UPDATED: Six More Years of Mayoral Control...

The battle to kill it forever starts NOW!!!!!

Join the resistance. Contact GEM, ICE, TJC.

Next time teachers and parents must be out in force.

STARTING MONDAY AT 12 NOON AT CITY HALL:


THE COALITION FOR PUBLIC EDUCATION
....is holding a Press Conference on the steps of City Hall at NOON on Monday August 10, 2009 to expose that Mayor Bloomberg and his media friends are giving us the false impression that Mayoral Control is the current rule of law for our public schools.

As of today, New York City public schools do not have Mayoral Control.

THE COALITION FOR PUBLIC EDUCATION understands that in order for the bill passed on August 6 by the NY State Senate to become law, it must first be debated and voted on and approved by the full NY State Assembly. Then it must go to Governor Patterson for review and signature. Until that happens, we have a decentralized system as enacted in 1969, not Mayoral Control as enacted in 2002. Since the NY State Assembly will not convene until sometime in September at the earliest, we will begin the new school year under a decentralized system without Mayoral Control. All reports to the contrary are false and misleading.

Joining us on the steps of City Hall will be elected officials who are opposed to Mayoral Control as well as educators, parents and students. They will explain how this deception is being used to help promote Bloomberg’s bid for a third term as mayor and help legitimize the privatizing of our public education system.

The UFT Survey Says (Gag, Gag).....

There's been a load of discussion on the current 35 page UFT survey on blogs and listserves. Accountable Talk is urging people to send it in blank in this post How to Fill Out Your UFT Contract Survey with this proviso:

But I am going to do one thing: I am writing across the front cover, in red marker, two simple words: PROTECT US. I urge you to do the same. Tell your friends and colleagues. Email this post to them. If the powers that be at the UFT HQ see enough of these, perhaps they will get the message.

Sorry, AT. Once the UFT allowed the cow of total principal power is out of the barn, there is no way to stuff it back in. At least not without a powerful rank and file movement that is willing to go to the mattresses with BloomKlein: NO COOPERATION ON ANYTHING

Merit pay? NADA.

Agreeing to data reports? NEVER.

Bullshit paperwork? NOT ONE STUPID BINDER WILL BE HANDED IN.

Call it a Winston Churchill WWII attitude. We will fight them on the beaches, etc.

But you know the answer. The UFT is incapable of this attitude. So you might get tough rhetoric from Mulgrew, but the UFT is so far in bed with BloomKlein he could not extricate it even if he wanted to.

One of the things I enjoyed the most when ICE's Jeff Kaufman was on the Executive Board was his take no prisoners approach, which infuriated Randi and the UFT/Unity Caucus suck-ups. I'll be the first to admit that when Jeff was chosen to run I barely knew him and had no idea he would bring this former cop/lawyer attitude to the table. But watching that show for three years was worth the shlep into Manhattan every two weeks. And of course the free buffet.

Anna Philips at Gotham Schools quoted Jeff :

Jeff Kaufman, a member of ICE, an opposition party within the UFT, sat on the union’s negotiating committee in 2005, but he said he never saw the survey results.

“If they get 10% response, I would be shocked. And the response they get back, you can’t tabulate — there’s no way they sit for hours putting these numbers together and reading the comments,” he said. “We do everything else electronically. I am certain a good percentage of these end up in the garbage.”

The survey, which at a bulging 35 pages long barely fits in its return envelope, lists a series of desirable changes to the contract under headings like “Class Size,” and “Respect and Professionalism,” and asks respondents to rate the importance of each on a scale of one to five. It must be returned by August 13, and may surprise more than a few union members who could return from summer vacations to find the deadline has passed.

Absent from the survey is any mention of tenure or the Absent Teacher Reserve — the pool of over 2,000 teachers who have lost their jobs and have yet to find work within the city’s school system.

Note the way the class size question is formulated. Did it ask if teachers want it as part of contract negotiations? Does it explain that there have been no significant changes in class size since it was last negotiated - in the late 1960's. I think the Beatles were involved on those negotiations.

ICE's partners in the upcoming UFT election, Teachers for a Just Contract (TJC) has takes a different position than Accountable Talk.

Note that Marian Swerdlow has an additional analysis on the UFT attempts to make it look like they are democratic and will send it out to those who ask, but she doesn't want it published on the internet. Email me and I'll forward your request to Marian.


TEACHER FOR A JUST CONTRACT: QUESTIONING THE QUESTIONNAIRE
The "Member Contract Questionnaire" sent to all UFT members is a beginning, however belated. But if membership input stops here, this will be a bad mistake. We hope there will be more complete follow-up questionnaires designed for use in and with discussion in chapters.

First of all, the timing of this questionnaire could scarcely be worse. Received the first week of August, it must be returned by August 13. This is the heart of most UFT members' vacation times, when the greatest number will be on vacation or out of touch. Why is it done now, with such a ridiculously short "window period" for return? Furthermore, the administration of this questionnaire to individuals by mail during vacation precludes collective discussion and sharing which always optimizes group decision-making. TJC is going to try to remedy this by offering some input of our own, via email, and encouraging more from you. We hope and expect our sister opposition group, ICE, will do the same with its email and its blog.

It's great that this questionnaire provides some opportunities for the respondents in "write in" their concerns. We want to encourage TJC supporters to think about the following writing in their thoughts on these issues when answering the questionnaire:

Excessing Procedures -
In 2005, the UFT started allowing principals to decide whether they will allow a teacher into their schools. The result has been an explosion in the number of teachers relegated to "ATR." This questionnaire basically ignores this problem. We need rights, protections and guarantees for excessed teachers.

Negative Material in the file -
Also in 2005, the UFT gave up the right to grieve a letter in the file on the basis of it being"unfair and inaccurate." This has made it much easier for administrators and supervisors to harass, intimidate, U-rate, remove and fire UFT members. The questionnaire does refer to this problem, but in ways that are too vague. For example, page 2, question 9 asks the respondent to rate "strengthen the grievance procedures" as a "negotiating priority." On page 9, it asks whether the respondent "strongly supports" 10 statements including "Restore Letter in the file grievance procedures." This is not clear enough. It should at least say, "Restore the right to grieve a letter in the file if it is unfair or inaccurate."

The Grievance Procedure in general:
Another specific way the grievance procedure could be strengthened is by imposing penalties on the D.o.E. for lack of timeliness. As of now, all the penalties for timeliness are on the UFT member: if we don't grieve on time, it is too late. However, the principal or the Chancellor's office can stall forever before rendering a decision, and there's no penalty. The result is that people can wait years until they get a decision on a grievance. In the mean time, the abuse can go on and on. If a lack of a decision within a time limit meant the grievant would win, we would get timely decisions, and violations could be curbed.

