Carol Burris With a Lesson for E4E and the UFT

Remember when Leo Casey led the UFT/AFT assault on principals like Carol Burris, one principal I would come out of retirement to work for (see my one-on-one interview with her from May 2012) for eviscerating the ed eval deal the union made with the State Ed Department?

Here is a great piece I missed during the Sandy recovery. I put together a leaflet with this article for a handout at the E4E rally at City Hall park today at 2PM. I will follow up with more on the rally and the fast developing ad hoc counter rally in the works.

Valerie Strauss at The Answer Sheet:

The newest rhetoric on teacher evaluation — and why it is nonsense

November 13, 2012

Carol Burris is the award-winning principal of South Side High School in Rockville Centre, New York, and a frequent Answer Sheet blogger. She just underwent an ordeal as a result of Hurricane Sandy. Yet even while dealing with all of this Carol Burris still keeps writing about the negative effects of school reform. Here she looks at the newest popular rhetoric on teacher evaluation — and explains why it is nonsense. Burris is the co-author of the New York Principals letter of concern regarding the evaluation of teachers by student test scores, which has been signed by more than 1,500 New York principals and more than 5,400 teachers, parents, professors, administrators and citizens. You can read the letter by clicking here.

By Carol Burris

As a high school principal, it is my job to evaluate teachers. I take this responsibility very seriously — it helps ensure that our students receive the rich opportunities to learn that they deserve. With strong teachers, evaluation may entail reaffirming good practice, supporting innovative practice and facilitating ways for them to share their expertise with their colleagues. For novices or those who struggle, we work to improve their practice and, when necessary, to counsel them out or let them go.

It is because instruction is so important that the sweeping generalizations and false assumptions that have fueled recent teacher evaluation policies are of such concern to teachers and school leaders alike.  The waves of misinformation about evaluation undermine confidence in our schools and result in “solutions” based on opinion and gut-level hunches, not research evidence.

The recent Phi Delta Kappan opinion piece, entitled “Million Dollar Baby,” is an example of the misguided critiques that appear all too often.

Let me begin by saying that I have always been a fan of the Kappan, which skillfully takes scholarly research and makes it accessible to educators who do not have time to pore over academic journals. Despite that fine track record, the generalizations that form the argument in this month’s editor’s note cannot go unaddressed.   It is time to get the record straight and address three common fallacies that dominate the new rhetoric on teacher evaluation:

 1. Every former teacher evaluation system was the same and that unitary system was terrible. To quote from the opinion piece, “Unfortunately educators must bear the bulk of the blame for allowing such a lousy system to exist.” In reality, there was never one evaluation system nor was every system “lousy.” Rather, each school district has had its own system of teacher evaluation, and some of those have been better than others. That doesn’t mean, of course, that we don’t have substantial room for improvement. But it does mean that it’s ridiculous to start a reform discussion with the contention that all districts should abandon their evaluation system regardless of its track record. I would wager, for instance, that Kappan’s editor would agree that the Montgomery County Maryland School System has a nationally acclaimed system, and that Cincinnati Schools had a system, before Race to the Top, that has been shown to not only improve the craft of teachers but to increase student achievement. Neither system incorporated test scores. In the small districts on Long Island, most of us did an excellent job evaluating teachers—dismissing probationers who do not merit tenure, helping teachers continue to develop, working with and counseling those who needed to improve or to leave the profession, and building on the strength of even our most expert practitioners.  Among Long Island principals, you will find few fans of New York State’s new evaluation systems, based on APPR.

   2. Tenure is the problem. It is a job for life and it is unique to teaching. The Kappan editorial states that tenure is one of the “unique privileges that teachers enjoy.” But in truth due process before dismissal (tenure) is not unique to teaching. In fact, it is more difficult for a principal to dismiss a custodian due to civil service protection than it is to dismiss a teacher. Civil servants enjoy seniority rights, probation periods, salary schedules, and due process rights for dismissal just like teachers. Civil servants, who are broadly defined as those who work for government, include librarians, police officers, firefighters, transit workers,  secretaries, and accountants.  Due process should not be understood or practiced as a “job for life,” but it should remove the threat of political or arbitrary dismissals.

 There are excellent reasons for such protections. The civil service was established in the late 1800s because prior to its establishment, government jobs were given to political supporters as spoils. The protections were put into place to make sure that public employees were hired on merit and could not be dismissed on the whims of the incoming administration. This remains a concern. Public schools are run by politicians—in some cases by mayors, in other cases by elected boards of education.

 As an alternative to tenure, the Kappan editorial suggests that teachers “should receive a contract for a limited period of time, say three or five years”.  Although this may sound reasonable, consider the clear consequences. Without the protection of tenure, educators could be dismissed for not pleasing the interests of powerful parents. They could be dismissed in order to bring in friends and relatives of newly elected mayors or board members.  Teachers could be pressured to pass students who did not deserve to pass a class or be pressured to not discipline a student when warranted. Presently, there is one person in every district who works on a renewable contract: the superintendent. Nationally, the average time that a superintendent stays in a district is seven years. For an urban superintendent it is fewer than three years. And the constant turnover of superintendents does not serve students or schools well.  Tenure promotes stability and community in our schools.  Teacher turnover, even when it is the less effective teachers who leave, has a negative effect on student achievement. Likewise it has been found that churn in the principalship is not good for schools. Such instability does not  promote excellence and the courage to make the tough decisions that are not politically popular but serve the best interests of students. Again, this isn’t an argument against pursuing ways to streamline the dismissal process; it’s an argument against poorly thought through changes.

 3. High-stakes evaluations are fine as long as they do not rely on a single measure.  This is the new popular rhetoric. It is a partial acknowledgement of the many problems associated with using students’ test scores and growth models in teacher evaluations, problems that have been repeatedly documented. And yet the Kappan editor and others still insist on the inclusion of students’ test scores in teacher evaluation. Multiple measures are indeed wise, but the effects of including any given measure need to be understood. Current policies do in fact place test scores in a prominent role, one for which they are not valid or reliable and because of which school districts can expect to be (justifiably) challenged in court by dismissed teachers (as explained in another article in the same November issue of the Kappan). The troubling reality is that these policies will promote teaching to standardized tests and a narrowing of the curriculum.  

