Lawsuit filed to stop the closure of PS 25, the 4th best public elementary school in NYC according to the DOE

For Immediate Release: Tuesday, March 27, 2018

Contact: Leonie Haimson, leoniehaimson@gmail.com

Lawsuit filed to stop the closure of PS 25, the 4th best public elementary school in NYC according to the DOE

Today a lawsuit was filed in the Brooklyn State Supreme Court against the proposed closure of P.S. 25 Eubie Blake in District 16, Brooklyn, a zoned neighborhood school, which Chancellor Carmen Farina and the Board of Education are attempting to close without the prior approval of the Community Education Council.

Last month, on February 28, the Panel on Educational Policy voted to close the school which will require students to seek enrollment in other schools, with no assurance of admission.  Not only is it a violation of NY State Education law 2590-e to close the only zoned school in the neighborhood without the district CEC’s prior approval, but P.S. 25 is also the fourth best public elementary school in NYC in the estimation of the Department of Education, and the second best in the borough of Brooklyn, when the need level of its students is taken into account.

According to the DOE’s School Performance Dashboard, which according to Chancellor Fariña is ““the most advanced tool of its kind,” the positive impact of P.S. 25 is greater than all but three of the city’s 661 public elementary schools, and its closure would leave the entire city-owned building to Success Academy Bed Stuy 3, a charter school. [1]  

Achievement levels of P.S. 25 students have steadily climbed over the last three years, and the school now exceeds the city average in state test scores, despite the fact that a large percentage of students are homeless, economically disadvantaged, and/or have disabilities. According to DOE’s figures, the school’s students outperform similar students by 21 percentage points in ELA and math.  The achievement of the more than thirty percent of students with disabilities is also exceptionally high.

The school also meets or exceeds standards in all the following areas:  Effective School Leadership, Trust, Collaborative Teachers, Rigorous Instruction, Strong Family-Community Ties, and Supportive Environment.

Plaintiff Crystal Williams, a parent of two children at P.S. 25, said: “The school has seen a big improvement in recent years.  The teachers are excellent.  They give students close support, and my kids are learning.  The teachers take their time in part because they have small classes, and I don’t believe my children would be provided with the same quality of education at whatever other schools they are forced to attend.”

“PS 25 should be honored and replicated, not closed,” said Mark Cannizzaro, President of the Council for School Supervisors and Administrators, the principals’ union. “The school has been on a clear, upward trajectory: Dedicated school leaders and teachers have helped boost English and math test scores ever higher compared to the district and the city as a whole. All the while, PS 25 has made great strides in addressing students’ social and emotional needs, and has offered them a vibrant curriculum with art, music, library skills, coding and STEM classes. We continue to oppose this decision. The students, families and educators of PS 25 deserve better.”

Said Shakema Armstead, a plaintiff who has a third grader at PS 25, “My son, who has an I.E.P, loves the school.  It gives him and other students with a sense of community and stability that allow them to thrive.  There is no reason for them to be thrown into another school where they would have to re-adjust to an entirely new environment, especially as P.S. 25 is doing so well.”

There is a precedent for this lawsuit. In 2009, a lawsuit was filed against Chancellor Joel Klein on behalf of parents at three neighborhood zoned schools, in Harlem and Ocean Hill-Brownsville area, to prevent the closure of these schools without a vote of the relevant CECs.  The lawsuit was joined by Randi Weingarten, then President of the UFT, and NYC Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum. Within weeks, Chancellor Klein withdrew the closure proposals.[2]  He subsequently signed the following settlement agreement:

The [plaintiffs and the DOE] agree with regard to the three schools identified in the Complaint and any other traditional public school that, for those grades that are within the province of school attendance zones, [the DOE] will not close, phase-out, remove, alter or engage in conduct designed to effect the closure of any such school in a way that deprives residents of the right to send a qualifying child to his or her zoned traditional school, without either (1) obtaining, pursuant to 2590-e(11) of the Education Law, the approval of the relevant Community Education Council as to such change or (2) timely replacing such school with another zoned school within the same attendance zone.

In this case, DOE has no plans to create another zoned school for these children, and yet no vote of Community Education Council 16 has occurred.  The DOE claims that the school is being closed because it is under-enrolled, but this ignores several important factors:  Parents have not been told of the exceedingly high quality of the school according to the DOE’s own metrics, and if they had been informed of this, more of them would likely enroll their children in the school.  The DOE could also install another preK or a 3K program in the school.   The availability of space has also allowed for very small classes, which in turn have provided PS 25 students with an exceptional opportunity to learn.

Said Leonie Haimson, Executive Director of Class Size Matters, “It would be tragic if the second best elementary school in Brooklyn were closed.  PS 25 has very small classes of 10 to 18 students, which are ideal for such high-poverty students.  Given how the DOE refuses to align the school capacity formula with smaller classes, that alone makes the school appear underutilized.  It would be extremely disruptive if this closure occurs, especially for the large number of homeless children at PS 25, because the school is a sanctuary of stability in their lives. Instead of closing PS 25, the DOE should celebrate, emulate and expand it—and give more NYC children the same chance to succeed.”

A copy of the lawsuit is posted here: https://tinyurl.com/y6wjocsu

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[1] https://tools.nycenet.edu/dashboard/#dbn=16K025&report_type=EMS&view=City

[2] https://www.nyclu.org/en/press-releases/response-nycluuft-lawsuit-doe-announces-it-will-keep-schools-open

The Rockaway Theatre Company Gala

Friday night was the annual RTC gala at El Caribe in Mill Basin. This is one of the most fun nights of the year as all participants in all performances in the 2017 season are invited, including the teens. I think I was the 2nd oldest person in the room of about 150 people.

We got home pretty late and despite what looked like such an energizing day of marching and rallying, there wasn't a lot of energy left for trekking into Manhattan. I got to feed off the wonderful posts of everyone and the coverage.

Jim Peithman, who has been a cameraman for CNN and NY1 put together a great video of the 2017 theater year at the RTC. Check it out and see why RTC productions are Must-See.

https://vimeo.com/261623421?ref=em-share

A few pics from the party.

