Reposting - Republicans Are Terrified of What Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Started

I accidentally deleted my previous post which went into some commentary on my part which is now lost in space forever. So I am just going to republish this without commentary. Sorry, a few of you left comments but they were lost too. Feel free to put them back.

I just heard a clip from Alexandria from Meet the Press in which she was asked about her socialist identification and had a good answer. (I must delve into the different socialisms very soon we know what we are talking about.)

Republicans Are Terrified of What Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Started

Jay Willis
GQ•July 2, 2018

It took the right-wing pundit class all of four days to decide how it planned to attack Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the 28-year-old Bronx native who won her New York City congressional district's Democratic primary on the strength of some really, really good policy ideas. Their chosen approach, however, might be characterized as a novel one. You should know, says this basic-cable talking head, that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez—and this is a Certified Politics Bombshell, so please make sure you're in a place where you can audibly gasp—grew up in a house.

Look at this dwelling! Feast your eyes on the scale of its opulence! Why, it has a roof, and trees, and several windows! Its walls completely enclose the living area so as to protect its habitants from the elements! By golly, I bet if you were granted access to the home's interior, you might even find a refrigerator in which Ocasio-Cortez's family could store perishable food for consumption several days beyond its purchase date! How, he might ask, can someone be poor if they also eat food?

Set aside, for a moment, the fact that Ocasio-Cortez attended Boston University, which is neither "Ivy League" nor "Brown University." (Set aside, too, how creepy it is to post on social media a Google Street View image of whatever now exists at the site of someone's former home as a gotcha argument.) Cardillo's implicit assertion is that because a cherry-picked aspect of her childhood does not comport with his lazy, pernicious stereotypes about the lives of working-class people of color, she must therefore be an inauthentic liar.

The candidate responded, in order, by correcting his mistakes and putting him in a blender.

Her first point is the sicker burn, but her second one is what will matter in November. Cardillo, a Queens native and former Bronx police officer, won't address Ocasio-Cortez's "radical" socialist agenda on the merits because he understands that Ocasio-Cortez's "radical" socialist agenda is popular enough to win elections: With neither political experience nor big-donor money to her name, she unseated a ten-term incumbent by outlining a bold vision for this country in which those who live in it can lead fuller and more dignified lives. This terrifies him. And so, instead of staking out the absurd position that things like "women's rights," "housing as a human right," and "supporting seniors" must be bad—seriously, no one in conservative media tells on themselves more willingly than Sean Hannity—Cardillo abandoned good-faith criticism altogether. It went about as well as you'd expect.

Ocasio-Cortez is the first to admit that her platform isn't likely to be adopted wholesale by the national Democratic Party in the immediate future. But oftentimes, the surest sign of a viable political strategy is the extent to which its successful deployment makes your opponents nervous. If they want to have any hope of slowing the movement of which she is now the most prominent member, Cardillo and his peers will need to come up with a better plan in a hurry. Dumb tweets about a house aren't going to cut it.

 https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/republicans-terrified-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-165942526.html?.tsrc=fauxdal

 7,239 reactions

Lessons from ISIS for UFT/Unity in the Age of Janus

In a terrorist version of the “broken window” school of policing, the Islamic State aggressively prosecuted minor crimes in the communities it took over, winning points with residents who were used to having to pay bribes to secure police help.... the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, was willing — even eager — to get involved in the messy details of people’s day-to-day lives, and conversely that hundreds of people trusted them to fairly resolve their issues, no matter how trivial.... NY Times,The Case of the Purloined Poultry: How ISIS Prosecuted Petty Crime

I'll admit that I'm making a weird comparison here, but read on. The UFT leadership must win points with the members which is one reason some members view the Janus decision as a good thing --- putting pressure on the union leaders to address the major concerns of the members.

In some ways they may be trying. Parental leave was a direct response to the Emily James' 80,000 sigs petition, which after Mike Schirtzer brought her to a UFT Ex Bd meeting, Mulgrew seemed to get on the stick. There is also the seeming move to two evaluations a year despite the union's constant defense of the 4 evals -- this may have been one of the major push-button unhappiness issues in the rank and file.

