Ravitch on Chicago

Sorry, Jonah. You don't know what mass action means. You have no idea what happens when working people organize and mobilize and stand together against the powerful financiers and politicians that you now represent. Karen Lewis showed that the teachers of Chicago stand together against mayoral authoritarianism.

Karen Lewis and the CTU are the new leaders of the labor movement. Time for us to follow in their footsteps, rather than more pointless and counter-productive engagement with “reformers” and their absurd notions. 

--- Arthur Goldstein, NYC teacher comment on Ravitch Blog 

Today at the Delegate Assembly (look for some of my notes in the morning posting) Mulgrew talked about Chicago and bragged about what good friends he was with Karen Lewis in Chicago. I also heard from people in Chicago that Karen and Mulgrew seem to get along. We'll see how that all plays out in Detroit this July at the AFT convention. In Seattle two years ago the Chicago CORE crew didn't always mesh with the UFT/Unity gang -- I heard more than a few "they're a-holes" as Chicago watched in disbelief how Unity people used the same manipulative tactics --- that I saw at today's DA.

But anyway, Mulgrew talked about the game the deformers have tried to play in limiting the union's ability to strike by requiring a 75% vote. So they got 90%. Mulgrew was careful to point out that there is no Taylor law making strikes illegal. Interesting that Mulgrew compared Rahm Emanuel and Bloomberg and said he'd rather have Bloomberg while also pointing to the fact Emanuel is a Democrat. Maybe Karen Lewis having chats with Mike is having an impact.

But I'll let Diane Ravitch pick up the story on her new blog, which has become so prolific. Too bad she doesn't go into how the UFT/Unity Caucus/AFT leaders match up with the Chicago people in terms of accountabilty to the members, deomocratic procedures. how far the union has gone to throw monkey wrenches into the works of the ed deformers.


Ravitch on Chicago

A few days ago, the Chicago Teachers Union voted overwhelmingly to strike.

This wasn't supposed to happen. Just a year ago, Jonah Edelman of Stand for Children boasted at the Aspen Ideas Festival how he had outsmarted the teachers' union. He described how he had shaped legislation not only to cut back teachers' job protections but to prevent the Chicago union from ever striking. He told the nation's elite, 'if it could happen in Illinois, it could happen anywhere." Stand for Children was once a grassroots group but has now become one of the active leaders in the corporate reform campaign to advance privatization and bring teachers to heel.

Speaking to a gathering of the nation's elite at Aspen, Edelman offered a template to beat back public employees in other states. Armed with millions of dollars supplied by wealthy financiers, he hired  the top lobbyists in Illinois and won favor with the top politicians. He shaped legislation to use test scores for evaluating teachers, to strip due process rights from teachers, and to assure that teachers lost whatever job protections they had. In his clever and quiet campaign behind the scenes, he even managed to split the state teachers' unions.

More of the Ravitch piece here.

UPDATE: Mike Klonsky nails Rahm

Rahm's anti-union spin machine is spinning in reverse. Even though his pals now own the Sun-Times and even with a big-bucks propaganda campaign bankrolled by corporate "reformers", nothing seems to be spinning the mayor's way.

S-T political reporter Fran Spielman, can't quite hide her disdain for Rahm's assault on the CTU.

Emanuel pushed for a change in state law that raised the strike authorization threshold to 75 percent, a benchmark so high, at least one education advocate [SFC's Jonah Edelman--mk] with ties to the mayor predicted that it could never be met. Instead, the Chicago Teachers Union roared passed that benchmark, fueled by their anger against a mayor who stripped them of a previously-negotiated, four percent pay raise and tried to muscle through a longer school day.

"Stripped" and "muscled" is a long way from the usual Civic Committee-style rhetoric of "union thugs" and "greedy teachers." Spielman then asks the mayor, "whether the showdown with teachers threatens to turn Chicago into 'another Wisconsin?'” It's a question no Democrat dare ask and one that answers itself.

S-T columnist Carol Marin, writing a day earlier couldn't make the case any better or clearer.

If I had been a Chicago public school teacher last week, I would have done as 90 percent of them did — and voted “yes” for a strike authorization...Teachers in this town have been demonized, demoralized, and disrespected. No profession is beyond criticism and no public school system is without significant problems. But taking a sledgehammer approach to CPS teachers and their union has backfired on the Emanuel administration and his schools CEO, Jean-Claude Brizard.

And all the radio ads and robo calls funded by out of town, union-busting billionaires doesn’t alter that fact.

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The opinions expressed on EdNotesOnline are solely those of Norm Scott and are not to be taken as official positions (though Unity Caucus/New Action slugs will try to paint them that way) of any of the groups or organizations Norm works with: ICE, GEM, MORE, Change the Stakes, NYCORE, FIRST Lego League NYC, Rockaway Theatre Co., Active Aging, The Wave, Aliens on Earth, etc.

UFT "Neutrality" in Jeffries-Barron Race is Support for Jeffries

Charles Barron, a former Black Panther out of East New York, has the the movers and shakers of this city aghast. All those Wall Street lawyers, hedge fund operators and charter school advocates who have poured money into stopping Barron’s bid for a Brooklyn congressional seat are worried.-- Juan Gonzalez

Jeffries was supported be DFER but then to cover his ass claimed he didn't want their money. There is no bigger supporter of ed deform than Jeffries yet the UFT would not support his opponent. I've seen Barron and his wife Inez at almost every single rally and event opposing Bloomberg control of the schools. Look at the money flowing into Jeffries and yet Barron is holding his own. I almost never contribute to a candidate but I may just do so now. (Barron has an office on Pennsylvania and Hegeman, a corner I used to walk by every day on the way to George Gershwin JHS, not to be closed.)

If you are a UFT member ask the leadership why they won't support Barron.

Juan Gonzalez really nails the issues in today's Daily News.
 

• 

Charles Barron, a former Black Panther out of East New York, has the the movers and shakers of this city aghast.

All those Wall Street lawyers, hedge fund operators and charter school advocates who have poured money into stopping Barron’s bid for a Brooklyn congressional seat are worried.

