chapter leader --- said admin will claim they are to busy to deal with it. Too busy to run their school? You can see
their priorities. what a shame, blame the DoE....your article infers that we like week to week. Today was the first time i felt like a teacher and would gladly stay with this class for as long as it takes, even though I was warned they are really bad from the other teachers, I said two weeks with me and they will be the best class in the
school!

The GEM ATR committee sent out this email tonight.


 Welcome to new ATR additions to this list,

A must read piece on ATRs at NYC Educator: http://nyceducator.com/2011/11/dignity-gap.html#disqus_thread
Leave a comment.

See the text of the leaflet below and the attachment if you want to share with others.

A reminder that we are holding our second meeting tomorrow at the diner at 9th ave and 34th St. at 5PM. Depending on how many people show we will avoid the situation of the last meeting by breaking up into work groups at different tables.

So far we have the following groups:
Legal
Publicity/outreach - to the general public, the non-atr teacher corps and right now most importantly so we can build - to other ATRs - and to closing schools.
UFT liaison
Anyone with another group send it along.

Other agenda items- building some structure into this group.

If you saw a recent TJC response to the report of what happened at the Delegate Assembly, this point was made:
"It's still possible for ATRs to organize themselves  and supporters to hold an action, and ask UFT to endorse and build, the way that  was done in 2008.  This cannot be done overnight, but needs to be carefully  planned and given adequate time to be organized sufficiently to make it  effective."

ATRs are too isolated to organize without setting up some structure. That is why GEM took action to jump start a group, which has begun. But we need to move to the next phase which is to make the GEMATR group self-governing (think of the Occupy movements) with some structure. Thus we hope we can move towards a steering committee - maybe even come up with a temporary committee at the meeting with the idea of having one elected at some point.

The most important outreach we need is to other ATRs and also get into schools on the closing list since the teachers there are the future ATRs.

Another thing to do it expose what is going on in the schools you are traveling to.

One ATR was told to do clerical work with the secretary. She refused saying she was  a teacher and wanted to teach. The principal called her "lazy" and said that was why she wouldn't get a job. You mean there isn't one child in that school who could not use some one on one tutoring?

Same situation at another school where a licensed math teacher was told to sit in the hallway all day. Not one child needs tutoring in math?

Another school - the ATR was told to go through the scanner and refused. I won't go into details but if she is at the meeting tomorrow we may hear all the details.

Another ATR ran into a union rep and he ran away to hide in the bathroom.

Maybe we have a "sharing table" tomorrow - but have these stories chronicled for publication.

TEXT OF OUR LEAFLET

Dear Delegates: PLEASE SHARE WITH ATRS IN YOUR SCHOOL! EVERY TEACHER IS A POTENTIAL ATR!

ATRs will gather Nov. 16 at 5PM at the Skylight Diner (34th St and 9th Avenue)               

On Oct. 22, almost 40 ATRs gathered at the first meeting called by the GEMATR committee, exhilarated at the opportunity to share their stories and strategies with others, something they felt they had not been able to do at the UFT borough ATR meetings. There was discussion of forming committees - publicity, legal, UFT liaison, etc. and a call for a follow-up meeting. Since then, ATRs have shuffled to different schools each week and have been issuing great reports on the blogs. While 10% have been offered provisional jobs, there are still an estimated 1200 left and with 49 schools on the DOE (don't fix schools, close them) chopping block, we can expect a massive influx of new ATRs next year.

It was clear to everyone in the room that only by organizing ATRs into an effective force could their interests be defended. And that could only happen by reaching out to other ATRs and the rest of the teaching corps to educate them – the forty must grow into 400. Since then, the GEMATR committee has received daily requests asking to join the GEMATR Google group. If your only sources of information are the D.O.E dispatches from Tweed, the UFT newspaper or the compliant mass media, you are not getting the whole picture.

Some amazing blogs by ATR are out there: nycatr.blogspot.com, chaz11.blogspot.com, travatr.blogspot.com (each week the ATR brilliantly issues his own rating of the school he was at), iceuftblog.blogspot.com, and ednotesonline.com. The amount of information about the schools ATRs visit offers a snapshot of the school system that is proving embarrassing for Bloomberg.