The 2005 so-called "Open Market Transfer Plan"
Does it serve our needs? Should we be fighting to restore the seniority plan, or aspects of it that could put checks on principals' arbitrary powers?

Rights of accused members
Do we want better protections for members against allegations? One important example: When there is an allegation against a member, the D.o.E. carries out an investigation. However, the accused member has no corresponding right to carry out an investigation, and doesn't even have the right to know the charge while the investigation is going on. This puts our members at a tremendous disadvantage and all the evidence is one-sided. Do we want better enforcement of due process rights and other rights of reassigned (removed) members?

New professional and administrative assignments
The only question here about this is whether there are too many of the latter as compared to the former. But do we want administrative assignments at all? The old way, both union and principal had to agree to add an activity to the menu, and what the "expectations" should be, and disputes went to a union-management committee. Now the principal has final say. Do we want to go back to the old way?

Sabbaticals
There is no mention of sabbaticals. Members are often denied sabbaticals and the explanations are irrational and/or violative. The union seems powerless to protect our sabbatical rights. Repeatedly, we hear sabbaticals are an endangered species. How important is it to us to have stronger protections for sabbatical rights and to make sure sabbaticals are preserved for our newest UFT members to enjoy as they accrue seniority?

Perhaps these issues can be included in follow-up questionnaires and discussions.

Individual questionnaires, and even group discussions, are important but not enough. It's great to go into a contract struggle with demands for generous raises and no givebacks. But sometimes a choice is unavoidable between taking one giveback or another, or launching or continuing a strike. It is imperative to consult the membership at such junctures. Even when you are making gains, during negotiations unforseen choices arise over which gains the membership wants more. The importance of membership control grows as negotiations intensify. In addition to Delegate Assemblies, membership meetings on the regional, borough and even union-wide level should be introduced to implement this control.

Unfortunately, the UFT's past record in this regard leaves much to be desired. For the present contract, there was an almost identical survey in August 2006. We had slightly more time to fill it out. There was no follow-up. When the contract was settled prematurely in October 2006, it had hardly any relationship to anything in the questionnaire, as evidenced by the fact that this questionnaire is practically identical to its predecessor: There seems to be only a single instance of winning the many priorities and issues we were asked about in the questionnaire: the five-year longevity. In the light of this, we have the right to feel skeptical over how much this questionnaire will mean.

2006 vs. 2009: A Section-by-Section Guide to What Can We Learn from Comparing Two Questionnaires

How has the questionnaire changed? What does this show us about our union's trajectory? What clues can the changes give us about what lies in the future? To get a copy of Marian Swerdlow's comparative analysis of these two UFT attempts to "look democratic," reply to this email. (EMAIL ME AT NORMSCO@GMAIL.COM)

Leonie Slaps Flypaper Over Class Size

Is there not stopping this woman? Yesterday she takes down the NY Times. Today she wipes out the Fordham Institute.

Leonie Haimson reports on the NYC Ed News Listserve:

See this nasty column in Flypaper – put out by the right-wing Fordham Institute, attacking my Huffington Post column on Frank McCourt posted here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leonie-haimson/what-frank-mccourt-could_b_241331.html

Check it out at http://www.edexcellence.net/flypaper/index.php/2009/08/no-offense-frank-mccourt/ and please leave a comment.

The author actually argues that smaller classes are “unsubstantiated remedies….- Rather than adhering to rigorous research standards, we resort to sweeping generalizations and sentimental stories about children’s lives.”

Hogwash! Actually, the research is stronger for class size reduction than for nearly any other education reform – and certainly stronger than the favored remedies of the Fordham Institute crowd.

My comments are below.

Thanks,

Leonie Haimson

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leonie-haimson

I'm glad that my column is being so widely read and cited, even by hidebound contrarians.

Actually, the scientific and empirical research is so strong for class size reduction that it is cited as only four evidence-based education reforms that have been proven to work by the Institute of Education Science -- the research arm of the US Dept. of Education. You can check it out yourself by googling the title: "IDENTIFYING AND IMPLEMENTING EDUCATIONAL PRACTICES SUPPORTED BY RIGOROUS EVIDENCE"

There are literally scores of studies indicating that smaller class sizes lead to better results -- not just STAR, which was one of the few large scale, randomized experiments in the history of education reform -- the gold standard according to most researchers.

Over and over again, smaller classes have been shown to lead to fewer disciplinary referrals, more learning, more student engagement, and less teacher attrition. Class size reduction has also been proven to be cost-effective. A recent study showed that in terms of health care, the economic cost-benefits would be expected to surpass childhood immunization.

Alan Krueger, formerly of Princeton and now the chief economist of the US Dept. of Treasury, has demonstrated that the number of positive studies on class size reduction far outnumber the negative ones. The links you provide above do not show otherwise.

Why ideologues and zealots put so much energy into disputing the simple fact that teachers can reach their students better and students learn more in smaller classes is beyond me. Why anyone would seriously argue that only student load matters and not class size -- as though the only learning and personal connection between teachers and students happens outside of the classroom -- I cannot possibly understand.

And Frank McCourt was a huge champion of smaller classes, as evidenced by his frequent comments on the subject as well as his agreement to be honorary chair of the campaign to lower class size in NYC public schools.

Perhaps its because unlike their own favorite strategies, such as privatization, vouchers, the expansion of charter schools and/or teacher incentive pay, none of which has any backing in the research, class size reduction has been proven to work, over and over again. Thus it is the dragon that they are unable to slay.

If anyone would like some fact sheets on this issue, including recent papers with findings about the importance of smaller classes in the middle and upper grades, you can email me at leonie@att.net.

I just took a look at the three links above -- supposedly research studies that weakens the case for smaller classes. One of the studies contains the following statement:

"Studies that used high-quality experimental data have consistently demonstrated the positive effects of small classes on average student achievement-for all students....The findings also indicated that although all types of students benefited from being in small classes, reductions in class size did not reduce the achievement gap between low and high achievers."

{This conclusion, by the way, is not shared by other researchers -- who have shown that class size reduction narrows the achievement gap between racial groups by more than 30%.)

The second is an EdWeek summary of the first article.

