We Told You So – Ed Notes on Mayoral Control, July 2001

For those confused by what appears to be flip flopping by the UFT on mayoral control, I have put up a piece I wrote for Ed Notes in July 2001 shortly after the UFT came out in favor while Giuliani was still mayor. Over the years, the UFT has tossed out all sorts of distractions for political purposes, but if you drill down, there has been no flip flopping. Thus, we were able to call the UFT task force on governance for what it was - a phony effort to create an illusion there was some democracy taking place. But when push came to shove, the UFT leadership even reversed some of the findings of their own task force. Throughout its history going back to the late 60's, the UFT, as a dictatorship itself, always preferred dealing one on one with another strong man, avoiding transparency and democracy.


Do Not Give This Mayor (or any Mayor) Control Over The School System

The plan put forth by our union leaders to give the Mayor effective control of the school system by allowing him to appoint 6 out of 11 members from an expanded Board of Education (to be chosen from a blue ribbon panel headed by the state education commissioner) puts us on a very dangerous path. Naturally, Mayor Giuliani, proving once again he is an ignoranus (see next page for a formal definition), immediately trashed the plan.

The arguments put forth at the June 4, 2001 Exec. Bd.* meeting focussed on the issue of making the Mayor accountable and creating common ground for providing resources to the schools. Results in other cities with Mayoral control were cited. It was also surmised that this plan would be a way to take some of the testing pressure off classroom teachers.

Ed. Notes contends that more pressure will be placed on classroom teachers as Mayors use test scores in their election campaigns. Given the choice, will these politicians put enough resources into classrooms to help children really learn? Or will they take the politically expedient way out by calling for more tests and more blame on teachers when children don’t produce? Allowing political forces to control what we teach and how we teach is already taking place. Mayoral control will only make the situation worse. We should be calling for the professionalization of teaching, which should give teachers more control over the schools, not less.

*That evening, after I emailed Randi my outrage, what had been a 4 year cordial relationship ended when she responded by basically calling me a mass murderer for being so critical of her.

Giuliani’s Response
Mayor Giuliani has responded to the UFT initiative offering Mayors control of the Board of Ed. by appointing Christyne Lategano Chancellor and replacing Judith Rizzo with Judith Nathan as Director of Instruction! Donna Hanover will be teaching 3rd grade in a SURR school in the south Bronx. Board of Ed. headquarters will be moved to the St. Regis Hotel.**

**OK! you had to witness the Giuliani Musical Beds board game to get all of this.

Sam Anderson on What's Next in the Mayoral Control Battle

While there are some aspects of Anderson's piece that I would disagree with, he makes a strong argument for rejecting tweaks and opposing mayoral control outright.

"Don't Mourn-ORGANIZE!" Our Struggle Must Continue-- Stronger than Ever

As has been expected for the past month, the politically dysfunctional NY State Assembly was thoroughly bought off by a combination of Bloomberg's promise of a few crumbs and lack of confidence in neighborhood-parent-teacher-student control over NYC's vast and complex public education system. The Assembly vote (see article below) where only about 14% of the elected officials voted against Mayoral Control indicates how weak we progressives are. We could not rally mass parental and community support to such an extent that it would overwhelm the typical unprincipled political maneuvers and Bloomberg's spreading of mere promises of money and connections.

The landslide victory for mayoral control also shows the overwhelming power of corporate media shaping the issues and debate. And these are not only Bloomberg's friends... there are, more importantly, class allies who are very conscious of their class. In addition, the UFT leadership has consistently aligned itself with Bloomberg's ruling class... abandoning their primary union purpose of serving the educators of our children first. It now appears that Randi Weingarten has done her work and is moving on to the national level and leaving another white labor aristocrat to continue selling out NYC's educators, children and parents for the sake of proximity with those who rule.

We have a lot of work to do over the summer and fall of this year. We first need to have a public forum assessing our work with all its warts and blemishes. The WE I'm talking about is made up of all of us who fought against mayoral control of public education--- NOT the tweakers. They are, of course, invited to listen and raise questions. But, our fight against mayoral control is far from over and we need to be self critical and clear on how we move our fight for Parent/Student/Educator POWER over public education. Those handful of principled and brave elected officials should be invited to join us in this public assessment forum... and be urged to help us think about how we move forward to defeat mayoral dictatorship.

Rest assure: Come the 2009-10 school year, there will be more educational disasters erupting throughout our public school system. There will be another major re-organization of how Bloomberg-Chancellor X will "govern." I say Chancellor X, because, Klein will most likely move on to push the national campaign for mayoral control of predominantly Black and Brown public schools for the sake of privatization of public education and racist control over the urban majority. In other words, we will definitely have issues to fight against in the coming months. They will be crisis-ridden and ranging from individual parent-student-educator issues to dictatorial citywide policies that continue to promote institutional racism, hundreds of millions spent on no bid contracts, further morphing of our schools into pre-prisons, and bum rushing even more corporate/church sponsored charter schools throughout Black & Latino neighborhood schools.