 The editorial suggests that we also include other untested ingredients, such as student surveys, in the evaluation mix. We should do this, apparently, even though there is as of yet no reliable research base to support the idea. As a high school principal, I thoroughly enjoy working with teenagers. I find their opinions to be frank and refreshing. But I do not think it is fair or wise to give 14 year olds a formal role in teacher evaluation. It is bad enough that we are undermining the student-teacher relationship by basing evaluations on those students test scores.

 The magazine’s editor concludes by asserting that “every classroom should have excellent teaching every hour of every day.” I would add that every child should also have an excellent parent who serves them excellent food and provides them with an excellent home in an excellent neighborhood. Let’s also add excellent healthcare and excellent supervision every hour of every day as well. If we could accomplish all of that, we would have the highest achieving students on earth. But the rhetoric itself accomplishes little. What we need are research-based policies supported by lawmakers willing to provide the necessary resources.

 In the meantime, while we wait for those wise lawmakers to emerge, perhaps we all could back off and allow teachers to enjoy the same humanity we seem to graciously grant to others. Teachers aren’t perfect, but I must tell you that nearly all of the teachers that I have met over the years are darn good at what they do. And the variation in their skill is no wider than the variation that I have observed in other professions whose evaluations we never seem to discuss. Let’s look to improve evaluation systems as well as other parts of our schools. But could we stay within reasonable bounds of critique based on fact and research? If we do not stop this constant drumbeat of criticism there will be no one left to evaluate with our new excellent-every-hour-every-day evaluation systems.

Rockaway Update: A Visit to The Wave, Occupy Sandy and Change the Stakes

I took a second day off from doing any work around the house on Friday. A sign that things are moving towards normal was a decision to attend the 5:30 meeting of Change the Stakes, one of my favorite groups of people which includes teachers, parents and principals (Carol Burris is an active participant on the listserve) and West Side HS principal Jean McTavish, a fierce opponent of high stakes testing.

I headed over to the offices of The Wave to pick up some copies of the paper -- the entire office was wiped out including all the bound volumes going back to 1893 -- a real tragedy. I was intending to use them for research I was planning to do on a Rockaway-based novel I started working on a few years go. I don't know how far back they digitized stuff. They had set up on the 2nd floor and it was so good to see publisher Susan Locke bustling about, so proud they were back up and running and being able to put out a 67 page issue. The Wave had published every week since 1893 until Sandy hit. It began life after a storm and fire destroyed whole areas of Rockaway back then.

I grabbed a batch of papers and headed over to the Occupy Sandy location on Rockaway Beach Blvd on that stretch between 116th and 108th right near where an entire block of stores had burned down -- The Wave reported that they left the oven on at Papa John's pizza when they abandoned ship and only the new concrete built social security office stopped the fire from spreading. Paul, my mechanic is located in that stretch near 109th and I hope he survives -- a really great guy.

The sad news is that the amazing Brown's Hardware, a Rockaway treasure on 116th St may not reopen as they lost all their inventory. This is a major tragedy for Rockaway --- in my opinion, the single most valuable business for the community. A hardware store owned and run by women -- I hope there is money out there for them to come back.

Anyway, I stopped at Occupy Sandy which has a few spaces running on generators -- they were getting ready to pour a new concrete floor. They were so busy I really couldn't stay. The guy I spoke to is good pals with Kelley Wolcott, a chapter leader who has been a stalwart of the Occupy movement, is also working with MORE. He said Kelley has been coming out on weekends.

More normal:  I headed into the city while my wife went off for her first post-Sandy mahjong game. I had to make an appointment with my doctor, Richard Mark, who I hadn't seen since June 2011. I've been avoiding him because I knew he would yell at me for being so fat and out of shape -- and my refusal to take cholesterol medication. Well, it's been a tough year and a half --- broken wrist took me out for 4 months, father's death, home renovation, two 2-week vacations, all the political activity and more. So how am I going to spend a lot of time at a gym and also eat well? But I had to go since over the past 3 days I've had severe heartburn and acid reflex --- my chest hurt like hell when I ate --- and that shrimp parm from Thursday night did not help.

While in the waiting room I got calls from a Geiko tow guy looking to find my wife's car -- good luck I told him but it seems he found it -- and a FEMA guy who wanted to know just how homeless I am. I told him "no worries" since FEMA had already sent us a check for 2400 for what I know not but it will cover 2 days of electrical work.

Dr. Mark told me right off I was going to get beat up by him for being so bad. I told him our story and he told me that he has been going out to Rockway every weekend to volunteer. The first time he tried to do some medical stuff but there was no organization so then he just came out to clean out basements. He worked with a gal from the east village wearing a Mormon vest. He was curious about Mormonism in the east village and she said she really wasn't a Mormon but since she caught a ride on a Mormon bus they gave her the yellow vest. Aha, so this vast horde of Mormons may not all be what they seem.

Finally, I was off for a bite before the Change the Stakes meeting, which was at 5:30. As usual, there was a great crowd and variety of people and a very productive 2 hours. Andrea Mata, a parent from Washington Heights,  has helped run the group so effectively. And having people like Leonie Haimson, Fred Smith and Jean McTavish among others tossing off so much info is invaluable.

CTS is involved in so many activities that I can't keep track. Coming up: This Tues at 5:30 a meeting with Bill Ayers -- yes that Bill Ayers -- see the announcement on Ed Notes tomorrow and a major event in Dec. 10 moderated by Juan Gonzalez with MORE's Brian Jones and CTS Diane Zavala on a panel with Pedro Noguera and the DOE's Shael Surakow-Polansky. Just check the CTS website for info: changethestakes.org

Tonight: Off to see Garrison Keillor and Prairie Home Companion at Town Hall followed by dinner at Havana Central where I expect to emerge with just a tinge of heartburn.

From Robert Rendo: a short essay on profit and priorities

Public Education has long become a billion dollar industry, according to a report put out way back in 2007 by Thomas Meldon, professor in the Benerd School of Education at the University of the Pacific in California, and editor of Teacher Education Quarterly, and Bruce A. Jones, professor and director of the David C. Anchin Center at the University of South Florida.

In their fact finding, they state that companies that produce educational materials and supplies were (then) over the billion dollar threshold, with product lines rapidly expanding.

Fast forward almost 6 years later and in the perfect storm of NCLB and Race to the Top, profits are at a record high while teacher's pedagogical autonomy and basic job rights remain at an all time low.

