Will UFT Renounce This Deal? Randi on the Board: Confidential Student And Teacher Data To Be Provided To LLC Run By Gates and Murdoch

UPDATED: 11PM - SEE FOLLOW-UP on Norms Notes:
How the feds are tracking your kid


I'm bringing this up again. This article by Leonie Haimson on Huffington is so disturbing given that Randi Weingarten has endorsed this and is on the board.

What can you do? BRING THIS UP IN YOUR SCHOOL. WHEN THE UNON SENDS IN A SHILL DEMAND THE UFT RENOUNCE THIS.

How about a reso at the DA? Then see if Mulgarten defends it. Bet he does.

Oh yes. And those slugs NY STATE ED/Regent Merryl Tisch and John King just love this.

Confidential Student And Teacher Data To Be Provided To LLC Run By Gates and Murdoch

 Leonie Haimson

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leonie-haimson/confidential-student-and-_b_1156701.html?mid=55

This week, the Wall Street Journal reported that the NY Board of Regents approved the state's sharing of student and teacher information with a new national database, to be funded by the Gates Foundation, and designed by News Corp's Wireless Generation. Other states that have already agreed to share this data, according to the NY State Education Department, include Colorado, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, North Carolina, Louisiana and Massachusetts.

All this confidential student and teacher data will be held by a private limited corporation, called the Shared Learning Collaborative LLC, with even less accountability,  which in July was awarded $76.5 million by the Gates Foundation, to be spent over 7 months. According to an earlier NYT story,  $44 million of this funding will go straight into the pockets of Wireless Generation, owned by Murdoch's News Corp and run by Joel Klein.

The Regents approved this project, despite the NY State Comptroller's veto this summer of the State Education Department's proposed no-bid contract to Wireless to build a state-wide data system, apparently because the state is not paying money to participate. The Comptroller -- and the public as well -- had opposed this contract, in large part because of privacy concerns and the involvement of Murdoch's company,  which is still embroiled in a major phone-hacking scandal in the UK.

Here is what SED writes, in explanation of their intent to share this confidential data:

The cost of the development of the SLC will be the responsibility of the SLC, not New York State. Consistent with the Comptroller's concerns regarding Wireless Generation, no New York State funds will be paid directly or indirectly to Wireless Generation or any of its subsidiaries for the development of these SLC services... As mentioned above, each state and school/district will retain sole ownership of its data. Only anonymous data will be used for SLC system development. As in any system development project, a limited number of authorized vendors will need to access actual educational data for system operation and improvements.

Including Wireless, one must assume. But this is not all. Here is more from the SED document:

The Shared Learning Collaborative (SLC) is a consortium of states organized to help increase the benefits and long-term sustainability of data, curriculum, and instructional improvement initiatives. The SLC is facilitated by the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) and has received initial funding from the Carnegie Corporation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Participating states include Colorado, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, North Carolina, Louisiana, and Massachusetts.
A primary purpose of the SLC is to help promote the efficient expenditure of taxpayer funds by coordinating the efforts of multiple states to provide for the common needs of all participating states, including shared infrastructure and services that integrate, deliver, and display educational data and curriculum resources for educators, students, and families. Legally binding agreements will ensure that each state's data remain separate and distinct from the data of all other states...

Along with  Wireless, some of the other companies involved will be two consulting companies: Alvarez and Marsal, who were behind the disastrous reorganization of NYC school bus routes in the winter of 2007, and McKinsey, which led the first reorganization of the NYC Department of Education in 2003, which included dissolving the community district structure (contrary to law) and totally ignoring any parent input.
Here is an excerpt from a Gates' fact sheet about this project:

In addition to making instructional data more manageable and useful, this open-license technology, provisionally called the Shared Learning Infrastructure (SLI), will also support a large market for vendors of learning materials and application developers to deliver content and tools that meet the Common Core State Standards and are interoperable with each other and the most popular student information systems.

In other words, companies will be making more money off our kids' test scores.
Meanwhile, it is not reassuring that the Gates document says that "the long-term governance model" of this national database "is still in development."
They add a standard disclaimer, that "Designing protections for student privacy will be addressed throughout the development of the system, and data access and usage models will be designed to support compliance with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act and other privacy laws" without any assurances of how this will be achieved.
SED adds:

The SLC is making plans for its long-term governance, including the protection of data privacy and security; the development of a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization structure; and the articulation of a business model for long-term fiscal sustainability. This work will be guided by participating states and informed by input from a panel of expert advisors, including Cheryl Vedoe, President and CEO of Apex Learning; David Riley, President of the Alembic Foundation and an open source technology expert; Dr. Michael Lomax, President and CEO of the United Negro College Fund; Randi Weingarten, President of the American Federation of Teachers; Michael Horn, Co-founder and Executive Director for Education at Innosight Institute; and Andrew Rotherham, Co-founder and Partner of Bellwether Education Partners.

I wonder how many of those organizations receive funding from Gates.
Where are the independent experts on privacy, and even more importantly, the input of parents, who really should be allowed to opt out of this national database?

Follow Leonie Haimson on Twitter: www.twitter.com/leoniehaimson

Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/. And make sure to check out the side panel on the right for important bits.

Support Bill Thompson for Mayor? NOT

It is time to lay to rest the phony myth of Bill Thompson as a good mayoral choice for UFTers. See the  email exchanges below on ICE mail:

Christine Quinn will be a continuation of Mayor Bloomberg, Ray Kelly will remain as Police commissioner to continue his stop and frisk reign of terror which is meant to scare blacks into leaving the city. 100,000 have left the city in the last 10 years. This enabled Bloomberg to get a 3rd term. Thompson only lost by 50,000 votes. Denis Walcott will continue his jihad against city schools. Christine Quinn will be Mayor Bloombergs proxy in retirement. Nothing will change. The UFT must support Bill Thompson for Mayor. He is the only candidate who will stop the destruction of our schools.

Bill

I absolutely disagree with you on Thompson Bill while agreeing on Quinn.

There's proof that Bloomberg preferred Thompson and there was some deal with Bloomberg supporting Thompson's wife's museum (See below). Lots of people wondered at the poor campaign Thompson ran. Don't get fooled again. He's a stalking horse. In fact there is no candidate that will defend our interests.

We need to be able to put thousands of people in the streets to force change and embolden our kind of candidates to emerge. First and foremost we need an Arab spring in the UFT.