Those who fought for a more democratic form of school governance have been defeated in this battle. But the WAR is far from over! One of the lessons we should learn is that we cannot just focus on school governance. We have to take on and envision the whole nature of what is the purpose of education and public education. Years ago, at the very beginning of the Bloomberg reign over our schools, some of us began to think about this and came to the conclusion that: "Education is a Human Right." And that governance flows from one's vision of education....

If you are a Bloomberg, your vision of education is about profit maximization and confining and preparing Black & Brown children for their subservient or penal role in your capitalist society. Hence, you construct a governance structure that guarantee this outcome.

Our next stage of our battle to seize power over our schools must be embedded within a vision of a democratic, antiracist, neighborhood-centered, student/parent/educator empowered school system. Without this vision at the very center of our work, we will, once again, merely react to the actions of mayoral dictatorship.

in Struggle,

Sam Anderson

WHAT NOW? A response to the state’s decision to uphold mayoral control

Jessica Shiller has run workshops for Teachers Unite. She makes an excellent point in that there were so few voices opposing mayoral control outright, with the majority willing to settle for tweaks. You get what you pay for. Watch what happens as a result of the tweaks. Next time people shouldn't make the same mistake. The battle to end mayoral control starts NOW.

Guest Editorial
by Jessica Shiller, assistant professor of education at Lehman College, CUNY
jessica.shiller@lehman.cuny.edu

A former student of mine wrote on Facebook recently,

Aaaah, crazy state politics! The state HAS to pass a mayoral control law before June ends, or else the city schools will revert to a totally inefficient governance model. Mayoral control also has to be reformed so there's at least some check on Mayor Bloomberg's power--Diane Ravitch has good ideas. But as long as the state senate bickers about who gets the keys to the senate chamber...NYC schools, and New York State, get NOTHING.

When I said that mayoral control might not be such a good thing for the city school system, he retorted,

As I understand it, if nothing happens by then, we automatically go back to the old governance structure. I don't think that's a good idea. I don't have too much background on what it was like when the Board of Education was in control, but it sounds like it was a lot of finger-pointing and not much getting accomplished. Reform (e.g. fixed terms for Panel for Education Policy members, taking the chancellor off the PEP, mechanisms for parent voice) are necessary within the current model, and June 30 seems like an important deadline for getting that done.

Well, he got what he wished for. The state assembly just upheld mayoral control by a vote of 121-18. The chaos in the state senate not withstanding, it is clear that New York City will have mayoral control for another several years (The assembly’s bill has 2015 as the next time the law will be up for renewal). After public hearings, protests, campaigns, and lobbying, efforts by those of us who oppose mayoral control have fallen short.

So, what now? If you are a fan of Bloomberg’s leadership, you are probably rejoicing, but if you are not then you are probably stomping angrily after reading the latest news. In any case, we need to understand what happened in order to move forward. My former student's understanding of mayoral control is probably how most people understand it, as a system contrasted with a pre-mayoral control arcane, inefficient school system. Many people believe that Bloomberg has whipped the schools into shape.

This myth has been dismissed by scholars like Diane Ravitch, parent groups, and teachers. Scholars have shown that mayoral control has not raised test scores and graduation rates as promised, parents have demonstrated how their voice has been eliminated from the school system, and teachers have maintained that their jobs have been narrowed to that of test-prep coaches. For more on the down sides of mayoral control, see http://education.change.org/blog/view/can_one_person_run_the_new_york_city_schools.

Yet, the myth that Bloomberg has single-handedly turned around a dysfunctional school system prevails because it has been broadcast across the airwaves and in the papers for the last seven years. The media campaign has been persuasive. That said, opponents of mayoral control did a lot of things well. They published counter-data to the false data put out by the New York City’s Department of Education (see Jennifer Jennings and Sherman Dorn's work on test score data). They organized coalitions, got petitions signed, lobbied legislators, and stormed public hearings. But it was not enough. Many opponents of mayoral control still favored mayoral control in some form. They advocated for some checks and balances on the mayor’s power, but did not oppose mayoral control altogether. So, when it came down to it, they supported the state's efforts to renew mayoral control. A much smaller group opposed mayoral control and did not get the word out early enough.