But, look at the comments on various blogs about the lack of service and response from the UFT/Unity leadership on many issues - note especially the issues with the massively flawed grievance process that the leadership has not attempted to redress - even having weakened it in the 2005 contract.

Now, there are some effective people who work for the union. I was wondering that when they have to cut staff, will these be the people retained or will those who suck up effectively survive? Or will the loyalty oath prevail?

A dew weeks ago we ran into an old UFT/Unity party member who held a position who castigated Mulgrew and the few leaders who hold sway on their refusing to listen to even other Unity people who want to see some change as necessary -- it is just not in their DNA.

There are some interesting lessons in this NY Times piece on how ISIS won some level of support from the populace - by taking care of fundamental disputes. Think of this on the level of issues that arise in schools and the UFT is looked to for some assistance. Now of course ISIS had a few arrows in their quiver to enforce their decisions. But I am focusing on the fact that they were aware that gaining support is not only about top down rule but in providing some service.

Justice was swift and efficient, mostly because no one wanted to risk punishment at the hands of the militants. Yet the fact that hundreds of civilians filed complaints, including against ISIS fighters who had wronged them, suggests that at least some Iraqis believed the terrorist group would do right by them.

Even residents who suffered abuses at the hands of the militants gave them points for their policing, saying that for nonreligious disputes, they were not only fair but also willing to wade into problems that might have been brushed off by most authorities.

Would the Iraqi government have pursued the case of a stolen chicken?

“They wouldn’t have even heard this complaint because it was only for 4,000,” or $3.50, said Mr. Imad’s younger brother, Alosh Imad. “You have to have wasta — a connection to someone,” for the police to take your case under consideration, he explained. “As far as justice was concerned,” he said, “ISIS was better than the government.”

Solution to abusive principals

OK, so we don't have the power to behead abusive principals. Can we get that in the next contract? 

Or will we one day see certain people in a shrinking UFT/Unity Caucus being led to the guillotine along with their pal superintendents and principal and the leaders of the abuse supporting CSA?

Lessons from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez win

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's victory is a shot across the bow of the Democratic machine. Here's how it happened.

https://jacobinmag.com/2018/06/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-election-crowley-democratic-socialists

The left is a very wide place, from liberal/left to the many varieties of Marxist_Leninists, Stalinists, Trotskyists, anarchists, social democrats (like Bernie). The DSA is a wide tent and its future is always going to be threatened by sectarianism.

This Jacobin piece makes many interesting points. I haven't joined or participated in Democratic Socialists of America events yet but given the Bernie politics I fundamentally support, I guess this is where I am at politically. DSA is attracting a wide-spread range of people who consider themselves socialists, or anti-capitalists. There is much debate on the left as to how much to align with the Democratic Party -- ie - can it be reformed or should it be used to build something else. I'm thinking things through with this victory over Crowley -- the wing of the Dem party our own beloved UFT hangs out with. Never forget that the UFT/Unity party was born out of an anti-left bias and has always tacked center of the road along with alliances with neocons.

So within the UFT itself, will we see a left surge? Knowing some of the left in the UFT, including some members of DSA, I don't see that happening, but if the energy that went into the Ocasio-Cortez victory were translated to the UFT, who knows?

Why Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Won

By

Michael Kinnucan

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's victory is a shot across the bow of the Democratic machine. Here's how it happened.

Brooke Parker exposes sham of @CenturyFoundation report on "diversity by design" charter schools

the corporation was projected to receive a total of about $5.6 million dollars by 2016, with more than half of these funds to be provided by NYC taxpayers. ...charter school carpetbaggers attempted to exploit some of the fears of white parents moving into an area with public schools composed of mostly Black and Hispanic students.... For all their talk of diversity, their internal leaked “marketing plan” identified their primary targets in Williamsburg as “Middle/Upper income/predominantly White” and in Crown Heights, “middle/upper income" parents.....Brooke Parker

Exposing charter school scams is some of our favorite reading. I've known Brooke Parker for many years through our Williamsburg connections. She is relentless. Leonie publishes her latest on her blog.

Leonie writes:

Brooke Parker exposes sham of Century Foundation report on "diversity by design" charter schools via leaked Citizens of the World marketing plan and exorbitant fees..
Please share!

