Kudos to Teachers at PS 196X Who Reject Merit Pay

Kudos to the gang at PS 196x and to the Lucy and Yoav from the Post for reporting the story. And for going to ICE'ers James Eterno and Lisa North for comments. Kudos to them too for speaking publicly. (Check out more from Lisa and James on the ICE blog.) Make sure to read ICE'er Michael Fiorillo's (yeah, kudos to him) amazing post on this blog from a few days ago on merit pay. (just scroll down.) Oh, and with these 3 founding members of ICE doing their thing it reminds me that ICE turned 4 years old on Halloween. Kudos and Happy Birthday to all the gang at ICE who keep plugging no matter what. And kudos to Jan, parent from Dist 2 for her great comment of support her teachers and the principal at her child's school as it relates to the school progress report. The outrage of some of these grades ties in with the crazy way merit pay will be distributed.

And kudos to eduwonkette for writing this today: "Five years ago, Malcolm Gladwell wrote an article called "The Talent Myth" questioning the management zeitgeist that the NYC Department of Education has swallowed wholesale...."
One thing leads to another and guess which company is the model? It starts with an E and ends with bankruptcy and dissolution on desolation road, or on the road to desolation.

Teachers at PS 196X Reject Merit Pay
From NY Post:
By LUCY CARNE and YOAV GONEN

November 5, 2007 -- Teachers at a Bronx elementary school gave a surprising response to a bonus plan that would pay them roughly $3,000 each for schoolwide student gains: Thanks, but no thanks.

Even without knowing if their school will be selected for the controversial program, more than 30 teachers at PS 196 voted preliminarily to reject it - largely because of its emphasis on
student test scores.

"I'm trying to move away from test scores being the be-all, end-all," said a PS 196 teacher. "I'd rather impress upon them the importance of a well-rounded education."

Mayor Bloomberg and United Federation of Teachers chief Randi Weingarten announced the bonus plan with much fanfare Oct. 17 in conjunction with a pension agreement relished by the teachers union. Many saw the bonus plan as a trade-off, and as a step toward an individual merit-pay plan sought by Bloomberg and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein.

The bonus plan calls for teachers at 200 of the lowest-performing schools to divvy up $20 million in private funds for improving student performance. Individual teacher payment will be determined by a four-person committee at each school.

But the union was given an escape hatch that some members seem to be savoring: 55 percent of teachers at each school must vote to participate in the plan.

"The whole concept is an insult that you're not working hard unless we throw 3,000 bucks at you," said James Eterno, a longtime social-studies teacher at Jamaica HS in Queens.

Eterno added that he wouldn't be surprised to see at least some schools reject an invitation to the program, which is expected to double to 400 schools next year.

Department of Education spokeswoman Debra Wexler said the list of eligible schools is still being worked on but officials "are completely confident that educators will want to be part of a program that rewards excellence."

Even Weingarten acknowledged that the program, despite relying too heavily on test scores, was better received than she had expected.

"For now, what we did was include enough checks and balances that this is something where the school staff has equal power with the principal to decide to go into this process and decide how the money gets distributed," she said.

Whether schools ultimately accept or refuse offers for the bonus pay, wary teachers maintain that aligning teacher rewards with student scores sets a bad precedent.

"I think it lowers the standard of what good education is," said Lisa North, a literacy coach at PS 3 in Brooklyn.

Grading Public Schools by Jan, parent in Dist. 2

It is outrageous to me that our city's hard-working educators are being subjected to this narrow grading system. How humiliating! How reductive! Chancellor Klein has no idea how to work with or respect professional educators. My son's middle school received a C, and according to the DOE website, a school that receives a “C” 3 years in a row is subject to “consequences.”

This grade does not match my experience of the school in any respect. The school’s principal is stellar -- gifted and visionary. The teachers as well are smart, concerned, and committed; they bring a vibrancy and enthusiasm to a curriculum increasingly threatened to be overcome by test prep. The team of teachers from each grade meets regularly to discuss curriculum and individual students; if a student is falling behind, they are alerted immediately and work together to bring that student back. I am so angry that the chancellor is subjecting these hard-working educators to a meaningless and demoralizing grade.

The DOE’s miserly focus on assessment, their non-stop testing and grading, is deadening to our children – and now the DOE has found a way to demoralize our principals and teachers in the bargain. All the children in our city deserve the opportunity to experience a love of learning, the chance to be engaged in vibrant learning communities, and our educators deserve support.

My grade for the DOE? A resounding F. Unfortunately, I fear that their actions will now resound throughout the system, and it is our schools and children who will feel the “consequences” of this grade.

-- Jan, School District 2 Manhattan

TAGNYC has been gathering feedback

UPDATED: Materials have been circulating calling for an action at Tweed on Nov. 26 the evening of the monthly PEP meeting. Right now we have sketchy information. We'll post more when we know more.

The following is a note from TAGNYC with comments on the meeting Randi held with RR denizens on Oct. 30. We wrote a previous report on that meeting here - ed notes

Teachers:

TAGNYC has been gathering feedback on the October 30^th meeting between UFT staff and persons currently in the Reassignment Centers. Very few of the responses have been positive. A couple of people who spoke to us expressed the sentiment that Randi was now trying to address the conditions of the Reassignment Centers and that her Ten Points is evidence of this new commitment. Here is a direct quote from a person who drew encouragement from the meeting:

“As negligent as she has been in the past, I think she is showing a greater level of concern now.”

TAGNYC can not agree. Our position: The UFT leadership is analogous to the farmer who shuts the barn door after the horses escape or to the fire department that arrives to hose down a building’s burning embers. No amount of theatrics on the part of Randi Weingarten could quell the constant muttering of the crowd: “Where have they been all this time?” Where was the UFT and Randi’s concern when the damage was being done? That is the question that should have been addressed. Where were most of the district reps and most of the chapter leaders when Bloomberg-Klein’s unethical principals and assistant principals were harassing teachers and using u-ratings to intimidate and force out senior/experienced teachers? TAGNYC holds that the consensus ‘on the street’ is that Randi is no longer silent because her lambs are no longer silent. “Fired up--won’t take no more”- a rallying union cry that has caught up with the UFT leadership.

