Social Justice Activist Ousts Randi Ally, 21-Year Incumbent as Baltimore Teachers Union President - Antonucci

The Union We Deserve slate, which is an alliance of two opposition caucuses within BTU – the Baltimore Movement of Rank-and-File Educators and the Baltimore Caucus of Educators for Democracy and Equity. Both caucuses have a social justice focus....
Brown is the latest in a string of candidates who have managed to defeat established union incumbents with a social justice platform. Though not strong everywhere, such candidates have had their greatest success by forming coalitions to present a united opposition..... Intercepts, Mike Antonucci

How much irony that the Baltimore MORE united with the other opposition groups while our own MORE divided the opposition here in NYC.

Let me point out that I and others called for a similar alliance of all forces here under the banner of a united front to confront the Unity monster in the recent election disaster in the UFT where MORE finished behind a ghost caucus. Maybe studying the Baltimore situation will be a lesson, though I doubt the wounds can be healed, especially as long as the ISO faction that took control of MORE is still dominant - which I expect they are despite the dismemberment of ISO - expect former ISOers to regroup somewhere else.

In Los Angeles a similar coalition of groups united under Union Power to win in 2014. Pay attention to the lessons of history which I tried to point out up to my final moments in MORE.

The Union We Deserve

The Baltimore coalition of two caucuses combined to run against the long-entrenched Unity Caucus-like leadership in Baltimore (it's called the Progressive Caucus - the same name as the Unity version in the AFT), defeating a 21 year incumbent and Randi ally who is a VP of the AFT. More lessons for us here in the UFT.

a preliminary tally shows a 901-839 margin for Brown. BTU has approximately 7,000 members.

Looks like the turnout might be less than here in NYC.

Antonucci has an interesting point:

The opposition slate appears to have won almost all of the teacher seats on the union’s executive committee, while the incumbent Progressive slate seems to have captured all the education support employee seats.

Interesting -- the opposition won the schools while the incumbents won what we would call the Functionals.

The strategy here in NYC has always been to go after the school divisional seats where retirees don't vote -- and I bet retirees don't vote in Baltimore - or anywhere else most probably -- and my point has been to win the 3 divisions and then go to court to fight the retiree vote - but that will never happen here as long as the opposition is divided and inept.

Don't expect this Baltimore outcome to be accepted by the caucus in power - Unity-like caucuses do not give up power easily. They will probably go to the AFT to adjudicate -- and Antonucci makes this point:

Whatever the ultimate outcome in Baltimore, English remains the president of AFT Maryland and one of the many vice presidents of AFT national.

"English, in a statement, pledged to challenge the preliminary results. “Throughout this campaign, there were egregious violations of the elections process,” she wrote. “I can’t in good faith concede this election.”"

Right - Her caucus ran the election. Reminds me of when Mike Shulman won the high school VP position in 1985 and Unity protested the election they ran and actually got a new election - which they then lost.

The opposition protested too:

Teachers who supported Brown’s slate of candidates said the union election was not conducted fairly. They have accused the elections committee of attempting to suppress the vote by having limited voting hours and locations, and denying the majority of absentee ballot requests. They also say educators had to use a confusing ballot that favored English’s team.... Only by the third page did he get the option to vote for people on the Union We Deserve ticket. Daniels was frustrated and upset — just imagine, he said, if the Democratic party tried to get away with that style of ballot during a citywide election.
Union We Deserve was not able to fill an entire slate, because some of its candidates for the executive board were rejected by the elections committee.

We know the AFT has a history of goon takeovers of locals, so this may be a big mess. Watch carefully - a new election wouldn't surprise me.

By the way -- our local conspiracy theorists always complain about the mail ballot we use here but look at the issues related to in-school voting which would take place on one day -- and in fact today's Chicago election is also taking place in schools.

That there are two caucuses coming together for the election should be interesting. Why are there two social justice caucuses? Hit the links to see where they stand - and will this alliance break down under differences?

Baltimore Movement of Rank-and-File Educators and the Baltimore Caucus of Educators for Democracy and Equity.

BMORE seems very similar to MORE in focus and is probably part of UCORE. CEDE is a facebook page and seems to be a less ideological group -- so it is possible to combine a heavy duty SJ caucus with others in a united front.

Today is the election in Chicago where CORE, the granddaddy of social justice teacher caucuses, to win as the incumbent against Members First (Chicago Teachers Union CORE Caucus challenged). There are attempts to brand Members First as right wing in the left wing press -- as if people calling for more attention to be paid to basic working conditions is right wing.

When CORE won in 2010 it was the most broad-based caucus and did not unite with other caucuses running against the Unity style leadership - but that was a special case - there were 5 caucuses running, 2 of them a split leadership and one pretty irrelevant -- and there was a run-off --- so the CORE strategy was based on finishing 2nd and gaining the support of the other key opposition. It was like the Democratic primaries coming up -- the more the merrier as long as you finish 2nd and then unite the rest.

Funny how a long-time voice in the opposition used the example of CORE as an excuse for MORE to run alone --- a specious argument that ignores what really happened in Chicago.

Mike Antonucci has the short report based on a Baltimore Sun article and both are published in full below the break.

Is Randi After Trumpka's Job? Would that make Mulgrew AFT President? No Way I say

If she wants to be AFL-CIO president, she's going to have to break Trumka's kneecaps.... A source

Mike Antonucci reports on a piece in Bloomberg Law
that Randi Weingarten is considering challenging Richard Trumpka for leadership of the AFL-CIO, a position I have always believed Randi had her eye on and back when people speculated she was after Secty of Education I pointed out that she had more power as head of the AFT. And in fact she still has more power now than she might as AFL-CIO head. But I always believed Al Shanker coveted this position but in those days the idea of a public service union head, especially a teacher, would lead the heavier industrialized AFL-CIO was not a reality.

My sense has always been that Randi wanted to go further than Shanker did and the AFL-CIO is a place that would accomplish that.

Things have clearly changed as industrial unions declined and the public service unions have risen to the top in the union movement. So Randi making a move is feasible. (Remember how Al Shanker made a move on his former mentor Dave Selden at the 1974 convention in Toronto (I was there)).  Shanker's move was partially inspired by then AFL-CIO head George Meany who was very pro-VietNam war, as was Shanker, and Selden was opposed to the war.

Selden did not go quietly and wrote a book with some heavy criticism of Shanker.

Maybe a lesson for Randi. But if Trumpka doesn't want to go it won't be as easy for Randi as it was for Shanker, who had Unity Caucus domination of the AFT to rely on. There is no Unity Caucus in the AFL-CIO.

And then there's this point from Antonucci:

I can think of at least one good reason she wouldn’t want the job. She made $405,793 last year as AFT president. Trumka made $261,779. 

Well, maybe the AFT/UFT Unity Caucus machine can supplement her salary to make up the difference.

If Randi should make the move and be successful, that leaves the AFT presidency open and since 1974 UFT presidents have occupied the position since then except for the 4 years between Sandy Feldman and Randi.