John Dewey HS Scandal: Audit slams city over ‘troubling’ grade-fixing fallout | New York Post

... 87% of credit recovery courses in their sample providing insufficient instructional time and 75% of students taking them wrongly given Hs diplomas.... Leonie Haimson

Elvin no longer works as a principal, but collects $169,916 a year as an administrator in the DOE’s Office of Safety Youth Development.... NY Post

Long-time Ed Notes readers know all about the scandals at John Dewey -- we published numerous articles about Elvin, the principal.

Leonie sent this to the listserve:

Rare but welcome NYsed audit confirms how egregious the grade-fixing scandal at Dewey Hs was — with 87% of credit recovery courses in their sample providing insufficient instructional time and 75% of students taking them wrongly given Hs diplomas.

Yet the former Dewey principal is still earning big bucks at Tweed because of Carmen’s failure to act —despite numerous articles in the DN, NYP and on Channel 2 News for over a year exposing the corruption, with courageous teacher whistleblowers proving the bounteous evidence.

A reminder to those who have been swept up in the undue praise awarded Carmen on the eve of her leaving office just how poor her judgement has been in confronting corruption and abuse.

If anyone can find the audit please share. 

https://nypost.com/2018/03/24/audit-slams-city-over-troubling-grade-fixing-fallout/

Riveting Video : Jeanette Deuterman, Opt-Out Leader

Among all the reasons to Opt out is to undermine the massive profits of the educational-industrial complex - and I include the charter industry - imagine all that draining of public funds out of the classroom. Michael Elliott has another in a series of short films out today. Make it go viral.

Jeanette Deutermann was the inspiration for this whole series of films about public education. She links Opt Out to so many other issues. It's the canary in the coal mine. How to we value our kids and their education, what does it mean for the future, are we empowering them or are we just force feeding them and killing their innate curiosity? She knows the answer

.... Michael Elliott

The tests are coming and we know the outcomes of the ent

Our latest video from the event in Brooklyn last April features Jeanette Deutermann, the founder of Long Island Opt Out, telling a very personal story of her own awakening. It launches on social media SUNDAY March 25th @10 AM Eastern.

Testing season is upon us and we need to reach as many potential parents as possible, so please share this video, comment on it, and like it on every page you find it.

Please share this video!!!  But first, please read specific sharing/re-Tweeting strategies below. This IS VERY IMPORTANT IN LIGHT OF CHANGES TO THE FACEBOOK ALGORITHM!

1) Watch the video in its entirety (2 mins 20 secs). It will be in the following places, watch/like/comment on one or all (the more, the merrier): Shoot4Education & Network for Public Education Facebook pages and Twitter. (It will be the pinned post on all of these, starting at 10AM eastern time.)

2) Share the video from Shoot4Education Facebook & re-Tweet from Shoot4Education Twitter, according to the instructions below.

3) It is essential that you create a personal framing of the video in your own post. So please tell other parents how you came to be involved in opt out and how you discovered your voice in this movement.  OR Tell them opt out is our most potent weapon to gain the attention of politicians and to regain our control over education policy. No matter what you say, make it personal. Don’t just click the share button and post, you must write your own headline!

4) Do not mention the words “like" or “share" in your own post.

5) Adding specific recipients (your friends or people you know to have good social media followings): On FB: Use the tagging feature to tag friends in the body of your post (not comments) On Twitter: add handles (quote tweet)

The closer to 10 AM that you can do any or all of the above, the more likely that the video will pick up steam and take off; everyone sharing at once at the very start really fuels visibility.

The  more you interact with the video through watching, liking/reacting, commenting, reTweeting, etc. the greater the probability that it will push into more feeds.

Thanks,

Michael and Kemala

Remember:

Watch—Like—Share—Comment—Tag

WIWRD - The Storm Before The Storm - Roman History c. 146-78 BC

I'm starting a new feature here at Ed Notes - What I'm Watching, Reading, Doing - WIWRD,  - pronounce it as "weird" - an appropriate sounding acronym for my life. Not that you all give a shit about what I'm watching, reading or doing but a way for me, as brain cells die daily, to keep a record of sorts. So skip WIWRD labeled articles if you are in the Do I Give A Shit (DIGAS)? what Norm is doing or reading?  

When I start reading a book I am going to open a page on the book and keep adding to it as I read. If interested, check back. Currently I'm reading 3 books so there will be a separate page for each one.
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The rise and fall of empires and civilizations is fascinating stuff. They all fall at some point and we will be no different. Wars and or environmental disasters are often the cause. But internal stuff happens too. Is Trump the beginning of the end? Or was it Bush? Or Clinton? Or maybe the Carter/Ford/Nixon tandem. But then again what about Johnson and the Vietnam War? Or maybe it was the Kennedy assassination.

An excellent model is Roman history - I was a history major in college and also had an almost Masters but never studied Roman history. (I didn't finish the masters when I went into teaching and switched to an MA in education.)

I just started reading Mike Duncan's "The Storm Before The Storm - The Beginning of the End of the Roman Republic" - the somewhat unreported 75 years before shit really began hitting the fan that led to the undermining and destruction of democracy (The Republic) in Rome and the rise of the Empire (Augustus). (Of course Star Wars is based on this model).

Duncan is a podcaster with a full history of Rome.

Check out Dan Carlin's history podcasts especially this one with Mike Duncan where he talks about the book. http://dchhaddendum.libsyn.com/rome-through-duncans-eyes

I'll give you one guess why this book is relevant for us today. The Roman Republic lasted hundreds of years and the Empire that followed it another 500 years. So we may be fairly young in comparison. But at the accelerated rate in today's world, the phase Duncan writes about is somewhat analogous to where we are. In other words, Trump is not Caesar but more like the guys Duncan is writing about before Uncle Julius was born. Some really fascinating stuff.

There is a Roman timeline that is analogous to later dominant cultures. Duncan's phases are the origin, revolutionary, global conquest, rise of the Caesars. I would add some phases in between like consolidation after the revolution, internal conflict - Civil War, the massive growth phase between the Civil War and WWI. 

The fall of the Soviet Empire (c. 1989.) might be analogous to the final fall of Carthage (146 BC - the beginning of the Storm) which Duncan says, "The triumph of the Roman Republic was also the beginning of the end of the Roman Republic." But here is the important points he makes in the introduction:

led to increasing economic inequality, dislocation of traditional ways of life, increasing political polarization, the breakdown of unspoken rules of political conduct, the privatization of the military, rampant corruption, endemic social and ethnic prejudice, battles over access to citizenship and voting rights, ongoing military quagmires, the introduction of violence as a political tool, and a set of elites so obsessed with their own privileges that they refused to reform the system in time to save it.