Here is Leonie's introduction on the blog:

Here is a column by Brooke Dunn Parker, Brooklyn parent activist, about a recent controversial report by the Century Foundation, which identified 125 charter schools that are supposedly “diverse by design” – though on the whole, most analysts find that charters have  had a segregating effect, according to the AP, NBC News, and the UCLA Civil Rights Project.

Moreover, this list of 125 schools was selected from 5,692 charter schools – only a tiny number.  The methodology is also questionable.  The authors identify these schools by analyzing their enrollment, websites and survey responses from school leaders.  Though the Century Foundation sent their survey about diversity to 971 charter schools, only 86 responded – which means that nearly 40 schools were put on the list even though the school leaders couldn’t be bothered to answer their survey.  
Several Success Academy charter schools were included on their list, including Success Academy Upper West, which has had multiple civil  rights complaints lodged by parents against it.  Finally, the report was financed by the Walton Foundation, the largest private funder of charter schools, who no doubt would like to whitewash their poor record of civil rights abuses.  Please read  the Network for Public Education and Schott Foundation report on how many charter schools violate students’ civil rights.

Check out Brooke’s dive into the issue, informed by her experience with one of the supposedly “diverse by design” charter networks highlighted in the report, Citizens of the World Charter Schools. Brooke has previously written about these schools on our blog, here and here.

 https://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2018/06/brooke-parker-exposes-sham-of-century.html


Brooke Parker has fought and exposed Citizens of the World charter when they invaded Williamsburg, Brooklyn. They used Eva Moskowitz' husband, Eric Grannis. Ed Notes published a bunch of stuff on the family scam.

Here is one on Brooke I published back in 2012:

Eric Grannis, Eva Moskowitz husband.

WAGPOPS Brilliant Expose of Citizens of the World Charter Ponzi ...

https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2012/.../wagpops-brilliant-expose-of-citizerns.htm...

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We believe that there is a place in public education for charter schools, but Citizens of the World is bastardizing the original intent of charter schools. ...

Brooke left this comment on the role Eric Grannis played:
Eric Grannis didn’t start it, but he created an organization, Tapestry, that made introductions between the “community,” the charter network that already existed in California, and SUNY. Tapestry was designed to help open charters in North Brooklyn, a district where we already had the most charters outside of Harlem. Tapestry’s marketing led many of us to believe that they were particularly interested in getting white gentrifying families invested in opening charters for their kids. - Brooke Parker

and a few more ed notes pieces:

Community Outrage: What is Eva Moskowitz's husband Eric Grannis ...

https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2012/01/community-outrage-what-is-eva.html

1. 
   
2. 
   

Jan 27, 2012 - There is so much going on around the Eva Moskowitz Success Charter invasion of Williamsburg (and Cobble Hill) that I could do 5 blogs a day.

Ed Notes Online: Eric Grannis (Eva Hubby) Charter Failure - Two ...

https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2017/.../eric-grannis-eva-hubby-charter-failure.ht...

1. 
   

Dec 18, 2017 - Eva Moskowitz' was involved in the scheme early on, as Brooke Parker from WAGPOPS reports: Eric Grannis didn't start it, but he created an ...

Ed Notes Online: Trashing Citizens of the World Scam Charter ...

https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2013/.../trashing-citizens-of-world-scam-charter.ht...

1. 
   

Trashing Citizens of the World Scam Charter Scheme. As registration is happening for citizens of the world (part of Eva Moskowitz empire), if you could circulate these negative articles and have everyone click on them, it would be very helpful. We need to let everyone know that there is significant opposition.

Ed Notes Online: Parents Opposed to Citizens of the World Charter ...

https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2012/12/parents-opposed-to-citizens-of-world.html

1. 
   

Dec 5, 2012 - Parents Opposed to Citizens of the World Charter: Hundreds, Parents in Favor: 4. The NY State Dept. would allow the Hitler Youth Charter to breeze through and not only would they authorize the Ku Klux Klan Charter School for Racial Harmony but they would wash the sheets. -- Norm at charter hearing.