Ultimately, children absorb this "system" as they're being jam packed into assembly line style teaching with frequent and numerous tests. The extent of testing narrows the curriculum by paying far less attention to the arts, foreign languages, athletics, and civics.

The high stakes testing culture created by the ruling power elite, most of whom are not educators or cognitive scientists, stands only to de-prioritize any discipline not measured by a standardized test. And it stands to reason that among the cruelest ironies of all is that standardized tests, which are empirically full of flaws and distortions, can never capture the truest, most accurate picture of a child's abilities. Yet, they dominate the landscape of a student's and teacher's worthiness. For now, the testing companies conjure up the imagery of a crass monster, a hideously writhing, wounded dragon that refuses to expire, thrashing its psychometric tail in a frenzy of might and will.

Upton Sinclair's "The Concrete Jungle" described the horrible working conditions inside Chicago's Meat packing industry, but the educational testing complex is fast producing the same tone of darkness, productivity, and obedience inside public schools. The love of learning is left to fester in the thick and grimy heat generated by the sweatshop of test-to-death academics. Such vapid curriculums will only dumb down future generations, marginalize labor rights, and fatten the pockets of upper end executive of these so called "education products and service" industries.

For fiscal year 2011, Pearson alone pulled in over one and a half billion dollars in income from its testing and publishing services. Add Pearson to other educational service companies, and one can realize an industrial complex that costs taxpayers several billion dollars annually while compromising the quality of education for the masses.

Rockaway Update: THE WAVE IS BACK - Bloomberg Visits

I got a call last night from one of the leaders of Occupy who I met last year -- he found my business card and realizing I lived out here and wrote for The Wave called. "Our Occupy Sandy crew said Bloomberg visited The Wave," he said and wanted to know what I knew. Apparently Bloomberg's visit was somewhat secretive and most of the press corps didn't know about it. So he hung out at The Wave office for an exclusive interview.

The Wave is out today with its first print edition and it is FREE. I may resume my column next week or the week after. The fact that Bloomberg went there is recognition of the importance of The Wave to Rockaway.

Here is the Wave temp web site with links to all the stories.
http://m.rockawave.com/news/2012-11-30/top_stories

And here is the Bloomberg interview. He talks about the city workers and the job they did and he is totally on target. Special credit goes to the Sanitation Dept which has been working 24-7 to clean this place up. Without them we would be way behind.

Concrete Boardwalk For Rockaway On Tap

Mayor Visits Wave For Exclusive Interview

 

At The Wave office on Thursday, from left, City Councilman Eric Ulrich; Director of Operations Caz Holliway, Wave General Manager Sanford Bernstein; Wave Publisher Susan Locke, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Chief Service Officer Diahann Billings- Burford. Mayor Michael Bloomberg dropped into The Wave’s temporary office on the second floor in its washed-out building on Thursday to talk about the issues facing Rockaway in the wake of Superstorm Sandy, which inundated the peninsula a month ago.

The discussion was wide-ranging and inclusive and the mayor, his aides and City Councilman Eric Ulrich were expansive in their comments.
On reconstructing the iconic Rockaway boardwalk:
“I guess this settles the issue of wooden boardwalks versus concrete boardwalks. There will be no more wooden boardwalks in Rockaway or anywhere else. I don’t know that we can reconstruct the boardwalk before this summer, but it will be done,”
On city workers:
“I am proud of what our city work-ers did during and after the storm. The things that the city had control over went well. Our workers did what our taxpayers had the right to have done for them. They all worked hard and did a great job.”
On bringing back business:.
“Business has now become our number one priority. Business means that people will have a place to shop – to buy food and gas, to go to a restaurant. It also means jobs for those who got laid off because their job no longer exists. We are talking to small business to insure that we do all we can to get them back running, including private money, city money and Small Business Administration loans.”
On evacuating the peninsula prior to the storm:
“We told everybody to evacuate and a large chunk of the population did. Many did not. We thought of sending cops around and taking people out of their homes, but we rejected that. We believe that people thought that we were crying wolf, but now they know better.”
On Schools:
“Somewhere in the vicinity of 50 to 60 schools were damaged and did not open when the vacation ended. We are down to five and most of them will be open in early January.”
On Looting Problem:
There was no real looting. There was a problem with burglary of homes that were dark and abandoned, but that is different than looting. Given the context of the devastation that we suffered, there was virtually no looting and local district attorneys have dismissed most of the looting arrests that were made initially.”
On the lack of electricity:
“Rockaway would have been better off if it had Con Edison rather than LIPA. National Grid is also not too great and does not even have good records about its customers. We concentrated on the larger buildings and then moved to homes. We started our Rapid Repair program to help homeowners back on line and those who signed up got the work done and paid for by FEMA. The program got emergency and potentially dangerous things taken care of – heat, hot water and electricity. More than 10,000 people signed up for the program and we have 150 teams working. We could use 500 teams.”
On issue of rebuilding in a waterfront area:
“People have to make their own decisions because there is obviously a risk in living near the water. If people don’t want to live here anymore, they can sell their property and I am sure that somebody will want to buy it.”
On the A Train:
“The trestle over Jamaica Bay was badly damaged and it will take a long time to fix it. This is not a city project, so I really can’t talk about it knowledgeably, but I do know it will take some time.”
On his continuing role in the storm’s aftermath:
“I can’t predict the future. That’s impossible to do. My job now is to make sure everybody is safe for the next 397 days and then I will be unemployed and it will be somebody else’s problem.”

2012-11-30 / Top Stories

 

 

Support Teachers Unite "Growing Fairness" Film on School to Prison Pipeline

Talk about school to prison pipeline? I once got a Thanksgiving Day collect call from an upstate prison from one of my favorite former students serving 15 to life (he got out after 28 years) who after a brief conversation handed the phone over to another fave who then told me there were 9 guys from the same buildings in the cell block.

I guess I didn't know it at the time but with some of my toughest kids I must have been doing some restorative justice given that generally I had good relations with these kids, I think because I wasn't judging them, only a specific behavior.


 

Not to preach once again, but there is some value in a teaching career working in one neighborhood school (in my case for 27 years) and learning lots of lessons over time. The ed deform destruction of neighborhood schools and the promotion of a teacher turnover corps (don't be dumb and stay in the classroom, go into ed policy) is making that impossible. Enough preaching.

