Chicago School Reform: Myths, Realities, and New Visions

In case you didn't notice, the model of school deform has been tried out in Chicago for over 15 years. This article exposes the myths and realities and points out just how damaging ed deform has been. I find this especially interesting in that starting in 2001 Ed Notes published information on this issue within the UFT at Executive Board and delegate assembly meetings and in the schools when we went to a tabloid mass distribution in 2002.

I claim the UFT/AFT knew exactly what was going on yet signed onto the program anyway - my big split with Randi came when she supported mayoral control while I was pointing to the Chicago disaster. Can anyone say "Manchurian Candidate?" 

What you have to do is share some of this information with your colleagues and other educators you are in contact with. That is the only way to  break the UFT news blackout and propaganda mill. 

Here is an intro from Fair Test's Monty Neil with a link to the Substance article, followed by the entire report which I'll leave up for the next day or two before I compress it for space:

A strong, interesting manifesto from a new Chicago group, CReATE (Chicagoland Researchers and Advocates for Transformative Education), covers many key areas of schooling (leadership; curriculum and assessment; public vs private control of schools; etc.). It exposes myths propagated by school deformers, offers real evidence, and issues calls for Chicago mayoral candidates and others to promise specific steps. It is aimed at Chicago, but a good deal of the material and references are relevant nationally and in other states and localities.

http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=1929&section=Article

Monty --

Monty Neill, Ed.D.; Interim Executive Director, FairTest; P.O. Box 300204, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130; 617-477-9792; http://www.fairtest.org; Donate to FairTest: https://secure.entango.com/donate/MnrXjT8MQqk

Download this statement as a PDF here: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2561000/CReATEjan2011.pdf

CReATE issues Chicago manifesto With National Implications
Chicago School Reform: Myths, Realities, and New Visions

CReATE - January 17, 2011

[Editor's Note. A new Chicago group called CReATE (Chicagoland Researchers and Advocates for Transformative Education) issued a major report on Friday, January 24, 2011, called Chicago School Reform: Myths, Realities, and New Visions. Prepared by CReATE (Chicagoland Researchers and Advocates for Transformative Education) January 2011- see attached PDF].

Public education in a democratic society is based on the principle that every child is of equal and incalculable value. This guiding principle requires the fullest development of every member of our nation. Effective public schools are necessary to enable every member of our nation to reach his or her fullest potential. Schools in a democracy aim to prepare the next generation to be knowledgeable and informed citizens and residents; to be critical thinkers and creative problem solvers; to be prepared to contribute positively to communities, workplaces, and societies that are characterized by diversity and inequities; and to be healthy, happy, and prepared to support the well-being of others with compassion and courage. The children and youth of Chicago deserve no less … but how do we do this?

Intel Science Competition Drastic Drop in NYC a Legacy of BloomKlein

If you want the see all the numbers and the full story with a deeper analysis than a newspaper can reasonably provide, please check out my blog post, NYC HS Success in Intel STS Continues Its Post-2002 'De-Klein'," on the NYC Public School Parents blog.  http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2011/01/nyc-hs-success-in-intel-sts-continues.html

Steve Koss reports:

Kudos to Yoav Gonen and his Intel STS story in today's NY Post (see below). He gets the facts right and provides some insightful commentary from local schools, but the overall thrust is also regrettably softened a bit in two ways that are worth noting.

First is the choice of base year, 1998, for comparing the number of Semifinalists to today. Yes, the number of participants and Semifinalists is down dramatically since 1998, but they could just have easily used 2002 as the base year, in which case the drop in semifinalists would still have been 70.2% and the drop in participation 35.8%. Those results would have told essentially the same story, but then the lead (the story's first line) would have read "since 2002," not "since 1998." That difference would have made it much more obvious that the real nosedive in these results all took place since 2003, when NYers handed the schools over to Mayor Bloomberg. At that point, the Intel STS crash started in earnest, and the pull has been relentlessly downward ever since. In fact, the last four years have been absolutely dreadful on both these measures, and it's only in the last four years that we're really seeing the bad fruits of eight years of Joel Klein's miseducation program. By using 1998 as the base year in some parts of the story and 1998-2003 versus 2004-2011 in other parts, the story may also be somewhat confusing to readers not well versed in these numbers (which will be the vast majority of NYers).

The second issue is the lack of mention of the past four years as a group. This year's all-time lows are not one-time occurrences; they are not sudden, inexplicable anomalies. They are part of a steady downward trend, a trend in which the last four years have been absolutely horrendous in terms of NYC Intel STS results and participation. By not mentioning the last four years as a "data group," or providing a chart of the data, the story does not give readers a sense of what has been happening and just how clearly this decline has coincided with, and accelerated under, the Bloomberg/Klein regime. The last four years, as even a simple bar chart would show, have been a total disaster -- yet they represent the reaping of what Bloomberg/Klein has sown for the past eight-plus years.

