http://youtu.be/02JYkc_ZaVc
In the meantime, Leonie Haimson has posted links to numerous videos with descriptions of each on her blog while pointing out how the NY Times totally misreported the story. Truly read their account and look at the videos. Her comments are so important I'm co-posting below.
http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2012/02/battle-for-soul-of-community-thursday.html
The battle for the soul of a community: scenes from contentious charter school hearing in S. Williamsburg -- and the memory of another controversial co-location 25 years ago
Nearly
500 parents, teachers, students, and community leaders filled the large
auditorium, with more than 80 of them speaking out against this
co-location proposal, and fewer than five parents from Brooklyn spoke
out in support. The rest of the audience consisted of parents bused in
from the various Success charter schools in Harlem.
And yet NYTimes/Schoolbook story ran a highly inaccurate and biased account, showing a large photo of the Success Academy parents, captioned with " parents turned out to support the co-location of a Success Academy charter school at J.H.S. 50 John D. Wells in Williamsburg, Brooklyn", without explaining that they were bused in by the charter operator from Harlem. The article went on to give most of its space to comments from the handful of supporters of the charter school, including the chain’s founder, Eva Moskowitz, with almost no mention of the huge outcry from the hundreds of community leaders, elected officials, and local parents who came out to oppose it. (Read what Williamsburg & Greenpoint Parents for Our Public Schools says about the piece, and read the irate comments from parents and community members at the Schoolbook website.)
And yet NYTimes/Schoolbook story ran a highly inaccurate and biased account, showing a large photo of the Success Academy parents, captioned with " parents turned out to support the co-location of a Success Academy charter school at J.H.S. 50 John D. Wells in Williamsburg, Brooklyn", without explaining that they were bused in by the charter operator from Harlem. The article went on to give most of its space to comments from the handful of supporters of the charter school, including the chain’s founder, Eva Moskowitz, with almost no mention of the huge outcry from the hundreds of community leaders, elected officials, and local parents who came out to oppose it. (Read what Williamsburg & Greenpoint Parents for Our Public Schools says about the piece, and read the irate comments from parents and community members at the Schoolbook website.)
Instead, see the video of the nearly 500 parents, students, teachers and community members leading off the hearing, chanting, “Whose schools? OUR schools” and Ms. Denise Jamison Principal of IS 50, where the DOE plans to put the charter, saying how grateful she is for the support of the community.
Here's the video of Council Member Diana Reyna,
pointing out that the District 14 Community Education Council that is
supposed to preside over the hearing is not present because the members
are boycotting it in protest; she says that we need the record to
reflect that this proposal is not supported by this community. She recounts how in Sept. 1986, more than 700 parents at S. Williamsburg's PS 16 kept their children home from school-- a 90% absence rate -- in protest of a plan to create segregated classrooms in the school.
(This 1986 protest occurred in reaction to a Board
of Education plan to construct barriers inside PS 16, and to hire
Jewish teachers to provide remedial education to Hasidic girls enrolled in
a nearby yeshiva, in classes held in separate classrooms from PS 16’s
mostly Latino students. The parents of PS 16 protested that this
segregation was not only discriminatory but would also cause more overcrowded classes
for their own children. The plan also required the displacement of 69
students with disabilities to other public schools -- to make way for
the Hasidic classes. The parents of PS 16 sued, asking the court to block this plan, and subsequently won on appeal. Here is an excerpt of the decision from the US Court of Appeals:
....each day, the public school students would observe some 390 Beth Rachel students arrive at P.S. 16. The Beth Rachel students would be taught in classrooms only they may use; no public school students would be taught either in those classes or in those rooms. Yiddish would be spoken in the Beth Rachel classes. Only Hasidic girls would be taught; those girls would be allowed no contact with boys. Only female teachers would teach the Hasidic girls. And where once there was an open corridor allowing freedom to traverse the entire hall, there are now a wall and doors partitioning the Beth Rachel girls from the public school students....
The lengths to which the City has gone to cater to these religious views, which are inherently divisive, are plainly likely to be perceived, by the Hasidim and others, as governmental support for the separatist tenets of the Hasidic faith. Worse still, to impressionable young minds, the City's Plan may appear to endorse not only separatism, but the derogatory rationale for separatism expressed by some of the Hasidim.)
Here's another video clip, where CM Reyna says
that DOE has abandoned our public schools; despite the fact that our
students have a basic unmet human right for quality education. Evelyn Cruz, representing Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez, ironically “thanks” DOE for once again dividing parents, children and neighborhoods, and disenfranchising them throughout the city.
Rob Solano, head of Churches United for Fair Housing and former IS 50 student, then speaks out in support of the public shool and against the charter co-location: “this is where I learned how to be a boy and then a man and learned about the world,” Ruben Flores, lead organizer for Churches United For Fair Housing also speaks out against the proposal.
Rob Solano, head of Churches United for Fair Housing and former IS 50 student, then speaks out in support of the public shool and against the charter co-location: “this is where I learned how to be a boy and then a man and learned about the world,” Ruben Flores, lead organizer for Churches United For Fair Housing also speaks out against the proposal.
More video as Khem Irby, CEC member from District 13, says
that Brooklyn does not need any more charter schools, which are here
for only one purpose: the money, and not about education. As a former
charter parent, she understands the abuse that happens to children in
charter schools and that they do not need this in any of their
communities, and parents are forming a united front in Districts 13, 14
and 15 against any more charters in their neighborhoods.
I berate the two DOE officials presiding over the hearings, Gregg Betheil and Paymon Rouhanifard. I say they should be ashamed of themselves and ask if they went into education to provoke the kind of division, anger and resentment seen tonight; I urge them to tell whoever who is making this decision to say no to this charter school; as there has to be someone in the city with the balls or guts to say no to Eva. I add that if there was one thing good that came out of this evening, it is that it is clear that NYC parents love their public schools and want them protected and supported, no matter how hard the DOE has tried to destroy them through budget cuts, test prep and rising class sizes. Lastly, I recount how at the recent City Council hearings on college readiness, the only thing the Council and the DOE agreed upon was that El Puente is a great school and should be replicated; with DOE officials repeating this several times. So why don’t they replicate El Puente here and create a great 6-12 school, instead of bringing in a charter school that no one in the community wants or needs?
I berate the two DOE officials presiding over the hearings, Gregg Betheil and Paymon Rouhanifard. I say they should be ashamed of themselves and ask if they went into education to provoke the kind of division, anger and resentment seen tonight; I urge them to tell whoever who is making this decision to say no to this charter school; as there has to be someone in the city with the balls or guts to say no to Eva. I add that if there was one thing good that came out of this evening, it is that it is clear that NYC parents love their public schools and want them protected and supported, no matter how hard the DOE has tried to destroy them through budget cuts, test prep and rising class sizes. Lastly, I recount how at the recent City Council hearings on college readiness, the only thing the Council and the DOE agreed upon was that El Puente is a great school and should be replicated; with DOE officials repeating this several times. So why don’t they replicate El Puente here and create a great 6-12 school, instead of bringing in a charter school that no one in the community wants or needs?
This afternoon Piccolo Elementary parents held a Press Conference to defend their school. They announced that they will occupy Piccolo to protest the Board of Education’s plans. The Board plans to vote on Wednesday to turnaround Piccolo and hand over management of the school to AUSL, Academy for Urban School Leadership, a privately connected firm with ties to City Hall. For the time being, you can follow what's happening on Occupy Chicago's
