Ed Notes Online

Public Officials and Major Civic Leaders Break with the Bloomberg Version of Mayoral Control

2012-03-01T07:01:00.000-05:00

Coming on the heels of a disturbing meeting with public school Chancellor Dennis Walcott, public officials as well as church and community leaders will charge the Chancellor with “Academic Malfeasance” and call for an end to the PEP process that they decry as the antithesis of good government practice.

March 1, 2012

A group of Williamsburg community leaders met with Dennis Walcott 10 days ago to request the removal of the Success Academy invasion of MS 50 from today's PEP agenda for further discussion, especially given the outpouring of people in the community opposed to Moskowitz and the lack of any serious level of support to the extent she had to bring 4 busloads of people in from Harlem to give the appearance of phony demand at the Feb. 16 hearing. This was the 2nd hearing because at the first one on Jan. 17 Eva didn't organize people because she knew it was a slam dunk. But the 500-1 voices opposed caused her and the DOE to rethink the issue and they suddenly found a "clerical" error in order to have a do over.

I was at both meetings and I think the 4 busloads of people from Harlem was one final straw for people in the community. Eva has united elements that have not worked together in the past in a coalition

But it takes years of seeing people like Walcott in action to realize exactly what he is made of so they figured he must be a reasonable man and a logical appeal to at least postpone the vote so other options/locations could be sought might work. His unmoving arrogance and obvious catering to Moskowtiz was the final straw, especially with Walcott's final words, "do what you have to do." Well they are and they will. This is hopefully only a first step. I'm still in Florida and won't be there today at all the PEP outside actions (March 1 - Stand UP! Speak OUT!)
and it will be interesting to see what the call for a PEP boycott will mean. But when the outrage spans politicians from the City Council to the US Congress we are entering some interesting territory.

For Immediate Release: Wednesday February 29th, 2012
Contact: Luis Garden Acosta 718-387-0404

Public Officials and Major Civic Leaders Break with the Bloomberg Version of Mayoral Control

Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez, Councilwoman Diana Reyna and a host of other public officials and high profile leaders will take the unprecedented step of breaking with the Bloomberg administration control of the public school system. A press conference is scheduled for tomorrow, March 1st, 2012 at 5:00 p.m., Brooklyn Tech High School, 29 Fort Greene Place, Brooklyn NY, (set up at S. Elliot Street and DeKalb Avenue) prior to the Panel on Education Policy (PEP) public meeting at Brooklyn Tech High School at 6:00 p.m.

Coming on the heels of a disturbing meeting with public school Chancellor Dennis Walcott, public officials as well as church and community leaders will charge the Chancellor with “Academic Malfeasance” and call for an end to the PEP process that they decry as the antithesis of good government practice.

Church and community leaders of the Southside Community Schools Coalition* will be present to denounce the Bloomberg administration handling of schools as irresponsible, lacking integrity and a failure for District 14 (Williamsburg, Greenpoint and Bedford-Stuyvesant) public schools in general, and Williamsburg Southside schools, in particular.

High school students from at least four high schools will rally across the street against the “closed back room dealings” of corporate driven charter networks that do not emanate from the communities they propose to serve, are not accountable to those communities and who are backed by the Mayor’s autocratic rule in the use and abuse of public school space.

*Southside Community Schools Coalition (SCSC) partial listing:
Brooklyn Legal Services Corp., Churches United For Fair Housing, Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez, Councilmember Diana Reyna, District 14 Community Education Council, El Puente, First Spanish Presbyterian Church, The Make School Planning Collaborative, Los Sures (the Southside) United HDFC, Nuestros Niños Child Development Centers, Occupy Williamsburg, Parents of P.S. 19, Parents of P.S. 84 Dual Language Program, Parents, Teachers and Staff of M.S. 50, Progress Inc.

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March 10 - STATE OF THE UNION PART 2: TIME TO FIGHT BACK ----
See 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.

On the Sunnyside of the TDR Street

2012-02-29T11:14:00.003-05:00

Posted by Norm Scott

TDR posts of the day:

Perdido St Schl: The Unbearable Randomness Of VAM
Assailed Teacher: 20%: The Difference Between Sucking and Really Sucking

Slimed teachers take one for the team

We have already seen a number of teachers like Pascale Mauclair [nobly defended by Leo Casey] slimed and hounded by the NY Post [let us know if anyone is tracking down those NY Post reporters' home addresses so people can go over and knock on their doors and windows and talk to their neighbors]. I even came across an old pal of mine listed with a 0 at one of the top schools in the city for teaching reading when she has a Spanish license and was teaching mostly Spanish in the years covered (she may have had one reading class but no rating on her Spanish teaching).

I know the pain that many people are going through but if we look at the long run this may be the best thing to happen for our side since the beginning of the war – a war declared choose one: a decade, two decades or 3 decades ago on the entire educational community by the usual suspects [I'm just too tired today to list them again].

Gates, Tisch, Kopp, et al. trying to cover their asses

It is not an accident that people like Bill Gates, Merryl Tisch, and even the always lying Chris Cerf now say they are opposed to the release of TDRs. And who can blame them? They were hoping to use these evals behind closed doors to wipe out huge swaths of teachers. Opening up the process has led to the light and the cockroaches are scattering. As Reality-Based Educator reports - If Merryl Tisch Is For It, It Must Be Bad. Add Gates, et al to the mix and we can begin to see the sunny side of the issue.

And with the forced release of selected charter school data we are also seeing another side of the TDR issue and why increasing numbers of ed deformers are now pulling back. Charter school parents are denied the right to see the same data parents of public school data can see. Since charters are given the choice --- their favorite word -- whether to hand over the data to the city or not parents of the charter schools who choose NOT do not get the choice to see the data. How nice. But what a good talking point for our side.

And I believe we will be able to shame/force the charters out of the closet and people will see that all the noise about creating a dual school system will come to naught. That charters -- even with creaming --- will not show much difference from comparable public schools. And we will also see that the vaunted Teach for America and other alternately recruited teachers will show little difference or in fact be inferior. Thus Wendy Kopp's opposition to the TDR release.

The coming counter-revolution: the most active and informed parents are increasingly rejecting the ed deform model

I received the following analysis from a long-time associate going back to the 70s and through ICE who I am keeping anonymous because of close relatives and friends in the schools she refers to. I think it expresses the enormous amount of harm the TDRs have done to the ed deformers – way more harm in the long run than to the named teachers.

I don't mean to minimize the harm that the publication of teacher scores is doing. There will be all kinds of of anger and chaos out there, which will hurt some teachers and some schools, but hopefully will stir a few people to make courageous choices. The first principal to speak out was from PS 321K, and she only did it so readily because she knows she has full support from her parents. Also her school is in no danger of losing students--it's the most sought-after school in Brooklyn. Hopefully she will spur other principals to do the same. And she knows full well that publishing the scores is nowhere near as destructive as having to lose teachers two years from now because of the value added punishment.

I'm sure that the principals at [2 schools in Brooklyn I know well] won't be pleased to see that their best fourth grade teachers got the lowest scores. In these two cases, for example, I would be surprised if any parents reacted by blaming the teachers or the school.

Likewise, in a top elem school in Manhattan where some of my family members go, I would be very surprised to see parents react in a negative way to the teachers whose scores are low. Especially since I believe that this was true for the teachers in the two inclusion classes. Parents there have constant access to their children's classes (there are "family days" once a month), and they have a good idea of how their children are doing. If their kid got a perfect score in the 3rd grade, I don't think they'll blame a teacher if he or she got two answers wrong on the fourth grade test. Looking at the map on p. 17 of Saturday's NY Times, it looks like many of the poorest value added scoring schools were in the best scoring neighborhoods (eg. Bayside, Queens, Borough Park, Windsor Terrace, Tribeca). It's all so absurd.

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March 10 - STATE OF THE UNION PART 2: TIME TO FIGHT BACK ----
See 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.

March 1 - Stand UP! Speak OUT!

2012-02-29T09:22:00.000-05:00

Calling all students, parents, teachers, education workers and community members to take part in a national day of action to defend public education...

Stand UP! Speak OUT!

Join Right to Education, Occupy the DOE and Southside Community Schools Coalition for:

2PM MARCH starting @ Department of Education Headquarters (52 Chambers Street)

led by Right to Education

4PM SPEAK OUT @ Fort Greene Park (Dekalb Avenue side)

facilitated by Occupy the DOE and Right to Education

5PM PRESS CONFERENCE @ Brooklyn Technical HS (Dekalb and Ft. Greene Place)

led by Southside Community Schools Coalition

At 6PM the Panel for Educational Policy will vote to co-locate more charter schools in public schools. Various students, parents, educators and community organizations have called to boycott the PEP.

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March 10 - STATE OF THE UNION PART 2: TIME TO FIGHT BACK----See 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.

FOIL: final performance evaluations all members of Chancellor’s leadership team

2012-02-28T21:54:00.000-05:00

Leonie will have to wait 'till hell freezes over. Let's see the NY Times follow up on this one. Send your own FOIL for the rest of the Tweedies.

February 28, 2012
Records Access Officer
NYC Department of Education
52 Chambers Street, Room 308
New York, NY 10007
By email: FOIL@schools.nyc.gov

Dear Records Access Officer:

Under the provisions of the New York Freedom of Information Law, Article 6 of the Public Officers Law, I hereby request a copy of the following records or portions thereof:

The final performance evaluations of all of the members of the Chancellor’s leadership team for 2009, 2010 and 2011, in the NYC Department of Education, including but not limited to every Deputy Chancellor, as well as the performance evaluation of the Chancellor himself.

According to Robert Freeman of the NYS Open Govt. Committee, the performance evaluations of all public employees in NY State are available to the public through FOILs, except for police and correction officers and firefighters.

These requested records are not exempt from disclosure under FOIL. To the extent that information contained in the requested records is protected please redact such information and provide us with the remaining information. In the event that all or part of this request is denied, please cite each specific applicable FOIL exemption and notify us of appeal procedures available under the law.

To the extent that these records are readily available in an electronic format, we request that they be provided in that format. Please provide responsive records as they are identified, rather than waiting to gather all records.

I request to be notified of any fees associated with this request of over $100.00.

The Freedom of Information Law requires agencies to respond within five (5) business days of a records request.

Please contact me by phone at the below number or by email at leonie@att.net with any questions. Thank you in advance for your timely consideration of this request.

Sincerely,
Leonie Haimson
Executive Director
Class Size Matters
124 Waverly Pl.
New York, NY 10011
leonie@classsizematters.org
www.classsizematters.org
http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leonie-haimson

NY Post reporters who wrote stories on Pascale Mauclair:
GEORGETT ROBERT, JEANE MACINTOSH
Additional reporting by Kevin Sheehan and Daniel Prendergast
jeane.macintosh@nypost.com

Is it time to head over to the homes of NY Post reporters who write these stories?

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March 10 - STATE OF THE UNION PART 2: TIME TO FIGHT BACK----See 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.

Finally, Williamsburg and Greenpoint Parents for Our Public Schools (WAGPOPS) were heard by the media:

2012-02-28T20:39:00.002-05:00

The Battle Continues:

http://www.dnainfo.com/20120228/williamsburg-greenpoint-bushwick/brooklyn-parents-protest-plans-for-two-new-charter-schools

Local news has been friendlier to our cause.

And here's a timely article about the former chairman of Teacher For America Los Angeles and founder of Citizens of the World Charter Schools, Mark Gordon:

http://www.aoltv.com/2010/08/12/producer-mark-gordon-accused-of-using-racial-slurs-at-pilot-tabl/

It turns out that this charter school DOES know something about sharing space. Their office suite is shared by scandal plagued The Wonder of Reading. http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/NBC4-Extra---Book-Wars-Episode-Two.html

LIKE us on Facebook:
www.facebook.com/WilliamsburgGreenpointParents
and follow us on twitter:
twitter.com/#!/WAGPOPS

March 10 - STATE OF THE UNION PART 2: TIME TO FIGHT BACK----See 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.

Charter school TDRs are now online at the NYP

2012-02-28T18:39:00.001-05:00

UPDATED: 8:30PM

We all know this stuff is crap for charter school teachers too. And this anonymous email does take aim at our of our favorite targets.

Sixty Minutes did a feature on Zeke Vandehoek who is the 125K a year maven for paying teachers. Where's the follow-up? In fact I don't necessarily believe TEP is a bad school or any worse than many other schools and in fact may be better. His results may be a sign he is not creaming and in fact playing an honest game. What Vandehoek is discovering is that unless he creams he will be branded a failure no matter what he pays the teachers. He is also a hero of sorts in the movie American Teacher which I've written about - a movie that claims all it takes is paying teachers more money -- with the usual caveat that teachers have to be accountable -- code for measure them, evaluate them to death and place the blame on them when things don't go right but when they do be sure to credit the school or district leadership.

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/ratings_of_public_school_teachers_agH4xQDbuen0uBUpEoSuDM

Fascinating little insight: TEP charter school, headed by that publicity hound Zeke Vandehoek who bragged about how he would get great teachers w/ higher pay and that class sizes didn’t matter at http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2011/03/zeke-vanderhoek-relentless-self.html

Has two teachers listed, both below average.

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/ratings_of_public_school_teachers_agH4xQDbuen0uBUpEoSuDM

One of the TEP teachers who is featured in the movie American Teacher got an 18.

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=553326148239 meet the $125K teacher…etc.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/05/education/05charter.html

The eight winning candidates, he said, have some common traits, like a high “engagement factor,” as measured by the portion of a given time frame during which students seem so focused that they almost forget they are in class. They were expert at redirecting potential troublemakers, a crucial skill for middle school teachers. And they possessed a contagious enthusiasm — which Rhena Jasey, 30, Harvard Class of 2001, who has been teaching at a school in Maplewood, N.J., conveyed by introducing a math lesson with, “Oh, this is the fun part because I looooooove math!” Says Mr. Vanderhoek: “You couldn’t help but get excited.” Hired.

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March 10 - STATE OF THE UNION PART 2: TIME TO FIGHT BACK----See 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.

Obama Admin To Apply Race to the Top to Airline Pilot Evaluations

2012-02-28T11:51:00.000-05:00

For The Wave - by Norm Scott

The Obama administration, recognizing the success of RTTT in education, especially with the enormously popular publication of teacher data reports in NYC, has decided to institute a version for the airline industry.

An admin spokesperson said the idea of Race To The Top was a perfectly named program for an industry which races to the top with every flight.

"Given that the pilot is the most important factor in a successful airplane flight, we think it crucial to find out who are the good and bad pilots," said Arne Duncan, who has been put in charge of all Race to the Top programs which will be applied to many other areas of industry. Merit pay will be given to the top pilots as an incentive to fly better.

"Arne has been chosen because he is so tall," said the spokesperson. "Get it -- Race to the TOP --- tall, top -- we can be so clever."

Lowest rating a pilot can get

In this extension of RTTT, the Obama administration is reaffirming its belief in choice as has been applied to the public school system. In its "Choose your pilot" program, upon arrival at the airport passengers will be allowed to look up their pilot's rating and if not satisfied switch to any other flight with a pilot that has a rating more to their liking.

The spokesperson said, "The public has a right to know whether a pilot is Highly Effective, Effective, Developing, Ineffective, or in the lowest category: Bend over and kiss your ass goodbye."

A pilot is rated in the latter category will be given time to improve while all passengers on flights flown by these pilots will be given double insurance at a discount.

The Real Story Behind UFT Push for Legislation on Charter Co-locations

2012-02-27T16:32:00.002-05:00

Limited proposal to have local CECs vote on Charter Co-locos while closing schools removed from agenda.
No role for District Leadership Teams (DLTs) or School Leadership Teams (SLTs).
Now that the UFT's two co-located schools in District 19 in East NY Bklyn will be removed after the UFT gets its own building, it is safe for them to enter the water of challenging co-locos.
Does UFT move undercut alliance to kill mayoral control?

Ask people at the 33 threatened closing schools or the ones already closed and threatened to be closed if they want CECs to vote on this issue --- but won't happen in UFT proposed legislation.

Amidst charges by some parents of a betrayal and hijacking of their agenda, the UFT will be holding a joint press conference on Tuesday Feb. 28 at 10:30AM at Tweed to announce proposed legislation that would give Community Education Councils (CECs - the Tweed version of local school bds) a vote on charter co-locations in public schools.

Various parent groups and individuals had been working on legislation in the fight towards ultimately ending mayoral control and wanted inclusion of both colocos and school closings in the legislation but feel their efforts have been hijacked by the UFT who rounded up their usual arm candy/paid off usual suspects to join with them.

While lots of Assembly members have been invited among the usual suspects are DFER Darling Brooklyn Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries (who is running for Congress - see below if you think he is not a DFER darling) and Harlem Assemblyman Keith Wright who not long ago declared he would oppose renewing mayoral control, (if you're asking why the UFT would climb into bed with a DFER Darling you haven't been reading this blog). Wright will be pushing the bill with Jeffries joining in -- when he isn't spending his DFER money on his congressional campaign. [I must throw in that Martine Guerrier is going to run for Jeffries' seat with lots of DFER support. Martine's story deserves its own post].

Wright deal after Wadleigh turnaround on closing: Do you smell school closing politics?

The Wright story is a prime example of how closing down of schools is political and not educational. Not long after Wright threw his bomb about not supporting mayoral control (coming from a supporter in Harlem this is not good news for the charter lobby or Bloomberg) the school he was trying to keep open -- Wadleigh -- where Cornel West visited --- the DOE pulled them off the list and Wright goes silent on mayoral control. Watch the UFT leaders brag how they worked behind the scenes to keep the school open -- while selling everyone else out.

CEC would get vote on co-locations but not on closing schools
While the bill would keep the DOE from force-feeding charters into public schools – some parents think this would be a significant victory even if mayoral control continues – a sister provision put forth by some parents requiring a CEC vote on closing schools was not included despite a big push from many real reformers, leading to charges that the charge of UFT hijacking.

No little irony here considering we have been attacking the UFT leadership for many years for putting on a phony show about fighting closing schools (after almost a decade of supporting this policy). Ask people from the schools closed and about to be closed if they wanted the CECs to vote on closing schools.

More usual suspects:
*AQE, NYCC and CEJ, all in some way receiving funds from the UFT will be in attendance supporting the gradualist approach to corralling the mayoral control monster. At the rate they are moving, we might see some progress by the next century. I hope you're all still reading ed notes then when we can trumpet the victory. *[Alliance for Quality Education, NY Communities for Change - formerly ACORN and Coalition for Educational Justice --- one day I'll do a piece on all these orgs -- are they real or are they memorex?]

All I will say now is, this deal is the ultimate in dirty politics where everyone from DFER to UFT leadership to Bloomberg get a little bit of what they want and preserve some of their power while parents and kids and teachers lose. Another example of a big tent created to serve multiple motives, instead of supporting truly parent led legislation that would really help our kids and reign in mayoral control which is out of control.

Charter lobby begin campaign to take control of selected CECs in districts they want to occupy --- in a year the UFT bill will be an anachronism. Note these 2 Gotham Schools reports.

Charter lobby pushes for seats on the CECs
Charter parents' inclusion call yields a bill but not city support ...
Feb 7, 2012 ... The request was the centerpiece of this year's Charter Lobby Day, which drew more than 1200 charter parents to Albany today to push the CEC ...
gothamschools.org/.../charter-parents-inclusion-call-yields-a-bill-but-not-city- support/
Feb 8, 2012 ... On Tuesday, more than 1200 charter school parents traveled to Albany as part of Lobby Day. Their main ask was that legislators set aside seats ...
gothamschools.org/.../city-actually-undecided-about-charter-parents-call-for- inclusion/

There is even more irony in that the charter lobby's main legislative ask is for seats on the CEC, their way of using their muscle to control the CECs so these selected CECs will vote for the charter co-locos.

In fact charter parents who live in the district already have the right to be on CECs via Borough President appointees or if they are a parent of kids in a district school in the past 2 years. Thus, gaining a "victory" as is usual with the UFT, may very well prove Pyrrhic if a quid pro quo is reached where CEC's are allowed to vote on charter colocos but charters get to use their money to push themselves into control of CECs. Can you imagine the day when Eva tosses an enormous pot of money into pushing her candidates for CEC? What would it take? Just buy off selected public and charter school parents in targeted districts for charters. If a public school parent works for a charter org that still allows them to be on CEC.

Push for more parent and teacher voice scuttled
Some parents were pushing for a role for SLTs and DLTs as a counter to the "CEC only" option but are being ignored in the deal, not surprising given that including SLT's, though also severely flawed, might allow for a rank and file teacher voice in the process. (Does the UFT fear that the teachers in the two schools the union charters co-locate might vote them out?)

What is a CEC and how is it chosen?
The CECs are the Bloomberg created versions of local school boards from the old days, but eviscerated of any real power and chosen in a severely limited process that is far more undemocratic than even the old school board elections pre-mayoral control. I won't get into any more detail here other than to say that with each election cycle the DOE screws things up more and more. [Parents sue to stop Community Education Council ... - Ed Notes Online].

Summing up
A coalition of parents were pushing a comprehensive plan to at the very least limit the absolute power a mayor would have over the school system, with an ultimate goal of ending mayoral control and were working with some political forces to accomplish some of their program. The UFT moves in and coopts them while severely weakening the controls they were asking for. Standard op procedure for the UFT.

Now also notice how deeply entrenched up the ass of DFER the UFT's partner, Hakeem Jeffries, is:

Just in case you have not had enough, this was posted to a listserve by a parent activist and former charter school parent:

The charters ALREADY have their bill introduced for charter parents to be on the PEP and CEC. It's been introduced in the Senate and Assembly. They're lobbying hard for this in an election year with loads of campaign cash to give out. Legislators haven't heard from any public school parents who object to charter parents being on the PEP or CEC's.

This is why parents AND teachers at all schools must have a say in school closings and co-locations. We already have charter parents who are BP appointees to the CEC's, we have those whose child has been in a public school in the last two years who are eligible to serve and now we'll have it in the law any charter parent can serve.

Funny thing is they're still not complying with the 2010 law requiring them to serve a comparable amount of students with special needs and ELL's and every charter have a PA/PTA but they want charter parents on CEC's and the PEP.

I guess it's okay to violate charter parent rights under the law and use us as puppets to undermine public school parental involvement structures to create more charters where more parents' rights will be violated.