The Post's story helps inform, and for that I am indeed very grateful. Yoav Gonen deserves recognition for being the first media person in the NYC area to publish on this issue, something we've been urging now for the past three years. I would perhaps have presented some of the results differently, but Yoav has done a great job in getting the story out and also putting some commentary behind it from science teachers in NYC area schools. Even in a softened form, Yoav's story stands as just one more indictment of the educational disaster that has been mayoral control and the schools chancellorship under Joel Klein. When even our city's "best and brightest" are falling off in performance and achievement, and that in a competition which not so many years ago was flat-out "owned" by NYC public schools, it's well past time for politicians and the public to be asking a lot more, and a lot deeper, questions,

Thanks, Yoav, for being first in getting this important story out to the NYC public.

Steve Koss

Schools down shocking 75% in sci competition

By YOAV GONEN, Education Reporter

Last Updated: 3:18 AM, January 18, 2011

Posted: 1:05 AM, January 18, 2011

Only 14 city public high-school seniors were named semifinalists in the prestigious Intel Science Talent Search this year -- a dizzying plunge of 75 percent since 1998.

The all-time low is part of a troubling trend over the last seven years, when the average number of city public-school kids named to the semifinals of the so-called "Junior Nobel Prize" fell to 20.4 -- out of 300 named nationally.

By comparison, the public schools here yielded an average of 46.3 semifinalists between 1998 and 2004. 

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/schools_big_drop_in_intel_obmo65bpROay0gkq0TCVFP#ixzz1BOMS8579

Wear Black and Take OUR Schools Back on Friday! Is Your School Taking Part?

See the big picture. Forming alliances with other schools is the long-term solution - by building a movement that grows with time we can force both the DOE and the UFT to move. Otherwise they will pick off one school after another. And there will be so many ATRs they will drum up a public vendetta by not putting them in the classroom on purpose so as to create an overcrowded situation.

Friday, January 21st - Join Public Schools Across the City to Advocate for Real Reforms that Will Transform our Public Schools.

 
-Please Share With Those Who Care-

To Particpate/Endorse (groups, schools, PTAs, CECs, chapters, individuals): email capeducation@gmail.com

Wear Black and Take OUR Schools Back!

Fight Back Friday

Stand Up For Public Education!

         School Based Actions to Fight the Attacks on Public Education                                               

Friday, January 21^st Join Public Schools Across the City to Advocate for Real Reforms that Will Transform our Public Schools.

Press Conference @ 4:30 on the Steps of Tweed

Wear Black and Take OUR Schools Back!

Stop the Attacks on Public Education:

·         Stop Closing Schools, Fix Them.

·         Stop Charter School Co-Locations.

·         Stop School-Based Budget Cuts.

·         Stop Increases in Class Sizes.

·         Stop the Overemphasis on Standardized Assessment:  More Teaching, Less Testing.

·         Stop Teacher Data Reports Based on Narrow Tests and Faulty Data.

·         Stop Ignoring the Voices of Parents, Educators, and Students:  More Parent, Educator and Student Empowerment, Not Less.

·         Stop the Dictatorial Governance of Our School System:  Mayoral Control is Out of Control!

·         No Layoffs of Teachers or School Personnel:  Reduce the Bureaucracy and Fire the Middle Managers Instead!

Choose one or more issues that are important to your school community and take action:

·         Wear black and/or black arm bands

·         Hold a rally before or after school

·         Craft a form letter or petition on an issue important to your school

·         Pass out literature and education material before and after school

___________________________________________________________________

If you, your school, or your school community plan to participate in Fight Back Friday, let us know @ capeducation@gmail.com so that we can include you on our list of participants/endorsers and interactive map as well as provide you with a Fight Back Friday Toolkit!  The Toolkit will include literature and educational material, media information, stickers, and sample materials to assist in your school organizing efforts. Visit our Blog @www.fightbackfridays.blogspot.com, visit and post to our Facebook page @ fightbackfridays, and post and send in your school’s perspectives, testimonials, videos and pictures of Fight Back Actions. 

****Fight Back Friday will culminate with a press conference on the steps of Tweed @ 4:30.  If your group or a member of your school community (especially if you are a school facing closing or co-location) would like to speak, contact us and we will do our best to accommodate you.  Let’s stand up for public education together, and make our voices heard!****

Sponsored by:  Grassroots Education Movement:  www.grassrootseducationmovement.blogspot.com, gemnyc@gmail.com 

UPCOMING ACTIONS

January 21st: Fight Back Friday- Stand Up for Public Education, Wear Black and Take Our Schools Back! (email capeducation@gmail.com for more information or to endorse). Press Conference on the steps of Tweed @ 4:30.

