Showing posts with label intimidation against free expression. Show all posts

Sunday, April 26, 2015

Pickering v. Garcetti -- How Mass Opt-Outs Will Aid Teachers Brought Up on Charges Over Opt-Out Advocacy

In the coming prosecutions we will see a collision over state authority and teachers' expression rights in the public interest. The parents' and students' opt-out activities will support teachers in their claim to use the free speech power as expressed in Pickering, over the state power as expressed in Garcetti.

The massive parent and student support that we have seen in the opt-out rebellion in the last two weeks profoundly shows popular revulsion for the high-stakes standardized tests that have no purpose other than to sort teachers. And as has been shown in statistical analyses, whether by Gary Rubinstein or by the American Statistical Association, Value-Added Measuring is invalid in assessing teachers.

Case law on public employee free speech, briefly
In Pickering v. Board of Education (1968) the Supreme Court justices upheld a teacher's right of free speech. A teacher had written a letter criticizing school board policy. The Court decided that teachers have a right of free speech if they are speaking truthfully and in the public interest.

By contrast a more recent Supreme Court ruling, Garcetti v. Ceballo (2006) the Court held that the interests of smooth government operation trumped government employee free speech rights. The case involved a dispute on the over over proper procedure with a warrant. For a lengthier look at the question of teachers' free speech rights see this posting at Diane Ravitch's blog.

A few days ago I wrote on how the Supreme Court has protected the free speech rights of youths. A case on a youth of the Jehovah's Witnesses faith was supported in a quest of being free from mandatory recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance. In a later case, a youth was supported in challenging the constitutionality of the mandate of reciting a prayer in school. These precedents would support those youths that would resent being compelled to sign a contract of secrecy regarding test content. Further, parental rights have been found to have had given greater weight than property rights.
How all this relates to kids and this month's tests: students should not have to sign secrecy oaths. Parents' rights mean that they can allow their children to opt out of tests.

Teachers: Massive student opt-outs, massive parental OKs are proof that you are speaking to a public interest need
The entire 11th grade in one Seattle school resisted taking the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) test. (See "What If They Gave the SBAC and Nobody Took It?") In Long Island the percentage of students\opting out of taking the Common Core-based tests took a meteoric rise. In Baldwin, Nassau County, student opt-outs took a 232 percent increase. (New York State has decided to use its own test, instead of the PARCC or SBAC tests used in other states.) A full 39 percent of third through eighth grade students opted out of taking the English Language Arts "assessment" (test for those of you in the real world). Across New York, the number of opt-outs (from about 73 percent of the districts) there were 185,000 opt-outs on the ELA test, an increase over the 49,000 from last year. About 1.1 million students took the test last year.

These numbers demonstrate that the parents and students are in alignment with the teachers.
So, if and when authorities prosecute teachers, as suggested by this disciplinary threat in Philadelphia, this mandate in New Mexico that compels teachers to withhold their speech on opting out, this suspension of a Rhode Island teacher, and this threat in Rochester, New York, teachers will be able to argue that the Pickering principal of protecting speech that is in the public interest evidently outweighs the Garcetti case emphasis on the smooth operation of the government.

It will be a great fight over the judgments of the two precedential cases. Bring it on.

Teachers should express special thanks to Change the Stakes, NYS Allies for Public Education, United Opt Out, Long Island Parents and Teachers Against Standardized Testing and APPR.

Thursday, February 26, 2015

Explosive Guardian Report: Under Emanuel's Watch: Chicago Police's "Gestapo-like" "Black Site" Facility

(This sort of secret facility is precisely what Bertram Gross warned of in his prescient book, "Friendly Fascism.")
The Manchester Guardian reported of CIA- or Gestapo-like tactics at a "black site" operated by the Chicago Police Department at Homan Square.

*Activists report being 'strapped' in the Homan Square facility
*Activist of the experience: "You're a hostage. It's kidnapping."
*Cook County Commissioner Richard Boykin: "We are calling for a Department of Justice investigation into these allegations"
*The Guardian's first investigation broke the story on Tuesday, Spencer Ackerman reporting, "The disappeared: Chicago police detain Americans at abuse-laden 'black site'", and it reported a shackling for 17 hours
*Activist arrested in a police raid during the city's hosting the 2012 NATO summit: "Nobody knows what happened to you"
--a summit which drew thousands of protesters
*Many detainees were held for 12 to 24 hours, denied federal right of speaking with an attorney; one such detainee was 15 years of age
*Two ex-senior U.S. Justice Department officials called the allegations of police power abuse "very disturbing" and raise constitutionality questions --Guardian story, February 25, 2015
*Official records were not kept; this prevented protesters' relatives and friends' knowing of their whereabouts or safety
*Rahm Emanuel's police department denied the charges on Wednesday
*Beyond the denial, the police department has denied requests for responses from other outlets, as reported by Ring of Fire Radio; this is parallel with Emanuel's refusal to cooperate with multiple requests for any official response re the black site detention center.
*Ironically, in January 2012 the City Council passed the nation's first city resolution banning torture