Please start calling your legislators and tell them NO to charter parents
on the PEP and CEC's and that they should enforce the 2010 charter
reforms.

Thanks.

http://assembly.state.ny.us/leg/?sh=printbill&bn=S06100&term=2011

Read the bill below -- if you dare:

S T A T E O F N E W Y O R K
______________________________
____________________________

6100

I N S E N A T E

(PREFILED)

January 4, 2012
___________

Introduced by Sen. GOLDEN -- read twice and ordered printed, and
when printed to be committed to the Committee on Education

AN ACT to amend the education law, in relation to requiring parental
representation on the board of education of the city school district
of the city of New York and on certain other councils for such school district

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, REPRESENTED IN SENATE AND ASSEM-BLY, DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:

1 Section 1. Paragraph (a) of subdivision 1 of section 2590-b ofthe
2 education law, as amended by chapter 345 of the laws of 2009, is amended
3 to read as follows:
4 (a) The board of education of the city school district of the city of
5 New York is hereby continued. Such board of education shall consist of
6 thirteen appointed members: one member to be appointed by each borough
7 president of the city of New York; and eight members to be appointed by
8 the mayor of the city of New York. The chancellor shall serve as an
9 ex-officio non-voting member of the city board. The city board shall
10 elect its own chairperson from among its voting members. All thirteen
11 appointed members shall serve at the pleasure of the appointing authori-
12 ty and shall not be employed in any capacity by the city of NewYork, or 13 a subdivision thereof, or the city board. No appointed member of the
14 city board shall also be a member, officer, or employee of anypublic
15 corporation, authority, or commission where the mayor of the city of New
16 York has a majority of the appointments. Each borough president's
17 appointee shall be a resident of the borough for which the borough pres-
18 ident appointing him or her was elected and shall be the parent of a
19 child attending a public school within the city school district of the 20 city of New York. Each mayoral appointee shall be a resident of the
21 city [and two] AT LEAST ONE OF WHICH shall be [parents] A PARENT of a
22 child attending a public school within the city district, AND AT LEAST
23 ONE OF WHICH SHALL BE A PARENT OF A CHILD ATTENDING A CHARTER SCHOOL
24 WITHIN THE CITY DISTRICT. All parent members shall be eligible to
25 continue to serve on the city board for two years following the conclu-

EXPLANATION--Matter in ITALICS (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[ ] is old law to be omitted.
LBD11811-01-1
S. 6100 2

1 sion of their child's attendance at a public school OR A CHARTER SCHOOL
2 within the city district. Any vacancy shall be filled by appointment by
3 the appropriate appointing authority within ninety days of such vacancy.
4 Notwithstanding any provision of local law, the members of the board
5 shall not have staff, offices, or vehicles assigned to them or receive
6 compensation for their services, but shall be reimbursed for the actual
7 and necessary expenses incurred by them in the performance of their
8 duties.
9 S 2. Subparagraph 1 of paragraph a of subdivision 4 of section 2590-b
10 of the education law, as amended by chapter 345 of the laws of 2009, is
11 amended to read as follows:
12 (1) nine voting members who shall be parents of students with individ-
13 ualized education programs, INCLUDING ONE FROM A CHARTER SCHOOL
WITHIN
14 THE CITY DISTRICT, to be selected by parents of students with individ-
15 ualized education programs pursuant to a representative process devel-
16 oped by the chancellor. Such members shall serve a two year term;
17 S 3. Subparagraph (i) of paragraph (a) of subdivision 5 of section
18 2590-b of the education law, as added by chapter 345 of the laws of
19 2009, is amended to read as follows:
20 (i) nine voting members who shall be parents of students who are in a
21 bilingual or English as a second language program conducted pursuant to
22 section thirty-two hundred four of this chapter, INCLUDING ONE FROM A
23 CHARTER SCHOOL WITHIN THE CITY DISTRICT, to be selected by parents of
24 students who receive such services pursuant to a representative process
25 developed by the chancellor. Such members shall serve a two year term;
26 S 4. Subparagraph (i) of paragraph (a) of subdivision 6 of section
27 2590-b of the education law, as added by chapter 345 of the laws of
28 2009, is amended to read as follows:
29 (i) [ten] NINE voting members who shall be parents of students attend-
30 ing public high schools AND ONE VOTING MEMBER WHO SHALL BE A PARENT OF A
31 STUDENT ATTENDING A CHARTER HIGH SCHOOL WITHIN THE CITY DISTRICT. Two
32 members representing each borough shall be selected by presidents and
33 officers of the parents' associations or parent-teachers' associations
34 in the relevant borough, pursuant to a process established by the chan-
35 cellor. Such members shall serve a two year term;
36 S 5. Paragraph (a) of subdivision 1 of section 2590-c of the education
37 law, as amended by chapter 345 of the laws of 2009, is amended to read
38 as follows:
39 (a) Nine voting members shall be parents whose children are attending
40 a school under the jurisdiction of the community district, or have
41 attended a school under the jurisdiction of the community district with-
42 in the preceding two years[, and], PROVIDED, THAT, IN ANY COMMUNITY
43 DISTRICT HAVING A CHARTER SCHOOL WITHIN SUCH DISTRICT, AT LEAST ONE SUCH
44 MEMBER SHALL BE A PARENT OF A CHILD ATTENDING A CHARTER SCHOOL WITHIN
45 THE COMMUNITY DISTRICT. SUCH MEMBERS shall be selected by the
presidents
46 and officers of the parents' association or parent-teachers'
associ-
47 ation. Such members shall serve for a term of two years.Presidents and
48 officers of parents' associations or parent-teachers' associations who
49 are candidates in the selection process pursuant to this section shall
50 not be eligible to cast votes in such selection process. The association
51 shall elect a member to vote in the place of each such president or
52 officer for the purposes of the selection process.
53 S 6. This act shall take effect on the first of July next succeeding
54 the date on which it shall have become a law; provided, that the amend-
55 ments to section 2590-b of the education law, made by sections one, two,
56 three and four of this act, shall not affect the expiration of such
S. 6100 3

1 section and shall expire therewith; provided, further, that the amend-
2 ments to section 2590-c of the education law, made by section five of
3 this act, shall not affect the expiration of such section and shall
4 expire therewith.

What ICE Said About Mayoral Control: Feb. 2009

2012-02-27T09:49:00.002-05:00

Without handing control of the schools to one person we would not be seeing charter co-locos, school closings except in the most extreme cases, crazy teacher evaluation systems and the publication and shaming of teachers in the press.

I know the publication of the TDAs is the issue de jour but let's look at the bigger picture. Today's NY Times claims the publication bolsters Mulgrew's standings with the rank and file. I think that is a misreading of the issue and that many teachers BLAME the UFT leadership for the debacle. But in case people start to forget history I am here to remind them.

With the battle over mayoral control of schools beginning to heat up again and with the UFT talking out of 12 sides of its mouth I will once again restate my position that I have taken for over a decade: that no matter what words come out of the mouths of UFT/Unity leaders, they will continue to back mayoral control no matter how bad it has been for all parties --- parents, students and especially teachers.

"Why," you might be asking? Because the UFT cannot live with any alternative to mayoral control. In their world they still prefer having to deal with one person --- even a Bloomberg -- than with community groups all over the city. In 1969-70 the UFT had the power to influence the decentralization law to weaken it to such an extent that 30 years later when push came to shove, they were able to push the baby they helped create off the ledge by handing power to Bloomberg. This time around they think they will do better. Thus we hear Mulgrew taking a page from the past by saying, "Only blah, blah days 'till we get rid of Bloomberg." They said that 4 years ago but punted on supporting an opponent and they said the same things about Giuliani and Koch. That is the extent of the message to the members which is code for "Next time we will do better with Christine Quinn, most likely, or whoever."

Without handing control of the schools to one person we would not be seeing charter co-locos, school closings except in the most extreme cases, crazy teacher evaluation systems and the publication and shaming of teachers in the press.

So no matter how loud they scream, those screams of UFT leaders are akin to the guy who murders his parents and asks for mercy on the grounds he is an orphan.

But watch the duplicity and back room dealing by the UFT as it tries to put out different messages to different people. On the deep inside within the Unity Caucus hawks, they will push the horrors of any plan that turns control of schools over to local forces even if those forces includes teachers at the school level.

Just to give you a clue as to how the leadership feels about the rank and file, I had a conversation with Randi Weingarten about 13 years ago where I urged her to support ideas that would empower teachers at the school level. Her response was, "How can we trust...." before she shut her mouth as she realized what she was saying.

In the last renewal for mayoral control, Randi set up committees and borough meetings and all kinds of crap for show and then overturned all the recommendations to do her own thing in supporting mayoral control --- claiming they got enough tweaks to curb Bloomberg power. How has that worked out?

When it came time to a vote at the DA, ICE members who had participated on the committee put our a minority report for the Feb. 2009 DA.
Remember these points as you watch the UFT leaders begin to dance once again around this issue.

Mayoral Control:
Bad for Teachers, Students, Parents and Communities

One of the major planks in the corporate agenda for education is to put large urban school systems under dictatorial mayors who are free to shut out parent and teacher input while undermining the union, especially at the school/chapter level. To continue this policy, even with checks and balances, invites disaster.

Mayoral Control Has Been a Disaster for Teachers:
Attacks on tenure, seniority, working conditions and the professional status of teachers.
Teachers don’ t know where incompetence ends and the malice begins.
Throughout the United States, mayoral control of the schools has been the vehicle for privatizing
public education, bringing in charter and contract schools that are overwhelmingly anti-union, and that have few or none of the protections and benefits that UFT members expect and deserve.

Mayoral Control Has Been a Disaster for Students:
Students subjected to a stultifying, stress-filled regime of high stakes testing, with the wholesale loss
of classes and activities that are unrelated to test prep. Science, art, music and physical education
have all been cut back to meet the single-minded focus on testing in math and reading.
Time and again, mayoral control has shortchanged students, whether it was the fiascos with bus
routes, cell phones, or the willful chaos they’ve brought to Special Education.
Mayoral Control Has Been A Disaster for Parents:
• Over and Over, Bloomberg and Klein have shown their contempt for parents, ignoring them, patronizing them, and creating an opaque, impenetrable system where it’s impossible to even get a phone call returned, let alone remedy a problem.

Mayoral Control Has Been a Disaster for Communities:
• Under mayoral control, the reorganization and closing of schools, many of which have served their communities for generations, has accelerated, and there has been no opportunity to give communities any voice in the process. As a result, the democratic process itself has been harmed, and the community fabric has been undermined.

The UFT Must Do Better!
The UFT Governance Committee wasted a golden opportunity to stand up for democracy by failing to call for a return to some form of school governance procedure enjoyed by the overwhelming majority of communities in the state and nation, namely, direct elections of school board members. Rather than come up with a governance system that would serve our and the students best interests, the committee started off with the assumption that our vision would be rejected by the press and other critics; that we had to water it down before we could even formulate a better vision. Not that we shouldn’t be willing to compromise when actual negotiations over governance begins, but was it wise to eliminate what we really wanted before we were publicly engaged?

Members of ICE (The Independent Community of Educators) participated on the Task Force, and repeatedly pointed this out, but to no avail. We could not support a position that in reality will mean more attacks on teachers, students and communities. Consensus means agreement is reached by all, not majority rule.

NOTE: Link not working at this time-- email norm for pdf:normsco@gmail.com

We urge you to read the ICE minority report on school governance.
Independent Community of Educators (ICE) http://www.ice-uft.org/ http://iceuftblog.blogspot.com/

Dear Delegate,

At the helm of our system are a Mayor and Chancellor who know little about education and care more about test scores, do little for our public schools, and care more about privatization and charterization. There has been more damage heaped on our students, their education, our profession, and our professional lives than at any other time in the history of public education.

We need to minimize the roles of politicians, make a Chancellor accountable to us, and put experienced educators back in academic leadership roles. The UFT recommended governance plan does not do that, ICE’s plan does.

Please consider substituting or amending the UFT report when voting this afternoon.

The major points included in the ICE recommendations, missing from the UFT plan.

ICE proposes:

SLTs appoint their principals.
The SLTs of a District select their Superintendent.
The DOE must be politically neutral and not tied to any one political office.
A Central Board will be made up of one member elected from each borough; one appointee from each of the borough presidents, three Mayoral appointees and a UFT representative. The Central Board will appoint a Chancellor.
Evaluations of schools and students should be based on multiple measures and should be used for gathering information in order to provide support.
All schools provide the core curricula subjects, performing and visual arts, health and physical education, career and technical education, and technology.
The school leadership committees will determine how funds are spent.
All contracts will be put out to open bid and made public via the Internet.
All registered voters and parents are eligible to vote for district councils and a representative to the Central Board from their borough.
Chancellors, district superintendents and supervisors must have a minimum of 5 years classroom experience, no waivers granted.

FULL VERSION OF ICE SG REPORT: EMAIL NORM FOR PDF - COUNTER THE UNITY PROPAGANDA MACHINE - POST ON YOUR SCHOOL UFT BULLETIN BOARD.

Video: Merit Pay, Teacher Pay, and Value Added Measures

2012-02-26T23:30:00.000-05:00

http://youtu.be/uONqxysWEk8

Exposing ROADS Charter School Invasion of Schomburg Satellite Academy

2012-02-26T20:51:00.000-05:00

I know the publication of TDRs is causing much anguish but the charter school invasion is as big a menace. Thank goodness teachers are still fighting the good fight.

More skulduggery from the partnership between the DOE and any charter that comes along. Posted by our friends at Schomburg Satellite Academy.
The blog, which I added to the blog roll, is at: http://savesatellite.blogspot.com/2012/02/roads-charter-school-plans-are-hidden.html

ROADS Charter School:
The plans are hidden, but the consequences are pefectly clear.
On February 2, 2012, the DOE quietly posted plans on its website for a new charter school, ROADS II, slated for co-location in the Bronx Regional high school building. The school is scheduled to open in September of 2012.

As of today, parents and students still have not been notified of the proposed changes, despite a critical Joint Public Hearing on the school scheduled just two weeks away.

Why has the DOE kept this charter school under wraps from the community? What will its impact be on students at the existing schools? And why is it facing nearly unanimous opposition from those who know about it?

FACT: The DOE claims that the ROADS II school will have “no educational impact” on existing public school students, despite the fact that the charter school will take over 1/3 of the classrooms in two of the existing schools schools by 2015.

FACT: The charter school will reduce the current students’ access to the computer labs, the science labs, gym classes, the library, and all other shared school facilities.

FACT: Last year, one of the public schools in the building, Schomburg Satellite Academy, developed an entirely new schedule based on best practices for the transfer school population. Attendance this year has increased by 5%, ELA Regents scores have increased by 30%, and Science and Social Studies scores have increased by 30% under the new schedule. Adding a new charter school to the building will render this cutting-edge schedule impossible.

FACT: New York Education Law Section 2852 states that charter schools must "locate charter schools in a region or regions where there may be a lack of alternatives and access to charter schools would provide new alternatives within the local public education system."
The proposed ROADS school and the exiting public schools (Bronx Regional and Satellite Academy) both serve over-aged, under-credited students though a competency-based program that culminates in a special capstone project. The charter school and the public schools would serve the same population through very similar programs. In this respect, ROADS II may violated New York state law.
(See page 5 of the linked PDF's for details on the mission of Bronx Regional and Satellite Academy.)

FACT: There are currently three programs in the building. The two District 12 high schools in the building are losing classrooms to ROADS charter school. The one District 79 school in the building will not lose any classrooms. The Executive Director of District 79, Sarah Sandelius, is an adviser to the ROADS board.

FACT: The ROADS charter schools are backed by Centerbridge Partners, a private equity investment firm located on Park Avenue.

FACT: Under the proposed plan, the ROADS II charter school will be allowed to grow while the existing public schools will have their growth capped indefinitely.

FACT: The ROADS II school will grant preference in admission to students who have been in the juvenile justice system. In doing so, it will concentrate an at-risk population who studies have shown have far better educational outcomes when integrated into the mainstream public education system.
(See page 10 of the linked PDF for details on admissions criteria.)

FACT: The DOE released information about the co-location on its website on February 2, but has given no notice to parents and students about the planned changes that would radically alter the character of their school.

Why does the Department of Education favor the ROADS charter school over the existing programs in the building?
What does Centerbridge Capital have to gain through its involvement ROADS charter school?
Why has the DOE not shared this information with parents and families?

The Joint Public Hearing for the ROADS II charter school co-location will be held at 6:00 p.m. at the Bronx Regional school building at 1010 Rev. James A. Polive Ave. in the Bronx.

For more info, follow our blog at savesatellite.blogspot.com

NYT and TDRs, Walcott Meets With WllmsbgComm Reps, Eva Hubbie Invades District 14

2012-02-25T14:48:00.002-05:00

There is so much stuff coming in I have to consolidate posts. Follow me on twitter if you want more: normscott1.

All of the reports below connect up --- one thing a union working in our interests would be doing but Unity won't.

Follow the Chicago story -- today Karen Lewis said grief counselors for the children should have been sent to closing schools. So much more on twitter:
Even better is this:
Catalyst Chicago Mag ‏ @CatalystChicag

Lewis claims Rahm told her that 25% of the children in this city will never amount to anything, and he's not throwing more money at them

This just about says it all -- the racism behind ed deform. But that requires its own post.
--------

I tweeted this morning - "NY Times excuse for publishing TDRs: The devil made me do it." Leonie pointed to the article today that showed how Cerf and Turf (Joel Klein) just about forced them to FOIL for the info while they refuse to give up stuff to so many FOILs people have given up. I tweeted back that they could have printed this article as a justification as to why they will refuse to allow Tweed to manipulate the press.

FAIR: In today's newsletter--takes the New York Times to task--if the scores aren't accurate why publish them in the first place?

NYT Sues for Right to Publish Bad Teacher Data

http://www.fair.org/blog/2012/02/24/nyt-sues-for-right-to-publish-bad-teacher-data/

------
The charter school battle in Williamsburg/Greenpoint heats up.

Walcott met with some comunity people last week. It was an interesting meeting where he refused to remove the Moskowitz co-loc from the March 1 PEP agenda. I'll report more on this meeting (with a juicy Walcott quote) when I can.

Parents battle Eva hubby Eric Grannis invasion
This came in from a parent group:

As many of you have heard, District 13 and District 14 are being targeted for the co-location of TWO MORE charter schools. These two charter schools are coming from a Los Angeles charter school chain, Citizens of the World Charter School, that has only been in operation for a single academic year.

Note that all Eric Grannis (Eva Moskowitz's husband) had to do was have a few meetings with a small roomful of affluent parents and now BOTH of our districts must scramble madly to fight TWO more charter schools seeking to co-locate in our public schools.

Here's a link to the Letter we sent to Krupa Desai and SUNY:

www.williamsburggreenpointschools.org/truth-about-charters/citizensoftheworldcharternewyork

We hope you will find this information enlightening and that you pass it along to your colleagues and your school communities.

LIKE us on Facebook to get regular updates:www.facebook.com/WilliamsburgGreenpointParents

Follow us on twitter:
twitter.com/#!/WAGPOPS

Best,

Williamsburg and Greenpoint Parents for Our Public Schools
WAGPOPS
www.williamsburggreenpointschools.org

I'm going to include the letter here below the fold. I urge you to read it. We have to build alliances with every group fighting ed deform.

Dear Krupa Desai,

At the suggestion of your Lead Applicant, we are writing to offer feedback on your proposal to open two Citizens of the World Charter Schools in school district 14, Brooklyn, NY in the Fall 2013.

We object to your proposal for the following reasons:
· No one knows who you are. The first charter school in your network has only been in operation for one full school year in the Los Angeles area. Your “Letter of Intent” (LOI) that was submitted to SUNY in January 2012 for your charter school proposals does not reflect any knowledge, insight, or even a scant understanding of our community, its history, and its cultures.

· There has been no public outreach to date. Aside from posts from your local Lead Applicant and an additional parent seeking market research info on your behalf (“What does your dream school look like?”) on a private, closed listserv of mostly white, affluent residents, there has been no community notification about the schools you propose to open next year. This is demonstrating a lack of regard for our state’s process for charter issuance, as SUNY RFP Guidance Handbook clearly states:
“...SUNY’s proposal review process must generally ‘consider the demand for charter schools by the community,’ per Education Law § 2852(9-a)(b).”
And:
“Per Education Law § 2852(9-a)(b)(ii), the SUNY Trustees are not to consider any proposal that does not ‘rigorously demonstrate’ that the applicant has conducted public outreach ‘in conformity with a thorough and meaningful public review process’ designed ‘to solicit community input regarding the proposed charter school and to address comments received from the impacted community concerning the educational and programmatic need of students.
“In order for the Institute to recommend any proposal to the SUNY Trustees for approval, the proposal must include evidence that:
The community was informed of the intent to develop a school proposal in a timely fashion;
The community had meaningful opportunities for input on that proposal; and
There was a thoughtful process for considering community feedback and incorporating it into the final proposal.
“Please note that seeking input about the proposal is distinct from seeking support for the proposed school. While applicants will also be required to show evidence of community interest in and support for the school (response to Request 16(d)), that support alone does not demonstrate that the community was given the opportunity to provide input into the design of the proposed school or how such input was carefully considered by the applicant.”

· The evidence of community outreach in your LOI is insufficient and narrow. Out of the three Community Based Organizations (CBOs) listed in the Community Outreach Addendum to your Letter of Intent: Greenpoint YMCA, Williamsburg Neighborhood Nursery School, and Padre Kennedy, only the latter is a Head Start Program. There is no copy of the letter sent to Padre Kennedy, no mention if the letter was addressed in English or Spanish, and no name to whom the letter was sent. The letter to the Greenpoint YMCA asked only that the recipient “consider and share with parents as you see fit” the contents of the letter. There was no follow up with any of those three organizations.
Finally, your Community Outreach Addendum claims that your proposals were discussed by community blog authors. This is patently untrue. Williamsburg and Greenpoint have a vocal presence in the online world. There has been no mention on any blogs of these two proposals, let alone a mechanism for feedback on these two proposals.

· There is no demand for charter schools in our community, save for a vocal minority, some of whom have already enrolled their children in their local schools. The recent two hearings in our district regarding Success Academy Williamsburg showed an overwhelming community opposition to charter network chains like yours. In addition, by the Fall 2012, our district will already have five elementary charter schools.