Endorsers and Participants

Sponsored by GEM

www.grassrootseducationmovement.blogspot.com

CEC1-unanimously endorsed

CIF- Center for Immigrant Families

Chris Owens- Democratic District Leader/ 52nd Assembly

NYCORE -New York Collective of Radical Educators

CAPE -Concerned Advocates for Public Education

Mulgrew to Speak to Restricted E4E Event

I posted this at Ed Notes this morning:

The Dudes Are Out at Educators 4 Excellence: Funded by Gates, A Fact Ignored by Gotham Schools

Now we get their invite to meet Mulgrew. But you have to sign the pledge and enter a lottery. Can you imagine - a lottery to go hear Mulgrew? This pledge commits you to support core E4E principles. Or you can't attend. But then again if you start scratching how the UFT has functioned you may end up there anyway. Maybe Mulgrew might even sign. Oh, yes, E4E is funded in part by Gates and other secret donors. Hmmm, Mulgrew should be right at home. Here's the pledge: As educators, we demand a system that:

1. Recruits, retains, and supports the highest quality teachers by offering
   • A higher starting salary
   • Encouragement and opportunity for continued intellectual development
   • High level professional development and support
   • An evenhanded merit-based pay structure to reward excellent teachers
2. Restores professionalism to education by
   
   • Evaluating teachers through a holistic and equitable system that incorporates value-added student achievement data as one component of effectiveness
   • Reestablishing tenure as a significant professional milestone through use of a comprehensive teacher evaluation system 
   • Eliminating the practice of "Last In, First Out" for teacher layoffs
3. Places student achievement first by
   • Giving students and parents more opportunity to choose great schools
   • Displaying more transparency in both fiscal choices and decision-making processes
   • Implementing an effective system of evaluating administrators
   • Adopting higher standards for students and teachers
   • Opening the education reform conversation to the voices of teachers and parents

Some fluff here to cover up the real intention - read the code - end LIFO which really ends tenure.

You and the UFT: A Conversation with UFT President Michael Mulgrew We hope you can join us for this E4E Special Q&A Event! This is an extraordinary opportunity for teachers to meet, ask questions of, and hear from President Mulgrew of the United Federation of Teachers. This continues E4E's series of Q&A events with important policymakers. This speaker series is designed to give teachers direct access to the individuals who make decisions that impact our profession and our classrooms. We hope you can join us to share your voice! WHEN: Tuesday, January 25th (6:00 - 7:30PM) WHERE: Location TBA RSVP REQUIRED: Please RSVP by clicking here.   *Due to limited space and the importance of maintaining a conversational atmosphere, we will be using a lottery system to select attendees for this event. Please RSVP as soon as possible to enter your name into this lottery. If selected, you will be notified by e-mail with further event details no later than January 21st. Thank you for your understanding.*

Who We Are | Sign Our Declaration | Tell a Colleague

--

The Dudes Are Out at Educators 4 Excellence: Funded by Gates, A Fact Ignored by Gotham Schools

UPDATED: Jan. 31, 2011

How much fun that Jeff Kaufman crashed the E4E party for his school the other day. Jeff refused to sign the pledge that you support everything E4E believes in before they allow you in for a drink. But they allowed Jeff in anyway - and he didn't even have to bring his gun (Jeff is an ex cop). E4E got an extraordinary amount of coverage when 2 third year teachers started organizing to end "Last in First Out" for layoffs, promote merit pay and the use of data to judge and pay teachers.

Jeff wrote all about his adventure on the ICE blog. 

When I was first asked by my colleague to attend an "Educators for Excellence" (they use a number 4 for their middle name which rubs this educator the wrong way) happy hour at a Prospect Heights bar I was very apprehensive. The RSVP required that I ascribe to their "core principals" which include much of the "ed deformers'" agenda; teacher layoffs by ability not seniority, "earned tenure" which require certain student test milestones, and teacher evaluation systems based on student data which are also tied to merit-pay schemes.

You can read the entire piece at  Up Close and Personal With An Opposition

Jeff makes mention of a story on E4E at Gotham Schools.

Attending happy hour sponsored by this group reminded me to dig a little deeper into this group. When the Gotham Schools article was posted Stone and Morris were reported to be full-time teachers in the Bronx and the organization was not funded. Well, things have changed as they are now funded by the Gates Foundation and certain anonymous donors and have 3 full time employees.

I went back to the Gotham story and found this comment from 
Teacher April 11th, 2010 9:46 am
I predict that this group will soon get funding from the Gates, Walton and Broad Foundations.

There were also many comments speculating as to whether the founders of E4E would be leaving teaching. Jeff reports:

"Educators for Excellence," it appears, is run by a couple of new teachers who now teach 1 day per week at P.S. 86 in the Bronx. There are some interesting blog entries about them and their organization and if you are really interested you can go here and here.

Strictly, not new teachers as they did teach for 3 years. Teach for America I believe. 

Editorial interjection:
You know I have to say right here that I was offered many opportunities to leave the self-contained classroom - even being told to become an administrator (so I could really make a difference) or a guidance counselor - anything but teach in the trenches - and I wanted to be with the kids, not deal with adults. It took almost 20 years before I was lured out. So when I see that people leave teaching to engage almost full time in some kind of political activity - even if it was a good political activity they were doing - I have to ask about the kind of commitment they have to children.