A group of Democrats, from liberals like Manhattan Rep. Jerrold Nadler to neo-conservatives like Ed Koch, even blasted Barron this week as an “anti-Semite” and a “racist.”

All of them have suddenly realized that Barron, the most outspoken member of the City Council for the past decade, could be heading to Washington.
This wasn’t supposed to happen.

Not with all the money the people downtown poured into their choice for the newly drawn 8th congressional seat — State Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries.

Jeffries, after all, is young, articulate, nonthreatening. He claims the mantel of a new generation of forward-thinking, technocratic black leaders, following in the footsteps of Newark’s Cory Booker and Barack Obama.

Jeffries’ list of donors reads like a who’s who. His latest campaign filing shows $500,000 raised, but he now claims to have surpassed $700,000.

Members of his former law firm, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, gave the most, $33,000; but a slew of other hedge fund operators, lawyers, bankers and philanthropists provided tens of thousands more.

They include John Petry and Joel Greenblatt, heads of Gotham Capital and the founders of the Success Academy Charter Schools ($2,500 a piece); Whitney Tilson of the KIPP charter schools ($1,000); Merryl Tisch, chancellor of the state board of regents ($2,500); Kathryn Wylde of the Partnership for New York City ($500).

Barron, on the other hand, lists a mere $50,000 in donations — most of it from himself.

Still, there was Barron Tuesday morning, sitting in a small campaign office on Nostrand Ave. in Bedford-Stuyvesant, looking very much like a front-runner.

Sitting next to him was U.S. Rep. Ed Towns, who recently announced his retirement from the congressional seat he has held for 30 years.

Back in 2006, Barron challenged Towns and came very close to defeating him. Then last week, Towns shocked everybody by endorsing the rival he once called a “bomb thrower.”

“Even though we’ve been on different sides, we always shared a belief in making things better for this community,” Towns said. “I feel Charles will do a better job as my successor.”

Senior citizens, the most reliable of voters, have always been Towns’ base. And given that the unusually early Democratic primary on June 26 is expected to have record low voter turnout, Towns’ decision to throw in with Barron is a potential game changer.

Jeffries discounted the new developments.

As for donations from hedge fund mavens and charter school advocates, they will not influence his views on the lightning rod issue of education, he said.
“No one is fighting harder to stop public school closures than I am,” he said. “I’ve always held the same position on school choice, and supported lifting charter school caps,” he added.

Barron’s focus has been “on the sound bite, mine has been on substance,” Jeffries said.

Sure, Barron has been loud and outrageous at times.

But he has also been a fixture at scores of social justice battles in this city for decades. Few black leaders are better known. Few are more willing to challenge the city’s rich and powerful.

No wonder the money people in Manhattan are suddenly worried about a congressional race in Brooklyn - one they thought was a sure thing.

Author:

Juan Gonzalez

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The opinions expressed on EdNotesOnline are solely those of Norm Scott and are not to be taken as official positions (though Unity Caucus/New Action slugs will try to paint them that way) of any of the groups or organizations Norm works with: ICE, GEM, MORE, Change the Stakes, NYCORE, FIRST Lego League NYC, Rockaway Theatre Co., Active Aging, The Wave, Aliens on Earth, etc.

NBC Bias on Deborah Kenny HVA Charter Scam and NY Times Trip Gabbriel Trips on Vouchers

NBC's Brian Williams is a shill for charters and ed deform

Student attrition at HVA is huge...the 66 5th graders in 2007-2008 have shrunk to just 16 9th graders in the 2010-2011 school year.  This is a 75% attrition.  In that same time, the district that the school is in went from 904 5th graders in 2007-2008 to 1313 9th graders in 2010-2011.  That is a 45% growth....  Contrary to what she preaches, teachers are her lowest priority

Why would you believe anything reported on NBC? Even more outrageous was the puff piece NBC's Today show and Brian Williams did in an interview with Harlem Village Academy founder Deborah Kenny. Leonie has done a few pieces on the school and today Gary Rubinstein tears it all apart.

An outrageous puff piece NBC's Today show and Brian Williams did on Harlem Village Academy founder Deborah Kenny. Leonie has done a few pieces on the school and today Gary Rubinstein tears it all apart. Really, if you want to see the entire charter sham exposed this is a must read piece.If NBC were fair and balanced they would have Gary or Leonie on to give the counterarguments. But NBC may be even less "fair and balanced" on school deform than even Faux FOX.

Here is Leonie's comment:

Great piece from invaluable Gary Rubinstein on the fraud that is Deborah Kenny and her charter school Harlem Village Academy. Kenny is all over TV promoting her new book, interviewed by the likes of Brian Williams and other reporters who never bother to check the stats or uncover the truth.

I would put quotes around reporter in this case. Just take this stat from Gary:

Gary Rubinstein's TFA Blog

It takes a village

 Excerpt:

The reason I need to debunk miracle schools is because lawmakers use them as examples of why it is good education reform practice to close down failing schools and fire their teachers.  My purpose is to show that the good test scores, if they really have them, come at an even greater cost.  The more I can show that the ‘miracle’ schools aren’t any better than the failing schools, maybe people will be more outraged when ‘failing’ schools are shut down. The latest ‘miracle’ school getting a lot of attention is Harlem Village Academy Charter School.  The founder of the school, Deborah Kenny, recently published a book about her experience, called ‘Born To Rise.’  The school was featured on NBC with Brian Williams.

 Gary also deals with their bogus claims on regent success and teacher turnover. He contacted a former teacher at HVA who has blogged about the school. Here is her entire comment which reveals ao much.