Norm

Thompson was visiting DC37 to make a stump speech. He was invited to a CPE meeting. He knew he was talking to a group opposed to mayoral control. The question of mayoral control was put to him. He said he supported it. We know that it not just the question of which mayor is in control and he knows that too.

Loretta

Here is the Ed Notes posting Jan. 10, 2010:  Barrett reveals Thompson as Dirty
The next time you read a New Action leaflet bragging about how they were the only caucus to endorse Bill Thompson, suggest people read this revealing Wayne Barrett piece in the Voice about Thompson's girlfriend/wife museum scam and how Bloomberg helped out.

Here's the first page of a 7 page article:

Bloomberg and Thompson: The (Really) Odd Couple

Now it can be told: The surprising ties between the billionaire mayor and the poor slob who ran against him

By Wayne Barrett Tuesday, Jan 5 2010

This is an odd story about an even odder couple, and the surprising ties that bind them. It's a tale of intrigue about a mayoral contest that left New Yorkers feeling so cheated fewer of them voted than in any election since 1917. It also reveals how one of these odd partners compromised the other, subverting the independent checks and balances required of a mayor and comptroller by law.

As the curtain opens on 2010, the stars of the year in city politics, Mike Bloomberg and William Thompson, who were awkwardly allied since being inaugurated together eight years ago, are each moving on to new and uncertain phases of their public lives.

Bloomberg, who has suffered recent stunning setbacks in the City Council, has already discovered that third terms and narrow wins can diminish even mogul mayors. Thompson—entertained at Gracie Mansion at a post-election private breakfast and praised by Bloomberg as "a quality guy" who the mayor hopes "stays in public service"—is still considering a 2010 race against our unelected senator, Kirsten Gillibrand, or unelected state comptroller, Tom DiNapoli ("Go for it," cheers Bloomberg). Friends of Thompson expect him to try, like loser Rudy Giuliani did in 1989, to stay in play on the sidelines and run for mayor again in four years, when a departing Bloomberg might throw him an endorsement or some checks.

Thompson, who only promises he will run again sometime for something, has suddenly become a darling of the media, which are now overcompensating for relying too obsessively on inaccurate polls that failed to anticipate a four-point margin of victory. Thompson, it turns out, got virtually the same total vote Fernando Ferrer did in 2005, while Bloomberg pulled in 180,000 fewer votes than he received last time. Thompson's close margin was less a result of his underappreciated strengths—the Times' Mike Barbaro correctly reported two weeks before the election that his "biggest obstacle" was "his own undisciplined campaign"—than they were of a result of Bloomberg fatigue. Thompson, in fact, had an "oddly relaxed" campaign schedule, with a single event some days, observed Barbaro, and was "chronically late" and often failed to appear at all. He spent more than half his money before the mid-September nominal primary, forcing him to rely on blink-of-an-eye, 15-second TV commercials in November.

But that wasn't enough. Thompson's real role, for Bloomberg at least, was to help force the feared congressman, Anthony Weiner, out of the race, a goal that Bloomberg guru Howard Wolfson has openly acknowledged. Thompson obliged, giving up a sure third term as comptroller. Weiner himself explained in a Times op-ed when he withdrew in May that "running a primary against Thompson would only drain the ability of the winner to compete in the general election." Having lost to Ferrer in 2005 by 11 points, Weiner understood that minority candidates have won all but one of the Democratic mayoral primaries since 1985. So when the leading black politician in the city decided to make his improbable run, Weiner had nowhere to go but out. Thompson and Bloomberg might as well have had a first-round victory party together that night.

Like other powerful New York pols, Mike Bloomberg wanted to pick his own opponent. Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer spent a year setting the table for 2010, and, as one-time putative opponents Steve Israel and Carolyn Maloney can attest, the incumbent pair used every knife and fork available. Ed Koch picked his opponent when he derailed ex-congressman Herman Badillo and won a third term in 1985, and Giuliani did it when he submarined a possible challenge from Alan Hevesi in 1997. Faced with internal polls that we now know rarely put Bloomberg above 50 percent, he preferred an opponent whose vulnerabilities were well known to him, having already exploited them for years.

Thompson couldn't, for example, attack Bloomberg's development policies since, as a member of the city's Industrial Development Agency, he had voted 876 times in favor of the $9.6 billion in bonds that underwrite the projects, opposing them only five times. Charged under the city charter with assessing Bloomberg's budgets and auditing his agencies, Thompson had instead gushed about the mayor for most of his two terms, leaving him with virtually no viable way of distinguishing himself from his golf buddy when the two ended up on opposite sides of the ballot.

What Bloomberg got with Thompson was a made-to-order challenge, so tame at times that a reporter, frustrated by Thompson's unwillingness to say a single critical word about Bloomberg at one September press conference, asked why he'd called it, and so over-the-top at other times (as when he promised to fire Police Commissioner Ray Kelly), that he looked grotesquely out of touch. The Daily News' Adam Lisberg captured it in a classic headline: "Nice-guy Thompson can't find the jugular." Thompson curiously decided to make schools the core of his attack on Bloomberg even as his key campaign consultant, Roberto Ramirez, was lobbying in Albany on behalf of a Bloomberg-tied group championing mayoral control. Thompson often looked like a befuddled shadow-boxer, tied to Bloomberg at the hip while serving up obligatory campaign lip. As for Bloomberg, he'd contended in 2008 that all the term-limits extension did was give voters the additional choice of voting for him, a supposed "expansion" of the franchise even as he overrode the result of two referendums. Then he maneuvered successfully in 2009 to narrow that choice to the opponent he wanted to face.

Read it all here. 

Guest Blog by Robert Rendo: The Rich and Education

The opinions below are solely those of the author.

No wonder the rich are so passionate about education; they stand to change the way young brains get wired, schools get financed, and who we become as a society. Moreover, who can ignore their capture and reinventing the vast public realm of American schools into an even vaster capitalist empire of goods and services? One such byproduct of the reform movement is the fixation on standardized testing, which is one of many ways of assessing students' strengths and weaknesses. Left alone to stand by itself or used as the dominant mode of assessment, it quickly gains the accurate status of "efficient, relatively cost effective, and weakly empirical".

