Teacher Quality at the Education Sector... a stacked deck?

UPDATE:
WARNING: Read at your own peril.

The following post has been declared as gibberish and unhinged at Rotherham's Eduwonk world of ed reform fantasyland and this blogger has received an official Eduwonk "crazy" designation, not the first time we have been so designated. Just ask former principal(s), District Superintendent(s), UFT District rep(s), etc.

While over there, make sure to read Edwonk's "unfair and unbalanced report" on the ATR situation in NYC. Then you make the call as to whether you have accidentally fallen into a science fiction blog.


This morning at 9 AM in Washington DC, the Education Sector will listen to the voice of teachers – at a time no working teacher can attend.

Teacher Voice: How Teachers See the Teacher Quality Debate
May 7, 2008 9:00 AM - 11:00 AM (Capital Hilton)

The announcement says:
As policymakers, teachers unions, and other stakeholders react to changing demands on the nation's public education system, there is considerable debate about what teachers think and what they want. Too often assumptions define this conversation rather than actual evidence of what teachers want and how teachers see their profession evolving.

A new survey from Education Sector by Ann Duffett, Steve Farkas, Andrew J. Rotherham, and Elena Silva examines teachers' opinions and attitudes toward teacher unions, teacher unionism, and a range of current district reforms, including those aimed specifically at improving teacher quality. Join Education Sector for a presentation and discussion of the survey's findings

Ed Notes has taken the position that this emphasis on teacher quality has nefarious purposes. There will always be a bell-curve of teacher quality, just as there is a curve for doctors, lawyers, plumbers, etc. Funny, but I don't see the Ed Sector running events trying to discern the quality of the physicians poor kids with asthma attacks might see in the emergency room in the middle of the night and then come into school too sleepy to pay attention and how that factor affects teacher quality.

I'm anxious to see where the surveyed teachers come from. I wonder how many are from places where the ed reform "the fault is on the lack of teacher quality" movement has hit, often in urban schools under some form of mayoral control.

Now there are actually a few teachers on the panel. One is from Denver. And the president of the Providence Teachers Union is also on the panel. In March, he led a protest and called for a vote on no-confidence in the current administration of the Providence schools. The last time they did that was against Diana Lam, who was hired by Joel Klein for a disastrous run as chief of instruction. (If a union protests against someone, that person must be good for him.)

And a NYC teacher too. I have faith than anyone who has taught in the NYC world of BloomKlein, so beloved by the Ed Sector, will have plenty of good stuff to say – if allowed to say much.

I would have loved to see people like NYC educator or Reality Based Educator or Chaz School Daze but they wouldn't take a day off for this stuff. Not like.....

......It is particularly gratifying to see controversial Wash. DC Superintendent Michelle Rhee, a Teach for America alum and former Joel Kleinite in NYC, will be able to take time away from running a large urban school system to attend. A few weeks ago, Rhee also found the time to come up to New York to attend a weekday Manhattan Institute breakfast to push the usual ed reform line. What would they say if scads of teachers took time off to attend some of these things? Bad, bad, go to the rubber room. But Rhee's attendance at these events is indicative of the real ed reform agenda - ideology and politics, not education.

I don' t even have to go. Let's see, bet they say a hundred times: research shows that teacher quality is the single most important factor in a child's education (I was disappointed to see Chaz School Daze say the same thing on his blog.) I don't agree.

We could just as easily proclaim that research shows that small class sizes are the single most important factor in a child's education. That seems to be what I heard at a recent symposium at Columbia about the famous Tennessee study, where all classes, with the good, the bad and the ugly teachers saw improvements when class size was lowered. But fuggedaboudit. Ed Sector, unabashed admirers of BloomKlein would rather talk about teacher quality in isolation of other factors like class size or the difficulty of some children to learn – watch out for the dreaded "we aren't talking about comparing apples and oranges - followed by claims of the unproven and as far as I'm concerned unfounded – value added approach where teachers are rated based on the growth of kids based on past performance (on highs takes tests only, not on things like "Johnny entered my class s serial killer and left a lamb.")

Good Norm Twin: But let's be fair here. You didn't even hear the results of the survey. Maybe it will bear you out on class size.

Evil Norm Twin: Will the teachers surveyed say colleagues they view as incompetent should be made to drink arsenic? And teacher unions are horrible because they protect these people? Anyone check in NYC lately to see how well the UFT has been protecting teachers?

The cast of characters
Featured Presenters:
Andrew J. Rotherham, Elena Silva

This event will feature:
Greg Ahrnsbrak, Teacher, Denver Public Schools
Ann Duffett, FDR Group
Steven Farkas, FDR Group
Ellen Halloran, Teacher, New York City Public Schools
Michelle Rhee, Chancellor of D.C. Public Schools
Steven Smith, President, Providence Teachers Union
Elena Silva, Senior Policy Analyst, Education Sector (as moderator)
Andrew J. Rotherham, Co-director, Education Sector (introductory remarks)

Greg Ahrnsbrak is on the panel because he led a battle to modify the union contract in his school, a trend in Denver. Rotherham loves teachers who are willing to throw out contract rules. He throws out the line we hear form the likes of Kahlenberg [on Shanker] and Leo Casey about the New Unionism (how has that worked out for NYC teachers?]

"If (unions) see this as an opportunity to redefine their roles, they will thrive," Rotherham said. "If they don't get in the game, it will pass them by."

The UFT has always been in the game, so how come NYC teachers feel oh, so passed by?

To get a sense of why Greg Ahrnsbrak is on the panel, check out this excerpt from

The Denver Post reported back in January (edited):

A bid for autonomy at Denver's Bruce Ran dolph school faces another test today, when union leaders meet for the second time to vote on whether to accept a waiver from the teachers contract.