The third, an unpublished "discussion" paper by Boozer and Cacciola, also does not dispute the effects of smaller classes, but appears to divide class size into direct and indirect effects, with some of the significant gains exhibited by students in smaller classes attributed to peer effects.

Thus students who are in classes with other students who are doing better because of smaller classes also benefit because their peers are doing better. At least that is what the article seems to conclude: "Small class type treatment induced not just potentially a boost in that child's test score outcome, but an indirect or spillover effect on the child's classmates through the peer group effect. This is what we mean by the feedback or social multiplier effect of the Small class type treatment."

There are many positive feedbacks that occur in smaller classes. The smaller the class, the more engaged are its students, and fewer disciplinary problems occur. The fewer disruptions, the easier it is for teachers to teach and low-performing students to focus and model their behavior on more engaged students. Also there is less stereotyping in both directions -- from teacher to students and students to teacher.

Teachers can figure out quicker who is or is not responding to a specific technique, style or approach, and alter their methods more quickly and effectively to reach specific students; and students feel as though their teachers understand and care about them more, and are willing to put back into the classroom their focus and energy.

None of this is surprising, and none of it is difficult to understand.

In any case, according to my reading of these articles, not one of them weakens the case that smaller classes leads to better outcomes.

Thanks,

Leonie Haimson
Executive Director
Class Size Matters
www.classsizematters.org
http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/

Please make a tax-deductible contribution to Class Size Matters now!

Pakter Whacked Her

The David Pakter open 3020a hearings continues today and tomorrow and it's a show that is worth the price of admission. Open hearings are rare, so this may be a rare opportunity. It's all about giving out watches for achievement and buying plastic plants for the school. Serious matters that require 2 DOE (or more) lawyers. I'm sorry I can't make it tomorrow. And probably not Thursday either, but if someone does go send a report. I'm sure there will be other chances - right until the next century, most likely.

I wrote about a previous visit to Pakter hearing (David made them open to the public) at which the Principal of Fashion Industries HS, after telling just slightly distorted stories, suddenly realized upon cross examination that there was a transcript of a meeting with David and went rigid as she asked, "You mean he taped the meeting?" (June 3rd.) (Note to all teachers who have to meet with principals under weird conditions, get a flower with a mic. Check out these I Spy stores.)

I also commented here. And in more places on this blog.

I went back a few weeks later and heard the Assistant Principal testify about Pakter putting trees in front of the auditorium doors, thus blocking their access. He gave the impression they were giant redwoods. In fact, they were plastic plants David had carried over himself from Home Depot, a few blocks away. The plants kept shrinking as the AP testified. So did he.

I made a return visit July 23. I am sorry I missed the road trip the day before when the hearing officer Douglas Bantl -- a gentleman and nice guy who is being axed as a hearing officer after this case for being too fair -- and the lawyers all went up to Harlem to visit the rubber room.

You see, another serious charge is that Pakter refused to report to the RR because he said it was pointless to sit there and do nothing and the place was harmful to people's health. He didn't mind not getting paid and the DOE didn't mind not paying him. But they are still charging him with not reporting. I guess they really do want to pay people for doing nothing even if they don't want to be paid. But watch the NY Post scream about the awful waste and blame the UFT.

There was a new DOE lawyer who was barely familiar with the case. His name is Phil Oliveri. And there was another DOE lawyer named Wilson Sia with him. You see, it takes two lawyers to talk about watches and plastic plants.

I was only able to stay for the morning and there was one witness - a guidance counselor who testified he saw Pakter showing some watches to a student monitor in the main office while the counselor was heating up his lunch in the microwave.

He thought it odd but not enough to say anything to anyone, until a week later when at a guidance meeting chaired by AP Olivier Poor, who mentioned that some teacher had bought plants for the school. The GC spoke up asking if it was the same guy who was showing watches. Poor perked up and asked him about it.

Soon after Poor wrote an email to the principal Hilda Nieto that the GC has told her he saw Pakter selling watches to a school aide in the school store.

Poor poor. She made 3 errors of fact in one sentence. But the day before she testified that what she wrote was true. Unfortunately for her, when the GC was shown the email, he stuck by his original story that Pakter was just showing the watches to a student in the main office. "Did it seem he was trying to hide that he was doing it," asked NYSUT lawyer Chris Calergy? "No," said the GC.

Now we must remind you that one of the major charges against Pakter is that he was selling watches to the kids. Nada.

That these events took place in November 2006 and it's now -- hmmm, I think August 2009.

That all this time has passed is a sign of

a) dysfunction at the DOE

b)a willingness to spend whatever it takes and however how long to snuff Pakter, who is way past retirement and has ooodles of moolah with his watch company (skip the intro - if you dare) but is way too stubborn to give up.

I wish he'd show me some of them watches. But first I have to look for my high school report cards to prove I had a 90 average.

Damn, just checked and it came to 89.7 over my last 3 years at Thomas Jefferson HS in East NY Brooklyn from 1959-1962. Can I get marked on a curve like they seem to be doing today? Better yet, how about giving me some of that credit recovery stuff? I can fog a mirror with the best of them.

Related
South Bronx School had been tracking the Pakter case.

And NYC Rubber Room Reporter did a long piece back in December chronicling the case up to that point.

Out takes:
Follow up to this morning's post on my new suits.
I already got invited to a school but if they see another suit in any way related to the UFT they will get out the tar and feather. I guess its back to jeans. Anyone got a Bar Mitzvah to invite me to?

I'm Practically Orgasmic

Earlier I wrote that criticism NY Times education coverage makes me hot –The NY Times Should Just Stop Trying to Cover Education.

As I suggested, they shouldn't waste time trying to cover education. Maybe use the resources on food. Or moon rocks.

The Times responded to Leonie and she then deliciously takes them to pieces.

Read all about it at Leonie's blog

The NY Times response, and my reply

Raging Inferno on PS 123/HSA Controversy at Gotham

When I saw Francis Lewis HS Chapter Leader Arthur Goldstein's piece at Gotham Schools last week while I was in LA, I figured it would inspire a lot of controversy. So I was surprised that after a few days, there was not much reaction. Until blogger Ken challenged some of Arthur's facts yesterday. Since then there has been a battle between defenders of public education and pro charter commenters - almost all anonymous. (Do you think there are some HSA PR people lurking?)

Patrick Sullivan has weighed in with some great responses as has Murray Bergtraum HS CL John Elfrank-Dana which begs for a blog post all its own.