Help fight off the destructive actions of the DOE done in the name of "school reform", as well as the poor decisions of the UFT leadership resulting in the loss of job protections and the unwarranted closure of over 100 of high schools (& middle schools) over the objections of parents, students, alumni, teachers, community, etc.
·       Ask ATRs to sign up for the GEMATR google group at gematr@googlegroups.com.
·       Support the resolution on ATRs co-sponsored by TJC and GEM during the new motion period.
·       Pass the word to ATRs: Attend the Nov. 16 meeting, 5PM, at the Skylight Diner (34th St and 9th Ave.)

The Grassroots Education Movement ATR Committee: gemnyc@gmail.com

Here are some interesting links from key ATR supporting blogs:

The Traveling ATR  http://travatr.blogspot.com/
My Adventures As A Gypsy ATR . School #6

From NYCATR: http://nycatr.blogspot.com/
The UFT 1% turns a deaf ear
Michael Mendel's "Hissy Fit"
Once again, the New York Teacher fails to report on the ATR
"Demagogic Rant" by Michael Mendel
Business as usual at the UFT Delegate Assembly

DOE and UFT claim that weekly rotation is peachy keen: New York Times
No ATR teacher on ATR Joint Oversight Committee: Chaz's School Daze
The Dignity Gap: NYC Educator
How reformers alienate teachers: Joanne Jacobs

http://chaz11.blogspot.com/
Who Are The People On The Joint Oversight Committe...
The Disgraceful Disconnect Between The DOE's Schoo...
The "Numb Nuts" At The DOE Adds More Responsibilit...
The "Restart/Transformation" Schools Are Shortchan...
If You Don't Believe That Principals Are Trying To...
Is This Really Something To Cheer About As One Out...

Google Group
We are still having some issues with the google group we set up. It does weird stuff. We have 47 people signed up and 60 pending. The problem is that once a person is invited we can't re-invite them. We will keep trying. Also some people seem to be able to get mail but when they try to send something it gets rejected.
Thus I am sending this out to both the email listserve and the Google group to be sure everyone gets it. If you get this twice then you are in the google group.

I'm resending some posts so those not in the google group can be up to date.

Insulting Article below - posted by an ATR

New Policy on Substitutes Leads to More in Permanent Slots


Nov. 14, 2011, 10:58 a.m.

By Beth Fertig

Further Cracks in Ed Deform No Excuses Mantra

“A teacher who works in a community like this and thinks that these children can leave their issues at the door and come in and perform is dreaming.”  NY Times, Nov. 15, 2011

This statement by Dr. Pamela Cantor the non-profit Turnaround for Children, is a dagger to the heart of the Teach for America and general ed deform "no excuses- the classroom teacher hero just needs better lesson plans - if a child disrupts it is YOUR fault" concept.

My principal used to claim that in a school with 15 regular ed and 15 special ed classes, 40% of her time was taken up by maybe 10-15 kids.

Anna Philips' piece in today's NY Times, "Calming Schools by Focusing on Well-Being of Troubled Students" about schools dealing with the most difficult students, students that you won't find in charter schools, has some interesting nuggets.

In focusing on students’ psychological and emotional well-being, in addition to academics, Turnaround occupies a middle ground between the educators and politicians who believe schools should be more like community centers, and the education-reform movement, with its no-excuses mantra. Over the past decade, the movement has argued that schools should concentrate on what high-quality, well-trained teachers can achieve in classrooms, rather than on the sociological challenges beyond their doors.

For schools in tough neighborhoods where many principals say they can barely see their teachers’ work through the fog of students’ extreme behavior, Turnaround offers a whole-child model that requires the hiring of social workers and the training of teachers in how to respond to outbursts in ways other than sending children to the principal’s office.

Turnaround’s approach is based on the premise that teaching can be made easier if schools confront the 5 percent of students who behave the worst. When they do not, Dr. Cantor said, those 5 percent often pull down the next 10 percent to 15 percent of troublesome students in an academic riptide. 

At a panel discussion in New York City last month, James Shelton, the federal Education Department’s assistant deputy secretary for innovation and improvement, said programs like Turnaround were often overlooked as “so much kumbaya.”

“The research for what Pam is doing is significant and growing,” he said, “and for us to ignore that is not only at our peril, it’s just stupid.”