When a school is truly great, teachers want to keep teaching there year after year.  So it should be telling that in this school over the past three years the amount of staff turnover was 2007-2008 53%, for 2008-2009, 38%, and for 2009-2010, a whopping 61%.  By comparison, the teacher attrition for the entire district in 2009-2010 was just 19%.
To me, this teacher turnover is the most alarming statistic of all.  So I tracked down a TFA alum named Sabrina Strand who taught for one year there.  Sabrina wrote an excellent blog post called ‘I’m no Superman.’  I asked her if she would give more details about her experience, and here is what she wrote:

I am more than happy to tell the truth about HVA, at least how it was when I left after the 2006-2007 school year. I’m really glad you’re dedicated to exposing the truth behind the whole TFA/charter school charade. It is very much a charade, an elaborate, expensive smoke & mirrors. HVA, as I knew it, was one of the worst offenders of creating and sustaining the myth that teachers can solve everything. Waiting for Superman infuriated me because just like HVA – just like Deborah Kenny – it sent the message that good teachers should be martyrs, not people with lives and passions of their own that happen to also be talented and passionate about educating children. I am not a martyr, and as I titled my op-ed, I am also not superman. But yet many would say I am a very good teacher. In Deborah Kenny’s world, that would be impossible.
During the 2006-2007 school year at HVA, I taught huge classes of 5th graders who were poorly behaved. The administration was weak and ineffective. Everyone, including the principal and the dean, was so stressed out that there were often medical problems. I used to take the bus up to Harlem with my co-teacher and best friend at the school, Johanna Fishbein, and we would often cry on our way to work.
The working conditions at the school were plainly unreasonable. They took advantage of young, idealistic, competent teachers; they squeezed and squeezed until there was nothing left to give, even our dignity. Deborah Kenny is LARGELY to blame for this, as we were all desperately trying to play our parts in the Deborah Kenny play – one where she produced and directed but never wrote or starred in the productions. I have zero respect for that woman. The only time she actually came into the trenches is when she was preparing the kids for some dignitary’s visit. At that time, she would talk to them like they were slow kindergarteners, and when she left, they would all ask me who she was. That’s how connected she is to the school. Yet when President Bush came to laud our teachers’ efforts for earning the highest math test scores in the city, it was Deborah who schmoozed and gave the tour, Deborah who took the credit.
Deborah Kenny and her Village Academies take advantage of budding teachers, often crushing their spirits in the process. Though we barely made more than NYC public school teachers while working seven weeks over the summer, teaching on multiple Saturdays, and averaging 12-hour work days during the week, Deborah pays herself the HIGHEST SALARY out of any charter school executive in NYC (that stat was recently published in The New York Post). She makes almost nine times as much as her teachers who are doing all the real work, the hard work, that lands her in the press so often and helps her send her own kids to tony private schools. Her “vision” is a bunch of bullshit – basically, work your teachers to death, and you’ll see results. Sure, and you’ll also see a lot of unhappy teachers, and a lot of people leaving your school and vowing to never come back.
The year I left, my entire fifth grade team left with me. Deborah refused to write letters of recommendation for any of us. Contrary to what she preaches, teachers are her lowest priority and she never has their best interests at heart. In fact, this whole thing started when her husband tragically passed away from leukemia, and she needed a massive project to keep her grief at bay. That project was Harlem and its children. She developed her miracle solution about holding teachers accountable after she had already latched onto this “save the poor black children” project as a desperate attempt to find new purpose in her life. I admire that tenacity and resilience, but not what has become of it.
No school with a 60% teacher turnover rate should be praised in the press as the model for other schools to follow. Now that I’ve taught in a relatively stable independent school for four years, I see that a school’s real success comes from its sense of community. When teachers are leaving left and right because they’re being asked to perform superhuman feats for little compensation, the idea of “community” essentially vanishes. All that holds Village Academies together is Deborah Kenny’s unrelenting ambition and greed.
Feel free to use any or all of this in your blog post. I am absolutely, 100% done with the TFA and charter school world, and I have no fear of burning my bridges. I’m one of the lucky ones; I moved across the country and found a teaching job that calls to my soul instead of giving up on education altogether like many of my peers did after their horrific experiences at HVA.

NY Times weak piece on vouchers
With the news that Michael Winerip is leaving the ed beat at the NY Times we know that the paper has basically abandoned adequate ed coverage on both the local and national ed beats. Today's Trip Gabbriel piece on the Romney Voucher program has so many holes, the space shuttle could have passed through it on its recent journey. How can you write an article on vouchers and totally ignore the failed voucher programs already in existence, as pointed out in Diane Ravitch's book where she has a whole section on the Milwaukee failed voucher program (p. 130-31):

When a team of reporters from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel examined the voucher schools... they uncovered unanticipated problems. Applicants to run voucher schools did not need any particular credentials, nor did their teachers. The journalists visited 104 out of 115 voucher schools (nine voucher schools would not let them in); they found good schools and awful schools. [many religious schools --Ed:  using public money to support religion, a major purpose of the voucher movement]. 
The reporters judged that about 10 per cent... were excellent, and the same proportion showed "alarming deficiencies."
...on the whole, the reporters concluded that "the voucher schools feel, and look, surprisingly like the schools in the Milwaukee Public Schools District."...This was not the momentous result that voucher advocates had predicted."

In other words, let's destroy the fabric of the public school system for no real gain while opening up the ability to open schools by any charlatan or religious entity.

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The opinions expressed on EdNotesOnline are solely those of Norm Scott and are not to be taken as official positions (though Unity Caucus/New Action slugs will try to paint them that way) of any of the groups or organizations Norm works with: ICE, GEM, MORE, Change the Stakes, NYCORE, FIRST Lego League NYC, Rockaway Theatre Co., Active Aging, The Wave, Aliens on Earth, etc.

Tuesday: Three Events Today - Press Conf on DOE Special Ed, Rally for Turnaround Schools, Class Size Matters Skiiny Awards

June 12, 2012

Contact:
Mona Davids, NYC Parents Union (917) 340-8987

New York City Parents Union Press Conference On The Roll Out Of The NYC Department of Education's Special Education Reforms

WHO:  Parents, Advocates and Elected Officials

WHAT:  Press conference demanding the NYC Department of Education delay the roll out of their special education reforms until they release all the results of Phase 1; answer questions raised by parents, advocates and the media; provide training to general and special education teachers; and guarantee parents their children will receive all of their mandated classes, services and supports at their neighborhood schools.