One of the edges of the debate has been whether the DOE slips data to charter schools like HSA so they can cream fours and threes (scores) or early childhood ECLAS test results. Sullivan reveals some amazing stuff gleaned by CEC One (lower east side parents council) president Lisa Donlan. More on this later today, but you can read it all at

http://gothamschools.org/2009/07/30/more-equal-than-others/#comments

I did do a bit rewriting of the Emma Lazarus poem for the occasion in this comment:

I would argue there is a generic use of the terms 3’s and 4’s to come to mean students who would be successful. The renovation of the Statue of Liberty now reads:

“Give me your tired, your poor

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

As long as they can score a three or a four.

Out takes (a new feature to celebrate the start of our 4th year in the blogosphere):
I bought 2 suits at L&T great August sale because of great prices. Joseph Aboud for about $200 each. Now when you invite me to visit your schools to talk about ICE or GEM or charters or used cars, I can look like the suits at the UFT, only better because these suits actually fit.

The NY Times Should Just Stop Trying to Cover Education

I'll admit it. I actually get hot when someone takes down the NY Times on the way it covers education. Today, Leonie did the deed over at the NYC Parents blog.

Today’s New York Times article on the Bloomberg/Klein record on test scores is incomplete, biased, and in some cases inaccurate.

The Times biased? Shocking. They're still looking for those weapons of mass destruction in Iraq they reported on in such depth.

Leonie has 5 examples,which you can read with a little click:
NY Times falls in line with the Bloomberg PR spin control

Related:
Mike Antonnucci* reports in EIA on the NEA branch using Randi Redux arguments to sell merit pay to the members: What Happens in Tulsa, Stays in Tulsa. and has some comments on the Greg Toppo USAToday article on charters which caused Rotherham to freak: Tempest in a Toppo.

* Never forget that Mike has a dog in the race and looks to make unions the bad guys. But he also covers things none of the press does, particularly you know who.

Prisco Report on SI Charter School Hearing

by Loretta Prisco

Tonight on Staten Island there was a "Public Hearing" on 2 charters being proposed - the Barak Obama Community Charter and the New World Charter.

Thanx so much to Mark, who came by public transportation from the Bronx to SI, and spoke so well against charters.

Thanx to Dom, who made the trip from Queens to SI and dittoed Mark's remarks.,

And finally, thanx to Imani, who spoke from her personal experience about what is happening at P.15. She spoke about how promises are made and just as quickly broken. We found out that we are Staten Island neighbors.

Interesting format. Michael Duffy, Director of Charters, spoke. The Parent Engagement Deputy showed up late. They spoke during the business meeting. The CEC asked tough questions during the Business Meeting. Many of his responses were "will check that out", "we are checking that out", "we will have that information soon". The 2 charters presented their plans during the Calendar or Regular Meeting. Before the public was able to comment, Duffy and the Parent Engagement person left!!!! We were offered the opportunity to write to them.

Some interesting comments from Duffy: they will not go into overcrowded schools. Then he mentioned the schools that were being considered. Many of us laughed - they are overcrowded. He said that the law demands that public hearings be held.. He said that some charters are welcomed and some have been contentious. He was a former member of the board of a Boston Charter and then a principal of a charter.

Duffy explained that charters that do not meet their goals in 5 years will be closed. 3 have been closed so far. But he did admit that most schools are in existence only 1-2 years so that they have not run out of time yet. The jury is still out, but they keep pushing ahead.

Staten Island is a small place and we knew many of the people involved. It was hard for us to attack - but we did. We think that they are sincere people that don't see the public schools working for their kids or their clients. The Barack Obama was the weaker of the 2 - they don't like the elementary school for which they are zoned. My daughter went to that school and did very well. I supervised student teachers from CSI when I taught in the Ed. Dept. The teachers are fabulous. It is what is often described as a "mom and pop" charter. They do now have the weight that New World has. Basically, the parents want options. One of the leads was a parent coordinator of the school they want out of.

The New World was a bit tougher to argue against. They want to serve the immigrant kids that are not doing well in the middle schools. Many of the people behind it are well respected in the community. Retired principal John Tobin is one of them. The kids are dropping out, on the streets, falling into gangs. The programs are really concerned about the Mexican kids and with good reason. Space is being offered by Richard Nicastro who owns the Staten Island Hilton and other properties. While they say that they will serve all immigrants, ( Liberians, Nigerians, Russians and Spanish speaking) it is quite obvious that they will serve Mexicans. We work with Liberians in Park Hill- they speak English!
The "cooperating design' group for the New World Charter is Victory Schools, Inc. The CEO is Margaret Harrington, former HS Supt. in Queens and had to leave for some scandalous reason. Does anyone remember?

A Board Member, Dennis Kelleher is the Founder and CEO of Wall Street Access and very wealthy. He donated the funds for a large beautiful building on the St. John's Campus on SI.

Also on the Board is the wife of the Pres. of Wagner College, a priest, a film maker, a parent, a teacher and sports columnist (I think private school teacher) and an attorney.

Anybody know anything about Victory, Wall Street Access?

Attached is my statement

We made the case that the work must be done to create answers within the public schools, creating institutes with the existing schools to serve special populations.

UFT endorsed Michael McMahon, through his rep, spoke heartily in favor of charters.

Charter school children do get busing! They must follow the same eligibility requirements for all kids - but of course, if they are out of their zoned school, they are eligible. So a parent who wants busing (busing is big issue on Staten Island as our schools are not close together and the streets around the schools are jammed at 3) need only go to a charter to get transportaton.

We also found that the John Lavelle charter approved and scheduled to open in September, while presented to us as a charter school for emotionally disturbed children, will only have 15% of that population.

But the best comments of the night came from a teacher who teaches in Soho and talked about the terrible conditions at her school. She compared that with the Petrides School(she obviously did not know that it was a public school!). And let's face it, she went on, the UFT protects teachers. In a charter school, she explained, those teachers who are not working get thrown out and "I should know I have been one of those teachers protected for 32 years".. Genius.

Of course, the best argument we made was that the reasons for these schools were worthy - so put the programs into the public schools, follow the rules of public schools.

Also note, charter schools went to court saying that they couldn't be audited, and won. It was taken to the next court and overturned. That was reported in NYSUT paper. It was then ruled against in a higher court - they need not be audited.

Loretta

Related:
More on Duffy and on these questionable hearings at: http://grassrootseducationmovement.blogspot.com/2009/08/charter-school-hearings-study-in.html.

Closing the Shoelace Tying Gap: UPDATED

This item from Gotham Schools caught my eye:

On the TA question, a teacher argues that leveling the playing field by lowering it isn’t great for kids.