An extension of mayoral control may bring its own demise as numbers of dissatisfied parents and teachers grows, but those opposed to mayoral control need to start organizing now to oppose it. There needs to be an independent media campaign that counters Bloomberg’s media machine. Second, organized parent groups need to continue their lobbying efforts at the state and city levels. Third, opponents of mayoral control need to organize teachers and students to join forces with parents and community activists to defeat it next time around. This is a battle that cannot be won only a few months before mayoral control is set to end, but needs to be a long term fight- starting now.

Smile, You're on DOE Cameras

Subject: Camera Installation Project
From: Chris Proctor
Sent: Monday, June 15, 2009 10:09 AM
To: #Safety & Health Committee; #UFT Borough Reps; #UFT District Reps (All Boroughs); #UFT Special Reps (Citywide); #UFT Ed Liaison (City Wide); #UFT Officers; #UFT Functional Chapter Leaders
Cc: Ellie Engler; Sterling Roberson; Chris Proctor

On June 10, 2009, the UFT met with representatives from the DOE Headquarters, DOE Office of School and Youth Development, DOE Division of School Facilities (DSF), DOE Division of Internet Technology and the School Construction Authority (SCA) to discuss the Internet Protocol Digital Video Surveillance (IPDVS) systems installations.

IBM does the design and installation of the systems. Large projects are coordinated through the SCA and before the camera installation begins, there is a protocol meeting. The SCA is currently involved in 136 buildings.

Prior to this there was no oversight for small projects and an outside consultant reviewed existing AHERA to determine if there was any impact on asbestos containing materials. The camera installation project at Cardozo is considered a small project so no on-site survey was conducted to determine if asbestos-containing materials (ACM) would be disturbed. There was an asbestos concern at the school and this was how we became involved.

The DOE DIT also conducts Project Connect which involves cabling work and the replacement of equipment and access points. Project Connect is done the same way the small IPDVS projects are conducted.

Following our meeting the phases of the camera installation project have been adapted to include:

1. All IPDVS projects will stop work immediately through Monday June 15, 2009. DSF and SCA, will meet with the IBM Project Managers to review all the work that has been done and to determine whether any asbestos-containing materials may have been disturbed and abate or change the scope of work as necessary for the small project camera installation jobs. Project Connect field project managers will also attend this meeting.

2. All work done by IBM will now be coordinated either through the DOE Division of School Facilities (DSF) or the School Construction Authority (SCA).

3. The DOE will direct principals to make sure chapter leaders participate at two key points in the process: 1) the on-site survey at the school with IBM and DSF/SCA to determine the scope of work and locations where the cameras will be installed; and 2) Once the scope of work is approved, the chapter leader should attend the “kick-off”/protocol meeting with DSF or SCA along with IBM before any installation work begins.

4. The attached UFT/DSF Pre-Construction Protocol Checklist for DOE/DSF Renovation/Construction Projects in Schools must be reviewed and completed at the protocol meeting.

5. All camera installation projects including the one at Cardozo will not resume until this review has been conducted and a protocol meeting is held with the UFT Chapter Leader, principal and custodian and representatives from DSF, SCA, and IBM.

Leonie Haimson for UFT President

I can't tell you how many people have said Leonie Haimson would make a better UFT leader than you know who. Here she responds to a reporter's question on rubber rooms with a more rigorous defense of teachers in a way I have never heard from the UFT, which tries to obfuscate (throw up flack) the issue so as not to make it appear they are making too much of a defense of teachers.

Q from reporter:
I am working on a story about rubber rooms. As you probably know, the DOE says about 650 to 700 teachers are in these reassignment centers drawing their full salary for doing nothing. Is this something that you are concerned about? Are there people I may not have thought of who I should speak to about this issue?

Leonie:
I am copying this message to Patrick Sullivan, Manhattan rep to the PEP who has made this one of his central concerns. Yes I think all parents are concerned about the incredible waste of manpower and money involved in more than 600 teachers sitting idly in the rubber room, month after month, when class sizes are going up and kids do not get adequate attention.

Not to mention the violation of human rights this entails. No charges are brought against these teachers for years at a time. Some of them haven’t even been informed of what the allegations are that were made against them. In some ways, it’s our Guantanamo.

Leonie Haimson
Executive Director
Class Size Matters

I was contacted by the reporter and sent this message
I'd be glad to give you some background on many of the people in the rubber room, who are indeed being paid to do nothing. But that decision to have them do nothing is not theirs, but the DOE's. I can guarantee there is some useful work they could be doing even if they have to be away from kids. Leonie hit the nail on the head about Gitmo.

Yesterday I spoke to a former colleague who has been in the RR for 3 years. Another colleague recently got out after 14 months. The "charges" against them are rediculous. Yet they are forced to sit in the same space with some teachers who are truly disturbed. That is like putting people who get parking tickets in the same cell with murderers. The goal is to make things so untenable they will resign.