The union, so far, has balked at the request — The school board approved its part of the waiver last month, and a majority of teachers at the school voted for the proposal. Last week, Manual High School in Denver made a similar request.

State Senate President Peter Groff may introduce a bill to encourage other schools to do the same, and more than $100,000 from nonprofit organizations has been offered to Bruce Randolph if the move goes forward.

National education experts are watching the Bruce Randolph proposal that would give the school control over its budget, teacher time, calendar, incentives and hiring decisions.

"It is going to be fascinating," said Andrew Rotherham of Virginia, co-founder and co-director of Education Sector, a national education policy think tank. "This is what progress looks like, messy and contentious."

The union wanted Bruce Randolph to clearly explain what parts of the contract should be waived. Last week, teachers submitted a five-page response, outlining each article and subsection they want waived or retained.

Union President Kim Ursetta said she discussed the proposal with representatives from the school Saturday.

"We want to be able to look at what contract provisions, if any, impede student achievement at Bruce Randolph," Ursetta said.

The union should be flexible, said Rotherham.

"If (unions) see this as an opportunity to redefine their roles, they will thrive," Rotherham said. "If they don't get in the game, it will pass them by."

"We took the worst middle school in the state and brought it to a low ranking," said Greg Ahrnsbrak, a teacher at Bruce Randolph and the school's union representative, who helped craft the waiver plan.

Now Greg Ahrnsbrak is at a school that had lots of problems and the staff has bought into the idea the way to fix these problems is to show a willingness to waive the contract, obviously pegged as the main culprit. The central union has been balking and teachers at Ahrnsbak's school are talking going charter.

Ahrnsbrak said some have encouraged the staff to go ahead and implement the proposal anyway, regardless of the union's stance.

Private foundations love the controversy and are leaping in. The Denver Post reported on Jan. 24:

....the Piton Foundation, ... offered the school $100,000 if the autonomy bid were approved...

"If somebody there says they'd like to do a charter," [said a Piton rep] "we'll give them the $100,000 and I'll go back and try and raise more money."

Ahhh. Bribery from the world of foundations. Check back with the teachers in a few years and see where the money has gone once the union is broken.

Looks like Ellen Halloran, our poor lone NYC teacher, will be seriously outnumbered.

Obama, Clinton, the UFT, Shanker, Kahlenberg

Boy, that's a mouthful.

With today's primaries promising to be somewhat important (my belief is that Obama has been damaged to such an extent, he will be hurting badly by tonight) I wanted to comment on a bunch of stuff related to the Democratic party and the splits going back 40 years to 1968.

Remember that year? Assassinations, the crazy Demo convention in Chicago, the UFT 3 month strike in Ocean-Hill Brownsville - all events that have major impact on today's events. Richard Kahlenberg's "Tough Liberal" spends a lot of time justifying Shanker's actions and blaming the New left, the New Democrats, the limousine liberals, etc for the problems the party has had.

As I read it I kept saying- this book came out at this time as justification for Hillary Clinton to be president. Do many of the attacks on Obama point back to 40 years of splits? Do the wounds of the '68 strike still play a role in the Obama-Clinton split? These are issues worth exploring and we'll take a shot at it at some point this week - if I can force myself to open up Kalhlenberg's book once again.

By the way, a review of Kahlenberg's book (funded by Eli Broad and other foundations that just love the ed reform teacher attack movment) written by Vera Pavone and myself will be published in New Politics summer edition. Interestingly, Michael Hirsh, a writer for the NY Teacher and a member of NP's board, will write a response in the following edition. Hmmm. Will Shanker/Kahlenberg come up smelling like roses? A funny thing, but the NY Teacher edition following our submission of the review had an article by Kahlenberg "explaining" Shanker's real position on charter schools.

Al had a lot of splaining to do that goes way beyond charter schools.

Absentee Teacher Reserves

Don't miss James Eterno's marvelous historical analysis on ATR/contract reopening over at the ICE blog. James points out almost 20 years of UFT obfuscation and dis-information. (I think it should be mis-information but they have gone beyond mis to dis.)

Tim Daly the head of the New Teacher Project which issued the report that condemned the union and ATRs' instead of the DOE (he DOES have contracts with the DOE, so why expect anything else), is the guest blogger at Eduwonkette today. Head on over and leave him a comment.

Jumping in today is NYC Educator (is there anyone naive enough to believe that if Mr. Daly's group came to different conclusions they'd still be riding the DoE gravy train?) jumping in.

Daley criticizes the UFT and on the surface, they actually come out looking good - the defender of ATR teachers. Start scratching to see what is going on behind the scenes and a slightly different story might emerge. We have the itch and some data is coming in. Is this all about the UFT covering its tracks over the role it played in creating the ATR situation in the first place? Their "it's a damn outrage" stuff - "we set up a system that would work if only Tweed were honorable" point should be up on Letterman's comedy of the day segments.

A comment (edited) left on another posting on this blog.

I feel like the tone Randi Weingarten takes is the one I imagine of individuals trying to rationalize with the Nazis. "You are very right that the street is, ultimately, in your jurisdiction, so if you don't believe that the broken glass on the ground is important, I can't argue with you. I would suggest, however, that you consider that the needs of my children are similar to those in neighborhoods where there is no glass on the ground today." What is sad is that I can see myself being equally "appropriate". Gandhi was able to embarass the British with his actions. They knew arresting a man for making salt is ridiculous and their metaphorical cheeks got read. But nothing makes American's blush anymore -- I don't mean sexually -- I mean in terms of standards with which we treat each other. That's why its hard to see how absolutely absurd it is to keep being so seemingly rational. While she is making her nice speech, the tracks are being built. It's a common mistake made centuries over by lesser and better people, so perhaps she is to be set in context and excused for it. Nobody thought they would really send people to their deaths on a daily basis. In plain sight. Would the city fire thousands of people on frivolous charges in broad daylight?