I checked the NY Times piece from July 30:

City education officials have angered hundreds of parents in recent weeks after cracking down on an informal system of hiring teaching assistants, in which nonunion members were paid hourly wages to assist teachers with reading, supervising recess, even tying shoelaces. Elementary schools on the Upper East Side and Upper West Side have routinely raised hundreds of thousands of dollars from parents to supplement their staff with these aides as their classrooms grew more crowded.

They would now have to do so under DOE supervision and must turn the money over to the DOE, which would have a role in doing background checks. I'm not sure this is such an outrageous demand. There also is the issue of going around union rules. There is a rumor there is some kind of collective bargaining agreement laying around all dusty somewhere.

Since the UFT made the complaint, they have taken a hammering. But school aides are not UFT people, though paraprofessionals are UFT. School aides belong to DC 37 (check the history books to review the hysteria when Al Shanker tried to poach on school aide territory in the early 70's and DC 37 head Victor Gotbaum's – yes, current NYC Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum's husband– more than nasty response, which led to a decade long rift).

Gotham linked to comments from the Teachable Moment blog:

We have to keep in mind that our goal is not just educational parity. Our goal is the best possible education for every student. That includes the rich kids. So while we should focus our efforts on raising the level of achievement for those on the bottom end of the spectrum, our efforts should not try to limit the options available to those on the top end.

This is a little disingenuous.

Who is going to tie the shoelaces of the kids in Bed-Stuy?

Throwing around "achievement" with shoelaces when in fact those of us who taught in urban schools found a shoelace tying gap does exist and has an impact on the so-called achievement gap. But people focused on the AG like focus solely on teacher quality while downplaying all the other gaps. Someone should come up with stats as to what percentage of kids in kindergarten in rich and poor neighborhoods need help in tying their shoelaces.

If rich schools are raising so much money from parents, let the NYCDOE try an experiment in at least some struggling schools they seem so eager to close by matching the highest level of money raised by rich schools and hiring many more classroom assistants. My guess is poor schools need twice as many as rich schools to be in the ballgame.

The Times reports there is a solution:

Under Mr. Klein’s proposal, essentially a technical change, the assistants would now be employed under the title of “substitute aide,” an existing departmental position that pays $12.30 an hour, with no benefits. The city’s current hiring freeze would not apply to them, as the positions would still be paid for with donations.

Mr. Klein made his proposal during a closed-door meeting with parent representatives from a dozen Manhattan schools, and three City Council members, Daniel R. Garodnick, Jessica Lappin and Gale A. Brewer. Michael Mulgrew, the newly elected president of the United Federation of Teachers, also attended.

Solution? Note how there were no parents from areas of the city which raise only a few hundred dollars. I agree with Teachable Moment that we would should raise the level of poor schools, something Joel Klein, that self-proclaimed civil rights advocate, did not do in this case. Also note that some guy named Mulgrew was at the meeting. (Wasn't he elected to something recently?) Do you think he even raised this issue? The UFT takes the narrowest view, so I think not.

There is no real solution until we close the shoelace tying gap.

Or Klein could just get every school a shoelace tying machine shown in the graphic above.

A Manifesto from The Coalition for Public Education/coalicion por la educacion publica

Posted by Bronx teacher Mark Torres:

By any means necessary...as long as it educates, agitates

and mobilizes people into action,

and it constructively empowers the people.

Our group, the coalition for public education/coalicion por la educacion publica, is made up of different groups and individuals, with different talents and passions, that have come together to create a potent force against the bloomberg-klein corporate dictatorship. That's why our group can address the people's work using different, yet complementary, tactics.

Details of the CPE on the legislative front, direct action front, media front, and the internal organizing front at Norms Notes: By Any Means Necessary and see side panel of Ed Notes for upcoming actions to support.

Next meeting Thursday August 6th, from 6pm-8pm, at DC-37.

AMAZING, MUST SEE Video as Chicago's George Schmidt and CORE Shred Arne Duncan and the Chicago Corporate Model

CORE (Caucus of Rank and File Educators) has only been around for about a year and is capturing the imagination of Chicago teachers, parents and students. And George Schmidt has been doing his Substance thing forever. Teaming up Substance and CORE will shake the pillars of the ed deformers in Chicago.

Obama got Arne got out of town just in time. Maybe Obama decided to rescue his basketball buddy from what is coming. Obama will not escape unscathed as the Chicago model of corporate/ed deformation is examined and protests grow. CORE is expected to challenge the Randi-like CTU leadership in union elections next May.

It is probably no accident that Chicago, the city with the longest history of mayoral control (since 1995), and with a collaborative union leadership (sound familiar, kiddies?) is facing the biggest pushback from the rank and file. Having just spent a bunch of time in LA with some of the leaders of this resistance movement, I am enlightened and encouraged. My guess is New York is a few years behind Chicago in building this movement, though I'll write more about these remarkable people as the weeks go by as we look for ways to support each other and activists in other cities.

Spend 28 minutes watching this Labor Beat video of Chicago-based Substance editor George Schmidt and my new best friends from CORE (Caucus of Rank and File Educators) challenge Arne Duncan and the Chicago model being imposed on the entire nation. Watch Arne gulp and break into a rash when a black student rakes him over the coals. George's comments are featured throughout and CORE members are prominent. CORE gave me a dvd which can be reproduced if you want to show it to people in your school. Or just watch it together online.

The best PD you can do to inform your colleagues as to what is coming down and the corporate rationale behind and demonstrate a model of how resistance can form in the absence of teacher unions. Let me amend that. Not the absence. The UFT/AFT is very present – on the wrong side. (See Schmidt's comments on CTU President Marilyn Stewart applauding Duncan as he outlines the plans to decimate the teachers in her union and the children they teach.)

The video is titled: Secretary of Education Duncan: Pushing the Chicago Plan

Here is the Labor Beat intro:

Before President Obama appointed Arne Duncan Secretary of Education, Duncan was the CEO of the Chicago Public Schools. Under his control there, Chicago Public Schools endured a relentless wave of privatization, school closings, militarization, union busting and blaming teachers for the problems of urban schools. Now, the war on public education pursued during the Bush administration will only continue and intensify under the new Secretary of Education Duncan. His Chicago Plan, as former teacher and editor of Substance News George Schmidt explains, is the template for a national strategy to dismantle public education. Through revealing footage and comments from Chicago teachers, this video shows the resistance that has been growing among teachers and community organizations.

Here is a national alert for everyone who cares about the future of public schools, threatened now by Arne Duncan and his corporate vision for the nation's school systems.