WHEN:  June 12, 2012

TIME:  12:00PM

WHERE:  City Hall

Our press conference is immediately followed by the City Council's hearing on the special education reforms.


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Tuesday, June 12th - 5 PM Rally for the Turnaround Schools Stand in solidarity with the teachers, students and communities of the 24 turnaround schools at this protest against the City’s outrageous closing of these 2 dozen public schools. Rally to be held at Tweed. 

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Please join us June 12 for the fourth annual "Skinny" awards!

More and more of what’s happening in NYC, from the expansion of charter schools and high-stakes testing, to the new teacher evaluation system and the Common Core standards, are coming down on us from the NY State Education Dept. and the Board of Regents.  

Please join us in honoring two women, both former NYC superintendents and now Regents members, working to see our children do not suffer from the negative impacts of these policies, that the quality of our public schools is strengthened rather than undermined, and that the parents’ voice is heard in Albany.

 Leonie Haimson, Diane Ravitch, Patrick Sullivan, Monica Major & Emily Horowitz

invite you to

the fourth annual “Skinny” Awards

When: Tuesday, June 12 at 6:00 PM

 Where: Bistro Lamazou

344 3rd Avenue (betw. 25th & 26th St.)

New York, NY 10010

A fundraiser for Class Size Matters

 Please join us for a special evening where we will honor two celebrated educators who give us the real “skinny” on NYC schools, and stand up for parents, smaller classes and our children’s right to receive a quality education 

 Dr. Kathleen M. Cashin

Brooklyn member of the NYS Board of Regents

 Dr. Betty A. Rosa

Bronx member of the NYS Board of Regents 

A rare opportunity to enjoy a three course dinner with wine, while celebrating two heroes, battling to defend our public schools.

Tickets:  $150 - Patron

                              $75 – Supporter

 To reserve your seat or to contribute, please click here or send a tax-deductible check to: Class Size Matters, 124 Waverly Pl., NY NY 10011

Sunday, It's A Wrap

UPDATED: Monday, 10 AM, reposted

Every week I promise myself I would do a wrap-up so I can review where I was the last week so it doesn't all slip away and point to upcoming events the following week. Every week that project slips away. Here is an attempt. Wait--- what was I going to do again?

But first, here are links to the Ed Notes posts from the past week. Note this June 1 report on Anna Phillips' going away party:

--Michael Winerip is leaving the Times. Or was pushed. Another blow and sign of their downfall. Many people have been predicting that given the quality of his writing on the side of real reform. How tempted am I to cancel my sub? --- Ed Notes, June 1.

Did I break that story, given that people seem surprised at Winerip's final ed column in the Times today slamming the Florida/Jeb Bush testing regime?

• Videos: FairTest Honors Diane Ravitch with the Deb...
• Proud Principal Crows About His AP After Big PSAL ...
• News: Chicago Teachers Vote 90% Pro-Strike, Wiscon...
• The DOE Special Education Passover Plot
• Support Class Size Matters Skinny Award Dinner - J...
• Police Estimate 400 at Pearson Field Test Protest
• Pearson Rally Pics
• Chicago Strike Threat Causing Panic: Brizard Call ...
• Fred Smith: Saying No to This Week’s Field Tests
• MORE Forum:The Trouble With Accountability @ Thu J...
• Parent-led Protest Against High Stakes Testing Thu...
• Joe Nocera: Income Gap Tied to Decline of Unions
• Breaking: Charter Schools Cut School Day, Use Pare...
• Christopher Cerf: The Perfect Face of Ed Deform......
• Standardized Test Field Testing This Upcoming Tues...
• Chicago, Chicago, A Hell of a Town
• Jaisal Noor Documentary: Neighborhood Schools: The...
• A former student gets in touch
• On Anna Phillips, Fiction Writing, MORE Chapter Le...

Monday, Monday, June 4.  Hmmmm. Nothing in my calendar from last week.A visit to my dad's apartment to clean it out -- followed by a coughing fit and what seems like swollen glands.

Tuesday:
Lunch with former student who tells me she is 47. The last time I saw her she was 16 and in high school. She looks the same. I don't. Quite a 2 hour conversation about the past. Maybe this is part of the face of accountability – meeting a former student from your 6th grade class and having her tell you she saw her first play because you took the class and she has been a theater goer ever since, making sure her own kids get to share that experience. And my principal used to tell me I took too many trips and the scores would suffer.
      Then it was off to visit a former colleague, an 82 year old who fell in her apartment, broke her hip and lay there for 5 days before being found. She looked so good, but she always looked 20 years younger. I remember someone had found out how long she was teaching and all the young guys gathered around in wonder at her age. Hot, hot, hot, and still hot at 82 with a broken hip.
     And finally the FAIRTEST event which I wrote about here where I posted videos (and revealed that I gave Weingarten a hug-- I am a serial hugger.) What I didn't reveal was the nice comments from Diane Ravitch about the movie and her thanking me for my role in that.
   After the event I went out with Fred Smith who has done such great work with Change the Stakes and Rosalie Friend and another local SOS activist along with an SOS visitor from Denver named Kemble Stokes who took a batch of copies back with her. (I got a great email from her tonight.)

Did I miss the Venus transit of the sun? I'll catch it next time in 2117. I also missed the shuttle being towed practically past my house last week. I'll catch that next time too.

Wednesday June 6 - D-Day - the invasion of Norman 41 years ago. The day belonged to my wife. And what a day. We both got haircuts in prep for the big wedding today, followed by a visit to a car dealer getting ready to buy my new Honda CRV, then off to the bank to take care of dad business, followed by a trek to clean up his apartment which is so full of dust mites we can only stand it for an hour at most. Finally back home to rest before heading out to a great dinner in the meat packing district, followed by a short stroll on the high line.

Thursday: The big Pearson rally, followed by hanging out in Central Park with some of the parents and their kids, followed by a great MORE education discussion on accountability and focused on chapters 8 and 9 of the Ravitch book, followed by my handing out a leaflet in front of CUNY at the E4E meeting with State Ed Comm John King. That was so much fun I have to write about it separately.