At least, at Credit Suisse, you get a package. At Verizon, there's a whole process you have to go through before you can fire someone. Why would a public sector agency be able to do things the private sector cannot do with such impunity? Can you imagine Bear Sterns hauling off it's over 40 accountants on charges they were dangerous to the clients without actually being able to prove so? Would they dare? Again, at least they would get a package.

On a similar track, rubber room teachers have also come under attack.
Check Saddleshoes' commentary at: http://saddleshoe.blogspot.com/2008/05/daily-news-and-rubber-room.html

Link to May 4 article

http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2008/05/04/2008-05-04_teachers_in_trouble_spending_years_in_ru.html

Link to May 5

http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2008/05/05/2008-05-05_rubber_room_uproar.html

Uppity.... With Malice Toward None

I was talking to some supposedly liberal teachers not long ago and was surprised at their animosity to Obama. "Distant. Arrogant. Slick. Thinks he's better than regular people." For a second I thought the next word to be uttered would be the dreaded "Uppity." Well, we haven't gone that far. (Well, maybe we have - look upper left.)

Now these are people active in the UFT. Has the Clinton machine been aided in the onslaught on Obama in more subtle ways by UFT underground propaganda? (ie. Randi Weingarten's hint at the April DA that they tried to reach out to him but have been ignored. It was more the way she said it than the actual words that made me take notice.)

I headed home with the intention to write about this but it seemed best to stay away from such a volatile topic. But I now feel free to put my toe in the water after Maureen Dowd used the word today in her column in the NY Times. Quoting Bill Clinton, she wrote:

“The great divide in this country is not by race or even income, it’s by those who think they are better than everyone else and think they should play by a different set of rules,” the former president said. “In West Virginia and Arkansas, we know that when we see it.”

Oh, well, at least Bill didn’t use the word uppity. And don’t you love this paean to rules coming from a man so tethered and humbled by rules that he invented an entirely new sexual etiquette to suit his needs in the Oval Office?

Why does Obama, the one with the bumpy background and mixed racial heritage, the one raised by a single mother who was on food stamps, seem so forced when he mingles with the common folk?

Karl Rove and other Republicans say he comes across as the snooty product of a Hawaiian prep school, Cambridge, Columbia and Hyde Park, and that is what led to the damaging anthropological “bitter” disquisition. Yet George H. W. Bush’s attempts to paint over his patrician style with a cowboy veneer was a silly sort of masquerade, obviously engineered by Lee Atwater, who brought the props of pork rinds and country music.

Voters also don’t seem to mind Hillary, with her $109 million bank account, selling herself as the champion of the little people. The blue-collar queen shared her thoughts about the “outrageous” Rev. Wright with the blue-collar king, Bill O’Reilly, last week. In reality, as first lady, Hillary was renowned for her upstairs-downstairs tussles in the White House, and her high-handed treatment of the little people in the travel office, on the switchboard and on the residence staff. The reports were legend about the Clintons’ problems with the Secret Service, and I once saw Bill dress down an agent in a humiliating way over a couple of autograph seekers who got past a rope line in Orange County, Calif.

Obama, on the other hand, may seem esoteric, and sometimes looks haughty or put-upon when he should merely offer that ensorcelling smile. But he is very well liked by his Secret Service agents, and shoots hoops with them. And I watched him take the time one night after a long day of campaigning to stand and take individual pictures with a squadron of Dallas motorcycle police officers on the tarmac.

It must be hard for Obama, having applied all his energy over the years to rising above the rough spots in his background, making whites comfortable with him, striving to become the sophisticated, silky political star who looks supremely comfortable in a tux. Now he must go into reverse and stoop to conquer with cornball photo ops.

“I do think that one of the ironies of the last two or three weeks was this idea that somehow Michelle and I are elitist, pointy-headed intellectual types,” he said, adding sincerely, “I filled up my own gas tanks.”

It’s hard not to be who you are, but it’s doubly hard to be who you’ve strived not to be. Obama not only has to figure out how to unwind with a Bud. He has to rewind his life.

If people think the love of the white male working class for Hillary, so many of whom despised her not too long ago, has nothing to do with racism, they are ignoring something endemic to American society. That the Clintons have chosen to exacerbate it all will cost them dearly in the short and long run.

Dowd touches on points of personal relationships in comparing Obama and Clinton. I remember a friend almost not marrying a guy because, though he treated her very well, he demeaned waiters and other help on a regular basis. There are lessons about character in the way people treat others at all levels. Abraham Lincoln was the master (Dorris Kearns Goodwin is a MUST read.) When some people compare Obama to Lincoln, that is part of what they are talking about. (Check out George Schmidt's personal reflections of Obama that we posted on norms notes.)

But there are other areas of comparison. Obama is painted as weak when he doesn't hammer Hillary in a negative manner and he has been forced to respond because he is branded as a wimp if he doesn't.

If Lincoln were out there today, he would be attacked for being weak and indecisive. No matter how badly he was attacked he never struck back. It used to drive his advisors crazy. (But Lincoln had the strength to put every single opponent in his cabinet.) Obama has tried to take a similar tack and has been pushed to show how "tough" he is.

Some more quotes from Maureen Dowd's column illustrate this point:

Paul Gipson, president of a steelworkers local in Portage, Ind., hailed her “testicular fortitude,” before ripping into “Gucci-wearing, latte-drinking, self-centered, egotistical people that have damaged our lifestyle.”

James Carville helpfully told Eleanor Clift of Newsweek that if Hillary gave Obama one of her vehicles of testicular fortitude, “they’d both have two.”

"With malice toward none, with charity for all" were not just words Lincoln used in a speech, but words he lived.