The video is hosted on blip.tv: http://blip.tv/file/2428857

Photo: Labor Beat

Caucus of Rank-and-File Educators try to talk to Secretary of Education Arne Duncan at his recent Chicago speech at the Hyatt, but are turned back [ED NOTE: also threatened with arrest if they enter the hall.]

LA Confidential

Well, I got back from LA on the red eye this morning and it was quite a stimulating few days meeting teacher activists from around the nation. And so many young ones. Lots to report on.

I'm not sure exactly what I can say about our meetings in case some of the issues and people present require some anonymity (you know, with that old AFT machine looking to kill militancy and resistance), so I will hold off on details until I check and will put out whatever I can throughout the week. Maybe some individual city views and then an overall conference view. NYC was represented by myself (GEM, ICE), Sally Lee (Teachers Unite) and Megan Behrent (ISO, TJC, GEM).

Candi was Dandy
Candi just posted at the Washington Teacher a brief note about being in LA. Though it was the first time we met in person, I felt I knew her forever through the blogging world. She was even more impressive in person with her knowledge and perspective on the DC situation. She has some news about the DC contract talks, which we got some updates on in LA. I'll leave it to her to keep us up to date on what I am sure will be an NYC modeled sellout, with DC teachers about to face market-based, ATR hell.


In the meantime, without much computer access in LA, lots of stuff accumulated on this end. So expect the ed Notes output over the next few days to be fast and furious. If you are a feedblitz subscriber and don't care for lots of emails, try the digest which you can receive once a day or even less frequently.

While I was there, NYC teacher Arthur Goldstein put out a fabulous piece comparing PS 123 and Harlem Success at Gotham Schools (PS 123 & Harlem Success Academy: More Equal than Others). A must read article that should get national attention, but will probably be suppressed because of the implications it raises about separate and unequal. Don't you wish we had a union that would tell so this kind of reporting? Not as long as they pushed their own two charter schools into public school buildings.

LA Deamin'

The meetings in LA with teachers from a bunch of cities has been quite revealing for the 30-40 people who have been attending. The charter school invasion has been one of the primary topics, along with organizing in the local unions. These are committed teachers, many of them young and their opposition to the ed deformers is an exciting thing to see and be part of. More coming.

In the meantime keep checking the side panel for events in NYC.

We heard some news that there may be a contract coming soon in Washington DC coming where the AFT/Weingarten crew is selling out to Rhee while figuring out a way to make it look like a great victory for the teachers.

PS 123 & Harlem Success Academy: More Equal than Others

"PS 123 has gone from an F-rated school to a B-rated school, and you’d think that would merit some encouragement from the Department of Education. You’d be mistaken. Rather than expand upon the progress they’ve made, the building that houses PS 123 has become a civics lesson for all who teach and study there—a newly designed two-tier education system. 55 years ago, Brown v. Board of Education stated, “separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.” At PS 123, separate educational facilities can be found within the same school building."

Arthur Goldstein at Gotham Schools

Read this superb piece: More Equal than Others

Praise to Politicians (a few at least) on Wanting to Put a Stake in the Heart of Mayoral Control

UPDATED 7/29 -6am

Anti-Mayoral Control Press Conference Small But Significant

State Assemblywoman Inez Barron organized today's press conference condemning the deal, or sellout, by some of the very same people in the state senate who stood on the same steps just last Thursday claiming they would stand firm on getting parents a real role in the governance scheme. Her husband, city councilman Charles Barron, made his usual powerful speech.

Charles Barron attacked the senators leading the conference last Thursday while it was going on. When asked why his wife Inez was standing with the senators, he said she was her own woman.
See our report here , some videos of what some of the senators Adams, Perkins, Huntley, Kruger and Diaz said here and a video of Barron laying waste to Monserrate and Espada at http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dailypolitics/2009/07/barron-on-amigos-mayoral-contr.html#ixzz0MB2ClOPn.

Today the Barrons were totally on the same page.

What's been interesting in this process is the tenuous but growing relationship between the Grassroots Education Movement (GEM) and some politicians. Now you know what I think of politicians but some of these guys (and gals) have been on the money standing firm against mayoral control. No tweakers here. We've gotten to feel real comfortable with Barron and his staff and Bill Perkins has made his office available for organizing meetings in Harlem. The staffers we've met seem to be very sharp.

The Barrons of Brooklyn today were no less than spectacular. I came in the middle of Inez Barrons wonderful speech but David Bellel got it all. Don't miss one second.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjXgO7kdQkE

Inez spent over 30 years in the NYC school system so she knows whereby she speaks. As Leonie said tonight over at the NYC Parents blog,

"From class size and "creative confusion" to the NAEPs, Barron tells the real story behind the Bloomberg myth. She even quotes John Dewey and Martin Luther King Jr. on the meaning and purpose of education. Inez Barron for Schools Chancellor!

What a great idea! Inez Barron for chancellor.

Could hubbie Charles top her today? He said he doesn't want parents to have just a role like parent training centers and other fluff in the bills. He wants parent power, not mayoral power. And power for educators. I'll call it a tie but see for yourself.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGhzdPJh3S4

Now, the surprise to me was the appearance of City Council Ed Committee chair Robert Jackson, who has said numerous times he supports mayoral control with controls. So what was he doing at a Barrons of Brooklyn total-opposition-to-all-forms-of-mayoral-control event? Jackson, who was not well received at the rally at Tweed a few weeks ago where Barron (Charles) stormed the steps of Tweed, seems to have had a change of heart – on the surface, at least.

After all, Jackson is so tied at the hip to the UFT which supports the mildest form of tweaks. But there he was thanking the Barrons for opening his eyes. At the end of his speech, there was an awkward hug with Charles Barron, who is seizing the reigns of the anti-mayoral control debate in sections of the black community. (See the Jackson video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjRThS4D4nw.)

And why not? What happened to the movement in the 60's calling for black parents to have a say in the control of their communities? We know what happened as local political forces in the white and black districts, with the help of the UFT, turned that movement into patronage mills where may white and black activists throughout the city were bought off. Now it's been Bloomberg doing the buying off. But that game is beginning to wear off as the calls for community power, BloomKlein's worst nightmare, are reemerging and slowly taking hold.


Tweak This
In the we'll take anything but going back to the old system of community control caucus, there are still serious anti BloomKlein forces supporting the Huntley bill which will supposedly forge a parent partnership with the mayor. If anyone has looked recently, you can't forge a partnership with this megalomaniac.