Rob Rendo

There is no metric out there that is sensitive enough to truly measure everything a student knows. Our so called language proficiency tests for English language learners, for example, are a prime example in which students are taught hundreds of elements and aspects of English, but are only tested on a few, randomly designed array of those elements. It's hit or miss when students perform on such tests, unless, of course, the students have had substantial amounts of test preparation, most often at the hideous cost of crowding out other types of knowledge. For example, when a student's augmented lexicon contains 3000 items, but the tests look for literacy skills such as decoding "wr" and "ch", then the child's true linguistic acumen is not only measured inaccurately, but is mischaracterized. Literacy and reading skills, while ultimately critical, are learned and tested at the dire expense of children's true rich oral language, which develops saliently through experiences and the five senses. It makes sense to lower the stakes on standardized testing, therefore, so that the tests can serve their main purpose: to inform the teacher and drive future instruction. The test should only function as a data tool and not as a politicized castigative whipping post.

Oral language development has not become a substantive standard in and of itself, and this absence reflects the egregious incompetence and disconnect of policy makers. In the United States, we sacrifice language acquisition for rigid, inflexible and perniciously dominating tests.

Equally worse and unjust is the evaluation of teachers; if the child is to be assessed holistically, so must the teacher’s tutelage and custodianship. The two are inextricably linked. It leads one to easily infer that part of the "education crisis" is indeed manufactured, and the “manufacturing process” has very thickly coated the product with politics. The rich and their tentacles in education have brought us to the astonishing realization that those who create and enforce educational policy are far removed from the educational process and have succeeded in swaying the commercial media and its audience into buying the “product”. Such policy makers vacuum up the humanism in teaching and learning.

Which, really, is why the FIRST thing we educators must do is to remove people like Randi Weingarten, Bill and Melinda Gates, Arne Duncan, Barack Obama, Steve Brill, and Michael Bloomberg, just to name a very few from the educational scene. And the aftermath of such a purging should also involve the cabinet installation of true cognitive scientists and researchers who observe and empirically prove what learning really is all about. . . . people like Steven Krashen, Linda Darling Hammond, Noam Chomsky, Jim Cummins, Pedro Noguera, etc. We would also add to this mixture actual veteran teachers who are Nationally Board Certified and some who have taught diverse student populations. If we were to systemize and institutionalize this, we would nearly eliminate achievement gaps and substandard levels of literacy, math, and science. We would also be fostering a more well balanced and well adjusted youth who would exude productivity in the workplace and in civic life. That very balance would propel and protect democracy. It would probably begin to ravage poverty. I think that this trajectory, seen by connecting all these obvious dots, scares not the ninety-nine percenters, but rather, the one percent.

Until we really convince and educate the public about what it means to learn, to teach, and to be educated, we will be absorbed into this cyborg-like plutonomy, all to have but a distant memory of what it was to be like to be creative, innovative, highly verbal, and critically thinking. And that, however subtly accomplished over a generation, would relegate the great populist masses into accepting a crime against humanity that no one should ever have to think of.

-Robert Rendo, New York

The commentator is a veteran Nationally Board Certified teacher in the public schools and teaches low income students. He is also a nationally award winning editorial illustrator with works in the New York Times and the Chicago Tribune. See http://altpick.com/rrendo

------------------

Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/. And make sure to check out the side panel on the right for important bits.

Straddling Fault Lines in New Zealand

Monday evening, Dec. 12, we returned from two weeks in New Zealand. I'm still a bit jet-lagged and not sure if it's yesterday or tomorrow. I slept over 8 hours last night and have been over the last week and I NEVER sleep much more than 6. All I know is we left on a Sunday, Nov. 27 and arrived on Tuesday, skipping Monday, Nov. 28. If you traveled that way and missed your birthday would you never get older? Then on the way home we left Wellington (the capital) on Monday at noon and got back to NYC on Monday at 6 after 28 hours of travel.

You would really have a hard time going much further than New Zealand from here. Just look at a globe and realize just how far south it is - the tip of the south island points right at Antarctica. Brrrr. Even Australia seems closer. (We have been there twice so skipped it this time.)

I really didn't do much homework for this trip, expecting to rely on the tour guide(s). And they certainly came through. I have a much greater understanding of NZ, a country I knew little about. We went with Overseas Adventure Tours (OAT), a branch of Grand Circle. These are small tours - we had 14 people - all roughly our age. Two couples from Wisconsin (not happy about the attempt to recall that putz), and couples from Baltimore and LA and a few singles from California.

NZ is basically on one big fault line with earthquakes threatening every part of both islands.

Bob Wilkerson, the tour guide, a rigorous typically active Kiwi, is close to 70 - a true outdoorsman and a passionate defender of New Zealand's social welfare system. He was not happy at the recent victory by conservatives, who actually took office on the day we left. We had a tour of Parliment the day before - an earthquake proof building that rests on flexible concrete pillars - probably one of the safest buildings in the world - even though Wellington is on a major earthquake fault. As a matter of fact, pretty much all of NZ is on a fault.

I can write about this trip in so many ways: the scenery, the meeting with Maori guides who gave us so much insight. I was surprised at how political the tour was. Bob said OAT tours don't hold anything back and give the full range of the good, bad and ugly. Bob is a strict environmentalist and was so proud of the rigid laws protecting and preserving and restoring the environment. He showed us trees thousands of years old that if they were cut down could fetch a hundred grand each. But they are never touched. Imagine where they would be in this nation. You'd see FOX News railing about how cutting them down could contribute to the economy.

We covered areas of both the north and south islands but spent more time in the south where the southern tip points right at Antarctica. Bob was from Christ Church which suffered 2 devastating earthquakes last year with the 2nd one in Feb. basically dropping all of the downtown into one big hole - just about every single historical building lost. (There was another one just the other day.) SO we only got to the city's airport to take off for Wellington.

We stared in Auckland on the north island  - the largest city with 1.4 million of the 4 millions people in the entire nation, where I connected up with the Occupy Auckland crew and actually filmed an important General Assembly and since I was the only one filming they were excited to have that footage. And also to have someone from NYC stop by. (I connected one of their tech guys to Justin from OWS here in NY.) There are probably more sheep. They hate possums which were imported and wrecked the environment but did discover they could be used for more than road kill - the fur fibers retain warmth and they mix them with merino sheep. I now have a possum/wool scarf to wear.

The treatment of the indigenous population has improved tremendously over the past 30 years and Bob was very proud of that - though as my dermatologist said after I told him that - "yeah, after they killed most of them off."