So, poverty and dysfunctional families does make a difference.

============
Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/. And make sure to check out the side panel on the right for important bits.

OWS Tweets and More - Judge Restraining Order - Eviction illegal

Last Update - 8:30AM

Hearing for TEMP restraining order -at 11:30AM.


http://www.livestream.com/globalrevolution

DEMOCRACY NOW - live stream - http://www.democracynow.org/

BorowitzReport Andy Borowitz

BREAKING: Libya Warns NYPD to Exercise Restraint #OWS #OccupyWallSt #OccupyWallStreet

MORE BELOW THE FOLD

Occupying Andrew Cuomo: NYC Office Election Day Protest

A short 7 minute video I made to try to capture the spirit of the demo - I would have had even more stuff if I had remembered to press the "record" button.





Watch directly on you tube: http://youtu.be/NCCQ-qzqyq0

Read the full excellent Sunday NY Times Nov. 13 piece by Gina Bellafonte exceprts of which I used in the video.


Also read Children March on Governor Cuomo’s Office

below the fold

Public Education is Under Attack!: GEM Public Meeting November 14, 2011

GEM: PUBLIC MEETING!
Public Education is Under Attack!

Learn how you can get involved with the Grassroots Education Movement (GEM) and the CITY-WIDE FIGHTBACK to:

• End high stakes testing!
• Demand a REAL Parent Voice in Education!
• Stop charter co-locations and school closings!
• Occupy the PEP to make it a true democratic forum!
• Support those in the Absent Teacher Reserve!

Join GEM and the
FIGHT FOR PUBLIC EDUCATION.
 November 14
5:00-7:00 Room: 5414
CUNY Grad Center
365 Fifth Avenue
(between 34th and 35th streets)

The Grassroots Education Movement to Defend Public Education educates and mobilizes educators, parents, students and our communities against the corporate and government policies that underfund, undermine and privatize our public school system. GEM advocates both within and outside the UFT for the equality and quality of public education services and the rights of school workers.

Parents, Teachers, Students:
Join Our Struggle!

The People's University in Washington Square Park presents Education for the 99%

ODOE WILL MEET SUNDAY AT NOON IN ATRIUM AT 60 WALL ST.


Thanks to Pat Dobosz for the following:


Here are some photos from today's People's University. All the speakers were excellent, but the most moving was Melissa Garcia speaking about the undocumented students and her own situation. She is working with the New York State Youth Leadership Council and is hoping for legislation that will help undocumented students be able to receive TAP grants. She was passionate and "unafraid" to speak out. Bravo! 

Gabriel People's University

 

Megan Behrent,

               Leonie Haimson,Class Size Matters

Melissa Garcia, keeping the

Dream Act Alive

Kelly Wolcott, Teacher OWS

                                    

Fred Smith, retired

    organizer teacher, writer

        

NYC activists, teachers, parents, and students speak on the fight for public education in New York City and around the nation.

Saturday, Nov 12th, 1:30pm
Washington Square Park

Leonie Haimson, Class Size Matters / Parents Across America 

[how the 1% are controlling education policy in this country and wrecking our public schools]

Latoshia Wheeler, PTA President, K634, District 23
[parents and students face school closings in a broken education system]

Megan Behrent, NYC Public School Teacher
[perspectives from the classroom on Bloomberg's policies]

Melissa Garcia, New York State Youth Leadership Council
[keeping the DREAM Act alive]

Organizers from Occupy the DOE and the Student Week of Action in Defense of Education, Nov. 14-21

More info on http://peoplesu.tumblr.com
http://www.facebook.com/NYU4OWS

=====
Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/. And make sure to check out the side panel on the right for important bits.

Benita Rivera on

Chaz' report

The "Numb Nuts" At The DOE Adds More Responsibility & Paperwork To Teachers By Now Requiring Them To Report Child Abuse Directly To ACS.

has caused some interesting comments. Chaz argues teachers are not trained and trained guidance counselors should continue to do the reporting. Jeff Kaufman points out that this is state law and the DOE was violating it and in fact this puts them in compliance, making this additional point:

  I for one think we should mandatorally report. If college football coaches were mandatory reporters perhaps the abuse would have ended 15 years ago at Penn State and Joe Paterno could still be a coach.