By the way - the same with frequent commenter Kitchen Sink - who taught in public schools for 4 years before running off to start and run a charter - this is the guy who always talks about how it should be about the kids and not the adults.

Anyway, back to the program.

Is Gotham Schools a nest for E4E?
The info on E4E led some people to wonder about the space Gotham gave them but never followed up with the new info. 

NOTE FROM ANNA PHILIPS:

I wrote a post in June saying that they were getting funding from Education Reform now. http://gothamschools.org/2010/06/03/klein-celebrates-no-layoffs-hits-the-bar-with-young-teachers/

Then comes the news that Gotham Community blogger Ruben Brosbe is also an E4E. South Bronx School is driven to mirth and merriment over Brosbe's ramblings:

The Mishegas Mind Of Ruben Brosbe Of PS 310 Bronx

But of course it takes NYC Educator to nail Brosbe, as he does in today's post:

So anyhoo, like, when I wanted to support the release of value-added grades, and everyone was all like, "Dude, they're inaccurate and invalid," and everything? Like, Gotham Schools let me write about how even though I was writing that stuff, I was, like, still cool and everything? And, like, Gotham Schools is SO KEWL, because, like, they don't even make me write in my bio that I'm a member of Educators4Excellence. So I'm, like, in a group funded by Bill Gates and stuff, and they don't even tell anybody! And I'm also in a video with Michelle Rhee, and like, at Gotham, I don't even have to say why! They just say, I'm just, like, a teacher and stuff! So, I don't look, like, uncool!

Read it all at Puke-O-Rama, Dude!

So Gotham seems to be taking a few hits lately. And not just publicly. Behind the scenes a number of activists - parents and teachers - have been whispering that charter school and ed deform money - which you can tell from E4E - is flowing into Gotham and has affected coverage. Why not? Broad, Gates, Walton, et al. and the hedge hogs will fund anything that they think can control the message of ed deform. I mean, they even fund E4E so they can throw school parties and allow the founders to have to teach only one day a week - someone tell me how to get that gig.

I don't pay that close attention and can't say I see bias at Gotham - yet - but when people can give examples I will point it out. I will say that at the Gotham holiday party in December, I felt outnumbered significantly by the ed deform crowd. Tilt!

Below the fold I extracted a few of the 150 comments on the original Gotham post last April, with some significant points made by Michael Fiorillo and a blogger - jodama - regarding charges that in the corporate world people who screw up would be gone.

Fergusan's 'Inside Job' Has More to Say About Education Than Guggenheim's 'Waiting for Superman' on school reform

As I watched Charles Ferguson's amazing movie "Inside Job" about the financial meltdown and how market based concepts were responsible, I thought he is the guy who could make a fabulous movie about the public education meltdown as a result of the ed deform movement which is based on the very same concepts that brought down the economy. I know. A lot of people have been hankering for Michael Moore (who ironically, the Real Reformers ran into Moore - scroll down for the RR video - on the way to rally at the opening of WfS). But Ferguson really nails it. Alas, without Ferguson or Moore we have to make our own film, The Inconvenient Truth Behind Waiting for Superman, which we hope to release in a month or so.

Well, here is the article by Kevin Welner I've been hoping to write for the past few months or so about "Inside Job." It's great to be scooped. Saves so much time. Valerie Strauss introduces it at the Answer Sheet.

Why 'Inside Job' bests 'Waiting for Superman' on school reform

By Valerie Strauss

One can only assume that the critics in the Broadcast Film Critics Association who bestowed their 2011 Best Documentary award to Davis Guggenheim's Waiting for Superman did not know how tendentious the film is, or else they might have honored a film that was more straightforward, in the tradition of classic documentaries. Superman is up for a Golden Globe Award, too, and is on the shortlist for Academy Awards in the feature documentary category.

Here a comparison between Waiting for Superman and a competitor, called Inside Job. Though the latter film isn’t about education reform, Kevin G. Welner, the author of the following piece (which appeared on Huffington Post), writes about why Inside Job better explains it than does Superman. Welner is a professor of education policy and program evaluation in the School of Education at the University of Colorado at Boulder, and director of the National Education Policy Center.

By Kevin G. Welner
Over the past couple months, I’ve been asked to participate in a few panel discussions about Waiting for Superman. The film presents a stark, moving portrayal of the denial of educational opportunities in low-income communities of color. But while the movie includes statements such as "we know what’s wrong" and "we know how to fix it," viewers of the movie are hard-pressed to identify those causes and solutions -- other than to boo and hiss at teachers’ unions and to cheer at the heroic charter school educators.

So in the panel discussions we try to make sense of that simplistic black-hat/white-hat story. We argue about whether the movie offers a fair and complete picture (it doesn’t even come close, unfortunately). But we never get to deeper issues about what’s wrong and how to fix it.

