I used to teach business letters, but I rarely do so anymore. In fact, I rarely even write them anymore, given the immediacy and availability of electronic communication. Nonetheless, one of the first things I taught was that your name goes at the bottom, as does your title. So it surprises me a little when I see a letter that opens like this (slide past the advertising to the right and enlarge to view):

My name is Martin Messner. I am a teacher and a NYSUT member who was elected as NYSUT’s Secretary/ Treasurer this past spring.

I have a few issues with this. One is that his name and title, of course, are included as a signature, and that this is redundant. You'd think with all the money we pay NYSUT they could find a high school grad to proofread. More to the point, Messner doesn't really work as a teacher. He’s full time at NYSUT these days, making 238K a year before benefits.

However, Messner and his Revive buds made sure they’d be able to keep their teaching gigs in case this whole NYSUT thing doesn’t work out. Thus, while they are out there in Albany doing whatever it is they do, they need not worry about being unemployed in case Mike Mulgrew decides they aren’t doing what he wishes. In fact, they managed to get legislation passed to ensure that. Sure, they couldn’t stop junk science ratings, tier 6, the GEA, the tax cap, and they couldn’t work for a pro-teacher candidate like Zephyr Teachout.

This was particularly important for them for several reasons. The primary reason is that the Revive NYSUT team is denying Lee Cutler, Messner’s predecessor, the severance pay that all the other leaders UFT Unity tossed out are receiving. Cutler, like Messner, had to leave his job before actually retiring. While Revive is willing to screw Cutler it’s important that they themselves be protected.

Messner is jumping for joy about potential savings for NYSUT members.  Not only do they save a few bucks by screwing Lee Cutler, but they also have fabulous insurance programs. Messner saved $375 by switching his home insurance, and another $190 by switching his car insurance. Ain’t that fabulous? This will certainly aid his bottom line, along with the double pension he and his buds negotiated for themselves.

Ironically, the only reason Messner was elected was because of UFT support. Lee Cutler is much-loved around the state, and basically kicked Revive’s ass outside of the city. Of course, UFT has 28% of the members, and 33% of the vote. This is because, in NYSUT’s peculiar vision of democracy, anyone who can’t afford to travel for a weekend at the NY Hilton doesn’t get a vote. I won’t belabor the fact that UFT is a rubber stamp for leadership, with a loyalty oath that makes sure all delegates vote as instructed.

The thing is, though, that MetLife can really suck if you’re a UFT member. For one thing, if you live around a flood area, like I do, and like UFT President Mike Mulgrew does, they won’t cover you at all. This has been the case for at least 20 years, because though I had insurance with them soon after I bought my home, they refused to cover me.

The other thing is that their rates for auto insurance in the metro are are simply awful. When I signed up with them, about 20 years ago, they were competitive, and I did indeed save money. But I trusted them to keep up, and in fact they did not. I bought a car last May, and the salesperson asked me who my insurance company was. When I told him, he said he was absolutely sure he could save me money.

I was a little wary. After all, this was a union-negotiated benefit, and they’re looking out for me. But having a teenage driver in my family, and now with three cars, my rate was pretty high—over $7,000. My wife was next to me, and she was pretty insistent. So I went into an office with a salesperson who saved us about $3,000 a year by switching me to Allstate.

Since it’s UFT that controls NYSUT, shouldn’t they choose an insurance company that offers competitive rates to not only Martin Messner, but also those of us who constitute the very largest local in the country? Shouldn’t Messner aggressively look for an insurance company that doesn’t redline those of us who were victims of Hurricane Sandy? Should Mike Mulgrew consider punching him in the face, rather than only Common Core oppenents, if he doesn’t look out for us?

Or is it the case that what’s good for Martin Messner is good for the entire state? Judging from NYSUT’s legislative record this year, which benefits Messner and his Revive BFFs rather than working teachers, that’s what they’ve concluded.

 by special guest blogger Harris Lirtzman

Dana Goldstein, author of "The Teacher Wars: A History of America's Most Embattled Profession," argues that the United States has entered a full-blown moral panic about "the vampiric ineffective teacher who sucks tax dollars into her bloated pension and health care plans, without much regard for the children under her care."

According to Goldstein, this moral panic--the last real ones were over "welfare queens" stealing food stamps and before that actual or suspected members of the Communist Party--requires policy makers and the media to focus on a single group of people (teachers) as emblems of a large, complex social problem (socioeconomic inequality and educational achievement gaps). The media repeats, ad nauseum, anecdotes about the most despicable examples of this type of person so that the focus on the "worst of the worst" comes finally to misrepresent the true scale and character of what may be a genuine problem.

Teachers of America, awake.  You are at the epicenter of a moral panic.

Moral panics are very hard to stop once they have been activated by the people whose interests they serve.

Sunday's Daily News includes an editorial "Listen to Mrs. Tisch," written by publisher Mort Zuckerman, himself, that is a Hall-of-Fame example of a media-generated moral panic.  According to Mr. Zuckerman:

Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch and Acting Education Commissioner Elizabeth Berlin on Wednesday delivered--with an aggressive and specific battle plan for improving teaching and learning from Brooklyn to the Bronx to Buffalo.  They would scrap the part of the teacher-rating system that allows teachers to juice their scores, and change the law so poorly performing teachers can more easily be removed from the classroom. And, of great importance, they would once and for all eliminate the union-controlled arbitration process that has protected from termination thousands of teachers, from those who engage in intimate conduct with students to those who can't write a lesson plan to save their lives.  The state Legislature no longer has any excuse but to send [Governor] Cuomo reform measures he can sign.

Note the required elements of "moral panic."  An "aggressive battle plan" against vampire teachers who "juice their scores" as a way to hide their fecklessness and incompetence from real Americans. The threat that endangers every part of the state from "Brooklyn to the Bronx to Buffalo." The call to final victory in a "once and for all" elimination of the subversive organization that coordinates all this heinous activity and harbors all these vampire teachers, the powerful and dangerous "union." The malefic forces that prevent the eradication of  "thousands" of vampire teachers among us who prey on their charges by engaging in "intimate conduct" with them.  The infectious incompetence of teachers who cannot write "for their own lives" even the very lesson plans that are the hallmark of their profession. Finally, the summoning of public courage and virtue to do the right thing by having the governor act with "no excuse" or mercy to reform the culprits or banish them from the community.

