How Mulgrew's Responsible for Disastrous NYC Teachers' Evaluation; Gender & the Weingarten Comparisons

In all of New York City teachers' complaints and analyses of New York State Education Commissioner John King's imposed evaluation scheme we must remember these core points on how UFT president Michael Mulgrew was fundamentally responsible for the terrible tragedy that the evaluation system is to New York City teachers and the profession.

I) The fact is that the components of all this (especially the Common Core test-based evaluations and APPR mandates) come from President Obama and Secretary Duncan's Race to the Top, whose architect, similar to Duncan, Joanne Weiss has no actual educator experience. Weiss was commissioned to direct the create the program on May 19, 2009 and the program's form and terms were announced two months later, on July 24, 2009. The Race to the Top mandates: *Compliance with the Common Core States Standards, *CCSS-anchored tests, *Test score-heavy assessment of teachers, *Maintenance of student databases, *Strengthened annual rating of teachers and principals, *"Turning around failing schools". Qualification for a high Race to the Top score means replacing more public schools with charter schools. A district superintendent in one New York State community wrote that the compliance with the RTTT would require every district to reopen union contracts.
Mulgrew supported Race to the Top as he endorsed New York State's RTTT application, the occasion for the August 24, 2010 photo below. Pictured are David Steiner, an unknown official, Joel Klein, Michael Bloomberg, Michael Mulgrew, Merryl Tisch, Christine Quinn and another unknown official. The standards were issued June 2, 2010.


II) The UFT and NYSUT did not have to go along with NYS on their RTTT application:
(a) the California Teachers Association opposed Race to the Top;
(b) it was not worth the money, many states and districts have decided that the attendant costs associated with implementing RTTT mandates exceed whatever money that states or districts would get from RTTT money-- 13 states did not submit applications to the final RTTT competition round; nearly 80 Ohio districts and charter schools have rejected RTTT funds, citing the costs;

III) Mulgrew did not have to cheer on Governor Andrew Cuomo's state imposition, he could have petitioned the Public Employee Relations Board for real labor-management arbitration. His letting New York State Education Department Commissioner John King write the evaluation system essentially is closer to having only management make the decisions. Predictably, right on the day of the actual release of King's imposed evaluation system, he said it was a well-needed reform.

* * *
Look at what John King's state-imposed evaluation system has wrought:
UNIQUE FOR NEW YORK CITY
*A termination tie-in after two consecutive year-end unsatisfactory ("U") ratings; by contrast, Buffalo is now suing its school district for violating their side agreement that evaluations not be used punitively.
*Student surveys, starting in fall, 2013 as a pilot program; with formal five percent weight in 2014-2015. Only Syracuse also uses student surveys for the evaluation algorithm.
*Sunset clauses; numerous municipalities across the state have one or two-year sunsets.

Do we wonder why people are saying that Mulgrew is part of a Trojan Horse scheme?


LOOK AT WHAT APPR-RELATED COSTS POSE JUST TO MODEST SIZED SUBURBAN DISTRICTS:

Note the cost of testing to comply with APPR requirements and how Pearson is the most expensive option. South Orangetown District Superintendent Ken Mitchell's detailed report for the State University of New York-New Paltz wrote and illustrated how Race to the Top expenses far exceed gains from Race to the Top awards. In his Fall, 2012 paper, "Federal Mandates on Local Education: Costs and Consequences – Yes, it’s a Race, but is it in the Right Direction?" he showed how total APPR mandated costs (accounting Common Core, 3012C training, assessments, technology and professional development) for 18 lower Hudson Valley school districts would amount to $5,472,166. RTTT funding would provide $520,415. The districts would still have to pay $5,951,751 in unfunded costs. (Table 2. Estimated 2012-2013 Costs Associated with APPR Mandates for Eighteen Lower Hudson Valley School Districts)

WILL RTTT-COMPLIANCE SPENDING DRIVE DEFICITS AND THEN LAYOFFS?
Mitchell pointed out that budget deficits will arise.

In six Rockland County districts, leaders projected a total four-year cost of almost $11 million, this compares with an aggregate revenue of about $400K in Race to the Top funding - a $10 million deficit. this represents an increase in average per pupil spending for this single initiative of nearly $400 per student.