I thought about that when leaving a showing of the other prominent documentary currently showing, called Inside Job. It offers an explanation of how the current economic crisis came about, describing the securitization of mortgages; the extraordinary leveraging of assets; the regulatory capture by Wall Street leading to minimal enforcement of federal regulations -- a deregulation intended to spur innovation; and the fraud, greed, hubris and general belief among hedge fund titans and others in the financial services world that they are infallible.

The film also points out the growing and now extreme inequality of wealth distribution in the United States. "The top 1 percent of American earners took in 23.5 percent of the nation’s pretax income in 2007 -- up from less than 9 percent in 1976."

Consider those final three items: (1) the advocacy of deregulation in order to free up innovation, (2) hubris and general belief among hedge fund titans that they are infallible, and (3) increased wealth inequality.

If Superman had explored these issues instead of bashing unions and promoting charters, moviegoers might have walked away understanding a great deal about why the families it profiled and so many similar families across America face a bleak educational future.

The movie certainly showed scenes of poverty, but its implications and the structural inequalities underlying that poverty were largely ignored. Devastating urban poverty was just there -- as if that were somehow the natural order of things but if we could only ’fix’ schools it would disappear.

Rick Hanushek is put forth, saying that if we fire the bottom 5 to 10 percent of the lowest-performing teachers every year, our national test scores would soon approach Finland at the top of international rankings in mathematics and science. But no mention is made of the telling fact that Finland had, in 2005, a child poverty rate of 2.8 percent while the United States had a rate of 21.9 percent. That gap has likely gotten even bigger over the intervening five years.

Rather than addressing these poverty issues, Superman serves up innovation through privatization and deregulation. We’re shown charter schools that give hope to these families. But what we’re not told is that the extra resources and opportunities found in these charters are funded in large part with donations from Wall Street hedge fund millionaires and billionaires.

Problems of structural inequality and inter-generational poverty are pushed aside in favor of a ’solution’ grounded in the belief that deregulation will prompt innovation, all the while guided by the infallible judgment of Wall Street tycoons. It’s no wonder that Inside Job better explained the school crisis than did Waiting for Superman.

Follow my blog every day by bookmarking washingtonpost.com/answersheet.

 UPDATED: Jan. 17: Note comment below from "In the trenches" and link to site, which I added to the blogroll.

Chatty Cathie: NYC"s Wind-Up School Chancellor Doll

BLACK IS BLOOMBERG'S FAILURE AND WILL COME BACK TO HAUNT HIM MORE THAN THE SNOWSTORM!

I had a link up a few weeks ago from an ed deformer (Mike Petrilli I think) predicting that Cathie Black would be out of there by April. Accountable Talk figures April Fool.

How about this Wednesday (Jan. 19) at her first PEP meeting? Come on guys, get on down and join the Real Reformers as they try to give Cathie a great welcome - it is after the UFT Delegate Assembly - or concurrently - I am going there first to hand out some leaflets and then on to Brooklyn Tech by 5:30.

We just can't keep up with all the comments on newly Chattie Cathie (remember when we called her Unchattie Cathie when she wouldn't talk to the press - maybe she was right) after her birth control and Sophie's Choice comments. We can only pray she says some more wonderful things at her first PEP on Weds. Jan. 19 but I wouldn't be surprised to see her show up with a muzzle.

David Bellel came up with this graphic at his blog inspired by a post from Perdido Street

Cathie's Choice: New Yorkers Comment On Cathie

Some very interesting comments on the latest Cathie Black gaffe in which she suggested birth control as a solution for school overcrowding and compared "tough decisions" she has to make on school funding and placement to sending children to a Nazi death camp:
A word of advice, Cath. You need to build up a modicum of credibility before you start with the wisecracks. Despite what you may believe, you have none when it comes to the educational system.
Well, what do you expect from a Waspish Park Ave matron? It's just a matter of time before her views on eugenics become public.
Come on, you guys. She was absolutely right. A little birth control would have been a great thing. Pity her own parents didn't use it...........

Here are more posts from RBE at Perdido:

Cathie's Choice: The ATR Solution

Cathie's Choice: To Open A Charter Or Take A Trip To Auschwitz

Cathie's Choice: Even The NY Post Hammers Cathie Black For "Nazi Death Camp" Reference

Wow - you know Cathie Black is hitting bottom when even the NY Post editorial writers are hammering her:

Cathie's Choice: Clueless Cathie Black Puts Her Foot In Her Mouth Again

Cathie Black might possibly be one of the most clueless people in the education reform world today - and given who inhabits this world, that's really saying something:

And of course NYC Educator: Dear Cathie Black, and South Bronx School: Cathie Black's Choice Of Birth Control.

Jamaica HS: The Play WAS The Thing

Jamaica HS Chapter Leader James Eterno posted this at the ICE blog. See the zines I posted that the students produced: YOU'RE INVITED TO SEE THE BANNED PLAY AT JAMAICA HS.
We are hoping to get some of the performers down to the Jan. 21 4:30 press conference at Tweed and/or the Jan. 27 rally.