The Brilliant Barrons of Brooklyn are talking about really changing governance, not throwing tweaks at it. Let's go back to community control and tweak that.

Related
The recent uprisings in the black community against BloomKlein must be making them sweat. They're even sending out their champion Geoffrey Canada to debate our champion Sam Anderson this Thursday on WBAI at 7 AM. Kick his ass Sam.

I'm heading out to LA early tomorrow with a NY contingent to meet with our teacher counterparts from other cities, so blog posts may be sporadic over the next few days. Unless Sally Lee let's me use her cute Macbook Air.

And don't forget to check the sidebar for some important events coming up. Teacher activist Mark Torres has sent a big list to keep people busy.

Keep Pave Academy Charter School at PS 15 to the 2 Year agreement

GEM met with a large group of teachers from PS 15 last week and they are a wonderful group of passionate and commited educators.

We find that many charters worm their way in by claiming they are looking for space, when in reality their goal is to steal the top kids and push out the public school and take over the building. Hey! Free is better than paying rent. The DOE cooperates fully in this process.

From our friends at PS 15 where PAVE Academy wants to break their agreement to leave after 2 years.

Please take a look at this petition.
All we are asking is the charter school to stick to their agreement...that is all.
Please keep forwarding this ... we need a lot of help.

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/PS15KPatrickFDalySchool2009Issue/

There is a request for a donation not by PS 15 but by the petition web site. You do not have to donate if you don't want.

Is New State Ed Commissioner Steiner Same Old, Same Old?

Progressive ed reformers would rather have seen Bill Cala become NYS Ed Commissioner. He actually taught in high schools and rose to superintendent of the Fairport schools and ran the Rochester school system for a while. Bill once said that anyone who doesn't understand that lower class sizes is a crucial element is stupid. Bill is also part of the test resistance movement. I guess having these credentials automatically disqualified him.

So, we have a state ed commissioner coming down from the ivory tower (see NY Times article). But isn't David Steiner a professional educator who ran teacher training programs (which have been so vilified by the Teach for America supporters and other ed deformers)? Well, though we certainly don't want lawyers like Joel Klein and Randi Weingarten making decisions real teachers should be making (ever guess why the UFT so easily accepted the waiver for Klein), the record of ivory tower types hasn't been much better. Note how unprepared to deal with the urban classroom so many classically trained educators have been.

Did Hunter College have a 29% grad rate and does it matter?

A comment on ICE mail by Bill made this point:

Dr. David Steiner is being hailed as a true reformer who is in favor of merit pay for teachers, but according to college data records, Hunter College students have a graduation rate of only 29% after 5 years. This is an abysmal record when compared to the NYC public school graduation rate of over 50%. I think Mr. Steiner should be advocating merit pay for college professors instead of public school teachers.

Interesting point Bill. How about merit pay for doctors whose patients don't die? Or for lawyers whose clients don't go end up on death row?


JW responded:

Yes, but the 29% grad rates at Hunter are probably somewhat more nearer the truth than the 50% in the schools. I guess that's a plus.

Sean responded:

All those who have been wringing their hands for a 'professional educator' can breath a sigh of relief now. Finally at last, someone with an graduate degree in education as straw boss, yeah, that's real progress.

Talking points from the Diane Ravitch fan club and the UFT may be forthcoming soon tentatively endorsing this reliance on the 'professionals' to get the job done. I wonder what the PSC has to say about Steiner? (Psst - College teachers really are smart - they already voted Unity caucus out a few years ago)

Let me take a wild guess, Steiner receives a thumbs up from Bloomberg and Weingarten and everything is in place to collaborate with Arne Duncan. If Bloomberg/Mulgrew win their respective races and this mayoral control deal is sealed, the corporate ed deformers and entrepreneurs will have all their ducks lined up in a row, neo liberal local, state and national elected officials, and institutional heads, marching in lock step with the Unity caucus officials bringing up the rear, riding shotgun in the caboose. It's a love fest amongst the elite! Satyricon USA!

The upcoming UFT and mayoral elections are an opportunities to build the grassroots resistance movement I urge everyone to participate in them in some way.

I agree with Sean – except for that Ravitch dig - yes I am in the Ravitch fan club.

I don't know about the comparison of grad rates, but Steiner is already questioning the teacher certification process, which he says has a 90% success rate and therefore should be suspect.
“It seems to me that a gateway certification test that has that high a pass rate should give us pause,” he said.

Yes, what we need is something like the Bar Exam where the pass rate has sunk from 70% to 65% over the past 15 years. Hey, I have an idea. Why not have teachers just take the Bar Exam. It will tell us as much about how they will really do as teachers as the current teacher test. Another sign Steiner doesn't have a clue? Well, he does say “It’s just a test that probably doesn’t put the bar high enough, but whether it’s even the right bar is something that we have to look at.”

Maybe Steiner does get it. Mentions the word "bar" twice in one sentence. See. He agrees with me about the bar. Actually, the right bar is one I know on 14th Street.

Well, Steiner sounds a hell of a lot like Jack Welch. In replacing one of the worst state ed commissioners in the nation – Richard (Dickie boy) Mills who turned the NY State Ed Dept. into a political shill – we may just be seeing someone with the potential to be worse.

Hunter College is one of the largest training grounds for NYC teachers, with 2/3 of its graduates (let's see, 2/3 of 29% is---you do the math).

What exactly has Steiner done to merit this post? The Times says

Since becoming the dean of Hunter’s education school, Dr. Steiner has developed a comprehensive system of filming student teachers to evaluate their mastery of skills.

Ahhh. Filming your lessons. Brilliant. I was involved in a program that videotaped lessons and analyzed the results for effective questioning techniques – in 1970. What goes around comes around.

Steiner said: “Nothing makes more of a difference for a child than the quality of the teacher that is in front of her or him."

Here we go again.

One of those "teacher quality" freaks. Guess he never heard of the impact on teacher quality of smaller class size (a great quote on this from a comment on a Pondiscio post in the sidebar – Even ineffective teachers are more effective when class sizes are smaller…and sure, it would be better to get rid of the ineffective teachers, but I don’t see that happening).

Until the powers that be at least recognize this point even if they say we can't pay for it (see one Bears Sterns bailout and ask why not), then we will remain on the hamster wheel of ed deform.

Now look at this "innovation"

Several New York City charter schools and some teachers at public schools run by the city’s Education Department have been participating in an experimental program at Hunter that places would-be teachers in classrooms right away and grants certification based, in part, on whether students improve on tests.