Unless you and your representatives--the same unions who are selling you out to education reformistas in New York State and across the country--find a way to stop, or even slow down, the rising crest of this moral panic you will find yourselves the vermin cause for the imminent breakdown in the fiber of American society, even as many of your students and their parents bring you some version of a red apple because they love what you do for them every day.

Moral panics occasionally run themselves out just as fevers do but mostly they continue until something or someone stops them.

In 1954, Senator Joseph McCarthy took the moral panic about American communists to its highest level during what were called the "Army-McCarthy" hearings, when McCarthy accused the Army of harboring and promoting Communist Party sympathizers. After more than a month of televised hearings, an attorney for the Army named Joseph Welch looked up at the senator and said, "Senator, you've done enough.  Have you no sense of decency, sir?  At long last, have you left no sense of decency?  You have brought it all out.  If there is a God in heaven it will do neither you nor your cause any good."

The moral panic broke.  Within two months, Senator McCarthy's personal approval ratings collapsed and six months later the Senate censured him by a vote of 67-22.

Moral panics are stopped by courageous people speaking truth to power. The moral panic now enveloping public school teachers in New York will not be stopped until someone like a Joseph Welch speaks fearlessly to someone like an Andrew Cuomo. Our Mr. Welch will not come from the United Federation of Teachers or from the New York State United Teachers.  They have no Mr. Welches.  They are afraid of Andrew Cuomo and do not have the words to call him to account.

But we, the teachers of New York State and New York City, do have Joseph Welches among us and our allies.  We must find our Joseph Welch very quickly, because if we do not find him soon we will be washed away by a moral panic that serves many purposes but certainly not the purpose of good education in public schools by trained professionals who change the lives of their students every day.

Perhaps as a student of history, perhaps as a student of human nature, I appreciate the short stories of Nathaniel Hawthorne.  Given this era of Ed. Deform, some of his characters seem all too real.  In particular, I am reminded of two stories, "The Birthmark" and "Ethan Brand."

In "The Birthmark," an alchemist named Alymer is increasingly troubled by his wife's single imperfection, a crimson-colored, hand-shaped birthmark upon her cheek.  This minor imperfection begins to consume Aylmer until he can see little else.  He seeks to eliminate this flaw from his wife's face by concocting potions.  As one might guess, in the end the mark fades and disappears, but he has killed his wife in the process.

In "Ethan Brand," the main character sets upon a quest which troubles his heart to no end.  He goes in search of "The Unpardonable Sin."  He searches for it in the hearts of his fellowmen.  Would you be surprised if I told you who harbored "The Unpardonable Sin"?

Hawthorne describes here the tragedy of Brand:



How many Ethan Brands are there among ed. "reformers"?  They argue for lofty goals.  Yet, as they set about on their path they use their supposedly superior intellects to destroy so much that is good.  They forget the moral and humanistic purposes of education.

In holding teachers accountable for unrealistic levels of "proficiency," reformers attempt to eliminate "the birthmark."  They would close and destroy every public school in their path towards perfection.  How long will it be before they admit that the problems faced by so many school children more often than not have little to do with school, itself--and that their "solutions" will only make the problems worse.  Perfect proficiency will never be achieved short of cut score manipulation, gaming data, the use of sub-par criteria, intimidation or tides of cheating.

And what legacies do the "reformers" leave in their wake?:

Testing becomes more important than learning.
Learning test-based knowledge becomes more important than helping children develop healthy and productive lives.
Students become ever-more anxious and fearful of school.
School becomes increasingly synonymous with drudgery.
Teachers resign, retire early and succumb to stress-related illnesses.
Making statistics look pretty replaces dealing in truths.
Schools are sold to the highest bidder.
Irrevocable harm is done to public schooling.
Communities are destroyed.

"Reformers" will search the heart of every teacher, looking for "The Unpardonable Sin."  Would you be surprised if they, too, like Ethan Brand, had been looking in the wrong places?  In the kiln of time, whose heart will be shown to have been made of marble?

With the passing of Mario Cuomo, we're left to reflect on his legacy. I voted for him every chance I got, and had no reservations whatsoever about it. He's well-known for his principled opposition to the death penalty, which he vetoed every chance he got. It's likely that's what lost him his bid for a fourth term against George Pataki. New Yorkers had also grown weary of his Hamlet on the Hudson routine, in which he endlessly pondered whether or not the time was right to run for President. But there were always reasons to support him. 

 Nowhere was this more evident than in his 1984 keynote address to the Democratic Convention. At the time, the White House was occupied by Ronald Reagan, who supported union in Poland but actively contributed toward its downfall in the US. Reagan, you may recall, fired the air traffic controllers, the only union possessing the peculiar lack of foresight it took to have supported him in 1980. He also instituted a GOP signature initiative, tax cuts for the rich, with the rest of us hanging on and hoping for the best. Reagan was happy with this, riding around his ranch with a cowboy hat. Mario had another vision:

...there's another city; there's another part to the shining the city; the part where some people can't pay their mortgages, and most young people can't afford one; where students can't afford the education they need, and middle-class parents watch the dreams they hold for their children evaporate.

Sounds familiar, doesn't it? This is a theme we heard Bill de Blasio use in his quest to become mayor--it's a theme many lifelong democrats take to heart. This is why a lot of us fight corporate education reform. We want our children and students to have the same or, hopefully, better opportunities that we did. Of course, in that, we have formidable adversaries.

Sadly, in the case of Andrew Cuomo, the apple has fallen miles away from the tree. Doubtless it's very difficult to live in the shadow of such a legendary figure, particularly when it's your father. And surely Andrew has gone to great lengths to rebrand himself. That's particularly evident when we look at another section of Mario's 1984 speech.

We believe we must be the family of America, recognizing that at the heart of the matter we are bound one to another, that the problems of a retired school teacher in Duluth are our problems; that the future of the child -- that the future of the child in Buffalo is our future...

Andrew's been vocal on both these issues. Much as we'd like to, we can't ignore his most recent remark on teacher pensions:

Albany has been too concerned with protecting the pension rights of teachers and not enough with the future of students. #NYGov2015
— Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo) January 1, 2015

How's that retired teacher in Duluth feeling about Andy right now? The New York Post can't contain its delight at the prospect of placing her on that cat food diet so Murdoch can pull in a few more nickels. It doesn't matter that NY is not in that sort of trouble, and it doesn't matter that the retirement system is not unique to teachers.