Sally Lee of Teachers Unite uses the video below to present a project aimed to reverse the trend of turning schools into prison-like atmospheres full of police and metal detectors. TU has re-focused its attempts towards restorative justice, which can help change the climate in the relationships between teachers and children with difficult behavior patterns.

I know that some teachers want more police, suspensions, metal detectors, etc. and I know that things are often out of control. But we do not have rational people running the school system and many schools. Throwing kids out or using extreme punishment on damaged kids has no long term benefit to society or to individual teachers. I felt like a total failure when I failed with some kids and I soared when I was successful -- sorry, I never defined success as raising a test score but as being able to move child emotionally in a more positive direction -- which by the way often --- though not always -- moved the test score too.

Sally's husband Josh Heisler writes of his experience:

I am convinced that working with students and adults to resolve the daily problems that arise in the course of a week in a just and caring way is so much better than a authoritarian, top down approach that you see in most schools. The community that can exist in school is really special and practices like fairness go a long way to build these communities. I've learned that this all takes a lot work, caring communities are hard to build and even harder to maintain. It can get messy and complicated. One thing is for sure, you have to reestablish fairness at a school year after year. Students and teachers have to experience this alternative discipline model before they can see its benefits and appreciate the community it builds.

So give Teachers Unite a hand with this project and one day you might find yourself in the role of Androchles facing an angry lion who has been told of your kindness (I know, I know, this was a stretch).

There are only 16 days left to raise the $20,000 and they are a quarter of the way there. I've already sent in my hundred bucks so I can get the tee-shirt.

Here is the donation web site: http://www.indiegogo.com/GrowingFairness?c=home

And check out this infographic:

Growing Fairness is a short documentary film and companion guide for educators and community members looking to change their school climate for the better. Featuring teachers and students, Growing Fairness will tell a story about school climate, restorative practices and their real impact on young people in New York.

We're so excited about this project that we've already started filming interviews, and before this Indiegogo campaign is through, we will have developed a storyboard for the documentary and outlined the companion toolkit, which will provide concrete resources developed by teachers for school communities to use in making a transformational shift away from suspensions and policing and toward student leadership and community empowerment.

The success of this Indiegogo campaign will determine the quality, scope and impact of Growing Fairness. Your donation will give us the ability to gather more interviews and resources from across the country to give an inspiring look at how whole school districts have taken action and introduced restorative justice to public education. Your donation will also enable us to host screenings and teacher-led workshops with communities across the country, expanding our distribution as well as the impact of the project.

Please help us make our vision a reality. Teachers Unite is a 501(c)(3) organization, so your donations will be tax deductible.

campaign? http://www.indiegogo.com/GrowingFairness/x/1696300?c=home

Quick Update: Michael Fiorillo just sent this:

"Isolation Rooms" in Elementary Schools: Are They Treatment or Punishment?
Take a look at the photo in the story and you'll see that the question posed by the title needn't be asked.

http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/isolation-rooms-elementary-schools-are-they-treatment-or-punishment

The Nation on Rockaway and Occupy Sandy

Great piece on Rockaway in The Nation.

I'm getting closer to finishing up the work I have to do to get closer to normal and I'm hoping to get over to Occupy Sandy at YANA out here to lend a hand. But at the rate they are going helping people they may be done before I am.

By the way -- rumor out there that Bloomberg came out by helicopter today and went to The Wave offices. Gotta do some checking on that.

The Nation: http://www.thenation.com/blog/171499/photoessay-sandy-ravaged-rockaways-one-month-out?rel=emailNation#

PHOTOESSAY: The Sandy-Ravaged Rockaways, One Month Out

Ayasha Guerin on November 28, 2012 - 4:02 PM ET

In the wake of one of the worst hurricanes to ever hit the East Coast, stories have surfaced about the phenomenal job Occupy Sandy has done to bring relief to some of the most affected sites in the New York area. For anyone who has not experienced the organized chaos that have marked Sandy volunteer efforts, it may seem surprising that Occupy, the group which US media outlets have criticized for disorganization and lack of clarity, has emerged as one of the most effective implementers of hurricane relief efforts.

Not only does Occupy continue to successfully manage two major distribution hubs in Brooklyn, which daily disperse thousands of materials to other hurricane relief sites, but Occupy volunteers have proven their ability to provide aid to affected populations even when government agencies have not.

While FEMA was setting up its relief stations miles from some of the most vulnerable populations, Occupy volunteers were hiking up dark stairwells in buildings without power, bringing supplies and medical aid directly to doors. When FEMA abandoned relief efforts during the nor’easter which hit the region shortly after Sandy, Occupy volunteers were still on the ground, dispersing supplies and helping residents clear out their waterlogged homes. Pictures snapped since then have documented FEMA workers turning to Occupy organizers for information about how to best serve the neediest communities.

Ironically, one year after its organizers were routinely rounded up by the NYPD for arrest, Occupy has turned out to be the most invaluable asset to New York’s largely unprepared first responders during this $42 billion crisis. The aftermath of this hurricane has proven that the months of group discussions and deliberation surrounding economic justice in Zuccotti Park last year were not “occupied” in vain. Today, anyone who walks into one of these Sandy relief centers will see those same communication systems in use.

Volunteerism in the Rockaways is a brilliant example of Occupy’s mutual aid in action. The Rockaways’ narrow strip of land, which juts westward at the bottom of the Long Island peninsula between Jamaica Bay and the Atlantic Ocean, is one of the areas hit hardest by Sandy. At one point during the storm, the water from the bay and the ocean met on the Rockaway peninsula, filling the first story of many homes and storefronts with water and destroying hundreds of parked cars. Streets were left filled with piles of sand. It is also an area where Occupy’s organized volunteerism has had the biggest presence.

The surge also twisted the A train tracks off their course, which stripped residents and visitors without cars of their main means of commuting to and from the rest of the city. Immediately, the Rockaways were at a volunteer disadvantage because of its now (even more) remote location. One of Occupy’s first major contributions to volunteer relief was to establish St. Jacobi Church in Sunset Park as a place where volunteers could self-organize carpools.
At the end of each day, volunteers make sure everyone who makes the trip down has a ride back to Sunset Park before dark. On multiple occasions, I have asked a volunteering stranger if they knew of a ride back to Brooklyn. Each time, word would travel to another stranger, who would walk up to me to offer a free seat. That is the power of mutual aid.