Holy shit -- tell me none of this has been happening since 1989 - in fact I would go back to the election of Reagan in 1980 for the real beginning of the process when the massive assault on unions -- no matter how undemocratic some of them were - they were still a bulwark.

Since I'm in the earliest stages of the book I will continue to add to this post as I read. But I wanted to add one more item about democracy in Rome and what they considered built-in protections against tyranny. (This has some relevance to an upcoming post on democracy in MORE and the UFT.)

Remember that our founding fathers studied Roman democracy and put in a system of checks and balances, which Rome had. Rome began as a kingdom until 509 BC when a group of Senators revolted (American Revolution). Rome had a Senate (the wealthy patricians) which ruled until the regular people (plebians - plebs) became restive - think the Andrew Jackson years (c. 1830) when voting was extended - culminating in the early 20th century with the direct election of Senators and Women's right to vote -- plus of course the abolition of slavery.

When the plebs refused to muster for military service, the die was cast and an elected assembly was established - closed to patricians. Any citizen could seek election as a tribune -- they were untouchable sentinels against tyranny of the aristocracy - the Senate.

The consuls- think president -  came from the Senate - and were elected in pairs - each could veto the actions of the other -- and were term limited to one year. In case of emergency, a Dictatorship could be established to break deadlocks -- but that expired after 6 months. An interesting sidelight --- "the Senate authorized any citizen, at any time, to kill another citizen caught seeking regal
power," a legal justification of sorts for the assassination of Julius Caesar, who made Trump look like a pussycat (not to trivialize but think Cleopatra vs. Stormy).

We shall see how all these institutions were subject to erosion as certain conditions began to escalate. And we're seeing that happen here today. Trump is only the beginning. We may see some retrenchment at times but the tensions on society (automation, environmental disasters, wars) will only increase and the end will not be pretty.

Now what does this have to do with democracy in MORE and in the UFT? Think of the UFT and MORE (origin phase, etc.) and where they lie in their respective life cycles.

Things to explore in the future.

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PETITION TO REPEAL NYS TEACHER EVALUATION LAW | James Eterno at ICE Caucus Blog

I hope you read the two articles in Another View in the UFT - on Danielson outrages.  James Eterno has a petition up. Here is his full post on the ICE Caucus blog.

PETITION TO REPEAL NYS TEACHER EVALUATION LAW

Thanks all who commented on the original draft. Roseanne added some but MoveOn thought it was too long so the rationale is here at ICE.

Please sign and then share the petition to repeal NYS Teacher Evaluation Law. Spread it to the world.

 Petition to Repeal NYS Teacher Evaluation Laws 3012-c and 3012-d

We must return teacher evaluation to local districts free from state mandates by repealing New York State Education Laws 3012-c and 3012-d.

• Evaluating teachers based on student results on tests and other student assessments that were never designed to rate educators is neither a scientifically or educationally sound way to be used for a Measure of Student Learning portion of a teacher's rating.

•  The Measure of Teacher Practice portion of teacher evaluations is subjective and highly unfair, particularly in NYC where the Danielson Framework has been used not to help teachers grow as professionals but as a weapon to frighten teachers into teaching to score points on arbitrary rubrics in multiple unnecessary classroom observations.

Why we are starting this petition?

The teacher evaluation system in NYS is broken beyond repair. NYS passed a flawed evaluation system into law in order to receive federal Race to the Top funds. However, the current version of the federal Every Student Succeeds Act no longer requires states to rate teachers in part based on student test results to receive federal funds.  Rating teachers on student exam scores is not recommended by the American Statistical Association as it is not a reliable way to measure teacher performance yet in New York we only have a moratorium on using standardized tests to rate certain teachers. Teachers are still rated on tests and other assessments that were never designed to rate teachers. The Measures of Student Learning portion of teacher ratings is highly unreliable. Many call it "junk science."

NYS ELA tests cannot measure student progress under any particular standard.From a statistical standpoint, a handful of questions per standard is not a statistically sound measure of a student’s mastery of that standard.  Additionally, test passages that are on, above or even slightly below grade level cannot measure the progress of a struggling reader who enters a class two to four years below grade level. These tests cannot measure the progress of newcomers to our country who are learning English as a new language.  It takes many years for newcomers to master the nuances of the English language.  In effect, students such as these described above can make more than a year’s worth of progress and yet still not show progress on the NYS ELA due to the text complexity of all test passages.

The Measure of Teacher Practice portion of teacher ratings in New York City is based on the Danielson Framework whose creator, Charlotte Danielson, said this about teacher evaluation in Education Week:

"There is ...little consensus on how the profession should define "good teaching." Many state systems require districts to evaluate teachers on the learning gains of their students. These policies have been implemented despite the objections from many in the measurement community regarding the limitations of available tests and the challenge of accurately attributing student learning to individual teachers.

"Even when personnel policies define good teaching as the teaching practices that promote student learning and are validated by independent research, few jurisdictions require their evaluators to actually demonstrate skill in making accurate judgments. But since evaluators must assign a score, teaching is distilled to numbers, ratings, and rankings, conveying a reductive nature to educators' professional worth and undermining their overall confidence in the system.

"I'm deeply troubled by the transformation of teaching from a complex profession requiring nuanced judgment to the performance of certain behaviors that can be ticked off on a checklist. In fact, I (and many others in the academic and policy communities) believe it's time for a major rethinking of how we structure teacher evaluation to ensure that teachers, as professionals, can benefit from numerous opportunities to continually refine their craft."

The Danielson Rubric describes an ideal classroom setting and was never intended to be used as an evaluative tool against teachers. Examples: A rubric that rates a teacher "developing" when he/she "attempts to respond to disrespectful behavior among students, with uneven results" (Danielson 2a) is not a fair rubric. A rubric that rates a teacher ineffective because "students' body language indicates feelings of hurt, discomfort, or insecurity" (Danielson 2a) having nothing to do with how that particular teacher treats her particular students is not a fair rubric for teacher evaluations. Teachers do not just teach emotionally well-adjusted children from idyllic families and communities. We teach all kinds of children who live under various conditions. These conditions have a major impact on the emotional well-being of children. 