As for Buffalo, Andy's using it as a rationale to double down on the junk science used to rate teachers. If Buffalo schoolchildren aren't doing well on standardized tests, it must be the fault of teachers. It has nothing to do with rampant poverty or lack of industry. And of course those things are not Andy's problem. While Mario would have fretted over such things, Andy couldn't care less. 

While Mario Cuomo took a principled stand against the death penalty, son Andrew opts for a principled stand against a millionaire's tax used to fund public schools. The contrast couldn't be clearer.

Alas, our governor is an unprincipled, opportunistic, self-serving, morally bankrupt empty suit whose only priority is his own selfish ambition. He does not answer to we, the people, but rather to his wealthy contributors. He brands himself a "student lobbyist," but lobbies only for schools controlled by Eva Moskowitz. We, the UFT and NYSUT, made a huge error in failing to endorse his opponents. Clearly Andy has no appreciation whatsoever for our neutrality.

The only redeeming factor here is the fact that he's no longer the juggernaut he was four years ago. It's pretty evident the Emperor has no clothes. Yet when NYSUT and UFT leadership had a choice between Andrew's agenda and Mario's (embodied in the form of one Zephyr Teachout), it chose not only to stand on the sidelines, but also to actively scuttle Teachout's WFP nomination.

Perhaps we can credit our activism, as well as Revive NYSUT's questionable promises, for the fact that they sat this one out. But we have to do more. If we respect the legacy of Mario Cuomo, it behooves us all to respect and enable his vision, a vision that respects and empowers not only us, but also our students and their communities.

You remember that wacky funster/ US Education Secretary Arne Duncan? Sure you do. He's the guy who said that Hurricane Katrina was the best thing to happen to education in New Orleans, Louisiana. He also made a ridiculous crack about white suburban moms whose kids weren't so bright. And our leader, Barack Obama, not only let him keep his job after that, but raised not a whisper of objection. To top that off, he was off blathering about how we need to tell second graders whether or not they will be able to go to college.

"Sorry, Suzie, but the aptitude test says you're gonna be a drawbridge oiler. It was written by Pearson, so we know it's accurate. After all, we pre-tested it and it was scored by an eight-dollar-an-hour banjo player from Kentucky, not some special interest unionized teacher from New York. You can't get much more accurate than that."

Now Arne Duncan has had yet another brainstorm.  He actually did an education tweet-a-thon with Shakira, she of the flexible hips, the pride of Colombia. Why does Arne see fit to tweet with a singing star? Well, for one thing, she belly dances a whole lot better than Bill Gates does. (Don't laugh. I haven't seen any of you moving like Shakira.)

For another thing, she has just as much teaching experience as Arne does, and quite possibly more. Who do you think tells the guitar player how loud to play, or tells the backup dancers whether or not they're shaking their booty up to the minute?

This is the state of the art, from our nation's top educator.

If we're a nation at risk, I doubt it has anything to do with teachers, because Arne Duncan has nothing to do with teachers either.

From my DOE mailbox. Much nicer than the insincere and convoluted nonsense Klein and Walcott used to send. Bloomberg never sent anything at all, to my recollection.

There aren't many UFT Unity bloggers. I know of only one chapter leader who bothered with a blog, and he was quietly instructed by his overlords to take it down. Of course he did, and now he's got a really cool gig at a UFT borough office. He also goes to conventions and votes however the hell Leroy Barr tells him to. In UFT Unity World, that's what's known as representing the membership. Being a chapter leader/ activist for UFT Unity entails doing as you're told. It's all neatly laid out in the oath.

The closest thing there is in UFT Unity World to a blogger is retired teacher/Unity bigshot Peter Goodman. Goodman tows the UFT Unity line very closely and clearly telegraphs the positions of leadership for them. While UFT President Michael Mulgrew makes it a point to tell the DA he doesn't read the blogs, because why the hell does he need to know what thinking teachers are actually thinking, I can only suppose Goodman is the exception to his rule that bloggers are purveyors of myth (read "liars").

The other day Goodman put up something I found fascinating, and you should too. Governor Cuomo and Merryl Tisch are raising a whole lot of Sturm und Drang about their APPR system. In their eyes, it's flawed because not enough teachers are getting adverse ratings. It's fairly simple in their eyes. Since they've set up a system in which 70% of our children are failing, shouldn't an equal number of teachers fail as well? I suspect they'd settle for 5 or 10% of teachers being arbitrarily dismissed to show how reasonable and flexible they are, but Tisch clearly wants anyone rated ineffective on junk science to be ineffective overall.

Here's what UFT Unity guru Peter Goodman has to say about that:

In my view, the major issues for NYSUT are not charter schools and the teacher evaluation law; the major issues are the 2% property tax cap and the Gap Elimination Adjustment.

That's an odd view for a UFT mouthpiece. Since these issues afflict our brother and sister NYSUT members more directly than us, we've heard little from UFT leadership about them. Basically Cuomo, who fancies himself a student lobbyist, continues to make draconian cuts in state aid while making it almost impossible for municipalities to make up the cuts in local budgets. It took 53% of the vote for Cuomo to win reelection, but it takes 60 if you want to raise your budget any more than 2% or rate of inflation, whichever is lower.

What this signals to bloggers like me and Perdido Street School is that leadership is likely to take a dive on APPR and charter schools. There's history supporting that--while Cuomo did his grand giveaway of mayoral control to Eva Moskowitz last year, Mulgrew didn't lift a finger to stop it. What will leadership do when Tisch and Cuomo pimp legislation to have an arbitrary percentage of teachers fired so as to appease Andy's wealthy contributor base? Tough to say.

Goodman offers us some other insights as well:

I mentioned to a teacher activist to expect “consequences” if the local endorsed Teachout. He thought Cuomo “would understand.”

Politics is a blood sport. When your guy/gal wins you expect them to support your issues and when your guy/gal loses you can expect the winner to seek retribution. A deeply embedded political aphorism: screw with me and I screw with you.

Maybe you didn’t learn this in your civics class and maybe you’re willing to take the heat and continue to battle and maybe you’re simply an idealist.