From what I saw of Mulgew at AFT conventions he didn't distinguish himself and Randi didn't give him much of a role while elevating former St. Paul teacher union head Mary Cathryn Ricker who I would put my money on as her successor.

There is some danger in not having a loyal base in NYC from the Unity Caucus people and that might be a factor.

But this is all fun speculation, and with the 2020 AFT convention coming to Houston where an endorsement of Joe Biden will take place, Randi may just stay put and wait for Trumpka to retire. But they are the same age so all balls are in the air. My money is on the status quo- Randi makes too much money and has a lot of power over her fiefdom.

Is Randi Weingarten Really “Sniffing,” “Swirling” and “Flirting?”

Posted: 14 May 2019 09:43 AM PDT

Bloomberg Law runs a column called the Daily Labor Report, and this week the lead item is about who is waiting in the wings to challenge AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka.

The timing of the piece is curious, to say the least. Trumka has more than two years remaining in his current term, and the AFL-CIO doesn’t practice term limits. Trumka has been president for 10 years and, leaving out the short tenure of one interim president, previous presidents have served for 14, 16 and 24 years.
But, okay, let’s roll with it:

Trumka still has more than two years left in his third term at the helm, but that’s not stopping some of his possible successors from sniffing out potential support for a run if and when the seat opens. Three names are swirling as likely candidates to eventually replace Trumka, and at least two of them are making calls behind the scenes to try to build a backing, according to sources.
…Randi Weingarten: The American Federation of Teachers president flirted with challenging Trumka in the last AFL-CIO election and has since been a prominent voice in highly publicized school house strikes. Weingarten is taking a page from the Paul Ryan for Speaker of the House playbook: She will publicly say she’s not interested in the job, while remaining open to the option behind the scenes if sufficiently urged to do so by others.

Weingarten’s name has been floated in the past as a U.S. Senator and a Secretary of Education. I have no idea if she is interested in being president of the AFL-CIO. Clearly, neither does Bloomberg Law, but it didn’t stop them from posting a column about it.
I can think of at least one good reason she wouldn’t want the job. She made $405,793 last year as AFT president. Trumka made $261,779.

Chicago Teachers Union CORE Caucus challenged by Members First - Election May 17 - Substance

While I have little direct knowledge of what is going on in Chicago since George Schmidt's death, I expect CORE, the ultimate example for progressive teacher union members who want change in union leaderships, to win. But here Members First is challenging a SJ oriented leadership and if it gets a significant vote total, that may indicate a sign of things to come for social justice caucuses that overreach on SJ and under reach on focusing on the needs of their membership, especially given the disastrous outcome for MORE in the recent UFT election.

The last time an election was held in Chicago TU was in 2010 when CORE won. I remember George telling me that he had security of some sort in every school to prevent the caucus in power from stealing the election --- they vote in the schools, not like here, by mail.

Some of the charges against CORE are that it has not been able to get a number of schools organized effectively like it did for the 2012 strike, that the contracts they have won, even in 2012, have been deficient but that the left press has overhyped their victories and downplayed the defeats, and that they have often played the political game poorly. I can't vouch for any of these charges but suspect some germs of truth. (See Jim Vail on the upcoming elec

[Read a report of the CTU recent delegate meeting and the caucuses debated afterward at Substance: May Chicago Teachers Union House of Delegates report includes election forum information].

The politics of the May 17 Chicago Teacher Union election are always interesting and relate to issues we see here in NYC with MORE trying to emulate CORE in its political stance but being  unsuccessful in its 7 years in existence compared to CORE which won leadership less than two years after being founded (CORE is less than 4 years older than MORE).

Contrast CORE and MORE, which got significantly lower vote totals even than in its first election campaign in 2013. But the faction, or fraction, leading MORE has been more divisive than CORE has been, though some of their leadership engaged in similar actions with the attempted failed purge of George Schmidt --CORE Attempted Purge of One of Founders George Schmidt Failed in Chicago - Eight Women of Color Speak on George's Behalf.
CORE maintained some semblance of internal democracy while MORE proved itself more adept at its goal of purging by just tossing democracy and due process out the window. 

Upon its founding in 2008, CORE offered a broad based social justice agenda but with a focus on the schools, as was originally intended with MORE before going off the tracks.

Members First came into existence as a reaction by some that the CTU/CORE union leadership was not paying enough attention to the issues in the schools. The George Schmidt often made the same charge -- that the leadership was more interested in holding rallies as an organizing tool than going into the schools to organize. And some in CORE agreed with him and some former CORE supporters helped form Membership First.

Some in NYC view Solidarity Caucus, formed by former MORE members, as the Members First equivalent. I don't think there is an exact parallel but I've been predicting over the years that if a caucus or leadership tips too far one way there will be a counter reaction the other way.

I understand what has driven the people organizing Members First but to me the name is a net negative and a narrowing of the agenda and by their name they have come under criticism as sending a message that the students are not important. Of course member needs should be a priority but the name is exclusive. They needed to be more subtle - like calling themselves Solidarity.

Content in [] added after publication based on some input:

[It is important for me to note that educators who feel the primary mission of a teacher union and caucuses within the union is to focus on union members, not students and other issues related to what they view as outside social justice issues should not shunned or mocked or call them right wing or racists. The fact is many teachers of color are in agreement. While we may disagree and feel that a union must address the conditions of students, we also feel a union cannot let issues related to SJ run ahead of taking care of the members. These are issues worth debating and when ICEUFT was active we did engage in that debate and as a consensus group often came to a meeting point. No debates like this took place in MORE -- it was somewhat of a shaming issue and people with those views either left or were silent so as not to be called a racist. Thus my point that we can't let how you feel about a leader prevent dialogue from taking place in groups like Solidarity and Members First - and I bet this may be going on in other places.]

Here in NYC MORE's former more inclusive message has been narrowed to aim at only a certain segment of the union -- I need to blog further about exactly what constitutes this segment but if the recent UFT election has some lessons, the drop from 10,700 to 2,700 votes may be some indication. A clue -- the MORE leadership views these 2700 as potential cadre and thus of a higher priority than the 8000 missing votes.

In NYC Solidarity Caucus arose in 2014 partly due to similar concerns about MORE but the leaders have come up with a more clever name. Some of us tried to keep Portelos inside MORE to raise his issues there instead of leaving. Despite being invisible for the years between elections and having few outposts in the schools, Solidarity with its mainstream message got a thousand votes more than MORE.

Yet Solidarity too has come under attack behind the scenes by both New Action and MORE leaders as being driven by forces that might attract the anti-student crowd and  turn to the right. Sometimes I think the criticisms directed at Portelos are a coverup for the underlying politics.

This is the first real challenge CORE Caucus is facing since its election in 2010 when it didn't start out as being favored to win. And in fact, with 5 caucuses running it finished 2nd to the caucus in power. But that Unity-like caucus had split in two (it had also lost in 2001 to PACT Caucus before winning back power in 2004 in a very close election - PACT had around 49% in the first round, just short of winning outright but lost in the runoff).