Chaz counters with:

Joe Paterno has a private office and a telephone, teachers don't. To dump us with the responsibility and paperwork is unfair to the teachers. Also if we fail to see any abuse then you could be brought up on disciplinary charges by the DOE. Change the law.

Benita Rivera, parent activist (and superb graphic designer) is concerned about the seriousness of contacting ACS for parents who could wrongly have a child removed from the home. I know of cases where a vindictive principal and one case of a vindictive teacher called ACS on a parent for reasons that had nothing to do with the welfare of the children. So be careful - and sure - out there but also remember Penn State.

Of tremendous concern is that this regulation (is it city or state?) puts another boulder in the way of parents and teacher becoming the natural allies they ought to be.  

Bloomberg's model of control, either carried out by the Tweedie birds, Networks, Principals, UFT or the NYPD refuses to recognize the essential factors that racism, classism, cross-cultural misunderstandings and lack of TRUST play in educational outcomes for our children.  As a parent and activist, I can speak authentically of the atmosphere of distrust and fear between school administrators and parents who are all espousing care for the well being of children. 

I agree that teachers should report if they have seen something suspicious, but being responsible for direct contact with ACS is OUTRAGEOUS!  Social workers, guidance counselors and the "trained" team of money-grubbers from the Networks should take the teacher's report, do an emergency assessment, intervene as a team with the parents, and be responsible for contacting ACS if it's warranted. 

I make no excuses for bad parents.  Those that abuse and neglect their offspring are despicable.  Their behavior needs to be spotted as soon as possible so the children are rescued, the family held accountable, and helped.     

The sad fact is, teachers and schools also abuse and neglect.  

Maybe not in the same way parents do, but horrible things DO happen inside schools.  The lasting effect of educational neglect or abuse by teachers--(not in a sexual way because that does seem to get attention) but in the not-so-subtle forms of abuse like bias and prejudice, or constantly screaming, demeaning, exhibiting emotionally destructive language, unfairness, favoritism, etc. is hurtful, especially to majority poor and children of color who may not have the support systems they need to overcome it from a teacher / authority figure.  What happens to too many of kids in our NYC schools is almost as terrible to their futures as is coming from abusive homes. 

A few years back, I was informed that my 10th grade son was constantly late for school even though he was leaving the house on time.  I found out that he was delaying going there because of the demoralizing atmosphere-- and the fact that he felt his teachers HATED him.  He said they made snarky remarks if he answered wrong and made unwanted comments about him bringing a cooked lunch from home (he has food allergies).  They made inappropriate mention of my attendance at SLT meetings, and they did not like that he spoke up in defense of some of his “slower” classmates when made fun of by teachers as a way to show their power.  The principal was guilty of replacing iPods when stolen, just to keep peace with her favored students.  She rewarded bad behavior by taking kids out to lunch with her or giving them special tasks in school where they could earn money, but the good kids got no recognition.  When I heard these complaints from my 14 year old-- what could I do about it?  No teacher would admit that they were guilty of such horrible behavior.  As if my job as a single mom wasn't hard enough, what was allowed to go on in that school actually made my parenting work even harder. It took a ton of effort to get my son to go to school on time, do well once there, and get out by graduating-- by any means necessary—which included offers of bribery gifts and extra privileges on my part.    

Grieving a complaint to the DoE or the police is not so easy a thing for a parent who recognizes teacher abuse or school neglect.  And all things being equal, since there is ACS to call on parents, there should also be a “trigger” agency to call on teachers and the schools.  But no teacher would want that—just as we parents don’t want teachers calling ACS on us!      

Contacting ACS is a wickedly powerful tool in the wrong hands.  All too often it can be used as a weapon against “problem” parents who are strongly opposed to a school's policies, or may be having trouble with their kid's teacher.   It’s wrong on so many levels to make teachers spy on parents as part of their job, especially since so many are cultural foreigners in the communities where they work.  The Anglo standard of "good parenting" does not one-size-fit all.  I have come across many parents in my community of color who are afraid to discipline their own children because of ACS.  As early as kindergarten, children are talking back to their parents after being told in school what their parents can't do.  Little angry munchkins are actually threatening to tell on Mommie or Daddy so that the teacher will call ACS on them.  What may look or sound like neglect or abuse in the home may be nothing of the sort, yet once ACS is called-- the parent can lose their job because of court dates and social service investigations, all to find nothing.  That just makes matters worse-- both at home, and between parents and teachers. 