Most RR who get back to their schools (and most do, some after a serious fine) are so scarred and scared they are never the same and wouldn't talk on the record because they think they are permanent targets.

The other day I was at a robotic tournament and a young lady who was volunteering was doing a fantastic job. One of the organizers was so impressed he said we have to get her more involved and introduced me. In our brief conversation she told me she is a former Teach for America who is a grad of the rubber room, which led to her leaving teaching. She said she would love to expose what is going on.

Cheers,
Norm Scott
Commentary on education: http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/
917-992-3734

Weingarten to Leave UFT - UPDATED

I won't believe it until I see it, but here is a report from Newsday:

Influential teachers' union leader Randi Weingarten is due to make it official next Wednesday that she will depart as head of the United Federation of Teachers on Aug. 1 to head only the national affiliate American Federation of Teachers, the traditional retirement route for that union's past presidents, according to reliable sources. She already officially serves in the AFT post. Speculation abounds that she will agree with Mayor Michael Bloomberg, with whom she has frequently been allied, despite what you may gather from some press reports, to allow a cheaper pension tier, or Tier 5, for future union members in the Department of Education.

There will be lots of comment and speculation on the implications of this move, which she will formally announce at next Wednesday Delegate Assembly according to this report. Is her anointed successor Michael Mulgrew prepared to take over? This will give him a 6 month window as UFT President before the next election season opens in January 2010.

If Weingarten does give in on a Tier 5, since it will only be for new teachers, the UFT leadership must feel they vets will not be concerned. They may be forgetting that in 1995, the membership rejected the first incarnation of the contract due to a clause penalizing new teachers. I guess she is thinking she will take the hit for this and then leave so Mulgrew could obfuscate his responsibility. I can see the election campaign, "I was in the bathroom when she decided to do it."

If this happens at the DA, let's see Randi make the announcement, shed a few tears as the Unity Caucus faithful rise up and cheer, and walk off the stage, handing the mic to Mulgrew, who has never run a DA as far as I can tell. But my guess is the delegates will be forced to listen to another endless report before being able to exhale with a sigh of relief.

ICE and TJC are expected to run a slate against him. ICE may determine its choice of candidate to oppose Mulgrew at this Thursday's meeting.

UPDATE:
Would Weingarten leave Mulgrew out there to run with a contract due to expire? There is speculation that a secret deal will be announced on the eve of the UFT election - think Oct/Nov/Dec 2009 – that will put money (what else can they get) in the pockets of some teachers in exchange for screwing the unborn. And maybe a few ATRs and rubber room people too. And maybe a little relaxation on the tenure issue. And support for a lift of the charter school cap. Or "have them work Labor Day," as one reporter joked. Pick one or all of the above.

The Parent Commision Bill on Governance

My opinion is mayoral control is now a dead issue and we should focus on the two year sunset provison and start organizing like hell for the next time. But if you believe in this political action stuff, contact your local thief- er- NY legislature rep.
-Norm (so Leonie doesn't get blamed for this comment.)

From Leonie:

Support the Parent Commision bill – the Education Through Partnership Act, sponsored by Shirley Huntley. S05739.

We propose six elected parents on the board –directly chosen by the CECs, as well as five political appointees (three of them Mayoral) and four members that would be collectively chosen by other board members. As well as CECs elected by all parents, CECS having the final word over all resitings, openings and closings of schools, and SLTs having the final word on School-based budgets (as was the case under previous Chancellors)

Real shared decisionmaking. Real parent power. As well as the DOE subject to all relevant city laws, like all other city agencies.

The bill is posted here: http://assembly.state.ny.us/leg/?bn=S05739

We are also now calling for a two year sunset on whatever bill is passed – which makes sense given the chaos in the Senate – though we are saying that we need a two year period to see if whatever governance changes that are enacted are working to create real accountability, checks and balances, and real parent input.

Leonie Haimson
Executive Director
Class Size Matters

How NYC Ed-Deformers Short Change ELLs

Advocates for Children of New York (AFC) and the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF) released a report today that illustrates how English Language Learners (ELLs) have gotten the short end of the stick in the New York City Department of Education’s (DOE’s) much touted initiative to close large schools and replace them with small ones. The report, Empty Promises: A Case Study of Restructuring and the Exclusion of English Language Learners in Two Brooklyn High Schools, illustrates how, as a result of these reforms, ELLs—who experience some of the lowest graduation rates in the city— are left with fewer and fewer options or are simply left behind. Using student enrollment and teacher assignment data combined with student and teacher interviews, the report examines the phase-out of Lafayette High School in Bensonhurst and Tilden High School in East Flatbush.