And here is a Daily News piece:

Charter school boss Eva Moskowitz's husband's group seeks to open ...

www.nydailynews.com/.../moskowitz-hubby-open-new-charter-schools-nabe-success-... Feb 27, 2012 - Group affiliated with Success head Eva Moskowitz's husband Eric Grannis is also looking to open a charter school in Williamsburg. (Bryan ...

Tone Policing Used as an Anti-debate Tool by Left Right and Center

In his Letter from a Birmingham Jail, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. condemned this type of silencing, writing that he was "gravely disappointed" with the "white moderate, who is more devoted to ‘order’ than justice."^{[3] ... Wikipedia}

On NPR's "On the Media" this morning I heard a discussion of tone policing and how attacks on protestors who are viewed as "going too far" has been used to subvert the message. https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/problem-with-civility

The Problem with Civility

 It is worth listening to.



I'll admit I also react badly to what looks like uncivil behavior. Like I wasn't for tossing Sarah Huckabee out of the restaurant. The owner who did that also killed her business. So there are consequences.

But having just been through years of being lectured about my tone by the tone police in MORE and seeing Mike Schirtzer purged under the cover of his "tone" when in fact it was a political purge, this story struck a note. I had not heard the expression "tone policing" as a way to deflect debate and yet I saw this in action in MORE on numerous occasions, with the final straw being taking an open discussion listserve and putting it under moderation which has in essence killed all debate in MORE.

Mission accomplished.

It was funny as the same faction, all aligned politically, tried to control the listerves when we were in GEM, so I had an inkling that some form of political policing was behind the tone attacks. But this morning I heard it discussed in the main stream media for the first time. 

The wiki item below focuses on tone policing as being used against women and minorities and the left, but it also comes from the left, especially from the sectarian left which always tries to control voices that don't align with their particular sect. On the other hand, to be fair, people do have a right to complain about tone if they are offended - that is fine. But what I found is that I would put out a serious argument and the tone police would ignore the entire argument and chastise me on tone. Sure, tell me I could avoid using a certain tone -- good friends have told me that curbing my sarcasm would strengthen my arguments.

So I tried very hard to avoid giving people an excuse to avoid my political points. The result? They just ignored what I was saying altogether. Dead silence. So now I avoid commenting at all inside the MORE bubble and will use Ed Notes to make my points.

Tone policing (also tone trolling, tone argument and tone fallacy) is an ad hominem and antidebate appeal based on genetic fallacy. It attempts to detract from the validity of a statement by attacking the tone in which it was presented rather than the message itself.

Tone policing - Wikipedia

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tone_policing

In Keith Bybee's How Civility Works, he notes that feminists, Black Lives Matter protesters, and anti-war protesters have been told to "calm down and try to be more polite". He argues that tone policing is a means to deflect attention from injustice and relocate the problem in the style of the complaint, rather than address the complaint itself.^[2] In his Letter from a Birmingham Jail, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. condemned this type of silencing, writing that he was "gravely disappointed" with the "white moderate, who is more devoted to ‘order’ than justice."^[3]

While ad hominem fallacies of relevance are often autologies, critics have argued that tone policing is a flawed concept simply because it is autological. As discussed by The Frisky's Rebecca Vipond Brink, the act of labeling tone policing may itself be considered tone policing:

The problem with telling someone that you have a right to express yourself as angrily as you want to without them raising an objection is that you’re also inherently telling them that they don’t have a right to be angry about the way you’re addressing them.^[4]

— Rebecca Vipond Brink, Calling Out Tone-Policing Has Become Tone-Policing

Bruce Byfield has written that steering observers away from the validity of an argument is only one of many possible motivations for raising concerns about tone during a heated debate.^[5] An article on The Good Men Project has argued that moderating tone, whether or not one cares about civility, is useful for increasing persuasive impact on the listener.^[6]

New Jersey Protects Unions: Workplace Democracy Enhancement Act

Here is the Jersey version of the law passed in NYC.