ALSO - COME TO THE JAMAICA HEARING ON THURSDAY JAN. 20 TO SHOW SUPPORT. HOPEFULLY THERE WILL BE SOME PERFORMANCE ART GOING ON. I HOPE TO GET THERE TO TAPE.

Note: If you have no access to Facebook, we will post the link when it goes up on you tube.

PREMIRE DAY AT JAMAICA!

Kids performed their play criticizing school closings at Jamaica yesterday. Take out the word Jamaica from the script and replace it with John F Kennedy HS or Norman Thomas or Beach Channel or Tilden, or Lane or Canarsie or many others and you could perform this piece all over the city. In fact you could show it in many cities across the country.

Below is a facebook link to a pretty good quality recording that one of the students made. I hope it works so you can judge for yourself what all of the fuss was about. Also, here are links to the current Daily News and NY1 stories on the play.

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=1747656686320&comments

In addition to the News and NY 1, there were a number of other media people in attendance at Jamaica yesterday including the NY Teacher and Anna Gustafson from the Jamaica Times. Councilman Leroy Comrie, a representative from Mark Weprin's office, Ken Cohen from NAACP and his wife, John Lawhead and Joan Seedorf from ICE, my wife, mother in law and daughter, plenty of Jamaica teachers as well as retirees and hundreds of students and free speech lovers were all in the audience. I guess it is the closest we will get to an opening night on Broadway at Jamaica. There was a great buzz in the place.

I hope all of you can see the play. Maybe the students and their teacher from CUNY, Brian Pickett, will put on more performances in other venues.

On a related note, January 20 at 6:00 p.m. is this year's Joint Public Hearing for Jamaica. Come on out as we are easy to get to (F train to 169th Street; exit at back of station and walk up the hill two blocks on 168th Street.)

Add Your School to the Jan. 21 Fight Back Friday List: Goal is 50 NYC Schools Taking Part

Hi all,

I am writing to let you know that on Friday, January 21st, GEM, in coalition with NYCORE, Coalition for Public Education, Teachers Unite and other groups is calling for a school based FIGHT BACK FRIDAY! (www.fightbackfridays.blogspot.com)

Sam Coleman

If you've been following Ed Notes and other blogs, you are aware of the daily assault on public education, blaming teachers and their unions for all the problems that exist, closing schools, moving kids and teachers around like chess pieces, and so on. Just take this item I put up on the sidebar last night:

Bloomberg Takes Aim on Senior Teachers

"Amongst the reforms, Recommendation #20 may cause the most outcry, as it would authorize the Department of Education to retain the most effective teachers -- as opposed to just the most senior teachers -- during downsizing."

Bloomberg Set to Shake Up Union Hiring and Firing Practices: http://bed-stuy.patch.com/articles/bloomberg-set-to-shake-up-union-hiring-and-firing-practices

I don't have to tell you that the UFT has been ineffective in fighting for the public schools - how many have been closed and are slated to close - a clear attack on and has even cooperated in areas like merit pay for performance, experimenting with the value-added measurements of teachers, supporting mayoral control, protecting teachers and public schools from charters (how can the UFT battle co-locations when they themselves have 2 charters co-locating?) and on and on.

Thus, the battle is in your hands. And I have been meeting a wonderful group of next gen activists - new leadership, along with some of the people I've met through blogging moving to the next step of activism. The Grassroots Education Movement is trying to fill the gap and has been joining in coalition with other groups around the city to begin to forge a fight back. A year ago we organized the rally at Bloomberg's home and it drew 400 people. A drop in the bucket you might say, but the bucket is filling, slowly, but filling.

An ad hoc committee to fight closing schools has been formed (meetings are open - next one this Tuesday, Jan. 18, 5pm at CUNY, 34th and 5th Ave, rm 5414-bring ID) and is organizing so many activities I get tired just thinking about it. The key events are: Jan. 21 Fight Back Friday and Jan. 27 rally at Tweed. And attending all the PEP meetings coming up on school closings while also sending reps to as many school closing and charter co-location rallies, hearings, etc.

That is why your help is needed to bolster the forces of The Resistance. There is so much to do and so few people to do it. I can attest that recently adding a batch of people has made an enormous difference (setting up blogs, creating leaflets, etc. takes man and woman power).

Now, you may be saying to Sam, one of the dynamic next generation activists we have been working with, "Why should I get my colleagues to engage in this action? Hasn't the union done this in the past? What did it get us?"

I don't have easy answers. But this is something growing from the grassroots, building school by school. Last June 4 Fightback Friday we had 25 schools. Now we're aiming for 50. Or more. It is no longer a matter of saving one school. The idea is to create a mass movement of resistance that consistently battles the ed deformers on every front. Imagine if one day hundreds of schools start joining in. Or come out to a rally. Jan. 27 will not be the last one. We must continue to build pressure. Classic bullies like Bloomberg historically buckle when the heat is on. Putting thousands in the street one day who are not there because the UFT paid and organized them would scare the hell out of the ed deformers. The only way is to build one block of a movement at a time.