Chicago has a more democratic system with a runoff if no caucus gets 50%. A weakened PACT was running in 2010 again with a former CTU president at the top of the ticket - but CORE was formed by some former PACTers. The very idea of having more groups run was why the CORE leaders, with a caucus only about a year and a half old, felt they had a chance if only they could finish 2nd.

Here's an article about the election from Substance.

http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=7089&section=Article

Chicago Teachers Union officers challenged by Members First

Jim Vail - May 01, 2019

Notes on a Staggering ISO - Louis Poyect - 2014

I want to address the question of the “right” of a Leninist organization to keep its discussions shielded from public view at the end of this article... Louis Proyect

This article from 2014 is important to understand what happened to MORE which was taken over by the ISO faction in a sort of coup d'etat that included so many features Louis Proyect, who bills himself as an unrepentant Marxist.

His comment opening the article is relevant to my banishment from MORE for posting some comments made at a MORE meeting. The ISO faction brought into MORE the precepts their own organization operated under -- and worse than anything, the so-called newbie Democratic Socialists ate it all up without a whisper of dissent. I will be publishing the internal memos from MORE members to the ISO leadership on how they won the battle for MORE which will be illuminating. The entire process makes me cautious about the direction DSA will end up going due to the influences of the former ISO faction and their allies. Don't think the recent election debacle and the dumb December 23 petition are not relevant. (See James placing blame at the ICEUFT Blog : WHO IS THE MOST CULPABLE FOR SCHOOL BEING OPEN MONDAY, ON DECEMBER 23? - And let me point out that the majority of people who started ICE and are still involved would classify themselves as Marxists and they have been among the most critical of ISO from the very beginning.

UPDATE - I added this to my facebook post:

From 2014 - a precursor from a long-time left activist with lots of signposts for teacher caucuses as former ISO teacher factions jump into DSA, a danger to attempts to build broad based inclusive progressive movements inside teacher unions instead of narrow ideologies dominated by a few voices and aimed at a narrow audience with only acceptable ideologies. We will be discussing the ideologies involved in small meetings and will have lots more to say about these issues over the next few months. Current and future activists may find the analysis useful. I can live in a system of democratic centralism and controlled output from an organization  - like Unity Caucus operates -  if it is not sneaked into the back door but discussed openly and honestly. That did not happen in MORE/UFT. 

Notes on a Staggering ISO - Louis Poyect

https://www.counterpunch.org/2014/02/18/notes-on-a-staggering-iso/

February 18, 2014

December 23, 2019: A Day of Infamy - Reports from the field and FB Outrage, including MORE Follies

MORE, the caucus that wants a militant UFT won't be militant by, say, calling for a sickout on Dec. 23. Instead they want to add a day at the end of the school year - June 29, a Saturday --   How much do you want to bet that if the UFT had done that in the first place MORE would have opposed? As of last count almost 15,000 people have signed. There's militancy for you.

....the UFT was negligent in not covering the calendar issue in contract negotiations. Those talks culminated in a contract in October even though the New York State United Teachers (NYSUT) put out a Fact Sheet in September telling local unions that the State Education Department expects new collective bargaining agreements to comply with new minimum instructional days (180) and hours (900/990) regulations.... James Eterno

I brought this to UFT Executive Board last week, and you can see what leadership said a little further down the blog. This is one of the stupidest things I've seen in over three decades of teaching in NYC, and that's saying a lot. Asking for another useless June day is hardly a solution, and asking for it on a Saturday pushes the absurdity even further.... Arthur Goldstein 

Oh the angst and anger over next year's school calendar which lists Monday Dec. 23, 2019 as a work day. At times it seems a bit much considering all the other issues out there to be outraged about. But I do get it - many people go away or prepare for Xmas and having Monday off allows people to travel with plenty of time to spare. Plus consider how many teachers are from other places and probably go home for the holidays.

One retired friend with a son who teaches and grandchildren who go to the public schools was surprisingly outraged - she says it just shows the level of disrespect and almost mocking of a working staff that is abused in so many ways. And she also blames the UFT for making excuses - she absolutely believes they could have stopped this if they were bothering to pay attention.

James Eterno has led the battle at the ICEUFT blog and fundamentally agrees and heaps scorn on the UFT--- he goes into the reasons -- the UFT was negligent.  James was one of the first out of the box at the ICEUFT blog and at last count had over 7,000 hits. And look at those comments. And all the math people are doing to add up the school days and minutes. And the research into what other districts have school on that day. 

NY1 did a story on James leading the fight.
NY 1 COVERS CONTROVERSY ON NYC SCHOOLS BEING OPENED ON MONDAY, DECEMBER 23, 2019 AND MORE ON THE SUBJECT
And we can see his kids too video of the news report.

James has posted extensively on the issue and has put a lot of time into doing the research -- OK- I can think of better things to do but here are the links:

• SCHOOL ON MONDAY, DECEMBER 23 A MAJOR UFT SCREW UP THAT WILL RECUR

• MULGREW BLAMES STATE ED DEPARTMENT FOR SCHOOL BEING OPEN ON MONDAY, DECEMBER 23 IN NEXT YEAR'S CALENDAR

While James blames the UFT, Arthur Goldstein heaps scorn on the State Ed Dept and the DOE. Arthur asked the question at the Ex Bd and has written about the entire folly of working Monday Dec. 23
NYSED, December 23rd, and Wasting Time and Money

Arthur and his pal Mike Schirtzer have come under attack for not attacking the UFT leadership over issues like this. I find myself in the middle of this argument.

I see both points of view - the UFT leadership need to be criticized but Arthur and Mike have chosen a different path -- try to get them to act not by criticizing but by trying to build alliances with people in the union who might be willing to act. And you don't do that by calling them slugs - which has been pointed out to me numerous times. I've been on both sides of this issue -- Ed Notes in its earliest years did not attack the leadership and I attempted to build alliances - ultimately I failed and then went on the attack. But Arthur and Mike feel the times have changed and more can be won by not attacking. Time will tell whether James' approach has a better outcome than Arthur's and Mikes.

In the meantime, Arthur has been having fun at MORE's expense.

NYC Educator

More in Bad Ideas from MORE--Opening School Saturday, June 27th 2020 - After MORE dumped all my friends in an effort to achieve ideological purity and cleanse itself, it managed to go from winning the high schools to winning ...

And a follow up: MORE Alters Petition After People Signed It
Arthur mocks MORE for coming up with an idea that is as bad as working Dec. 23.

As usual, the opportunists in MORE, desperately seeking issues to raise jumped on the bandwagon Eterno created and created a petition on the Dec. 23 issue. And people were signing it in droves. Except they didn't read the fine print that MORE was calling for Dec. 23 to be replaced by adding June 27 to the school year, even dumber than the UFT plan. And even worse, June 27 is a Saturday. MORE has come under attack on FB by rank and filers. MORE then changed the petition to call for school on Monday June 29.

This petition indicates how democracy has fallen apart in MORE. In the days we were there we would have called for a full vetting of the idea on the listserve and fought it out. But when no dissent is allowed you fall into the world of stupid.