· There has been no venue for legitimate feedback on your proposal. Two local parents wrote to you recently to inquire about hearings, information sessions, or any other venue where they could give feedback on your proposals. One parent was told that there would be no more information sessions before the application date, and another was given an evasive non-answer.
Your online “feedback form” is buried way below the fold on an interior page of your new website in a small cropped window that gives no indication of anything below. When finally found, the survey does not provide any opportunity for feedback, as it’s merely pre-selected multiple choice questions designed to collect information for your marketing data. (http://cwcschools.org/newyork.html)
Parents have become aware of your intentions because of postings your Lead Applicant made on a private neighborhood listserv. Some parents have repeatedly requested that the Lead Applicant hold public meetings in our community to gain feedback on your two charter school proposals, but he refused. The Lead Applicant also refused to work with our elected officials to arrange a community forum to discuss the proposals, and made it clear that he would not hear from the community at large until AFTER the proposal was accepted by SUNY. It is our understanding that denying the community the opportunity for feedback before the proposal is submitted is against Education Law § 2852(9-a)(b)(ii).

· Your information sessions have been exclusive and limited. The only information sessions that your Letter of Intent submitted were held in Schaefer Landing and Northside Piers, two new high-rise condominium buildings populated with wealthy residents. These sessions were not publicized; the only notification was on a small, private email list.
· Your claim of outreach to low-income housing is not true. According to the Community Outreach Addendum to your Letter of Intent, you claim that part of your outreach was to buildings offering mixed- and low-income housing. Yet the evidence you submit of outreach (sign-in sheets from information sessions) do not support this. Both Schaefer Landing and Nortside Piers are luxury condominiums that maintain affordable housing units for tax abatement purposes. The subsidized portion of these condominiums, including the 80/20 mixed-income housing, are actually housed in separate buildings with separate addresses than the location for your information sessions.

· Until Eric Grannis and Gideon Stein can explain their interests with Tapestry Project, and their relationship to you and the schools you intend to open next year, our community will have strong doubts about your intentions and theirs. You were introduced to our neighborhood via a newly formed organization with undisclosed intentions. While the Tapestry Project website (http://tapestryproject.org/index.html) masks its intentions by using a “.org,” in its web address, which it is typically used for non-profit businesses, Tapestry is not a recognized 501(c)(3) non-profit business. Tapestry Project is also not a community based organization (CBO). In fact, as you can see on their website, Tapestry Project is led by the husband of Success Academy CEO Eva Moskowitz, Eric Grannis, and is chaired by Gideon Stein, a real estate developer and a sitting board member at Success Academy Networks.
Although Eric Grannis originally claimed on a private, closed listserv for Williamsburg parents of young children to be merely volunteering his time to support the cause of bringing new charters to North Brooklyn; and your Lead Applicant has claimed numerous times that Eric Grannis is just acting as a neutral, third-party broker, trying to help people like him open charter schools; and your Lead Applicant repeatedly insists that Eric Grannis and Citizens of the World Charter School have nothing to do with Success Academy, we have recently learned that Eric Grannis is in fact claiming to be the person who is opening the two new Citizens of the World Charter Schools in our district. (http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/35/8/dtg_successtwo_2012_02_24_bk.html)
There are many reasons to doubt Eric Grannis’ intentions, abilities, and motivations. Please see Schoolfisher.com, a website developed by Grannis that claims to help parents “find great schools.” On the Schoolfisher site, Grannis uses manipulative tactics, selectively using and at times falsifying data about our community schools in order to advance his agenda of opening more charters. And, of all the charters he chooses to feature on his site, he conveniently only lists the Success Charters that his wife runs and a few others for which he serves on the board.
Regarding Tapestry’s board chair, Gideon Stein, there is also a lot of skepticism about his intentions. In recent years, Williamsburg residents have had numerous contentious battles with the city and real estate developers like Mr. Stein over rezoning. We have also had two hearings this year where an overwhelming number of local parents turned out to protest Success Academy (where Stein serves as board chair) in their proposed co-location at JHS 50. Considering the national trend for charter schools to expand quickly, and for real estate developers to profit handsomely from it, our community has many questions.

· Your stated goal of opening your schools in the Williamsburg and Greenpoint neighborhoods of our district belies your true intentions. Applications for charter schools are by district only. Only AFTER your application is approved by SUNY does the DOE assign a location. It is puzzling that both your Lead Applicant and Eric Grannis made it quite clear that you plan to open in Williamsburg and Greenpoint. Williamsburg and Greenpoint represent prime real estate in increasingly white, affluent and neighborhoods. Our district also includes Bushwick and parts of Bed Stuy where there are greater concentrations of people of color. (http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/35/8/dtg_successtwo_2012_02_24_bk.html)

· You have not disclosed who your charter management organization (CMO) will be. According to your board meeting minutes, (http://www.citizensoftheworld.org/agendas.html), your organization has long had plans for rapid expansion, but in order to do so it needs to partner with an established CMO. Who have you contracted for this work? How is this expansion going to be managed, and who will profit from it?

· In your first year of operation, you violated conflict of interest laws in your home state of California. According to your governance files, the Citizens of the World board unanimously voted to award a contract to Wonder of Reading, an organization where your board’s chair, Kriste Dragon, works as Executive Director. Although, when questioned by a fellow board member, you withdrew the contract, we have significant doubts about your ability to manage a non-profit, public institution ethically. (http://www.citizensoftheworld.org/docs/MYM_92310_letter.pdf)
· Your admissions policies in your California schools are highly suspect. New York State law does not allow preference for “founding parents.” The history your charter school network has of embracing that policy is unethical. That you continue to embrace the policy of “founding parents,” offering preferential admission outside of the lottery in exchange for fundraising or working for the school, is unconscionable and demonstrates a blatant disregard for the poorer population you pretend to serve.

· Your financial health is highly questionable. According to the “New Student Packet” available through your website (http://www.citizensoftheworld.org/docs/CWC-New-Student-Packet.pdf), your flagship charter school “depends on significant support from families to sustain our program of small class sizes, teachers’ assistants for every class, art, music and p.e.” amounting to “an average family contribution of $1,300 a year per child.” With that degree of fundraising required to maintain your promises, your school model does not appear sustainable. You also mention in your minutes (which have not been documented online in recent months) concern about your charter school’s financial future. (http://www.citizensoftheworld.org/docs/06-09-11_SpecialBoardMeetingMinutes.pdf

) Further, this tactic shows that you do not understand the pain and reality of those living in true poverty, as many of our District 14 families do.

· Your continued conflict of interest with Wonder of Reading, an organization with a history of scandal and unaccountability, is unacceptable. Despite your issues in 2010 with Kriste Dragon and Wonder of Reading, your newly formed “national network of charter schools,” Citizens of the World Charter Schools, elected Kriste Dragon as its CEO (http://cwcschools.org/ourteam.html), and is operating out of the exact same address as her business, Wonder of Reading (http://www.wonderofreading.org/page.aspx?pid=223). Considering Wonder of Reading’s history of corruption and unethical behavior, the community does not want Ms. Dragon to manage our public school funds. (http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/NBC4-Extra---Book-Wars-Episode-Two.html) We are very concerned by the ethical impropriety of the $5.2 million contract between Wonder of Reading and CWCS that is scheduled to extend to the 2014-2015 school year: http://citizensoftheworld.org/docs/WoR_admin_servs_contract8-17-10.pdf . This, doubled with (founder?) Eric Grannis’ recent financial scandal at another charter network that he founded make it impossible to trust you with our public funds. (http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2012/01/30/financial-improprieties-found-at-all-girls-charter-school-network/)
Our district has already seen more than one charter school close as a result of financial mismanagement and ethical scandals. We would be remiss to invite that kind of controversy into our district.

· Our public schools do not need a lesson in diversity. Williamsburg and Greenpoint do not need more socioeconomically diverse education options. (http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/35/8/dtg_successtwo_2012_02_24_bk.html) We invite you to closely examine NYC DOE data for our district. You will see that our student populations are already quite diverse. We have strong solidarity between different groups and cultures in our neighborhood schools for the first time as middle class families are choosing to send their children to local schools rather than to neighboring school districts.
And, while our neighborhood schools are finally representing the diversity of the communities in which they are housed, we are concerned that yours will not. According to your own meeting minutes, you are not meeting your o

Defending the Art of Teaching: Assailed Teacher

2012-02-25T09:39:00.001-05:00

At a PEP meeting many tears ago when few people attended I raised the concept of measuring teachers. I asked the PEP members and Joel Klein to think back to the 10 best teachers they ever had and what made them that way. I could actually see a brief moment of thought on their faces. I pointed out that you know a good teacher when you see one. All else is pretty much beside the point. There was possibly a second where Klein gave a short nod.

Another long post from Assailed Teacher but here is the essence of teaching as an art that cannot ever be measured. It has been my pleasure to recently meet this blogger who has been teaching for over a decade and said something so important. I'm paraphrasing: "For most of my career I thought all I had to do was focus on teaching my classes to the best of my ability. But now I see there is a much bigger fight going on. It is time for me to get involved." Boy can the movement use guys like this in this struggle.

If one is to list the crimes the UFT leadership has committed against its members, at the top of the list is the refusal to engage in a defense of the core of teaching as this blogger and people like Leonie Haimson do, instead pandering to the ed deformers insane assault on the teaching profession by accepting the very concept that teaching can be measured in any way whether by tests or Danielson.

http://theassailedteacher.com/

Value Add This

The New York Times beat everyone else to the punch by releasing the teacher data reports last night. The rest of the news outlets are sure to release them throughout the course of the rest of today.

No, I am not linking to them.

I have taught United States History for as long as I remember. My students generally do well on the U.S. History Regents. Since I have been at my current school, my students have had well above a 90% pass rate every year. Two years ago 100% of my students passed the Regents with over 60% of them scoring 85 or higher.
Teachers like me who generally have students with high pass rates should be just as outraged over what the DOE and the media are doing with this “value added” garbage as anyone else.

First, the U.S. History Regents is cake. The scoring rubric is so generous that an average student has to literally try to fail it. Second, the test is usually given to 11th graders, who are more serious and mature than underclassmen. The ones at risk of dropping out have usually done so before the 11th grade.

The scores of my students do not reflect my quality as a teacher. When I used to teach 10th grade Global History, the Regents pass rates of my students were lower. Take me out of 11th grade and put me in front of a 10th grade class and my stats would take a hit.

It reminds me of the famous Casey Stengel line after he went from managing the championship-addicted New York Yankees to the hapless Mets, essentially moving him from first place to worst place. He said “I guess I got dumb in a hurry.”

Read the entire piece: Value Add This

A Parent "Gets" the UFT But Doesn't "Get" the Membership

2012-02-25T00:30:00.000-05:00

...if the union isn't WITH you, it is effectively against you. From where I sit, it looks like they are in the latter category. Unless YOU do something about that, you're screwed in a big, far-reaching, long-term way. I'd really like to know how it has come to be that the people that make up the union seem to be the last ones with any say at all in what it does "for" them.

The way I see it is this: the union leadership is working with the legislature and Governor 1% to basically redistribute YOUR wealth to themselves, their cronies and their districts. No teacher I've ever spoken to thinks a) the union works FOR the teachers (it's the other way around where they work for the union), b) that they have any power to effect any changes within that structure, and c) that it is inevitable they will be screwed by the system so why bother?

I believe that the union power structure making these far-reaching decisions that are counter to the best interests of the membership, makes those decisions based on the "lack of objection equaling consent" principle, and that the rank and file membership remains docile and takes what they get handed to them without any unified protest - as long as the union delivers good benefits and (dwindling) job security.

I watched "The Train" last week with Bert Lancaster. What a story of the French Resistance. If you look at history with the odds stacked and how some people respond it is thrilling. I understand the reality for many people but that is pretty much true throughout history -- until some plug gets pulled for enough people to begin to make a difference. We can never tell when that time comes. The Middle East a little over a year ago? All I know is that the arrogance of power, whether a dictator or a mayor or an Eva or a UFT leadership, at some point makes enough people say, "Ive has enough.

This was posted to the Dump Duncan group on Facebook on Feb. 23 by a NYC public school parent. He just about says the UFT is Vichy without actually using the term.

I have a question...

I'm father of two kids in the NY public school system, in 3rd and 5th grades. I see the stark difference between the kind of schooling I received as a child of the '70s and what millenials are subjected to by what the system has become. Beyond dismaying, it makes me very angry to see my kids' creativity and their love of imaginative learning stifled by the requirements of rote indoctrination into a system the discourages individuality and creative thinking, while inuring them to mindless repetitive tasks. The test prep regime strikes me as little more than training them to be factory workers, content with their lot as they purposelessly screw endless nuts onto endless bolts. Equally dismaying is the response of teachers and especially the teachers' union.

As a reader of Dump Duncan, it is also quite clear to me that the anger and dismay I feel as a parent is shared by the teachers in classrooms across America. And while I admire an initiative like Dump Duncan (and I signed it!), I don't see it gaining any kind of meaningful traction in the general population for a few key reasons:

1) the transformation of the school system has proceeded gradually, so the metaphorical frogs have no idea how hot the water has become,
2) the media's cooperation in the demonizing of teachers has caused the public to become *skeptical of educators' claims* that the problems are structural rather than holistic, and
3) there's big money to be taken from the teacher's unions (in the forms of compensation and pensions) that private - and public - interests would like very much to get their hands on.

Once the traditional vehicles of profit stalled - real estate, credit and derivatives markets, to name a few - and all the wealth to be easily had had been extracted from traditional public sources like industry subsidies, defense contracts, Social Security, medicare/drug contracts and mineral rights markets, it became imperative to find new ways to extract public money from non-traditional sources.

Unfortunately for all of us, America's schools and pension annuities are a ripe fruit waiting to be juiced.

The truism holds: be very leary whenever government tries to "help".

I'm not going to go into a history of the "Testing-Industrial Complex" - if you're not familiar with it, there are a multitude of easily-found sources that cover it completely.

The purpose of this post is to ask why *nothing meaningful* is being done to counteract the stunningly aggressive, rapacious takeover of our educational heritage by the corporate parasites who care about nothing but maximizing their "share" of the public loot.

Again, I appreciate Dump Duncan, but how on earth do you expect parents to know or care about Arne Duncan? How can you expect someone like me to know that my kids' teachers are as appalled by the shift in the educational paradigm as I am - especially when criticizing the regime could end a career?

I don't believe you can expect either. At the same time, I don't blame teachers for remaining silent on these issues, though, paradoxically, your silence will ultimately be your undoing.

And far more importantly, I have to wonder why the teachers' unions have done nothing to educate parents.

I'm going to insert a comment I made on Mark Naison's "Dark Day for New York" blog post yesterday - that went unanswered.

If it were MY union, I'd be harassing my rep, calling and writing the union management and generally raising hell. YOU are the ONLY ones with the ability to do so, as the union derives its power from YOU, not the other way around.

Tell me why the union - the only entity ostensibly on the side of the teachers, and the only entity with the skillset and capabilities - has not printed 1/2 page flyers giving an executive overview of the points of this debate and handed them to parents at the elementary schools as they go to get their kids?

I mean something like: "your kids' education is being transformed into a drastic testing regimen that SOUNDS good but has not been proven effective by ANY studies; that removes everything but test prep from the curriculum so that teachers can be "evaluated" and fired in order to help take pressure off of the state and banks that squandered the money that you've paid toward your schools and we've contributed toward our retirements (that they now blame US for!).

Add a couple action bullet points for parents along the lines of "call your community board/school board members who are Ms. X at (xxx) xxx-xxxx and Mr. Y at (xxx) xxx-xxxx, your state rep Ms. Z at (xxx) xxx-xxxx, state senator Mr. A at (xxx) xxx-xxxx, as well as your congressperson at (xxx) xxx-xxxx and Senators Schumer at (xxx)xxx-xxxx and Gillibrand at (xxx) xxx-xxxx and tell them to stop punishing the schools as though they are the cause of the problems the state has. And include a link to the Dump Duncan petition.

Why isn't this being done? A few interns at Union HQ could compile all that data and make the flyers in an afternoon.

Like I said earlier - if the union isn't WITH you, it is effectively against you. From where I sit, it looks like they are in the latter category. Unless YOU do something about that, you're screwed in a big, far-reaching, long-term way.

You bemoan lack of parental awareness and involvement, but that's like asking why the doctor didn't magically know you were sick and come over to your house to heal you. The only information we get comes from the papers, and the papers definitely aren't working to make you look good. If parents were really aware of the big picture surrounding what their kids - AND YOU - are being subjected to, you'd have more parental involvement than you knew what to do with. But the parents DON'T KNOW the deal, nor do they know that there's anything they can do. The educators need to EDUCATE them and ALIGN with them to work together against that hegemony. Or just give up and pray there's still a pension fund when you're ready to retire.

Save Coney Island Wood Boardwalk

2012-02-24T06:00:00.000-05:00

Friends,

I created a petition entitled New York City Parks Department: Keep the Boards in the Coney Island Boardwalk and Save the Rainforests, because I care deeply about this very important issue.

I'm trying to collect 5,000 signatures, and I could really use your help.

To read more about what I'm trying to do and to sign my petition, click here:
http://www.change.org/petitions/new-york-city-parks-department-keep-the-boards-in-the-coney-island-boardwalk-and-save-the-rainforests?share_id=COFLBMHVFg&

It'll just take a minute!

Once you're done, please ask your friends to sign the petition as well. Grassroots movements succeed because people like you are willing to spread the word!

Rob Burstein

NY Times

Wood May Give Way to Plastic on Coney Island Boardwalk
By LIZ ROBBINS
Memories, more than wood and nails, have long been embedded in the weathered Boardwalk of Coney Island: a first kiss, a marriage proposal, a roller-coaster ride, a hot dog and a custard cone, a seaside stroll in New York City.
But rites of passage take their toll. And one day soon, it seems, economic reality will pave over sentimentality.
After a yearlong fight over the city’s proposal to use concrete to replace the wooden boards along stretches of the aging, 2.7-mile Boardwalk, the city’s parks department is offering a compromise of sorts — but wood is not part of the plan.
Instead, the department is promising to use a combination of concrete and a type of recycled plastic that looks like wood. They want a 12-foot concrete section for emergency vehicles, with 19-foot-wide sections of the plastic polymer on either side for pedestrians.
This is not the all-concrete sacrilege that local preservationists had feared, but they still see the hybrid product as a travesty of tradition — not to mention a worrisome indicator of what could happen when the city decides to renovate other portions of the fabled walkway.
“It’s like putting a piece of plastic into a diamond ring, and this is our jewel,” said Rob Burstein, 57, the chairman of the Coney-Brighton Boardwalk Alliance, whose online petition to keep the Boardwalk wood was signed by more than 1,700 people since the beginning of the year.
The five-block stretch in question is in Brighton Beach, a mile from the heavily-traveled historic district of Coney Island, where wood is still used.
Mr. Burstein, who lives in Brighton Beach, was offended that his neighborhood could not have wood. “What are we, chopped liver?” he said.
Two small sections of the Boardwalk are already concrete. The push for new materials followed a campaign by environmental advocates and a directive from Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg to reduce the use of tropical hardwoods from endangered rain-forest supplies.
The parks department’s plan must be approved by the Public Design Commission, whose members are appointed by Mr. Bloomberg. If the commission approves the plan, as it is expected to do, reconstructing the Boardwalk would take at least another year, said Adrian Benepe, the parks commissioner.
Some commission members said they would reluctantly embrace the synthetic wood-concrete compromise.
“I have pushed them to look at every possible wood alternative, and they have persuaded me that there aren’t wood alternatives that are practical,” said one commission member, Otis Pratt Pearsall, a trustee of the Brooklyn Museum. With that in mind, he said he would support the hybrid plan because “it is important to have the thing look as Boardwalk-y as possible.”
Another commissioner, Paula Scher, shared that sense of resignation.
“If you think we’re happy that wood is being replaced by material we find less appealing, that is certainly not the case,” said Ms. Scher, a partner at Pentagram Design. “It’s called a Boardwalk, and if you use other material, it loses its identity. I understand that, but it’s so much better to have a surface to walk on next to the beach.
“We love our icons of the past, and sometimes you can preserve them,” Ms. Scher said, but “things have changed.”
Mr. Benepe said the parks department had investigated every option, from natural woods like Douglas fir and black locust to treated woods like Southern yellow pine. They concluded that such hardwoods were neither durable enough nor, in the case of black locust, abundantly available. Opponents rejected this argument, and Michael Caruso, a forestry expert in West Virginia, said that black locust wood could be ordered in sufficient quantities.
The plastic composite, which can last 75 years, is cheaper than wood to build with and maintain, Mr. Benepe said. According to City Council member Domenic M. Recchia Jr., it costs more than $1 million a year to maintain the wooden Boardwalk.
Under the hybrid plan, it would cost the city $6.85 million to replace the 60,110-square-foot stretch of the Boardwalk from Coney Island Avenue to Brighton 15th Street. That is more expensive than concrete, but cheaper than some natural woods that could last just eight years, the parks department said.
“Given all the variables, this addresses as many of the desires as possible,” Mr. Benepe said.
The local community board, which has an advisory role, rejected the plan for synthetic wood last spring. One board member, Todd Dobrin, who founded a group called Friends of the Boardwalk, said the department was “disregarding the will of the public.”
Mr. Dobrin said it would be problematic to use concrete in any form. This winter, he said, the concrete sections have been dangerously icy, with poor drainage and numerous cracks.
“When you come to the Boardwalk, it’s such a peaceful realm,” said Soul Bryan, 48, who, like many local residents, takes a round-trip walk on the Boardwalk daily. “As soon as you go off the wood, it takes you out of your zone.”
But Mr. Benepe said economic considerations outweighed the historical importance of the wood.
“Suggesting that you can only have wooden Boardwalks because that’s what they were originally built of is like saying you should only have cobblestone streets,” he said.
Still, economic sense clashes with the emotional connection that many Brooklynites have to the Boardwalk.
Dan Klores, a public relations executive and filmmaker from Brooklyn, remembered running on the Boardwalk in the 1970s and encountering Abraham D. Beame, who was campaigning for mayor. The wooden boards were in disrepair then, Mr. Klores said, and Mr. Beame told the crowd that replacement wood was on order from Honduras.
One elderly man, Mr. Klores recalled, did not miss a beat.
“Honduras, shmonduras!” the man shouted. “We want the wood.”
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: February 22, 2012
An article on Monday about a plan to use a combination of concrete and recycled plastic to replace a stretch of the wooden Boardwalk in Brighton Beach, N.Y., misstated the timing of an online petition to keep the Boardwalk wood. More than 1,700 people have signed it since the beginning of 2012, not in the last year. The headline also misstated, in some copies, the status of the plan. It is under consideration; it has not been adopted.