Children experiencing emotional distress due to factors beyond their teachers' control quite often have trouble concentrating in class yet to be considered "highly effective" under Danielson, Virtually all students are intellectually engaged in the lesson." We teach children with selective mutism and other speech and language and learning disabilities yet Danielson doesn't take this into account. Students' emotions have an impact on their academics, and students' emotions are impacted by many factors beyond any teacher's control such as homelessness, marital stress in their home or divorce, loss of employment of a caregiver, physical or emotional abuse, mental illness, bullying outside of their classroom, personal illness or illness of a loved one and many other factors too numerous to list. Holding a teacher accountable for these factors that are beyond a teacher's control is not reasonable and yet that is what some of the components under Danielson demand.

Teachers in NY are frustrated and demoralized by a teacher evaluation system that has robbed us of our professionalism.

We demand an end to this absurdity. We demand that NYS change its education laws so teachers can return to the practice of seeing their students as human beings who are so much more than a test score or a robot that must adhere to absurd requirements under the Danielson Rubric in order for their teacher to be judged "effective" or "highly effective." NYS has created an adversarial relationship between students and their teachers and this absurdity must end now.

Teachers have no confidence in the evaluation system that reduces teacher worth into a meaningless series of numbers and letters. Teachers in NYC fear classroom observations are not being used to help them grow professionally, but instead teachers must teach to try to score points on Ms. Danielson's often misused framework.

In NYC, there is a climate of fear in the classroom which does not lead to improved teacher practice. Four observations per year for veteran teachers is excessive. One per year or every other year is sufficient for the vast majority of veteran teachers. Ms. Danielson stated in Education Week that after three years in the classroom, teachers become part of a "professional community" and should be treated as such.

Danielson says:

Personnel policies for the teachers not practicing below standard—approximately 94 percent of them—would have, at their core, a focus on professional development, replacing the emphasis on ratings with one on learning.

We agree. To get there we must first repeal Education Law 3012-c and 3012-d and return teacher evaluation to local districts, free from state mandates.

Another View in the UFT - Holding UFT/Unity Caucus leadership’s feet to the fire - March 2018

The 5th edition of Another View, a newsletter handed out at the UFT delegate assemblies and posted her on Ed Notes and on listserves. Editors: Mike Schirtzer, Arthur Goldstein, James Eterno, Norm Scott

Articles by MORE members Prudence Hill, Arthur Goldstein, Eric Mears, Alexandra Alves, and myself.

If you'd like a pdf to share email me offlist.
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What do you do with a “principal in need of improvement?” 

These days many NYC principals come from the Bloomberg-era collection of “Leadership” academies designed to make people with little teaching experience and no pedagogical background into principals of public schools.

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West Virginia, Oklahoma Strike Lessons – Right to Work does not have to be a Death Sentence

By Norm Scott, MORE, Education Notes blog

On the Saturday evening of March 10, 2018, about 300 people showed up at the meeting hall of the NY State Nurses Association (NYSNA) on West 33rd St to hear a presentation by three West Virginia teachers who played key roles in the recent victorious strike. Starting with the idea of a sickout, termed “the blue flu”, in a few counties, the movement turned into a full-fledged wildcat strike in every single county in the state that led to the closing of every school in the state. A right to work state. A state where strikes by public employees are illegal.

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Arthur Goldstein: Mar. 12 Exec. Board Takeaway March 12th--The Good, the Bad, and the Worse – Excerpt

ATRs are given an opportunity to vote in UFT elections for a chapter leader who will almost certainly not be their chapter leader come September. It hardly seems worth it. Why should I be worried about a leader who won't be my leader? This distinction, alas, appears to escape leadership, who didn't even wish to discuss it. My understanding is that they contend the ATR to be a temporary aberration. The fact that they enabled it via the 2005 contract, as well as the fact that it's endured for twelve years appears not to register.
More at: http://nyceducator.com/2018/03/exec-board-takeawaymarch-12th-good-bad.html plus Unity Caucus guts Class Size Resolution

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The shocking sample comments of the Danielson rubric: Focus on the “Professional Responsibilities” section
By Erik Mears, MORE – Presented to UFT Exec Bd, March 12, 2018

One can infer from these comments that teachers who are unwilling to do free labor or commit treachery against their colleagues may be rated Developing or worse. Teachers' opinions may also be used as reasons for low ratings under Danielson. Here are four egregious examples of sample comments:

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Is Danielson Making You Sick?
Reprinted from MORE-UFT site–
by Alexandra Alves, Chapter Leader, PS 2M
https://morecaucusnyc.org/2018/03/13/is-danielson-making-you-sick/#more-5985

Are you frustrated with your loss of professionalism, pedagogic agency, and constant demoralization?

Do you dread the Danielson based drive-by observation and the inevitable feedback session and rating, which happens not only once or twice, but several times a year, even though you have consistently received effective and highly effective ratings throughout your career?

Oklahoma Teachers Plan a Strike: “Our Children Cannot Wait any Longer” - John Thompson

I've seen John Thompson's writings since the earliest days of the Ed Notes blog. As in every post I urge you to check out the Ok teacher grassroots leader Larry Cagle phone call to the Jacobin/DSA/MORE/ISO WV conference.
https://www.facebook.com/jacobinmag/videos/2087299477963409/.

I swear I am going to summarize Larry's points, one of the major ones of which were -- in this battle it's Trump vs Trump. I'm interested in the "how we got here" story. Larry described it and it is must listening stuff.

Oklahoma Teachers Plan a Strike: “Our Children Cannot Wait any Longer”

John Thompson

A seemingly spontaneous teacher revolt in Oklahoma has resulted in a potential statewide walkout to shut down schools beginning April 2. The work stoppage declaration was no doubt sparked by the recently successful West Virginia teachers strike, but the grievances of Oklahoma teachers stem from deeply-rooted fears for their students’ future.

Oklahoma ranks in the top five states for oil and natural gas production, and gives $500 million a year in tax breaks to energy companies. But the state also leads the nation in cutting state funding for education, reducing formula funding by 28 percent since 2008.

http://progressive.org/public-school-shakedown/oklahoma-teachers-plan-a-strike-for-their-students-180321/

NY Times/Dana Goldstein -- Oklahoma Teachers Ready to Walk April 2

We shift from WV to reporting on Oklahoma and other states like Arizona -- note many of the states are heavy Trump territory - and a wild card in upcoming politics. The info we have based on this must-see video and audio goes deeper than this article. Deborah Gist was the slug who attacked the Falls Church teachers in Rhode Island.