(Bolding, my emphasis) Why did not Mulgrew ask any questions about compliance? This of course not only strikes taxpayers, but consider the ramifications. In many government deficit instances layoffs ensue. The literature on testing and learning are increasingly shedding doubt that the test-emphasis path is productive for educational goals. Furthermore, we need to consider that school spending and teacher jobs will fall victim if APPR and RTTT compliance related deficits develop.
* * *
THE GENDER POLITICS OF MIKE, CONTRASTED WITH RANDI
People say "at least he's better than [Randi] Weingarten," his predecessor that installed him via the executive board, a half-year before a popular vote. For all of Weingarten's pioneering the collaboration stratagem, from her sitting on the Broad Foundation, to her countless other mistakes, accounted here and in the comments here, she let us vote on the 2005 and 2007 contracts.
Mulgrew, caved in repeatedly to side agreements that have amounted to a de facto contract, the data binders, the portfolios, the ratched up tenure requirements, the VAM evaluations, APPR changes, Danielson, the decision to defer his evaluation dispute with Bloomberg to King Cuomo and his henchman Reformy John King, and the evaluation system as the 2007 contract 3.0. What the heck is there left for us to negotiate over and vote on?
I think that his gender and physical stature give him the pass with the members. His loud tone, his sneering jokes. Alas, none of this has helped us. He makes an appearance at the NYSUT rally,* but he blacks out any publicity to UFT members, lest they get exposed to "Corporate Core" signs. He is a Trojan Horse cancer or zombie/body snatcher, destroying our union and profession from within. I'll take arguments citing Mike's great accomplishments that part from Randi's ways. The suggestion box is open.
*The UFT was also absent from a Jan. 9, 2012 (a Monday) protest in Albany about frozen funds, Gotham Schools reported then.

MORE Caucus (UFT) Responds to State Imposed Teacher Evaluation Plan, Cites Coordinated Grievance Campaign

GOTHAM SCHOOLS NOTES MORE'S COORDINATED GRIEVANCE CAMPAIGN - THE UFT MAY HAVE LET YOU DOWN; MORE IS THERE TO HELP

UFT president Michael Mulgrew endorsed a state-imposed evaluation system; what a mistake --look what we've got:
Mulgrew is perennially assuaging the UFT's members, saying that things could be worse than whatever bad deal the UFT leadership has agreed to. Wrong, this is worse than other systems in the state. As MORE says in their statement, Mulgrew is claiming victory in the face of defeat. Bloomberg advisor Howard Wolfson openly gloated on Twitter, that the UFT was “shut out on nearly all their demands.”
This system makes New York City join Syracuse as the only one school systems to experiment with student surveys for evaluating teachers.
Insights arising from the Movement of Rank and File Educators' (MORE-UFT) incisive analysis of the NYS Regents-imposed teacher evaluation system (published in full below) and MORE’s Facebook page:

*This scheme operates by the state education law 3012-c whereby a teacher is assumed guilty, as the teacher must prove their innocence, reversing the American system’s presumption of innocence.

*It is difficult to believe Mulgrew’s contention that this is about supporting teachers. Mulgrew has added his disingenuous spin, “Here is the bottom line: The new teacher evaluation system is designed to support, not punish, teachers and to help them develop throughout their careers. That is what we will be fighting for as this plan is implemented.” The lack of pre- and post-observations will mean rash observations by administrators that are uninformed of the entire context of lessons. On the MORE Facebook page, MORE points out that the new system’s removal of the post-observation strikes away the pretense that this evaluation system is constructive, to help teachers and their craft.

*The new system will lead to teachers teaching to a rubric. The Common Core and the Danielson system are ones “that have no scientific evidence of increasing learning."

*The New York City system, in contrast to other municipalities, is effective for at least four years; whereas many other municipalities expire after one year. As MORE points out, “can only be re-negotiated in collective bargaining within the framework of State Education Law 3012-c.”

-> The UFT may have let teachers down; but MORE will be there to help you: MORE will have a coordinated grievance campaign in the fall: Note MORE's statement in the What Now? section of their response: A coordinated grievance campaign around particular issues of implementation can help us make the most of the 15 extra arbitration days to deal with systemic abuses. MORE will be campaigning in the fall to organize and train chapter leaders, delegates and school activists to be effective in defending their colleagues and organizing strong chapters. Kudos to Gotham Schools for running this point in tweet on MORE's response.
-> Wondering how teachers in other New York State cities and towns are faring with their Albany-compliant systems? Want to express your discontent to NYSED or the Cuomo administration for Race to the Top which carried so many elements driving this change (mandating unrealistice evaluation metrics in the new Annual Professional Performance Review [APPR], the Common Core, Value-Added Modeling [VAM])?
Go to Albany, June 8, the rally that the UFT is afraid to publicize, lest NYC teachers learn how much worse their system is, and how teachers are already experiencing tough evaluation systems. (Notice how the May 30 NY Teacher (UFT) does not mention it; but the June edition of NYSUT United has promotion of the rally on the front cover. Some of the stories in NYSUT's paper: "National momentum grows to put a brake on high stakes," "'The sickest testing story of all time'," "School boards agree: Obsession with testing taking toll," "Educators push back on testing.")