What follows are comments made by individuals who attended the meeting with some TAG commentary.

• Why was not a copy of the Ten Points handed out? People tried to copy them down from the PowerPoint but there was not enough time. (Possibly not to have a paper record?)
• Most of the Ten Points came from the brainstorming of people in the Reassignment Centers. How is Randi planning to make "her" Ten Points happen?
• Randi got the message loud and clear that her people were not doing their work (of representing the members).
• A member of the audience called out “If you can’t do anything, why are we here?’ Randi heard this comment.
• A reply of Randi’s: “That’s why I’m here. I need to hear.” (Brings up the main question- Why weren’t you hearing for the past many years? Isn’t that the role of a union leader?)
• There were no surprises. However experiencing it was really depressing. I’m glad I did not go alone.
• The UFT staff looked visibly upset when Randi told us “...we would be here until all questions are answered.” They kept talking among themselves and looking at their watches. A member of the audience had to keep asking "Can you please be quiet."
• She’s not going far enough. She has to do something before people are removed from the school. (That’s when the chapter leaders and district reps could earn their stipends and salaries.)
• Why is enforcing due process such a big deal when Article 21 of the contract repeats the state law? Why doesn’t the union just enforce the contract? Some of the Ten Points are contractual.

The next meeting will be on November 15th to address the issue of the ATRs. Affected TAG members please ask: Where was the union and how did you let this happen without a fight?

TAGNYC

http://teacheradvocacygrpnyc.blogspot.com/

Suggestion from Michael Fiorillo on ICE-mail:

In regard to David Pakter's plan to demonstrate at Tweed, I think it might be helpful if the Rubber Room teachers did a borough by borough survey to see if the detainees have been put there disproportionately by Leadership Academy principals. If this were to pan out, it would make for a much more effective attack against Klein and the regime, since it would be hard for them to counteract the logical inference that this a policy developed by Tweed and implemented by its minions.

Commentary from a variety of people on ICE mail:

"Do We Live In A Police State?" asks teacher A:

Teacher B: Most decidedly YES!

It strikes me as strange that we, as teachers, sat back for so long and allowed ( yes, allowed) all of these things to happen to us. Piece by piece, little by little, we have turned our destinies over to those (Bloomburger, FrankenKlein and Swinegarten) that are seeking greater political careers for themselves and even greater personal power. Do we not see the Bear directly coming at us?

Sure, I've heard all kinds of reasoning for why we have allowed ourselves to be led like sheep to the slaughter ( time in, pensions, age, etc). True enough, but WHEN will those blinders come off, and teachers take control of their own destiny? We have let ourselves be treated as less than professional, and now we see the results.

Rallies, etc., are great for publicity, but, after the dust settles, what will have been accomplished? It's time for teachers to rally together, and form our own professional association, and PAC's.

Teacher C:

Definitely. And it's time to write letters to members of the City Council and other public officials. It is time to learn how to be effective activists, and not rush blindly and emotionally into anything.

The opposition is extremely clear headed and relaxed. If this were a game of chess, we are fast approaching check. We're not there yet though. There's still some time, but not much.

The message that must get out of the Rubber Room is "If it can happen to us, it can happen to you." Every in-service member needs to be aware of that possibility.

A CONTRACTUAL LANDMINE

Updated with additional material on merit pay, Sunday AM

A CONTRACTUAL LANDMINE
By Michael Fiorillo

Like a land mine buried and forgotten but still active, merit pay exploded in the faces of UFT members attending the October 17th Delegates Assembly. Jamming the membership with a deal that was embedded in the discredited 2005 contract, President Randi Weingarten welcomed the delegates and chapter leaders with an agreement that pits schools and UFT members against each other. In so doing, she once again showed by her actions that she agrees with the use of high stakes test scores for judging school success, and has helped further the privatization and corporate control of our public schools, and the weakening of the union.

INSTITUTIONALIZING HIGH STAKES TESTS

Despite the PR spin and semantic contortions, this agreement will further entrench test scores as the basis for judging student, teacher and school success. They may claim that other benchmarks will be factored in, but the reality is that those who are setting the agenda for education are only interested in what can be counted, measured and controlled in their interests. And it will be an all-powerful executive, free of any checks and balances, that will define what is worth measuring, and how. The end result will be the removal of all programs, methods and individuals that do not further the testing/control/punishment regime. Randi Weingarten makes eloquent noises about the distortions and injustices created by this, but her actions demonstrate her basic support for it.

AN INVITATION TO CHEAT

Financial incentives for increased test scores will inevitably lead to cheating and gaming the tests. Just as corporate executives, through stock options, were given incentives to manipulate their companies' accounting, principals and schools will now be further tempted manipulate who takes the tests and how they are scored. While many, if not most, schools will try to resist these temptations, it is a statistical certainty that others will, and be rewarded for it. The resulting scandals are predictable, and will be used to intimidate and discredit teachers further.

DIVISIVE ACROSS THE BOARD

Although pitched as a way for school staff to collaborate, this program will pit schools and teachers against each other. This has been the Mayor's intention all along. The fantasy that cooperation will magically appear in schools that do not currently enjoy it is typical of the market fundamentalism that governs urban education today, which cannot imagine that people are motivated by anything other than greed or fear. This program will worsen the epidemic of schools screening and cherry picking students based on how they'll make their test scores look, and will diminish services for ELL's, special ed and other high needs students. It will be divisive within communities, creating a two-tier educational system modeled after the two-tier labor markets that corporate America is imposing across the nation. Within schools, it will enable unscrupulous principals to pit UFT members against each other.

WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK?

For generations, unions have struggled to institutionalize the practice of equal pay for equal work. They've done this for ethical and practical reasons: because it's the right thing to do, and because employers have always tried to use divide and conquer schemes to destroy the cohesion and solidarity of their employees. This is simply another version of that timeless game. Distrust and resentment within and among schools will be the inevitable result, with non-participating schools and those that "fail" to meet the benchmarks essentially being told that they don't "count."