Fear and humiliation are tactical weapons of the system of educational control we live under.  But they are NO WAY to change the status quo of bad parent/teacher relationships and terrible learning outcomes.  Yet ACS is to Parents what the Rubber Room was to Teachers. 

Surely, TOGETHER, all of us smart and caring adults can up with a better method of protecting children, their homes and educations from abuse and neglect than making teachers and parents any more distrustful of one another.

If anyone is willing to work with The Mothers' Agenda NY on a better solution for protecting children than what the DoE is forcing on teachers, please contact us thru our website:  www.wearethemany.org

Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/. And make sure to check out the side panel on the right for important bits.

The Convenient Truth About My Road Trip to SUNY Cortland, Part 2

11/11/11 -11:11 PM - Don't you love it?

In Part 1 I laid out the background of my road trip to SUNY Cortland – which was really an air trip – to the Syracuse neck of the woods. I forgot to describe the tiny plane which seated 2 across on one side and had only one seat on the other side. One of the smallest planes I've been on. I prayed the rubber band wouldn't break.

Before getting to the panel itself, I want to give you some of my impressions of a day spent in the bowels of academia.

Cortland is the 8th largest teacher training school in the nation. So I spent the day interfacing with two groups of people: higher education professors who train teachers and college and grad students who are becoming teachers, pretty much all of them in their early twenties and under.

Though I got to hang with the loveliest people all day, I have to say that that my comfort level with education academics has never been great since I started teaching. You see as a history major in college I was one of those who looked down on people becoming teachers, on ed courses and on the people who teach them. I certainly changed my mind about those (mostly) women teaching elementary school after my first week when many of them saved my ass.

Even in my brief 6 week summer of '67 TFA-like training program for men looking to get out of the draft by teaching elementary school in hard to staff areas the best instructors I had were NYCDOE supervisors. OK, I never liked them much either but in those years you didn't become a supervisor unless you spent a number of years teaching in the trenches.

Now meeting all the academics on Wednesday, I felt they knew what they were doing and some of them even did teach for a while before moving up to higher ed. But my contact the future teacher students  made me feel I connected with some of them - at least from the ones who came up to touch base after the panel. The same thing happened at the Oct. 27 panel at NYU where the experience as a teacher who didn't leave the classroom for 30 years seemed to resonate with some future educators while sometimes I feel higher ed people are thinking - dumb, dumb, dumb.

Let me get to the panel. 

The hall was not fully occupied but I'm guessing 100+ people, mostly students.

Sandra Vergari who has done extensive research on charter schools was the first speaker. While putting on a face of neutrality on charters and pointing to the positive and negatives of both WFS and TITBWFS, I felt the way she presented the material was somewhat simplistic: that there were 2 opposing sides - one led by reformers and the other by the old stakeholders (teacher unions, school boards, supervisors - the old guard defending the status quo - though she didn't actually use that poisoned term - which I would have countered with " the ed deformers are the new status quo after 16 years in Chicago and a decade in NYC and charters all over the nation screwing up as bad or worse than public school in greater numbers. She also presented school choice as a positive factor. In her critique of the films she declared them both one-sided propaganda pieces, not addressing the fact that our film was a response to WFS that focused on the deficiencies of that truly propaganda piece. We did not make our film to show both sides of the charter or union debate. I do not consider our film propaganda but the truth.

Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz went next and started out taking a middle position between where Sandra and I were coming from. But she clearly was lining up against the ed deformers (as was most of the audience it seemed, especially the instructors. But is was her climax where the read a letter from a teacher at a well-known charter school who resigned in frustration that blew everyone away.

My presentation, after showing a short clip of our movie, was a hybrid between my personal experience as a teacher and activist (I connected the two, pointing out fighting for better conditions for students and teachers outside the classroom was a major component of my satisfaction as a teacher) and an assault on ed deform. I was working from some notes but ended up digressing, yet felt much more confident than I did at Hofstra and felt I got a better response - I could tell by the expressions on people's faces.