I have no idea which teacher activists Goodman speaks to, if indeed there are any.  Of course Revive NYSUT leadership endorsed no one at all, despite its explicit promise when running to oppose Cuomo (to which Goodman raised no objection whatsoever). I suppose we're now supposed to believe that it isn't Revive's fault the governor reneged on his promise to pass a bill exempting teachers from adverse Common Core-based ratings. This was touted as a great victory by our prescient leadership, but actually was not all that significant--it would clearly have affected a very small number of teachers, and it was temporary in any case.

What Goodman is trying to do here is blame those localities who failed to tow the Unity line and endorsed pro-teacher Zephyr Teachout or Howie Hawkins. If only they had sat down and shut up, the preferred mode of UFT Unity activism, everything would have been fine. We'd have our seat at the table and Andrew Cuomo would not have shown himself to be the lying weasel that he is.

You see, it's through quiet and highly diplomatic negotiations that UFT Unity has managed to usher in charter schools, mayoral control, school closings, junk science teacher ratings, two-tier due process, getting paid a full decade after everyone else, and the lowest pattern anyone has bargained in my living memory. Victories like that are a model for the entire state, and surely Revive NYSUT was propped up by UFT leadership so that this vision could be realized.

If Tisch and Cuomo manage to enact a toxic statewide APPR, every teacher in the state will feel the consequences of UFT Unity's unique negotiating tactics.

From our entire editorial staff.

I've got a lot of disagreements with AFT President Randi Weingarten. But I very much respect that she engages people on Twitter and elsewhere, myself included. In contrast, I've sent UFT President Mike Mulgrew a few emails, and he's much too busy to respond, though I'm chapter leader of the largest school in Queens. Given that, when I've got something to say to the UFT President, I copy it to the blog so someone will actually see what I'm doing.

Sadly, Randi presides over a broken system, which I'll get to later. On Twitter, she's pushing the notion that we can decouple testing from Common Core. That's a great idea, but given the AFT and UFT-approved APPR, it's a high bar. Most Americans are not aware VAM is nonsensical junk science, and the papers, NY Times included, cry in unison that it's necessary. We'd extracted a promise that NY Governor Andrew Cuomo would delay Common Core-related junk science while rating teachers, and he simply broke it. Screw teachers, screw NYSUT, and screw Randi Weingarten, says Governor Andy.

So while we may, in fact, be able to reduce the number of tests, or the stakes they represent, we aren't addressing the central issue--that Common Core is baseless crap that ought to be abandoned and replaced by something that will help our children. There's always some reason from union leadership to put it off. Sure, you don't like junk science, but let's talk about this right now. Sure, Common Core is developmentally inappropriate, but if we have fewer tests it will be better. Sure the standards are based on NAEP standards that will fail 70% of our kids, but we'll fail them less often this way. It's never, "Let's take a cold hard look at this situation and face it head on."

When I complain about our support of Common Core, Randi points to the debate at the AFT Convention, notable for Mulgrew's offer to punch its opponents in the face. Whatever the strong points of this debate, its outcome was a foregone conclusion. 800 UFT loyalty oath signers know that they are the only ones Mulgrew can really threaten. If they vote against Common Core, it's exile from the Unity Caucus, no more trips to California on my dime, and no more part-time work at UFT HQ. Worst is the fact that the Holy Grail, a UFT gig that entails no work in those nasty old classrooms, will be forever out of their grasp.

Consider that the UFT dominates NYSUT. Though it holds 28% membership in the state union, it controls 33% of the vote. Last year UFT dumped NYSUT leadership, with the exception of reliable Andy Pallotta, and installed hand-picked, utterly reliable folks who know they serve at the pleasure of Michael Mulgrew. There will be no more inconvenient limits on how much money Andy Pallotta can spend on fundraisers for Andrew Cuomo. Consider that NYSUT is the largest group in the AFT, and there's not a whole lot of doubt how AFT debates will end. Honestly, does anyone think real teachers would tolerate Bill Gates as a keynote?

The key to total control, of course, is the UFT's insistence on a loyalty oath that has all 800 of our delegates voting lockstep. You'd think every UFT member adored Bill Gates. You'd think we were all jumping up and down screaming Common Core now, Common Core forever. You'd think we all loved school closings, charter colocations, junk science ratings and every reformy thing our leadership has enabled and stamped with its approval.

In fact, given the way UFT leadership has rigged elections, and given that it's deliberately shut out every independent voice from NYSUT and AFT, it's outrageous that we're compelled to pay dues to these organizations. This is the taxation without representation we were taught about as schoolchildren. Unless you sign a loyalty oath to UFT Unity leadership, neither you nor your school has any voice whatsoever in NYSUT or AFT.

Here's the kicker. If you do sign the loyalty oath, you still have no voice. You can only vote as told and your vote makes no difference whatsoever. This is the tail that wags the dog, and our union, the United Federation of Teachers, precludes democracy not only for all city teachers, but also for all state teachers, and for every member of the AFT.

It's quite a system. And it's quite durable. The Berlin Wall may have fallen, but Unity Caucus is still alive and kicking each and every one of us.

I ran across an old folder the other night, stuffed between tons of lesson plans.  It was a file of my NYC observation reports.  

My first observation is dated Oct. 26, 1992.  Funny, I don't remember the crafting of that particular lesson or its observation now.  But the report makes it as clear as day.  Apparently, I was teaching about the role of knights in the Middle Ages.  I introduced the lesson with a poem (perhaps, from a woman troubadour) and utilized C'est Moi from Camelot.  Reading over this dusty observation report, I found myself pleasantly pleased with my younger self.  C'est moi!  C'est moi!   'Tis I!

Here it is:


My second observation report is dated a month later, November 19, 1992.  Here, I read the tale of a young teacher, prepped to go and caught off guard by a fire drill, all while trying to find some way to relate Martin Luther to her students.  I chose Malcolm X for the Do Now.  Apparently, the film "X" had been released recently.
  



Today, I would use a different "Do Now" in my global class.  I have a completely different audience.  But I know why I chose it.  I was searching for some way to draw the students into the content.  Malcolm X worked, although apparently it worked too well and went on for far too long.

The third observation report was dated December 10, 1992.  Again, I found myself pleasantly surprised.  I managed to have a New York Times article from the previous day ready to go for a lesson on the Supreme Court.  It appears the lesson might have been better organized, but all the component parts were present.