Once volunteers and supplies make it to the Rockaways, there are several locations where one may go to drop off or pick up materials like cleaning products and yard tools along the peninsula. The main Occupy hub in the Rockaways is located at the YANA community center on Rockaway Beach Blvd, between Beach 113th and 112th streets.

YANA, which stands for You Are Never Alone, opened as a worker training facility only a week before Sandy hit. Barely surviving a massive fire that destroyed the block of property just a few storefronts west of its own facilities, YANA was badly water damaged and required a complete gutting. Occupy volunteers and Greenpeace members came together at the site to support the effort. Now, powered by Greenpeace solar energy generators, the entire block hosts medical relief. hot food and the supply center where volunteers keep lists of residents who call in for assistance, whether it be a medical need, material request, or a need for manual labor.


The volunteers at the YANA site then assign people to attend to each request. Partnership efforts made with local organizations and small businesses have connected Occupy volunteers with local residents, who play a critical role in advising the unfamiliar eyes and ears, creating a relaxed, shared learning environment amid overwhelming scenes of destruction.

One YANA site volunteer, Rasul Murry, explained that Occupy Sandy volunteers are beginning to understand both the short-term and a long-term scope of needs in the Rockaways. Partnerships with local organizations and faith centers have spurred discussions about ways to support local leadership, during the storm cleanup and beyond.
“Something impressive is that we see residents go in to supply centers for help and then later come back to volunteer,” Murry explained. “There is real evidence of the beginnings of a local infrastructure that can begin to look at the longer-term needs of the disaster that Rockaway has seen for several decades.”
Murry is referring, in part, to the razing of large swaths of beach bungalows during New York’s period of urban renewal that produced large vacant land plots, and their recent infill by mass suburban style luxury condominiums, which are generally seen as paying little respect to local community needs.

Tenants on the peninsula tell me they suspect the recent real estate surge has prompted some Rockaway building owners to prefer that their properties be condemned. This way they may stop providing services to tenants, collect insurance, destroy property and repurpose it for profit. “My landlady, she’s from Brooklyn and she wants me out. She knows she can make a lot more money off someone new to the Rockaway Beach area, so she’s not turning the heat or electricity back on. She says she wants me out by the end of the month,” one resident explained.
Among the Occupy volunteers are a few lawyers who are helping organize rent strikes and pushing for mechanisms whereby the government will not condemn a building without prosecuting the landlord for failure to provide services. Murray added, “We need to assure that residents have a long lasting real voice and that Rockaway recovery does not become a replication of New Orleans, not an opportunity to systematically remove people of color.”

The horizontal leadership model used by Occupy (wherein no one is “in charge,” and volunteers may start initiatives without the official clearance of a head figure), on the one hand, makes it difficult to know if the organizing is as effective as it could be. On the other, it's working at least as well as other, more traditional relief efforts and much better than most.

A Sandy Relief Resources newsletter was started recently by a few volunteers and distributed in South Brooklyn, South Queens (including the Rockaways) and Staten Island. The newsletter provides information about disaster unemployment and hiring opportunities, staying warm without heat, emergency snap benefits, FEMA disaster relief, cleaning up, shelters and care and food and supplies. Another similar publication that came out of the Occupy splinter organization Strike Debt is the Debt Resistors’ Operations Manual, which provides tips to those who will have to take out FEMA loans to rebuild their destroyed properties. As Murry put it, “the Occupy movement is a sort of organism—it generates cells that move out, bound by a broad supra-ideological consensus.”

Technology has, of course, played a huge role in the success of Occupy Sandy’s relief efforts. At the end of each day, each distribution hub submits a list of needs for the following day to Celly, a website that forwards messages to any cell phone tapped into the social network. The affiliated Twitter and Facebook channels which are updated several times per day to tell volunteers where they are needed and which supplies to bring. Camera phones have also proved useful: a sign taped up in YANA’s headquarters instructs volunteers to “Take a picture of this with your phone,” referring to a map of the Rockaways with relief headquarters marked.

Perhaps it is the adopted motto “Another World is Possible” that has mobilized thousands of volunteers to join the newly directed Occupy movement. “Last year Occupy was criticized for promoting class warfare,” said one first-time volunteer, “It’s much easier to stand behind Occupy now that we are not only critiquing the government’s assistance granted to big banks and business, but are actively stepping in to provide assistance to the individuals and small businesses that are being ignored.” For several volunteers I’ve spoken with, the Occupy Sandy effort is their first experience working within the mutual aid framework.

Occupy volunteers continue to spend donation funds as needed, with an eye towards the future. In times of crisis, New Yorkers do come together, though many residents have expressed worry that as soon as Sandy headlines begin to wane, so too will the much-needed volunteer support and supplies. “The Rockaways is New York’s ugly stepchild,” remarked one resident, expressing frustrations the Rockaway community has had with Mayor Bloomberg’s lack of attention to community concerns, both before and after Sandy hit the peninsula. While the community was still reeling in response to storm damage, the Mayor’s administration was still championing the construction of a natural gas pipeline to be built straight through the Rockaways’ Jacob Riis Park—a move which many environmental groups believe will endanger local wildlife and residents, in light of recent pipeline leaks and explosions elsewhere.

Gasland Filmmaker Josh Fox has been on the ground since Sandy hit to create a documentary “guerilla” film which will air today (November 27, 2012) somewhere in the East Village (text @climatecrime to 23559 to stay in the loop.) Meanwhile, Occupy Sandy intends to hold a long-term occupation in the Rockaways, and will use the donated funds that continue to come in to provide further support for the community’s reconstruction. You can make a donation to the ongoing effort here.

Fight the Moskowitz/Grannis Machine at Public Hearing, Dec. 5, 6PM

Harlem and Williamsburg/Greenpoint have become two of the most lucrative real estate pieces in what they consider "THEIR PORTFOLIO"...
Under the guise of improving schools they have pushed through ridiculous and unproductive co-locations and flooded our community with unwanted and unneeded charter schools. --anon.

I really want to go to this but was already committed to attending a meeting of Change the Stakes with Bill Ayres (see announcement tomorrow). I covered MS 126 as a district 14 tech specialist in the last 4 years I worked.  I have not yet received permission to publish the name of the author so I am keeping it anonymous.