UFT Rank and File Says King’s Evaluation Plan Bad for Teachers, Students

While Micheal Mulgrew launches a campaign to convince the membership that the new teacher evaluation system is designed to help teachers improve and give them a professional voice, Bloomberg is proclaiming victory. The truth of the matter is, this evaluation system is bad for educators and the children they serve: the system requires a tremendous amount of additional work with no compensation, time or otherwise. It will create an even greater climate of fear and effectively ends tenure as we know it; putting all educators who partner with parents to advocate for the best policies for children at risk. This system places too much value on testing and is flawed in its high stakes premise. Educators are best positioned to evaluate and assess our students and teachers, not imposed tests, not junk science, not pre-packaged rubrics.
Julie Cavanagh, Elementary School Teacher & Chapter Leader P.S. 15 Brooklyn

The day has finally come. State Education Commissioner John King has imposed a new teacher evaluation deal on New York City. UFT president Michael Mulgrew's attempts to claim a victory in the face of defeat are hardly convincing. In his letter to the membership Mulgrew says “Here is the bottom line: The new teacher evaluation system is designed to support, not punish, teachers and to help them develop throughout their careers. That is what we will be fighting for as this plan is implemented.” Given the enormous amount of money the DOE has spent trying to fire our colleagues over the last few years, it's credulous to suggest that this system will be about “supporting” teachers. The media has honed in on the point that Mulgrew wants to avoid: tenure has been seriously weakened, and it will be easier to fire teachers who are seen as “ineffective” based on flawed standardized tests.

We knew already from State Education Law 3012-c, which was supported by the UFT leadership as part of Race to the Top, that two years of ineffective ratings means a teacher is presumed to be incompetent. In the new termination process for tenured teachers, the burden of proof will shift to the teacher, unlike the current system where the burden of proof is on the Department of Education to prove incompetence. [1]

King's release states: “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." In other words, there will be more testing for our students and tests will be the ultimate determinant of a teacher's effectiveness. According to the outline of the plan, "Each school will have a committee comprised of an equal number of teachers and administrators who will determine, along with the principal, which assessments each school will use," however the plan states that principals may reject this committee's recommendations and apply their own default measures. In many schools, this is exactly what will happen.

Only 13 percent of all ineffective ratings each year can be challenged on grounds of harassment or other matters not related to job performance. Is the UFT comfortable trusting that the other 87% of ratings of "ineffective" will be based solely on teacher performance? Given the new principals Tweed is pumping out of the Principal's Academy and their "fire your way to success" mentality, our union leadership has left us in an extremely dangerous situation.

The union leadership is pleased that the rating system will be using "the complete Danielson rubric, with all 22 points.” The potential for abuse of this complex and multifaceted rubric is enormous.

"This system will lead to educators teaching to a rubric," says Mike Schirtzer, UFT Delegate at Leon M. Goldstein High School in Brooklyn. "Pedagogy is a craft which no two teachers do the same, yet can still be equally effective. This new scheme will limit teachers creativity in the classroom and our ability to differentiate styles in order to reach a diverse set of learners. Our greatest concern is the amount of time this will take from teachers to properly prepare for their classes, due to all of the assessments and/or SLO's that need to be created, the committees need to be formed and countless hours of professional development dedicated to Common Core and Danielson, two directives that have no scientific evidence of increasing learning."

In addition to the onerous micromanagement of the Danielson rubric, observations will be more frequent and at least one will be an unannounced observation. This is problematic, as without pre- and post-observation conferences, administrators will likely be unaware what scaffolding the teacher has done beforehand, and are likely to penalize teachers because they don't have this information. Mulgrew says this is not a “gotcha” system, but in practice it most certainly will be.
The new system also includes a pilot of student surveys. This encourages grade-inflation and a lack of discipline in the classroom. Research shows that student surveys don't work in high-stakes settings. The use of such surveys poisons the relationships between teachers and students, who now in addition to their test scores bear even more responsibility for the future of their teachers' careers.
Crucially, this agreement will not include a sunset provision, unlike districts in other parts of the state. The sunset provision was a key sticking point in negotiations, as the UFT was hoping it would be able to renegotiate the terms of this plan under a new and presumably friendlier mayor. The current deal is in place for the next four years at least, and can only be re-negotiated in collective bargaining within the framework of State Education Law 3012-c.