Empty_Promises_Report__6-16-09.pdf, Small_Schools_Report_Press_Release_06_16_09_FINAL.PDF

Purges, the UFT and the Teachers Union

The NY Times piece today on the teachers fired in the 50's for being members of the Communist Party or refusing to answer questions by exercising their 5th amendment rights has some interesting offshoots, some relevant even today. The unfinished documentary is called “Dreamers and Fighters: The NYC Teacher Purges.”

“None of those teachers were ever found negligent in the classroom,” said Clarence Taylor*, a professor of history at Baruch College who has written a study of the Teachers Union and the ideological strife that destroyed it. “They went after them for affiliation with the Communist Party.”

The Teachers Union was a major bulwark defending teachers and schools in the 1930's when the depression was at its worst. Unsurprisingly, Albert Shanker was in favor of firing these teachers in the 50's and his rise had some basis in his virulent anti-communism, perfect for the 50's.

This strain has continued right through to today, as witnessed by the Unity Caucus Red Scare attack on the ICE/TJC presidential candidate Kit Wainer in the 2007 elections.

The unfinished work is narrated by the actor Eli Wallach, whose brother, Samuel, was president of the Teachers Union

from 1945 to 1948 and was fired from his teaching job for refusing to answer questions before the superintendent of schools, Dr. William Jansen.

“They called everybody a Communist then,” growled Eli Wallach, 93, in a telephone interview, still bridling over the way his brother was treated.

The Teachers Union, which was expelled from the American Federation of Teachers in 1941 before disbanding in 1964 and being succeeded by the United Federation of Teachers, maintained that “no teacher should be disqualified for his opinions or beliefs or his political associations.” State and city authorities countered that Communists were unfit to teach because they were bound to the dictates of the party.

When asked by Mr. Moskoff, “Are you now or have you ever been a Communist?” many teachers refused to answer. They were then charged with insubordination and subject to dismissal.

The UFT, formed out of a merger of the anti-communist Teachers Guild and the High School Teachers Association, defeated the leftist Teachers Union in the bargaining election in 1960. The TU had been decimated by the witch hunts of the 40's and 50's. Before the Hitler-Stalin Pact in 1939 (which led to the desertion of the CPUSA by many), the TU was pretty well respected and even as late as 1940/41 led the resistance to budget cuts. In unpublished research I saw, the Teachers Guild seemed to play no role in these battles. Thus, the ultimate rise of the UFT was fueled to some extent by the Red Scare, though it is hard to imagine collective bargaining rights would have been granted to a communist dominated movement even in the early 60's.

Though the Teachers Union disbanded in 1964, many of the members became the core of Teachers Action Caucus which opposed the 1968 strikes, as most of the extremely pro-labor left did as they viewed the strike not as a labor struggle but against the community.

The group I was with (NYC School Workers) ran with TAC in a number of elections from the mid-70s through the mid 80s. A third group, New Directions, merged with Teachers Action Caucus to from what is currently New Action.

The files contain reports by informants who have never been publicly identified. But one operative known as “Blondie” and “Operator 51” was later revealed as Mildred V. Blauvelt, a police detective who went undercover for the Board of Education in 1953 and was credited with exposing 50 Communist teachers. Later, in a series of newspaper reminiscences, she said her hardest moments came when, posing as a Communist hard-liner, she had to argue disaffected fellow travelers out of quitting the party.

Nice job, Mildred. Do you think there are any undercover agents lurking in your schools today rooting out people who disparage differentiated learning?

*Clarence Taylor was a high school teacher and involved with various incarnations of New Action in the 80's and early 90's. His twin brother Larry, is chapter leader at Arts and Design HS and associated with TJC. Larry was one of the six people ICE/TJC elected to the UFT executive board in 2004. Larry also was David Pakter's chapter leader and testified for him at his first 3030a hearing a few years ago. Larry's enormous integrity and support of David went a long way in getting us involved.

Did Anyone Find My Missing DVD?

The NY Post reports on an accidental showing of a Jemma Jameson porn flick to an auditorium full of kids at PS 17 in Brooklyn.

I used to visit the school when I was in tech support 10 years ago. I was wondering what happened to that missing dvd.

Do you think the dvd player was locked in the principal's office or not? Check out the pic they used of the principal. Not his best. Every principal should spend an hour a day watching porn. Would keep them out of the hair of teachers.

Does anyone question the classes watching the "film festival" in the auditorium, also known as mass preps, something that occurs almost every day in many schools? Well, if its Jemma, why not?

I'll bet there's some math to be taught somewhere in this flick.