Based in part on student improvement on tests? What part? Bet it's more than any other factor. There certainly is no opportunity to even use whatever bogus value added stuff is around. Call it the luck of the draw as to which kids you get.

When one reporter asked him if he had spent time teaching in a high school or elementary classroom, Dr. Steiner, who had not, said:

“I have had the pleasure of teaching about 2,000 students in the last quarter of a century,” he said of his time in universities. “Of course I have spent a lot of time in schools and I look forward to doing ever more of that.

Not someone who walked a mile in our shoes.

Steiner.

Ivory tower.

In spades.

We're doomed.

Doomed to more testing and more judging of teachers based on the wrong criteria.

Related:
Take a look at the list of characters posted at Gotham Schools that love the Steiner appointment and you'll get the idea.

Is the Charter School Concept Inherently Anti-union and Racist?

Angel Gonzalez says yes:

Charter Schools:

• are privately operated and exempt from govt & labor laws that provide public oversight. While taking public $$, they operate under private mode.
• are union busters and deny pension, tenure, and other important labor/educator rights
• have private & undemocratic governance - no parent, educator & community voice in decision-making thus helping to destroy neighborhood school concept.
• reflect another institutional racist pattern in the education of public students. Charters are being imposed by NYC dictatorial decree predominately Black & Latino neighborhoods. See attached map. White middle & upper class communities of NYC have not sought these out. Blacks and Latino poor and working class communities have not sought these charters out. Folks want democratic quality and equality public schooling ....and these charters are what have been handed down from above by the corporate-government and those Black & Latino politicos, officials, community groups, ... that have bought into the deceit.
• split a school with their disparate elite treatment of their charterees with smaller class size, better maintained facilities, materials, (Can do so because of greater corporate dollars pumped in as they seek to initially capture the student market.)
• contribute to a greater multi-tiered school system ...not two tiered system. We have smaller new visions type schools in buildings that contribute to the tiered system and the regular school without outside supports, the elite-select schools like Bx Science, Stuyvesant, Bklyn Tech, and now Charters (private although they claim public)

Related:
Sean and Angel bat the issue of charter use of non-unionized labor on ICE-mail, posted at Norms Notes.
Charter Schools and Non-unionized Maintenance Workers

When Charter Schools Hit the Wall

Ed Notes has been slightly preoccupied with the charter school issue over the past few weeks. And we will posting lots more today and in the next few days before I head to LA later this week to meet with other ed deform resisters from around the nation to share strategies for the growing resistance movement by the true progressive ed reformers.

That it has become a flashpoint was indicated by a meeting I and some of my ICE/GEM colleagues attended with teachers from a school where a charter that wanted to stay only for a short time has asked for extended time. Ten teachers from the school showed up on a rainy afternoon in July.

They feel the charter wants to push them out completely and take over the school. The entire story of how they were looking for space and couldn't find any was a crock. So for schools being sold on the same bull, watch out. They lie. And Tweed is behind them all the way and gives them info they can use to recruit your best kids and has even been known to manipulate kids out of your school so they can then claim you have so much room a charter can enter.

Similarly, people at PS 123 in Harlem which was invaded by Moskowitz' HSA, have also been coming out for protests.

But hope is on the way.

The charter school movement will be hitting a wall before long as teachers working long hours for less pay start to unionize (see today's NY Times), private funding for all those little extras like lower class size starts to dry up, and they find that they are in competition with each other to cream the best kids (see Harlem where Moskoswitz's HSA is now looking to invade District 4 (East Harlem) after charters have skimmed so many kids from central Harlem's District 5 (the largest concentration of charters in the nation - see charter map).

Now, on the unionization issue, guess who is doing the unionizing? Our old friend and now head of the AFT, Randi Weingarten (who our Washington contacts say wants to make a deal with Michelle Rhee that will give them the same ATR life we have here in NYC).

I know, I know. Better an AFT/UFT type charter than nothing.

Related:
What are the issues of contention when we talk about charter schools? Some people are only opposed to charters if they stay out of their schools. Others oppose all charters. Ed Notes will explore this issue further later.

NYC Educator takes the NY Times to the whipping shed for today's piece on unionizing charters.

In yet another shallow and superficial article, the New York Times maintains its standard as the paper that asks the fewest questions and holds the least curiosity about education. It manages to ask the obvious questions about unionization in charter schools, but doesn't bother to examine what actually happens when charters unionize.

More at: The Grand Tradition

Race to the Bottom

Diane Ravitch (Obama's Heavy-handed Education Plan) at Politico nails the Obama/Duncan plan to use stimulus money to extort states into pushing the ed deform program down our throats. You know the drill: mayoral control, teacher bashing, merit pay, charters galore.

Diane's summary of ed deform is more elegant than mine:

...lots more charter schools; lots more privatization; evaluate teachers based on the test scores of their students; open more alternate routes into teaching to break the grip of professionalism.

It's worked so well in Duncan's Chicago, which has ruined a generation over the last 14 years of mayoral control. Diane's point here is one that should be blasted all over the nation to counter the deformers.

If Duncan knows so much about how to reform American education, why didn't he reform Chicago 's schools? A report came out a couple of weeks ago from the Civic Committee of Chicago ("Still Left Behind") saying that Chicago's much-touted score gains in the past several years were phony, that they were generated after the state lowered the passing mark on the state tests, that the purported gains did not show up on the federal tests, and that Chicago 's high schools are still failing. On the respected federal tests (NAEP), Chicago is one of the lowest performing cities in the nation.

Mike Petrilli of the Fordham Foundation (not a foe of ed deform, by the way) calls it "Washington Knows Best at its worst." Diane asks,

"What if Washington doesn't know best?" What if the "reform" ideas are wrong? Just a few weeks ago, a respected Stanford University study reported that 80% or more of charter schools are no better than or worse than their neighborhood public school. Why replace struggling public schools with worse charter schools? There is a ton of evidence that evaluating teachers based on student test scores is a lousy idea (see the work of Jesse Rothstein at Princeton , for example).

Why is Washington pushing "reform" ideas that have so little evidence behind them, as well as ideas that will positively harm public education in America ?

Related
Robert Pondiscio at Core Knowledge:
http://www.coreknowledge.org/blog/2009/07/24/nineteen-points-and-one-very-bad-idea/

See a compilation of raw posts from the NYC Ed News listserve, including Diane's full piece, posted at our storage facility Norms Notes: Several Posts re: Obama/Duncan's Race to the Top