Subject: Community Hearing : December 5th 2012 at MS 126 6:00 PM

It is no secret that the powers that be are out to take over every piece of real estate they can in District #14.

Under the guise of improving schools they have pushed through ridiculous and unproductive co-locations and flooded our community with unwanted and unneeded charter schools.  Make no mistake, this not an accident. It
is a major part of their agenda.  When the charter school cap was raised last year they fought and - everyone caved into them - to maintain the right to expand charter school without a saturation clause.

The reason is at the heart of the struggle: The communities they are flooding with charter schools: 

Harlem and Williamsburg/Greenpoint have become two of the most lucrative real estate pieces in what they consider "THEIR PORTFOLIO".     Just look at the name of the office that handles school closings, co-locations etc. The Office of Portfolio.

Regardless of anybody's opinion or the stated position of any politician or union, Mayoral Control, via the Panel For Educational Policy, amounts to absolute Mayoral authority.

The Panel does as they are told and has never gone against the Mayor since he fired two members for going against his first proposal.  Thus, we can expect that anything proposed, (my guess is that the Mayor and Chancellor draft the proposals for submission) will in fact be passed by the majority, as they are appointed by the Mayor.  We may not like it but that is the reality of the system that has been created and approved by the State Assembly/Senate.

That said, the reason folks like myself were so vocal about the need for the saturation clause is because we are the ones who are now  forced to live with the results of the failure to obtain such a provision.

DISTRICT # 14 IS NOW SATURATED WITH CHARTER SCHOOLS as a result of the failure of everyone to demand such a clause.   So now we are faced with yet another charter school proposal, as well as the threatened closing of one of our neighborhood High Schools.  

To add insult to injury in a case of that does not pass the smell test, Eva Moskowitz' husband Eric Grannis is now trying to open a Citizens of The World Charter School here in District #14,which he hopes to locate at MS 126.  The expansion of such a charter will only serve to drain much needed resources from our District's public schools.   I understand and respect (though I totally disagree with)  the law that allowed the charter school cap to be lifted, however, this latest school would create a situation where almost 1/3 of District #14 students would be in charter schools.  That is not equitable.  It is totally unfair and I believe it is purely political.

If Charters need to expand let it be to other Districts where parents are actually asking for them.  Our CEC is on record as being against any more charters opening in this community.

There will be a mandatory Public Hearing about this proposal.  I doubt that we will be able to change the outcome but  I encourage all of you and the families of public school students to attend.  These schools belong to the communities they serve not any one person's "portfolio".   We went into this to serve the people not run a real estate trust.

Please come out and show your support of Community Public Schools and voice your opinion about the latest proposed charter school.  Today it is MS 126 being proposed for co-location and Juan Morel Campos HS being slated for closure, tomorrow it could be your school or mine.

The Hearing for The Proposed Co-location of Citizens of The World Charter School  at MS 126 will be held on :

Wednesday December 5th at 6 PM
in the Auditorium of
MS 126
424 Leonard Street
Brooklyn, NY

I look forward to seeing you and hearing our parents teachers and school leaders speaking truth to absolute power.

Rockaway Update: Heat, Glorious Heat After Two Different Electricians Show Up

Where do I turn in my absence note for missing yesterday's Delegate Assembly and MORE planning committee meeting?

Note: My boiler is ready to go but the wiring has to be done and Pat the plumber said his electrician will contact us. No word so far.

Wednesday, November 28 went like this:

wishful thinking

Early morning -- I move my new car out of the driveway onto the muddy street. One day and it's already filthy. Rockaway is one giant dust bowl. The cleansing rain didn't cleanse enough.

10AM: Mike the air condition/heating guy sends over a 3 man crew to finish the work of replacing damaged equipment which will give us heat on the main level of the house (we already have the 3 bedrooms working off the individual room heat exchangers. All we need is for Ken the electrician to come and run a new line to the compressor and we could stop hovering over the stove burners, which we are sure is giving us CO2 poisoning. (Excuse me while I take a nap). We also need Ken to start rewiring and reconnecting our power throughout the house so we can stop running extension cords from the garage throughout the house. But my last contact with Ken was not promising. If he ever finishes I would be close to back to normal.

1PM: I'm in the midst of demolishing more sheet rock between basement and den, along with a basement closet that was never taken apart -- and I'm finding some ugly mold. I should have taken care of this before. I figure I could leave for the DA around 2:30. But lo and behold Ken shows up to run the line to the compressor. I practically beg him to connect up some of the lines that didn't get wet. He says maybe if he has time. In the meantime he tells me some bad news. He won't rewire the wet stuff in the basement which powers our entire kitchen/dining room and who knows what else until I clean up the area near the ceiling and spray it for mold. My wife doesn't want these pros in who will toss all kinds of poison around --- they want to use a fogger and we would have to abandon the house for most of a day with the cats. She wants us to mix up a solution of vinegar and water and go at it. She orders a dehumidifier to help dry out the basement. Now we did have some anti mold spraying done when the crew we hired cleaned out the basement just 5 days after the storm. But there's a hell of a lot of remaining grit up near the rafters that has to be sprayed and we have to do that before the new wiring. I'm seeing Xmas with extension cords. Ken says I should cut all the BX cables myself and pull them out. But where do I cut them so he can follow the trail when he comes back? Jeez.

3PM: So as usual I ignore the issue and just keep demolishing -- the DA is slipping away but I am having more fun. I decide to hang around to try to catch Ken who is taking a very long time running and connecting this one cable to see if he would do some more work since he is already here. I go upstairs for a bite and to warn up. When I go back down Ken is gone. The AC crew is still working and since the line is hooked up we will have heat from the main level units by tonight. I have to wait until they finish so I can shut the garage door. If they are gone by 5 I can still leave and make the MORE meeting which will be in some bar where I can drink enough to forget the mold for a few hours.

5PM: The AC guys finish and proudly turn on the heating units on the main level. Glorious feel of warm air gushing out. We now have 5 individual units to heat the entire house other downstairs.