Charter School War at PS 160, Co-op City

Grassroots Education Movement (GEM) members Angel Gonzalez and Pam Garrison went up to Co-op City to support the parents and teachers at PS 160 who are fighting off the imposition of a charter school in their building. The original application for the charter was for District 11, which does not have as much of a middle class population to draw from as District 12 with Co-op City. So they are trying to switch horses in midstream. Talk about creaming.

Equality Charter School at P.S. 160, Bronx

by Pam Garrison
June 11, 2009-- A Equality Charter School revision meeting took place at P.S. 160 in District 11 - Bronx where changes to its charter proposal for its placement at this Co-op City zoned elementary school were to be discussed. Equality Charter School plans to open with 132 sixth graders and eventually would become a 6th-12th grade secondary school with a total population of 414 students. Instead of a discussion on the proposed revisions, the meeting, with close to 100 people including young students, generated a raucous and sometimes hostile exchange over whether this Charter Middle School should be placed at PS 160 at all.
The announcement of the placement of the Equality Charter at PS 160 caught many off guard and has divided the community as well as the PS 160 PTA. Its co-president, Mona Davids, who now also heads a newly created Citywide Pro-Charters Parent Association, rallied speakers in favor and an audience who displayed pro-Equality Charter signs whenever opposition voices spoke. Co-president Sebastian Ulanga, has organized against this siting of this Equality Charter here and spoke along with others against the lack proper consultation, misinformation (Equality had been processed for District 12), the negative impacts of middle school youth on PS 160 younger elementary and the special education students. While the pro-charter speakers voiced excitement about the expected higher attention, resources, and smaller class sizes with the Equality Charter there, opposition speakers expressed anger that the projected benefits would not be for the entire school population and create disparity.

Grassroots Education Movement member, Angel Gonzalez, spoke about the need to fix instead of privatizing our schools with charters. “We need to support quality and democratic processes for all public schools. Charter schools, such as Equality Charter, split communities and sow inequality instead. They ‘cream the best students’ and evidence shows that charters service fewer percentages of the neediest of students such English Language Learners, Special Education and the poorest of the poor. We need to organize a citywide fight-back against the mayor’s undemocratic imposition of these charters that take away resources from public schools. Charters union-bust and undermine the necessary unity parents and teachers against government’s failure to properly provide for all public schools.”

Jeffrey Litt, the Superintendent of this Carl Icahn Network of Charter Schools (which includes Equality Charter), expressed his support for the placement of Equality Charter at PS 160 while simultaneously engaging in a tense verbal exchange with an audience member who opposed the charter and Mr. Litt’s assertions. Mr. Litt claimed that Icahn schools do service the poor and are not exclusive, but PTA’s Mr. Ulanga interjected that any entry-lottery process for selecting students are exclusive.

Revisions to Equality’s Charter were presented at the beginning of the meeting. These included some administrative and staffing changes along with its placement now in District 11 instead of District 12. At the end of the meeting, many audience members were unable to determine the actual revisions that were being proposed – they were never restated for many who had arrived late. The meeting, which was adjourned in a particularly abrupt manner, appeared to do little to alleviate the fears, concerns and questions of many audience members. The rift, that this Equality Charter School has spawned, left many confused with many unanswered questions.

Our Children Are Not For Sale...

...Say No to Mayoral Control

In recent months, sectors of the African-American community, which BloomKlein have attempted to divide though their market-based misleading school choice/charter school movement (don't send your children to the horrible schools we've been running for 7 years), has been throwing up resistance.

Basir Mchawi of the WBAI show, Education At the Crossroads, is looking for endorsers to the AD against mayoral control. "We need individuals and organizations to sign on. We also need some donations to make this happen. To date we have identified the Amsterdam News and Brooklyn's Our Time Press as conduits for the ad."

GEM has made a contribution for the placement of this ad. ICE is considering doing so too. Contact blackeducator@africamail.com if you'd like to contribute or for more info.

Click to enlarge. If it is not clear, email me and I'll send the pdf.

New Teacher Recruitment Tool from the NYCDOE

Get immediate placement as a teacher in a NYC school with a degree from the University of Andy.

Sample course: Holding Your Liquor

Because you never know when you're going to be called upon to make nice with the bottle: how to boot and rally, properly mix, and more!

Endorsed by the New Teacher Project.

Thanks to David B for the tip.

I think we should buy out this Union that does not do anything for the teachers

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Educators File Discrimination Charges Against Chic...":

Good Luck with your your lawsuit. I do not know anymore what is going on with RW. that doesn't defend the teachers.