Friday:  Bikram hot yoga in AM (wipeout), smoking a stogie, followed by a meeting with a newbie to the ed wars now working for a non-profit who was sent by her director to get the historical background and guide to every single activist group in NYC. After 2 hours she was worn out. And so was I -- but we shared a great chocolate chip cookie to recover. And she was delightful to chat with --- intelligent, engaged and ready to roll. Welcome to the ed wars.

Saturday -- went to a wake for the mom of an activist teacher/blogger who I don't know well but have enormous respect for and was moved by the story of his mom.
Followed by the movie Hunger Games (which we loved -- and maybe our future). I have the 3 books waiting to be read -- if I ever get over my new obsession with Jo Nesbo deep dark Norwegian novels starring Harry Hole.

Sunday -- all day getting ready for the gala wedding of the daughter of our great friends. What a great wedding due to the incredible couple and their clear joy and love for each other which so infected everyone.

Best to Robyn and David.
I have a great pic of dad and bride walking down the aisle. If dad reads this, let me know if OK to add it here.

Home at 1AM -- oy! I had to drive someone to the airport at 6AM. Got up at 5AM. Monday will be a couch potato day.


=============
Afterburns -- some collected items that won't get into separate posts:

Reality Based Educator's comments about KIPP founder Dave Levin's work week and the mantra at KIPP inspired the above response.

I used to work in a KIPP school. None of the teachers had kids and there was a 50% turnover rate every year for staff. You simply can not have a life when you work in a KIPP school. The funny thing is that they brag about how you can't have a life other than the KIPP life. Their entire mantra is "Work Hard, be Nice". I actually felt like I was in a cult when I worked there.

-------

Hi Norm,

I just found out about your blog although I have had a copy of your group's doc since last year. Our group in W. Marin County, California just successfully defeated a charter proposal that would have turned my daughter's Waldorf Inspired program into a corporate charter. I have been blogging about it and am writing a guide for fighting charter schools. I decided to write one since I found nothing when I first started to study how to fight charters in March and didn't find any. Do you know of any other guides? Can you help me get in touch with other parents and teachers and communities that have and are fighting charter schools around the country?

My blog is at http://robertovetz2011.blogspot.com/

Keep up the great fight!

In solidarity,

robert

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A question came in on Harlem Village Charter School after an NBC puff piece on founder Deborah Kenney. I wrote about it but best to read Leonie's response:

We have written about this school many times on the parent blog:

NYC Public School Parents: More blatant charter school propaganda - http://goo.gl/XLFsh

NYC Public School Parents: The Blind Side - http://goo.gl/QXE2p

NYC Public School Parents: Is Harlem Village Academy Really the Model for Urban Public School Reform? - http://goo.gl/gfxUu

A charter school with extraordinarily high teacher and student attrition rates and one of the best PR operations around.

Leonie Haimson

Videos: FairTest Honors Diane Ravitch with the Deborah W. Meier Hero in Education Award, June 7, 2012

 Ravitch and Meier and Monty Neill plus Weingarten and Mulgrew in the same space, Plus lots of super attendees. So far the ed social event of the season for me.

Love was in the air to such an extent at this event, I even gave Randi Weingarten a hug. And smiled at Mulgrew. After all, being in the same space with Debbie Meier and Diane Ravitch is a very special occasion, especially as it was a fundraiser for a worthy organization. You know I just found buried in my archives a book by Debbie that I was reading around 1971 when I gave up my dream of an open classroom in frustration. I have followed her career since then but only got to meet her 5 years ago.

FAIR TEST has been leading the battle against high stakes tests for a quarter of a century and  its director Monty Neill has been a major voice in the struggle, which if you have been following this blog you know has been heating up (Police Estimate 400 at Pearson Field Test Protest). It was the best $75 I've spent in a long time.

It was just a few short hours before we found out Walker had won in Wisconsin. And though I think that big labor bears part of the responsibility, the evening of good feeling transcended it all. Feeling a great deal of labor solidarity I had a brief but nice chat with Randi.




The entire video is worth an hour of your time and you can watch it at https://vimeo.com/43587373.

I also cut it into 4 chunks for those short on time.

I'm embedding this 19 minutes piece when Deb and Diane did a version of their Edweek (Bridging Differences) blog to end the evening. Just priceless stuff.

Meier and Ravitch in Conversation

https://vimeo.com/43759101

FairTest Award - Meier and Ravitch in Conversation from Grassroots Education Movement on Vimeo.

Here are other segments:

Deborah Meier Introduces Diane Ravitch
https://vimeo.com/43747985
Diane Ravitch Acceptance Speech
https://vimeo.com/43748488
And in this segment I collated all the other speakers:
Michael Mulgrew, Ann Cook, Monty Neill, Randi Weingarten
https://vimeo.com/43759471

The battle against high stakes tests has been in the forefront of Ed Notes from way back to our print publishing beginnings in 1996 when I was still working at a school that had been led since 1979 by a test/data driven principal (yes, even in those days) and I saw first hand what that did to deform education as the ability of teachers to control what they taught was being taken out of their hands. Thus, the issue was a key when ICE, followed by GEM were formed. The GEM committee, Change the Stakes, which began as a teacher dominated group has shifted into much of a parent/teacher group, with the sensibilities of both points of view making it stronger. Of course many teachers are also parents.

Also, on June 7, the afternoon of the Pearson rally, the education committee of MORE, the new caucus in town, held a great session on chapters 8 and 9 of Ravitch's book, with a depth of analysis that delved into what Ravitch left out and what she nailed with an intellectual rigor I haven't experienced in a while. In the room were some new teachers and some veteran ICE people, along with some NYCORE and GEM. Quite a mix -- the next meeting is June 21 (which I can't attend because we are having a party in honor of my dad where we will serve samples all of his favorite foods -- and have a barf bag ready just in case).

One major group we have to convince to get involved are the very people we work with. Organized, teachers can fight back against this testing mania and while the UFT/AFT make noises, they do nothing at the school level to get some pushback --- like how about getting a movement going to boycott some of the crap teachers have to do that has little relation to the children -- the waste of time monitoring crap?