Well, if you want my theory on why MORE would call for adding a day to replace Dec. 23 here it is. Can the social justice caucus of the UFT call for taking away a day of instruction? Just sayin'.

School Scope: Democracy, Socialism and the UFT

My weekly column for The WAVE - May 10, 2019 - part of my series where I try to decipher socialism, the left, capitalism and democracy and relate it all to local issues in the UFT and general politics.

School Scope: Democracy, Socialism and the UFT
By Norm Scott

I’ve been writing about the variety of brands of socialism and democracy and no matter how people look at these ideas there are so many interpretations that if you take any one definition of democracy or socialism, you will violate the sensibilities of others: the eye of the beholder syndrome. My views hang from a bungee cord, bouncing back and forth.

Last week we went so see the enormously popular Freda Kahlo exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum. Kahlo was a lifelong socialist/communist, as was her husband Diego Rivera. They hosted Leon Trotsky, one of the key leaders of the Bolshevik Revolution when he lived at their house in Mexico City before an agent of Stalin assassinated him. Trotsky and his followers were purged by Stalin and became the heart of the socialist movement that became increasingly critical of the Soviet system. They claim Stalin hijacked the Bolshevik Revolution and turned their version of communism into an undemocratic state controlled by one strong man.

Trotsky and Trotskyism were viewed by hard core Stalinists as their major enemy and they persecuted Trotskyists all over the world. Reading George Orwell’s works from the Spanish Civil War, which he fought in in the 30s, he was clearly sympathetic to the Trotsky point of view and his Trotsky brigade came under attack by the Stalinists. Thus, Orwell who became famous for writing anti-Soviet novels like “1984” and “Animal Farm” has been used by anti-communists. But Orwell died a socialist in 1950 and seemed to be aligned somewhat with the Trotskyist wing of socialism.

Back to the Kahlo exhibit, there were many photos of her and Trotsky and others. One photo identified a key Trotsky supporter named Max Shachtman who morphed out of Trotskyism in the late 40s and became the leader of a branch of socialism known as “Shachmanism”.

In a recent column I pointed to the history of my union, the United Federation of Teachers, which due to the high number of members was organized into a powerful political force in the early 60s. Those key organizers, led by Albert Shanker, were socialists. Shanker as a young man in 1948 campaigned for Socialist Party presidential candidate Norman Thomas. Shanker and the other organizers of the UFT were fundamentally Shachtmanites. Indeed, Shachtmans wife, Yetta, was a key advisor to Shanker in the UFT for many years.

It is worth exploring this particular brand of socialism in order to better understand the political stances and organizational structure of the UFT which is based on some key concepts of the Leninist branch of socialism, like democratic centralism – which means everyone in the party must go along with the majority publicly or face expulsion. (I will address the complexities of democracy and protection of minority views in the future.)

The UFT’s ruling party, Unity Caucus, has been so organized since 1962 and has maintained power since then, often under the leadership of one strong voice --- which itself undermines the democracy part of democratic centralism. There have been only 4 UFT presidents since 1964. The recent UFT election was won by Unity with 87% of the vote, the kind of dominance Putin would kill for (and he probably has.)

Quoting Wikipedia on Shachtman:
“In 1958, the Independent Socialist League led by Max Shachtman dissolved to join the Socialist Party of America. Shachtman had written that Soviet communism was a new form of class society, bureaucratic collectivism, in which the ruling class exploited and oppressed the population and therefore he opposed the spread of communism. Shachtman also argued that democratic socialists should work with activists from labor unions and civil rights organizations to help build a social democratic "realignment" of the Democratic Party. Though he died on November 4, 1972 and had little involvement with the Socialist Party in the year proceeding his death, his followers, identitified as "Shachmanites", exercised a tremendous amount of influence on the party. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Party_USA#Background).”

The party is known as SDUSA and in the early decades to get anywhere in the UFT membership was an important ingredient, but has waned once the old-guard founders of the UFT like Shanker and his successor Sandy Feldman were gone and replaced by more traditional Democratic-like politicians like Randy Weingarten and Michael Mulgrew who have never identified themselves as socialists. That original old guard put anti-Communism at the top of their agenda and allied with right wing forces on many issues, leading the UFT away from its earliest roots while keeping elements rooted in methods of control used in certain socialist parties and organizations. Even today, you will find that the UFT, NYSUT and the AFT pretty much aligns with the center of the Democratic Party on most issues, especially when it comes to foreign policy and defense spending.

I will close on this question: Can socialism and democracy co-exist? I don’t have an answer yet but we will keep exploring.

Norm is very democratic at ednotesonline.com where his vote of one always prevails.

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Adult Ed Teacher Castigates UFT Leadership - Do you have our back?

Speaker—Sarah Tyson Adult Ed.—chapter leader—Co workers under terrible burden for almost seven years. Here and seen injustice done by admin. Asks—Do you have our back? A few weeks ago I was in a CL training and I heard the president echo that UFT has our back. I’m wondering today.  --- Excerpt from NYC Educator report --- UFT Executive Board April 29, 2019--Adult Ed. in the House, and All About December 23rd

The Adult Ed chapter of the UFT has been under years of attack by the DOE and have come to the Ex bd to protest a number of times, only to be fundamentally ignored. Here are just a few posts on Ed Notes about adult ed.

• Adult Ed Superintendent Rose Marie Mills targeted veteran teachers over age and they sue - UFT Mum - Ed Notes June 2018 
• Councilman Danny Dromm Hearing on Adult Ed Issues - Sept, 2017 
• First UFT Ex Bd Meeting of Year - A Stephen King Horror Movie

I would think that the speech about the lack of UFT response over the years by Sarah Tyson was the most significant event at that meeting for those who are critical of UFT policy, but the Dec. 23 day of teaching in what will most likely be schools devoid of children is getting the most play: 

OH, NO! I have to work Dec. 23

ICEUFT Blog:  MULGREW BLAMES STATE ED DEPARTMENT FOR SCHOOL BEING OPEN ON MONDAY, DECEMBER 23 IN NEXT YEAR'S CALENDAR -
There are a number of comments, almost all are anonymous.

Sarah Tyson is not anonymous.

Sarah Tyson's speech 29 April 2019

Good Evening... My co-workers who have been under a terrible strain for almost seven years. I’m the chapter Leader of the Adult Education program. I have heard and seen the injustice that the administration has done and is still doing.

I put this question to you this evening: Do you have our back? A few weeks ago, I was in a chapter leader training. I heard the UFT President echo that the UFT has our back. I saw a sign on the subway on Friday from Consumers’ and Workers’ protection: We have your back.
I turn this statement around in my head; “I have your back.”

What does this mean? According to the Free Dictionary, “I’ve got your back” means to be willing and prepared to help or defend someone, to look out for someone.” This evening we are calling for help. Help defend us. Help look out for us. I am reminded of the song, “Lean on Me.” It says, “You just call on me brother or sister, When you need a hand, I’ll help you carry on.” We need our union of over two hundred thousand members to help us carry on and help our students.

I know that together we are strong. But to be strong we must come together. Mark 3: 24-25, If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand, and if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand.