Shortly after this last report, as fate would have it, I found myself "excessed."  I ended up at a new school.  I have remained there for over twenty years.  Now, in place of the old grades of S for satisfactory and U for unsatisfactory, I get numbers that equate to levels of effectiveness.  Despite common sense and logic, it is quite possible with the new formulas that I might become less effective with time.  All that needs happen is tests get harder or my students study less.

Do I need to say I miss the old system?  Given the new reports, teachers are being dissected alive.  When I examine the report, I don't get a sense of my lesson until I make it to the third and final page.  In my old reports, I had the sense I was part of a family or a community; that same community of my first school has since been willfully ripped apart by educational "reformers."  I am part of a new community today, but one would guess from these mandated reports that I am little more than a living, breathing statistic.

This last page was the most useful.  It seems largely equivalent to the reports of old.  I pity overworked supervisors, given this new system of observation which seems unworthy of the incredible time and effort spent upon it.  I am glad I did not become a supervisor. The above observation was formal.  It was planned in advance.  It lasted for an entire period.  Although I opted for the shorter snapshots this year, it was only to ease the pain of the observation cycle.  If I was a new teacher, there is no doubt in my mind that I would benefit most from full period observations.  Then, one could see if the Do Now is too long, if I actually make it to the summary, the cohesion of my lesson, the totality of its glory or abject failure.   This new system treats seasoned professionals as really no different from the newbie, just learning the trade.  Tenure has come to mean less and less.  Thanks to ed. deform, the dignity of teachers is slowly stripped away.  Teachers are asked to prep for standardized tests more than awaken young minds.  And, if some would have their way, tenure would be pulled out from underneath our feet.  The apprentice and master craftsman would walk in the same shoes.

Then, at the end of the year, I get year-end reports.  Here is one from the year I completed my probationary service.  In addition to the excerpt below, it included additional remarks, noting six observations by my A.P. and four observations by my principal.  The reverse of the form was completed, as it related to probationary personnel and I was awarded an S.



Guess what?  After I was awarded my tenure, having survived a trial by fire, I didn't decay.  I continued to grow.  But I was greatly relieved to be a trusted professional, no longer under the most careful and time-consuming mandated scrutiny of my superior officers.  No longer!

My year-end APPR statistically-based, scientifically-approved measure last year looks something (exactly) like the image below.  Forty points are determined by students' test scores.  How helpful is this report to me?  How does it compare to the observation reports of twenty years ago?  I was once S.  Now, I'm "Effective."  Sorry for you, if you're an "ed. deformer."  You probably are not satisfied with anything more than an ineffective rating.  Looks like no one's happy now. 

It makes me very sad to read pieces like this on the ICE blog or elsewhere. Evidently, UFT President Mike Mulgrew was busy calling bloggers liars, saying there would be no compromises on health care. Mulgrew later admitted whether or not that was the case would be up to arbitrators, told us the cupboard was bare, and the substandard contract was the best he could get.

In fairness, I believe it was the best he could get. After all, he was willing to stand up and tell us the cupboard was bare. We now know it was not.

And in that, we can blame Mulgrew for misleading us. We can blame him for not being cognizant of the facts. We can blame him for not doing sufficient research. We can blame him for being dead wrong, no matter what the cause. I certainly blame him for all of the above.

I blame UFT leadership for selling the contract on a logical fallacy, to wit, an appeal to fear. It was no coincidence that, at the DA where the contract was endorsed by a large crowd of loyalty-oath signers, the first question was something like, "Hey Mike, you're a rock star and we love you, but what happens if we don't accept this contract?"

The answer was something like, "Well, if we don't take this, we have to get in line behind 150 other unions." There were also statements like retro pay isn't a God-given right. What was really odd was that these statements did not come from the city, but rather our own leadership. You'd think the city would make these arguments so that we'd buy the lie that it was the best they could offer. In fact, several uniformed unions have already done marginally better, and they didn't have to accept two-tier due process in order to achieve it.

Mulgrew and his top-down leadership team did an awful job of negotiation. They sold out our brother and sister ATRs for virtually nothing, and Mulgrew publicly suggested ATRs could be fired for shouting in the halls a few times. He did abysmal research. Leadership treated us like fools, arguing that anyone who opposed the contract opposed teacher empowerment.

Mulgrew did a terrible job negotiating the only contract he negotiated. He has done a terrible job representing us, and in fact when he gets all bellicose over Common Core, he doesn't represent us at all. Certainly we'd have liked to see that kind of belligerence while we went six years without a contract, but it was nowhere to be found.

I can say plenty more about our disappointing President, but ultimately it isn't his fault. 75% of us voted for that contract. Mulgrew can say what he likes all day long, but it's up to us whether or not to accept it.

We bought it hook, line and sinker, and sentenced our brother and sister unions to the worst pattern in my living memory, even as the city is well in the black. We can blame Mike Mulgrew. We can blame Bill de Blasio, but in this case he is our adversary, and despite the nonsense in the tabloids, he in fact saved NYC a ton of cash by getting us to accede to this piece of crap. 

We can blame anyone and everyone. But it's on us. We bought it, and we are now stuck with it for two years after it expires. The balloon payments in 2019 and 2020 will discourage the next mayor from being reasonable with us or indeed our brother and sister unions.

Until and unless we wake up, this is our destiny.

I'm a little flabbergasted by commentary I see everywhere not only about, but sometimes also by NYPD. They turned their backs on the mayor at a funeral. It's odd, because in fact the mayor has not said a disparaging word about them. However, this man, who was elected by 73% of New Yorkers, mustered the audacity to tell the city, after a man was killed on the street, that he told his son to be careful when he went out, that he was concerned for his safety.

For this, the NYPD turned their back on the mayor at a funeral where he was paying his respects to a murdered officer. What sort of a society is it where an elected politician may not tell a heartfelt truth? Would Pat Lynch like personal approval over every word said on mass media? Are we a society in which we are not only prohibited from criticizing police brutality, but also from expressing empathy with its victims? I'd hope that not even police would support police brutality.

I've heard de Blasio blamed for these murders, which is ridiculous. I've even seen the same people who say people kill people, guns don't, are blaming de Blasio for the actions of this deranged individual.