In New York we had the same problem. My school was phased out. A couple of teachers filed a grievanace because 50 percent of the senior teachers were kicked out. The day of the hearing or meeting the principal and the Union Rep. of my district did not show up. The Dist. Rep. sent another woman who did not know about the problem and we lost. I think that the grievance was a BIG FARCE! Then Mr. Mendel called us stating that the UFT was filing a lawsuit on our behalf. Many of us agreed with this lawsuit. We went to talk to the NYS lawyers with all the documentation and after a year RW. told us that the lawsuit was dismissed because of the ATR Agreement they reached.

The ATR Agreement is supposed to benefit ATR teachers. RW. explained to us that they are going to have a HIRING FREEZE so the ATR teachers can get jobs. So far none of the ATRs got jobs.

I applied to many jobs on the Open Market and went to drop my resume to numerous schools to no avail. A month had past since the agreement and I did not get an answer. Is this another FARCE AGREEMENT?

In my district there are some rumors that RW. is negotiating a buy out for the ATR teachers. I think we should buy out this Union that does not do anything for the teachers.

The parents and staff within my school community are organizing and looking for support

I am a public school teacher in Brooklyn. I happily stumbled upon the ednotes blogspot when searching for information and resources to support my own school's struggle with the charter school occupying space in our building. It looks like GEM is having a meeting soon and I was wondering if you could tell me who can attend and where it will be held! The parents and staff within my school community are organizing and looking for support and help from like-minded individuals to stop the madness of the mayor and chancellor's bogus school reform agenda.

Any information you have will be a great help. If the public schools who are forced to share space with charter schools have a forum or way to communicate with each other, maybe we can change the direction of school reform!

A Brooklyn Teacher

Welcome on board. Please join us. We are reaching out to all school communities threatened with closings, phase-outs, charters to build a unified fight back. Two of us went to support the struggle this past Thursday at PS 160x Co-op City. Look at ednotesonline and our GEM website for updates on our written and video (youtube) documentation of various struggles. We project also meeting over the summer, although not as routinely. I'll put you our listserv and do send our gem listserv info on the situation where you work.

Angel Gonzalez, GEM
May 14 GEM Rally at the DOE: (also look up Marine Park, Brandeis HS, MS 399x, Charles Barron on Youtube) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78_6T_HarE8

http://grassrootseducationmovement.blogspot.com/

Related:

Charter eyes a fair share: PAVE may have to extend stay in PS 15 another year

Another Brooklyn teacher writes:
We have a charter school in our building that will be overstaying until their building is ready. They will be adding an eighth grade. We will have classrooms moving all over the place so that they can have rooms. Then, we hear, an elementary charter school is scheduled to move in!

Educators File Discrimination Charges Against Chicago Board of Education

ICE and GEM will be opening links to CORE next weekend in Chicago.



FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contacts: Carol Caref, Teacher
CORE
June 10, 2009 (773) 791-5500
ccaref@gmail.com

Jennifer Purcell, Attorney
Robin Potter & Associates
(312) 861-1800
jennifer.n.purcell@gmail.com

Educators File Discrimination Charges Against Board of Education

Chicago Public Schools "Turnaround" Policy Unfair to African American Teachers

On Wednesday, June 10th, the Caucus of Rank and File Educators (CORE) filed charges with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission alleging that school "turnarounds," a "Renaissance 2010" policy, have a disparate impact on African American teachers. Teachers who filed the charges contend that African American teachers suffer a disproportionately adverse impact as a result of the school turnarounds.

LINK to Charges

The charges filed fall under Title VII which prohibits not only overt, obvious, and intentional discrimination, but also practices that are fair in form but discriminatory in operation. Essentially, a "turnaround" constitutes a layoff policy that almost exclusively impacts African American teachers.

Wanda Evans, a teacher who worked at Orr High School for 11 years before it was turned-around, claims that the plan is designed to get rid of senior teachers and replace them with lower-salaried new teachers to save money; "I'm completely offended by the way veteran teachers have been treated, it's like a fast food special, let's get a 2 for 1." Ms. Evans has been nominated for Golden Apple and DRIVE teaching awards and now feels "swept right out of the door."

Lois Ashford, a member of CORE's steering committee, taught at Copernicus Elementary for sixteen years before losing her job to the "turnaround" process. "In my professional opinion, Ren2010 has been a disaster for everyone concerned: parents who have been left out of decision-making, students who are forced out of stable educational environments in their neighborhoods, and minority teachers who are being disenfranchised at an alarming rate for no other reason than they've taught for over 10 years."

For Karen Lewis, a teacher and co-chair of CORE, the turnarounds have undermined an entire sector of black teachers in the Chicago Public Schools. "Since the beginning of the year, I've met black teachers who are working as substitutes. They are in tears, not just about the loss of their jobs but also about the loss of their status in the community. These school and position closings are insidious and Draconian. They are based on only one measurement -- test scores -- which say more about socio-economic status than they do about teaching and learning."