Let us come together and stop the injustice that is going on in Adult Ed. Together we can be strong and stop the abuse of Teachers, and Paras, and others!

My call today to all is to all: Come together and stop the injustice that is going on in Adult Ed and all the public schools!

Oh, and MORE which has been in the witness protection program since the election (the last post on the MORE blog was 5 weeks ago about how to vote in the election), emerged with a "jump on the bandwagon" opportunist petition. Ho Hum!

School Scope: Socialism and Democracy

School Scope:  Socialism and Democracy

By Norm Scott

Going back to its roots in the mid 1800s, the many brands of “socialism” kept dividing as new tendencies and interpretations arose. Those divisions continue through today and sorting it all out can be daunting. Which is why I am using this space to explore the depths and limits of my own knowledge. What motivates me is the current mainstream media talk which so often demonstrates a lack of understanding about socialism. The earliest roots of socialism was tied to the rise of unions in the most highly industrialized nations with growing working classes. And  my own union, the UFT, was founded by people who considered themselves socialists.

Wednesday May 1 5:30 at Cipriani -- NYC Teachers, Students and Activists to Protest Secretary of Education Betsy Devos As She Receives an Award

Join teachers, students, and activists outside of Cipriani 42nd St. to protest Betsy DeVos's return to New York as she receives an award from a think tank. DeVos has worked tirelessly to expand federal vouchers and cut education spending. DeVos backs Trump’s proposal to cut education spending by $8.5 billion in 2020, eliminating more than two dozen programs that help public schools, including teacher development, academic support and enrichment, and after-school activities.

More details here:

https://www.facebook.com/events/584503618696723/

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

MEDIA ALERT

UFT Election Overall and Retiree Data: Halabi Reports

Mulgrew had 37,000 votes and over 20,000 came from retirees, a warning shot across the bow of the UFT leadership and to some extent it explains their reaching out to former opposition people to stay on the Ex Bd by running on the Unity line. It won't do them much good as the UFT needs deep structural changes instead of cosmetic ones.

It was a bad election for the UFT. Vote totals were down across the board. My caucus, New Action, did particularly poorly
Unity did sweep the seats. But the group that has a monopoly on power has a growing inability to turn out votes, even after turning a popular chapter leader of a huge school, and a prominent Bernie Sanders supporter, with following.....
....Unity can claim a victory – they took an absolute majority of the high school votes for the first time since I’ve been a teacher… but with their second lowest vote total in years, perhaps ever.
I’ve seen speculation about who came in second overall. These results make me think Unity came in second – and those with an interest in promoting distance between the members and the union – our enemies – came in first...
..... Jonathan Halabi, https://jd2718.org

I've been posting the election data as Jonathan compiles it division by division. Below are the retiree votes -- which seem to have leveled off at around 21,000 with Unity getting almost 90% of the votes. First here are his rough overall totals. The numbers are pathetic for everyone.

Here is the rough skinny on the retiree vote:

School Scope: UFT Election Results; Socialism or Progressive Capitalism?

April 26, 2019 - www.rockawave.com

School Scope:  UFT Election Results;  Socialism or Progressive Capitalism?

By Norm Scott

The triennial UFT election ended last week with the usual victory for the Unity Caucus, which has been in control of the UFT since its inception in 1962. President Michael Mulgrew received roughly 85% of the vote, with retirees being the largest voting block. Other than retirees, the turnout from working UFT members bordered on embarrassing. For instance, in the 20,000 member high school division, 3260 teachers voted. Without an effective opposition, the high schools, the only division where Unity has been weak, went totally for Unity by 67%, one of the few times that has happened over the past three decades. One of the reasons was the divisions among the three caucuses running against Unity. The rough order of total votes were Solidarity (7%), MORE (5%) and New Action (3%). As a longtime activist in the opposition, I shudder and question whether it is even worth participating in UFT elections, a waste of resources and time. You can read a detailed election analysis on my blog: https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2019/04/uft-election-results-halabi-posts-high.html.

Unions are a product of the capitalist system and the salvation

The UFT is the largest union local in the nation and some 200,000 people are eligible to vote. Above you can see some of the negatives when a union leadership locks itself into lifetime control, but even critics like me would take that system over the alternative – no union. Unions came into existence in the first place when conditions become intolerable enough to force people to get together. There were no unions before capitalism (though there were craft guilds). The very idea of a union strikes some people as being socialistic, which leads me back to one of my favorite topics.

Since Bernie came on the scene, there’s been a lot more talk in the mainstream press about socialism, but often without clarifying the various degrees, from social democracy within a capitalistic system to out and out revolutionary socialism leading to communism.

Nobel Prize winning left wing economist Joseph Stiglitz was featured in two columns in the NY Times this past week. One was written by him and titled “Progressive Capitalism Is Not an Oxymoron: We can save our broken economic system from itself.” The other was an interview with Stiglitz by Andrew Ross Sorkin: “Socialist! Capitalist! Economic Systems as Weapons in a War of Words.” If you are interested in understanding some of the degrees of socialism look these up.

Stiglitz is arguing for progressive capitalism vs. a total socialistic system where the state owns the means of production. Rather then the attacks we see on government, Stiglitz sees the need for major government controls and that is where he believes we have gone wrong and entered the realm of runaway capitalism via the rise of neo-liberalism to counter the New Deal imposed in the 1930s during the great depression. There’s a lot wrong with the way we are governed and much of that connect to a corrupt system where money rules. It doesn’t have to be that way.

Note: political liberalism in the US which promotes more government control is very different from economic liberalism which calls for minimal government – this version has been branded “neo-liberalism” – unfettered free markets – and we’ve seen that applied to our public schools system with the counter “choice/charter” movement. Stiglitz and others point out the fallacies of rampant neo-liberalism.

Last week I talked about how popular socialism was in parts of this country in 1912 and asked: What happened to socialism in the century since 1912? What happened was the October 1917 Russian Revolution and the resultant consequences, the rise (and fall) of communism and the confusions engendered between various brands of socialism. Next week we will have a primer.

Norm, unhappy with the working conditions at ednotesonline.com, is waiting to be unionized.

UFT Election 2019 - Functional Chapters Based on Halabi Data

Functional chapters (non-teaching) are the mystery ship of the UFT - we address the fundamentals. There are about 40,000 working functionals - non-classroom plus 60,000 retirees and they are lumped together when they vote in UFT elections and get 19 Ex Bd seats. Thanks to Jonathan Halabi's efforts, we are getting some of the data from the UFT elections with his comparisons to previous elections. In this piece he provides info on the often mysterious functional chapter(s).

Actual teachers in the three divisions total over 70,000 so even if a strategy of winning the three teacher ex bd divisions (total- 23 seats) where retirees don't vote was successful, the UFT would still be under Unity control, but seriously threatened if the opposition could gain control of the functionals. Below I delve into why that would be so difficult. Even if the opposition were to win these 19 and add them to the 23 teaching seats the 42 seats would still fall short since there are 48 Ex Bd at-large seats where retirees vote. And in fact retirees vote and run for the functional ex bd seats too so that is how the election is rigged.