A PROFESSIONAL INSULT

Perhaps the worst quality of this plan is the professionally and personally insulting message that without merit pay, teachers and other educators will withhold their best efforts. While all educators need to make (more) money, they are motivated by things that transcend marks on a ledger. Bloomberg, Klein and the other privateers who've targeted public education cannot conceive of this, but the disgrace and danger is that our own union president shares their blindness and values.

SCARE TACTICS AND POLITICAL MANIPULATION

The timing and manner in which this came about reek of an underhanded deal between the mayor and Randi Weingarten. Consider: the language leading to merit pay was quietly embedded in the controversial 2005 contract, only to be sprung on the DA without any real debate or opportunity to bring it back to the chapters for discussion. Consider: in the weeks leading up to the DA being presented with this fait accompli, RANDI WEINGARTEDN WAS SOUNDING THE ALARM ABOUT INDIVIDUAL MERIT PAY IN A RE-AUTHORIZED NCLB WHILE SHE WAS SIMULTANEOUSLY NEGOTIATING THIS DEAL IN SECRET. She now claims that this "closes the door" on individual merit pay, a transparent falsehood, since any federal law would trump this agreement. Either she was exaggerating the likelihood of individual merit pay to prime the members for a deal she was secretly negotiating, or she negotiated a deal that will become moot. Either way, the membership has been bamboozled.

WHERE TO NOW?

This episode once again raises questions about the values, direction and tactics of the UFT leadership. Members must ask themselves what kind of system they want to work in, and what kind of union is to represent them. Will it be a two-tier, de facto privatized system with rewards and punishments based on invalid, arbitrary, divisive and politically-motivated criteria, enabled by a union leadership that agrees with the fetish for numbers, numbers numbers? Or will there be a membership that recognizes and fights for public education as a foundation of our democracy, and its union as a guardian of that democracy within and outside the schools? The time to begin that discussion is now.

Michael Fiorillo is the Chapter Leader at Newcomers High School in Queens and a founding member of the Independent Community of Educators.


Merit bonuses elude top teachers
WARNING from Susan Ohanian:
Read this at your own risk. It is likely to make anyone who cares about teacher professionalism ill.

By Rachel Simmonsen
Palm Beach Post 2007-11-02

Of about 400 Martin County teachers and administrators awarded bonuses recently, one name was conspicuously absent: Carol Matthews O'Connor, the district's teacher of the year.

Fewer than half of the teachers of the year at the district's 22 schools earned a bonus under STAR (Special Teachers Are Rewarded), a controversial merit pay plan that was approved reluctantly last school year by the school board and teachers union.

"I'm just as disappointed as those who didn't get the money," school board member David Anderson said.

"I don't even know where to begin," teachers union chief Jeanette Phillips said of the program's faults.

Full article posted at Susan's web site here and at Palm Beach Post here.

Million Dollar Diane

Great work by Sal Maglie, as usual

UFT's Leo Casey Wants Open, Lively Debate

Guess what? He won't find it at UFT Delegate Assemblies or Executive Board meetings or just about anywhere in the UFT. Here's what he wrote on Edwize about Kathryn Wylde's assault on Diane Ravitch:

"Education policy thrives in a vigorous, dynamic public sphere where ideas and initiatives — new and old, good and bad, half-baked and well-formulated — are subjected to open, lively debate and contestation. What is essential in this sphere is that it is the policies, not the persons advocating them, which are the center of debate."

Nice to know the red-baiting attack on Kit Wainer by Unity Caucus in the elections was not personal. Or Casey's attempt to brand an entire opposition Caucus as Nazi sympathizers because of the colors used on their web site.

Casey goes on to say, "It seems that for some, markets should rule all education — except for the free marketplace of ideas. There, their monopoly must go unquestioned and uncriticized."

If you've read this blog you see how the UFT leadership attempts to suppress debate on a consistent basis. Don't believe me? Check anyone who is not in Unity Caucus to tell you how much open, lively debate and contestation there was at the October Delegate Assembly over the merit pay deal as Unity Caucus faithful hooted and hollered to close debate as soon as they could. How they rejected attempts by delegates to go back to their schools to discuss the issue before voting. You see, in the UFT open lively debate consists of springing something on the delegates without any advance notice on the agenda even after months of discussion with the DOE, taking an hour to have the president present it, "allowing" less than a half hour to talk about it before voting.

Or how when Jeff Kaufman rose to amend an ATR resolution there were immediate calls from Unity that he did not have the right, followed by about a hundred violations of Robert's Rules by Randi Weingarten as she constantly interjected herself while Jeff attempted to talk.

Wylde unfairly called Ravitch hypocritical. Call Casey and the rest of the UFT hierarchy hyper-hypocritical.

Free marketplace of ideas indeed!

Kathryn Wylde Goes Wild on Ravitch - Tweed Hit Job

Wylde photo lifted from the eduwonkette blog which has excellent commentary on this issue. Also check out the brilliant Halloween parade of ed stars.


UPDATE Nov. 1

See Leonie Haimson and NY Sun article below showing Wylde's NY Post article aided by Tweed - thanks to reporting by one of our favorite reporters, Elizabeth Green. Yo, Wyldewoman, who's the one without integrity now? And to David Cantor, Tweed head of public relations: want to see a good file? Check out Bloomberg's file on sexual harrassment. Finally! Holy crap - I'm on the same side as Randi Weingarten and Sol Stern on this one. Gotta get my head x-rayed.

Bloomberg hack & flack Kathryn Wylde, one of those dilettantes dabbling in educational policy as president and CEO of the Partnership for New York City, went wild in a vicious attack on Ravitch’s integrity for her daring to say the union bested BloomKlein. The wild Wylde writes, “When it comes to public education in NYC [Ravitch is] no longer a source we can rely on for fair-minded commentary.” Wylde wrote this in the NY Post, that paragon of fair-minded commentary.

While I agree with Wylde that this was not a win for the union, her attack on Ravitch is a sign of how critics of Ravitch’s stature are getting under the BloomKlein skin. And while I often disagree with Ravitch, I have absolutely no doubt about her integrity and indeed, have increasing respect for her for her stand on BloomKlein.

UPDATE from Leonie Haimson and NY Sun below

1. Yesterday, the NY Post published an oped by Kathy Wylde, head of the NYC Partnership, which claims to represent all the business interests in this city. The oped was a blistering, personal attack on Diane Ravitch.