See Jacobin FB page and the last 20 minutes for the Larry Cagle (who sounds like a Republican and possibly Trump supporter) phone call: https://www.facebook.com/jacobinmag/videos/2087299477963409/

Read the NY Times article:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/20/us/oklahoma-teachers-strike.html

Their Pay Has Stood Still. Now Oklahoma Teachers Could Be the Next to Walk.

by DANA GOLDSTEIN,  2018-03-21T09:15:50-04:00

West Virginia, Oklahoma Strike Lessons – Right to Work does not have to be a Death Sentence

I wrote this up for the March edition of Another View in the UFT which we were going to hand out at today's postponed Delegate Assembly and will hand out next week. I had to squeeze this on so I didn't say a whole bunch of stuff I wanted to touch on. One of my thoughts was that the strike in WV, possible upcoming ones in Oklahoma and elsewhere

(Intercepts: California School Unions Gearing Up For Strikes, Political Campaigns)

strikes fear into union leaderships like Weingarten and Mulgrew because they will never have the stomach for a strike and if there is a day when the rank and file revolt (as we did in 1975 when Shanker opposed striking) they wouldn't be able to control things -- though Shanker managed to manipulate things to end the strike.

If you want to know more about both states watch this must see video: Video feed of the March 10 event at the Jacobin FB page: https://www.facebook.com/jacobinmag/videos/2087299477963409/


West Virginia, Oklahoma Strike Lessons –
Right to Work does not have to be a Death Sentence
By Norm Scott, MORE, Education Notes blog

On the Saturday evening of March 10, 2018, about 300 people showed up at the meeting hall of the NY State Nurses Association (NYSNA) on West 33rd St to hear a presentation by three West Virginia teachers who played key roles in the recent victorious strike. Starting with the idea of a sickout, termed “the blue flu”, in a few counties, the movement turned into a full-fledged wildcat strike in every single county in the state that led to the closing of every school in the state. A right to work state. A state where strikes by public employees are illegal.

Yet, despite all, they struck. And won. Not only did they win the 5% raise they asked for plus an agreement to control rising health care costs, but attempts by the state legislature to impose charter schools was also turned back. The state is one of the few without any charter schools. After the presentation, one of the teachers leading a similar movement in Oklahoma called in and told their story, which includes enormous resistance of the state union leadership which is being dragged kicking and screaming by the rank and file towards taking actions they clearly are not comfortable with.

With the Janus decision on the horizon, the stories coming out of West Virginia and Oklahoma have been remarkable, especially since both states are the heart of what is considered heavy Trump territory and most probably many of the teachers themselves are Trump supporters or centrist Democrats. While local activists here often assume that the most militant voices come from the left, these stories prove that militancy can come from any segment of the labor movement when conditions reach a breaking point.

Even more impressive has been that the actions in both states seem to be led by actual classroom teachers, as state and county union leaders (and maybe national too) urge greater caution.

An immediate thought was that the actions coming out of these states, and maybe more to come, is the threat they represent to the top teacher union leaders who won’t even whisper the “S” word. How often have we been warned about the Taylor Law over the past 40 years since our last strike in 1975? No matter how difficult it may be to face the truth, the greatest gains we have made often came out of strikes or the threat to strike. With the people running the city assured that we will never strike, de Blasio can refuse parental leave or any other improvement of working conditions without demanding give backs. It will be certainly interesting to watch how Mulgrew and other union officials dance around these stories as they offer cheerleading support for them while also trying to tamp down similar moves that might come from the UFT membership. I have been posting stories about the strike at: ednotesonline.com.

Video feed of the March 10 event at the Jacobin FB page: https://www.facebook.com/jacobinmag/videos/2087299477963409/

Three NY Times Articles Explore the Intersection of Race and Class and Class Comes in 2nd

The worst places for poor white children are almost all better than the best places for poor black children.... Poor white children struggle in parts of the Southeast and Appalachia. But they still fare better there than poor black children do in most of America. In effect, the worst places for whites produce outcomes that are about as good as the best places for blacks.... Extensive Data Shows Punishing Reach of Racism for Black Boys..... 
......NY Times, March 19

Monday was a beautiful sunny day out here in Rockaway and I managed to spend 3 hours sitting in the backyard reading the NY Times and getting some much needed sun - and a jolt of vitamin D. That it took me so long to read the paper was due to some intriguing articles, three of which connected some dots.

The major article was the front page one I quoted above with some important data about the impact of racism. I would bet that many people feel that if a black boy grows up in a high income family there would not be much difference in long time outcomes from white boys. But that seems so not true.

White boys who grow up rich are likely to remain that way. Black boys raised at the top, however, are more likely to become poor than to stay wealthy in their own adult households. Most white boys raised in wealthy families will stay rich or upper middle class as adults, but black boys raised in similarly rich households will not.
Even when children grow up next to each other with parents who earn similar incomes, black boys fare worse than white boys in 99 percent of America. And the gaps only worsen in the kind of neighborhoods that promise low poverty and good schools.

The numbers are very different for black girls. And from my own experience with black kids I could see the different gender trajectories in elementary school.

I often issue a challenge to people who say race is not a factor. "A black guy dressed in a suit and carrying a brief case and a white guy dressed in fatigues and carrying an AK-47 walk down a street. Which one is more likely to get stopped by cops?" I've never had one white male answer that it would be the white guy. Reminds me of the great 1970 film, Where's Poppa, where a well dressed black couple have cab after cab pass them by but George Segal dressed in a gorilla suit is picked up immediately.

I remember a story told to me by a white high school teacher who had a deep understanding of racial issues - she took in kids to live with her family over the years, including one of my former 6th graders who grew up poor. A few of his relatives had apparently escaped the pull of gravity of poverty and had middle class jobs. The teacher pointed out that the escapees never quite escape the pull of poverty gravity because the rest of the poor family was always pulling on them for help.

At any rate, the article is a must read, especially for educators though some of the charts gave me a headache. Read it here - and I have a bunch of excepts below the break - but no charts.