Former DOE Official Michael Duffy: It's All About the Adults

2012-02-23T22:24:00.003-05:00

Don't you just love it when every ed deformer says it's about the children not the adults -- like teachers--- when in fact an entire charter school industry has sprung up where adults like Michael Duffy go into the DOE for a short time before using that "service" -- a very loose term here --- to enrich themselves on the backs of children.

Here Leonie Haimson takes Duffy and Victory down. (By the way -- Victory used to be run by Peg Harrington, with a deep resume of working as a teacher, principal and top level official at the old NYCBOE. I think she got nudged out by Klein and went on to run Victory.)

Before you get to Duffy, check out Leonie doing about a 200% better job than any UFT official in defending teachers in her appearance on WPIX- 11 this morning: who is to blame for struggling schls. Hint: it’s not teachers. http://goo.gl/ZpqeI

Michael Duffy and the "turnaround" of Victory charter schools
A new charter school called Great Oaks is applying to the state to start in NYC’s District 2, to be located on Governors Island, though Downtown Express reports that the Education Committee of Community Board I opposes it. The charter school’s letter of intent to NYSED lists as the lead applicant Benjamin B. Carson, described as a former “statistician” for the NYC DOE charter office, as well as the Co-Founder of the Great Oaks Charter School in Newark.
The Newark branch only started last August and has no track record, but the letter of intent says the network has formed to “replicate the successful methods of the MATCH Public Charter School in Boston," featuring “high academic expectations, a No Excuses school culture, a focus on engaging classroom instruction and individualized attention to students’ needs via high-dosage tutoring.”
One of the co-founders of the proposed NYC school and a board member will be Michael Duffy, who is the former head of the NYC DOE charter office, well known for his blase attitude towards protesting parents during intense co-location hearings. Duffy is also listed as the key contact for the Great Oaks Charter School in Newark on the NJ State website.
Michael Duffy
Duffy is now employed by a company called Victory, which has started at least 16 charter schools in NYC, Philadelphia and Chicago.
Victory has had a generally dismal reputation in NYC for charging large management fees while running some of the lowest-performing charters in the city. Here is what Kim Gittleson of GothamSchools wrote about the chain in 2010, after analyzing their management fees and results:
“I found that the five Victory Schools that had progress report scores in 2008-2009 placed in the bottom 35 percent of all charter schools and in the bottom 20 percent of schools citywide… These middling performance numbers come despite the fact that the seven schools paid around $2,163 per pupil to Victory Schools for the company’s services. This is 17 percent of these charter schools’ per pupil revenues from the state.”
DOE now intends to close Peninsula Prep charter, a school run by Victory until recently. Unfortunately when NYT /School Book ran a story about DOE’s plan to close the school, Duffy was quoted as a approving of the decision, as an apparently disinterested observer, without noting that he currently works for the company that ran the school until June 30, 2010. Indeed, in Peninsula Prep’s most recent annual report to DOE, dated July 2011, the board made clear that they had dropped Victory as their management company, in an apparent attempt to persuade DOE to allow the school to stay open:

a. Peninsula Preparatory Academy Charter School disassociated itself from Victory Schools as a management company.
b. PPACS adopted the New York City Department of Education scope and sequence for Social Studies instruction instead of the Victory proprietary Core Knowledge Program. and: c. PPACS increased the student enrollment to from 300 to 350.

In the NYT/Schoolbook article, Duffy supported DOE closing of the school: “I definitely think in 2012, what was good enough even five years ago is no longer good enough,” Mr. Duffy said. (He should know!)
Duffy left DOE to work for Victory in July 2010, shortly after Victory’s Albany charter school, New Covenant, was shut down by SUNY because of poor performance.

Parent Objects to Walcott Being Honored by 100 Black Men

2012-02-23T12:37:00.000-05:00

7 p.m. – Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott is honored at One Hundred Black Men’s 32nd Annual Benefit Gala, New York Hilton, Mercury Ballroom,1335 Avenue of the Americas.

Karen Sprowal whose child was tossed out of Eve Moskowitz's Harlem Success Academy responds:

This a joke right?
As an African American public school parent I can say honestly, Walcott is a disgrace to the race! We should be protesting his appointment as chancellor not honoring him for anything!
Shame on 100 Black Men org. there are many black men working within public schools and the community they could honor, all they had to do was ask.

Testing Expert Fred Smith Calls for Boycott of Flawed Tests

2012-02-23T08:34:00.002-05:00

Leonie posted this post with fabulous links and I'm cross-posting due to the importance of Fred Smith's work.

The GEM high stakes testing committee, which Fred has worked with, has been working on supporting parents who are willing to do a test case in NY State, one of the only states without a policy) by opting out of the test (do their kids get left back?). Even within the anti-hst community there is some controversy as to whether pushing a program of opting out is worthwhile at this point (if high scoring kids opt out the school rating goes down) but there will be a push forward.

From Leonie Haimson: Feb 22, 2012
http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2012/02/testing-expert-points-out-severe-flaws.html

Testing expert points out severe flaws in NYS exams and urges parents to boycott them this spring!

Many recent columns have pointed out the fundamental flaws in the new NY teacher evaluation system in the last few days: by Aaron Pallas of Columbia University; Carol Burris, Long Island principal, education historian Diane Ravitch, (who has written not one but two excellent critiques) and Juan Gonzalez, investigative reporter for the Daily News. All point out that despite the claim that the new evaluation system is supposed to be based only 20-40% on state exams, test scores in fact will trump all, since any teacher rated "ineffective" on their students' standardized exams will be rated "ineffective" overall.

To add insult to injury, the NYC Department of Education is expected to release the teacher data reports to the media tomorrow -- with the names of individual teachers attached. These reports are based SOLELY on the change in student test scores of individual teachers, filtered through a complicated formula that is supposed to control for factors out of their control, which is essentially impossible to do. Moreover, there are huge margins of error that mean a teacher with a high rating one year is often rated extremely low the next. Sign our petition now, if you haven't yet, urging the papers not to publish these reports; and read the outraged comments of parents, teachers, principals and researchers, pointing out how unreliable these reports are as an indication of teacher quality.

Though most of the critiques so far focus on the inherently volatile nature and large margins of error in any such calculation, here in NY State we have a special problem: the state tests themselves have been fatally flawed for many years. There has been rampant test score inflation over the past decade; many of the test questions themselves are amazingly dumb and ambiguous; and there are other severe problems with the scaling and the design of these exams that only testing experts fully understand. Though the State Education Department claims to have now solved these problems, few actually believe this to be the case.

As further evidence, see Fred Smith's analysis below. Fred is a retired assessment expert for the NYC Board of Education, who has written widely on the fundamental flaws in the state tests. Here, he shows how deep problems remain in their design and execution -- making their results, and the new teacher evaluation system and teacher data reports based upon them, essentially worthless. He goes on to urge parents to boycott the state exams this spring. Please leave a comment about whether you would consider keeping your child out of school for this purpose!

Fred Smith:
New York State’s Testing Program (NYSTP) has relied on a series of deeply flawed exams given to 1.2 million students a year. This conclusion is supported by comparing English Language Arts (ELA) and Math data from 2006 to 2011 with National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) data, but not in the usual way.

Rather than ponder discrepancies in performance and growth on the national versus state exams, I analyzed the items—the building blocks of the NAEP and NYSTP that underlie their reported results.

NAEP samples fourth and eighth grade students in reading and math every two years. Achievement and improvement trends are studied nationwide and broken down state-by-state. The results spur biennial debate over two questions:

Why are results obtained on state-imposed exams far higher than proficiency as measured by NAEP? Why do scores from state tests increase so much, while NAEP shows meager changes over time?

By concentrating on results—counting how many students have passed state standards; or trying to gauge the achievement gap; or devising complicated value-added teacher evaluation models, school grading systems and other multi-variate formulas—attention has been diverted from the instruments themselves.

In 2009, the year statewide scores peaked, Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch discredited NYSTP’s implausibly high achievement levels and low standards. She pledged reform—“more rigorous testing” became the catch phrase. She knew that New York’s yearly pursuit and celebratory announcements of escalating numbers belied a state of educational decline.

It was an admission of how insidious the results had been, not to mention the precarious judgments that rested on them. Unsustainable outcomes became a crisis. But Albany refuses to address the core problem.

The NAEP and NYSTP exams contain multiple-choice and open-ended items. The latter tap a higher order of knowledge. They ask students to interpret reading material and provide a written response or to work out math problems and show how they solved them, not just select or guess a right answer.

Ergo, on well-developed tests students will likely get a higher percentage of correct answers on machine-scored multiple-choice questions. In addition, the same students should do well, average or poorly on both types of items.

NAEP meets the dual expectations of order and correlation between its two sets of items; the NYSTP exams, which are given in grades three through eight, do not. Here are the contrasting pictures for the fourth grade math test.

NAEP’s multiple-choice items yield averages that are substantially higher than its open-ended ones. The distance between them is consistent over time—another way of saying that the averages run along parallel lines. There is an obvious smoothness to the data.

Items on the NYSTP exams defy such rhyme and reason. The percent correct on each set of items goes up one year and down the next in a choppy manner. In 2008, performance on the teacher-scored open-ended items exceeded the level reached on the multiple-choice items. In 2011, when the tests were supposed to have gained rigor, the open-ended math questions were 26.2% easier than the NAEP’s.

The reversals reveal exams made of items working at cross purposes, generating data that go north and south at the same time. That’s the kind of compass the test publisher, CTB/McGraw-Hill, has sold to the State since 2006 to the tune of $48 million.

I found incongruities in all grades measured by NYSTP. On the ELA, divergent outcomes on the two types of items are noteworthy for grades 5, 6 and 7 in 2010 and 2011. The fifth grade items provide a jarring illustration, because they continue to function incoherently in the years of promised reform. Averages on the open-ended items increase (by 10.7%), as sharply as the multiple-choice averages fall (10.3%)—crossing over them last year.

It all goes unnoticed. Press releases are written in terms of overall results without acknowledging or treating NYSTP’s separate parts. This is odd since so much time and money go into administering and scoring the more challenging, higher-level open-ended items.

So, we’ve had a program that has made a mockery out of accountability, with the head of the Regents running interference for it. Parents watch helplessly as their children’s schools become testing centers. And the quality of teachers is weighed on scales that are out of balance, as Governor Cuomo takes a bow for leveraging an evaluation system that depends on state test results to determine if a teacher is effective.

If the test numbers aren’t good enough, there’s no way teachers can compensate by demonstrating other strengths needed to foster learning and growth. Within days it is likely that newspapers will publish the names of teachers and the grades they’ve received based on their students’ test scores going back three years. As shown, however, these results are derived from tests that fail to make sense.

The graphs are prima facie evidence that the vendor and Albany have delivered a defective product. High-stakes decisions about students, teachers and schools have depended on it. An independent investigation of NYSTP is imperative to determine what happened and, if warranted, to seek recovery of damages.

It is also time for the victims—parents in defense of their children, and teachers in support of students, parents and their own self-interest—to band together and just say “No!” to this April’s six days of testing.

---Fred Smith, a retired Board of Education senior analyst, worked for the city public school system in test research and development.

Jumping on Leo Casey Defense of Ed Eval Deal From Critics Ravich and Rest of World

2012-02-23T00:20:00.000-05:00

I hear Leo Casey over at Edwise is defending the ed eval deal after the assault by:

Diane Ravitch -- with the scary title of A Dark Day for New York,
LI Principal Carol Burris at the Answer Sheet ---Carol will be speaking at the GEM conference on ed evals on March 15) and
pretty much everyone else as you can see at Perdido Street School (Ravitch, Gonzalez, Pallas Take On Cuomo's New Teacher Evaluation System).

One has to find it pretty interesting that long-time UFT/AFT ally Ravitch has pretty much gone ballistic on them. (Don't look for an invite to speak at the AFT convention this summer).

UFT to auction off spots for inclusion in 13%

I just don't have the patience to dig into the particulars -- I take the position with so many others that high stakes tests (as opposed to tests useful for diagnosis and correction) are a waste of time and money and have been saying to -- even proposing resolutions at Delegate Assemblies as far back as the late 90's. So I'll just leave it to others to address Casey's defense. [WARNING: CASEY IS DOING A PART 2].

This insightful parsing of Casey came in anonymously. Darn, wish I could take credit

Casey: “With evaluations based on multiple measures, evaluations will be more comprehensive, more accurate and fairer, and in sharp contrast to other states such as Florida and Tennessee, the role of standardized testing in the evaluation will be minimized.”

This is hard to see from reading the SED summary that says “Teachers rated ineffective on student performance based on objective assessments must be rated ineffective overall.” In this context, multiple measures would seem to mean one thing: multiple ways to fail.

Casey bases his argument on the fact that the 20% left up to local bargaining will not be standardized tests: but “an authentic assessment of student learning” based on some other not yet agreed-upon process. He adds: “I know of no significant New York district where the local union has agreed to the use of standardized state exams as the basis for the local measures of student learning.”” (Today King restored the SIG grants to Rochester and four other cities because they had submitted evaluation plans acceptable to him; no news yet as to what they involve. )

Casey goes on: When the UFT was working on developing performance assessments as the local assessments for the 33 Transformation and Restart schools, one of our agreements with the NYC DoE was the development of a system of weighting that would account for the academic challenges of a teacher’s students.

So what happened? Not clear if DOE really agreed to non-standardized tests as their local assessment component, especially as the DOE issued an RFP over the summer for 408 new citywide standardized tests – some of which were conveniently called performance assessments. Indeed, “performance assessments” is another phrase like “multiple measures” which seem to have multiple meanings depending on the eye of the beholder.

It is also true that many districts are cash-poor and may adopt the state tests simply because they don’t have the funds to develop and score their own assessments.

Casey doesn’t mention that Commissioner King has the authority under this agreement also to reject any local assessment that is not “rigorous” or “objective” enough; in general, King doesn’t sound particularly open to portfolios etc:

“All evaluation plans are subject to review and approval by the Commissioner to ensure rigor, quality and consistency with standards;
· The Commissioner has the authority to require corrective action, including the use of independent evaluators, when districts evaluate their teachers positively regardless of students’ academic progress.

In a footnote, Casey mentions something even more startling: that “The law envisions that once the State Education Department has developed a valid value-added model for measuring growth in student learning, which it has yet to do, the state component can grow to 25%, while the local component would shrink to 15%.”

I wonder who gets to determine whether the state’s value-added model is “valid” or not. The Regents? So far the majority of members have rubber-stamped anything that King or Tisch want them to do.

Casey concludes by echoing the words of the corporate reformers: “While a change of the complexity required by the new teacher evaluation system is daunting, it should not lead us to romanticize a failed evaluation status quo.”

-----------

Next up is a long piece by blogger Assailed Teacher: Leo Casey “Sets the Record Straight” on the New Teacher Evaluations who closes with

As much as I would like to believe Leo Casey’s characterization of the foremost historian on American education’s concerns as “alarmist”, I do not see anywhere in his post today where he silences those alarms. All I see is a dark time ahead for the children and teachers of New York City.
This does not even touch on how the new evaluation regime destroys tenure for teachers. According to Leo Casey, his next installment will address this concern. I can only say I hope it goes over better than his latest defense of this horrid new system.

HS Chap Ldr John Elfrank-Dana comments at his blog Labor's Lessons:

Teacher Evaluation and the Lesson of Teaching for the 21st Century (RIP)

---------
And then there's Eric Przykuta, president of the upstate NY Lancaster Central Teachers Association with a scathing assault on NYSUT for making the deal, calling NYSUT dues a "horrible waste of hard-earned dollars." He closes with:

I find you and your organization wholly ineffectual and ineffective. Teachers can not sit idly by facing financial ruin while you enjoy your wine and chocolates. You offer no clout in Albany and services that can be duplicated less expensively. NYSUT dues are a horrible waste of hard-earned dollars that members of this Association can put to better use and receive a better value in so doing. You will be notified in writing regarding our future association with your organization.

Here are some links he includes:

Letter to Iannuzzi in response to February 16, 2012 Agreement
Letter to Iannuzzi in response to NYSUT RTTT 2010 Agreement
Links Relating to Teacher Evaluations

And a link to a news report.
Naturally, as expected, Mike Antonucci over at Educational Intelligence Agency has some fun with the view from the right. I'm including this because I know how much Leo looks forward to my citing EIA and since he pretty much reads this blog full time (check this video for proof) I'm sure he'll enjoy the reference.

Eric Przykuta is upset about what he sees as a NYSUT sell-out on the issue of teacher evaluations. He sent a rather pointed letter about it to NYSUT president Richard Iannuzzi.
“Your pandering is shameful,” Przykuta wrote. “You have done nothing to protect teachers or advance our agenda as professionals to be respected. NYSUT caved under pressure and ran from the good fight.”
But it’s the final paragraph that drops the big hammer:

Przykuta wants to hold a summit of local union presidents in Western New York that, according to one published report, would discuss “severing ties” with NYSUT.

I doubt this will amount to much, especially since natural ally Phil Rumore (see item #2 here) thinks the letter was “a little over the top.” Still, if a bunch of mid-sized locals break off and form their own organization, I have the perfect name for it: NEA New York!
It might cost a few bucks to buy the old domain name back from the odd dudes who own it now, but there’s probably a stack of old stationery and envelopes lying around that will help keep costs down.

Well, there it is. We can look forward to Casey's Part 2 where he will tell you that tenure is totally unaffected, followed by a fund-raiser auctioning off slots for those who want to be included in the magic 13%.

On Chicago and New York Teacher Unions

2012-02-22T11:45:00.001-05:00

Info Overload
There's so much incoming from so many sources --- too many listserves, too many blogs to follow, too much facebook and twitter is a killer. And all that great video to process. So many issues -- teacher eval, charter invasions, Chicago news, general UFT crap --- I can't decide what to write about. As usual in my case, when presented with too many options I do nothing. Of course I hope you are checking my blogroll which takes me hours to get through before I get to post anything here.

One of the more interesting blogger/NYC teachers I've come across recently is Assailed Teacher, who I was tipped off to by a Diane Ravitch tweet. Some really thoughtful stuff there with some depth. Today's post -- It’s Up To You…. Chicago?
digs into a comparison of the actions of the UFT and the CTU.

Michael Dunn over at Modern School nicely outlines the coming contract battle between the Chicago Teachers’ Union and its employer, Chicago Public Schools. Mayor Rahm Emanuel wants to expand the school day by 90 minutes. The union wants a 30% raise, lower class sizes and greater enrichment opportunities for students. They have put money aside for a public relations campaign and are already making arrangements for a strike should contract negotiations break down. I agree with Michael Dunn in that teachers, even workers in general, across the country should keep their eyes on Chicago.

For teachers in New York City, seeing a union actually standing up for its members and students is strange indeed. It seems like it was just this past Thursday that our union sold us out by agreeing to a bonehead evaluation system based entirely on student test scores. In return, the union got absolutely nothing for its members, not even the due process for teachers rated “ineffective” for which they had been holding out. Our fearless leader Michael Mulgrew can be seen hobnobbing with the people responsible for the chartering in this, the country’s largest school district. If New York City schools serve as a model for the rest of the country, then there is plenty for the country to fear.

Read the entire piece (It’s Up To You…. Chicago?).

I wouldn't paint everything that's going on in the Chicago TU as slam dunk perfect even though I am pretty prejudiced because I know many of the leaders. Sure there have been some mistakes (no time to find links now) but I remind people that all these guys and gals were in the classroom teaching until July 2010, not part of a Unity Caucus like machine that has been running the UFT for 50 years. (And how many mistakes have they made?)

CORE -- the Caucus of Rank and File Educators --- started out as a small group to study Naomi Klein's "The Shock Doctrine" in 2008 and captured the union in the 2010 elections. I have some tape from an appearance in NY in late 2010 at Teachers Unite by CORE leaders talking about their short history (if I have some time I will post on vimeo). One important point is that (at least at that time) CORE was run by people still in the classroom, not by people working for the CTU.

In fact, when people felt that Karen (who says she reads Ed Notes so I hope I get this right) screwed up she had to face some music from within the caucus, something that can never happen in Unity.

This is an important point --- creating the most democratic body that will function that way under all circumstances. CORE must maintain some level of independence in its relationship to the CTU leadership even if coming from the same group.

I believe in caucuses as a way to function within a union. The problem with the UFT is that there is no balance of power. New Action owes its existence to Unity benevolence. ICE and TJC have had gained traction, and they know it unlike NAC. Other groups like NYCORE, Teachers Unite and GEM have not directly related to the union -- until recently.

Assailed Teacher closes with:

Teachers in NYC have to take a page from CTU’s playbook now. When their union proved to be shills for the forces of ed reform, they turned the leadership out of office. When their Machiavellian mayor proposed a longer school day, their new union immediately responded with a deluge of common sense demands that school districts around the country have long neglected. Contrast that with a union that rolls over and dies in every negotiation and smiles in the face of their members like they did them a favor. It is time for New Yorkers to swallow their pride and give Chicago their due respect for having a teachers’ union ahead of the curve.

He is right about doing it now. And that is why people from all the groups (including people from TJC and ICE) have been meeting around the concept of State of the Union in an attempt to create a CORE-like caucus. Will such a caucus be able to capture power in terms of a union election in the near future? Anyone who came to my UFT 101 workshop at the Feb. 4 SOTU came away pretty depressed over the almost impossible task given how Unity has basically rigged things (there is a video of my workshop I will release soon), especially given the new constitutional amendments diluting the voice of the classroom teacher.

But I point to Egypt where the government fell without an election but because of a people's movement. I view the over 1500 schools in the same way --- the true battleground for the union.

CORE didn't even win power through taking the schools but due to a very incompetent version of Unity that split into 2 plus other caucuses running and winning a runoff, which we don't have here in NYC. In reality, CORE captured 1/3 of the vote the first time and all the other groups endorsed them in the run-off. Thus CORE has had to do school by school organizing AFTER they won and the old guard still has support. If CORE doesn't accomplish this in time for the 2013 election they might very well lose.