Diane is a personal hero of mine. She’s the top expert in the country on the history of the NYC public schools, and a relentless critic of this administration’s wrong-headed education policies, whether that be holding back kids on the basis of their test scores, to the new merit pay proposals that will pay principals, kids, and now teachers for higher test scores at schools.

Diane has also been a big proponent of the need to reduce class size, and the right of parents and the public at large to be involved in the decision making process when it comes to our schools, which puts her at odds with this administration.

Today’s NY Sun reveals that this oped -- ostensibly written by Wylde – originated at Tweed. (See below article.)

Apparently, their highly paid PR department spent days researching in a file on her – to try to show that she had switched positions on a number of issues to use in an attempt to label her as hypocritical.

Yet if anyone is hypocritical, it is really the Mayor and the Chancellor, who refuse to reduce class size, and instead are trying to squeeze out better test scores by bribing principals and teachers and students. All their efforts are turning our schools into the sort of joyless establishments that they would never consider sending their own children to.

Clearly, the administration has decided that they cannot stand any dissent but are now using Wylde and the NYC Partnership as their attack dogs. It’s becoming like the Nixon White House with their enemy lists -- and our taxpayer money is paying for this!

Here is a link to yesterday’s NY Post oped, attacking Diane : http://www.nypost.com/seven/10302007/postopinion/opedcolumnists/hypocritical_critic.htm

The NY Sun article is below.

Please write a letter to the NY post in defense of Diane and her courage and integrity in speaking up for our kids, when so many others have been cowed into submission. letters@nypost.com

You can also write a letter to the NY Sun – decrying the city’s efforts to smear her, and the way our taxpayer money has been used in this effort: editor@nysun.com

2. The administration’s dishonesty was also in evidence in their attempt to obscure the fact that on their own parent survey, class size came out as the number one concern of parents from throughout the city. As recounted in articles in the NY Times, Post, and on our blog, the Mayor actually claimed that “enrichment” came out over two to one over class size, whereas smaller classes were chosen by 24% of parents, compared to enrichment at 19%.

Steve Koss, PTA pres. at the Manhattan Center for science and math HS and former CEC member, has just written a devasting expose on our parent blog – showing that parents at nearly 50% of our general ed public schools opted for smaller class sizes over all other nine options – as did parents at more than 55% of our failing schools – many of which continue to have classes of 30 or more.

There’s a lot more fascinating detail in his analysis --check it out at

http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2007/10/parent-survey-results-more-spin-spin.html

But first, read the piece in the NY Sun below, and then write a letter to the Post and/or the Sun in support of Diane.

We need people like Diane, strong enough to stand up to the bullies in this administration, more than ever before.

leonie@att.net

www.classsizematters.org

http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/

Feud 'Twixt Wylde, Ravich Laid to City's Machinations

BY ELIZABETH GREEN - Staff Reporter of the Sun
October 31, 2007
URL: http://www.nysun.com/article

A scathing opinion piece deriding a prominent critic of Mayor Bloomberg's education policies was generated with the help of city officials, sources said yesterday.

The article, written by the president of the Partnership for New York City, Kathryn Wylde, and published in yesterday's New York Post, accuses Diane Ravitch of opposing the Bloomberg administration irrationally, despite formerly supporting the policies it has implemented, perhaps because of a personal grudge. It concludes that Ms. Ravitch is "no longer a source we can rely on for fair-minded commentary."

Ms. Ravitch yesterday said the piece plainly originated from the city's Education Department, calling it a "paid hit job" meant to silence all critics of the Bloomberg administration. "They're trying to intimidate me, and they're trying to silence me, and I'm not going to be silenced," Ms. Ravitch said.

Ms. Wylde said the idea for the piece was her own, but that she wrote it with the help of a research file composed by the Education Department that chronicles Ms. Ravitch's policy positions over the years. The seven-page document, titled "Diane Ravitch: Then and Now," tallies quotations by Ms. Ravitch on nearly a dozen topics, comparing comments she made in the 1990s to statements in recent years.

A spokesman for the department, David Cantor, defended the decision to make a file on Ms. Ravitch. "She's the most influential educational commentator probably in the United States. If she is typically either distorting what we're doing, or if she is reversing long-held opinions in order to attack us — that's an indication that there's something more there than fair-minded observation," Mr. Cantor said.

A former education aide to President George H.W. Bush who has written numerous books on American education, including the definitive history of the New York City schools, Ms. Ravitch was a strong supporter of Mayor Bloomberg's move to take control of the public system but has since ridiculed many of his education efforts.

Ms. Wylde's article accuses her of abandoning former support for more than a handful of policies, including merit-based pay for teachers; increased autonomy for principals; standardized testing as a way to set high expectations for achievement, and even the belief that every child is capable of academic success — all points that appeared in "Diane Ravitch: Then and Now." The reversals, Ms. Wylde writes, "seem more tied to her unhappiness with the personalities in the Bloomberg administration than its policies."

Ms. Ravitch condemned the characterization of "an odd Ravitch turnaround," saying it is grounded in misunderstanding.

The moment her disagreements with Mr. Bloomberg and his schools chancellor, Joel Klein, emerged, she said, exemplifies the point. She had indeed long argued for setting a single standard curriculum in the schools, but when Mr. Klein implemented a new reading curriculum around the idea of "balanced literacy," Ms. Ravitch said she balked. Balanced literacy is a method of teaching that mixes phonics and other approaches, but Ms. Ravitch said she had never meant to advocate for a standardized pedagogy. What she wanted, she said, was a single curriculum mandating, for instance, when to teach American history.

Ms. Ravitch said her support for standardized testing has not wavered, either, though she has sniffed at Mr. Klein's emphasis on tests. She said that is because she has lost confidence in the ability of local and state governments to administer fair and reliable tests — the temptation to let political interests affect results is too strong. She said she still supports a national test.

Ms. Ravitch said her most serious concern with the Bloomberg administration is the way it responds to dissent. She said that many educators who are professionally reliant on support from the city, through grants or contracts, fear voicing any differing opinions.