Article 2 is this one about discipline. It is a complex article addressing issues that come up often here in NYC about punishing kids, suspensions, etc. I won't print any of it but leave those interested to read it at the link


Why Are Black Students Punished So Often? Minnesota Confronts a National Quandary

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/18/us/politics/school-discipline-disparities-white-black-students.html

As I often say I learned a lot from my students, especially about racism. Here are a few stories that sort of fit into the framework of the article above.

I once had my class(roughly 65% Hispanic and 35% black) lined up ready to go back up after lunch and told them we weren't moving until everyone was quiet and in line. Some kids were still rambunctious and pulled one after another off the line into a separate line. Then I noticed that every single one of the kids I pulled was black. It made me stop and think about whether I was being objective or exhibiting some prejudice. I thought I was objective but it was a wake-up call for me to be sensitive.

Another story about race has to do with a black boy in my 6th grade class who gave me a hell of a lot of trouble the first month of school -- I had moved up with my 5th grade class and they were attuned to my teaching and happy to be in my class again - but he was an addition - his also problem brother had been in the 5th grade and was not in this class - than goodness. It was a known problem family with all the kids having been problems. Did this prejudice me? Well, I got pretty exasperated with him and finally said I was coming to his house after school to talk to his mother. He didn't seem to care -- so I decided to go. The projects were pretty rough at that time so I had some butterflies. When I knocked on the door he answered. His eyes were disbelieving. I sat down in the living room waiting for his mom to appear. He sat there looking scared when she came in. I can't explain why I did what I did - I had no plan - but the first words out of my mouth was how funny he was (he was) - but I think at that moment it was the first time I thought of him that way --he looked so relieved. I did lodge some complaints about his behavior but said with her help we could work things out.

From them on he and I were pals and had the most fun in class. My attitude towards him totally changed. I began to laugh at his antics instead of punishing him and we often entertained the rest of the class. He did have some very rough years - or decades - ahead but now I see him on facebook and am delighted at the way his life seems to have turned out. What was my lesson here? That sometimes we as teachers can change our views of certain kids.

In retrospect, I found that I often connected with most of the black boys I had in my class and later on when I began to hang out with one of my former students and his friends when he was on the high school basketball team years later I learned a lot about black teenage boys - a view I wish everyone had a chance to be part of. They were poor urban kids - but so interesting and delightful - I at times took a bunch to my house after school to play video games. A few slept over once or twice. It was my honor to be invited into their world.

The final article ties is about Testilying by police - part 1 -- Tuesday was part 2.
A Stubborn Problem:
Police lying persists, even amid an explosion of video
evidence that has allowed the public to test officers’ credibility.

How does this tie in? Well think of the disciplining and arrests of so many black boys and men. Do all cops lie? Obviously not. But if a cop is even subconsciously racist - or views black teen boys very differently than the view I had of them -- always a menace -- and certainly some are -- then they are more likely to overreact. And shade the truth to match their point of view.

All of the above, a complex problem with mo easy solutions.

Tulsa World editorial: Oklahoma can avoid a statewide teachers' strike, but not if the Legislature keeps screwing around

Legislature must get serious about pay raises for Oklahoma teachers

Oklahoma has been hemorrhaging teachers to neighboring states which pay much more. Something's gonna blow. I went to an event where one of the main players, teacher Larry Cagle, a Republican I believe, spoke on the phone in depth about what is going on there. You can hear him and West Virginia teachers at:
https://www.facebook.com/jacobinmag/videos/2087299477963409/

Tulsa World editorial: Oklahoma can avoid a statewide teachers' strike, but not if the Legislature keeps screwing around

Immediately above this editorial is a note about a coming crisis, a completely avoidable statewide teachers’ strike.

We have 14 days — two weeks — until thousands of Oklahoma teachers will walk away from their jobs, bringing children’s educations to a halt and creating havoc for Oklahoma families from border to border.

It doesn’t have to happen; but unfortunately, a solution relies on the Oklahoma legislators, who are best at doing nothing or, alternatively, doing next to nothing and claiming they’re hard at work.

Teachers have gone without a state-funded pay raise for nearly a decade. The Oklahoma Education Association, the dominant teacher organization in the state, is demanding a $10,000 teachers’ raise over three years; $5,000 raises for support personnel; solid funding for education programs and a sustainable, rational revenue plan to pay for it.

It’s a reasonable demand, but instead of working to meet it, the Legislature is fiddling around the edges.

Last week, the state Senate proposed a raise package that fell well short of the teachers’ position. It included no money for support personnel and nothing for classroom funding. A revenue package to pay for it fell two votes short of the supermajority needed for passage.

Then Speaker of the House Charles McCall rolled out an even less acceptable plan: Incremental increases over six years, starting with about $2,000 next year. The McCall plan included no specifics on how it would be funded.

Both plans should be scrapped and legislative leaders need to get to work on a real effort to fund education adequately.

A statewide teachers’ strike would be bad for children, teachers and the state. If lawmakers continue playing political games and teachers end up walking out on April 2, there will be no doubt about who will be at fault: Oklahoma’s political leaders who lack the courage to fund public schools adequately.

Call your legislators and insist that they fund education and stop playing political games as the crisis nears.

It's Mayoral Control, Stupid - Senator to introduce bill scaling back mayoral control over city school closures, changes | NYDN

Brian Benjamin on the whole supports mayoral control. So this is a mild attempt to control but continue this undemocratic system.

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/education/senator-push-bill-reducing-mayoral-control-city-schools-article-1.3882557

Putin Wins, But Still Jealous of Unity Caucus Control

With most of the ballots counted, Putin had received 76% of the vote, the central election commission said.

 "The Unity Caucus operation manual is my bible and Michael Mulgew is my hero," stated Putin. "He gets the same or greater percentage of votes and he doesn't even have to poison people."

"Sixty years in power is even better than Stalin."He hopes to meet with Unity officials soon to get ideas on how he can increase his dominance.

Putin smirked that the opposition in the UFT should not to be fooled by the improved food at the executive board and suggested they bring food tasters to future meetings.

He promised that Russian hackers would hack into the MORE emails accounts and be involved in the next UFT election to push Unity totals even higher.