The question and answer period was dynamic though it seemed few questions were coming from the students. But a number of them came up at the end to say hello and thank me. I invited them all to join us one Sunday at 12 noon at 60 Wall St. at Occupy the DOE.

The Convenient Truth About My Road Trip to SUNY Cortland, Part 1

11/11/11 - Been waiting  a hundred years to write that.

Happy Armistice Day everyone. That was what we called it when I was a kid. Just read that 116,000 Americans died in the Great War - most over a very short period of time. We visited the War Memorial Museum in London not long ago and I had to be torn away - just trying to imagine what being part of that was like.

I realize I have too much to say so I am making this a 2-parter. (See part 2 here.)

Last Update: 5:30pm

Part 1
I got back Thursday from my overnight trip to SUNY Cortland, a small state school not far from Syracuse. I was representing the Grassroots Education Movement film "The Inconvenient Truth Behind Waiting for Superman." The surprising demand for our film as a counter to WFS in colleges has been amazing. (See the note I attached at the end of this post as an example of the kind of email we get every day.) Of course need I remind you that the UFT continues to boycott our film while failing to come up with an adequate response to the ed deformers - but then again when they try to straddle the line how can they? At the TC panel when an audience member attempted to brand the union as opposing standardized testing, Julie pointed out that union has basically supported high stakes testing (though you hear whimpers now and then about how awful it is.)

This was the 4th panel I have been on over the past 2 weeks. Up to now I have backed off these panels, deferring to so many of our great young spokespeople who are so facile with the issues. But with all our classroom people so busy, the the 3rd string is going in - me.

Let's see now, I was at Hofstra, NYU, Teachers College and Cortland. All in 2 weeks. Whereas NYU and TC were post screening QandAs, at Hofstra and Cortland I was expected to speak for 15 minutes.

Yikes! A speech. I really have never done much of that so I had to do a lot of thinking, a dangerous thing, continuously worried I would have a Rick Perry moment.

The speaking events did not follow a screening so the audience did not necessarily see our film. Both had a focus of sorts on charters - at Hofstra I was in a debate of sorts with a NYC Charter School Center rep. I did OK but felt me remarks should have been tighter but I had trouble putting the case against ed deform into 15 minutes. That experience helped me organize a better presentation at Cortland which I hope to further refine just in case I have to do it again.

I did have some trepidation about heading into the land of academia where I am not that comfortable. I did not leave the classroom and I believe that no matter what people say deep down those who did leave must be wondering what was wrong with me.

But as you'll see, the experience at Cortland was A+ all the way.

I want to thank Alexis Abramo of the Teacher Professional Development Network at SUNY Cortland for organizing the event and taking great care of us. She got us plane tickets and hotel rooms and even picked us up at the airport. She arranged a full day for us including lunch, dinner and a conference room for us to work in preparing our remarks, also treating us to lunch and organizing a dinner with much of the faculty before the panel. And she brought us chocolate snacks.

Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz

By "us" I mean Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz a professor at Teachers College, Columbia who I flew up with. I  briefly met Yolanda at one of the New Teacher Underground meetings this past summer where she was a guest speaker. As we went around the room announcing how many years the teachers were in the system, we heard numbers from one to four - until they came to me. My "35 years" blew some people away. She came over to thank me for my years of service and gave me a big hug. We chatted and realized we were both on the same panel in Cortland.

So when we met again as we were boarding the plane and found we were sitting next to each other, we began a rich conversation about education that went on - except for a some breaks during the day - until we closed down the restaurant in the hotel later that night after a delicious late post dinner snack. We would have kept going except Yolanda had to catch a 5:30AM flight back.

I found out on this trip that Yolanda is one of those incredibly supportive people who expresses appreciation to everyone for what they do - really always thinking of others - one of those Teach for America alum who really gets it.

After lunch we went to a bag lunch seminar run by Lalitha Vasudevan, another Teachers College Prof and a good buddy of Yolanda's. There was a small group of future teachers in the room and I was impressed by their fervor and commitment to teaching. I was thinking whether these fully trained teachers preparing for a career who were not Teach For America 6 week short-term wonders would go the way of the Dodo bird.