"It's a very sad situation, when people don't feel free to speak their mind," she said.

"The Legislature eliminated the independent board; they eliminated the community boards, and now the mayor and the chancellor are trying to shut down all independent critics," she added. "That's dangerous to democracy."

Ms. Wylde disputed that characterization, citing the city's recent agreements with the teachers and principals unions over merit-based pay as evidence of its ability to cooperate with critics.

She said she and city officials have mulled their frustration with Ms. Ravitch for years, but she said the Bloomberg administration did not ask her to write the article. She said she decided to write it herself after Ms. Ravitch published an opinion piece criticizing a program to bring merit-based pay to public schools — a plan that Ms. Wylde's Partnership is partially financing. She said the attack was reminiscent of other critiques Ms. Ravitch has made against programs supported by the Partnership, which Ms. Wylde said she also felt were unfair.

"The largest fund-raising we have undertaken are in public education," she said. "It's damaging to those projects, to our fund-raising efforts."

The president of the teachers union, Randi Weingarten, said Ms. Wylde's article offended her. "Anybody worth his or her salt in education has been both criticized and praised by Diane Ravitch," Ms. Weingarten said. "That voice should not be silenced."

Another critic of Mr. Bloomberg's education policies, the Manhattan Institute fellow Sol Stern, said: "It's been clear for a while that City Hall and the DOE want to cut off all serious debate about their education policies. But they've never stooped so low as to try to delegitimize the country's leading historian of education."

Randi does the Maury Povich show

UPDATED: Oct. 31 8pm with a 2nd RR reporter (below)

Here is a report from RRR - our Rubber Room Resident correspondent about last night's meeting (I didn't attend but was outside with someone from the Rubber Room Movie who would like to get some more video or audio reactions from people to the meeting. Anonymity guaranteed if requested.)

RRR:
Catching Maury -- I mean, Randy. Tonight's meeting regarding the Rubber Room.

I knew we were in trouble when Randy walked in and asked us how we wanted to run the meeting -- did we want to hear her ten point plan or talk first? I didn't know how to respond to this, but my colleagues had better manners and did their best impressions of good students anxious to hear what the teacher has to say.

The Ten points were themselves reasonable. We weren't given copies, but here's what I remember.

1. That the arbitration process should be expedited in a fair, but fast manner. That we should have the 20 arbitrators the contract calls for as soon as possible.

2. That whistle-blowers should be protected and people should have access to all their rights under the law --- the disabled, to the protection of disability laws, for example.

3. That teachers should receive their charges within two days of removal from the classroom.

4. That a committee be convened including the teacher's peers to determine IF the person needed to be removed from the school.

5. That while there would not be UFT rep's at each site, there would be liaisons assigned to each center so that cases could receive more attention and be better managed.

6. That the centers not be warehouse-like in themselves.

7. That a suspended teacher remains on the school's payroll so he/she can't be replaced.

8. That people facing criminal charges who are exonerated in criminal court don't have to endure another trial from the DOE.

I would ask others at the meeting to add what they remember and impressions.

What disturbed me even about the presentation of the ten points was the feeling of "rough draft" to the whole process. It seemed that Randy intended this to create a kind of feeling of open dialogue (or, at least, that was her given intention). She asked if we thought these points were "on the right track." I guess, I would have preferred to have a sense that these points were part of a proposal to be made on a specific date with the intention of implementing them quickly. Frankly, also, I'd have preferred to be given copies of the proposal before the meeting so that I could've come in with specific questions. I realize that Randy is very busy -- these points were apparently hot off her notepad this afternoon.

What followed was mostly a long, dirge of a session, with person after person relating his or her story. A few of the speakers made specific suggestions -- one which very importantly related to untenured teachers. She pointed out that keeping the untenured teacher on the principal's payroll would just give the principal incentive to fire/excess the untenured teacher. Randy, at first, dodged the question, but finally said she would then have to re-think the suggestion on the proposal.

The microphone then passed among the crowd like a special edition of a morning talk show, with teachers telling their stories, some sadder than the others. There was almost a feeling of people bringing their stories to some sort of papal figure, as if something could be done for them at the moment. Randy did gesture to her SWAT team -- Betsy Combier, Jim Callahan, etc. that they pay attention to some of these and even directed one woman to the legal department.

I am sure some people, particularly those speaking, felt satisfied for their opportunity to vent/get some sense of immediate redress. For those of us who didn't speak, there was the opportunity to listen to some terrible, but not unfamiliar injustices. A colleague of mine suggested that perhaps Randy had no idea how many people would come and that is why she had no more formal system than passing the microphone around.

What happened, as the meeting moved closer and closer to seven pm (having started around five), was that the NYSUT lawyers began passing notes in the back, people started flitting around to talk with their lawyers or other people they knew, and the circle of keening became a small one with Randy slumped behind it.

Maybe this meeting will help Randy to see badly people have been treated. It was probably far more contact with the masses than she intended and she did listen, even when she might have been the only one still listening. But, it's unclear to me if any of the larger stories will help shape the proposal. For all the demands and re-demands that "two days is too long to wait" for your charges and insistences that principals, and even sometimes union reps, do not behave fairly, I had a feeling that Randy's rough draft was meant to be fairly close to final and that the negotiable points were really meant to be fine tuning -- not core re-shapings that, for example, insisting that people get their charges before they are removed would necessitate.

I'd be curious to see what other's thought -- which points other people remember. A lot was also mentioned in passing. Randy alluded to wanting to have five cases like those of David Pakter and Lenny Brown -- and I took this to mean five "poster children" to be used as test cases, for stories in the press/help give a public face to the rubber room.

Randy also made clear that the UFT lost its age discrimination suit -- that the EEOC rejected the case as a whole as unworthy, though individual cases had merit. Somehow this loss blurred into a general answer about lawsuits -- implying that the union might not sue for discrimination against the disabled, for example as a whole, or might do so individually. She made clear she didn't want to take on the case of teachers who might be discriminated against because of their accents (a point raised in a RR resident's question) in the cold-hearted environment of Bloomberg and Klein, who might argue that the teacher could not be understood by the students. It will be up to the individual, it seemed to me, to bring his/her case to the union's attention and raise the issue of discrimination.