As Sam says in his email:

The protest can be big or it can be as small as a few teachers/students/parents outside fliering. The slogan is: Wear Black, Take our Schools Back! 

We need pictures, video, reports from your school. It would be great if you can send a school rep  to the press conference on the steps of Tweed at 4:30 on the 21st. And get people out for the Jan. 27 rally at Tweed. If you are doing a Fight Back Friday at your school email CAPE: capeducation@gmail.com and CC me: normsco@gmail.com.


I'll let Sam take over.

JAN 21st!

What's a Fight Back Friday?

Individual schools all over the city will have some sort of action to protest the attacks on pubic education.

NOTE: You can NOT be written up by your administration for any action you carry out off school property. Please email me if you are concerned about this (sam_p_coleman@yahoo).

com

The protest can be big or it can be as small as a few teachers/students/parents outside fliering.

The slogan is Wear Black, Take our Schools Back! 

So, naturally we are asking people to wear black.  I am attaching some stickers(eng/spa) that can be printed out and given out on the day of. You can get black ribbons or arm bands to give out with the stickers. You can use the sticker for ideas for signs.

I am also attaching five fliers written on 5 big issues in education. We are in the process of translating them into Spanish so look out for that or contact me if you need the translations. These can be modified to fit your needs, they are in word.

Please contact: capeducation@gmail.com to let us know your school will participate! 

The movement is growing! Get your school community involved and aware!

I am attaching a flier with more details but here is some of the pertinent info from it:

If you, your school, or your school community plan to participate in Fight Back Friday, let us know @ capeducation@gmail.com so that we can include you on our list of participants/endorsers and interactive map as well as provide you with a Fight Back Friday Toolkit!  The Toolkit will include literature and educational material, media information, and sample materials to assist in your school organizing efforts.

Visit our Blog @ www.fightbackfridays.blogspot.com, visit and post to our Facebook page @ fightbackfridays, and post and send in your school’s perspectives, testimonials, videos and pictures of Fight Back Actions.  

****Fight Back Friday will culminate with a press conference on the steps of Tweed @ 4:30.  If your group or a member of your school community (especially if you are a school facing closing or co-location) would like to speak, contact us and we will do our best to accommodate you.  Let’s stand up for public education together, and make our voices heard!****

thanks

sam

NOTE: The 5 leaflets Sam is talking about can be viewed and there are links for downloading at the GEM blog.

Fightback Friday Informational Fliers for January 21, 2011
Download at: http://www.scribd.com/full/46864057?access_key=key-ptivdl0qry389dstkxw

TODAY: YOU'RE INVITED TO SEE THE BANNED PLAY AT JAMAICA HS

Jamaica HS chapter leader James Eterno reports on the ICE blog:

Friday at 4:00p.m. at 167-01 Gothic Drive is the time and place to see "Declassified; Struggle for Existence; We Used to Eat Lunch Together" The link below is to a Jamaica Times story on the play.

http://www.yournabe.com/articles/2011/01/13/queens/qns_jamaica_high_folo_20110113.txt

I went to the Beach Channel Joint Public Hearing tonight. It was worse than last year's.

One of the kids at Jamaica was talking to me today and he said that they should not call these hearings because the DOE people don't hear anything we say. Can't argue with that.

The students have a Zine that can be downloaded as a pdf in 2 versions.

Here is the read version:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/46651868/Antigone-Declassified-READ

Antigone Declassified READ

For print - fold for use. at http://www.scribd.com/full/46651798?access_key=key-16co463vnu6wsi6ca5kl (Below)

Antigone Declassified at Jamaica HS

Jackson Potter: Reformers in Chicago Teachers Union Grapple with Leadership Challenges

When I was in Seattle in July at the AFT convention, I kept asking the new leaders of the Chicago Teachers Union from the CORE caucus who has been elected only weeks before and had taken office a few days before heading to Seattle what is going on in Chicago and why so little seems to be going on in NYC in terms of opposition to Unity Caucus style union leadership. "You need a Jackson" or "We'll send you Jackson" was what they often said. Jackson is Jackson Potter, who is the new staff director of the CTU.

I understood exactly what they meant. I got to hang with Jackson and a bunch of CORE people, along with a great group from the LA teachers union, Candi and Nathan from DC (new leaders of the WTU) and Sally Lee and Megan Behrent from here in NYC in July 2009 in LA where we broke bread and shared ideas. On my last day there I toured around LA with the CORE group and we got to speak of many things about organizing. At that point, winning the election was merely a gleam in their eyes.

But what was clear was that Jackson was a kind of glue or connector who knew everyone and put the pieces together that became CORE. And we certainly could use a Jackson Potter type here in NYC.

Here in a new article in Labor Notes Jackson talks about the challenges facing a caucus that suddenly found itself in charge of the entire union. Here is a short excerpt outlining their program, which is so different from where Unity Caucus and the UFT stands.