In the case of NYC, they are sort of starting from scratch and if a new caucus emerges that focuses on Delegate Assemblies, Exec Bds and talking to the union leadership instead doing the school to school organizing, it will not go very far. Doing this school to school work is not easy, especially given that Unity uses the District reps to monitor and disrupt every sign of opposition coming from schools. (The other day I heard an example of one of the nastiest pieces of work a DR could do in an attempt to undermine a perceived threat --- I am efforting to get permission to print).

The only advantage a true opposition caucus would have is numbers or organizers. Not enormous numbers but enough to counter the Unity machine and get people at the school level to work with the caucus. Given the apathy, that is not an easy task. But I am guessing of such a group can develop strong people in 300-500 schools it becomes a real threat, especially if they can capture delegates and chapter leader positions.

Elections for CL and Del are coming this spring. If you have had enough of Unity, consider running for at least the delegate position and joining with the State of the Union crew (next meeting is March 10).

If things continue the way they are expect more and more sell-outs.

-----
Aftterburn
The move to a new caucus have caused ICE, TJC and even GEM to examine what role they have to play in the battle against ed deform --- which after all is the main war --- but you can't have a hope to win that with a union leadership on the city, state and national level that plays footsie with the deformers instead of organizing to fight them. We'll be reporting on whatever we are allowed to on these internal debates.

Another Bill of Goods the UFT/AFT is Trying to Sell: Common Core Standards

2012-02-21T20:07:00.001-05:00

Remember, the first action of Occupy DOE was to shut down the Walcott/David Coleman "information" session on Common Core in October.
(Video at: http://youtu.be/YbmjMickJMA).

When our union and WalBloom and Gates are all on the same page, it's time to run the other way. Susan Ohanian has been outing the common core crap (CCC) for years. When the UFT starts pushing this like dope, time for you to stand up and fight.

THE COMMON CORE STATE STANDARDS FOR ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS & LITERACY IN HISTORY/SOCIAL STUDIES, SCIENCE, & TECHNICAL SUBJECTS
http://susanohanian.org/outrage_fetch.php?id=1205

Ohanian comment: This incredibly Incredibly pompous, ignorant document is part of Coming Together to Raise Achievement prepared Center for K--12 Assessment & Performance Management at ETS.

Don't you love this?
The CCSS outline what students will know and be able to do. By grade 6, students will trace and evaluate an argument and determine the specific claims supported by evidence and those that are not. By grades 9 and 10, students will have read U.S. documents of historical and literary significance and will learn to delineate and
evaluate the reasoning in these texts.
How many 6th graders do you think this claimant has taught? She has been Director of Curriculum and Instruction for Rochester, MA school district and Director of English, MassInsight Education, a corporate-based organization, infamous for pushing the MCAS.
Student writers will think expansively. [emphasis added]
In the 1970s, the era of behavioral objectives,I refused to write required "The student WILL. . ." in lesson plans. My god, I taught 7th grade. On a good day, student "might"... And there were plenty of days that weren't-so-good.

Apostles and assorted groupies writing about the Common Core admit to no such students, no such days.

Writers of documents like this never admit to the reality of students or the variety they bring to the classroom. I once wrote a little document for the New York State Teachers Union "What is a 7th Grader?" In it I pointed out that I never knew which Sherrie would walk in the door--the one sucking her thumb and wanting to read fairy tales or the one parading the role of nymphet. Some days she would indeed think expansively. Other days, she was much more intent on the drama of being a 7th grader confused and challenged by her own sexuality, family problems, insecurities. Whichever Jenny appeared on a given day, I had to be ready to adapt to her needs of the moment. Certainly, I did not pull out any "The student WILL" document. Or call on Aristotle to show me how to teach. I do remember how much Sherrie--and her peers--enjoyed our read-aloud of Ron Jones' Acorn People. My team teaching partner and I felt it was critical for our students, known as the worst readers in the school--and not so good in other subjects either--learn to empathize with people with worse problems than their own. I am happy to see this book is still in print. It's values will far outlast any picayune dictates coming out of the corporate-educational complex.

Okay, I admit it: Jenny and her classmates also liked Flat Stanley--almost as much as I did. I've recounted all this in a book about our middle school years, Caught in the Middle: Nonstandard Kids and a Killing Curriculum.

I would just add that years ago my article in The Atlantic featuring what the basal committees had done to make Flat Stanley "acceptable" provoked more mail than I've received on anything--including a correspondence with Jeff Brown and Sid Fleischman.

Oh, sorry. I wasn't teaching "Twenty-first Century students. I'm still mired in that old Twentieth Century paradigm.

Sorry. Sorry. Sorry.
[T]he CCSS compel collaboration; students will know how to be smart, sound smart, and affirm the intelligent contributions of the people with whom they work or learn.
Damn. Damn. Damn. I just keep forgetting. I don't work in the century of such claims. In our time, we did our best, but we just lacked the standards to guarantee that students would be smart, etc. etc.

But hey, you teachers in the Twenty-First Century, if you made a list of "What has to be taught", what would be on it? Think hard. Picture your students. . . individual students. Think hard. What must be taught. Here's what this ETS writer, delineating the Common Core dictates: key Aristotelian claims of ethos, logos, and pathos will have to be taught.

This writer offers David Coleman lite. Not that I subscribe in any way to true blue David Coleman, but. . . I'm somewhat bemused that ETS would offer such a weak argument.

And Gentle Reader, if you don't recognize the name David Coleman, I advise you to put the name into a 'search' on this site. Do it immediately. Your very survival as a teacher who responds to the needs of the children in your care depends on it.

You must prepare yourself to fight. YOU...with colleagues. NCTE won't help you. The unions won't help you. You have to gather with other teachers and parents and FIGHT THIS.

See below the fold for the original article:

By Elise M. Frangos

Oliver Wendell Holmes explained, "A mind that is stretched by new experience can never go back to its old dimensions."

As a longtime English language arts teacher and Curriculum Director who has taught across grades 5--12, I think the new CCSS will shift literacy instruction toward empowering students with more of the skills they need to succeed in college and at work.

Before this happens, the CCSS will foster many spirited conversations among colleagues, between schools, and within districts. It will profoundly influence professional development and the inception of new pedagogical techniques. But ultimately, students across all economic backgrounds will be stretched in powerful and multidimensional ways.

Student literacy experiences will directly engage students in ways that are critical to their future success. The CCSS document distills support for what we already know works --that students need to interact with great texts, drill into them, comprehend and evaluate them, and use them as models for their own creative work.

Its emphasis directs students toward becoming rhetors, people who can speak and write effectively to communicate with others while appreciating context, understanding their audience, and knowing their purpose. In essence, the CCSS will help students find their voices and more effectively partake in both face-to-face and virtual communities.

Revitalizing Rhetoric,Promoting Fresh Writing

Whether one teaches composition in grade 2, grade 7, grade 10, or college, a common teacher lament is that student essays are often in search of a thesis. Meandering essays "talk about stuff," but students have difficulty forming an argument. The student may have written a lot, but the teacher wonders, where
was she going? What was the writer's purpose?
Students need to not only think and feel, they also need to question, gather evidence, shape, re-shape, and revise their understandings. They need the opportunity to formulate arguments and argue a lot. They need to know how to create claims and launch them after gathering sound, informed evidence. Students need the tools and models of civil discourse and to study examples of successful written arguments and those that failed. Through the CCSS, they will get experience in this.

The CCSS outline what students will know and be able to do. By grade 6, students will trace and evaluate an argument and determine the specific claims supported by evidence and those that are not. By grades 9 and 10, students will have read U.S. documents of historical and literary significance and will learn to delineate and
evaluate the reasoning in these texts.

The study of argument won't be limited to expository writing; student writers will think expansively. Whether a student argues that Conrad's depictions of the River Thames and the Congo in Heart of Darkness stand in contrast, creating images of the known vs. the unknown, or if she claims that the calm, lovely natural world of Golding's island imagery in Lord of the Flies intensifies the horror of Piggy's death, she is still forming an argument. Effective composition, whether
focused on imaginative literature-prose, poetry, or drama, is based on knowing one's purpose, content, and audience and relaying an argument in such a way that the piece hits the target.

With the advent of the CCSS, students will be taught to support claims with varied evidence, guide readers to their conclusion, and also anticipate the perspectives of those who differ with their arguments. Once students are taught the tools of rhetoric, they will see that an argument is the backbone of all expository and literary work.

The CCSS provide the backwards planning to help students get there. In the elementary years, students will focus on the comprehension of main ideas in their reading. As students progress through the curriculum, in grade 6 they will "trace and evaluate an argument and the specific claims in a text distinguishing claims that are not supported by evidence." To accomplish this, key Aristotelian claims of ethos, logos, and pathos will have to be taught. By grade 9, students will be "able to read and comprehend seminal U.S. documents of historical and literary significance." Students also will be expected to know how to make a counterclaim or concession.

Discarding the Five-Paragraph Straitjacket

When student writers display the backbone of a solid argument, it is often supported in the form of a five paragraph essay. This formulaic template offers the younger student a predictable skeleton for writing, but it can wrench the purpose of the composition, confine proofs to the prescribed three, and fail to engage the reader. Writers learn best from reading. The shift toward reading great nonfiction, in addition to imaginative texts, will assist student writing.

The Study of Sentence Scrambling

The CCSS extend grammar study into the realm of syntax. We may see fewer middle school, high school, and college level writers clinging to the standard sentence form of subject/predicate. By grade 5, students will "expand, combine, and reduce sentences for meaning, reader/listener interest, and style." By high school, students will "... Use words, phrases, and clauses as well as varied syntax." The focus on sentence acrobatics in the CCSS propels teachers to work with students on sentence structure and word arrangement. Sentences will be written to suit the desired musicality in writing or the purposes of the argument.

Ethical Information Gathering

Twenty-first century students need to know how to gather information and communicate information with people in front of them and beyond the classroom in fresh, clear ways. With the explosion of research sites, students need to know what research is evidence based and salient to their research questions. The CCSS value ethical, multigenre research. Research will start in the early grades, focused on short projects to build knowledge. As students advance through the grades, they will gain experience gathering information from digital and print sources, learning how to synthesize multiple research sources and properly credit the sites they use.

Common Core Collegiality and Cooperation

Our increasingly diverse world is full of people with different ideas, histories, and cultures. Sadly the news and, sometimes, our schools are rife with stories of incivility, intolerance, and conflict. With the CCSS, practice in discourse is on the horizon. Small children will have the opportunity to learn concession and counterclaim. They'll build proficiency as collegial members of learning communities.

For me, the most heartening facets of the CCSS are the speaking and listening standards. As early as kindergarten, students will learn how to have collaborative conversations and learn to ask for help on grade-level appropriate topics. The CCSS will stretch students to continue to read across genres, but learn how to use great stories encountered in canonical, contemporary, and multicultural literary texts to support their arguments. Students will learn how to formulate forceful and fortified arguments in writing or in speaking. Students will learn to research skillfully and write about what they find, weaving information together with artful sentences in organized compositions. Most importantly, the CCSS compel collaboration; students will know how to be smart, sound smart, and affirm the intelligent contributions of the people with whom they work or learn. Our 21st-century students, heading to rigorous college work or the workplace, will benefit from the CCSS's shifts in literacy instruction, the classroom experiences that teachers will craft to transmit them, and the assessments that will inevitably measure these new directions.

A Ph.D. candidate in language arts and literacy at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell, Elise M. Frangos is the Director of English for the Massachusetts Math & Science Initiative, a nonprofit dedicated to increasing student success in Advanced Placement® courses.

— Elise M. Frangos
Center for K–12 Assessment & Performance Management at ETS

2010-12-01

http://tinyurl.com/7e5jkm5

NYC Teacher Performs One Woman Show at Cherry Lane

2012-02-21T00:39:00.002-05:00

Support a fellow teacher.
NYC teacher Elizabeth Rose opens her one woman show tomorrow night at the Cherry Lane. There are even some ed references in it. It will run through March 3. Tickets are $18.

RELATIVE PITCH

Written and performed by Elizabeth Rose
Mentored and directed by Gretchen Cryer

The Cherry Lane Theater's Mentor Project

Angelina Fiordelissi, Artistic Director

February 21 – March 3, 2012 PURCHASE TICKETS

Elizabeth Rose's RELATIVE PITCH is a one-woman musical comedy about the hilarious roller-coaster ride of a performing songwriter. Written and performed by Rose, the musical's score features 19 original songs (from opera to rap) to depict her story of a childhood in a noisy musical family through the Vietnam and Woodstock eras to an inner-city classroom where hip hop trumps the blues.
As a performer Elizabeth Rose's wide-ranging credits include having sung the National Anthem at Shea Stadium, composing music for Discovery Channel and PBS as well as for the film "Sex and the Other Man" starring Stanley Tucci. She created the music video "Leave Me Alone" featuring a cast of nonagenarians, wrote the hit single "I'm Too Beau'ful for You," and recorded an original CD "Sleep Naked." As an educator, she has raised over $300,000 for several NYC public schools.

The press links are:

http://broadwayworld.com/article/Cherry-Lane-2012-Mentor-Project-Kicks-Off-2

http://www.playbill.com/news/article/159514-Gretchen-Cryer-Will-Direct-Elizabeth-Roses-Relative-Pitch-at-Cherry-Lane

http://www.theatermania.com/off-off-broadway/news/02-2012/gretchen-cryer-to-direct-elizabeth-rose-in-relativ_49930.html

and...

The Cherry Lane Theatre's Mentor: Project:http://www.cherrylanetheatre.org/programs/mentor_project/

Website: www.elizabethrosemusic.com

Teaching Addict

2012-02-21T00:14:00.000-05:00

...the contribution I want to make now I want to make in the classroom. The difference between teaching and play-writing is not incomprehensible to me, they're not so different. They both create a public event that leads to understanding..... Teaching -- for Ms. Edson at least -- is a full-time occupation. She needs the summers, she said, to do nothing, because that makes you a more interesting person in the classroom... Margaret Edson, Pulitzer Prize winner and classroom teacher.

I love reading about teachers who love the process of classroom teaching. I never heard of Margaret Edson until today's Susan Ohanian update. I watched the video of her Smith commencement speech from 2008 and I think I'm in love.

Susan Notes:

Margaret Edson astounded the media when, as a kindergarten teacher, she won the Pulitzer for drama. And she gets more than ten minutes of fame. More than ten years later, the media stays fascinated. The media is amazed that a teacher is an intelligent person.

Margaret Edson now teaches sixth grade. She remains passionate about her calling. Her teacher calling. And we can all be grateful that the media is still interested enough to talk to her about her teaching.

Here is the transcript of Margaret Edson's 1999 appearance on the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. Here is video of her commencement address at Smith College, delivered without a written text.

Read a fascinating interview with Margaret Edson. Changing Gears but Retaining Dramatic Effect

---------------------
Debbie Meier often says that teaching kindergarten was one of the most intellectual challenges she faced. I loved the mechanisms of organizing a class of 4th, 5th or 6th graders and found intellectual challenges in figuring out a good seating chart or how to get coats hung in the wardrobe without them falling to the floor. Or how to get the idea of circumference across.

I was a classroom teaching addict for most of my first 20 years in the system and developed a superiority complex that I was doing the most important job in the school system. I was in the infantry and though I would never leave till they hauled me out. I certainly felt superior to people who did leave, even clusters or pull-out people. Unless they were older and had put in their time.

Then one day, I was older, with a principal who began to limit the control the teachers had over their classes through the institution of a high stakes testing program. I started thinking about leaving teaching altogether and even went back to school for a degree in computer science which led to part 2 of my career which I spent as a computer cluster and training teachers. I really can't say I was addicted to teaching once I left the elementary school classroom – once I was out of a classroom with a group of kids I would spend the day and the year with, I lost some of that passion. So reading about Edson was inspiring. Of course she didn't start teaching until she was in her late 30's and is in the early part of her 2nd decade. I hit that wall in the latter part of my 2nd decade. Here's hoping she never meets that wall.

Video: Williamsburg Parents Rise Up Against Success Charter Invasion at Hearing

2012-02-20T10:24:00.001-05:00

So much material, so little time. Here is the 2nd video from that Feb. 16 hearing. More to come later as I'm trying not to put up entire speeches but extract bits and pieces in order to keep the videos under 10 minutes.

http://youtu.be/02JYkc_ZaVc

In the meantime, Leonie Haimson has posted links to numerous videos with descriptions of each on her blog while pointing out how the NY Times totally misreported the story. Truly read their account and look at the videos. Her comments are so important I'm co-posting below.

http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2012/02/battle-for-soul-of-community-thursday.html

The battle for the soul of a community: scenes from contentious charter school hearing in S. Williamsburg -- and the memory of another controversial co-location 25 years ago

Please check out the videos of Thursday night’s contentious hearing on the proposed co-location of yet another branch of the Success Academy charter school, this one in IS 50 in South Williamsburg, a proposal that the entire community has risen up in opposition to, because of the discriminatory recruitment and enrollment policies of the hedge-fund backed Success Academy charters, their policy of pushing out high needs students, and the fact that there are four under-enrolled public elementary schools in this mostly Latino neighborhood within three blocks of the proposed charter.

Nearly 500 parents, teachers, students, and community leaders filled the large auditorium, with more than 80 of them speaking out against this co-location proposal, and fewer than five parents from Brooklyn spoke out in support. The rest of the audience consisted of parents bused in from the various Success charter schools in Harlem.

And yet NYTimes/Schoolbook story ran a highly inaccurate and biased account, showing a large photo of the Success Academy parents, captioned with " parents turned out to support the co-location of a Success Academy charter school at J.H.S. 50 John D. Wells in Williamsburg, Brooklyn", without explaining that they were bused in by the charter operator from Harlem. The article went on to give most of its space to comments from the handful of supporters of the charter school, including the chain’s founder, Eva Moskowitz, with almost no mention of the huge outcry from the hundreds of community leaders, elected officials, and local parents who came out to oppose it. (Read what Williamsburg & Greenpoint Parents for Our Public Schools says about the piece, and read the irate comments from parents and community members at the Schoolbook website.)

Instead, see the video of the nearly 500 parents, students, teachers and community members leading off the hearing, chanting, “Whose schools? OUR schools” and Ms. Denise Jamison Principal of IS 50, where the DOE plans to put the charter, saying how grateful she is for the support of the community.

Here's the video of Council Member Diana Reyna, pointing out that the District 14 Community Education Council that is supposed to preside over the hearing is not present because the members are boycotting it in protest; she says that we need the record to reflect that this proposal is not supported by this community. She recounts how in Sept. 1986, more than 700 parents at S. Williamsburg's PS 16 kept their children home from school-- a 90% absence rate -- in protest of a plan to create segregated classrooms in the school.

(This 1986 protest occurred in reaction to a Board of Education plan to construct barriers inside PS 16, and to hire Jewish teachers to provide remedial education to Hasidic girls enrolled in a nearby yeshiva, in classes held in separate classrooms from PS 16’s mostly Latino students. The parents of PS 16 protested that this segregation was not only discriminatory but would also cause more overcrowded classes for their own children. The plan also required the displacement of 69 students with disabilities to other public schools -- to make way for the Hasidic classes. The parents of PS 16 sued, asking the court to block this plan, and subsequently won on appeal. Here is an excerpt of the decision from the US Court of Appeals:

....each day, the public school students would observe some 390 Beth Rachel students arrive at P.S. 16. The Beth Rachel students would be taught in classrooms only they may use; no public school students would be taught either in those classes or in those rooms. Yiddish would be spoken in the Beth Rachel classes. Only Hasidic girls would be taught; those girls would be allowed no contact with boys. Only female teachers would teach the Hasidic girls. And where once there was an open corridor allowing freedom to traverse the entire hall, there are now a wall and doors partitioning the Beth Rachel girls from the public school students....

The lengths to which the City has gone to cater to these religious views, which are inherently divisive, are plainly likely to be perceived, by the Hasidim and others, as governmental support for the separatist tenets of the Hasidic faith. Worse still, to impressionable young minds, the City's Plan may appear to endorse not only separatism, but the derogatory rationale for separatism expressed by some of the Hasidim.)

Here's another video clip, where CM Reyna says that DOE has abandoned our public schools; despite the fact that our students have a basic unmet human right for quality education. Evelyn Cruz, representing Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez, ironically “thanks” DOE for once again dividing parents, children and neighborhoods, and disenfranchising them throughout the city.

Rob Solano, head of Churches United for Fair Housing and former IS 50 student, then speaks out in support of the public shool and against the charter co-location: “this is where I learned how to be a boy and then a man and learned about the world,” Ruben Flores, lead organizer for Churches United For Fair Housing also speaks out against the proposal.

More video as Khem Irby, CEC member from District 13, says that Brooklyn does not need any more charter schools, which are here for only one purpose: the money, and not about education. As a former charter parent, she understands the abuse that happens to children in charter schools and that they do not need this in any of their communities, and parents are forming a united front in Districts 13, 14 and 15 against any more charters in their neighborhoods.

I berate the two DOE officials presiding over the hearings, Gregg Betheil and Paymon Rouhanifard. I say they should be ashamed of themselves and ask if they went into education to provoke the kind of division, anger and resentment seen tonight; I urge them to tell whoever who is making this decision to say no to this charter school; as there has to be someone in the city with the balls or guts to say no to Eva. I add that if there was one thing good that came out of this evening, it is that it is clear that NYC parents love their public schools and want them protected and supported, no matter how hard the DOE has tried to destroy them through budget cuts, test prep and rising class sizes. Lastly, I recount how at the recent City Council hearings on college readiness, the only thing the Council and the DOE agreed upon was that El Puente is a great school and should be replicated; with DOE officials repeating this several times. So why don’t they replicate El Puente here and create a great 6-12 school, instead of bringing in a charter school that no one in the community wants or needs?

The videos end with Luis Garden Acosta founder and President of El Puente, thanking Ellen McHugh of the Citywide Council for Special Education, for taking a strong stand in favor of the community and against the charter school co-location. He concludes by saying, tonight the DOE has heard from white, Latino and black parents, all opposed to this proposal; from students, teachers, and community leaders; from our City Councilmember, our State Senator, and our member of Congress; in fact, they've heard from the entire Southside community in opposition, what else does it take? He then leads us in a chant, “the People united will never be defeated,” first in English then in Spanish, and we walk out together, leaving the auditorium empty except for the DOE and their clients, the charter school operators and the parents they bused in from Harlem.