Many of you  may remember the anti-Teachers College frenzy that went on in the early years of BloomKlein during the Lucy Calkins craze where teachers felt that the TC method was being forced down their throats. Well, being exposed to these ladies for an entire day certainly had a positive impact on me.

After dinner, we went over to the lecture hall. Both films had been screened

Sandra Vergari

3 times over the last week but I was concerned that people in the audience may not have seen the film. So I asked for a brief segment to be shown.

In addition to Yolanda and myself the panel also included Sandra Vergari who has done extensive research on charter schools. Sandra was there to provide a neutral perspective on charter schools to counter my rabid anti-charter stance while Yolanda was taking a position somewhere between Sandra and I.

In Part 2 I will talk about the panel, the audience (mostly students with a batch of professors) reaction and my impressions of a day spent in the bowels of academia.

---------------------
Afterburns
In our movie, Sam Coleman from GEM and NYCORE, a teacher at PS 24 in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, makes some powerful statements about how high stakes testing has affected his school, which services so any English language learners. He says when asked why his school doesn't do as well on the tests Sam says, "You're asking the wrong question. What's wrong with your tests?" Here is a great piece on Sam's school, which by the way has a number of activist young teachers working with NYCORE. (Thanks to Gotham Schools for the link). It is noteworthy that the DOE offered reams of support for the principal and the work the school is doing.

A look into a dual-language program at Brooklyn’s P.S. 24. (Feet in Two Worlds)
-------------------------
Our Film at UNM

Hi there,
I am part of the Peace Studies Program here at the University of New Mexico and we are interested in doing a large scale (hopefully!) screening of the movie at the start of next year where we plan to try to raise some money for your work and local education reform efforts.  In the meantime - we would like to show it to a small group of students and faculty this coming Monday (Nov. 14) in order to figure out a specific set of talking points and how to prep. classes and the public in advance of the film and to better prepare for a post film discussion. Last semester we did the same with 'Waiting for Superman' and were able to quite successfully debunk the film...  We hope to take as good of a look at your film in order to highlight its attributes...When we showed 'Waiting for Superman' last semester (to an audience of about 100+ people), we had invited the New Mexico Secretary of Education - Hannah Skandera (formerly of Florida fame) to engage in a debate with our in state NEA Union President.  She cancelled at the last second when she realized that the crowd on campus might be critical of her - so we had a great time deconstructing the film without her!

Walcott Visits District 6: A Parent Report

I used to praise Joel Klein for his ability to alienate people - he really was our best organizer. At the very least I thought Walcott would have the ability to deflect people. But it is turning out he has that old Klein magic touch.

UPDATED Friday, 11/11, 6PM
Leonie posted Tory's email on the NYCParent blog with links, etc.

Dennis Walcott infuriates parents once again, this time in District 6

On Thursday November 10, the Community Education Council in Northern Manhattan hosted a Town Hall meeting with Chancellor Dennis Walcott.  The CEC prepared an excellent power point containing key data about the district, along with specific questions for the Chancellor.  It was a contentious meeting, according to all reports; see the Gotham Schools story.  Unfortunately, despite lots of PR spin about "partnering with parents," there is no evidence that Walcott is willing to listen to parents and shift away from the wrong-headed and damaging policies of his predecessor, Joel Klein, including repeated budget cuts, class size increases, worsening overcrowding, preferential treatment of charter schools with continued co-locations , and incessant testing. Here is the account of the meeting from Victoria Frye, CEC 6 member and public school parent:  

We described the issues facing our schools: too little resources to provide a quality education; overcrowded schools; disgraceful school conditions; budget cuts; co-locations; THE LIST GOES ON!

Tonight the District 6 CEC hosted a Town Hall with Chancellor Dennis Walcott.
We described the issues facing our schools: too little resources to provide a quality education; overcrowded schools; disgraceful school conditions; budget cuts; co-locations; THE LIST GOES ON! 

With each, Dennis Walcott got up and...spouted the party line:

• "The reality is that in this economy there will be mid-year budget cuts."
• "With shrinking budgets, leaders must be creative."
• "By creating school choice we are allowing the market place to drive the issues."
• "I respect Joel Klein tremendously. I think the world of Joel Klein."
• "There are no plans in our capital budget for a new facility for Mott Hall*."
• And then something along the lines of: "your D6 schools are so bad that we will not replicate or grow them; we will simply bring in [charters that really know how to educate your D6 children."