Can't you just imagine the workup Bill Clinton and James Carville would be doing on him?

Lincoln is proof that toughness can take many forms. I have a sneaky suspicion there's a whole lotta more Lincoln in Obama than he is given credit for.

And did Thomas Friedman in essence endorse Obama in his column today (Who Will Tell the People) when he touched on a similar theme:

Much nonsense has been written about how Hillary Clinton is “toughening up” Barack Obama so he’ll be tough enough to withstand Republican attacks. Sorry, we don’t need a president who is tough enough to withstand the lies of his opponents. We need a president who is tough enough to tell the truth to the American people. Any one of the candidates can answer the Red Phone at 3 a.m. in the White House bedroom. I’m voting for the one who can talk straight to the American people on national TV — at 8 p.m. — from the White House East Room.

Who will tell the people? We are not who we think we are. We are living on borrowed time and borrowed dimes. We still have all the potential for greatness, but only if we get back to work on our country.

I don’t know if Barack Obama can lead that, but the notion that the idealism he has inspired in so many young people doesn’t matter is dead wrong. “Of course, hope alone is not enough,” says Tim Shriver, chairman of Special Olympics, “but it’s not trivial. It’s not trivial to inspire people to want to get up and do something with someone else.”

While you're perusing the Week in Review section, check out Frank Rich's "The All-White Elephant in the Room" which compared how McCain's preacher supporters get a free pass even when they attack the Catholic church.

Weingarten on Budget Cuts

This is worth reading if nothing for its conciliatory weakness. Do we have to review what so many of us said when the UFT cancelled last year's May 9 demo in exchange for promises we all said the mayor and Klein wouldn't keep? OK, now that you asked:

Except for a few instances, the wording is full of the kind of promises to consult, recommend, participate but contains little or no elements that bind the very people at Tweed who have engendered such distrust in the past.

Ednotes, April 19, 2007

Or this:

The May 9th demo scared the hell out of Bloomberg and would have made a national splash and focused attention on so many of the awful policies as a result of his control of the school system. In addition, it looks like the back of the coalition forming to stand up to him may have been broken. Divide and conquer, used to perfection. With the cooperation of the UFT.

Ed Notes April 20, 2007

Well, look what's back – the Coalition, running ads complaining about BloomKlein not keeping their promise (Today the city broke that promise to kids. - sniff, sniff). Just dumping money down a hole to make it look like something is being done.

Are you sick of the whining and complaining from the people at the UFT who cave at the nearest opportunity? If you actually stood up, how could you be looked at as a rational educational spokesperson by the people you want to impress - not the teachers of NYC mind you - but the ed reform pundits, the press and the politicians.

Take this one: "The Mayor rightly understood it was important to keep his $400 promise to homeowners and to roll some of the surplus as a cushion."

WHAT! She says he rightly understood? Wrong!

She should have hammered him for choosing to give people a measly $400 bucks while screwing the schools. You see, the UFT never wants to talk about taxes, especially at the corporate and corrupt real estate level, feeling it will lose support. But the money has to come from somewhere. How about asking for a chunk of the money going to Bear Stearns?

UFT President Randi Weingarten’s Statement on Mayor’s Executive Budget
Last year the Mayor and the City Council matched the historic commitment that the state made to reverse the chronic, multi-generational underfunding of the New York City public schools by agreeing to $2.2 billion increase over 4 years. Today the city broke that promise to kids. Today the city reversed the approximately $450 million it had promised in the 2008 adopted budget.

The governor and state legislature—despite facing daunting budget deficits actually increased their commitment to kids when the state appropriated $600 million in new funds for NYC public schools. Compare that to the city’s reduction of promised funds in the wake of the substantial multi-billion dollar surplus.

The Mayor rightly understood it was important to keep his $400 promise to homeowners and to roll some of the surplus as a cushion. He should have given the same consideration to the importance of the 4-year promise the city made to our children. He has broken that promise, and we have five weeks to work with him and the City Council to reverse it.

Advice to 3020a Participants

TAGNYC has some Advice to 3020a Participants

WHY DO WE TEACH?

Working with Teachers Unite on educational forums has been amongst the more exciting things I've done this year. Every one of them has been illuminating and insightful and they have attracted a wide variety of teachers and students. In addition to TU's Sally Lee, the TU forum committee is made of up of members of ICE, TJC and independent activists in the UFT, so the Unite in Teachers Unite has real meaning.

I first heard of Deborah Meier in the early 1970's at a time I was struggling with an attempt to try an open classroom style of teaching. There were rumors of a master teacher who was actually doing it in a public school. For progressive teachers looking for new ways, Deborah became almost mythical. I wish I had been able to meet her then, as I gave up the attempt after a year and a half and went back to running my classroom in a traditional way.

I finally got to meet her back last fall at NYU, where Sally and I approached her about speaking at the TU forums. Deborah was on the panel discussing Kahlenberg's "Tough Liberal" book on Shanker. With all the Al gushing going on, Deborah did one of the most effective jobs I've ever heard taking Shanker's policies apart – without rancor. She had been a member of Unity Caucus way back when (she left over the lack of democracy) and a friend of Al's, who introduced her to Diane Ravitch – and their current collaboration as bloggers at Bridging Differences has been extremely popular. So it was clear she had a very good relatinship with Al despite their disagreements.

This last forum of the year should not be missed. And look for more excitement next year as we expand into new areas.

WHY DO WE TEACH?
Revisiting Our Vision of Public Education

Did you want to give back to your community?
Did you want to support your students as leaders?
Did you want to be a part of public education reform?

Join Deborah Meier and Teachers Unite in a discussion about what brought us to teaching, and what we're fighting for now that we're here.