CTU has initiated a community board composed of the biggest, strongest community organizations in the city. With these allies CTU can reach out directly to parents, door-knocking and phonebanking.
Together with the community board we’re demanding a superintendent with an education background, instead of another corporate-oriented schools “CEO.”
We’ll fight for an elected school board composed of parents, teachers, administrators, students, and community leaders, as an alternative to the current mayoral control of the schools.
The union has a plan to stop the expansion of charter schools and turnarounds this winter. (The district “turns around” a school by closing and reopening it, firing the entire staff in the process.) Charters receive tons more public resources than public schools, destabilize neighborhood schools, displace students, and don’t provide a better education. We’ll create area hubs that meet, train, and plan with affected communities.

Read Jackson's entire piece: http://labornotes.org/print/2010/12/reformers-chicago-teachers-union-grapple-leadership-challenges

Yes, Virginia, They Do Undermine Schools on Purpose

The Riverdale Press has an article which describes the process by which DOE policies have contributed to the failure of many large high schools, especially, but not exclusively, in the Bronx.

Leonie Haimson: 

This is an excellent article; I hope all read it.  Congrats to Nikki who is doing an excellent job at the Riverdale Press. http://riverdalepress.com/stories/Did-DOE-set-up-JFK-for-failure,47860

Lynne and others: I will never forgive them for how they closed the automotive repair shop at Kennedy, which had a huge waiting list and guaranteed good paying jobs for grads right out of HS, to make more classroom space after the new small schools had taken floors from Kennedy.  It was exactly the sort of valuable program that should have been saved and replicated, instead of destroyed.

I remember Bob Hughes (New Visions) testifying before the Council that his schools didn’t push anyone out, but just used “underutilized space” for their schools, Hah!  But these guys have no shame.

Check out this column by Sam Freedman of the NY times about this.  God knows how many kids’ lives were damaged by this one decision.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/02/nyregion/on-education-as-cars-become-more-intricate-automotive-tech-class-is-junked.html  

Check out my testimony here:

http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/2007/02/testimony-on-small-schools-initiative.html

or the report from New School here:

http://www.newschool.edu/milano/nycaffairs/publications_schools_thenewmarketplace.aspx

Retired UFT Bronx HS District Rep Lynne Wynderbaum:

"While I have always felt that HS of Law and Finance is one of the better small schools, the impact of its introduction into the JFK campus with 4 other small schools on Kennedy HS cannot be minimized as Evan Schwartz states in this article. "The small school coming into Kennedy had nothing to do with the problems that Kennedy had" is at best revisionist. Aside from the thoroughly documented space squeeze and overcrowding that started in 2003 and worsened each year that each school added a grade, the contention that they weren't complicit in the shift of high-needs children to Kennedy HS is quite debatable. He acknowledges that they did not accept Special Education students for the first two years but says that was because they did not have the teachers. This is putting the cart before the horse. Special Education mandates say that if you accept students who are in need of mandated services, you must provide the program (i.e. hire the teachers!). Using lack of qualified teachers as a reason to not accept these students would mean that any school that didn't want to accept such students would simply not have to hire the appropriate teachers! But the fact is that they got the reprieve for a totally different reason: the DOE gave all their new small schools a two-year waiver to not take Special Education students. That happened everywhere, not just JFK. So between 2003-2005, no small schools at the campus had to accept Special Education students and large Kennedy HS gladly did. We had over 400 Special Education students at the time and they were provided with all the mandated services. So overcrowding, space encroachment, shift of high-needs populations, and disproportionate budget benefits from their New Visions grants, all had an impact at the time and began the irreversible impact on Kennedy's data and fate.

Just one correction to the article. I never said that supply closets were left unlocked when academic departments were eliminated under Mr. Rotunno. I explained that one of the problems this caused was that material and books formerly stored in department offices and bookrooms were now scattered throughout the building and difficult to locate for instructional use. Some books were even piled up in unused classrooms. But the corruption and disorganization came well after the initial damage to Kennedy caused by the DOE policy to bring in small schools and relegate Kennedy and its students to second-class citizen status."

Lynne

NYCDOE maintained a flagrantly illegal policy of allowing new small schools to exclude kids with IEPs and ELLs for the schools' first 2 years.  Someone(s) filed a complaint re this policy with US DOE's Office for Civil Rights.  NYSED actually came out with some "data" purporting to show that the NYCDOE's new small schools had lovely percentages of kids w/IEPs and ELLs, in an attempt to protect NYCDOE, but nobody in his/her right mind believed the NYSED data since NYCDOE admitted its exclusionary policy publicly.  From what I gathered, there was a back channel deal with OCR - NYCDOE ended the illegal exclusionary policy and OCR allowed NYCDOE to get away without having a formal finding of unlawful discrimination made against it.

The rationale the NYCDOE gave for the illegal, exclusionary policy was appalling, btw.  I was surprised that they actually had the temerity to say it publicly.

Dee Alpert

__._,_.___