9000 non-retiree functional voted in this election out of the 40,000. Unity got 7200, a drop of around 400 from 2016 - maybe due to the OT/PT people. MORE received 824 and New Action 212 while together in 2016 they got 2200. So they lost 50% of the previous vote together but MORE even got less than they did in 2013, which is remarkable since they opportunistically focused their attention on the OT/PT chapter and ran one of the big voices in opposition to the contract as an officer. Let's assume a batch of their 824 came from that chapter.

The surprise was the showing of Solidarity (referring to them as Portelos' clique by Jonathan is disrespectful to the people involved) which got 917 votes, following their trend of tripling their 2016 votes across the board. I assume some of the unhappy OT/PT people went for them too. And secretaries are not happy either. Paras seemed to get some improvements in their contract and I would assume they went big for Unity.

I hear over 21000 retirees voted. (Some MORE supporters are whining about a phony issue where some retirees cut off the ballot in the middle and sent it in - we are addled, you know. And to count those the machines had to be reset. It seems that somehow counting these caused some to start charging it was fraud -- sure.)

In previous posts Jonathan covered the other divisions of the union and also did an overall summation (which we have yet to publish). I've been trying to break down the data with some analysis. Why? Because the past counts no matter how much people want to deny it and the patter in UFT elections is consistent. Yet we will see once again in 2022 caucuses claiming we need to vote in new leadership in the UFT. My goal is to get people to stop wasting everyone's time and energy unless you have built a massive and united opposition going head to head with Unity. That won't happen as long as caucuses see their priority as building their own narrow caucus instead of an opposition united on some basic principles. Let me know when that happens.

Here are my previous reports in reverse order of publishing with links to Jonathan's posts.

• UFT 2019 Election Report - MORE Follies, Middle an...
• UFT Election Results: Halabi Posts High School Tot...
• UFT Election Results: Unity the BIG Winner, MORE t...
• UFT Election Report: What I learned - Don't Eat th...

Also read Arthur's take: MORE Plans to Fail, Fails to Plan to Fail Sufficiently, and Comes in Second Among Working Teachers

About the functional chapters: 
There were 13 colored ballots during the contract vote for the functionals. The biggest one is the para chapter with I am told 19,000 members. Secretaries were usually over 3000. Guidance counselors and social workers and OT/PT and school nurses and hospital nurses. Others are much smaller.

Each chapter elects its own chapter leader and delegates and an ex bd to run the chapter and Unity makes sure to control this process and make sure the chapters remain loyal and don't go off the reservation. They have been pretty successful in this -- I was in a functional in my last few years in the system - the teacher assigned chapter -- I worked for the district - and I believe Randi opened up a delegate position for me since I was not in critical mode at the time --- I was sort of told that they wanted to be pushed - a little -- but when my pushing went over a line they were not happy.

Functionals help Unity control elections and the delegate assembly
Retirees are a functional and there are 63,000 retirees with 300 delegates to the DA - and add all the other chapter delegates -- like paras etc -- all pretty much under Unity control - so the functional chapters when added to the Unity chapter leaders and delegates in the schools give Unity control over the DA too.

Retirees don't vote for contracts but do vote in UFT elections. But their vote is broken out separately because there is a cap on retiree votes - I think 21,000  - which means if more than 21,000 vote - as I think happened this time -- each vote becomes a fraction. Like this time maybe .95 or something.

The little trick Unity plays with the 19 functional ex bd seats is to lump them together instead of allowing each functional to elect its own member(s) to the Ex Bd. One reform of the UFT Ex Bd to open it up would be stop lumping them. And to manage the retiree issue I would give retirees a bunch of seats on the Ex Bd since they are such a big chapter -- say 5. But I would also cut down on the 300 Unity delegates they get in the DA. And I would also give retirees a seat on the ad com. But they would not vote for the rest of the adcom or at large ex bd. In fact, I would fundamentally eliminate the at-large seats or maybe reserve 10.

Well, I hope you understand more about the UFT functionals. If my plan to win the 23 ex bd teacher seats ever came about, an opposition would have make some inroads into some of the functionals. Ironically, the only chapter with even a semblance of an opposition is the retiree chapter where the Retiree Advocate operates with New Action and some of the former MOREs who are also still involved. We run in the chapter elections and put out a newsletter but of course getting retirees to go against Unity is a useless operation because who are the happiest people in the UFT?

UFT 2019 Election Report - MORE Follies, Middle and Elem from Halabi Data

A united front in UFT elections might actually have won the middle schools in addition to the high schools and possibly made a dent in the elementary schools.

MORE shrinks rank and file power
MORE is contending that attempts to win these seats is somehow counter to what they term as "building rank and file power", another piece of rhetoric that is fundamentally meaningless, as if having the rank and file actually cast a vote for you doesn't really mean very much. The actions of MORE have actually shrunk rank and file power by undermining the general opposition to Unity Caucus and strengthened the ruling power. Building real rank and file power requires weakening the control of Unity and how driving out people into the arms of Unity does that is beyond me.

Arthur has a must-read funny and devastating blog post on the MORE folly of not winning: 

NYC Educator

MORE Plans to Fail, Fails to Plan to Fail Sufficiently, and Comes in Second Among Working Teachers

MORE went into this election cycle with the clear goal of losing. Optimally they would get no votes whatsoever. However, an election campaign requires that you ask people to vote for you. Otherwise, it would not be a campaign. So there's the rub--when you run to lose you have to at least pretend to run to win, or people will find you insincere. Now it's pretty tough, when you are sincerely insincere, to prove you are not. So that was one quandary.

The ISO (now disbanded) wing of MORE (which is still intact and in control of MORE) in its internal reports to the ISO leadership (which I will be publishing excerpts of) were selling the idea to the newly recruited Democratic Socialists (DSA) that the now purged ICEUFT wing of MORE was somehow right wing - a joke since it was mostly socialist or left Democrats - and that in order to win seats on the UFT Ex Bd MORE would have to dilute the social justice message where in reality we called for cutting the rhetoric and dog whistles and presenting a broader base of ideas without labeling things as bread and butter or social justice. As a lifelong socialist in ICEUFT recently commented: We are not ceding to MORE that their vision of social justice is the correct one.

ICEUFT was truly a rational social justice caucus. That real conditions teachers and students were facing in the schools not the agenda of a tiny group of people is the real way to drive building rank and file power.

The ISO fraction (as they call themselves) viewed winning as being just for the sake of winning. Arthur takes that down with:

... you run no candidates whatsoever for the high school seats, because last time you won them, and that was a disaster. I mean, there were those people going to Executive Board twice a month, making themselves available to anyone who wanted to talk to them, and advocating for just about anyone who asked. Worse, they didn't bother to advocate for the things you wanted because it was Monday night and hey, Monday night is rumba lessons.