What to say?
OCCUPY. IT IS THE ONLY WAY.
* The only program for gifted D6 IS students and a national model. 

Victoria (Tory) Frye, member CEC6

Educators use Occupy Movement to Empower Students, Defend Public Education

UPDATE: 2PM

NY Times Schoolbook coverage: http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2011/11/08/tweed-protesters-decry-privatization-of-schools

 

Another video from Jaisal Noor on yesterday's ODOE- that one of GEM's amazing parent activists Janine Sopp with her daughter.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_z3_oGsFGyU&feature=channel_video_title




If you saw my post last night of the action on the steps of Tweed (OCCUPY The DOE)
you can see a whole new generation of teachers taking charge of the movement. You'll note that this is an independent movement of NYC teachers not controlled by the UFT. While mildly critical of the UFT, whenever they mention the union is it not with the kind of critical eye I turn on them - I guess it takes about 40 years of dealing with Unity Caucus before you give up - but they talk about pushing the UFT leaders to take action in defense of public education. Good luck!

One of the exciting things for me is the expansion of video coverage of education events by independent professional or semi-professional videographers and reporters - people who really know how to tell a story. This takes a lot of pressure off me to be there to film every event. But without adequate editing skills or working with more than one camera, or without the time to really work up a piece, I am often left to throw up the entire unedited video.

I really need to learn how to do what Meerkat Media or Jaisal Noor at The Real News does in this great video story featuring some of the movement's fabulous teacher/organizers.

http://youtu.be/LLox1bQ47Vs




Filmaker Michael Galinsky whose "Battle for Brooklyn" resonated with so many people has gotten involved in the Battle for Public Ed since the school his child attends was co-located. Here is a piece he wrote connecting the OWS to the ODOE movement that in just a few weeks has taken off.
http://www.rumur.com/news/occupying-the-institutions/

NEWS

Occupying the Institutions.

Posted by Michael on October 29th, 2011 Filed in Rumur

Last week on buzzflash I wrote about the connection between our film “Battle for Brooklyn” and OWS. Last year, as we completed Battle, we started to make a film about education in NY. We saw intense similarities between the way in which parents were shut out of the education process and the way in which communities were shut out of the development process. Our daughters’ school felt under attack by the DOE, and we heard rumors that they planned on putting a charter school in our building. We started to examine the way in which decisions were made and information flowed, and we found a thoroughly corrupted system that was gamed to shut out parent and community involvement. It was once again, a top down management style that did not take into consideration the voices of those most affected by decision makers.

The process, of housing one school inside another has a tendency to pit neighbor against neighbor, forcing them to fight over scarce resources in the guise of fostering competition. If the community is divided, those in power have a much easier time of doing what they want. We witnessed both development fights and school fights using sham public forums to create the impression of public involvement. However these public meetings were almost always overrun by division. We saw this time and time again in the Atlantic Yards fight, and it was clearly taking place in the schools fight. In fact democratic leader Jo Ann Simon made this direct point at a meeting about inserting one charter school in another public school

Last year I wrote a piece about our process of starting a film about education in NY. The times they have a changed in an unbelievable way. Last year the people accepted the fact that they would have to fight each other for scraps. In the following video there is anger at the DOE from all sides, but a lot of that anger is also based around communities fighting each other. Charter schools brought their supporters and the threatened schools brought theirs. In the end the vast majority of people walked out. The charter supporters stayed, and they got their schools. People walked out en masse because they knew that they weren’t going to be listened to and they were fed up. The public meeting was a sham, and people knew it.

This year the people took over the PEP meeting using consensus techniques learned at Occupy Wall Street, rendering those in power essentially useless. Thankfully it was captured by meerkat media collectiveso that we have direct evidence that the occupy movement has moved from anger to rage to action.

From the first moments of my first visit to occupy wall street I had a sense that something momentous was taking place. This morning, when I saw this video by meerkat media that cinematically captures the people taking control in a consensus model it was clear that the movement has powerful legs to carry it.