Proud Principal Crows About His AP After Big PSAL Baseball WIn

I wanted to share this wonderful email from PS 257 Principal Brian De Vale after his AP, Melvin Martinez, had coached the local high school, Grand School Campus, to a PSAL Class A baseball championship. Here's the story in the NY Post.

I know them both for many years and here's the best to them and have fun in the Puerto Rico Day Parade tomorrow.


 =======
Brian De Vale

Please take a moment to read this article from today's NY Post, share with friends and congratulate our brother Melvin Martinez as sometimes it seems we can't get a bit of Good News in this business.

The story is more than a story about baseball -it a tribute to the love of family and community.  My Asst. Principal, Melvin Martinez, embodies  my belief in Community Schools.  He is a product of  District 14 where he continues to live, work and he has his two sons enrolled with us at PS 257.

His parents emigrated from Puerto Rico and raised 4 fine sons in Williamsburg long before it became the "oh-so-chic" place it is considered today.   His father spent 37 years as a teacher at a local day care where he influenced the lives of countless children and their families.  Two of his brothers (Edwin and Steve) continue the family tradition as both educators and sports coaches here in  District 14. Another brother is a law enforcement officer in Florida. The Martinez Family  runs a Saturday Sports Academy at 257 in the winter FOR FREE and Melvin has been  the Varsity Baseball Coach at our local High School Grand Street Campus for the past many years. I have witnessed him on multiple occasions counseling kids on his cell phone ordering them to stay in school while living in places as far away, and as foreign to them, as rural Texas. They are there attending College on Scholarships he helped them to win, on terms he helped negotiate.  He has also groomed several students and worked with Major League Baseball scouts to score major league contracts for his players(Dellin Betances NY Yankee, who still attends and participates in our school's Special Olympics- which were founded by Melvin's brother Steve ).   Many of his players are Dominican immigrants (ELL's ) and/or the first in their families to apply to college.  He not only wins games, but he also demands high grades, gentlemanly behavior and good sportsmanship.

The timing of this victory is awesome!!!  The P.S. 257 Marching Band was invited to perform tomorrow at the National Puerto Rican Day Parade. This band was born out of Melvin's idea to create a band as an additional way for kids to earn college scholarships-through music. He noticed years ago that at every college sports event there were always bands playing - and many of the students were attending college for free. When we were lucky enough to become a Magnet School and receive additional funding our band effort went into overdrive.  Now he will see the band he created perform at an event he truly loves, the day after becoming the BEST H.S. BASEBALL TEAM IN NYC!!! I know Melvin will be dancing his way up 5th Avenue tomorrow with us as a PROUD Puerto Rican son, husband, father, AP  and coach, screaming at the top of his lungs as he does every morning when he walks into the Main Office:

Dios te bendiga!!! Amen, Amen, Amen!!!!! Y Que viva Puerto Rico!!!!

So wave to us tomorrow if you see us on TV, as we crown Melvin our District's own Grand Marshall:
We love you "Uncle Melski"  CONGRATULATIONS ON ANOTHER JOB WELL DONE!

Brian and the Entire District #14 Family

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The opinions expressed on EdNotesOnline are solely those of Norm Scott and are not to be taken as official positions (though Unity Caucus/New Action slugs will try to paint them that way) of any of the groups or organizations Norm works with: ICE, GEM, MORE, Change the Stakes, NYCORE, FIRST Lego League NYC, Rockaway Theatre Co., Active Aging, The Wave, Aliens on Earth, etc.

News: Chicago Teachers Vote 90% Pro-Strike, Wisconsin and Car Talk

Chicago teachers have shown their solidarity in massive numbers. More than 90 percent of teachers have given the OK for a work stoppage, multiple sources told NBC Chicago. That number is well above the 75 percent needed, by law, to authorize a strike.

How did we get from hundreds of thousands in the streets of Madison, Wisconsin demanding union rights for everybody and fundamental economic justice for all, to a desultory set of Democratic campaigns for the candidates who, as they say, sucked the least, and ended up losing...[Labor leaders] turned a nascent movement into a series of electoral campaigns, first against a handful of state senators in 2011 and then the statewide recall campaign that ended in defeat this week. They turned the movement into a campaign, and then managed to lose the campaign.

Fast and furious, the news is coming in.

MORE News

First an article on why Walker won (blame Labor) circulating on the MORE-Discussion listserve (you can join by sending an email to more@morecaucusnyc.org). Or better yet, come to the MORE Happy Hour next Saturday from 5-7PM.)

I believe this article best sums up our agenda, how labor leadership has failed and the right/wrong direction for labor movements. This is must read for MORE members [and everyone else].

Labor is taking a beating, but don't only blame the Koch brothers. Take a good look in the mirror with the UFT/AFT as big a culprit as possible. Now team that with what is going on with the Chicago Teachers Union and you get a different picture. Which is why you should help build MORE into a caucus that can make Unity Caucus break a sweat.

Wisconsin: What Happens When Movements Turn Into Campaigns

http://blackagendareport.com/content/wisconsin-what-happens-when-movements-turn-campaigns


Chicago Teachers Vote 90% to strike
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus


Remember that famous Edelman video on how the ed deformers put a big one over on the Chicago Teachers Union? How they needed an "impossible" 75% to strike? I pointed out at the time I wouldn't want anything less if I were going to strike.
http://www.nbcchicago.com/blogs/ward-room/chicago-teachers-union-ctu-strike-authorization-vote-158260415.html

And YES, many of the teachers are YOUNG who know little or nothing about the union -- until our pals at CORE and the CTU started educating them.


Mike Klonsky explains why even before the count was in.

Why teachers will vote yes

Sitting at a coffee shop a few days ago, I was asked by some friends, how I felt about teachers taking a strike vote. They couldn't understand, especially in these tough times, why any teacher would want to go on strike. I told them about what I saw at the CTU rally a few weeks ago and why I left the rally and march of thousands of teachers, feeling certain that any strike vote taken would surpass the 75% needed to authorize a strike.