The point I could never seem to get across within MORE was that winning seats from Unity IS a message to the rank and file, which has its only opportunity to participate during elections and gives them a chance to send the UFT leadership a message. And by winning or at least challenging seriously, the leadership itself feels threatened enough to possibly modify its policies. For me the golden oak leaf cluster would be to win all three school divisions where retirees can't vote --- that would not only send a message, but would also open up the idea of a law suit on the retiree issue -- that the working teachers were voting opposition but were thwarted.

That dream is done in by the sectarian actions of the MORE leadership under the control of the ISO faction or fraction or whatever.

In this election, whatever share of the rank and file that votes shat on the MORE vision of building rank and file power.

Middle and Elem school election outcome
Jonathan Halabi has been doing a yeoman job parsing UFT election data. (What a way to spend a week off. But look at me spending time on doing the same thing.) Here is his middle and elementary school data with my commentary.

While we considered winning the high school ex bd seats a pretty sure bet with a united front, the middle school ex bd seats were deemed remotely winnable if a concerted effort was made by a united opposition. That may not be obvious at first but look at Jonathan's data over the past 3 elections - 13, 16, 19. In 2016, MORE/New Action with Solidarity data hit 39%, withing striking range in 2019 with a concerted effort to hit the largest middle schools from the beginning of the school year. Notice the drop in Unity votes from 2016 (think of it - Unity gets 1236 out of a potential 12,000 MS teachers). If you take the opposition totals from 2016 and apply them to 2019 (not a given), we would have been in striking range. The only time the opposition won the middle and high schools (13 seats) was in 1991.

MORE received only 145 ms votes - and they had one strong school - Kevin Prosen's where I bet many of the votes came from. Solidarity despite the low totals actually has made its best showing in MS % wise - and bested MORE with 188 votes. New Action's 74 votes is mostly due to the work of the tireless of Greg DiStefano in Staten Island.

Where did the rank and file strategy go in the middle schools when 882 people voted for MORE/NA in 2016 and only 219 MS teachers voted for them individually this time, a drop of about 75%? As Arthur said, MORE failed in its attempt to get 0 votes but got close.

Now the elementary schools are a different kettle of fish and winning this division would require a district based strategy, which no opposition in history has had(other than my group, Another View in District 14 in the early 70s). I did try to bring that idea to MORE with a focus on the one district where we seemed to have some strong elementary school people - District 15 -- but that effort fell apart as people left and other reasons. My idea was that a strong effort in just a few districts might pull enough elementary school votes to get close. That idea is not dead too.

But again look at the Unity numbers - 7k in 2016, 6k in 2019. MORE/NA did not do too bad in 2016 - over 2500 elem school votes if you add Solidarity. I believe most of these elem school votes came from MORE which in 2016 still had some force in District 15 and a few other districts.

And look how Solidarity outpolled MORE in the elem schools this time -- 519-433.  A disastrous drop for MORE -- probably closer to 80%. Hail to building rank and file power.

Here are my previous election reports:

• UFT Election Results: Halabi Posts High School Tot...
• UFT Election Results: Unity the BIG Winner, MORE t...
• UFT Election Report: What I learned - Don't Eat th...

UFT Election Results: Halabi Posts High School Totals Plus Historical Perspective

I've been reporting on UFT elections - UFT Election Results: Unity the BIG Winner, MORE the Biggest Loser, Solidarity Stays Alive-
based on the data I've been given. Election results have been coming in piecemeal - Since I'm  not attached to any caucus I don't get official results. New Action's Jonathan Halabi posted these interesting high school vote totals on his blog where you should check out his comments. I left this comment on his first election post:

As a UFT wonk these numbers are fascinating to parse. Don’t forget that in 2004, ICE-TJC won the high schools because Unity didn’t run candidates. Unity vote went up very little. Total opposition vote went down drastically. The reason? Has to be the split in the opposition. Longtime anti-Unity voters just sat it out. The MORE drop from 2013 is stark. 60 or so people who signed up to run on the Solidarity ticket including a people who are respected in the UFT. Portelos played so much of smaller role this time — if he had played a bigger role they might have gotten more votes. The pattern of 30 years was broken not by Unity but by decisions made by the opposition caucuses. The so called Portelos clique which was considered marginal was given life by the MORE disaster. Also the idea that Arthur and Mike brought votes to Unity might be valid when you look at Unity’s 2013 totals – or not valid when comparing to 2016. The 50 extra votes this time could be from Arthur’s school plus some from Mike’s. Both schools had voted heavy for MORE/NA last time.

He also did a followup which I will address in tomorrow's post.

UFT 2019 High School Election results compared to previous years.

Analysis: There are about 20,000 high school teachers in the UFT .... Only 3265 voted in 2019

Unity
WOW! The numbers are ridiculous. Jonathan is painting this low turnout as a big loss for the UFT even if a win for Unity. But I don't even see this as a win for Unity in this sense. It is clear that if there were a united opposition that went after winning, Unity would have lost again.

2004
Look at the Unity numbers over the 6 election cycles Jonathan posted. The height of their vote totals in the HS was in 2004 but ironically, they didn't run any HS Ex Bd candidates due to their deal with New Action, which lost to the ICE/TJC which got 1417, less than half what Unity got. NA got 700 - so even if you added that to ICE/TJC, Unity would have won outright.

2016/19
Now consider that they only got 50 more votes this time than in 2016 and also that Arthur and Mike brought them a batch of votes over from MORE. So this makes Unity look even worse in the high schools. Mike got a bunch people to vote Unity at Leon Goldstein, which had been a TJC and then MORE school - and 4 faculty ran with MORE this time. Assume Arthur shifted at least a 100 or maybe 150 votes to Unity. It is clear to me that Unity is as weak as ever in the high schools, if not more so and that a united opposition that started early could win these seats in 2022 even if Arthur and Mike stayed with Unity. My question is why bother?

Solidarity
Some are painting the outcome as a big win for Solidarity over MORE but I don't see it that way. MORE, though suffering a tremendous drop in the high schools still beat Solidarity 544-376 with New Action getting 242, which is not totally out of line with the past performance since NA only got 454 in 2013.

But note that even with the ballot line and running candidates for HS Ex Bd, Solidarity went from 108 to 376 - which some are saying is a major move - more than tripling. I guess, but given that there are 20,000 hs teachers, that the HS have always been the most militant part of the union and that MORE ran no candidates for the winnable ex bd seats, claiming 376 votes as a victory is farcical.

New Action
The question is whether they survive. I think they do decide to continue a presence in the UFT and I hope they do. If the landscape changes within the opponents to Unity, they may have a role.

MORE: Plus A little history going back to the 2016 election
Since MORE was a combination of ICE and TJC plus others, Halabi has a continuous record of high school voting since 2004. Note the consistency over 4 election cycles from 2004 through 2013 - MORE's first year. 1417, 1524, 1369 with ICE/TJC and then when they combined with NYCORE and others  -- a shockingly consistent 1430 in 2013 even with so many new people. For MORE to drop from 1430 in 2013 to 544 in 6 years is a shocking loss of support.

I think MORE will just shrug the outcomes off and try to sell the idea they really didn't put much effort into this election and they never really cared about the outcome anyway. Will the members buy it? Since MORE is fundamentally a DSA oriented group I think most will because they have a bigger agenda than UFT politics.