Honk if You're Proud of the UFT

2012-02-20T09:30:00.000-05:00

Chicago teacher Katie Osgood @KatieOsgood_tweeted

I am SO proud of the CTU! "Chicago & NYC school reform: Creating possibilities versus surrendering without a struggle" http://newpol.org/node/599

So, are any of you feeling proud of the UFT/Unity Caucus machine? I know of at least one Unity Caucus chapter leader at a school threatened with closing who was handing out donuts to "celebrate" the union's "victory" in the recent agreement in ed evals. And if you checked out my last blog on the Moskowitz invasion in Williamsburg, the UFT has zero presence leaving the community to fight the massive machine on its own --- UFT leaders are fraidy cats when it comes to Eva. Or just about everything. Just check some Unity comments on this blog --- something like if you're not part of the conversation -- blah, blah, blah. Occupy a few schools threatened with being closed and you'll be part of the conversation soon enough.

Here is the Lois Weiner piece Katie was referring to.

Chicago and NYC school reform: Creating possibilities versus surrendering without a struggle
Lois Weiner February 19, 2012
As I write, the Brian Piccolo Specialty School in Humboldt Park, Chicago is occupied by parents, teachers, and students, with Occupy Chicago and others camped outside the schol in solidarity. The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) is building this movement, with a wonderful wholeheartedness and passion. Bravo! The union is showing both brawn and brains. In another sign of its commitment to fight hard for the education low-income kids deserve, the CTU has released an excellent report on what we should demand of politicians who say they want to improve the schools. Another part of the Chicago strategy is using the courts. Parents are the backbone here but as a long-time community organizer in Chicago wrote me, "Honestly, we could not have done this without a progressive union leadership."

In contrast, the New York State teachers union (NYSUT) has signed an agreement that is an abject surrender of teachers' professional dignity and tightens the stranglehold of standardized tests. Let us hope - and mobilize - so that this Faustian agreement does not become the "national model" that NYSUT (and NYC) teachers union leaders would like it to be. Consider that NYSUT applauded this agreement that allows up to 40% of teachers' evaluations to be based on their students' progress on standardized tests. Yet, according to NYSUT's own poll conducted in January, two-thirds of parents "believe there is too much emphasis on state testing in public schools." Public opposition to testing has been organized by parent and teacher groups independent of the national unions, which are fearful of angering the corporate media and its political friends. Is there a principle for which the NYC and NY state teachers unions will really fight? Hmmm... maybe the right to collect dues?

We have a tale of school systems in two cities being demolished with the same policies of privatization, school closure, and deprofessionalization of teaching. In Chicago, the teachers union has mobilized with parents and activists to turn the tide. In New York, the teachers union signs and applauds a deal that endangers the job security of teachers who want to use their creativity, skill, and knowledge to teach in ways that are meaningful to kids. Chicago shows us resistance can be mobilized, if a union leadership has the heart and vision, knows how to empower its members, and can work respectfully with parents.
Lois Weiner's blog
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Meanwhile, back at the ranch, blogger Under Assault makes a rare appearance since retirement with some comments on the teacher eval system, which she terms (d)evaluation. Nice.

"An almost total capitulation by the union"
You can read Jeff's whole analysis of the new (d)evaluation system on the ICE blog, which he ends with a very dark prediction:
If today's agreement becomes our actual teacher evaluation system, then there will more than likely be massive teacher firings beginning in 2014.

Some of the comments are worth a chuckle. There's a lass called Sandra who thinks getting tenure in the old days was a "gift":
I don't feel one bit of pity to those teachers who were gifted tenure back in those days of desperation and think that that should save them from a true evaluation of their effectiveness ...
I'll be damned if I know what she means by "those days of desperation." I'm assuming Sandra was a youngster when the rest of us were chewing our fingernails over the Board of Ed's certification tests. The music exam was distinctly uncomfortable, even with a Masters and heading into a doctorate. You couldn't just swim in on Music Appreciation and your instrument. There were also tests on piano performance and sight-reading, and the whole thing only came around every few years. Tough titties if you failed it, because no one was going to give you NYC certification or tenure without it.

Ah, those were the days, when deep knowledge of a subject was actually valued. Now your career's a coin coss: heads if your administrator recognizes and respects variations in style, personality and methodology and makes use of your talents, tails if your evaluation is scripted by an inexperienced Tweedle or a politically appointed senior administrator.

I have to credit Wiki for using the Michelangelo painting as an antecedent of our "Perp walk."

Neat.

Williamsburg Responds to Success Charter Invasion

2012-02-20T00:37:00.000-05:00

There is so much to this story I don't know where to start. I'll have to do a bunch of stories.

A 2nd hearing for Eva's co-loco at MS 50 in Williamsburg was held on Feb. 16.
The legal hearing was originally held on Jan. 17, 2012 where there was only 1 person who spoke in favor of Success while hundreds of community people were opposed. So the NYCDOE invented an excuse to have a repeat hearing to give Success Academy an opportunity to create a semblance of support. Not being able to recruit more than 3 local supporters, the charter chain had to bring in 4 busloads of people from Harlem to create the illusion of support

There's lots of irony here in that most of the people Eva brought into a mostly Latino community were Black --- other than the almost all white Success handlers (plantation politics). It was pointed out time and again that Success put their ads not near the MS 50 building but in white areas where they spent a fortune in advertising (and they still couldn't find more than 3 people to support them). Talk about people being used. They came on as if they were out to save the poor kids of Williamsburg without questioning why Eva is no longer trying to help all those children in Harlem who are still "stuck" in public schools there but didn't make the lottery. You see, Success has done all the creaming it in Harlem could and doesn't want the rest of the Harlem kids. Do they know Eva is now trolling for wealthy white people for schools these very people she brought from Harlem whose kids would not be welcome in the Brooklyn gentrified Success schools?

GEM had 3 cameras in the room and outside. I'm working on a few videos. More later.

Here is the first one where I start out questioning the HSA people -- check the arrogance of some -- and an amazing parent with 3 kids at PS 84 interjects.

http://youtu.be/S8i1wHhCR5I

Wllmsbg/Grnpt parents respond to distorted NY Times School Book report of the meeting:

We wrote a response to the crummy reporting at School Book (http://
www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2012/02/17/huge-turnout-over-new-williamsburg-charter-school/) on the co-location hearing Thursday night. It's posted on our website
with pictures of the busses that have HSA signs on them:

http://www.williamsburggreenpointschools.org/news

Pat D from GEM/ICE did these videos of the press conference in front of MS 50 before the meeting. (view them from bottom up).

http://www.youtube.com/my_videos

[20120216051927 Press Conf. ] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jisWuHn-GUg
[20120216051754 Press Conf.] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXf1yafTBGw
[20120216051339 press Conf.] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2awSbF0ofHI
[20120216051207 Press Conf.] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpkeDv3tV4

[20120216050916 Press Conf.] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VomJSAW3Su

20120216050509 Press Conf.] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1wnJdAufYs
[20120216050245 Press Conf.] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qgRDZniStY
[20120216045955 Press Conf.] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5M_ARPtCP0
[20120216045241 Press Conf.] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Z0XF8CS1i4

PEP Popping: The Play’s the Thing Plus Jones/Casey Pre-PEP Debate and Mulgrew on Mic Check

2012-02-18T15:15:00.004-05:00

Casey claims Ed Notes criticisms of the UFT leadership is reason for UFT refusal to go along with the coalition.

Below is my column in the Feb. 17, 2012 edition of The Wave: www.rockawave.com (modified from the original) along with a short video demonstrating the UFT double or triple switch before and during the PEP. It begins with me following Leo Casey handing out leaflets to Occupy DOE activists urging them not to go in to the PEP but to join the UFT in a march to an alternate location and a debate between Brian Jones and Casey about what seemed to be a change in the UFT position that they would go in initially to support the People's mic and then walk out and march to the other school. Instead there were rumors the UFT was using scare tactics to tell people that there might be violence and arrests which Brian alludes to but Casey denies. Also that buses were being diverted away from Tech. It ends with Mulgrew using the People's mic and the buses coming back an hour into the meeting. Honestly, people truly cheered the UFT on its turnaround at the end of the day, me included. I'm a wus.

http://youtu.be/sYiDN1tpP3U

Gotham Schools' Goeff Decker also shot some of the same footage from a different angle and put up about a minute of it http://youtu.be/LCaLougjqLs.

I'm working on a more extensive video that shows how I confronted UFT officials and how they reacted plus the ODOE folks directly challenging the UFT with union songs. And a video that captures the intensity of that evening inside the PEP. You also should check out the video Darren made of politicians trashing Bloomberg at the UFT press conference across the street. Check the post below this or http://youtu.be/LCaLougjqLs.

Don't get me wrong. In fact ODOE in the end did decide to walk out and so in some ways the UFT and ODOE came together.

I need to do an analysis of exactly what went on that day but the fact that Casey attempted to blame me was a blatant attempt to get my fellow activists to use a decision by the UFT for a number of reasons (like they wanted to separate themselves from ODOE as a way of showing Bloomberg they were "reasonable") that have nothing to do with me to pressure me to tone down my critiques of Unity. Actually, he has tried this with a bunch of people I know (sort of how can you hang with that lunatic type of stuff) and in fact I have tried to bend over a bit in their direction when I'm told I am going too far.

All day on Feb. 9 as I heard that they were going to work with ODOE I was giving them creds --- until they changed position in a memo from Leroy Barr at 2:45. You should read that post if you haven't to get the feeling on the ground at 3:30PM: Occupy and Stay! Don't Walk Away as UFT Changes Plan...

Ok, enough of that --- here's the column.

PEP Popping: The Play’s the Thing

By Norm Scott

Setting: Thursday, February 9, 2012, 5-11PM

Brooklyn Technical HS, housed in an 8 story fortress like building in Fort Greene on Dekalb Avenue. A very tall antenna sits on the roof – a landmark you can spot from far away. There's a double level balcony in the auditorium, one of the largest in the city schools. The Panel for Educational Policy will be meeting to vote to phase out 23 schools. Over 2000 people will fill the space to say “no” to school closings.

The Players

Tweedie-Dees and Tweedie-Dums: Anyone connected with the NYCDOE.

Panel for Educational Policy (PEP): Bloomberg puppet dominated board of education with 8 mayoral appointees and 5 borough president appointees.

Occupy DOE (ODOE): a coalition of forces and offshoot of OWS aiming to take over the meeting by holding its own meeting using the people’s mic to give people from closing schools a chance to speak on their terms by drowning out the audio from the amplified sound. The ultimate goal is to force the Panel to hold the vote in such chaos they violate the open meetings law, provoking a possible court case to invalidate the vote.

Coalition for Educational Justice (CEJ): an Annenberg Institute backed coalition of community organizations, organizing parents and students at a number of closing schools. They will march to Brooklyn Tech and join ODOE in the use of the people’s mic with students from closing schools playing a major role.

UFT (playing the role of Hamlet): To go or not to go into the PEP or march instead to an alternate site, that is the question. Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of those ODOE and CEJ people who enter the PEP to challenge the forces of the vassals of King Bloomberg or to take arms against a sea of closing schools and by opposing end them. Unlike Hamlet, the UFT takes a halfway position. At first they say they will go in with ODOE and CEJ and then walk out en masse with the hope everyone else goes with them four blocks away to an alternate site where they have 600 seats reserved. ODOE, CEJ, the NAACP and other groups allied with the UFT are balking, saying they don’t intend to leave. The UFT will flip-flop – more than once as the evening goes on.

Dmytro Fedkowskyj: Queens borough rep appointed by Borough President Helen Marshall who has was often silent on the ed deforms under Bloomberg but has been increasingly vocal.

The Action

5PM: The UFT, which originally was supposed to enter the PEP and join ODOE in making noise and using the People’s Mic, changes policy. Rumors circulate that they are diverting the buses from the closing schools away from Brooklyn Tech and sending them directly to PS 20 four blocks away where they would get to make statements about their schools to politicians. The UFT holds a rally across Dekalb Ave. from Tech in front of Fort Greene Park. Many schools on the school closing list are there and some have mixed feelings between following the UFT lead in not going in or joining ODOE inside the PEP and using the People’s mic to have their say.

Occupy DOE sets up with their signs directly across Dekalb and starts serenading the people at the UFT rally with union songs. Some cross the street to lobby people to join them inside to help disrupt the meeting. ODOE distributes palm cards saying, “Occupy and Stay, Don’t Walk Away.” There is a mixed reaction as some say they would go in if the UFT said it is OK. At this point the UFT sticks to its guns and officials, including HSVP Leo Casey start passing out leaflets urging people affiliated with ODOE to not go in but go to PS 20 instead. [See video of GEM/ODOE Brian Jones having a conversation with Casey about the actions of the UFT.

5:30: CEJ marching from Flatbush Ave along Dekalb arrives with masses of cheering students and everyone starts entering the auditorium past a massive police presence. The UFT is supposed to send in HSVP Leo Casey with 10 reps from closing schools in each borough to get to a mic and urge people to leave. It doesn’t happen.

6-8PM: The orchestra fills up and people are making lots of noise. “Whose schools? Our schools.” “What does democracy look like? This is what democracy looks like.” As the meeting starts, ODOE people and the students start shouting “mic check” and begin the people’s mic where one person makes a short statement and everyone repeats it. The space is so big much of what is said gets lost. Lots of people are not really clear on how to use this technique. Politicians get to speak first and when they use the amplified mic they are shouted down with chants of “use the people’s mic.” Some work their way through the crowd and join in with ODOE.

Once it is clear that no one is leaving, the UFT reverses direction again and decide to stay. UFT sends emissaries to ODOE to say UFT President Mulgrew wants to use the people’s mic. They welcome him with cheers. The UFT sends the people back from PS 20 to Tech. Many in the upstart ODOE group feel they have won a pissing contest with the UFT Goliath.

Things get increasingly chaotic. The DOE cranks up the decibel level of the amplified sound which begins to drown out the people’s mic. People begin to speak at the regular mic. ODOE is in some retreat. Students decide to walk out and meet in the lobby where a student led people’s mic takes place with passionate statements defending their schools. They decide to go back in and continue the battle. Police block the doors. There is much pushing and shoving with charges that a lockout constitutes a violation of the open meeting law. Police stand aside. Students flood into the left aisle.

Some in ODOE are getting worried the extremely volatile situation might lead to police overreaction and a decision is made to have one speaker use the amplified mic with a speech urging people to leave, an ironic twist given ODOE had been urging people to stay ‘till the bitter end.” But staying and listening passively to each 2 minute plea to save a school, only to know that the PEP will vote to close them anyway is just not in the DNA of many ODOE people. Most people leave with just a few hundred left to harass the PEP as they vote to close the schools. The meeting drones on for hours with speakers pouring their hearts out in 2-minute segments about why their schools should not be phased out.

The finale

Before the meeting ends at 11PM, the panel members from the boroughs force Dennis Walcott and other DOE officials to justify the closing of schools. It is here that Queens rep Dmytro Fedkowskyj comes up big, real big. Fedkowskyj questions DOE officials Dennis Walcott, Marc Sternberg and Shael Polokow-Suransky with an intensity and seething anger not seen before, forcing them to defend the concept that closing schools is a solution. Fedkowskyj makes a passionate statement (nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2012/02/dmytro-fedkowskyj-on-why-he-voted-no-on.html) , joining the Bronx, Brooklyn and Manhattan reps who also stand firm in defense of the schools in their boroughs. In the end all four vote against the closing of every school. Only the Staten Island rep stands with the eight Bloomberg panel members. The remnants of ODOE heckle and boo as the vote is taken.

As the audience files out, James Eterno, union rep from Jamaica HS, who sat through the same kind of vote to close his school a year ago, says, “No matter how many times I come here and see the PEP vote to shut down schools, it never stops the hurt. It’s like watching a death in the family.”

Postscript: Monday, February 13

Queens Borough President Helen Marshall (who has often supported Bloomberg or been mostly silent on education issues) and Fedkowskyj host a hearing at borough hall for the eight so-called “turn-around” schools in the borough faced with closing in the next round where at least 50% of the teachers will be replaced, vowing to push back against the DOE, which has been accused of holding these schools hostage to force the union into agreeing to a plan to evaluate teachers based 40% on one test score a year. Gotham Schools reports, “Marshall often clapped and cheered as she listened to dozens of teachers and families defend their schools. Occasionally she even interjected to describe how her respect for teachers developed over years of working as an early childhood educator.” Is it possible the message is seeping through? That handing total power over the school system to one person is a very dangerous thing?

From GEM/Real Reform Studios: Outside the PEP – Electeds Slam Bloomberg Ed Failures

2012-02-17T23:02:00.000-05:00

Another great film from GEM's Real Reform Studios pre-PEP before the Feb. 9 meeting at the UFT rally at Fort Greene Park where numerous elected officials, most of them from the communities under assault by the Bloomberg privatization machine slam his failed school leadership. Another great job by DM at RRS.

http://youtu.be/Ulr8Bv_T0Vw

WalBloom's Worst Nightmare

Check out this news from Chicago TU (Where would the UFT stand if parents occupy a school in NYC slated for closure?)

CTU supports Piccolo Parents in their Occupation of their Neighborhood School #takebackourschools

Occupy Chicago Stands with Parents, Teachers & the CTU | Occupy Chicago

Breaking News! Piccolo parents defend their school, children and teachers, protest “Turnaround”

02/17/2012

This afternoon Piccolo Elementary parents held a Press Conference to defend their school. They announced that they will occupy Piccolo to protest the Board of Education’s plans. The Board plans to vote on Wednesday to turnaround Piccolo and hand over management of the school to AUSL, Academy for Urban School Leadership, a privately connected firm with ties to City Hall. For the time being, you can follow what's happening on Occupy Chicago'sUStream account.
“For months now, Piccolo parents have wanted their voices heard, but the mayor, CPS and members of the Board have given them a deaf ear,” said CTU President Karen GJ Lewis. “Tonight these courageous parents have decided to dramatize their efforts to save their school by engaging in non-violent protest. We stand in solidarity with them, as well as the thousands of parents and community leaders from other targeted communities, in our ongoing education justice fight. We call on CPS to invest in our under-resourced neighborhood schools and halt its plans to turn them over to AUSL or shut them down all together.”
To support the parents of Piccolo, go to Piccolo School, 1040 N. Keeler. Bring friends, food, blankets, and water. Support Our Schools, Don’t Close Them!
Get text updates from CTU!
Send a text to 69238 (MYAFT) with "CTU1" as the body of the message.
*Your carrier's messaging and data rates may apply
Click here to watch a video from the press conference.

Comments on Evaluation Agreement - Not good

2012-02-16T23:53:00.000-05:00

UPDATE: See the follow-up article on reactions of principals below.

I'm just back from the Success Charter hearing at MS 50 so I am just catching up on the evaluation agreement. Of course, knowing the UFT I don't need to see no stinkin' agreement to know it sucks but why not let experts confirm my instinct.

I'm just going to post James Eterno at the ICE blog and Leonie Haimson who both seem to see this as bad news. You know I'm always amazed when savvy people tell me that Mulgrew would never give on this or that because it would destroy the union. Coming Next: the ATRs.

NYC Public School Parents: Leonie's take on the teacher evaluation deal announced today in Albany

http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2012/02/my-take-on-teacher-evaluation-deal.html
Leonie heard more bad news and followed with:

only 13% of teachers will have independent review the 1st year of a an "ineffective" rating from a principal, and none the second year, according to GothamSchools.

See statement below from SED. The agreement is as bad as could be imagined and considerably worse than it was before.

“The remaining subjective, collectively bargained 60 percent must consist of tightly defined, research backed measures. “

As though anything in this ridiculous plan – esp. his test score 40% -- which is really 100% the way I read it – is research-backed!

Teachers rated ineffective on student performance based on objective assessments must be rated ineffective overall.

So tell me what’s the point of the 40%? Why isn’t it really 100%? Does this make any sense?

The Commissioner has the authority to require corrective action, including the use of independent evaluators, when districts evaluate their teachers positively regardless of students’ academic progress;

What a dictator. So even after we’re finally through w/ Bloomberg we’re stuck w/ this guy?

Duncan gives his blessing to the NY deal; says it was “union imagined” and claims there’s “strong evidence” for the turnaround model:

“The turnaround method has already shown strong results in other states,” he said. ”We have coming out soon some data on the first year those schools that are being turned around, and we are seeing some amazing success stories around the country: dropout rates going down, graduation rates going up, test scores increasing in the double digits.”
Whenever you see double digit increases in test scores, it’s probably fraudulent.

NEWS: Arne Duncan: NY overcame “stumbling block” with evals deal

James Eterno at ICE

EVALUATION AGREEMENT BAD NEWS FOR TENURED TEACHERS
The UFT and New York State United Teachers (All of the local unions in the state) gave away the store in today's agreements with the city and the State Education Department concerning teacher evaluations. This is part of a 2010 law that New York State passed to try to get Federal Race to the Top money. Details had to be negotiated with unions. While we still don't have a final agreement on a new evaluation system in New York City, what is emerging is a system with few safeguards that has the potential to allow the Department of Education to terminate many tenured teachers starting in 2014.

At the state level, the NYSUT lawsuit on evaluations was resolved by today's agreement with the state. 40% of a teacher's annual rating will be based upon student performance on tests, with half of that 40% being standardized tests and the other half being locally developed assessments (whatever that means) that the State Education Department must approve. The other 60% will be based on subjective measures such as principal observations and they can throw in some peer review, parent review or student review if the local district and union want to.

The overall grade to achieve a passing rating for the year will be 65. Scores of 0-64 will result in an ineffective rating, 65-74 will mean a developing rating, 75-90 will mean an effective rating and 91-100 will translate into highly effective. However, if a teacher is rated ineffective in the student test score portion, the teacher cannot get a passing grade.

Also, if a principal doesn't like a teacher and does hatchet jobs in observations, it appears to me that huge test score gains will not save the teacher. There are so many ways to fail teachers here.

People say we shouldn't worry because we have tenure but two ineffective ratings in a row shifts the burden of proof onto the teacher to prove that he/she is not incompetent. That will not be easy. One wonders why NYSUT would agree to any of this and not just tell the State to turn down the federal money that we would lose if there was no agreement.