The mayor and his henchmen have been gloating effusively. The mayor's statement said “Commissioner King has sided with our children on nearly every major point of disagreement we had with the UFT’s leadership, while also rejecting the UFT’s long-held demand for a sunset provision.” Dennis Walcott said he was extremely pleased with the commissioner’s announcement today and we look forward to implementing it.” Bloomberg advisor Howard Wolfson bragged on Twitter that the UFT was “shut out on nearly all their demands.” No matter how the UFT leadership tries to spin it, this is a major defeat for teachers and students.

What Now?

The dropoff in voter turnout in the recent UFT election was already a sign of a disengaged and passive membership. The new evaluation system and the way it was imposed are likely to further demoralize the rank-and-file and increase their cynicism toward the union. The UFT surrendered our collective bargaining rights by turning over the key issue in the next contract to the State Education Department, calling for a biased state official to impose evaluations on us.
MORE campaigned for a membership vote on this evaluation system, and presented a petition with over 1,000 signatures to the December Delegate Assembly. Unity opposed submitting this to the membership since they knew it would be deeply unpopular. The fact that this has instead been imposed by the State Education Department means Mulgrew and the Unity leadership will have an alibi for what will now certainly be a deeply concessionary contract. We must expose the leadership's circumvention of membership in this process, and their contempt for the voices of their rank-and-file.
June 12 will be the day that city workers come together to demand fair contracts. In light of the new evaluation system, one wonders what's left to negotiate. The key concessions, the biggest change to our working conditions in at least a generation, are already in place. It will be crucial for UFT members to attend and discuss the magnitude of this sell-out, and the undemocratic way in which it was imposed on us. Our next contract will inevitably include the new evaluation system. It will also be the first time in this process that the membership has been consulted at all. A campaign to vote no on this contract would send a signal to the leadership that the membership rejects this plan.
Everybody agrees that the key to this will be implementation. Teachers must build active chapters that can be vigilant in calling out abuse of the new system. A coordinated grievance campaign around particular issues of implementation can help us make the most of the 15 extra arbitration days to deal with systemic abuses. MORE will be campaigning in the fall to organize and train chapter leaders, delegates and school activists to be effective in defending their colleagues and organizing strong chapters.

Teachers also need to unite with students and parents to call for an end to the high stakes testing regime that is central to this new evaluation system. Students will now not only be taking high stakes state tests or PARCC assessments*, but also regular "performance assessments" designed to assess teacher effectiveness. Campaigns like the MAP test boycott in Seattle show the power of a community uniting to fight the standardized testing regime.

What this whole sad story tells us is that we can't rely on our union leaders to deliver on our behalf. They have conceded everything, and may now even prove unable to win us retroactive pay for the years we've spent without a contract. It's only by rebuilding the union from the bottom up, school by school, classroom by classroom, that we will begin to stand up to the corporate assault on our schools. MORE is dedicated to a different kind of union, one where democracy and accountability replace backroom deals, where the members make the decisions that matter in their professional lives. Join us!

[1] If a DOE-appointed validator disagrees with the principal’s rating, the DOE keep burden of proof. However, validators are likely to be retired principals, ain the PEP+ system, which is currently used to help fire teachers.

Visit MORE CAUCUS NYC AT morecaucusnyc.org.

*For some criticisms of Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, PARCC, see here and here.
(SLO: Student Learning Objectives.)

NY Regents' Imposed Evaluation for NYC; Buffalo's Eval MOU; How Mulgrew Needs to Stand Up to Cuomo

So, Andrew Cuomo's John King and his New York State Education Department have issued New York City specific teacher evaluations. Already Perdido Street, NYC Educator, Accountable Talk, NYCDoENuts, ICEUFT blog, and EdNotes have highlighted parts and opined on them. I won't play a ranking game; look at all of them. This is an important change on our working conditions.