Deborah Meier has spent more than four decades in public education as a teacher, writer and advocate. http://www.deborahmeier.com

This is the final forum in the 2007-2008 series of events where educators relate their experiences in schools to larger political trends. The 2007 - 2008 forums focus on the impact of privatization and the corporate model on classroom life in NYC public schools.

Co-sponsored by National Center for Schools and Communities at Fordham University

Thursday, May 8th, 5:00 - 7:00 p.m.
McMahon Hall Lounge, Fordham University
155 West 60th Street (between Columbus and Amsterdam)
RSVP: info@teachersunite.net

Closest subways: 1, A, B, C, D

NYCDOE Policy Reflects Bloomberg Discrimination

The long reported stories of the intensive discrimination against pregnant women with women with young children resurfaced in a story in the NY Times today that 54 women have joined a suit against Bloomberg, LP. (Once Bloomberg buys the Times, you won't be seeing such stories again.)

When the story first surfaced, some of the original women filing the suit repeated Bloomberg quotes that would made whatever hair I had left stand up.

All this is not surprising. We have been making the point for some time that the missionary style of teachers who spend 12 hour days and weekends working as teachers until they are burnt to a cinder or decide to have families is also discriminatory against women with families.

With all we can complain of in the BloomKlein stewardship of the education system in NYC, we can at least say there is consistency.

Graphic from womensspace.wordpress.com/

Jetblogged

So let's get this straight. I leave Tokyo at 11 AM on May 1 and arrive in New York at 10:30 AM on May 1.

I think I need a nap.

Before I go, make sure to read the great social justice teaching debate going on at Eduwonkette where Sol Stern and Bill Ayers do dueling guest editorials. Check out the various comments in all the posts - I chipped in a few, the gist of which...........
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

ATR's in Bloomberg Purgatory

The breaking Bloomberg wanting-to reopen-the contract ATR story reached us here in Tokyo. I'll link to Elizabeth Green's story when I get back. The gist from the people who published the vicious attack on ATR's by calling for them to be put on unpaid leave after 12 months until they get a job is what we all expected to happen. That the character in charge said he has confidence that Randi will agree in the long run is actually funny - if you're not an ATR. The UFT always gets mad he said. Or acts mad before signing on to whatever.

Yeah! The UFT response even 7000 plus miles away will make me go all gooey inside.

Ok, Bloomberg, here's the deal. Let's reopen the contract - Teachers get all seniority rules back and your - is it $60 million- ATR problem goes away. The UFT doesn't need no stinkin' press conferences with ATR's pleading their cases. Time to say we don't give a crap how much the public or the press or anyone slams us. Time to act like a union. Draw a freak'n line in the sand and say a loud SCREW YOU ALL. THE CONTRACT IS THE CONTRACT EVEN IF IT SUCKS.

Oh, but what does that do the image of the next president of the AFT? Won't Rod Paige and Eduwonk withdraw their praise?

And gee, I just have been reading about a certain union that went on 3 strikes for almost 3 months 40 years ago over 19 teachers who were transferred. Where's Shanker guru Richard Kahlenberg on the current ATR outrage with his defense of Shanker's actions then? (I heard he got some nice space in the NY Teacher 'splainin what Shanker REALLY meant on his charter school idea.)

This email was sent to ICE-mail asking us to spread around this letter some teachers wrote to the NY Times, soon to be owned by Bloomberg. Think anyone there has the balls to publish it?


Hi colleagues,

Here is a "Letter to the Editor" of the New York Times, which two GED Plus teachers, Roz Panepento and myself, sent off today. It was in response to the Times Metro page article on ATRs. The Times, the Post, Channel 7, the Daily News all ran varieties of the same story, which disgustingly blamed the ATRs for being in sub pools, and not in the classroom. The story was clearly generated by the Chancellor's office. The UFT is asking ATRd teachers who have tried, but not been successful on the open market, to contact the union and be willing to speak to the media to counter this latest onslaught from the NYCDOE.


To the Editor:
New York Times

April 29, 2008

Your story about the Absent Teacher Reserve pool today can only be seen as part of a coordinated campaign by the mayor and chancellor to be able to layoff senior teachers, with years of critical experience.

Your article states that many teachers in the reserve pool are “undesirable.” This is pure slander. In District 79, last June we faced a chaotic “restructuring” which led to the loss of hundreds, if not thousands of students (the DOE is not keeping records), and the loss of over 250 teacher positions. Some of our ATR’d colleagues have Ph.D’s in education; others are college professors who have returned to the classroom; still others are highly-skilled math, science and literacy teachers. Some were not permitted to interview for new positions, others had phone interviews; others faced interviewers who were utterly unqualified and clueless about specialties such as ESL or Special Education. Most had years of “S” ratings, and had never received an unsatisfactory in their lives.

Behind the fiasco of the ATRs was the end of seniority transfers in the 2005 UFT contract. That system assured that with school closings, teachers could find new positions in an orderly way. Bloomberg and Klein vowed to get rid of tenure, seniority transfers and bring in merit pay—all of these are disasters for the students and the teachers.

The article blames teachers for the NCDOE’s own policies: closing schools, “excessing” teachers, forcing them into pools, and replacing them with new (cheaper, younger) teachers. Looking at the “bottom line” might work in business, but it sure hurts students. It takes years to develop knowledgeable, experienced, effective, caring teachers.

You blame teachers for supposedly not taking advantage of the open market. We suggest you ask the teachers who tried it --many applied for numerous positions, and never got a call back (many positions are filled before even being listed). We strongly suggest that, rather than the blame game, you give the ATRs a voice, to get a real view of what’s really going on in the schools.

Signed,
Roz Panepento, former Chapter Leader during the ATR reorganization of District 79
Marjorie Stamberg, ESL specialist, teacher GED-Plus, District 79

Tokyo Notes

Random thoughts on many things...