"Turnaround" is a program where everyone at a school is fired, including teachers, cafeteria staff, administration, and every other employee on site. This program is a part of "Renaissance 2010" which is Mayor Daley's program to overhaul the Chicago Public Schools through privatization and destabilization of the city's schools.

CORE researchers, looking at statistics compiled by the Illinois State Board of Education, concluded that since 2002, when the term "Renaissance Schools" was first used in relation to the closing of Dodge, Terrell and Williams elementary schools, the percentage of African American teachers in CPS has dropped from 39.4 to 31.6. Currently, there are 2,000 fewer Black teachers working in CPS than there were in 2002.

CORE is the reform caucus of the Chicago Teachers Union that represents rank-and-file members. The group is composed of teachers, retired teachers, educational staff and other champions of public education who hope to democratize the Chicago Teachers Union and turn it into an organization that fights on behalf of its members and the students they teach.

More on Passing Klein's Lemons

Our recent piece on the passing of Klein's lemons Garth Harries Leaves DOE as Ed Notes Helps Pass Klein Lemons elicited this response from Baltimore which also has one of Klein's lemons, though at least this lemon actually spent a decade teaching and never seemed as bad as the others.

Greetings from Baltimore (thanks for the lemon)

Hi Norm,

I like reading your blog. We in Baltimore have been dealing with one of your castaways and ... well ... misery loves company.

But the latest news is simply delightful, sure to warm your heart.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/editorial/bal-ed.morris11jun11,0,1358252.story

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/news/education/blog/2009/06/brian_morris_and_baltimore_sch.html


UPDATE:

Thanks, Norm.  Incredibly enough, it gets even better:

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/education/bal-te.morris12jun12,0,6392849.story

What Goes Around Comes Around

I'm reading a new bio of Winston Churchill called Warlord. Here is an account, with an accompanying map, of one of his first actions as a war correspondent.

...the Mullah of Swat ("the Mad Mullah"), a Muslim holy man, incited the native Pathan tribesmen to rebel against the British presence and control the territory they believed was rigthfully theirs. The insurgents attacked the Gibraltar-like fort at Chakdara and the garrison posted at Malakand Pass, both of which secured access to the Swat Valley...

The year: 1897

Leonie: Three Ways to Throw Obstacles in the Way of Mayoral Control

Dear parents:

Yesterday, I was up in Albany, talking to legislators on school governance. There is a lot of confusion up there, especially as the Republicans seem to have engineered a coup to take over the State Senate.

But one thing is clear: While the Mayor and his legion of paid staff and supporters are pressing them hard to retain complete his dictatorial control, the legislators are not hearing enough from their constituents – us – about what we want for the future.

We need to make our voices heard! If the system is renewed with only minor changes, our kids will likely suffer even more in the future from more overcrowding, higher class sizes, our schools converted to test prep factories, and the priorities and views of parents completely ignored.

Here are three ways you can help out!

1- Please distribute the attached flyer at your school, or email it to other parents. It is also posted at: http://www.classsizematters.org/Stop_MC_flyer_doubled_sided.doc

There are many school-wide events this time of year at which you can hand out fliers.

On the second page, there is a section that you can fill out with your legislators’ names and fax and phone nos. before you distribute it. Parents then can use this as a script for calling or faxing, while filling out their own name and addresses. You can find the names of your legislators by plugging in your zip code here: http://www.nysenate.gov/senators and http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/

If you can volunteer to hand out flyers at your school, please email Henry Sidel at hsidel@jotosake.com ; copy me at leonie@att.net

2- We are also going to be setting up phone banking for evenings next week in one or two central locations. Let us know if you’re willing to volunteer. If you have an hour or two, you can also do this from your home – we will send you the script and a list of names and phone nos. of activist parents who have expressed their concern on this and related issues.

3- If you have a day in the next two weeks, Mon-Wed., please consider coming to Albany with us. We will have parents from the Parent Commission going up on each of these days, and you can accompany us in our rounds and also stop off at your legislators’ offices. They really need to hear from you!

I know it’s a very busy time of year. But please, we need you to help us help you now!

Thanks, and please forward this message to others who care.

Leonie Haimson
Executive Director
Class Size Matters
124 Waverly Pl.
New York, NY 10011
212-674-7320
classsizematters@gmail.com
www.classsizematters.org
http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/

Ed Notes, GEM, ICE on WBAI, 99.5 Tonight from 7-8 PM

Education Crossroads

Talking about mayoral control, the UFT, and other ed related topics.

Steaming at http://stream.wbai.org/