Protecting unions with the law

The Workplace Democracy Enhancement Act that Murphy signed last month is one of those laws that could help public-sector unions. It gives them:

• the right to meet with members on the premises of a public employer during the workday to discuss grievances and other workplace issues;
  
• the right to conduct worksite meetings on premises during lunch, breaks, and before and after the workday to discuss negotiations, administration of agreements, and other union matters;
  
• the right to meet with new employees for a minimum of 30 minutes within 30 calendar days from that employee’s date of hire, without the time being charged against the employee’s leave time;
  
• the right to certain employee contact information and the right to use email for union matters.
  

http://www.njspotlight.com/stories/18/06/27/nj-public-unions-vow-to-stand-up-to-u-s-supreme-court-janus-ruling/

The Gates Foundation’s big-data experiment wasn’t just a failure. It did real harm

Thanks to Jeff Kaufman for posting this.

Here's How Not to Improve Public Schools

The Gates Foundation’s big-data experiment wasn’t just a failure. It did real harm.

By 

Cathy O'Neil

2

June 27, 2018, 9:00 AM EDT

Quality can be hard to measure.

 Photographer: Dave Einsel/Getty Images

The Gates Foundation deserves credit for hiring an independent firm to assess its $575 million program to make public-school teachers more effective. Now that the results are in, it needs to be no less open in recognizing just how wasteful — and damaging — the program has been.

School Scope: The UFT and Janus – Would a More Democratic Union Keep People from Leaving?

Union leadership will use the Janus decision to shut down internal critical voices. If we let that happen, we are abrogating our responsibility to build a better union by trying to force changes (and believe me it will take force) and we are also helping the anti-union forces who are using the impregnable union hierarchy against them. I expect the slings and arrows to come my way but I have my shield ready.

I wrote my column Monday, June 25, when we were still guessing about Janus outcome. It should be in The WAVE - on June 29, 2018, www.rockawave.com when it will be a bit outdated. It is about democracy in the UFT and whether that would be an issue in decisions to leave the UFT. Though this comment on the ICEUFT blog mentioned democracy.

Bronx ATR said...
This decision is not the end of unions. It doesn't even weaken strong unions. The strength of unions is not their bank accounts. but their willingness to fight and stand up for its members. The UFT's lack of democracy and its intentional creation of an apathetic rank and file has it rightfully concerned.

BronxATR is one of the few who mention democracy and my conclusion is that democracy is basically a non-factor for the overwhelming majority of UFT members. Democracy in the UFT only seems to be a factor to the tiny fringe opposition.

We recently watched MORE shunt internal democratic functions onto a side rail by overthrowing a steering committee a faction didn't like and violating so many by-laws we lost count. (See Why We Choose to Leave MORE)

So, even the supposed opponents to Unity (and I no longer consider MORE a serious opponent to Unity) don't seem very interested in pushing back on the issue of democracy in the UFT.

Yet, unless the ruling Unity Caucus party considers offering dissidents a role in reforming the union, Janus will make them bleed deeply unless there are some fundamental reforms. But I don't have much hope this will happen as the Unity DNA means maintain ironclad control even in a shrinking union.

THE WAVE: June 29, 2018

School Scope: The UFT and Janus – Would a More Democratic Union Keep People from Leaving?

By Norm Scott

Democratic norms seem to be slipping away all over the world. But there are alternate views as to exactly what constitutes democracy. We would have to define these norms first – which would require too much of my limited brain power. So I’ll leave it to you readers to define democracy on your own terms. Suffice it to say, I don’t take a traditional view of democracy.

Some UFT members may think the UFT is a full-fledged democratic union. So I imagine the state of democracy in the UFT won’t affect their decision on whether to keep their union membership or not when the Supreme Court most likely rules in the Janus case that no one can be forced to pay dues even though they may continue to accrue the same benefits as those who remain union members.

Without getting into the weeds let’s talk specifically about democracy in the UFT, which I have been a member of since 1967. In UFT elections the almost 60 year ruling party, Unity Caucus (a caucus is similar to a political party), always wins almost every one of the positions up for election with roughly 75% of those who vote. But almost three quarters of UFT members do not even vote and almost half of those who do are retirees, of which 85% vote for Unity. Thus, to a large majority of classroom teachers, a vote in a UFT election is basically irrelevant. Technically, this is still democracy – majority rule, even if only a relatively small minority of the total number of UFT members. Now, it may be that with a sure Unity victory, there is not much at stake, but that is the way our country seems to view democracy – a majority of a minority is still a majority -  though given the way things have been working out there are more and more calls for serious reforms.