*As one Guardian commenting reader said, "I didn't know that Chicago was in North Korea"

Read the Guardian's latest report from today, "'Gestapo' tactics at US police 'black site' ring alarm from Chicago to Washington" and Tuesday's initial report: "The disappeared: Chicago police detain Americans at abuse-laden 'black site'"

Let's hope that rising star and Chicago Teachers Union-backed challenger for April's mayoral election, Jesus "Chuy" Garcia raises the issue of this site in the debate. Emanuel's response will be very interesting. He is a take-charge fellow; but if that is the case how could he put a "I didn't know about this face" on the issue of this Guantanamo on West Fillmore Street?

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Sign the Petition: Terminate Comm. John King's Employment

New York State Board of Regents: Terminate the Employment of State Education Commissioner, John King

2. Petition by
  Coalition for Justice in Education

PETITION TO TERMINATE THE EMPLOYMENT OF NYS EDUCATION COMMISSIONER, JOHN KING
(references substantiating each charge available at www.coalitionforjusticeineducation.com)

John King has served as New York State Commissioner of Education since 2011. During his tenure, the quality of education in NY has continued to decline; particularly in poor and rural districts.

1 The Commissioner’s solutions rely upon blindly accepting NCLB, RTTT and Common Core policies and implementing more high-stakes, standardized testing for evaluation of students and teachers,

2 implementation of an untested national curriculum,

3 undemocratic corporate management strategies for operating schools,

4 more privatization of schools

5 and insistence that poverty-related conditions are not an excuse for low student achievement.

6 Furthermore, Commissioner King: · Refuses to lend credibility to staff and community-voiced concerns that much of Common Core curriculum and testing is developmentally inappropriate for students, and that NYS teachers received no significant training for the implementation of Common Core,

7 Refuses to allow meaningful dialogue about Common Core tests by imposing a “gag order” on teachers and administrators, preventing them from discussing test questions among themselves or with students,

8 Supports policy to allow private corporate vendors to have access to personal student data, without parental consent, for the purpose of marketing educational services,

9 and ·Remains silent on the stress-related suffering by many students taking recent Common Core tests,

10 Promotes the reduction of the reading of fiction in favor of an increase in informational texts (50% informational texts in elementary school, and 70% for 12th grade readings by 2014)

11 with the generally predicted impact of a further reduction in the joy of reading and learning for all students especially those with learning challenges,

12 Continues to advocate more high-stakes, standardized testing, despite research concluding that it is ineffective for motivating students and increasing their learning,

13· Continues to ignore positive research results for the use of performance-based assessment, such as portfolios, performances, presentations and exhibitions, by more NYS schools,

14· Advocates for more closings and privatization of low-performing schools,

15 despite research indicating that charter schools are generally less effective than public schools,

16 and promote more racial and class-based segregation,

17 and create negative impact on community morale, motivation and development,

18· Advocates the use of poorly designed, ineffective corporate strategies, such as APPR, which de-professionalize teaching,

19 We, the undersigned, strongly believe that New York State’s education reform agenda is fundamentally flawed and must be re-directed in a humanistic, research-based manner; directly counter to the direction Commissioner King has taken. New York State children, parents and teachers need an education commissioner who passionately supports and actively works for:
· De-concentrating the impact of poverty in classrooms and schools,
· Institutionalizing performance-based assessments,
· Ending the obsessive use of high-stakes, standardized testing,
· Developing creative, alternative curriculum, assessments and schools,
· Assisting poverty-stricken, low-performing schools through collaboration with teachers, parents community members and students, rather than through closures and privatization,
· Ending corporate reform,
· Using school practitioners and constructivist-oriented consultants for developing and implementing curriculum & assessments,
· Implementing a moratorium on the Common Core Curriculum,
· Transforming the NYSED to serve as helpful consultants to schools and school districts, rather than enforcers of top-down policies that are disrespectful to teachers and harmful to students.