I understand police being proud of what they do. My daughter wants to be NYPD, and I've said nothing to dissuade her. If she actually follows through, I'll be proud of her too. I always respect people who do jobs I'd be no good at, and as such I respect the police.  I'm not NYPD, but rather UFT, and I'm proud to be a city teacher. I think there are few jobs as important as mine. I can certainly understand police feeling the same way.

Here's the thing, though. There is clearly a different standard for teachers. We are trashed regularly by pols, and often by NYC mayors. I've watched Rudy Giuliani say teachers stink and shouldn't get a raise. I've actually heard him blame teachers for the Eric Garner killing. Mike Bloomberg regularly made outrageous statements about us. He said he wanted to fire half of us and double class size. Joel Klein regularly trashed tenure and step pay. I still hear people, all of the above and more, demanding all sorts of reformy nonsense. Who cares if merit pay has been around for a hundred years and has never worked? I see so-called liberals like Bill Maher talking about how teachers need to be fired. Whoopi Goldberg says outrageous stereotypical nonsense about us without a second thought.

There was some big thing with Joel Klein and Condi Rice saying we were a threat to national security. Rod Paige, former US Education Secretary before he started buying off journalists to pimp out his programs, called us a terrorist organization. You'd think we were that, or public enemy number one, or a zombie plague ascending upon America.

Actually I don't think it's that bad to turn your back on the mayor--if you have a valid reason. My first act of union activism was marching in a UFT Labor Day Parade. We all wore black shirts that said, "Shame on City Hall," and planned to turn our backs on Dinkins for denying us a contract, if I recall correctly. There was a good reason. Anyway, Dinkins ran off to a tennis match before we got the chance, but I still have the shirt.

I don't feel much like wearing it today. I don't think Bill de Blasio deserves scorn for trying to calm down NYC after a man was killed on the street and a grand jury cleared the man who did it. We have seen a few peaceful protests. We have also seen some random acts of lunacy. I have seen people twist logic in bizarre ways trying to attribute this to Bill de Blasio. Rudy Giuliani spouts bile, saying it wouldn't happen under his watch. As a matter of fact, 9/11 happened under his watch, and he'd determined it was a good idea to place his emergency room on a high floor of a proven terror target.

It's lunacy to think that a democratically elected mayor has no right to try to calm down a troubled city. We'd be better off without the attacks on de Blasio. They are unwarranted, as are the perpetual and visceral attacks on teachers.

I see teachers who've done next to nothing repeatedly attacked in the tabloids, with their names and spurious charges that have been dismissed. Neither they nor police ought to be disrespected by politicians.

But honestly, Pat Lynch appears to have no idea what it means to be have voices of alleged authority spew condemnation. He could learn from us, and I certainly hope he never has to. But loving your children and trying to protect them is far from a crime. Trying to keep the city together during a time of crisis is the mayor's job.

There are certainly things UFT could do better. Still, I see absolutely nothing we could learn from the example of Pat Lynch right now.

I understand NYSUT EVP Andrew Pallotta, who bought a whole table at a Cuomo fundraiser and then claimed to oppose him, is sending a bunch of lucky NYSUT folks to a wing-ding over at the Governor's mansion on December 31st. I don't know whether or not Andy is going himself. But someone has to eat Sandra Lee's Spam Kebobs a la mode, and preserve our valuable seat at the table.

I suppose if all the guests have enough of Sandra's drinks, the ones that match the tablecloths, there will be ample time to discuss politics. Hey, Andy P. wants to know why Andy C. just screwed us again. Why did he do that? Why can't Andys just get along? Didn't we buy all those $5000 seats at your fundraiser? Aren't we best buds? Can't we be Andy's Gang again?

Andy Pallotta didn't really mean it when he called you clueless. After all, we're here, aren't we? Didn't we each eat a Spam Kebob? No of course that wasn't us tossing them out the window. No, we didn't feed them to the dogs. Look at all those kebobs on the floor that the dogs refuse to eat. They couldn't all come from us.

But here's the thing--if Revive NYSUT leadership really thinks Cuomo is clueless, and if they really find him remotely as self-serving, self-important, and reformy as we do, why on earth are they going over there at all? What does Andrew Cuomo need to do, beyond taking money, changing laws and initiating rallies,  before we realize that he's just another front for Eva Moskowitz? What the hell does he need to say before we realize we haven't got enough loose cash to buy him over to our side?

It's time to be consistent. Our friends are our friends, and we haven't got nearly enough of them. But those who wish to set arbitrary benchmarks to fail our children and fire us are not our friends. And when people hate you and everything you stand for, it sends an odd message when you go to their parties.

Here's the message I get. I get the message that we are crawling on our hands and knees begging the guy who just broke a promise, reneged on a deal, stabbed us in the back, to please be nice to us and let us keep our seat at the table. It doesn't matter if you smash it over our heads. We'll gladly paste it back together and sit in it again because no matter how many times you screw us we never learn anything at all.

What's sad about that is learning is perhaps the most important aspect of our job. If we refuse to do it, how can we teach anyone else to do it? Fortunately, the leaders of NYSUT aren't teachers anymore. So what if we're fired because of the invalid use of an invalid test? They're still up there in Albany making over triple a teacher's salary for buying seats at fundraisers and hanging at Cuomo's wing-dings.

Nice work if you can get it, I suppose. But I'd feel much better about paying those salaries if they were doing something just a little more serious. I mean, if my employer demands that we be effective, why can't we demand the same of those who are supposed to work for us? And make no mistake, that's what the union leaders are supposed to do, despite frequent behavior that tends to indicate otherwise.

Update: This is did not not happen exactly as my source reported it, as NYSUT protested, and claimed to have organized the protest before the governor's veto. But Andy Pallotta did indeed attend the soiree.

I'm in Montreal right now. We drove here yesterday, and though it rained all day it wasn't really that bad. Sometimes you can be on the NY Thruway and either side of it feels like you're driving though a wading pool. That can be pretty scary on long drives. Our only bad luck yesterday was the unspeakable traffic when we got within an hour of our destination.

Of course that's incidental to my Christmas story, which is all about drugs. You see I have this doctor who not only told me to take these drugs, but also contacted Medco via his computer, so they would arrive on my doorstep via an official employee of the United States of America. Alas, by Tuesday my drugs had not arrived. I spoke to the doctor, who sent a prescription to my local pharmacy.