And then, all sorts of random facts some of us might not have known came out. I didn't know that if you have two "u" ratings you can get an independent person to evaluate you in your third year. It almost seemed as though Randy had been on a bone-up course/overdrive of "u" rating/3020a info and was just teeming with thoughts about it. That can happen both when you study hard and when you pull an "all-nighter" and get your paper done ten minutes before presentation. This is not to say she didn't have good intentions or ideas.

I just wished that things had been a bit more organized and objectives clearer. Maybe this is the fault of having been a teacher for too long.
RR Resident

Randi called a meeting of all the school systems' teachers reassigned to the rubber room.It was scheduled for 4:15 on Tuesday October 30th 2007. Over two hundred fifty people in rubber rooms from the five boroughs, as well as the entire nysut legal staff and many union district representatives were in attendance. Randi did not come to the meeting place until 4:30. No staff member said a word about the delay. Staff milled around and talked for one half hour. Randi then arrived and said that she could not get started because she was waiting for a power point presentation to be given to her. We waited another 15 minutes. She then began by explaining the reason she was late. A crisis had occurred due to a bomb threat at a Bronx school.

A teacher who came to class 30 minutes late would get a letter in his or her file. If a teacher arrived at a class and kept the class waiting for 15 minutes because he or she was unprepared, it would mean another letter for the file. Why was Randi involved in resolving a bomb threat in the Bronx? If a Union presence was necessary couldn't she have delegated someone to take care of it?

The experience of the first hour and fifteen minutes of a meeting with Randi was a crystalization of the problem. She was rude to the participants by showing up late. When she showed up she was not prepared. Finally, with a huge paid staff, she was unable to delegate responsibility meaningfully and as a result we, all of us in the school system, both in and out of rubber rooms are in the mess we are in.

Denizen of the RR

Rubber Room Movie and Harlem RR Report - UPDATE

Filmmaker and former teacher Jeremy Garrett a filmmaker and former teacher, who got the idea for the Rubber Room Movie when a colleague was unfairly assigned there, asked me to post a message that someone from the movie will be outside 52 Broadway at 4pm to ask people their opinions. I will try to be there with them to assist.

The movie has been long in the making and kudos to Five Boroughs Productions for being on the case before anyone else. The UFT gave them permission to film a discussion at an Executive Board meeting and they attended an ICE meeting to film one of our discussions. Check out their site at http://www.rubberroommovie.com/ where a trailer will be posted soon.

Also, see a report from the Harlem Rubber Room by David Pakter below Jeremy Garrett's as David refuses to remove Van Gogh prints he bought and hung to liven up a windowless, drab space. David will be at the UFT meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 30 and it should be a lively event.

We want to point out that while we remain skeptical, we support the attention being paid at long last to this issue by the UFT leadership, which all too often gave RR people the impression they felt they were guilty, giving one the sense the UFT only wanted to touch them with a 20 foot pole. Now that the mainstream press has picked up the story with some level of sympathy for a change (began when ICE's Jeff Kaufman's stint in the RR was featured in the NY Times and the NY Post), the UFT is trying to take the lead. They are welcome to the struggle and hopefully their advocacy and the pressure of the press will embarrass the DOE into changes.


Greetings Norm,

I have tried to contact the UFT in order to be granted permission to shoot at the Rubber Room Summit meeting that is taking place tomorrow (Tues, Oct. 30 at 4pm). I have e-mailed Randi Weingarten and spoken with [UFT Public Relations chief] Chris Policano but I have yet to receive a response.

Could you please post this notice on your blog to let people know that Five Boroughs Productions will be outside 52 Broadway tomorrow if we are not granted permission to shoot inside? We wish to speak with folks both before and after the meeting to address issues surrounding the Rubber Room and discuss what the UFT is finally doing to address the needs which are specific to reassigned teachers.

Obviously we are aware of the sensitivity surrounding reassignment, so we can grant anonymity to those individuals who have something to say but fear retribution.

Thanks for your continued support,

--
Jeremy Garrett
Executive Producer
Five Boroughs Productions
www.rubberroommovie.com
347-834-5206

Rubber Room Update from David Pakter

As of today it was ordered that the Metropolitan Museum Prints be removed from the prison like walls of the Harlem Rubber Room. I have refused to comply. Can you possibly get this IMPROVED VERSION published all over the universe tonight because Randi Weingarten is holding a special meeting at the UFT, tomorrow, Tues at 4 PM for all 700 prisoners of the various Rubber Rooms. I want as many members of the press and public AS POSSIBLE to know about the situation in the Harlem Rubber Room before that massive UFT meeting begins tomorrow at 4 PM. The order to remove the Van Gogh prints is totally "Arbitrary and Capricious" and intended to make the RR's as painful/oppressive/uncomfortable as possible.

LATEST- Breaking NYC DOE Education News

For Immediate Press Release - Monday, October 29, 2007

Attention: Museum Art Curators, UNESCO, Cultural Organizations Worldwide


The New York City Dept of Education "Art Police" Demand

Metropolitan Museum Vincent Van Gogh Prints Be Removed

From A New York City Dept. of Education "Rubber Room".

Is It Because the Flowers Are Nude?

Please see previous Press Release attached below.
_______________________________________________________
Regarding: The New York City Board/Dept. of Education
"From Inside the Harlem Rubber Room"
Open Letter To Chancellor Joel Klein, Esq.
Will A Teacher Be Charged With Hanging A Museum Poster?
____________________________________________
Picture a small room without windows or even a water cooler on the 6th floor of a nondescript government building on West 125th Street in Harlem in New York City. Now imagine that you cannot reach that floor without being accompanied by a uniformed Security Guard and that once you enter that small windowless room, you are greeted by two uniformed Security Guards with badges, shoulder patches and the whole nine yards.

Is this a secret FBI uptown office or a local branch of the Homeland Security Administration? Hardly. Just one of the ten, (going on one hundred, at the present rate of expansion), NYC DOE teacher "reassignment centers", better known as "Rubber Rooms". These are centers set up by the NYC Board of Education to warehouse teachers who the DOE, in their infinite wisdom, has decided should not be in a school setting.