The Charter School Horrors

Some teachers, having bought the hype, enter teaching in a charter with exuberance. Think of the joy of a hot shower. Early on you are in ecstasy. And very soon, the horror begins. Read the horror stories coming out of charter schools. The music is eerily familiar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQLfWZ3qPvU



Here are some posts of interest.

A teacher quits a charter school as posted by Robert D. Skeels * rdsathene posted at Schools Matter

Florina Rodov: The Truth About Charter Schools

“[W]hen teachers aren’t unionized, they’re exploited — and when teachers suffer, so do kids.” — Florina Rodov
This amazing piece by Florina Rodov on Shondaland is a must read. Taking place at one of the seedy charter corporations here in Los Angeles, the story Rodov tells is all too familiar to all of us that are anti-privatization activists. Much of the mistreatment of faculty and students mirrors the accounts in Professor Horn's Work Hard, Be Hard: Journeys Through "No Excuses" Teaching. Hat tip to Leonie Haimson, whose Tweet regarding this essay caught my eye... Robert D. Skeels * rdsathene posted at at Schools Matter

 =======

Another teacher quits Noble charter in Chicago on March 1.

I left Noble because I could no longer stomach feeling unvalued and untrusted by the administration and the network, and hampered in my ability to provide an environment in which my students could thrive.

https://whyileftnoblenetwork.blog/2018/03/11/i-left-noble-because/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

Noble needs a Union because teachers need to feel respected, valued and trusted in the work that they do. Leadership and education are collaborative endeavors, and they require trust and respect on each side. The policies that Noble enforces on its staff, students, and communities are not equitable because they do not represent the voices of those populations in a meaningful, substantive, or concrete way. Noble designed and implemented a payscale without transparency or formal outlets for staff input, and as a result it does not adequately account for teacher experience or equally recognize the work of our paras, facilities workers, office staff, or culture team. My experience, though potentially an outlier because of credentials, is surely not an anomaly in the dismissive manner which Noble treats much of its staff and their service to our kids. Noble constantly demands that teachers are to trust their administrators, yet they fail to show us that trust in return. A union would allow teacher and staff voices to be heard, teacher autonomy to be respected, and teacher expertise to be valued. Without those things, your network will continue to be a revolving door for educators and the students will suffer the most for it. 

=====

Jersey Jazzman begins a multi-part series:
 

The Facts About NJ Charter Schools, Part I: Prelude 

=======

Renegade Teacher: Online Charter Schools Are a Fraud and a Scam by dianeravitch

 

Renegade Teacher hast taught in both public schools and charter schools in Detroit. He writes here about the highly profitable fraud of online charter schools. Among their most prominent supporters are Betsy DeVos (who invested in them, and now advocates for them) and Jeb Bush, who relentlessly promotes online learning.

From his own experience as a teacher, he saw what online learning lacks: human relationships between students and teachers and between peers. It is soul-deadening.

“Online education in the K-12 sphere is a growing trend- as of 2015, there were some 275,000 students enrolled in online charter schools. In my home state of Michigan, from 2010 to 2014, the number of students in Online Charter Schools increased from 718 students to 7,934 students (over 1000% increase).

“Private, for-profit companies (using public funds) are cashing in- the two largest online charter companies, K12 and Connections Academy, are raking in an estimated $1 billion per year (as of 2014). The motive is profit over substance: less operating costs, less teachers, and less building maintenance.

“The results have been damning: according a study from the Center on Reinventing Public Education (CREDO), students in online charters lost an average of about 72 days of learning in reading and 180 days of learning in math IN THE COURSE OF AN 180-DAY SCHOOL YEAR. They could have had equal math progress if they had spent the entire year asleep.

“In Philadelphia, a system composed of mainly poverty-stricken Black and Latinx students, online schools educated more than one-third of students as of 2014 [1]. The kicker is that, between 2011 and 2014, 100% of those students failed their state achievement tests. 100%!!! [2].”

The biggest online charter school in Ohio recently collapsed, both an academic and financial disaster.

Renegade Teacher thinks they should be banned. They are educational frauds.

Rewriting History: Mulgrew Obfuscates on Testing

Mulgew not only supported NY RTTT but he was critical in getting it.... A source

See:

https://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/ny/2010/08/20/no-surprises-in-new-yorks-second-race-to-the-top-pitch/
http://www1.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/366-10/mayor-bloomberg-chancellor-klein-uft-president-michael-mulgrew-new-york-s-winning-race#/0

https://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/ny/2010/07/28/klein-mulgrew-to-help-pitch-new-yorks-race-to-the-top-plan/

Dear Norm,
I am former UFT delegate during the time that the current APPR law was being voted on. I was shocked that there was no mention at delegate assemblies to oppose testing. I was so upset, I called my State Representative to ask that he vote against the current teacher evaluation that includes testing as part of a teacher's rating. He was surprised that teachers were against this measure, and kept repeating how our Union "shook hands on it". Other states have already repealed that part of teacher evaluations. Why is NY dragging its feet?

The moral: Mulgrew is piece of $#&*!!!

---- Retired teacher

On Thursday morning the UFT held an event with Daniel Koretz who wrote "The Testing Charade." I intended to go but something came up. Lisa North went and reported that Mulgrew was trying to line himself up with the testing critics. What a crock. Lisa reports"

I attended a UFT event with Daniel Koretz who wrote "The Testing Charade"....It was mostly made up of UFT employees since it was during the school day. Mulgrew spoke as if he was always against the tests. I asked him when the UFT would send emails to members like NYSUT did concerning testing...His response? We are NYSUT! He said the UFT's main objective now is to make sure the teacher evaluations do not include tests....

Mulgrew's wording was mostly something like this....When "No Child Left behind" was passed, I know there was going to be big problems with testing.....He did not come out saying he was always against testing.... Lisa North

Jia Lee replied:

How the spark became a flame in W. Virginia | Socialist Worker

A good blow by blow account:

We're hoping this is just the beginning of a much larger movement and that people wake up...
----
Let's talk about step two, which we called that "blue flu" [everyone calling in sick and staying home]. We said what does everyone think about a "blue flu" day? Everybody was in support.
Our union reps were there, and I think they were surprised. They said: Let me tell you about all the legal repercussions, you may lose your seniority, you might lose your job, you're definitely going to lose a day of pay. But everyone was still on board.
The momentum and energy in the room was intense.-----
other counties were saying we weren't giving them enough time, that they needed more time to organize. We talked about that in our leadership meetings: Do we stop? Do we wait on other counties to get organized, or do we just go ahead and do it?
We decided, no, let's just go ahead and do it. The day before I went, someone looked at me and said are you really going to go to the Capitol with four counties? They will laugh you out. You need at least 45 to make a difference. I said I don't believe that. I think that it wouldn't matter if it was one county. It's going to start a movement.
You just wait and see if other counties don't start jumping on board and following our lead. And sure enough, it happened. It was like a domino effect.....