Therefore, we, the undersigned respectfully urge the NYS Board of Regents to terminate the employment of John King as NYS Education Commissioner, and immediately search for, and hire a candidate who strongly reflects the characteristics described above.

Cent. NY English Teacher's Lament: 'I am a teacher, and I am tired'

By Savanna Kucerak, English teacher, Homer C.S.D., as published by NYSUT:

"I am a teacher, and I am tired"

Tired of coming home every night angry, abused, and insulted.

Tired of being treated as a child, as a robot, as a stepping stone for politician$ and publi$hing companie$ to make more money.

Tired of ignorance littering the air: “the Common Core is an exciting time in education!” or “APPR is just showing off the wonderful work you already do!”

Tired of being told to “wait it out,” that the “pendulum will swing the other way eventually” while witnessing the casualties pile up — casualties with names and dreams and futures and the RIGHT to the BEST EDUCATION we can give them.

Tired of being afraid to stand up for what I know is right for our kids and our country because I am afraid of losing my job and being unable to pay my bills.

Tired of my superiors being afraid to stand up for what they know is right for our kids and our country because they, too, are afraid of losing their livelihood.

Tired of wanting to be better, volunteering to do additional work, and watching helplessly as any progress I have made is brushed aside by the newest educational reform acronym.

Tired of being told, “Ohh, sorry, but my hands are tied,” accompanied by a half smile, a shrug of the shoulders.

Tired of spending hours of my life documenting and sorting and filing instead of revising and learning and improving.

Tired of wasting taxpayer money on binders and tabs and computer paper and ink.

Tired of being a taxpayer, watching as my money is spent on binders and tabs and computer paper and ink instead of STUDENTS and STUDENTS and STUDENTS and STUDENTS.

Tired of paying my student loan bills and nostalgically remembering that I chose to be a teacher, that I wanted to teach, blissfully ignorant of what lay ahead.

Tired of my two degrees and experience and individuality being ignored and devalued.

Tired of knowing what’s best for my students, but being told NOT to do it.

Tired of telling the best and brightest young people NOT to be teachers — and meaning it.

Tired of being told that if I love literature, then I’d better choose another profession.

Tired of Googling “what can I do besides teach?” only to close out of the browser every time, knowing there is nothing I’d be better at or love more than what was formerly known as “teaching.”

Tired of living in a country where my dream job no longer exists – where “teacher” is now synonymous with data-collector, test-prepper, script-reader, automaton.

Tired of grappling with the notion that I now have a job instead of a life or even a career.

Tired of disillusionment poisoning even the best of days.

Tired of telling my students that they will be heard if they support their arguments with evidence, yet knowing in my heart that that is a lie.

Tired of worrying about my own future children, who will either be numbers under this developing “educational” system – or dealing with the wreckage of a failed, expensive national tragedy in which all the best teachers have either abandoned this sinking ship or remain on board as empty shells, whispered voices, gasping for air.

I am tired, but I am still here – and there are many of me.

Join us. Say something. Do something.

Our collective future depends on it.”

S.I. parents chafing under the Common Core perversion of curriculum

The Common Core - that's that toxic result of ill-minded state and federal policy plus a tone-deaf collaborationist union leadership.

"My son made a comment to me the other day. He asked, 'Did I become stupid?'" said his father, James Hardison. "We're supposed to be inspiring students, and giving them what they need to be successful. For a 10-year-old child to feel discouraged like this, something is not right." --from SILive.com, 3/28/13, powered by the Staten Island Advance.

Culture of testing takes a toll on Staten Island pupils and their families (photos/video). [Ed.: It's not mere testing, it's testing to support the Common Core, foisted upon America by the unelected, non-educator, David Coleman.]

MORE -Our working conditions are our students' learning conditions

Check Out New Yorker's App on Inequality and the Subway

This cool app at the New Yorker's website, "Inequality and New York's Subway," takes each MTA subway/elevated line and matches stations with U.S. Census-provided household income.

The results are stark. Along the 6 train in the upper half of Manhattan, the results vary from over $150,000 to under $25,000.

New York City has a problem with income inequality. And it’s getting worse—the top of the spectrum is gaining and the bottom is losing. Along individual subway lines, earnings range from poverty to considerable wealth. The interactive infographic here charts these shifts, using data on median household income, from the U.S. Census Bureau, for census tracts with subway stations.