Some may perhaps deserve to be removed from their schools. But more often than not a huge percentage of these "reassigned educators" end up there for political reasons. In short removed from their positions due to being Whistle-blowers or having some type of disagreement with their immediate supervisor about what is in the best interest of the children in their care and who they have a fiduciary obligation to nurture, educate and protect.

In the NYC Dept of Education those in charge expect teachers to accept the premise that you surrender your First Amendment Rights once you pass through a school's front door. Most NYC schools now have metal detectors which can detect when a student is attempting to smuggle a knife or a loaded pistol into a school building.

Presumably, the way things are going, the NYC Board of Education may soon be installing "First Amendment Rights" detectors at the entrance to every school building just to ensure that no teacher becomes audacious enough to believe that he/she can successfully get away with smuggling a "First Amendment Right" into a school.

But getting back to the business at hand, it must be said that the term "Rubber Room", referring to the padded holding rooms in hospital psychiatric wards, (for the incarcerated person's own protection of course), is a term that was never so appropriate and fitting, as it is used by the NYC Board of Education. In particular to the teacher Rubber Room in New York's Harlem, which is in a space so absolutely perfect, whether by intentional design or not, to get the incarcerated teachers there to sooner or later start feeling claustrophobic, utterly cut off from the world and hence likely to start bouncing off the walls, sooner or later, figuratively speaking.

And to think the NYC DOE totally forgot to install the obligatory Federally Approved rubber padding that rubber rooms are required by law to contain, permanently affixed to the walls with Federally Approved, non-toxic glue and/or other approved adhesive material.
I realized this past week, as I enter my second year as an inmate of the 125th Street Harlem Rubber Room, that those four barren walls, with no windows, were definitely beginning to play tricks on my brain. At times there were days when I was even beginning to think that Chancellor Joel Klein, Esq. and the NYC Dept of Education did not like me. Was I becoming paranoid? Or what? Maybe I really did belong in a Rubber Room, medically speaking.

But then I had to remind myself that two years before, the Director of the NYC DOE Medical Office had tried to advance such an idea by knowingly claiming I was medically "not fit for duty" only to later incur a massive degree of public humiliation when the City's own hand picked Final Binding Medical Arbitrator, quickly saw through the knowingly false claims of the NYC DOE Medical Office. In fact the NYC DOE was forced to compensate me a full year's salary plus interest for that very foolish indiscretion and the last I heard the Medical Director involved has taken a "leave of absence for 'personal reasons' ".

(Sadly, I have been informed, however, that this same DOE Medical Office is continuing to Railroad innocent teachers out of the system on knowingly false Medical claims. This will all be leading to a $ 30,000,000 Lawsuit in due course. The "Official Notice of Claim" has already been filed with three separate government offices).

But returning to the question of whether the Harlem Rubber Room was beginning to take a toll on its inhabitants, that thought alone was sufficient to make me realize I had better take action before I went over the edge and got sucked into a Black Hole in DOE inner or outer space from whence there is no escape, ever.

I made the decision that I either had to paint, (as an experienced artist, see www.OldMasterPortraits.com ) virtual windows on those four barren walls. Or else have real window frames installed, with built in flat screen monitors, continuously showing refreshing French Riviera scenes of gorgeous beaches with their foaming waves lapping at the sands or perhaps views of Venice with romantic gondolas, gracefully gliding by on azure waters.
But then common sense and a reality check rudely stepped in and made me realize that I might very well go over the edge long before I completed such an ambitious project. Then I recalled that my residence was just a two minute walk, (passing Mayor Michael Bloomberg's stately townhouse at 17 East 79th Street), from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, whose many gift shops offer no end of ravishingly beautiful, full color, luxury posters of paintings from their immense Art collection.

But there was one glitch in my anticipated solution to making the 125th Street windowless Harlem Rubber Room relatively inhabitable. Just recently one of the building custodians who is responsible for our Rubber Room, a gentleman named "Caesar", (no-you cannot make these things up), had informed the inmates that no person was to hang anything on our Rubber Room's pristine and glaringly barren walls, "under penalty of death", or worse still, having yet another charge added to his/her Official 3020-a Specifications, thus leading even more swiftly to that teacher's permamnent termination.

But it seems to me, coming from a long line of first rate lawyers, that there really is such a thing as "cruel and unusual punishment". Did not the United States Supreme Court issue such a finding just this very week? Are there not times and situations in Life when the punishment does not fit the crime and where the punishment imposed is so far in excess of what the alleged perpetrator, (in this instance- educators), deserves, that exception must be made lest our entire system of American Law become a mockery of Justice in the eyes of the entire civilized world.

So this past Friday afternoon, when all those teachers who are incarcerated in the 125th Street Rubber Room departed for the weekend, having more or less survived another week of "cruel and unusual/inhumane punishment", I put my survival plan into action.

I carefully unrolled the stunningly beautiful, large full color posters of paintings by Vincent van Gogh, Claude Monet, Paul Gauguin, et al which I had purchased at The Metropolitan Museum gift shop and proceeded to install the high quality prints on the barren, (nervous breakdown inducing) walls of the NYC DOE 125th Street Rubber Room.

I could hardly believe my tired Rubber Room eyes. Suddenly I felt I had been magicly transported to Southern France to a kinder, gentler, lovelier, more peaceful age. Each wall in that formerly drab and barren Rubber Room seemed to have come alive as if they now contained real windows, looking out on beautiful green cypress trees being kissed by the wind and blue skies and floating gardens punctuated with shimmering, iridescent water lilies of every imaginable kind and color. All the flora of the world greeted one's eyes as one turned his gaze from one Rubber Room wall to the next.

North, South, East and West, has suddenly been transformed into a world that a reassigned teacher could live in, and even survive in, and miracle of wonders, even thrive in as they waited for months or even years for their "Trials" to begin.

"Was it a vision or a waking Dream- fled is that Music. Do I wake or sleep." as a great poet once said.

But that was late Friday afternoon and early on Monday morning, Caesar and two uniformed Security Guards, assigned to be our full time "KGB like minders", will make the astounding discovery that an inmate of the 125th Street Rubber Room has done "the unthinkable". That one of the prisoners has taken it upon himself to make that NYC DOE gulag liveable- just as millions of detained prisoners in US prisons do all the time by hanging whatever it is they paste on their own prison cell walls.