Wed. April 30, 5 AM, Tokyo time (which is 4pm, Tues., Apr. 29, NY time)

Leaving tomorrow early to start heading home. Plane takes off at 11 AM and we arrive in NYC at 10:30 AM, a half hour earlier than we left. Will I be a half hour younger?

I came to Tokyo as part of a group to assist with the Asian Open FIRST LEGO League tournament. The event ended Tuesday afternoon after 3 intense days. As a first time referee I was in the middle of a lot of the action and there's a lot to say about FLL, robotics, etc.

This trip turned into a unique opportunity to interact with a great variety of adults and children from all over the world. So much has gone on, it is hard to contain all of it. We have also been on the constant run - I'm leaving soon to meet the teachers and kids from Little Red Schoolhouse from Manhattan for a trip out of town to a giant Buddha. But more on that later. (Note- I'm using a borrowed computer and the browser is in Japanese, so there will be lots of typos which I'll fix when I return.)

There's lot to write about - including some of the observations I've had and many educational conversations I've had with Europeans and Asians and Americans. We had 2 contrasting NYC middle schools here - one public school from the Bronx and the other a private school from Manhattan and I had a bit of perspective from talking to the teachers and observing some of the interactions between the kids, especially last night when we all had dinner together. We were joined by one of my traveling companions from NYC, who is of Japanese descent but born and raised in Brazil but also lived in Japan for 9 years. After dinner a few of us met up with a group of Europeans from the Netherlands, Germany, and Denmark in the bar.


This posting will keep a running account over the next few weeks as things come back to me.

Last Saturday there was a planned excursion to a temple, followed by lunch and then onto an area of Tokyo known as electronic city - think of a thousand B&H's and J&R's piled on each other block after block - plus assorted other stuff like the old Canal Street hobby shops. Geek heaven. Back to that later.

About 200 kids and the adults with them milled about the lobby at the Keio Plaza hotel. The teachers from Little Red -Sherezada, Karen, and Steve finally met Gary who works with the Ridder Kids from the Bronx to hand over the $1200 they raised from bake sales to help out the Ridder Kids.

We were part of a group that never signed on, so there was no room on the buses.

...to be continued

Illiterate in Tokyo

So this is what it feels like to be illiterate. You can't even look something up in a dictionary. The streets have no names so following a map is almost impossible. We've (I'm travelling with Gary who was my counterpart in Region 2 and then moved on to handle the entire Bronx) figured out you have to use buildings as markers. Luckily we have Marcio with us. He's a New Yorker of Japanese decent originally from Sao Paulo, Brazil. He lived in Tokyo for 9 years and even he finds it confusing. He took us out last night to the east end of the area where his hotel is located. One of the known red light, raunchy districts in Tokyo. But we saw little raunch and ate on the 5th floor of a building. Many restaurants are on top of each other in a vertical pile. So are some people around here I imagine.

We're in Shinjuko in the west end of Tokyo. The train station here may be the busiest in the world. Some 2 million people pass through a day.

We want to walk everywhere. Marcio discourages us, urging us to take the subway. We did convince him to walk to day but it is not easy to get around that way for anything but short distances. Some aspects of the city remind me of London, certainly that they drive on the opposite side of the road. But London could be walked. Here, you have to go up stairs, then down stairs. Streets do not run parallel.

We got back to the hotel this afternoon for the meeting with the organizers and volunteers. Most are from Europe and LEGO education. We were led on a school-type trip back to Shinjuku station for a 4 stop subway - really, many trains here are elevated- ride to someplace I can't pronounce - they have the offices there. Someone from LEGO Japan did the translating for us. I am going to be a referee for the first time and had to relearn the game. Gerhardt from LEGO in Denmark is a lifesaver and we went over all the aspects and now I have a feel for it. We're meeting Sunday at 9:30 to go over stuff and practice scoring - I need the most help - to be ready for the real competition on Monday. The 56 teams from 24 countries and 456 kids. Really all over the world. Peru and Brazil, a bunch from the US, Canada and Mexico. Five from China, teams from Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan. any from Western Europe. And Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia. We were disappointed to hear the 2 teams from Israel had to cancel at the last minute - we could have solved the middle east in 3 days.

We were taken to eat after the training at an 8th floor restaurant with a buffet right over the train station - there's lots of these big shopping areas as part of train stations. I sat with David who is a phys ed teacher in Barcelona and runs all of the tournaments in Spain and a woman who runs the tournaments in Benelux. Is iit amazing meeting all these people who speak fluent English? What a dunce I feel like.

After eating the organizers felt the trains would be too crowded, so they piled us in cabs to get back to the hotel. I could have walked faster. Tokyo traffic is awful. But in addition to David, a gal from Germany was in the cab and she works in the social responsibility section of a major corporation and recruits mentors for teams.

In a major interesting point of the conversation, she asked about KIPP involvement in FIRST activities and said she has friends who work with KIPP in the states. That led to a great follow-up - I told her to tell her friends to contact me if KIPP in NYC was interested in FIRST robotics. We did get to talk about some of the broader issues facing the corporate takeover and she surprised us by saying there were few private schools in Germany and those that do exist are viewed as havens for kids who buy their degrees because they cannot make it in the much better perceived public schools.

Back at the hotel, the organizers told us the tallest building in Tokyo was open for us to go up and check out the views and David, Gary and I went on up but the glass prevented us from taking good pics. Gary and I went over to the Hyatt to try to find the school from Little Red which had raised $1200 in bake sales to contribute towards the Ritter Kids from the Bronx who arriving 17 strong along with their principal and 6 parents Saturday afternoon. They didn't check in 'till after 7 (what a long, grueling trip they must have had) but must have gone out to eat.

Tomorrow we go on an all day excursion out of the city.

I think I'm jet-lagged up the kazoo.