The Unity party controls the 200,00 member UFT with a minority. Using this power base it also controls the NY State union with 600,000 members which in turn controls the national AFT union with 1.5 million members.

In the last election in 2016, a coalition of opposition groups won 7 out of the 100 Executive Board seats, none of the 12 officer positions and none of the 750 delegate positions to the New York State and national teacher conventions. That’s a worse winning percentage than even the METS. Those 7 seats were all from the high schools. In fact, various opposition parties have won the majority of high school votes in most UFT elections since the mid-1980s. Admittedly, the vote totals are low. In 2016 the opposition won the high schools with about 2350 votes while Unity received about 2150. There are almost 20,000 high school classroom teachers in the UFT. Even though our side won, we did so with less than 15% of the high school teachers voting for us. But that was the majority of those who did vote. Our side often claims that high school teachers as a whole do not get enough representation in the UFT, since a majority of those who do vote have relatively little say over UFT policy. The 7 non-Unity reps are only 7% of the Executive Board and they get voted down all the time. The argument that this disenfranchises  20,000 high school teachers, even if it makes the case for our side, is also an iffy one.

Let’s just say that the issue of a democratic UFT is a marginal one and when people chose to stay or leave the UFT post-Janus, the question of democracy will play little or no part.

Having thoroughly confused myself (and you) on the nature of democracy in the UFT, I will go back to blogging at ednotesonline.com where I may just blog about food.

DC 37 Sets A Pattern - And UFT Members Will Probably Be Screwed

So, Yes, Virginia, there is a pattern set for the next contract and expect things to run along fairly smoothly from now on.

DC 37 did it again. Here is the Daily News link:

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/ny-metro-dc37-contract-20180626-story.html

The pattern has not worked very well for teachers over the years even when we set the pattern, as we did I believe in 2014. What has happened with contract negotiations is that if we want to improve working conditions or get more benefits we have to pay for it. I don't have the brain power to do much analysis. I'm sure Eterno will take on that job on the ICEUFT blog.

The city will save money on health care changes - newbies must join HIP for the first year - also known as UGH! You see, my wife dealt with these insurance groups at Maimonides hospital for over 30 years and said HIP was the worst -- and it seems to be the cheapest for the city -- DUHHH!

And for certain illnesses - not described - you have to go to some chop shop clinic before a hospital. Minor issues like Ebola.

This response from one of the leaders of MORE gets into more depth on the effect on UFT contract negotiations.

This is very, very bad news for our contract negotiations. In exchange for raises that basically match inflation forecasts, the public sector union movement in the city has agreed to continue its strategy on giving up money in health care. The health care concessions are the same way that they funded our retro raises (and what led to our recent health care copay increases at ER's and Urgent Care facilities).  The details are not included here but I have heard they include a requirement that new employees have to join an HMO for the first year of employment - the first time we've had two-tier health care in NYC. The problem is that DC37's deal (note the family leave provision, paid for by employee contributions) sets the pattern for all other contract.  This, combined with Mulgrew's comment at the DA emphasizing that the Negotiating committee will meet over the summer, indicates to me that we are looking at an early contract settlement, wasting the 6 months that we have in the next school year that could be used for mobilizing members and seriously negotiating. The UFT is a major member of the MLC (Municipal Labor Coalition), and doubtlessly played a lead role in these negotiations.

If there is a quick contract it is also not great news for MORE, which had set its eyes on a major organizing campaign around the Contract  over the coming school year and even considered not running in the UFT elections in order to focus on that campaign. (I will be doing a deep dive on the upcoming UFT elections next year in an upcoming blog.)
Arthur Goldstein has an interesting take on the DC 37 contract at

NYC Educator

First Day of Summer Brings Contract to DC 37 

NYC Educator rates this pattern as Not Terrible, particularly given the draconian and insulting offers de Blasio has been offering the cops. I do not wish to do better, and I'll tell you why. Historically, improving on money has entailed givebacks. I don't think we've got anything to really give back anymore. My personal contract asks are unrelated to money.