I took hundreds of photos and hours of film and will blog more about what is happening with education there another time. Happy holidays and here are just a few pics.

Nocera/Krugman Let Bloomberg Off Hook on Fannie/Freddie

Nocera and Krugman expose the fallacy and open lies the right and Republicans engage in with their making excuses for the corporate greed in pushing sub-prime mortgages by placing the blame in Fannie/Freddie Mae. But guess who also adhere's to the same lie? No less than our esteemed mayor.

I left a comment about their ignoring Bloomberg at Krugman's blog hours ago but so far it hasn't appeared. Maybe it's just Xmas eve and the moderators at the Times are doing last minute shopping  - let's see -  if you call Republicans idiots and liars and Bloomberg says exactly the same thing are you  protecting Bloomberg's idiocy?

Thanks to Leonie Haimson for making this connection with this tweet:

Nocera refutes Big Lie that FMacs caused the ec collapse goo.gl/qJjIs omits @MikeBloomberg repeats same myth goo.gl/cs0MY

Nocera also wrote about the FMac distortions in a previous column.

Not only Nocera but one of my idols, Paul Krugman who in commenting on and complimenting Nocera on Nocera's  column in today's NY Times says on his blog:

Joe Nocera Gets MadAnd it’s a beautiful thing to see.

Today Joe once again goes after the Big Lie — the claim that Fannie and Freddie caused the crisis — and drives home the point that the people advancing this story aren’t just wrong but are acting with intent, engaged in deliberate deception:

Basically, Joe is arriving where I’ve been since 2000: what’s going on in the discussion of economic affairs (and other matters, like justifications for war) isn’t just a case where different people look at the same facts but reach different conclusions. Instead, we’re looking at a situation in which one side of the debate just isn’t interested in the truth, in which alleged scholarship is actually just propaganda.

Saying this, of course, gets you declared “shrill”, denounced as partisan; you’re supposed to pretend that we’re having a civilized discussion between people with good intentions. And you’re supposed to match each attack on Republicans with an attack on Democrats, as if the mendacity were equal on both sides. Sorry, but it isn’t. Democrats aren’t angels; they’re human and sometimes corrupt — but they don’t operate a lie machine 24/7 the way modern Republicans do.

Ooops Paul. Not JUST Republicans operate a lie machine 24/7. We can name a whole lot of big city mayors who are so-called independents like Bloomberg and even Dems like Rahmbo Emanuel in Chicago who operate a lie machine 24/7.

Bloomberg: 'Plain and simple,' Congress caused the mortgage crisis, not the banks
Nov. 1, 2011

Mayor Michael Bloomberg said this morning that if there is anyone to blame for the mortgage crisis that led the collapse of the financial industry, it's not the "big banks," but Congress.

Speaking at a business breakfast in midtown featuring Bloomberg and two former New York City mayors, Bloomberg was asked what he thought of the Occupy Wall Street protesters.

"I hear your complaints," Bloomberg said. "Some of them are totally unfounded. It was not the banks that created the mortgage crisis. It was, plain and simple, Congress who forced everybody to go and give mortgages to people who were on the cusp. Now, I'm not saying I'm sure that was terrible policy, because a lot of those people who got homes still have them and they wouldn't have gotten them without that.

"But they were the ones who pushed Fannie and Freddie to make a bunch of loans that were imprudent, if you will. They were the ones that pushed the banks to loan to everybody. And now we want to go vilify the banks because it's one target, it's easy to blame them and congress certainly isn't going to blame themselves. At the same time, Congress is trying to pressure banks to loosen their lending standards to make more loans. This is exactly the same speech they criticized them for."

Read the entire Bloomberg piece: http://goo.gl/cs0MY
=========
Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/. And make sure to check out the side panel on the right for important bits.

Closing Schools Folly Exposed, So Why Was UFT In Favor For So Long?

“A lot of my good good teachers have left,” she said. “I hate the term jump ship, because of Columbus … But they told me they didn’t want to wait until the end and risk going into the Absent Teacher Reserve pool,” where teachers who have lost their jobs rove from school to school as substitutes. 
--- Linda Fuentes, Principal, Columbus HS from Gotham Schools.
http://goo.gl/hKqDQ

All the cards fall into place. We all know that the ed deform agenda is about destroying the career and pay track and the unions of teachers. But teachers cannot be teacher centric in this war. (See the Milwaukee Teacher Education President Bob Peterson on Reinventing the Union – Social Justice Unionism in Action).

Ed deform while claiming to be about children/student first is also about segregation and inequality of students.and is exposed by the number of push outs and disappeared kids which the privatized schools don't want to deal with. See (Segregated Charter Schools Evoke Separate But Equal Era in U.S. Education)

Any hope of claiming improved results is dependent on this and despite all kinds of games being played their results are still crappy as public schools with limited resources often perform as well or better. (See Gary Rubinstein's work on proving the fallacy of closing schools like Washington Irving High School — another school unfairly closed and Come Back To Jamaica HS.)

The master plan of the privtizers is hinged on destroying public schools building by building, creating a domino effect as the most difficult children to educate are moved around like chess pieces to the next school down the line to become a target. This was established as a plan decades ago by the free-marketeers. 

The UFT/AFT supported closing schools as a solution until recently
But no matter how clear this was to many of us and no matter how hard we screamed at the UFT leadership, they aided and abetted this policy. Remember Al Shanker? He was a cheerleader for closing down "failing" schools from the early 80's and Randi picked up on the policy (remember her" Lafayette HS should be closed" statement?) And UFT/Unity shills like Peter Goodman was being paid to go around and take part in the dismantling of schools like my own alma mata Thomas Jefferson in East NY Brooklyn.

Before 2005 it was not easy to close a school - because the teachers had some seniority rights. But after the 2005 contract with its free market and the creation of ATRs the DOE was freed to go full speed ahead.


After being patsies and enablers for so many years, Tweed spit in the face of the UFT in 2009 when they announced the closing of 19 schools and the UFT began to stir - a bit. 


An article at Gotham Schools focuses on closing school Columbus HS in the Bronx, one of the dominoes. At Columbus, students and staff grapple with looming closurehttp://goo.gl/hKqDQ 

 Leonie Haimson points out: "Yet DOE still sending them kids."