.......WV Teacher Katie Endicott, Socialist Worker

Yes, the union leadership warned them of consequences. They weren't scared off. It depends on how you look at it. Here we see the union leadership as damping militancy. In this account Katie says they were doing their job to warn them but then also telling them they'd have their backs.

How the spark became a flame in W. Virginia 

March 12, 2018

Teachers were celebrating at the West Virginia Capitol last week, after their nine-day, statewide strike won the passage of legislation that gives them and other state employees a 5 percent raise. Some 20,000 educators in a "right-to-work" state walked out February 22 over wages and the underfunding of the Public Employees Insurance Agency (PEIA), which provides health care coverage for state workers.
The day after the strike ended, 10th and 12th grade English teacher Katie Endicott from Central Mingo High School spoke with Dana Blanchard about how this struggle came together.

Teachers stand united during a nine-day strike in West Virginia
 

I WOULD love to hear a little bit more about the Mingo story. I know you've probably told this a thousand times in the past weeks, but you all kind of started this whole thing.

ON MARTIN Luther King Jr. Day, there was a rally. That's a holiday that West Virginia schools have off, and teachers went to the rally in Charleston.
My little boy had the flu, so I stayed with the kids while my husband went to the rally.

When he came home, he was so dejected because he said there were only about 150 teachers there. And when he talked to state senators and delegates, they were telling him: You should be scared, you have no idea what is coming your way.

https://socialistworker.org/2018/03/12/how-the-spark-became-a-flame-in-w-virginia 

How the West Virginia Teacher Strike Was Made | Rewire News

What bothered Null the most, she said, was when legislators made clear they “have money for businesses but not for you.” The money for businesses in question is a $140 million tax break on mining and manufacturing business inventory, money that would ordinarily mostly go to fund schools. Null believes that this tax break largely benefits corporate interests outside of the state.

So at the suggestion of Cheatham, a group of teachers went to the state capitol to talk about their concerns. Null said, “Most of [the lawmakers] gave nice political answers, but there were a handful of Republican senators who decided to use sarcasm.” These responses served to galvanize the teachers and they set to organizing.... Rewire News

Here's another article on the WV strike. The UFT has another  lobbying day coming up. Ho-hum, I guess. Here is what the teachers in WV put on the table but our UFT/NYSUT leaders won't -- hard economics.

What bothered Null the most, she said, was when legislators made clear they “have money for businesses but not for you.” The money for businesses in question is a $140 million tax break on mining and manufacturing business inventory, money that would ordinarily mostly go to fund schools. Null believes that this tax break largely benefits corporate interests outside of the state.

I'm posting all these articles so we can have as much info as possible from all sides - including from the right - so we can learn what lessons we can. For those who dream of it happening here, it will never happen as long as the current leadership can control the membership. Now if that gets to a point where the membership is angry enough to rise up, even with the current leadership in power, they would be forced to become more militant but I still wouldn't trust them. Watch the WV and OK stories to see how the leadership is operating. More to come.

How the West Virginia Teacher Strike Was Made

https://rewire.news/article/2018/03/12/west-virginia-teacher-strike-made/
Mar 12, 2018, 12:55pm Rita Mae Reese

 
Powerful social movements throughout history have been led by women and children, and the statewide strike in West Virginia, along with the movement ignited by students from Parkland, might be the sign of major changes ahead. 

While the pussy hat became the best-known symbol of the Women’s March in 2017, the West Virginia education strikers of 2018 had their own head gear: red bandanas and occasional bunny ears. The bandanas were a nod to labor history in West Virginia—striking miners at the Battle of Blair Mountain tied the bandanas around their necks to symbolize solidarity that spanned differences in ethnicities and languages, making them the original rednecks. But it was also a defiant gesture to Gov. Jim Justice (R), who told a crowd at a town hall at Wheeling Park High School that he could be “the town redneck, too.”

Many have noted the long, proud history of labor activism in West Virginia, with some tracing the activism of the striking teachers to their “fathers and grandfathers” active in the coal mine wars. But this ignores the rich history of women organizers such as trailblazing union leader Mother Jones, or Fannie Sellins, who was killed during a coal mine strike.
Vice News / YouTube

The bunny ears came after Governor Justice declared the teachers were “dumb bunnies” if they trusted other politicians rather than him.

The West Virginia Teachers Strike Shows That Winning Big Requires Creating a Crisis | The Nation

“Wages and health benefits were almost a distraction. They are important, but there were five major stances we took, and we won all five.”

These included defeating an expansion of charter schools, killing a proposal to eliminate seniority, and scuttling a paycheck-protection bill (aimed at weakening unions by taking away their right to deduct union dues through payroll collection), as well as a mechanism to fix the health-insurance crisis and a raise big enough to matter. ... The Nation

Here's my third piece of the day on the WV strike as I sit and watch the nail biter from Western PA. This time from the left- The Nation. Note the wins were more than wages -- they killed a charter school initiative. I asked one of the WV teachers at the big show last Saturday night about charter schools in WV - he said "None." I figured that was the case since how do you close every school in the state if there were charters? That is the hidden purpose of charters -- to assure teacher unions cannot get the power to close every school. Who knew WV had no real charter influence? He told me that was because they are so rural with such big distances.

I have some stuff on WV and OK from the right - my pal Mike Antonucci - some snark, as usual, but always with stuff not being covered by others --- some of that coming up Thursday night.

The strikers won all five of their demands by shutting down every public school in the state.

By Jane McAlevey

https://www.thenation.com/article/the-west-virginia-teachers-strike-shows-that-winning-big-requires-creating-a-crisis/


Thousands of teachers and school personnel at the capitol in Charleston, March 5, 2018. (Craig Hudson / Charleston Gazette-Mail via AP)