Unfortunately, the pharmacist said Medco denied it. I was very sad, because there I was with no drugs, and the doctor said I should take them. So I called Medco. They wanted to know a lot of things. They wanted numbers, they wanted to send me to the right department, and I sat in the pharmacy pushing buttons until they finally finished asking all the questions. Then I got a recording, telling me my call was very important to them. You would think, then, they'd have someone answer it, but that was not the case. After a while on hold, I finally got a person, who began by asking me all of the questions I had answered for the recording.

I explained that I needed these drugs, and that I was about to leave the country. She listened politely, and said they had already mailed the drugs. I listened politely, and said while that may be the case, I had ordered them a week previous and did not have them. She said they could arrive any day. I said I was not going to be here any day, that I was here now and would be gone tomorrow. After a few such conversations, she put me on hold to speak to her supervisor, or someone. She came back and said she would check out the possibility of a "vacation exception."

I sat and waited.

The woman came back and said she had good news and bad news. The bad news was they absolutely could not cover my prescription. The good news was that I was free to take only a seven-day supply and pay for it myself. How generous of her to allow me to do that. It was very, "Welcome. Feel free to step up to the bar and buy yourself a drink."

So that's what I did. And on this Christmas I thank my magnanimous insurance company for allowing me to reach into my pocket and buy stuff myself. What other insurance company gives you such perfect freedom?

And what further improvements will the arbitrator come up with so as to achieve the insurance savings Mulgrew promised in order to clinch our most recent sub-standard contract?

Arwen and I wish a happy and healthy Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, New Year, Festivus, and whatever it is in your heart to celebrate both this year and next!

We look forward to another year of truth to reforminess, and thank you all for taking time out from your busy lives to read our blog!

This is a photo of us taking a rare moment away from close reading to do a blog planning session. We fully intend to submit this as an artifact so we get Danielson credit for our teacher team. We realize, of course, that the UFT had a brilliant victory last year precluding the use of artifacts, and that this was preceded by the previous year's brilliant victory allowing the use of artifacts.

Both Arwen and I continue to be amazed when our union leadership wins victories for getting things, and then gains equally important victories by losing them.  For example, it was a great victory when we gained the right to have "validators" who would decide whether or not the burden of proof would be on us at 3020a. Doubtless that was much better than having the DOE actually have to prove our incompetence. And it was yet another great victory when we got actual UFT members to call thumbs up or down on us for an extra 15 grand a year, even though the fantastic previous system had never even been tested.  No doubt fired UFT members will say, "Gee, I'm glad it was one of my own who got me fired," and would send the validators Christmas cards if only their identities were not top-secret.

Let's hope for a year of truth. Let's hope for a year when Andrew Cuomo is exposed for the self-serving, self-important, morally bankrupt, rudderless stooge he is. Let's hope scandal rains upon him and his equally odious New Jersey counterpart. Let's hope the papers start reporting truth rather than being megaphones for Moskowitz and her rich reformy BFFs.

Let's wish good health to all our bold supporters, among whom we're proud to count you.

All our best for a great holiday season, and a great 2015!

Modern-day ed. "reformers" invariably deal in inconvenient contradictions.  First, there was Rhee, former head of Students' First, jovially describing how she had her class tape their lips shut to the point of bleeding.  Then there are a whole spate of reformers who preach the Common Core, high-stakes tests and junk-science teacher evaluations, yet refuse to send their kids to schools that practice the same.  One such reformer is NY State Ed. Commissioner John King, now on his way to D.C.  King's kids had been schooled at a private Montessori in Greenbush, NY, dubbed Woodland Hill.

In the wake of the oxymoron, Susan Kambrich, head of Woodland Hill, attempted to explain it away.  According to her, "When I looked at the pedagogical shifts that are part of the Common Core, it felt like we were already doing those things."  She followed up, "Montessori education lends itself very well to the initiatives of the Common Core."  Not all agree.  Some are quick to point out that Maria Montessori was more about teaching to the whole child, allowing greater latitude for unstructured play and exercise.  She never would have stood for a punitive test-based learning culture.

Teachers at my school have also looked at the standards and remarked that we do all these things.  Some say it without realizing our kids will be Common-Cored alive in Global History and Geography come the Spring of 2015.  When it comes to pass (or in this case fail), perhaps we will be comforted by the fact that even Woodland Hill's fifth-grade class failed its 2013 State math test miserably.

That is what happens, I guess, when it seems you have been doing Common-Core-type things all along.  Like an unsuspecting deer, you walk into the headlights of a high-stakes test.  It is the equivalent of a rapidly firing machine gun.  You marched off to war with a bounce in your step, but when the guns fire, it's hit the ground and good luck!

Now, that King is on his way to D.C., he will have the opportunity to put his money where his children's mouths are.  Will he become a public-school parent?  Will he subject his kids to classes focused on test prep?  Will he subject his kids to tests made to drain the living spirit from them?  Will he subject his children to tests that academically drown even reputable swimmers?

Let me conclude with a quote by Maria Montessori.  Perhaps when King is considering into which school he should enroll his children, he will be thinking more of Montessori's sentiments than his own promulgation of the Core:

“We cannot know the consequences of suppressing a child's spontaneity when he is just beginning to be active. We may even suffocate life itself. That humanity which is revealed in all its intellectual splendor during the sweet and tender age of childhood should be respected with a kind of religious veneration. It is like the sun which appears at dawn or a flower just beginning to bloom. Education cannot be effective unless it helps a child to open up himself to life.” 

― Maria Montessori

It's remarkable to watch UFT and NYSUT finally appear to come to the same conclusions about Cuomo we bloggers arrived at years ago.

Perdido Street School: The Arrogance Of Cuomo's Power Play Over Education... http://t.co/rCey0YDxDT
— UFT (@UFT) December 19, 2014

It's fabulous to see the UFT citing Reality Based Educator as a source. Last spring UFT President Mike Mulgrew, fervently pushing yet another sub-standard contract, stood in front of an audience largely composed of his 800 loyalty-oath signing sycophants, He then declared he didn't read the blogs, but that we were purveyors of myth. He then said he was being nice, having evidently determined we were too stupid to realize he was calling us liars. I suppose when you're accustomed to addressing bought-and-paid-for loyalty oath signers you don't expect much in the way of even marginal critical thought from your audiences.