MULGREW ASKED FOR THIS DISASTER
Shame on United Federation of Teachers (UFT) president Michael Mulgrew. For he cheered governor Andrew Cuomo's pledge to impose an evaluation system.
And don't forget- the resolution between the UFT and the New York City Department of Education was by state fiat. This is outside of contract collective bargaining procedure. The Unity/UFT should have sought arbitration.
And he penned onto the disastrous evaluation system at its genesis, with the APPR factor, when three years ago he joined on with New York's Race to the Top application. See here and here.

Why did they rush to agree to an imposed system? That implies that Mulgrew and the UFT are OK with any idea that New York State Education (NYSED) Commissioner John King and the Board of Regents concoct. In some ways, the system that King and the Regents have imposed is the toughest in New York State.
Mulgrew will spend today with his staff, as he said in his letter 3 days ago. Of course, we can anticipate that he will be prepping staff to put a positive spin on this monstrous disaster.
BUFFALO PLAN: NO TO TERMINATION USE, RECOGNIZES STUDENT ABSENTEEISM
Hundreds of cities --not merely Buffalo-- across the state have side agreements to their evaluation schemes, including stipulations that the evaluations will not be used punitively, that is, in line for teachers to lose their licenses. Back to Buffalo whose evaluation I discussed on Thursday. The memorandum of Understanding (MOU; see here, here and here) the Buffalo school district and the Buffalo Teachers Federation stands in stark contrast to what Mulgrew has conceded to. It guarantees against its punitive use for termination, it factors in student student absenteeism, by degrees of absenteeism.

(On the other hand the Buffalo plan has some flaws --see above links. It makes principals and teachers develop a schedule of student growth goals, akin to the SLO targets that NYC DoENuts refers to, with graduated indexing by factors of students with disabilities (SWDs), English Language Learners (ELLs) and the proportion of students living in poverty. It is unrealistic for teachers to perform as metricians to gauge how students in these categories can change their performance.)
For a fun Buffalo blogger writing in a wildly irreverent Gonzo style, see these posts by B-Lo Ed Scene, writing on Cuomo going nuts over Buffalo's MOU here and here. His most serious one is a fine send-up of how the Republicans on are a crazed Benghazi non-corruption, non-crisis frenzy against president Obama, and how their and the media's non-crisis obsession is a direct parallel to Obama's (and of course Cuomo/King, by extension) endless manufactured emergency war of terror against teachers, see Public School Teachers Feel Your Pain Mr POTUS, which leads with a poster graphic: "Is your child a libertarian?."

Look to what Mulgrew and Unity/UFT have conceded to, the Regents-imposed evaluation system for New York City, released last night.

DANIELSON CHECKLISTS, CRITICIZED BY DANIELSON AND UFT IN 2011, ENDORSED THIS SPRING BY THE UFT Note how the UFT protested in November 2011, but keep in mind that this spring it asked for 22 checklist elements from Danielson's Framework:

When the UFT obtained a copy of one of the checklists, it shared it with Danielson herself to get her thoughts.
Danielson was troubled by the checklists and disapproved of them, union officials said. With that endorsement, UFT Secretary Michael Mendel wrote a letter to the DOE and demanded an immediate end to the practice. He even threatened to cut off negotiations toward a larger evaluation deal that is required by the end of the school year.
. . .
The checklist she saw, Danielson said, was inappropriate because of the way it was filled out. It indicated that the observer had already begun evaluating a teacher while in the classroom observation. She said that’s a fundamental no-no.

NYC AND SYRACUSE, TOUGHEST EVALUATION SYSTEMS IN STATE -- AND THE STUDENT SURVEY FACTOR
The Regents imposed system is one of the toughest in New York State. Again, evaluation systems across the state have side agreements that are more sensitive towards the myriad factors impacting on educational performance. Alone among the hundreds of New York state municipalities only New York City and Syracuse are the only systems that will use student surveys. As one teacher that posted at the Movement of Rank and File Educators UFT caucus Facebook page, "'The new system also includes a pilot of student surveys.' Fantastic. This encourages grade-inflation and a lack of discipline in the classroom." What is behind the Regents' drive for this stipulation? Will the UFT be intellectually honest about how mistaken it was to include student surveys? (Remember, all the Democratic candidates for New York City mayor will lift the cellphone ban.)

The student survey element is a curve-ball that has only recently come up under public discussion, which previously has focused on VAM/high-stakes tests and qualitative (Danielson Frameworks) evaluations. Back in February Gotham said such surveys were unlikely. UFT Secretary Michael Mendel, to his credit, has been on record criticizing student surveys. The Gotham article quoted him:

UFT Secretary Michael Mendel said the union’s position is that it is inappropriate to ask students to make high-stakes decisions about their teachers, because it puts the students under pressure and also could encourage teachers to put student approval ahead of student learning.
“Could you imagine if you were a teacher and you were ineffective by a point or two because you were rated ineffective by the children?” Mendel asked.