In response to questions of where they are stashing the kids, Leonie pointed people to various links:

There is a new law that says DOE has to report on what happens at closing schools.  There have been many reports on this as well. See our report which shows sharp spikes in the discharge rates:
http://www.classsizematters.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/High_School_Discharge_Report_FINAL.pdf

also see:  http://www.urbanyouthcollaborative.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/No-
Closer-to-College-Report.pdf

http://www2.flanbwayan.org/news/wpcontent/
uploads/2011/07/tcr1pdf1.pdf)

and: http://www.advocatesforchildren.org/Empty%20Promises%20Report%2
0%206-16-09.pdf.

There were lots of reports of substandard credit recovery programs at Tilden HS for example as it was phasing out. Ssee for example 

http://coveringeducation.org/schoolstories10/2010/05/a-race-for-diplomas-before-tilden-high-closes-for-good/

Leonie Haimson
Class Size Matters

Make a tax-deductible contribution to Class SizeMatters now!

Click on the link above to support Leonie's work (and for a hundred bucks get a prized Class Size Matters mug).

The Gotham Story below. Worth reading as students and teaches get screwed.

The Wave: Jumping From Kiwi-Land into Shadow of the Valley of the Panel for Educational Policy

The Wave: www.rockawave.com
Written Dec. 20, Published Dec. 23, 2011
By Norm Scott

I’ve been back a week after spending two weeks in New Zealand where summer is just beginning, so I’m not sure what is up and what is down or whether it is yesterday, today or tomorrow. But I do have beautiful photos of roses in bloom in December. Internet access was difficult – meaning the hotels charged way too much and with an active tour guide getting us up early and delivering us late there was little time to spend time online anyway. But I did try to keep up through my Blackberry, which was burning up with news from the education front lines. I did manage to get over to Occupy Auckland, where I videotaped what turned out to be an important General Assembly and they were going to use my tape as part of their court effort to remain in the park they were occupying. What is interesting is that New Zealand is a nation with fully socialized medical care, a very successful system indeed. More on some of the wonderful stuff we learned about that nation of 4 million people in future columns.

But, apparently, New Zealand, even with a top-notch education system, is not immune to attempts to push an education deform privatization agenda, with the just-elected conservative government springing the charter school option of school choice out of a hat. Boy, these corporate reformers are coming out from under rocks everywhere in the world.

I was contacted by a NZ principal who had heard of our filmed response (The Inconvenient Truth Behind Waiting for Superman) to the supreme ed deform film “Waiting for Superman” – he was prepared to take a 2-hour car trip to meet up with me in Wellington (the capital and home to Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson who has his studios there) to get a copy. Apparently, our film is viewed as one of the most effective ways to counter the ed deform free market corporate agenda.

How thrilling that word of our movie has gone out to the far corners of the world (all 50 states and 6 continents) with letters pouring in from people making and distributing dozens of copies. I’m guessing that we have gone over 8000 dvds distributed with people setting up screenings all over the nation at colleges, unions and school boards. I was even invited up to SUNY Courtland (all expenses paid) to be on a panel discussing both films. (Of course our own UFT leadership here in NYC has been boycotting the film because, while defending teacher unions is a major portion of the film, we did have a few criticisms of the weakness of the UFT organizing efforts.)

We had lost an entire day travelling but got it back on our return on Dec. 12th. We left on a Monday, travelled 24 hours and came back on a Monday. Imagine travelling that way on your birthday – you’ll never get older.

Two days later, while still jet-lagged, I was ready for action at the Dec. 14th Panel for Educational Panel meeting being held in central Queens at Newtown HS. The meeting, which was focused on handing over more schools to Eva Moskowitz’ Success Charter Network in Brooklyn had been moved to Queens (even though there wasn’t one item on the agenda related to a Queens school) to make it difficult for the overwhelming number of parents and teachers, especially in gentrifying Cobble Hill, who used their two minutes at the mic to oppose the giveaway of school buildings to private interests, especially when there are a number of high quality and popular schools in the area. But under Bloomberg, it is all about political connections and not education.
(Did you hear this line from David Letterman commenting on the death of Kim Il Jong: “The only tiny tyrant left is Mayor Bloomberg.”)

As expected despite an overwhelming majority of people using their 2 minutes to speak against the Moskowitz invasion, the Panel dominated by Bloomberg appointees voted in favor of the Success co-location with only one vote against, the always-reliable Manhattan Borough Rep Patrick Sullivan. Many people showed up with puppets to mock the Bloomberg crew. But clearly, even most of the borough reps, appointed by the borough presidents, are also puppets. Brooklyn’s Marty Markowitz’ rep voted YES (Marty you are a puppet AND a buffoon) and our own Queens rep supposedly (I was long gone by then to catch up on the 18 hour time difference) abstained – say it ain’t so Dmytro Fedkowskyj. Is he a pathetic puppet too? I can say this: Helen Marshall is a Bloomberg shill and puppet. And Dmytro does what Helen wants. I wonder what guys like him get out of doing this sleazy suck-up job. I hope Dmytro isn’t fooling himself into believing he is doing a public service.

One of the notable events of the evening was the use of “mic check” before the meeting began by a branch of the Occupy movement calling itself Occupy the DOE. For the unfamiliar, “mic check” is a powerful tool that allows one to speak to a large crowd by making short statements that are repeated by the crowd, thus avoiding the need for amplification. After years of having the Bloomberg appointees control the mic and shut it off after 2 minutes, “mic check” gives the crowd a powerful weapon to take control of a meeting – as long as there is enough of a crowd to accomplish this.

Now the pro-Bloomberg press and some people who have not had their voices shut down and ignored for years charge that using “mic check” can be viewed as rude and counterproductive, which would be true if these public meetings really were about providing community input. But gone are the days of people passively using two minutes to describe decades of neglect or outright sabotage of their school communities while PEP members bemusedly sit back ignoring them, knowing full well they will vote as they are told no matter how deep the emotion asking them to keep schools open or to keep a politically connected charter school from eating up space in public school buildings like Pac Man.

So, at the PEP meeting, ODOE consisting mostly of NYC teachers, parents and some students intermittently used “mic check” to make their points without totally disrupting the meeting. After a few hours, they walked out en masse and held a brief meeting outside the school before heading home. ODOE is continuing to meet weekly to decide on actions at the upcoming January and February PEP meetings where closing schools will be voted on and is reaching out to these closing schools to offer support.