The revelation came to me after interviewing a group of young, white, women, suburban-raised and schooled, teachers in the crowd at Grant Park. From what I could tell, many of them had only been teaching for a few years and none of them probably even knew anyone who belonged to a union, say 5 years ago. Now here they stood in the park, fists in the air singing along with thousands of other teachers, the old IWW tune, Solidarity forever, for the union makes us strong.

As we marched down Michigan Ave. and then up Adams St. past CPS headquarters, they chanted strike, strike, strike until union march monitors waved for them to cool the chant. After all, the union doesn't want to risk a strike unless there's no other option. But these young teachers had had enough and were ready to put it all on the line for the future of their profession.

I asked my friends, "what do you think the mayor would have to do to turn these teachers, who went into the profession for the love of teaching,  into union militants?  After a short review of Rahm's war on unions and on the teaching profession, I think they got it.

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Car Talk -- the funniest program on radio -- or anywhere --- going away in September
This was sent by my friend Bob, a retired industrial arts teacher. Don't forget to listen today at 10AM.

I was motivated to post a comment on the following article on the demise of a favorite NPR program, in the Saturday, June 9, 2012 edition of the New York Times. Hosts of 'Car Talk' to Retire After 35 Years of Automotive Banter.

The brothers Tom Magliozzi and Ray Magliozzi, whose show has been a staple of NPR for decades, will stop producing new shows this fall.

http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/08/hosts-of-car-talk-to-retire-after-35-years-of-automotive-banter/?nl=todaysheadlines

Most of the comments were from suburbanites or upscale folks, who I felt were missing something important. Below is a comment I posted (as "Bronx Bob") responding to the article as a result of trying to teach "Industrial Arts/Technology Education" for 28 years in NYC high schools, under an indifferent/hostile city administration & education department.

"For a New York paper, I notice few local comments.  While stereotypes about affluent/effete New Yorkers abound, the majority of us struggle to get by and the many of us try keep our aging cars on the road just a little longer, in a city that leaves the majority of its residents poorly served by mass transit. While much of the upscale NPR audience appreciates the Magliozzi brothers' sophisticated humor, many folks miss the interaction between mechanical wisdom with intellectual wit and heartfelt humanity.

All to often, we don't expect to find these qualities in the same person (or garage, for that matter).  But these a 3 fields of human should interact more, but due to our intellectual prejudices against those that inhabit the mechanical/physical world, those inhabitants are rarely allowed to appear in the public eye as fully rounded humans. Mechanical literacy, one of many valuable intelligences, was once offered as varied shop electives to all students in our academic schools. The "applied" arts (ceramics, auto shop, culinary arts, wood shop) complemented the "fine" arts, along with academics in a rounded education.

The current politically mandated corporate-style "school reform" with its focus on testing, data and accountability has resulted in the "narrowing" of the curriculum, eliminating much of what is not tested.

Here in NYC, scores of large, comprehensive community high schools. that have educated generations of New Yorkers, have been closed, over the objections of students, parents and their communities. Their former buildings have been crammed with 5 to 7 charter and mini schools who fight each other over limited space, facilities and resources. None of these new schools has any interest or space for these electives. I have seen dozens of modern, fully equipped shops dismantled at the request of the new, incoming schools who wanted the space for classrooms. This is going on in other cities as well. Where will our future "Car Talk" hosts and articulate callers come from? Not from our cities anymore!"

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The opinions expressed on EdNotesOnline are solely those of Norm Scott and are not to be taken as official positions (though Unity Caucus/New Action slugs will try to paint them that way) of any of the groups or organizations Norm works with: ICE, GEM, MORE, Change the Stakes, NYCORE, FIRST Lego League NYC, Rockaway Theatre Co., Active Aging, The Wave, Aliens on Earth, etc.

The DOE Special Education Passover Plot

Thou shalt not put SPED or ELLs in charters

The LORD BLOOMBERG said to his knave Dennis Walcott, "Yet one plague more I will bring upon the public schools. I deem neighborhood public schools shall accept all children with special needs whilst I deny them adequate resources to service such needs.” 

June 8, 2012 -- Norm in The Wave -- www.rockawave.com


The DOE Special Education Passover Plot
By Norm Scott

The LORD BLOOMBERG said to his knave Dennis Walcott, "Yet one plague more I will bring upon the public schools. I deem neighborhood public schools shall accept all children with special needs whilst I deny them adequate resources to service such needs.” And Walcott said, "Thus says the LORD BLOOMBERG. I will go forth in the midst of the public schools and all of them shall die (eventually), especially those with the most senior and highest paid teachers. But against any of the people of charter schools, either man or beast, not a dog shall growl; that you may know that the LORD BLOOMBERG makes a distinction between the evil unionized public schools and the good non-unionized charter schools.”

And the LORD BLOOMBERG thus saith to his servant Walcott: “Tell every charter school to take the leg of a lamb and smear the blood of doth lamb on the doorpost, so the angel of death of the public schools shall know to pass IEPs over the charter school and not deposit even one child with an IEP (or English Language Learner either) in saith charter school.

"And parents of children in classes with high class sizes shall be mixed with such children that require more intense help than they shall receiveth and thus overburdened teachers shall not be able to give such attention to all children and parents of such children shall get perturbed and blame and degrade and defame such public schools and seek out charter schools while I send my knave Walcott to smite such public schools into closure and turn such buildings built with public funding into the hands of doth privatizer charter school management organizations which shall taketh a 15% commission for services and make sure to pay extremely high salaries to all who run such charter schools. Thus I have spoken.”

And Walcott doth did as he was told, as he always doth does when LORD BLOOMBERG doth speak to him.

=====================
OK, so let’s get serious. The Bloomberg education destruction machine has ordained major changes in special education that will put special needs children in regular classrooms in neighborhood schools, but with little of the support they truly need, thus burdening classroom teachers and school administrators even further with even more responsibilities. Parents may even be pressured to support modifications of their children’s IEPs (Individual Education Plans mandated by law for children with special needs) that will lesson the services they really need.