The only ed news that seems to have come up of note is that Queens Bor. Pres Helen Marshall seems to have woken up and appointed a Queens rep to the PEP. Leonie posted a good article from the Queens Courrier. Will Manhattan PEP Rep Patrick Sullivan have another independent colleague?

Tokyo Bound

Well, I'm heading over to Tokyo for the Asian Open FIRST LEGO League tournament so I will be posting sporadically for a few days. Updates on the robotics aspect at the Norms Robotics blog. I'll post any interesting ed news I come across on this blog. I wonder if they are addressing issues such as school choice, teacher quality, achievement gaps, etc over there? Think they have rubber rooms? Probably, but not where you think.

I registered for the Ed Bloggers Summit in Washington May 14/15. The keynote speaker is Newt Gingrich - now you know all you need to know what this is all about. I'm going disguised as Eduwonkette.

Students at Manhattan Center Protest Teacher in Rubber Room

We've heard lots of RR stories but this may be the first student protest. Teachers are protesting too - I saw a teacher from the school with a black armband last week. That so many students are denied their teacher is one of the under reported aspects of putting teachers in the RR. I have lots of stories where the teacher is charged with such bull that could easily have been resolved without shipping them out. Check out NYC Educator's take today. Check the video of Michael Meenan's NY 1 report.

Randi Weingarten added to 4/23 Grading NYC Schools Panel

Public invited. Details here.
I bet no one says the very idea of grading schools is rediculous and a waste of time and resources.

"Scarsdale Success" To Give Parents Choice - Finally

EDNN News Reports:

Tired at being barricaded inside their zoned schools, a group of Scarsdale residents have asked some Harlem African-American ministers to open a charter school in Scarsdale, NY. They will urge space be found to cram it in to a current public school. The school will be called "Scarsdale Success" and will be modeled on former NYC City Council member Eva Moskowitz' "Harlem Success" school.

"It is not fair to the people in that community that charter schools are only being opened by white people for black residents in Harlem," said a spokesperson. "Free choice of schools should be open to white folks too. Why should the good people in Scarsdale have to send their children to a conscripted public school without having the freedom to choose alternatives? Our individual rights are being subverted in favor of some misguided notion of collectivism that favors the status quo."

"But they aren't they wealthy enough to send their kids to private schools if they are not happy with the public schools," we asked?

The spokesperson said:
"Do you know what they pay in taxes to support the public schools? A portion of that money should go to open a variety of charter schools so they can have a choice. What if a parent is not happy with the progressive curriculum and wants their kids to have a test-prep-all-day education like the kids in Harlem? What if a parent is sick of all the trips and excursions their kids go on and prefer they stay in school all day and work to close the achievement gap with Shaker Heights, Ohio? What if you are a minority in the community and you don't want to go to the school with the majority-chosen principal? The only model that avoids the tyranny of the majority and respects the individual rights of parents and students is the school choice model."

Won't cramming a charter school into an existing public school cause class sizes to rise? "Class size is overrated. Better to have a class of 50 with a good teacher than a class of 10 with a low quality teacher," said the spokesperson.

"I'm sick of having to elect school boards and having a say in running our schools," said a Scarsdale supporter of the plan. "We want what the residents of Harlem have – no say at all in how their schools are run. Liek them, we want outsiders to come in and take the burden off our hands by telling us how to run our schools. I've noticed too many of our kids do not look at the teachers and nod on cue." We want some Kipp of our own.

Some Scarsdale residents plan to petition Mayor Bloomberg and Joel Klein to come in and take over their schools. "Better yet," said a parent leader, "we hope Eva Moskowitz gets off her missionary kick and comes on down."

Scarsdale middle school will have to make room for a charter school, causing a rise in class size.

The attack on teacher unions...

..... is broad-based and international - Lois Weiner put together an excellent presentation at the Teachers Unite forum last week and I hope to have the video up in a few weeks.

Naturally, one aspect is money. Non-union teachers can be paid less - don't be fooled by 125K salaries - the numbers still don't compute in terms of time. The other costs associated with contracts are health care, preps, and class size and other aspects.

But it goes beyond to the ability of organized unions (not the UFT, of course) to drive a progressive education agenda by mobilizing people.

Teachers are the point people all over the world in bringing information to the mass of people and are viewed as potentially dangerous to any agenda unless they can be controlled through fear and intimidation. That's the Taliban assassinate teachers, especially those working with girls. And why teachers in Mexico have been murdered. This is echoed all over the world where teachers are amongst the leaders of progressive movements - except here.*

Thus the real reason for the attack on tenure and senior teachers, people who are the most capable and knowledgeable in terms of resisting the idiot ed ideas being fostered on them.

They want teachers to respond when they are told at 12 midnight that it is really noon to say, "Where are my sunglasses?"

*[Analysing the Kahlenberg "Tough Liberal" book on Al Shanker with supplemental reading goes a way to explaining a lot.]

Randi, Hillary and Barack

UPDATE2: George Schmidt on Obama and the Chicago Teachers Union
A remarkable piece by George (who disagrees with so much of Obama's program) but talks about him as a man.
"I remember the numerous times he'd come by the union offices (before he was an intergalactic star) and thank us or just talk. He was also at just about every union event. After he was elected to the Senate, he came by the CTU to thank everyone on the staff."

And read why Michael Moore has just endorsed Obama.
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UPDATE1: Clinton and Labor
from Counterpunch, Vol 15, no 7: April 1-15
"U.S. labor unions bitterly point out that Clinton (along with two of her own top staffers, Mark Penn and Howard Wolfson) has been lobbying for Colombia’s Alvaro Uribe, while the latter has consolidated his regime’s record as the most dangerous in the world for labor organizers. In the six years since Uribe took office, over 400 labor activists have been killed. In 2008, almost one unionist a week has been assassinated."