Jersey Jazzman, with tongue in cheek, shows how farcical it will look when youths will write evaluations of teachers.
But my favorite is when he shows what a student wrote in response to Merryl Tisch's saying that a Long Island student that threw up during the state tests was healthy. See this post for the full story on Tisch's non-chalance during this episode. (Remember, she's the major campaign aide to Bill Thompson, the NYC mayoral candidate that the UFT is grooming to endorse on June 19.)

ACTION MULGREW SHOULD TAKE -- GO TO COURT -- CUT THE UFT-CUOMO PURSE-STRINGS
Of course, this would reverse numerous pro Regents-imposed evaluation statements by Mulgrew and long-standing UFT policy of blind obeisance to whomever's in power or viewed as costing to power (e.g., Thompson), especially if they are a Democrat, but this is what Mulgrew and the UFT should do: *Challenge this evaluation system in court. No to evasion of collective bargaining.
[UPDATE: ICEUFT Blog reports that there are legal grounds for the UFT to appeal this:

THE PARTIES MAY MAKE AN APPLICATION TO THE NEW YORK STATE SUPREME COURT TO VACATE OR MODIFY THE DETERMINATION OF THE COMMISSIONER PURSUANT TO SECTION SEVENTY-FIVE HUNDRED ELEVEN OF THE CIVIL PRACTICE LAW AND RULES. THE COURT'S REVIEW SHALL BE LIMITED TO THE GROUNDS SET FORTH IN SUCH SECTION.
The UFT would have to argue that King exceeded his constitutional authority, which would be a tough standard to meet but otherwise expect a new universe when we return in the fall.

*While Cuomo did not write this evaluation system, he was the one that decided that the evaluation system would be deferred to the Regents. On what legal authority did he take it upon him self to do this? True, King wrote this, with the Regents, but Cuomo is 100% aligned with King. It is time for teachers to pull their support for him.

A century ago, labor movement pioneer Samuel Gompers advocated that unions should reward their friends and punish their enemies. The UFT wants us to support Andrew Cuomo? He has the greatest contempt for New York City teachers in particular. No Committee on Political Education (COPE) dollars to education deformer in chief governor Cuomo!

UPDATE: One blogpost commenter's statement on how the struggle needs to reach beyond the big cities, and reach to the parents:

I was hoping that the URBAN teachers were not going to have to fight this battle alone. I was hoping that when the silent majority of SUBURBAN teachers realized that the APPR was going to unfairly affect their jobs, as well as ours,
we would then achieve some solidarity and strength in numbers. THEN it would be "game on". Two of our local suburban districts, admins and board members, have publicly and in writing complained about testing and tying the tests to evaluation of teachers. THOSE are the districts where the parents are also complaining about the
effect of the insane testing on their students. They GET IT. And as soon as they would begin to see their beloved teachers mysteriously disappearing from the profession due to high stakes test data, they would call a halt to the Commissioner Boy's silly games.
But no. Once again, the urban teachers will have to fight this battle and suffer the legal consequences. Don't forget, we will have a new Board made up to teacher bashers and haters. They, and Albany are hoping (salivating, actually) that Buffalo will strike, so they can swoop in and waterboard us. Maybe make us sit in a hot summer school cafeteria and listen to Bob Bennett and his Commissioner Puppet do their ventiloquist act via skype? (Because we all know that the Little Commissar, er Commissioner, is afraid to travel to Buffalo without his Daddy Bob.)
Urban parents have had their leadership, DPCC, hijacked by Buffalo REform Ed and the like. The leader of Buffalo ReformEd, James Sampson, will possibly be on our School Board. The Chameleons Polowitz and Friedman are highlighted in is fundraiser photos on his facebook page. Here is a blurb form one of Sampson's supporters:
"We will never change public schools from a gulag of sub par education until we make the purpose of public schools education rather than a secure jobs program for people not qualified to teach."
We urban teachers now need strength and solidarity. We need to ally with our other urban districts so as to not make this just about BUFFALO. We need to make this a STATE issue. We need allies and support. We need informed teachers.
I'll end now. In the eyes of our new Board members, I am just another Sub Par Gulag worker who is not qualified to teach.