As for New York City, the UFT held out in negotiations with the city for a stronger appeal process for teachers rated ineffective. The DOE walked out of negotiations during the Christmas break and proceeded to announce that they would close most of the transformation-restart schools that were supposed to be the first to use the new evaluation system. The UFT wanted teachers rated ineffective to have a review before an independent arbitrator while the DOE held that teachers should have a review by the Chancellor like the U rating appeal process where teachers lose 99.6% of these appeals.

The compromise that was reached today was, as usual, an almost total capitulation by the union. 13% of teachers rated ineffective can have an appeal before a three person panel. One of the panel members will be chosen by the union, one by DOE and the third person will be selected by the first two. That is truly an independent appeal process but according to President Mulgrew's email to us, "The union can identify up to 13% of all ineffective ratings each year to challenge on grounds of harassment or other matters not related to performance." It will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to prove harassment if the students didn't succeed on the tests or a teacher's performance in class was rated ineffective by the principal. Also, it is the UFT who decides which teachers get to have their case heard by the independent panel. There will be no favoritism there right? It gets worse.

The other 87% rated ineffective can only appeal to the chancellor just like the current U rating appeal process. One does not need a crystal ball to predict that teachers will continue to have virtually no chance in these hearings. However the UFT says don't worry because, "A teacher who has an ineffective rating the following year will receive an independent validator. (The person is chosen through a joint process and will not be a UFT or DOE employee.) The independent evaluator will observe the teacher at least three times during the school year and issue a report with his or her rating of the teacher."

This process sounds eerily like Peer Intervention Plus to me. In PIP+ people not employed by UFT or DOE observe U rated teachers and basically rubber stamp the U's in most cases. If the validator agrees that the teacher is not ineffective, then that evidence can be used in a 3020A hearing (tenure hearing) to help the teacher as the burden of proof would then fall on the DOE but if the validator validates the ineffective rating as they usually do in PIP+, then the teacher would carry the burden of proof in the tenure hearing and the chances of staying on the job will be slim and none in my opinion.

Tenure will be significantly weakened if this evaluation system is finalized. The local assessments still have to be negotiated by the UFT and DOE. A best case scenario is that there will never be an agreement on the local assessments and this whole new evaluation process will then collapse under the weight of its stupidity. What are going to be the assessments for teachers in non regents subjects in the high school for example?

The only way to stop any of this from going into effect is for us to raise our collective voices loudly and say that we're not going to voluntarily walk into the guillotine. If today's agreement becomes our actual teacher evaluation system, then there will more than likely be massive teacher firings beginning in 2014.

If there is anything positive to take from today's events, it's that President Mulgrew was there with the governor announcing the deal and maybe they are developing the kind of bond we can use to influence the state to pass legislation to end mayoral control now before the school system is completely destroyed.

PS-For those expecting our monthly Delegate Assembly report, I was stuck on the platform waiting for the 7 train for a long time yesterday, as a train was stuck one station ahead, so I missed most of the DA. The resolutions that passed were not controversial and some of the Presidents' report, I am told, was about the evaluation issue so I am skipping doing a report which today is obsolete. If anyone else wants to do it, email me at savejamaicahighschool@gmail.com and I will post it.

Leonie posts:

Carol Burris, principal, on new teacher Evaluation Agreement

Carol is courageous Long Island principal who co-authored of a letter, signed onto by about one third of all NYS principals, protesting the NYS teacher evaluation system.

Her follow-up article for the Washington Post Answer Sheet was called, “Forging ahead with a nutty teacher evaluation plan.”

Below is the email she sent out, late last night; below that is a message from by the State superintendent association, and below that, a statement by Commissioner King and Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch, explaining the agreement announced yesterday.

Clearly the agreement as summarized by King below says that test scores will trump all, as “Teachers rated ineffective on student performance based on objective assessments must be rated ineffective overall.”

In addition, the Commissioner can reject any locally devised system that isn’t “rigorous” enough, and can require “corrective” action if “districts evaluate their teachers positively regardless of students’ academic progress”, i.e. refuse to rate them as ineffective based on test scores alone.

This all will be done by means of unreliable state tests that in recent years have been repeatedly shown to be defective, and by means of a “growth” model that has been shown to have even less reliability.

The only possible meaning of “multiple measures” in this context is that there are multiple ways to ensure that a teacher can be judged as a failure.

From: Carol Burris

Sent: Thursday, February 16, 2012 10:16 PM

Dear friends,

Every teacher I know in NY is in a state of shock after seeing what NYSUT agreed to. I think principals were somewhat prepared, but I do believe that teachers had hoped that somehow NYSUT would come through for them. The power transferred to the commissioner is unprecedented. The governor's 'shot clock' flies in the face of the Taylor Law. The fact that Randi Weingarten applauded this agreement is beyond comprehension. Teachers feel abandoned.

The governor who just last week said "I am the government" is a bully who is now thumping his chest in victory as the 'student lobbyist'. My greatest fear is that educators will be so discouraged they will bow their heads. Anything you can write, post, blog or send as an editorial in the next days and weeks will help to lift spirits. I know Sean and I will keep the letter going but we will need your help in keeping resistance to this wrongheaded policy alive. thank you for all you do. Carol

From: Bob Lowry [mailto:boblowry@nyscoss.org]
Sent: Thursday, February 16, 2012 3:51 PM
To: superintendentsonly@listserver.nyscoss.org
Subject: NYSCOSS Superintendents Only Listserv: SED Statement on Evaluation Agreement

Below is the State Education Department’s news release on the SED-NYSUT agreement on teacher/principal evaluations announced earlier today.
This release provides a few more details, some of which are encouraging – for example: “Appeals must be timely and expeditious and districts may terminate probationary teachers/principals or grant or deny tenure while an appeal is pending.”
Some portions of the agreement will require changes in law which the Governor will propose as amendments to his budget. Those must be submitted to the Legislature today, but we have yet to see those. That makes it hard to take a firm bottom-line position.
STATE EDUCATION DEPARTMENT

News
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE February 16, 2012
For More Information Contact:
Tom Dunn, Jonathan Burman or Jane Briggs
(518) 474-1201
www.nysed.gov

CHANCELLOR TISCH AND COMMISSIONER KING
PRAISE EVALUATION AGREEMENT

Board of Regents Chancellor Merryl H. Tisch and State Education Commissioner John B. King, Jr. said today the newly agreed upon teacher and principal evaluation system was made possible by a collaborative willingness to implement a process that will help improve student performance. The two education leaders praised Governor Cuomo’s leadership in driving a resolution to the complicated negotiations. King said the new system will protect more than $2.5 billion in federal Race to the Top funds and other education funds over two years, and, more importantly, help improve student performance.
"This agreement is a significant improvement over the evaluation law passed in 2010," Chancellor Tisch said. "But our work is by no means over. The Regents have adopted a major education reform plan, and teacher and principal evaluations are just a part of that reform. Today is a good day, but the best day will be when we’ve fully implemented the Regents reforms and we’ve made sure all our students get the education they need to succeed in college and careers."
"The goal is and always has been to help students – to give them every opportunity to succeed in college and careers," Commissioner King. "To make that happen, we need to improve teaching and learning. We owe it to our students to make sure every classroom is led by an effective teacher and every school is led by an effective principal. Today, the Governor’s leadership and his commitment to our students have helped us take a strong step toward that goal."
King said teachers will be rated as either ineffective; developing; effective; or highly effective based on a scale of 100 points.
Other key provisions of the agreement include:
·       State assessments can be used for up to 40 percent of the evaluation if the local 20 percent share based on state assessments is used differently and collectively bargained;
·       The remaining subjective, collectively bargained 60 percent must consist of tightly defined, research backed measures. A majority (at least 31 percent) of the 60 percent must be based on classroom observations by a principal or trained administrator;
·       There must be multiple observations and at least one observation must be unannounced;
·       Teachers rated ineffective on student performance based on objective assessments must be rated ineffective overall. Teachers who are developing or ineffective will get assistance and support to improve performance. Teachers who remain ineffective can be removed from classrooms;
·       All evaluations must be done annually by September 1;
·       All evaluation plans are subject to review and approval by the Commissioner to ensure rigor, quality and consistency with standards;
·       The Commissioner has the authority to require corrective action, including the use of independent evaluators, when districts evaluate their teachers positively regardless of students’ academic progress; and
·       Appeals must be timely and expeditious and districts may terminate probationary teachers/principals or grant or deny tenure while an appeal is pending.
King noted Governor Cuomo has included a "shot clock" in his budget proposal to link implementation of the new teacher evaluation system to increases in school aid. Districts not finalizing an approvable evaluation plan by next January risk losing their share of state aid increases. King said setting a deadline with consequences for districts will help ensure prompt effective implementation of the new evaluation system.
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New York State Board of Regents
The State Education Department / The University of the State of New York / Albany, NY 12234
Office of Communications / (518) 474-1201
Robert Lowry
Deputy Director for Advocacy, Research and Communications
New York State Council of School Superintendents
7 Elk Street
Albany, NY 12207
518-449-1063
www.nyscoss.org
Check out our blog too: blog.nyscoss.org

UFT and City Reach Deal on Evals

2012-02-16T11:54:00.000-05:00

Ben Chapman @NYDNBenChapman

Breaking: Teachers union and city reach historic deal on teacher evaluations. Daily News exclusive nydn.us/z16vbP

Teacher Letter to Mulgrew on TDR Release: Demand Release of Administrator Rankings

2012-02-16T09:15:00.001-05:00

You need to accuse the mayor and the DOE of promoting low ranked teachers to leadership positions as administrators and hiding it from the public---and you need to point out that there are former NYC "low ranked" teachers who now have students with higher scores in the burbs----to point out the inaccuracy/waste of taxpayers dollars etc... of this nonsense. ---- NYC Teacher to Mulgrew

What a delicious idea. With so many loser admins running around who couldn't teach their way out of a paper bag, how about demanding the release of their data reports when they were teaching --- if they taught at all. I mean, these are the people observing and supervising teachers.

But we do mixed feelings about what is being asked for if you claim the reports are not accurate for teachers. On the other hand, with so many administrators being protected and given bonuses it might be fun to see the results.

Dear Colleagues:
Now is the time to demand that the UFT stand up and shout out the mayor and the DOE. Our new evaluations will also be made public and our names and ratings will be printed in the NYPOST. Forward this to all NYC teachers in your address books. I am sending the below in an email. I suggest you email as well if you agree.
Roseanne

Dear Mr. Mulgrew:
Now that the DOE must release TDR info to the press and names will appear in newspapers, is it not the best time to insist that they include all current administrators who had TDRs as teachers as well as teachers who left the system for the suburbs? And if they do not----you need to scream "COVER-UP"---- You need to accuse the mayor and the DOE of promoting low ranked teachers to leadership positions as administrators and hiding it from the public---and you need to point out that there are former NYC "low ranked" teachers who now have students with higher scores in the burbs----to point out the inaccuracy/waste of taxpayers dollars etc... of this nonsense. I have no TDR reports---but I am outraged for my colleagues who do have them. Anything less shows us you are not committed to the cause. I want to know what my APs' rankings were as teachers. If you want us to believe you are truly in our corner, demand it and make those demands loudly and publicly. Anything less is insufficient and a waste of union time and effort.

Roseanne McCosh

WAGPOPS Supports SCSC and Public Schools

2012-02-15T14:37:00.001-05:00

Come see WAGPOPS and SCSC in action together at MS 50 (South 3rd between Roebling and Diggs) hearing for Eva's Success Academy, Thursday, Feb. 16, starting with a march at 4PM.

We sent this to the NYPost today and asked that they print it is an OpEd piece. We highly doubt that it will get published.

In response to:

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/good_school_for_all_fNkzyqfPs3wpBrR1JSC0JP

Op Ed: Response to Jane Rentas', "A Good School for All"

Janet Rentas' dilemma that she spells out in her OpEd column, "A Good School for All," is a common one. Her son is a high-achiever and she doesn't believe that her zoned school will be able to challenge him. Many parents of early readers feel that way across New York City.   Rentas, however, is mistaken in her belief that the only option available in her district is Success Academy Williamsburg, whose co-location is being vociferously protested by the prominent Latino leadership in the area where the charter school intends to co-locate.

Success Academy Williamsburg is far from Rentas' only choice as a parent of a high-achieving child. Rentas could enroll her son in the OTHER Success Academy that will open this fall in her district, or for that matter, any of the other district charter schools, including Beginning with Children Charter School, The Ethical Community Charter School, and Brooklyn Charter School.   Rentas can have her son tested into the local gifted and talented program which is housed at PS132, or either of the two citywide programs: NEST +M and the Brooklyn School of Inquiry. Rentas' district also offers the unzoned option of PS31, a Blue Ribbon school. There is room in these schools for Rentas' son and other parents of high achieving children in our district who are seeking alternatives to their zoned schools.

Success Academy Williamsburg's opposition is more diverse than Rentas' OpEd belies and extends far beyond the voices of the latino community. Our group, Williamsburg and Greenpoint Parents for Our Public Schools (WAGPOPS), consists of district-wide parents who are protesting Success Academy Williamsburg in solidarity with the Southside Community Schools Coalition. WAGPOPS are middle class parents (often described as "newcomers," although some of us have spent decades in the district) who send our children to PS110, PS84, PS31, PS17, PS132, and PS34, among others. Our district schools are good enough for our high-achieving children.

WAGPOPS recognizes that a school's test scores all too frequently misrepresent the learning that takes place inside the classroom.    After many years of middle class families fleeing the public schools in our district, our schools now represent the diversity of the neighborhoods that house them. We believe that our schools have finally achieved that winning combination of strong leadership, diversity in the classrooms, meaningful curriculum, parent engagement, and committed teachers that creates the best possible learning environment for all of our children. We don't need charter schools.

What comes across most clearly in Rentas' OpEd is her absolute disconnect from the educational communities of Williamsburg. Rentas' high achieving son might enjoy either the Spanish dual language program at PS84 or the new ASD Nest program beginning in the fall which boasts a 6-1 student/teacher ratio. Is Rentas' son interest in French? He could enter the dual language French program at PS110 while simultaneously studying with the resident artists from Mark Morris Dance Group. Rentas' son could benefit from working at PS31's student-run bookstore or join it's winning chess team. Rentas' son might enjoy any one of PS132's community service projects and be a part of the next group that receives honors at the White House. Parents from all over Williamsburg and Greenpoint are bringing their entrepeneurial spirit into the schools and starting music programs, developing green roofs, and building robotic teams.

Rentas says that protesting Success Academy is a sign that the Latino leadership is not embracing the diversity of a changing community. She is wrong. Our neighborhood schools are the realization of our community in all it's diversity, and we embrace them.

Williamsburg and Greenpoint Parents for Our Public Schools
www.williamsburggreenpointschools.org
williamsburggreenpointschools@gmail.com

ATRs to Hold Informational Picket at UFT Delegate Assembly

2012-02-14T19:44:00.000-05:00

With the avalanche of closing schools, the ATR crisis is sure to grow. The DOE spends money on hiring field supervisors to observe ATRs who are shifted from one school to the next each week. Pretty amazing when they spend so much time teaching as subs out of their area of expertise.

Think ahead to September with thousands of ATRs while new TFAs are hired and the assault on ATRs based on the costs.

When ATRs complain to the UFT they are told, "No one has been u-rated yet."

In August, GEM began an ATR support group and set up a listserve which has been active amongst ATRs who have joined in sharing information and announcing gatherings. At the Feb. 4 State of the Union, almost a dozen ATRs held a lunchtime meeting where they came up with the following action.

Tomorrow (Feb. 15) a group of ATRs will be handing out this leaflet outside the UFT DA to alert chapter leaders and delegates to the situation. If you are an ATR come on down from 3:30-4:30 to help out.

One of the goals is to have more ATRs join the listserve so they can communicate with each. If you know an ATR send an email to gemnyc@gmail.com.

Here is the text if you can share with ATRs in your school. Or email to have a pdf sent.

Think being a Delegate or a Chapter Leaderwill stop you from becoming an ATR?
Think Again!
Every school closing, every school transformationputs you in the crosshairs of the Mayor’s let'smake another ATR machine.
Help Us, Help You, Help Us All.
Demand No School Closures!
Demand an elected ATR Chapter Leader foreach borough!
Demand the numbers of ATRs be publishedincluding the number of ATRs in essentiallyprovisional jobs!
Demand a meeting of ATRs at 52 Broadway.Demand that the UFT oppose the shamevaluation of ATRs.
Demand that Michael Mendel retract thestatement he made “that it’s OK for the DOE toevaluate ATRs” on lessons and classroommanagement! An evaluation after one day in aschool? How absurd, who does he work for?Demand an immediate meeting to be called byPresident Mulgrew on the ATR crisis!
Don't let UFT leadership sleep while our Unionis gutted!
Put a Stop to Teacher Harassment by DOE.
ATR evaluations are a sham meant to enableteacher firings. Imagine being evaluated for alesson in Chemistry if your license area is Phys Ed!
Stop The Coming Lockout!
Imagine when 50% of the teachers at nearly 30closing schools (maybe yours?) are forced to lookfor new jobs, in essence, locked out from theirappointed posts! Say good by to tenure then.Then picture job hungry teachers applying forthose newly vacant positions. Is this the scenarioyou want to watch unfold from the sidelines?
If an injury to one is an injury to all still meanssomething to you, don't remain silent. Fightback by proposing the demands above, Now!
ATRs Informational Picket, Feb 15, 3:30 -4:30UFT Headquarters 52 Broadway
Contact GEM ATR email: GEMNYC@GMAIL.COM

NY Post Reveals: Wittlest wee ones not welcome

2012-02-14T16:32:00.002-05:00

A handful of city charter schools already set their entry cutoff date at Dec. 1 — something SUNY says it’s allowing new charter schools to continue doing because it’s an option allowed by the state. This is in the purview of charters – to exclude students according to age – cutting off up to one fourth of otherwise eligible Kindergarteners? Clearly this will push up their test scores. ----Leonie Haimson

What the hell is going on there with the NY Post's Yoav Gonen breaking stories that support our side? See his story on how the DOE decided to support the schools the day after the PEP voted to close them.

Ok. So I stole the lead after Yoav tweeted: They nixed my "Wittlest wee ones not welcome." lede.

I can't believe the Post wouldn't use it.

Today he does it again with a report on how charters are allowed to play with admission dates for kindergarten, not admitting the younger children who would tend to bring a school's scores down for many years.

We accuse charters of creaming and counseling/pushing kids out who end right back in public school, as Brian Jones points out in our movie when he says, "The win the lottery and then they lose it."

Charters counter that public schools often counsel out too. Sometimes they do --- except the public kids end up right back at another public school. Let's reverse the process - send counseled out public school kids to charters. They claim to be miracle workers. I say give them a chance to prove it.

My former principal was the queen of creaming and counseling out. She made sure to never have a bi-lingual program, knowing full well the elementary school on the other side of the projects did have one and that most non-English speaking children would end up there. Our school was near the top of the district while theirs were near the lowest. People thought she was a great principal while the guy running the other school was considered a poor school leader. He was Puerto Rican and believe in bi-lingual ed and suffered the consequences. Thus I saw as far back as the early 80's what the system valued in a good leader.

My principal had another neat trick. While she couldn't deny admission to kindergarten by playing with admission dates as reported by Yoav, she just held many children back in kindergarten or 1st grade, thus assuring that they would be a year older for all the rest of the grades in the school, which really makes a difference at testing time. I'm not saying this was absolutely bad policy, given the reality that they started behind the rest of our kids who were also behind, only not as bad as the others. Kids that started pre-k had a clear advantage. In my early years there were kids who did not show 'till 1st grade --- they were basically doomed.

Here are a few more reports from Yoav Gonen:

PARENTS FURIOUS AS CITY VOTES TO SHUT 23 SCHOOLS - NYPOST.COM

There was this:

Internal Department of Education predictions of graduation rates at more than 200 public high schools show that a number of schools have been closed even though they met or came close to meeting their expected results, data obtained by The Post shows.
Among them were Franklin K. Lane HS in Brooklyn and Far Rockaway HS in Queens — which both began phasing out in 2008 — and Columbus HS in The Bronx, which last week was approved for closure.
READ: PREDICTED GRADUATION RATES
Critics liken those closures — under which most teachers and administrators are bounced and forced to find positions at other schools — to shuttering a police precinct for its crime stats even though it’s known to be in a high-crime neighborhood.

Revealing Interview With Harlem Success Academy Principal

2012-02-14T08:48:00.003-05:00

We are getting dramatically different results. Sure, you could explain away 5 percentage points to parents being a little more motivated. But it’s not even close. We pass 75 percent of our kids in the third grade test. The co-located school below us passed 22 percent.

---HSA principal

This NY Times interview with Jim Manly, principal of HSA 2 reveals the fault lines of Success so-called success. Manly makes up his own stat of 5% difference due to greater parent motivation. Even if it was 5% just think of the impact even 5% more children from disruptive families have on a school due to the kinds of attention these children need from all resources in the school.

Follow this thread to see how the child who does not fall in line ends up on the co-located public school downstairs.

Q.
You’re a very demanding school, but surely not all your kids will meet up to your standards. How do you deal with failure compared to how other schools might deal with it?
A.
I think it does matter that they chose us. [CREAMING 1.1].

In Harlem, over half the parents in District 5 apply to be in our school [will HSA publish the list of those applying?], so it’s not like we’re creaming. We have an established product.

If a child isn’t doing well, we say to the parents, listen, this is a true ticket for your child to redefine their academic expectations [first stage in counseling out]. This is an incredibly rare opportunity, and you’re blowing it. Your kid is coming to school at 12:30 in the afternoon, or they’re missing three days in a row for no other reason than you felt tired or you didn’t feel like coming to school. We can’t throw anybody out, [WINK WINK] but we sit parents down and say there is a waiting list a mile long of people who want in to this school, and you have this spot and you’re throwing it away. You’re not bringing your kid in on time, you’re not making sure they do their homework, you’re allowing them to disrupt lessons. We need your help.

We see some pretty remarkable turnarounds. The parents will say you’re right. I hear your message. I’m messing this up.

And if they don't hear the message they are pressured until they remove the child because Success can't function with loads of kids public schools manage to deal with every day. You know public schools have the same conversations with parents.

How about this deal. If parents don't cooperate in a public school we just send them to HSA and Jim Manly to fix.