Bill Clinton was paid $800,000 by Columbia based Gold Star Int'l to promote the US-Columbia trade deal that Hillary is supposedly denouncing. Did she tell Bill to give the money back?
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We all know where the UFT/AFT stands - four square for Hillary.

Ed Notes has been speculating what Randi et al. will do when Obama gets the official nomination.

So, when she was asked exactly this question at the Delegate Assembly on April 16 - will you be giving Obama the same level of support you are giving to Hillary, she smiled (sort of) and said, "We don't want McCain to win, do we?"

Well, do we?

How do Hillary and Randi benefit if Obama wins? Four and probably eight years in the wilderness. Basically, for Hillary, it's over.

But if Obama gets the nomination and loses, the bigger the better for the Clintons, then it's "I told you so" time and the "Hillary in '12" campaign begins.

Some pundits have speculated as to why with so little chance, the Clintons continue to cut up Obama. Her fighting spirit is what they attribute it to. Nah! It's all part of the cut-your-losses-today-plan-for tomorrow strategy. Sort of like what happened with their "support" for Gore and Kerry.

So Randi's follow up to the question was insightful. "We have reached out to Obama, but they don't respond," was what she said. Hmmm. You know, code for -- arrogant.

I've heard from chapter leaders about the not so subtle anti-Obama stuff at chapter leader training sessions. Videos of Obama coming out in favor of individual merit pay. Terrible. After all, Hillary and Randi are for their own versions of merit pay, so that's all right. And they were fed all the stuff about how Hillary wants to rid us of NCLB while Obama is ho-hum. Hmmm. Naturally the history of AFT/UFT/Randi/Clinton support for NCLB from day one is somehow left out.

Using chapter leader training to spread the anti-Obama message is a sign of the undercurrent of what things are all about.

There's a story in Kahlenberg's "Tough Liberal" Albert Shanker book about Bill and Hillary Clinton favoring testing of veteran teachers when he was governor of Arkansas in the 80's. Shanker was toying with the idea as part of his reform movement, saying in 1984, "there is ample evidence that states – through past hiring practices– have hired people who are illiterate."

Admittedly, these tests for vet teachers were supposedly for literacy. But if you were for testing vets, why not in subject areas and beyond? Were Shanker and the Clintons in favor of a literacy tests for, say, politicians? And how about having lawyers retake the Bar exam every 5 years? And doctors retake med boards? Oh, boy!

Shanker invited Hillary the 1985 AFT convention to debate Rand researcher Linda Darling-Hammond, who was apparently opposed to testing veteran teachers. Kahlenberg writes, "Politically, [Hillary] Clinton said, the weeding out of incompetent teachers helped create the political environment in which the public would support new taxes and further investments in education."[p. 290]

Linda Darling-Hammond is now one of Obama's chief education advisers, and a noted critic of Teach for America.

Ahhh! Hillary arguing the case for testing veteran teachers opposed by one of Obama's chief education advisers. Wish I had a video of that debate to show chapter leaders.

The Sort of Arrogance Black People Encounter...

....when white folks start schools in their neighborhoods with their values and try to dictate how black people should live...and these same white missionaries try to turn the tables and accuse their critics of being arrogant or racist.
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UPDATE: Make sure to check out more on paternalistic white "saviors" of poor black kids:
"KIPP Schools-Brainwashing the Disenfranchised"
Written by A Voice in the Wilderness on April 20, 2008
Posted at The Chancellor's New Clothes.
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What does it take to reach an inner city child? Teach them to nod on cue.

Are Joel Klein and Michael Bloomberg, who have dictated to people in Harlem and other places how their schools should be run, also black? They have allowed so much parent input in Harlem.

Did I make a mistake. Is Eve Moskowitz black? Did the African-American parents get to choose her as the leader of the school? Or is she self-chosen?

I have an idea for Eva Moskowitz and her supporters.

Let's have an election. Let the 3600 black parents who turned out for the Harlem Success Schools elect a board of directors and turn the schools over to them to run. Think they'll choose Eva?

That's called community control, as opposed to mayoral control ... where people do get to do the dictating on how they want to live.

Evil Eva at it Again

Eva Moskowitz, former NYC Councilwoman and failed candidate for Manhattan Borough President (we can guarantee she would not have appointed an independent voice to the Panel for Educational Policy like Scott Stringer who defeated her) has used her down time between political campaigns to open a charter school in Harlem, squeezing her way into a public school space.

The NY Post has yet another oped on how great Joel Klein and charter schools are, again from Eva Moskowitz, nearly identical to her oped in the NY Sun.

In a piece worthy of any comedy routine, among the best lines are these.

"Suppose you ran a school and you had some good ideas you wanted to try. Then imagine that you couldn't try those ideas because dictating your policies were people hundreds of miles away who'd never visited your school and didn't have any experience running one."

Eva did have experience going to school, so that is why she feels she should run one. Even law makers in Albany went to schools once and have as many qualifications as Eva does. And poor Joel. He's never had the joy of running a school himself. Or a school system. But why not give him the largest school system in the nation as a playpen?

Now according to Eva, the public schools in Harlem suck. You know, all that red tape. But...but... Eva... Hasn't Joel Klein been running all these schools for 7 years? Isn't it his red tape? Here's a funnier line:

"Remarkably, Chancellor Joel Klein, despite these handicaps, has made meaningful improvements to the public schools over the last seven years. But he's being forced to fight with one hand tied behind his back."

Poor Joel, suffers with having to give teachers 50 minute lunch hours and some prep time. And health care. Now we know why all those schools in Harlem are failing. Bet those Catholic schools where teachers make half what public school teachers do are making out ok. Boy, if Joel could only get that hand untied we would really see improvements.