Just as the crew is finishing I get a call from Pat the plumber. "I was supposed to call you earlier in the day. The electrician is on the way and will be there soon." While we are talking Doug the boiler electrican's truck pulls up. Well, there goes the MORE meeting. I figure a half hour to an hour to hook up the 3 thermostats. I have a FIRST LEGO Robotics conf call at 6PM so at least I can do that. It is dark and cold and I have to leave the garage door and den door open so Doug can go back and forth. The new thermostat I bought for the room that was flooded and now without sheet rock or insulation reads 49 degrees. I'm going to try to stay in the basement with Doug to make sure he runs a new wire for that thermostat and also connects each zone to where it us supposed to go -- so that if I turn on the thermostat in the bedroom the heat doesn't come up in the kitchen. "I'm not leaving until this works and you have heat," Doug says. Did I fall into heaven? This morning I had heat in 2 rooms and by tonight I will have 2 separate heating systems working covering the entire house. Boy am I looking forward to Doug finishing so I can have a nice dinner and relax watching TV.

Doug doesn't finish until 11:30PM. Yes, I said 11:30 PM.

I was down in the basement with him almost every step of the way as it got colder and colder. I had no idea of the complexity of this wiring job. The new boilers have so many backup/safety features he has to connect all these weird little color coded wires, in addition to installing all kinds of doo-dads. And then test them. "You mean these are not ready to go?" I ask, naively. Doug spends a lot of time crawling around on the awful floor that 4 weeks ago had almost 8 feet of water. I wander around the basement looking at all the work I have to start doing to clean the grit up off the beams.

We hear all kinds of action on the street all evening -- front loaders and little wildcats racing up and down the street with loads of stuff from demolition on the block.  My wife urges me to get my car back into the driveway. Good idea. We even see a street cleaner come down pushing the dirty mud away from the curb and into the middle of the street -- nice. But he has to go around the car stuck in front of my house. If only my neighbor across the street who had a messed up car towed out of his driveway and in front of my house can get the lying people who are supposed to tow it away to actually come and get it the crap might have been cleaned. It's been there for weeks and they keep promising to take it away.

Doug, who is from Brooklyn but now lives in Jersey, is amazing. Careful and deliberate working through the evening not complaining. If I knew I tell him I would have gotten him pizza -- except there are no pizza places open in Rockaway -- or any food stores nearby. So in sympathy I try not to eat and be as cold as he is -- though I do sneak upstairs every so often to warm up a bit.

Well, I learn a lot from Doug -- at the very least I can hook up the thermostat wires. He tells me all of them had been wet and  have to be changed --- no light job given they are snaked through the walls. One has the insulation stripped off -- he tells me they were run along the heating pipe -- a no-no. That one is easy to replace so he runs a new line into the damaged den right up the stairs. And he does it right -- taking a lot of time -- I mean it is past 11PM. And then he installs the thermostat in the den where I will keep the temp at 50 degrees so nothing freezes. How long a drive home does he have? Two and a half hours -- commercial vehicle and he can't drive on the Belt. That means he won't get home until --- I can't even do the math. And until he walked out at 11:30 he never showed on iota of being in a rush. Wish I had that patience.

I know this has been one boring post but I had to get this long day out of my system. At least I found another reliable electrician in Doug who said he would come back if I needed him just in case I can't get Ken back soon. "Next time I promise to get pizza," I tell him.

MORE Happy Hour Tomorrow, Fri 4-6 Brooklyn

WHAT: A happy hour! Get to know MORE, (Movement of Rank and File Educators) and meet other educators interested in transforming the UFT.

WHERE:    Freddy’s Bar in the Backroom  627 5^th Ave. (Between 17-18^th St.) Park Slope, Bklyn

http://freddysbar.com/       (see below for transit options)

WHEN: This Fri, Nov 30th 4-6

WHY. . . .

                 

The UFT is the most powerful union in the city. And its OUR union! Yet most members feel discouraged by our leadership's lack of. . .well. . .leadership. 

MORE (Movement of Rank and FIle Educators) believes in a member driven, social justice, social movement oriented union.

 We envision a union that educates, organizes and mobilizes the membership.  Remember the contract. . . imagine a UFT that spent the last 3 years mobilizing the membership around a contract fight instead of. . .  doing nothing. Imagine a UFT that brought the discussion around OUR evaluations to us, and let us decide what was acceptable. 

 A MORE leadership would mean a union that defends the rights of teachers, promotes membership engagement in all aspects of education and joins in the fight against racism, poverty and the other social injustices that we and our students face every day.

 

Come, have a drink, relax and meet other educators from District 15 and beyond who share this vision and want to know MORE about how they can get involved. 

Meet some of the teachers who will be running on the MORE slate in the union wide elections this spring and build solidarity with your fellow educators.

Subway: R to Prospect Avenue in Brooklyn, F/G to 4th ave and 9th st.
Bus: B63 to 5th Avenue and either Prospect Avenue or 18th Street.

Questions or RSVP (not necessary, but helpful) sam_p_coleman@yahoo. com

Rockaway Update: Singin' in the Rain

But perhaps most disturbing of all, when I heard that the bridges supporting the shuttle train tracks to Rockaway Park had been completely wrecked, I got a chill.  It took 6 years to get the bridge rebuilt and train service restored, after the trestle fire of May, 1950.  Let’s not even think about it… Vivian Carter at Oy Vey Rockaway blog.

Well, it doesn't look like we will have train service to Rockaway for a loooong time. How about starting over with a monorail of some sort similar to the link to the JFK? Service often sucked anyway --

Some people might think it is a bad sign to pick up a new car in lousy weather. Not me. Yesterday's full day of fresh water cleansing rain was a welcome sight. It hasn't rained in the month since Sandy and the sense of freshness washing away some of the muck was invigorating. I almost felt like standing naked in front of my house but luckily for all passed on that, especially as PS 114 reopened yesterday.

Plus it gave me a day off from the crap I had to do outside. Besides, the new Honda CRV was ready to be picked up at noon and I was rearing to go. I got an exact replica of the car I bought at the end of June so it was like being right at home. Andy Feldman didn't have to review how the car works and due to the rain didn't even have to wipe it down. And paying was just so easy --- deposit the check from Geiko and take the money right back out again. Other than some of the taxes I broke even.