I put up videos of the meeting on you tube. Check the gemnyc1 channel.

Norm blogs at: http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/, Email: normsco@gmail.com

Losers Merryl Tisch and John B. King: Principal Revolt Against State Ed Teacher Evals

These two jokers keep pushing but are facing a major revolt not by teachers but by their bosses. Even Fox has a report:


NYS Teacher Evaluation Controversy from Rockville Centre Schools on Vimeo.

http://edupln.com/video/nys-teacher-evaluation-controversy

List of Protesting Principals Tops 1,000 

Dec. 15, 2011, 11:42 a.m.By SchoolBookNearly a quarter of all principals in New York State have signed a letter objecting to New York State’s system of teacher evaluations.The letter, which was posted online, voices objections to a new state evaluation system that will rate teachers and principals based on student scores on standardized tests.The principals’ complaints include: The system has not been field tested; there are scores to rate only English and math teachers; state tests have repeatedly been shown to be unreliable.While more than 1,000 principals have now signed the letter, the numbers remain heavy on Long Island principals, where the protest started. Here are the numbers, as of Wednesday:Total 1,019 principals (22.4 percent of the 4,511 principals listed by the state). As of Dec. 11, the total was 902 statewide.Westchester 107Long island 507Rockland 32New York City 47

--------------
More scandal at State Ed: Testing Firm Faces Inquiry on Free Trips for Officials 

For commentary:  Perdido Street School

Pearson In Corruption Probe - Why Are The Regents And The NYSED Not Being Scrutinized Too?

--------------
And here is some more commentary on Tisch from Reality-Based Educator:

She (Tisch) needs to be taken down.And then she ought to be taken to jail. 

reality-based educator has left a new comment on your post "Michael Winerip Lays Waste to NY State Ed Departme...": 

I have not seen Merry Merryl Tisch's name show up in the K12 Inc. articles that have surfaced lately - not in the Times article, not in the Wash Post article, not in Gail Collins' column on K12 and online ed. I even wrote Collins to say she should look into the Tisch connections so long as she is commenting on the political connections that the company has that enable it to finagle contracts. Never heard back from her, never saw her revisit the issue. I understand that the Tisch connection is through a subsidiary of K12 Inc. and the connection to Tisch is with her brother-in-law, not herself or her husband. Still, the thing stinks.
Somehow Merry Merryl never gets hammered in the press, even when she says stupid shit like state test results "have never, ever, ever exaggerated...” or the public hates teachers but will like them better when the new "objective" evaluation system is put into place...
http://perdidostreetschool.blogspot.com/2011/11/merryl-tisch-public-hates-teachers-but.html
She really is as bad as Eva on this stuff - a self-centered, accountability for others/no accountability for me demagogue.
Steiner was a putz, but it's clear Tisch put the knife into him and brought her man King to the NYSED to consolidate her power.
It would be nice to see Winerip take a look at how the state has done since Tisch has been there and have him ask her why she thinks all the problems are other people's fault, never her own.
She needs to be taken down.
And then she ought to be taken to jail. 

============
Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/. And make sure to check out the side panel on the right for important bits.

Bob Peterson on Reinventing the Union – Social Justice Unionism in Action

I met Bob Peterson in Chicago this past summer at the national educator's activist meetings. Here is an amazing educator who was one of the founders of Rethinking Schools, one of the most progressive journals for educators. (A perfect place to give a donation).

So Bob is a serious teacher. Given the mayhem in Wisconsin, Bob decides to run for president of the Milwaukee Teachers Association (NEA). And wins. Whoa. As unique a union leader as there is. And in the home of the largest voucher (failed) program in the nation. Just about everything Bob said in Chicago made oh so much sense. As it does here. You'll be hearing a lot more about social justice unionism from me in the next few months. Here is a good start.

This was sent to me a few months ago from another Rethinking Schools guy, Michael Charney, from Ohio I believe - another hot spot for anti-public employees with teachers in the eye of the storm.

Norm,
I have pasted below a talk by Bob Peterson, newly elected president of the Milwaukee Teachers Education Association, gave to 250 Building Reps and members about his direction for reinventing the MTEA in the light of the new Wisconsin law regarding unions and collective bargaining. The MTEA has a contract for two years before all the implications of the attack on collective bargaining takes hold. I found the focus on site based organizing around contract protection, professional issues, community and parent out reach and a site based focused on democracy and political action compelling. I thought you might be interested in finding out about Bob's direction as president of the MTEA.
Michael Charney

It’s Time to Re-imagine and Reinvent the MTEABy Bob Peterson
MTEA Convocation, Milwaukee WI – September 21, 2011 

I’d like to explain in detail why we need to re-imagine and reinvent the MTEA.
First, let me be clear. We are facing a crisis of historic proportions. Public education is the foundation of any socially just, democratic society. Educators are the foundation of public education. Yet the survival of both teacher unions and public education is up for question.
Governor Walker, the Republican Legislature and their right-wing corporate supporters have laid down the gauntlet. ACT 10 is a direct attack on public workers, our unions and the entire public sector. Walker’s massive cutback of funding for public schools and other public services is an unprecedented assault on our community. Our challenge is to win greater public support for public education and to win greater identification to the MTEA and the MEAA from our own members. As a union, we will not be able to adequately respond to these new realities and challenges unless we re-imagine and reinvent the MTEA. 

First, I’d like to talk about some lessons from the past.
Milwaukee has been ground zero in the battle over public education for more than 20 years, ever since the private school voucher program began. Fundamentally, vouchers are based on a free-market, right-wing ideology that doesn’t support public education. At the same time, however, voucher proponents successfully convinced many people that vouchers were needed because MPS would not reform itself and that the union was an obstacle. 

Let’s be honest. The union did not adequately respond. Too often, when faced with criticisms we were reactive and defensive. We criticized the exaggerated charges against us but we did not differentiate between legitimate and illegitimate criticisms. So, lesson number one we need to learn. The union must be proactive. We can’t just circle the wagons and defensively dismiss all criticisms. 

A strong teachers’ union rests on a tripod of concerns. One leg is bread and butter unionism, which ensures quality wages, hours and working conditions and focuses on the contract. The second leg is professional unionism — understanding that we as educators take ownership of teaching and learning. The third leg is social justice unionism — the understanding that we must build strong relations with parents and community groups not just to ensure adequate support for public education, but so that we as a union are also involved in improving the community. 