But they must deal with the fact that ICE/TJC and MORE through 5 election cycles, with a broader agenda than just social justice pretty much were able to get 1350-2200 votes in the high schools. And look at the MORE candidates and the high schools they came from - count the potential votes and you will see even in the schools where they had a base they didn't necessarily get overwhelming support. I heard reports from one school with a prominent MORE as CL where people complained that chapter meetings were all about issues that they felt had nothing to do with them - like the fact Mulgrew signed on to bringing Amazon back - something they couldn't care less about.

To say MORE didn't put effort into the election is not totally true. The election is pretty much all MORE talked about at its meetings since October and they kept pushing people to get out the vote in their schools. Since MORE is almost all high school based, the 544 votes is a sign of how weak an impact MORE is having. But they may even try to sell this as a base with the argument that MORE in essence remade itself into a new caucus after the purges and was essentially starting over. Still, there are those numbers from 2013  - 1435 - when MORE was a new caucus to explain.

Also consider that some of that 544 comes from legacy voting - people not aware of changes in MORE but who had voted for MORE in 2016. Thus the actual strength is less than 544. Also consider the two schools Arthur and Mike come from. Arthur probably brought 150 or more votes to MORE in 16 and assume some shift of these to Unity. And Mike's school, which had always been opposition due to TJC's Kit Wainer, was split this time.

Background to MORE internals in the 2013 and 2016 election and signs of divisions

With all the action around the founding of MORE, with the ICE and TJC and NYCORE connections, especially in the high schools, in 2013, I expected we had a chance to compete for winning the HS ex bd seats. So when all we got was 1430 and Unity 1592 to which New Action's 452 were added, it was a bitter pill that all we needed was 2000 votes in the high schools to win and fell so far short.

It was clear not enough outreach even in their own schools had been done and it was at that point that I saw that MORE as an electoral entity did not have much promise, which is why I fundamentally urged them not to run unless it was in coalitions. MORE held a "2013 victory" party on the day the results were being announced attended by 80 people and when I showed up crestfallen to deliver the outcomes - they begged me to show a happy face. Also a clue that they did not want to face reality but wanted a positive spin. But imagine that 80 or more people came out in 2013 and compare to today? The MORE promise and where it went? would make a good study.

Some of us knew that with better organizing we could get at least 2000 or more in 2016 and we set out to do so -- but disruptions internally in MORE in 2014 derailed us.

Mike, James, Arthur and I - and the rest of the ICE wing of MORE - were the leading proponents of going all out to win the high school seats in 2016 as a way to show the membership Unity could be beaten in at least one division with the hope that would lead to a move to defeat Unity in the middle schools and eventually the elementary schools in the 2019 election.

That we had to put up a fight internally in MORE to go for these seats was a sign of things to come.

In the spring of 2015 we began a high school newsletter outside the bounds of MORE because trying to do so inside would be a struggle with the ideologues. But that newsletter - The High School Forum - got some resonance and distribution we were asked to bring that inside MORE, which later on co-opted the name. We formed a MORE high school committee which none of the MORE sectarians got involved in - at first. And that allowed us to take the lead. (We also urged the other divisions in MORE to do the same -MS and ES -- and that never happened.)

By early summer 2015 when NA was still with Unity, we organized at the MORE convention to focus the high school committee on winning and the vote was very favorable. We really thought we might win the high schools even if Unity and New Action ran together. After all, in 2013 Unity only had 1592 and New Action brought only 452. So we aimed at 2500 votes even if NA stayed with Unity.

Rumors were that NA was not happy with Mulgrew and I and a few others did see that if New Action could be lured away from Unity and into an alliance with MORE we could beat Unity in the high schools for sure in 2016.

At the convention we put together a MORE high school committee basically run - in the early stages - July, 2015 - by the ICE wing and its supporters - much to the dissatisfaction of the ISO led ideology wing which didn't really want to go after these seats - they didn't see winning as a fruitful exercise - (given today's context I might take the same position).

We reached out to New Action and there was a positive response and thus an alliance was born -- though I do remember some of the ideologues pushing back at a MORE meeting in September of October 2015 that New Action wasn't ideologically kosher enough due to its 12 year alliance with Unity. That winning came second to ideological purity. The majority of MORE at that point was overwhelmingly for the alliance. How things changed by the fall of 2018 and I would say the split in MORE was fundamentally over these kinds of issues.

By the fall it was clear we had some momentum and at this point the MORE sectarian ideologues became concerned enough to jump onto the HS committee, which led to struggles through the fall of 2015 to shunt Mike and Arthur off the ballot, with unmatched levels of skulduggery which we managed to beat back. I kept stressing that Arthur's large school was the key to winning a close vote.

We won that internal battle at the time but the ideologues used their own negative reactions to the victory in the election as an internal organizing tool against Arthur and Mike.

And they literally began their attacks within weeks of winning the high schools in May 2016. But that's a story for another day.

I may even write a play.

Susan Ohanian - Trump,Trump, Trump: The March of Folly

One of my favorite people is Susan Ohanian
who has been one of the leaders of the movement critical of standardized testing forever -- she is one of the first people who influenced me. But Susan goes far beyond that in terms of advocating for rational education. She has a new book out and if you happen to be in Vermont on May 7 stop by.

Trump,Trump, Trump: The March of Folly

Burlington

Tuesday, May 7, 2019 - 7:00pm

Join Onion River Press and Phoenix Books Burlington for the launch of Susan Ohanian's new book, Trump, Trump, Trump: The March of Folly, a clever and meticulously thought-out poetic rebuttal to the absurdity of the current president.

ABOUT THE BOOK: From giving his second-grade teacher a black eye to insulting the grieving parents of a military hero, the rollicking verse in this book presents a Donald Trump profile of bombast, babes, and bankruptcies. Details of Trump, his progeny and current political cohorts, characterized by greed and deceit, are verified by engrossing news accounts. The facts are grim, the humor captivating.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Susan Ohanian, a longtime teacher and writer, is the author of more than a dozen books on education policy and practice. Notable titles include: One Size Fits Few: The Folly of Educational Standards; Garbage Pizza, Patchwork Quilts, and Math Magic; Who's In Charge? A Teacher Speaks her Mind; What Happened to Recess and WHY are Our Children Struggling in Kindergarten?

Susan's more than 300 articles have appeared in publications ranging from Education Week and Phi Delta Kappa to The Nation, The Atlantic, and The New York Times "Metropolitan Diary." Her website of resistance to corporate intrusion into public education received The George Orwell Award for Distinguished Contribution to Honesty and Clarity in Public Language. She also received the Kenneth S. Goodman Award in Defense of Good Teaching from the University of Arizona and the Vermont Society for the Study of Education John Dewey Award. In March 2017 at her Vermont Town Meeting, Susan introduced a successful advisory motion to Impeach Trump, based on Article 1, Section 9, Clause 8 of the U. S. Constitution.

ADMISSION:  This event is free and open to all.

Event address: 

191 Bank Street

Burlington, VT 05401