Williamsburg and Greenpoint Newcomers Join Latino Community Against Charter Schools

2012-02-13T16:35:00.000-05:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Williamsburg and Greenpoint Newcomers Join Latino Community Against Charter Schools

BROOKLYN, New York (February 12, 2012) -

At 6pm on February 16, 2012, in what will be an unprecedented display of solidarity, the Williamsburg Greenpoint Parents for Our Public Schools will join the Southside Community Schools Coalition to protest the placement of a Success Academy Charter School in JHS50.

Both groups are expected to attend the Success Academy Williamsburg Co-Location Hearing which starts at 6pm JHS 50, where both groups will join together in protest to a decision in favor of Success Academy that they believe has already been pre-determined by the DoE.

This is the first time that gentrified Williamsburg and the Latino community of Williamsburg will have come together in such numbers on any issue. Both groups want the Department of Education to hear their voice as one and recognize that District 14, in all its diversity, does not want Success Academy Williamsburg.

Both groups demand that the Department of Education listen to the impacted Williamsburg community and reject the proposed co-location of Success Academy Charter School into JHS50.

The March will gather on February 16th at 4pm at El Puente on South 4th Street and Roebling, and will end at 5:30pm at JHS50 (183 South 3rd Street) to attend the Public Hearing for the Co-Location of Success Academy.

Contact:
Williamsburg Greenpoint Parents for Our Public Schools
williamsburggreenpointschools@gmail.com
phone: (646) 543-4492

Cheers,
Norm Scott

Twitter: normscott1

Education Notes
ednotesonline.blogspot.com

Grassroots Education Movement
gemnyc.org

Education columnist, The Wave
www.rockawave.com

nycfirst robotics
normsrobotics.blogspot.com

Sent from my BlackBerry

Williamsburg/Greenpoint Parents Join Southside to Proetest Eva Moskowitz Success Invasion of MS 50 -- Thursday, 4PM

2012-02-13T00:48:00.000-05:00

Dear PS84, PS110, PS147, PS157, PS196, IS 71, Lyons Community School, Green School, Brooklyn Prep, Williamsburg High School or Architecture & Design, and Williamsburg Prep,

Over the past few months, some of you may have heard the news in District 14 about the closing of PS19 and Success Academy Charter School's impending co-location in MS50 in our district. In our efforts to stop Success Academy Williamsburg's co-location we have found that:

Your school has been identified as MOST URGENTLY AT RISK for co-location with a charter.

The very people Eva was aiming for have been leading the charge out of North Williamsburg and Greenpoint, joining with the Latino Southside. I reported on the Southside Town Hall last Tuesday with some videos. See their web site: http://scscbrooklyn.wordpress.com/

Links to videos I shot that night: here, here, here.

With each passing day, communities are fighting back against school closures and charter co-locations. Sure the PEP will vote against these communities but with each battle lost something is won. People who were never active before are helping create a movement.

This comes from a group of activated parents based around PS 84 (where I spent the last few years of my career) who see a public school they support threatened by both Eva and hubby Eric Grannis who is starting his own charter chain. They are joining an already active Southside (mostly Latino/a) in this battle, uniting elements of the community that Eva thought she could split.

The Moskowitz machine counts on protests going away once the PEP votes in her favor (in this case March 1). I don't think she will find it that easy this time. Imagine if there are protests from the first day kids arrive at the school and continue. Will parents want their children to go through a gauntlet? Naturally Eva and crew will cry about how children are being used as pawns and the press will join her. But in this war that she started she is the one using children to build her political machine.

All these groups will be shock troops in the battle to kill mayoral control.
See the website: http://www.williamsburggreenpointschools.org/

Not only does Success Academy Williamsburg plan to open with 95 children in Kindergarten and 95 children in 1st grade, we have discovered that two additional charter schools are planned for 2013 opening with an additional 120-160 kids in Kindergarden and 120-160 children in 1st grade. These are students that will be pulled from our local schools, jeopardizing our public schools' budgets, and these charter schools WILL BE PLACED in our existing DoE schools. Maybe your school.

We are working with the Southside Community Schools Coalition and the Community Education Council for District 14 to educate our families and community stakeholders about the consequences of the increased presence of charter schools in our district. We want to save our local schools.
We are asking for your help and we want to help you.
Please warn your parent community about the risk to your school and ask for their help to save our schools.

Help us send the message to the DoE - NO! to Success Academy Williamsburg! Let your school's voice be heard!!

The public comment period (written or oral) for the March 1st meeting is open until 6pm on Weds. Feb. 29th. EVERYONE should email d14Proposals@schools.nyc.gov and tell them "WE DO NOT SUPPORT the colocation of Brooklyn Success Academy Charter School 4 (84KTBD) with Existing School J.H.S. 050 John D. Wells (14K050) in Building K050"

You can also call Toby Shepherd of the DOE: (212) 374-0208 and tell him the same thing.

Here is another letter sent to parents:

February 12, 2012
Dear Williamsburg and Greenpoint Community,
Over the past few months, you have likely heard the news about the closing of PS19 and Success Academy Charter School's impending co-location in MS50 in our district.

Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Walcott are running roughshod over entire communities in the name of "school reform" and "better schools." Despite vast community opposition, the DoE has placed Success Academy Charter Schools in the Upper West Side, Cobble Hill and now they're gunning for Williamsburg. Williamsburg and Greenpoint are fed up.

Williamsburg and Greenpoint doesn't want Success Academy Williamsburg or the effects of Success Academy on our community. We believe in fixing schools, not closing schools. Our families want local schools, not corporate schools.

In our efforts to stop Success Academy Williamsburg's co-location, we have discovered that the Tapestry Project (tapestryproject.org) is bringing in two more charter schools for the fall of 2013, opening with an additional 160 Kindergarten spots and 160 1st grade spots. The Tapestry Project is an organization started by Eric Grannis (Eva Moscowitz of Success Academy's husband) and Gideon Stein, a real estate developer on the board of Success Academy. Tapestry's sole aim is to bring more charter schools to North Brooklyn and has been targeting families in the middle class areas of our community by sowing fears that our schools are not good enough for their children.

Eric Grannis created a website: schoolfisher.com using manipulative and sometimes absolute misinformation about our community schools. Schoolfisher only lists information about the economic and racial demographics and the amount of unused space in each school. The only data included are ELA/Math %, a link to the school report card, and a grade that Schoolfisher itself designates for each school. There is no information about PS31's student run bookstore, or PS84 and PS110's dual language programs or PS84's new ASD Nest program. There is no information about PS17's gorgeous library or PS132's commitment to service learning or PS250's commitment to the arts. The personality of each of our schools has been whittled down to data skewed in favor of creating charter schools.
The number of the children that will be pulled out of our local schools will be 255 kids in K and 255 in 1st grade - all of them from the Northside and Greenpoint. That's larger than any school we have in our area, and these charter schools WILL BE PLACED in our existing schools, very likely PS110 or PS84.

This is a very big deal and will negatively effect the budgets and diversity of every single school in Williamsburg and Greenpoint - even the schools that seem safe like PS132, PS31, and PS34.

All the while, the arguments to open these schools appear innocent, "All we want are better schools." "What's the harm in school choice?" "Just let these schools open, if no one wants to go to them then they'll close." "This isn't about pro or anti anything this is about choice," "The competition will improve all of our schools,"

This is an issue with sides. We believe that our community should have a say in our public schools. We urge people to take the side of democracy and help us stop Success Academy WIlliamsburg!

- Come to the MARCH gathering on Thurs., Feb. 16th at 4pm at El Puente, on S. 4th & Roebling.
- PROTEST with your community at the JHS Hearing (5:30 at JHS 50 - 183 S. 3rd St Driggs/Roebling)
- call 311 to register a complaint. Let the city know: "I don't want Success Academy Charter School in my district!" - sign the petition: http://www.change.org/petitions/nyc-department-of-education-stop-success-academy- williamsburg

For more information:
visit the www.williamsburggreenpointschools.org visit scscbrooklyn.wordpress.com email info@williamsburggreenpointschools.org call (646) 543-4492

Together we can save our local schools!
Williamsburg and Greenpoint Parents for Our Public Schools www.williamsburggreenpointschools.org

Jeff Kaufman on Alan Rosenfeld

2012-02-12T12:58:00.003-05:00

Jeff left this comment on yesterday's blog entry (Poor NY Post -- losing Alan Rosenfeld, favorite whipping boy) but I think it important enough for its own post. You hearing this Yoav Gonen and Sue Edelman, et al. from the NY Post?

Jeff KaufmanFeb 12, 2012 03:58 AM

The media and some of its critics look to who botched up Alan's case. The fact is that the case was not botched up...there never was a case. The junior high school that Alan was dean in shared space with a high school and the high school principal didn't like Alan on the floor. He was was loud and strict to his students. After Alan was to be appointed an Assistant Principal the high school principal attempted to set him up and made the allegations that included oggling and such. He was placed in the rubber room and his AP appointment pulled. After his initial rubber room stint and his hearing which was mostly dismissed "because they couldn't prove anything" (in my book not a technical or procedural reason) he was reassigned to another school where he taught for six months! He began to inquire about his AP appointment and that is when he was sent, once again to the rubber room where he stayed until his retirement.

Alan's case is not DOE bungling. It is the case of person who, despite the incredible pressure by the DOE, the UFT and the media, stood his ground because there was a tenure system in place. Let's not forget we are all one allegation away from being brought up on charges but fortunately we have a system that provides what every job in our democratic society should provide, some level of due process to prevent baseless allegations from depriving us of our livelihood.

Poor NY Post -- losing Alan Rosenfeld, favorite whipping boy

2012-02-11T11:00:00.001-05:00

Say it ain't so Alan, I thought you would rather die in the rubber room.

I often tell a story a teacher in Rockaway once told me. He was teaching summer school in a tough middle school. As he dismissed a class one day, he leaned over the desk and gripped the edge to talk to a student. One girl pushed another girl and her ass landed on his hands. She promptly went down to the office and charged him with grabbing her ass. When he got downstairs the police were waiting to arrest him. Luckily, his AP was on his side and talked the cops down (just imagine if this AP was one of "those") but the teacher spend a long time in a rubber room, a horrifying experience for him and was under a cloud when he went back to school.

Fast forward a year. Same school, same students in summer school but different teacher -- a friend of my contact. The teacher hears the girls laughing and bragging how they "got" that teacher by staging the ass grabbing affair the year before. Luckily the teacher knew the guy and reported it and he was totally exonerated. But that was it.

I bring this up due to the Daily News reports on the Alen Rosenfeld retirement.

In the midst of the political fight over the future of teacher evaluations, Rosenfeld’s case has been held up as a prime example of the difficulty of firing tenured public servants. His case, though, does not focus on an issue of incompetence. Rosenfeld was given satisfactory ratings by his last principal and even commendations, records show.

Every teacher owes Alan a thanks for retiring as his case was going to become a point of attack on LIFO. But no matter how hard I try to sift through the "facts" I can find little to justify pulling him out of the classroom for a decade.

Right now this looks like the worst of it:

Rosenfeld was found guilty of having told a student that she loved him.
The student testified Rosenfeld told her “that I love him. That’s why I talk to him so much,” according to records.

Holy shit -- I said did exactly the same thing to a very mature 6th grade girl in my 1976 class--- one of my favorite students of all time (we still are in touch at times). She used to compare me to Kotter and probably had a bit of a crush. She used to hang out so close to me --- with a bit of physical contact at times --- that I once said to her: "You must love me. You can't stay away from me." I must have embarrassed her -- she responded with a squeal of disgust and from then on kept her physical distance.

Then there is this:

Rosenfeld was also accused oggling students rear ends and exhibiting a pattern of inappropriate behavior, but the judge did not rule on those matters. Then-Schools Chancellor Joel Klein decided not to send Rosenfeld back to the classroom and to exile him to the rubber room.

Hmmmm. Did I ever check out a mature student? Hell yes. But I tried not to ogle, though. I would love to see more examples of inappropriate classroom behavior. I'll bet my principal could have come up with some interesting examples --- like refusing to use a bullshit and inappropriate basal reader she kept sending me.

And Joel Klein looking to make political hay by exiling him to the rubber room? Is anyone surprised?

You know, now that I think of it, I could have spent decades in a rubber room. Too bad Uncle Joel wasn't in charge during my glory years.

There's more.

Rosenfeld, 66, who taught typing at Intermediate School 347 in Queens, was originally brought up on charges of making inappropriate comments to female students in 2001. An administrative judge made the decision not to fire Rosenfeld after much of the case was dismissed on procedural grounds.

So we have one inappropriate comment which I don't necessarily consider all that inappropriate. Maybe there's more but unless the press has more, the automatic assumption that Rosenfeld is a sleaze is slander. A judge making some kind of decision is part of a process established by contract and law, yet the press says that is not good enough. Why not claim that jury decisions should be overturned by public opinion? We know full well that if there was anything real there Rosenfeld would have been hung.

The case has also been used to point out bureaucratic incompetence, since city officials failed to make its case when it had the chance.

There is the implication that the DOE screwed up and didn't get the witnesses to the hearing. Duh! Remember that story I started off with? Is it just possible the "witnesses" were untrustworthy?

Now let's make this clear. Rosenfeld is not the most loveable character. In fact based on my brief contact with him he seems to be a stubborn pain in the ass. He so bothered UFT officials with his use of the mic at Exec bd meetings they changed the rules to shut him up. I can just imagine his principal just loving a chance to dump him. So why not take a minor incident and blow it up? The more I think of it Joel Klein's strategy of keeping Alan out of a school only made him dig in his heels. Imagine if he were sent back to a middle school to teach under the Tweed torture chamber? It might just have been enough incentive for Alan to retire years ago and save the DOE all that money the press complains about.

But what's money when you want to create a political tool to be used to undermine the entire teaching staff? Call it a smart investment if it ends up killing LIFO and you can get rid of thousands of high salaried teachers without having to deal with such bothersome items as an judge and a hearing.

Coming next: a focus on a few specific ATRs with some history who can be targeted.

---------------------
Rubber room case in trial
I posted this notice Rubber Room Suit: The Manhattan Five (plus one) g...
about the trial in federal court on Thursday. I was hoping to get over there but was preoccupied with the PEP. The lawyer Nick Penkovksy has been in touch and will fill me in this weekend on what transpired. I will report after we talk.

----------------------
TAPCO Principal follow-up
From the blog post that keeps on giving comments:

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Another DOE Scam - TAPCO - Theatre Arts Production...":

Ms. Lynn will not get a bad rating because the staff are terrified of retribution. The majority of the teachers at TAPCO are brand new and are not willing to stick their necks out. Most are just hoping to see the end of June, and get the heck out of Dodge. 14 teachers left last year. That number will probably be exceeded this year.

Ms. Lynn knows how it works. She will plan the staff retreat to coincide with the school rating survey. As she has done over the past several years, she will stage the staff retreat at a posh hotel in Manhattan ... either the Sheraton or the Hilton. BTW, this is on tax payer money.

Teachers will stay overnight in $300 a night rooms (on the taxpayer dime), and have a dinner filled with food and all-you-can-drink alcohol at a lavish restaurant (on the taxpayer dime). The next morning, after half the staff is waking up from their late night hangovers, and happy as dumb pigs ... they happily give Ms. Lynn an outstanding rating on the on-line survey while her (Inquisition) Inquiry Team members watch over their shoulders.

As for Janice Acosta, she is Ms. Lynn's little angry dog. She barks loudly and enjoys Ms. Lynn tugging on her leash. She doesn't carry the respect of a single teacher in the entire school but thinks she carries the authority of her unearned position.

Even through this phony DOE investigation, Ms. Lynn is still cooking the books and making a mockery of the education system. Students who do no work, cheat, copy, and lie are still passing with flying colors. Teachers jobs are threatened when they attempt to impose responsibility on the students. A casual glance into classrooms will find rooms full of students texting, listening to iPods, insulting teachers ... anything but learning.

One really has to wonder how a school in the middle of the Bronx has the magic formula of 100% graduation rate when the City graduation is barely 65%. The middle school which shares the same building MS 391 has an on-time graduation rate of about 60%. But in the same building, Ms. Lynn and TAPCO are sailing with a 100% graduation rate. In DOE-land, being honest and hardworking gets your school closed down. In DOE-land, lying, cheating, and changing grades is how you earn the #1 school in NYC.

Well done Ms. Lynn. The staff respects and supports you. Please continue to manipulate, cheat, and lie. It's working.

PEP Pics

2012-02-10T12:48:00.001-05:00

Coverage of Panel for Education Policy meeting

by southsidecommunityschoolscoalition

(Thanks to SCSC Member Dennis sinneD for compiling)

20120209052013 PEP 2-9-12 - YouTube

Students, teachers and parents unite outside Brooklyn Tech HS

20120209052223 PEP 2-9-12 - YouTube

Leo Casey's is asked by Brian Jones why he isn't going inside to the PEP.

20120209055616 PEP 2-9-12 - YouTube

Whose school? Our schools!

20120209055729 PEP 2-9-12 - YouTube

Whose schools? Our schools!

20120209070746 PEP 2-9-12 - YouTube

Security harassing students at their seats.

20120209060933 PEP 2-9-12 - YouTube

Brian Jones on the People's Mike

20120209061212 PEP 2-9-12 - YouTube

Noah Gotbaum on the People's Mike as the PEP members ignore the voice of the people.

20120209064135 PEP 2-9-12 - YouTube

Michael Mulgrew uses the People's Mike

Two PEP videos

http://youtu.be/CnZZi0Q4rrE

http://youtu.be/8D0dQWDOieo

From Jaisal Noor:
I covered the PEP meeting for two independent media outlets, Democracy Now! and Free Speech Radio News

You can read the Democracy Now headline here:
http://www.democracynow.org/2012/2/10/headlines#11 (you have to click to 9 mins and 9 seconds into the show to see the video )

and here's the Free Speech Radio News link:
http://fsrn.org/audio/audio-tag-title-raw/9827

Democracy Now airs on over 1,000 TV and radio stations everyday and FSRN is on about 115 radio stations across the globe.

-Jaisal

Assessing the Impact - Part 1

2012-02-10T01:22:00.000-05:00

UPDATE: Fri. Feb. 10, 11AM
Leonie has posted videos on her blog with this important comment on press. Note that she gives the Post's Yoav Gonen a top mark plus the Gotham live blog (Live-blogging the PEP: 23 school closure votes on the agenda).

Videos here: http://goo.gl/SgRFx

TV reports of Thursday night massacre: protests vs. the closing of 23 schools
None of the newspaper articles capture the full rage and bitterness expressed last night by thousands of parents, students and teachers at last night's hearings, at which the Panel for Educational Policy, controlled by the mayor, rubberstamped the closing or truncation of 23 schools. Best among the print accounts was live-blogging by GothamSchools and the NYPost article by Yoav Gonen (GS, Post).

The videos do a far better job at conveying the atmosphere, if not the substance, of what happened last night. Below are the reports from Channel 2 news (CBS), Channel 7 (ABC), Channel 4 (NBC), Fox News, and a short video by Michael Galinsky, maker of the Atlantic Yards documentary, Battle for Brooklyn.

Last night was one more skirmish in the battle for our public schools, and for the future of this city. Whether it will prove to be a turning point in the history of mayoral control, brought down by the administration's arrogant disregard for the views of parents, students, and community members, remains to be seen.

Friday, Feb. 10 1AM
Got home at midnight and too tired to say much so I'll let others do it -- for now.

One report from an ODOE person

I'm struck by how many of these articles make mention very clearly of the various possibilities of open meetings law violations concerning both the volume and the lockout in the lobby, and also of the police presence. And while Fox 5, for example, does lead with the "division" between the UFT and Occupy the DOE, they also mention that the two groups "came together in the end."

The DOE and Bloomberg look really bad in all these reports, and Occupy looks, well, provocative and militant, if also chaotic. And well, we knew that about the movement already. I'm sure there'll be plenty of negativity flung at us over the next 48 hours or so, but so far the media is better than I expected.

Another:

The more I read the media coverage the more successful I think we were. I don't want to sugarcoat it; we definitely did not achieve what we wanted. But if it's true that 1,800 people showed up and less than 100 signed up to speak, that means our message of boycotting got through to a whole lot of people. And the fact that the UFT marched back and we had all forces united in one room is also a major accomplishment. And the coverage makes clear that there was mass opposition. Not what we wanted but not a bad start.

And a short film by Battle for Brooklyn film director Michael Galinsky: http://vimeo.com/36526142

from NY1:

http://www.ny1.com/content/top_stories/155700/protesters-rally-against-closures-to-no-avail

Fox 5 called it a "family scene"

http://www.myfoxny.com/dpp/news/educational-policy-meeting-protest-20120209

Gotham Schools live-blogged it:

http://gothamschools.org/2012/02/09/live-blogging-the-pep-23-school-closure-votes-are-on-the-agenda/#more-77000

The NYTimes also live blogged:

http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2012/02/09/another-school-closing-vote-and-another-protest/?ref=nyregion

Anna Phillips' report in NYT.

Daily News:

Tension high as thousands crash Brooklyn hearing for closing of 23 schools

Panel for Education Policy expected to approve the shutdowns despite outcry

By Ben Chapman AND Rachel Monahan / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Thursday, February 9, 2012, 11:29 PM

Anthony Lanzilote for New York Daily News

Meeting was raucous, and Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott blasted the teachers union for helping fill

MORE THAN 2,000 protesters swarmed a contentious hearing Thursday night on the city’s plan to close 23 struggling schools.
Despite the protests, the Panel for Education Policy was expected to approve the closures before the end of the meeting at Brooklyn Technical High School in Fort Greene.
“People are getting fed up,” said teachers union president Michael Mulgrew told the Daily News. “They’re sick and tired of schools being blamed for the failure of the city.”
Inside the meeting the protesters chanted and drowned out officials who attempted to direct the meeting.
Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott took aim at the union for working with Occupy Wall Street demonstrators to disrupt the hearings.
“There are important proposals up for discussion,” Walcott said. “If all the (teachers union) wants to do is bus in Occupy Wall Street protesters . . . then we will just have to work around that.”
The panel, the majority of whose members are appointed by the mayor, have never voted down a school closing.
The Bloomberg administration has approved closing 117 failing public schools since 2002, and it has opened 396.
Over 100 people were scheduled to speak at the hearing, including dozens of activists and elected officials who blasted the city for closing schools.
bchapman@nydailynews

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/tension-high-thousands-crash-brooklyn-hearing-closing-23-schools-article-1.1020238#ixzz1lxBlN9oK