During the era in which vouchers gained an increasing foothold in Milwaukee, too often the union’s energy was focused on bread and butter. The contract was king. When there was a problem in MPS, too often we said in essence, “That’s a problem for the administration. You fix it, but don’t you dare violate the contract.” As we look at the past, lesson number two is that being a union means more than defending the contract. 

Which brings me to lesson number three from the past. We can’t just change our rhetoric.
We have to change our practice. 

In recent years, the MTEA has clearly made progress and has better understood the need for professional unionism. We have talked about the need for educators to take ownership of teaching and learning. We began to understand the need to collaborate and work with the administration and school board, and not to view them merely as bosses and management. We started the TEAM program with the administration that addresses the problem of struggling teachers. 

We also recognized the need to build ties with parents and with the community.
Within the union, we talked about moving from a service model to an organizing model. Yet we were not able to fundamentally change our practice. We used some of the right rhetoric, but not enough changed. 

Today, in this era of Walker’s assault on teachers and the public sector, we don’t have the luxury of relying on past practice. 

So, what do we do? How do we build for the future?
This spring we participated in massive opposition to Walker’s policies. For many of us our Wisconsin Spring showed us what democracy looks like. It showed us the power of people – of regular people like you and me as we signed petitions, marched, traveled to Madison and picketed Governor Walker’s house in Wauwatosa. And many of you took that energy into the recall campaigns this summer, and while we just missed our goal, we won back two seats in the Senate. We will carry that energy into a recall campaign early next year against Walker himself. 

As we work on these broader political levels, we must also reinvent and re-imagine the MTEA. Today must be the first day of a process to change our union so we are able to thrive and be powerful in a non-contract world. Our educators’ voice has to be more powerful, more credible, and more focused on solutions if we are to win the hearts and minds of our own members and the broad public. 

We face several essential tasks.
The first task is to understand that the union is not just the staff and elected leaders. Too many members view the union as the staff and a few leaders on Vliet Street who they call if there is a problem. The staff in turn works hard to service hundreds of calls each week. But we are all responsible for building our future. We need to relocate union activity and power to the school level. 

Second, we must better understand who are our friends and who are our enemies. The MPS administration has many problems — we all know that. But in this era of anti-public education, they are not our enemy. We must continue to defend the rights of all educators. But we must also learn to work together with anyone who believes in and supports public education. 

Third we must adopt a social justice perspective and rebuild both our schools and communities. In the past, when we talked of a labor/community alliance it usually meant convincing the community to support labor’s demands. But an alliance must go both ways. We must also support and defend the needs of our families and communities — whether for quality jobs, against segregated housing patterns, or for improved healthcare. 

We are all in this together.
I have talked mostly of re-inventing the MTEA. I’ve outlined what I believe are essential tasks. But, together, I want us to re-imagine the MTEA. Please imagine with me… a union that has such active members that we’ve reclaimed the craft of teaching and taken ownership of teaching and learning in our schools. We have defeated the obsession with data-driven instruction, and have reaffirmed that we are child-driven and data-informed. Imagine that in each school, staff have identified which faith-based groups, neighborhood and community organizations they belong to. We are able to get our message out to tens of thousands of people without relying on mainstream media. 

Imagine our members, on behalf of the MTEA, work with community groups and faithbased groups in our common struggle to provide quality jobs, health care and housing for all.
Imagine a union that uses social media and the Internet to not only have vibrant discussions among members, but to reach non-educators across the city. 

Imagine a union, that even without a contract, has so much influence in the community and on the school board that when the school board adopts a “handbook,” it does so in collaboration with the union and empowers educators rather than stripping them of rights.
Imagine a union that works with the administration and other community allies to build a system of quality schools that become the envy of parents throughout the city. We have a number of quality schools right now — we know that. And we know that, working together, we can build more. 

Finally, imagine a union, so vibrant, so professional, that members unquestionably join. Not only because we defend their rights and working conditions, but because it is one the most respected organizations in our community — and the leading force in the city in building quality education for all children. 

Imagine. Re-imagine. And together we will reinvent the MTEA.

Washington Irving HS Protest - Monitored by Large (15) Police Presence

UPDATED: Thurs. Dec. 22, 11AM - See Gary Rubinstein analysis -  Washington Irving High School — another school unfairly closed

A peaceful gathering of teachers was watched by riot police and regular police and 2 white shirts from across the street.   - Teacher report

Now, there weren’t many police in riot helmets. Maybe 3 or 4, plus another 15 police (including two White Shirts) milling around. When I arrived there were two NYPD squad cars, two vans, and three mopeds. You might say to yourself, as someone responded to me on Twitter, Hey man, 3 or 4 riot-helmeted cops with their hands in their pockets, looking bored, isn’t such a big deal. Well, you’re wrong. It’s absolutely a big deal. Not because the police were going to beat up anybody, or arrest anybody, but simply because 50 teachers protesting the closing of their school do not deserve to be treated like potential rioters — even by 3 police officers. -----Political media

The above is from two separate reports. Note my last post (NYC Police Turn Ugly Since Occupy Movement Began) on the growing police state (with video) from Bloomberg's private army - the NYCPD. I pointed to the growing threat education-based protests are facing. After all, Bloomberg's legacy is steeped in the schools and the growing opposition movement will be met with increasing monitoring.

We have been doing Fight Back Friday events for a few years in front of schools. But to send 15 cops with 2 white shirt supervisors?

Here's an idea: Let's do these in front of 50 schools on the same day and see how they handle it. Or maybe 1500 schools one day.

I noticed in the video below a few UFT officials. They should be concerned at the presence of 15 police at a rally of 50 people.

DEMAND THE UFT LODGE A FORMAL COMPLAINT ON WASTE OF TAX PAYER MONEY  IN A TIME WHERE CLASS SIZE ARE RISING ON WASTED POLICE PRESENCE AT PEACEFUL EXPRESSIONS OF PROTEST.
 
Here is a report with video from a teacher who is at another school in the building:

The Department of Education (=Bloomberg) announced the closure of Washington Irving High School.  The school, the teachers, the parents, the students and the community who knows and cares about this school fight back!

A peaceful gathering of teachers was watched by 3 riot police and about 10 regular police and 2 white shirts from across the street.  What's the message? Figure!