Monday was an active day out here with two sets of workers -- Pat the plumber sent his guys to finish installing the new burner -- other than wiring up the thermostats -- he has to send his own electrician, so we still don't have our regular heat. And Mike the air conditioning/heating guy sent his crew to replace the compressor which was hanging only 2 ft off the ground. The removed all the old inside and outside stuff and today may be back to hang the new units which will also pump some heat -- except I still need Ken the electrician to come back and run a new line since the old one was covered with salt water in my basement. Their hanging it 8 ft off the ground like the one on the other side of my house --- ugly but until the predicted 25 foot sea rise comes --- and maybe sooner rather than later it seems -- I am good for a while.

My fellow Wave columnist Vivian Carter is back up and running at Oy Vey Rockaway (http://rockviv.wordpress.com/) with some wonderful commentary and pics where she points out the important fact so many of us who figured we wouldn't die from 4 feet of water missed: fire. The only moments of panic we felt was the smell of smoke -- we thought it was our house -- and looking out at the ocean surrounding our house there seemed to be no way out. We finally realized it wasn't us and didn't find out until the next morning that almost a whole block had burned down 4 blocks away. Many of our friends saw the flames from their houses and watched them jump from house to house, terrified that it would burn the neighborhood down like happened in Breezy Point. Vivian was closer to the fire.

I survived Hurricane Sandy, which struck the Northeast coast of the United States at about 9 p.m. on Monday, October 29.  I sent a panicked text message to a friend a few minutes later that said:  ”the entire basement and first floor is flooded, and the house is shaking.  My car is filled with water up to dashboard.  The whole 400 block here has water half way up first floors!”  That panic was nothing compared to how I felt a few hours later as I watched the embers of the Harbor Light Restaurant fire blowing hard to the north, landing on the Maroneys’ house, just across the back yard.  I only managed to sleep once I was assured that Bulloch’s gas station was not going to blow up, as tanks are always sealed off from such catastrophes, these days.  The risk of fire was something the OEM brochure on hurricanes didn’t mention. Something few of us had thought of.

Read Viv's wonderful account of the impact on the commercial district and her fabulous pics of which these are only a sample.

http://rockviv.wordpress.com/2012/11/15/we-demanded-the-sand-but-this-is-ridiculous/




-----------------
Today I might actually take a shot at going to the Delegate Assembly and the MORE planning committee meeting following for a change of pace. I took the great Accountable Talk piece - Real Questions for our Unity Leaders a and made a quick 2-sided leaflet. If I get there early I may make some copies and distribute some. MORE has lots of stuff to give out but I feel there is a need for some stronger stuff attacking Unity.

E4E Bans People From Walcott Event Today

E4E is an unethical undemocratic group, to say the least ...

The dishonest slimebags at Educators 4 Excellence are at it again. After sending out plea after plea for people to come to see Walcott spout his nonsense today -- you know, part of the pressure to get the UFT to agree to enslavement and send the diminishing E4E teachers back to their schools to lobby for the DOE, they withdraw the invites of people who might actually raise a question with Walcott-- like why promote the use of VAM when it has a 50% failure rate?

This was sent by one of our contacts:

From S. Braithwaite - Monday, Nov. 26

So It seems I was just uninvited from the talk with the Chancellor tomorrow. I was actually CALLED at home by Jonathan Schleifer, the executive director of E4E!

We had a somewhat spirited discussion about why I couldn’t/shouldn’t attend. :-} I highlighted the fundamentally undemocratic nature of their policy for the event and how this wasn’t really a conversation about evaluation but a chance for the chancellor to be told what he wanted to hear. Basically his argument was that the event was ONLY for members of E4E and based on my previous email I wasn’t really a “member” even though I had signed their pledge. Side bar  - after attending one of their events in the past (free movie screening) they kept emailing me trying to get me to go to lunch with their folks. After initially ignoring them, I finally responded that I wasn’t interested as based on what I had seen of their organization of was highly suspicious of their motives.

I find this really remarkable and extremely telling about the organization and how fragile they are politically.  I’m definitely adding this to the scrap book.

Please if anyone is going let me know if you identify non-E4E members in attendance at the event. I painted him into a corner on that point, and he alleged that only E4E members would be in attendance.

 Gloria from MORE added:

I was uninvited to the free showing of "Won't Back Down" 30 minutes prior to movie time via a telephone call.  The guy (forgot name)  said they were overbooked and since I was not a member, I could not attend. This  despite the fact that I had signed up on-line without needing to be a member.  E4E is an unethical, undemocratic group, to say the least.

Gloria

E4E is also working its magic in LA

E4E in LA

Jose del Barrio 12:17am Nov 27 Hello folks, The group Educators 4 Excellence may have recently contacted you in regards to teacher lunch-ins, “thank you” breakfasts, or education Galas. I think it is important for folks to know that E4E is not a UTLA endorsed organization and it has no affiliation with UTLA. If they are on campus it is at the will of Santee Administration and/or other teachers at Santee with Admin permission. Lastly, this group platform is in direct contradiction with longstanding UTLA positions. After researching this group, you will see their platform will: 1. Destroy hard earn seniority rights 2. Link students test scores to teacher evaluation 3. Merit –pay 4. School “choice” aka Charter Schools etc.. Lastly, you may have been invited by E4E to a “Gala” that will be hosted by none other than School Board President, Monica Garcia. The same Monica Garcia that has approved school giveaways, teacher witch hunts, furlough days, etc.. She is no friend to Public Education. I am not sure how each of you feels on these issues, but please make sure you read up on and know what these “non-profit” reform groups are about and enjoy the bagels they bring in the morning. It is all on the Educators for Excellence Website: http://educators4excellence.zissousecure.com/register Warmly, Jose Lara Social Justice Educator/Chair UTLA Central Area A Declaration of Teachers’ Principles and Beliefs educators4excellence.zissousecure.com We, as educators, believe that it is our duty to prepare our students for college, the workplace, an...

When the NY Press Corps Stops By

Aw shucks, I thought they were all coming to see me. But it was just that PS 114 up the block was reopening. They had been busing kids every day -- big buses out front in the morning and delivering them back in the late afternoon. It is a big day to have all that over. It took a month to get it back.

I went over to the NY1 truck looking for Lindsey Christ to offer her some warmth (we have the fires going on the stove) and some hot coffee but she was not there. She said she might be around later but we are picking up our new car at Bay Ridge Honda today. Same model, same color as the one I bought 3 months ago. Deja vu all over again.