I received this email from Mona Davids, who ironically heads an independent charter school parent advocacy group, NY Charter Parents Association (NYCPA).

We need your help and our teachers' help. DOE is implementing destructive, unproven special education "reforms" this September with no support for parents and teachers.

To summarize:
• The DOE is implementing special education reforms beginning this September that will deny children with IEP’s their mandated classes, services and support.
• The DOE is implementing these reforms forcing students with IEP’s to attend their neighborhood school even though the schools do not have enough trained, professional general & special education teachers and cannot provide the mandated classes, services and support required by law in the IEP’s.
• The DOE’s reforms will not improve student achievement because they do
not support research based effective practices.
• The DOE is decreasing the funding for full-time integrated co-teaching services and full-time special classes forcing principals to coerce parents to change their child’s IEP because they don’t have money to provide all mandated services and supports.
• The DOE is implementing these reforms without notifying all parents about these reforms affecting general education and special education students in September.
• The DOE is violating Special Education law and our most vulnerable children’s civil rights by sending students with disabilities into schools that are not prepared to meet their needs.

We need to get word out about these destructive reforms. It's not fair to our children and it's not fair to our teachers.

Supplement: since I wrote the column June 6, Mona has sent out more materials plus a comment from Loretta Prisco. First Loretta:

Norm,

 

There are some significant points missing in the discussion of special ed. "reforms".

 

When Walcott visited D.31, I asked the following question:

 

The money follows the child. If a child's IEP mandates a 12:1:1 but there are only 7 children in the neighborhood school who need these services, how will the school pay for it?

 

The response: the situation "escalates" to the network leader. If the network leader cannot help, it "escalates" to the DOE.  To me, though not stated in the response,  that means that the network leader and DOE will tell them what to cut and how to change IEPs.  They never never said that funding would be given to meet the mandates.

 

If they continue to rate/punish/close schools as they do now, the idea is not a bad one.  For the most part, Special ed kids do not score as well as general ed. That is why they need services and are in special ed.!   When one school gets too many special ed. kids as some do now, their scores go way down. In addition, by necessity, because of labeling schools, the school often focuses on the learning and behaviors of special ed., and general ed is slighted. That was the case in almost every SURR school -their spec. ed. population was over 25%.  Superintendents did that to prevent the number of "failing" schools.  Limit the number of schools that have special ed in your district and you limit the number of "failing"schools. 

 

In addition, they will be able to cut teachers with "creative"programming. Program all of the kids in one class for mainstreaming in the same period and the teacher will be free.   Program all of a class for  SETSS in the same period and the teacher now has another "free"period. Send them to  related services during the same period and there is another "free" period.  Send them to chorus, art, lunch, gym without the self contained teacher.  This will loosen up the self contained teachers program and he/she can cover 3-5 self contained classes in a 12:1 or 8:1 setting in one day.  This can be done in larger elementary school, but more of a challenge.

 

 

Loretta

And Mona:

Yet, the DOE is still moving forward. Unacceptable. Join us at our press conference demanding the DOE stop violating the rights of students with special needs. These "reforms" must be delayed until they've sorted the issues out. Parents should not be forced to change their child's IEP to suit the school budget!  Press conference June 12, 12 noon at City Hall.

 Daily News

ARISE Coalition says schools not prepared adequately for reforms involving students with special needs


System-wide effort in 2013 to move students with disabilities into mainstream classes

Support Class Size Matters Skinny Award Dinner - June 12, 6 PM

If you like the work Leonie Haimson does this is her annual event to raise funds. Did you know she has a fabulous intern who assists her? Don't make Ellie work for nothing. Even if you are not going send in a contribution. If you watch what Leonie does all the time, she is the best defender teachers have.

Why are they called the "Skinny" Awards? Because Eli Broad gives out his ed deform awards.

I met Leonie about a decade ago through a teacher at the Delegate Assembly who read Ed Notes and suggested we had a lot in common. Few people knew who she was at the time. Since then she has become a rock star. I was the one who suggested she start a blog because her work was so good it seemed the world should know about it (I want that on my tombstone). She introduced me to Patrick Sullivan and Diane Ravitch. She is now nationally connected through Parents Across America with other parents around the nation just like her. Amazing -- there are lots of Leonies, but our one and only here in NYC.

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MORE

Police Estimate 400 at Pearson Field Test Protest

Pearson Rally Pics here

What a day. What a rally this morning. I'll just let the press stories and the pics I took tell the story. Video is processing tonight and I'll try to get a piece up tomorrow. Look for Jaisal Noor's professional version next week. I met loads of new people today and would love to write about it but too late and I need some sleep. I did head up to Central Park after to hang with some of the amazing parent activists and then over to the MORE education committee meeting that covered 2 chapters of Diane Ravitch's book -- we had a great session talking about high stakes testing and accountability. I stopped by the E4E meeting with John King on the way out and of course I was banned for not being a member and when I tried giving out my  leaflet they called security on me and thet told me I had to stand outside despite the fact this CUNY is a building I pay taxes for and not a play tool of private interests. Then I saw press going in  - E4E doesn't allow teachers in who don't sign the pledge but anyone in the press can go -- except me of course. Evan Stone lied to security by saying press had to sign up in advance to be allowed in but every member of the press told me that wasn't so. Should E4E be banned from CUNY events for making up stories to security? I will file an official complaint.

Here are some stories on the protest. My pics are here. See more on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/436323489726279/

http://dianeravitch.net/2012/06/07/parent-to-pearson-let-my-child-learn/

http://www.ny1.com/content/top_stories/162683/schools-boycott-latest-round-of-standardized-testing

http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2012/06/07/parents-and-students-say-enough-to-more-testing/

WSJ: Parents Protest High-Stakes Exams Outside Testing Company Offices

NY Daily News: Parents and students protest dummy exams by ‘talking pineapple’ test-maker

Pearson Rally Pics

I'm putting up some text in a separate post. Here are 24 pics. What a great event.
Also see:  www.parentvoicesny.org/