The video sums it up beautifully. There is some inspirational testimony by one parent in this video. Great testimony by teachers as well.  Feel free to watch and share!

http://vimeo.com/34010240

And another from reporter John Knefel.

http://www.thefastertimes.com/politicalmedia/2011/12/20/teachers-protest-closing-hs-nypd-don-riot-helmets/

Teachers Protest, NYPD Officers Don Riot Helmets

NYC Police Turn Ugly Since Occupy Movement Began

I've generally been pretty supportive of the police, viewing them as fellow public workers and members of the same class - ergo - the 99%. But since Occupy Wall Street a switch seems to have been turned on for all too many cops who seem to take the Occupy movement as a personal affront. I understand as members of a paramilitary organization you have to follow orders. But when you do so with relish and glee that takes it to another place.

Now we are not just talking about how they treat protesters, We are talking about attempts to control the coverage by the press which just might document some of the transgressions that are taking place. I know of one guy who has been arrested twice - both times (luckily) on tape despite police attempts to stop journalists from documenting the story. Now this is a slight smallish guy who was using a cell phone to film and was beset upon but a load of police bullies.

I had my own minor wrestling match with some of the overwhelming security at the Dec. 14 PEP meeting where the press was more hassled than I've seen in almost a decade of covering PEP meetings. I was standing inside a white square for the press but leaving when there was something to cover in the auditorium and was continually warned, even threatened with being ordered to leave. At one point I was standing in the box when incredulously 2 security guys came out and penned me in. There was a look of intense satisfaction on their faces. The enemy was vanquished.

I heard one female cop say after people walked out, "Now they'll engage in civil disobedience outside" when nothing of the sort was occurring. I turned the camera on her and she walked away.
Since this was a PEP meeting I felt safe to photograph the cops, which seems to make many of them extremely nervous. After all, as NYC teacher Brian Jones said, "What public body has to meet to talk about our schools under armed guard....maybe some of that budget can be shifted over. No matter how many police you bring here that's a sign of your unpopularity."

Here is a video compilation I made to demonstrate the extent of police presence at the Dec. 14 PEP meeting including some of my interactions: http://youtu.be/xa-OQGuMXhI



The NYC police seem to be doing everything they can to deny people press passes. I have tried for years to get an official press pass as a reporter for The Wave. They give you a phone number to call, which I have numerous times but never get a response.

Here is a frightening account of a journalist who was arrested.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2011/12/19/snatched-for-photographing-michael-bloombergs-cops/

37 Hours in Lock Up

Snatched For Photographing Michael Bloomberg’s Cops

by STANLEY ROGOUSKI

I was taking photographs of the police arresting Occupy Wall Street demonstrators at the December 12 Winter Garden flash mob, which had been organized in solidarity with the port shutdowns on the west coast, when I found myself targeted. “That one,” I heard a voice say in a brutal “New Yawk” accent, realizing that a senior police official was pointing me out over a row of people, “he goes. He goes.”
All at once I felt like a high school quarterback getting blitzed by the 1970s Oakland Raiders. Five police officers, all much larger than my 5’11” and 190 pounds, crashed through a line of protesters, photographers, and Rude Mechanical Orchestra band members and slammed me to the marble floor of the Winter Garden. To my horror, I realized that they had body slammed me down on top of my Nikon D200 and bag of lenses, and, to my even greater horror, I also realized that they went out of their way to interpret my reflexive movements to protect my camera equipment as resisting arrest. “Stop resisting,” one police officer screamed at me as I lay pinned to the floor under 1700 pounds of New York City’s finest, “stop resisting.” “Metal cuffs,” I heard one of them scream. “Metal cuffs. Put the metal cuffs on this fucking guy.” Recovering from the initial shock, I realized that I was handcuffed to a chair with a row of 17 other people, 10 men and 7 women, under arrest for “criminal trespassing” and “resisting arrest.” Almost all of us were members of the Occupy Wall Street media team or independent photojournalists known by the police to be sympathetic to the Occupy movement.
The next 36 hours and 55 minutes would be aggressively impersonal, an attempt to use the tediously bureaucratic day-to-day operation of the criminal justice system to give legitimacy to a snatch and grab operation by Michael Bloomberg’s “personal army designed to cow the independent media into leaving the coverage of Occupy Wall Street to Fox, the New York Post, and The Daily News.
---------

Nobody save maybe a New York Post reporter or three believes that Occupy Wall Street is dangerous. At the very worst, New Yorkers unsympathetic to the Occupy movement see it as an aggressive nuisance, but therein lies the problem. Ray Kelly the crew cutted junior league Stalin who sometimes masquerades as a police commissioner in a democratic state, has milked the terrorist attacks of September 11 over the past decade in a way that makes George W. Bush and Dick Cheney look like amateurs.  In his mind, anything that even slightly inconveniences his department, the last defense against two more planes crashing into the skyline of Manhattan, needs to be gotten rid of, even if that thing is the First Amendment.
That New York is indeed a difficult city to govern, that it does have problems with traffic, sanitation, and crowding, problems that have to be managed by a very large and powerful city bureaucracy, means that threats to democratic liberty come not as blatant reaction, but as “necessity,” as the compromises we have to take to keep the overcrowded metropolis humming along. Creeping totalitarianism in what should be the most colorful city in America comes off as strangely gray and banal. Kelly, the police commissioner, whose department can now shoot down planes and conduct intelligence operations overseas, and Bloomberg, the Napoleonic little billionaire who was able to spread around enough cash to buy off all opposition to his stealing a third term in office, have successfully convinced most New Yorkers that they and only they can make the trains run on time.
The propagandists at Fox, the Daily News, and the New York Post have, in turn, seized upon this “necessity” as a way to attack Occupy Wall in the name of the financial industry. The interests of the authoritarian Bloomberg, the Stalinist Kelly, the “1%” and their PR departments in the corporate media converge into at least one important directive. The state, the municipal government of New York City, and the NYPD must hold veto power over who is and who is not a legitimate journalist, who can and who can not take photos at a public event. Ray Kelly, thus, becomes more important than the Dean of the Columbia Journalism School in determining what about Occupy Wall Street is reported on, and what is ignored. Anybody who even passively defies this de facto form of censorship risks getting thrown in jail.

========
Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/. And make sure to check out the side panel on the right for important bits.