But RBE is right, of course, as usual, and has been all those years as Mulgrew and NYSUT kept their respective heads placed firmly in the sand. He was right when Eva trounced mayoral control last spring while Mulgrew did nothing. And he's been right to call out Cuomo consistently. NYSUT has now rolled out its big gun, which entails calling Cuomo "clueless." They've apparently put their heads together and determined this remakably clever tactic is the straw that will break the Cuomo's back.

In fact, it's possible they've finally determined that sitting in the cone of silence is not the optimal strategy after all. Six months ago, in a Suffolk forum, I sat a few seats away from NYSUT EVP Andy Palotta as he hemmed and hawed and failed to answer a question--"Will you support Andrew Cuomo for governor in November. My answer,  "No," was very well received. The moderator had to ask me to expound on it, which I did, but the overall gist of it was in that single word.

In a later campaign leaflet, Pallotta and his Revive pals claimed to oppose Cuomo. This notwithstanding, they missed a golden opportunity to do so when their overlords, the UFT, scuttled Zephyr Teachout's bid for the Working Families nod. That was more significant than their failure to support her Democratic bid. Teachout would have been a huge threat to Cuomo in the general. It was quite clear that she inspired people as much as Cuomo left them cold. Could you imagine having the choice of brilliant Zephyr Teachout as Governor of New York? UFT and NYSUT found that prospect unacceptable, and made certain we didn't get it.

Cuomo has now reneged on his promise to spare teachers being judged on Common Core junk science. This is what reformy folk do. They give you the "seat at the table," so valued by our leaders, and then stab us in the back. It's happened time after time. If we just give Bloomberg mayoral control, everything will be fine. If we just make a few people ATRs, everything will be fine. If we just allow him to close a few schools, everything will be fine. If we just allow a few charter schools, everything will be fine. If we just get a few changes to mayoral control, everything will be fine. If we fail to get those changes but support its renewal anyway, everything will be fine. If we just show how open-minded we are by making Gates keynote, everything will be fine.

It's fine that NYSUT and UFT finally appear to have woken up and realize Cuomo, like other reformies, is not our friend after all. But history suggests he's had a consistent agenda to follow the mandates of his huge campaign contributors, and that betraying us is just one more step in enacting it.

It's certainly correct that someone is clueless. But it does not appear, by any stretch of the imagination, that it's Andrew Cuomo. Worse, it's by no means clear that the folks who claimed to be "against Cuomo" when running for election, and call him clueless now won't be in love with him, inviting him to keynote the next convention, or enjoying a "seat at the table" with him next year, next month, next week, or one minute from now.

"Stink" is a verb, Mr. Chancellor. @JoelIKlein @garyrubinstein
— Arthur Goldstein (@TeacherArthurG) December 21, 2014

It's a reformy world. All sorts of money seeks and follows demagogues like Michelle Rhee and Eva Moskowitz. They get in the media and spew their blather unchallenged about whatever they like. Always, the bottom line is unionized teachers as scapegoats. The only solution is more and more selective test prep factories. If they can pick the best kids and get rid of the undesirables, they can post better test scores, which in their world is the sole factor that determines whether or not a school merits existence.

But we won't shut up. Big voices like Diane Ravitch, Leonie Haimson and Carol Burris are out there, loudly proclaiming the truth. When Eva Moskowitz attempts to spout her nonsense in a fair forum, multiple voices of reason stop her dead in her tracks. There are more of us than there are of them, we love our children, and we will not give up no matter how much money they fight us with.

In our own schools we are dispirited by the junk science evaluation system, terrorized by the whims of imperious supervisors. Mulgrew, displaying no connection to what we feel, boasts of how few teachers are rated ineffective. Talk to one of those teachers, facing job loss, and you'll instantly see how little consolation it is. At the same time, Mulgrew boasts to the DA that John King finds our system among the best in the state because so many of us are rated developing and are on improvement plans. You see how that works? It's good because so few teachers have adverse ratings, but it's also good because so many teachers have adverse ratings. It must be a greatly comforting to reside in the Unity Caucus echo chamber.

Everywhere I go I see teachers afraid of their own shadows. They're terrified they'll get poor ratings for no reason. They're afraid their small-minded vindictive supervisors will target them. They won't sign grievances because they fear that will make them targets. Consequently the Contract means nothing. You want me to put up a bulletin board and include a rubric that parents will neither comprehend nor care about? Fine. You have no time for me to do it? That's fine too.

Mike Mulgrew still thinks the evaluation plan is the best thing since sliced bread, and it's likely as not because he's never tried artisan bread that you cut with your own knife. After all, he took part in the creation of the law. He's proud to have made junk science a factor in teacher evaluations. Though he, like just about everyone, doesn't understand the MOSL, he has people who do, and while none of us actually understand it, the formula somehow worked, spitting out only a tenth of NYC teachers as sub-par.

Of course the consequences for those teachers can be draconian. If your supervisor gave you decent ratings and you're on a humiliating "improvement plan" simply because of junk science, that can be incredibly demoralizing. Of course if you were rated ineffective, and face 3020a dismissal charges with the burden of proof on you rather than DOE, you're facing the loss of your very livelihood. And yes, junk science can be the deciding factor placing you there. Then you're at the tender mercies of some UFT member who saw fit to join the rat squad.

Mulgrew, unlike working teachers, has nothing to be afraid of except an election that's heavily rigged in his favor. He well knows that most teachers find it so ridiculous they throw their ballots in the trash.

That's where we are. But there's no advantage in being afraid, I'm afraid. If indeed your supervisor is a bully, tolerating abuse won't make him any less of one. I've seen people who have opted to keep quiet so as to avoid retaliation end up the subjects of retaliation anyway.  There's no upside to fear, be it justified or simply garden-variety paranoia.

Those of us who see the truth must speak it. Those of us who see what's right must preach it. We must prop up our brothers and sisters who are fearful and oppressed. We must point to others who say the truth. These are tough times and there are those who'd leave us for dead.

But we're far from it. And for our own sakes and for those of our children, we can't give up. The fight's not easy, and the fight's not fair. But we have the numbers and we will prevail. There is simply no other option.