I think the UFT has the biggest gap between highest and lowest salaries so money may mean a lot to people not on the high end. I personally never worried about money in the contract (but I had no kids and my wife made good money so I am not typical). I was interested in other issues like making my work place liveable.

There are some downsides to adding percentage increases. And regressive. One percent at the top is almost 2 grand while at the bottom it might be around $5-800. (Someone check my math).

Thus, the money gap grows and that makes high end teacher un-hireable  and makes low end salaried teachers attractive. Of course ending the fair school funding formula would address this.

I maintain both the city and the UFT have a common interest in keeping fair school funding and dumping high salaried people. The DOE gets 2 for 1 and so does the UFT. One high salaried teacher pays $1400 a year to the UFT and two newbies each pay $1400. Post Janus we may see some erosion by newer members once they get the sticker shock.

Basically, UFT contracts have come down to how much of a raise you will get and nothing much else, other than some givebacks. From my first day on the job in 1967 it was clear that while the UFT at the top had influence and power (much diminished over the decades), teachers in the classrooms were fairly powerless. But we did seem to have some control over our classrooms -- though I will say that the principal who took over my school in 1978 (it was a coup) imposed her "test practice all the time" rules on most teachers. I saw the handwriting on the wall.

Under Bloomberg, principals became kings and the power of the UFT over the system was severely eroded - no longer partners. If I were teaching I would want more control and less power for the principal. But I also knew lots of teachers who preferred to be told what to do -- even work from scripted lessons -- less work in planning.

The health care squeeze is treading into dangerous areas --  like you have to go to some health chop shop for certain conditions before you to a hospital.

Yesterday morning, I had my first cataract eye surgery at Manhattan Eye, Ear, and Throat Hospital (Next one due in 2 weeks) and the level of service was wonderful - just that I am doing this blog 24 hours after eye surgery.

As it was when I had my prostate surgery at Mt. Sinai last October and my wrist surgery at Maimonides in 2011 and my hand surgery at NYU in 2015, and my pic lines from NYU when I had a bad infection last summer  -- boy just think of what I've been costing the system as I age.

But will people get a getup like the one I had yesterday before my surgery at chop shop clinics?

 

Ding Dong! Swinton is gone from Port Richmond HS

Can't believe Port Richmond did in a year what Law couldn't do in 7. Good for them.... Former teacher at Swinton's old school

Port Richmond parents, staffers and students have complained about Swinton’s management, charging that she de-funded popular programs and spent $400,000 to hire friends.... NY Post

You see, the DOE doesn't give a crap if she spent 400G to hire her friends or de-fund programs or treat teachers, kids and parents like crap. They were about to appoint her permanently.

This was sent from a contact at the school:

https://m.insurancebusinessmag.com/us/news/breaking-news/school-principal-busted-for-interstate-insurance-scam-104128.aspx

NY Post's Susan Edelman:

Alleged insurance scammer principal finally ousted from job

The Staten Island principal charged with felony insurance fraud has been bounced from her job, The Post has learned.
Oneatha Swinton, interim acting principal of Port Richmond HS, was caught registering her luxury cars at the Pennsylvania home of a city vendor she had hired — a scheme first exposed by The Post in November.

“The decision to remove Ms. Swinton was made in the best interest of the school community,” said city Department of Education spokesman Doug Cohen.
Swinton was a no-show at Monday’s commencement ceremony for 394 graduating seniors.
“She wanted today to be about you, the graduates, and didn’t want anything to take away from your special day,” Assistant Principal Andrew Greenfield told the crowd.
Swinton’s name was mentioned a few times during the ceremony, but there was little reaction, said parent Joann Nellis: “There was no cheering, there were no boos.”
Greenfield, a Port Richmond assistant principal since 2001, will take over as acting principal until a new leader is chosen, the DOE said.
Port Richmond parents, staffers and students have complained about Swinton’s management, charging that she de-funded popular programs and spent $400,000 to hire friends.
After release of criminal charges against Swinton by the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s office, a group of school leaders sent a letter to Chancellor Richard Carranza demanding her “immediate removal.”
The DOE would not say whether Swinton, who remains on the city payroll, has been assigned to a new post.