Will Caesar and the NYC DOE uniformed Security Guards be so cold hearted and such unforgivable cultural Philistines as to remove the greatest glories of French Art from the walls of that formerly barren and "cruel and unusal punishment" windowless incarceration room?
And will Chancellor Joel Klein, Esq. and the NYC Dept/Board of Education decide that in addition to the already insane and preposterous charges already leveled against a former "Teacher of the Year", including SPECIFICATION 6, which violates the United States Constitution and The Bill of Rights, yet one more preposterous charge.

Shall I not save them the time and expense of paying high priced lawyers, (at tax payer expense), the trouble of drafting the new and additional charge against me, that of posting prints of famous paintings from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, on the walls of my/our prison cell.

ToWit:
SPECIFICATION X : Respondent, David Pakter, did knowingly and willfully, on or about October 26, 2007, cause a barren, drab, windowless, NYC DOE Rubber Room, (on the 6th floor of a building on 125th Street in Harlem), to become a moderately, liveable space in which to reside, six to seven hours per day, by posting and/or hanging on the four walls of that formerly cold and uninhabitable room, full color prints of famous and celebrated European paintings from the permanent collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.
__________________________________________________________________
David Pakter, M.A., M.F.A.
New York City, October 27, 2007
"Teacher of the Year", Decorated by Mayor Rudolph Giuliani in New York's City Hall
for "Exceptional Achievement in Education"
For further information see: http://www.uft.org/news/teacher/top/axed/

What If There Was a Fiscal Crisis?

Randi Weingarten bragged about the no-layoff clause in the contract at a recent meeting, slipping in the proviso "as long as there isn't a fiscal crisis." Remembering 1975 when contracts were rendered moot, this is a very apt observation and possibly a warning. ICE's Michael Fiorillo has raised this issue on ICE-mail and at ICE meetings.

The UFT in defending the open market system always points to the no-layoff clause, somewhat moot with so many new teachers recruited each year. They argue that ATR's always will have a job. In '75 as teachers were excessed they had seniority to protect them. What would happen today if there were a fiscal crises of the same scope?

Check out Reality-Based Educator's post Bull@#$% Market at NYC Educator for the state of the economy.

SUNY Approves UFT/Green Dot Charter

http://www.uft.org/news/issues/press/greendot_approved/

For Immediate Release (from the UFT)

SUNY Trustees approve Green Dot charter school for South Bronx

The State University of New York Board of Trustees on Oct. 26 approved the application for the Green Dot New YorkCharter School founded in partnership by Green DotPublic Schools, the most prominent charter school operator in Southern California, and the United Federation of Teachers, the labor union representing New York City’s 110,000 public school educators.

The approval by the SUNY trustees, coming just eight days after a District 7 Community Education Council hearing on the plans, sets the stage for final consideration by the State Board of Regents in coming months. If approved by the Regents, Green Dot will operate a high school in the South Bronx beginning with 100 students in grade nine and eventually expanding to include all high school grades through grade twelve. Class size will be capped at 25 students.

Ed Note: No matter how one phrases this, deals like this go hand in hand with the abandonment of public education as money is funneled into these schools. Search this blog with the label Green Dot for articles and also check NYC educator for articles there.

Data Driven Destruction

by Paul A. Moore

Teacher, Miami Carol City Senior High School

One of the corporate wrecking balls brought down recently on America’s public schools is “data driven” education. The charade is a creation of the Business Roundtable and other forces that dream of a privatized school system that serves only their global profit making schemes.

Because their sinister intentions must be kept on the down low, data driven education is packaged and sold as economical but revolutionary pedagogy come to the classroom. Absurdity is the inevitable result. And so it is that our system of universal public education is now trapped in a scene from Woody Allen’s farce Bananas. The new leader has decreed that, “From this day on the official language of San Marcos will be Swedish. In addition to that, all citizens will be required to change their underwear every half hour. Underwear will be worn on the outside so we can check. Furthermore, all children under 16-years-old are now…16-years-old!”

Promoting insanity in the classroom has proven to be quite an effective weapon of public school destruction. Teachers are being broken down and driven away at an unprecedented rate. One in five new teachers will not make it through their first year. Half of them will be gone inside of five years.

In still sane sectors of our society data is collected on a rational basis. The U.S. Census Bureau gathers data on population, infant mortality, life expectancy, health insurance and the distribution of wealth for the sake of a more effective government. In a sector of our society targeted for demoralization and destruction, data is collected for data’s sake. There is no earthly reason for most of the information teachers are now being ordered to collect and analyze through incessant testing of students. If the Census Bureau was put on the same footing they would be checking people’s underwear every half hour.

Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush is a high ranking leader of the corporate assault on public schools, right up there with Michael R. Bloomberg, Eli Broad, and the Walton (Wal-Mart) Family. Jeb Bush is not just a friend of big business; he is a big business! One of his wholly-owned subsidiaries is his brother Neil Bush and Ignite! Learning. Ignite is a software company that “helps” students prepare for the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) with “portable learning centers” at $3,000 per kid. The business has contracts in 13 Florida school districts and rakes in millions.

During Jeb Bush’s final year in office there is strong evidence to suggest that FCAT scores were manipulated and artificially inflated. The “education governor” was apparently going to barnstorm with the “education mayor” Mr. Bloomberg as a prelude to a run for the White House. Big brother has poisoned that well for the time being but in those days there was speculation over another possible career path for Jeb.

Imagine if Jeb Bush had been tapped by National Football League owners rather than Roger Goodell as the league’s commissioner. The new commissioner could have applied his education philosophy to the NFL. Certainly the players would be more effective if they spent less time on the practice field and in the weight room and more time being tested daily in the 40-yard dash, shuttle run, vertical leap and bench press. Less time practicing football plays and more time being tested on the playbook. Or imagine the new policy if President Bush had named his brother to the Cabinet? As U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Jeb Bush would surely have ordered the nation’s livestock weighed every few hours because even if it did cut into their feeding time it would certainly result in fatter cows.