I've read and heard a lot from Michael Mulgrew and his Unity Caucus about how fabulous the new teacher evaluation system is. Obviously Mulgrew cannot be bothered lowering himself to mix with rank and file teachers who haven't signed his caucus loyalty oath or he'd be hearing a different song altogether. But they have their talking point set, and they're sticking with it.

This is the talking point--if you oppose the junk science/ Danielson system, you therefore want to place 100% of the rating power in the hands of principals. The junk science somehow mitigates the principal evaluation even though it's largely a crap shoot. So, therefore, ipso facto, shut up and stop complaining. That shut up and stop complaining theme is very popular among Unity folk. It's pretty much their greatest hit, and I've personally been hearing them sing it since 2005.

But then along comes Michael Mulgrew's BFF, Carmen Fariña, and she's singing another song altogether. In fact, she's talking about "purging bad teachers," counseling them out or firing them, whatever it takes. Now this runs counter to the Mulgrew talking point. Mulgrew says only 700 teachers were rated ineffective this year, as opposed to 2,000 unsatisfactories under the previous system. We are, therefore, supposed to spring up on our hind legs and applaud wildly.

The problem is, though, that teachers don't much feel like applauding. Teachers feel the Sword of Damocles over our heads. We feel tremendous pressure to do all sorts of things that may or may not benefit our students. We worry that we will be fired for no reason. While Mulgrew can boast about the wonders of junk science and how it mitigates the judgment of those awful principals, I personally know a great, smart young teacher who was rated ineffective last year solely on the basis of test scores. Had this teacher not moved schools last year, another such rating could've led to a dismissal hearing.

On one issue, I think Mulgrew is right. A lot of supervisors are incompetent. I know plenty of people working for various Boy Wonders, and their lives are a misery. I mean, if you're a vindictive, small-minded, self-serving narcissist, it's unlikely you'll inspire great work, let alone enable or encourage it. And the fact is teachers with figurative guns to their heads are not likely to be of the very best service to children we serve.

But here's a fun fact--Mulgrew and his Unity Caucus have done absolutely nothing to improve the quality of administrators. It doesn't seem all that well-known that it's the  job of administrators to help teachers improve. Adminstrators seem shocked when I bring that up at meetings. Rather than help those who need it, adminstrators walk around checking off boxes and consigning teachers to Danielson hell. I know supervisors I very much doubt could perform better than the teachers they relentlessly criticize. People driven by ambition rather than care for what they do are not necessarily "effective." Those who rose in the ranks to "escape the classroom" weren't good teachers, and can't be good leaders of teachers either.

I question whether Fariña, who is on a mission to fire rather than support teachers, is really contributing either. It's pretty well known that this was her MO when she was a principal, but the fact is she not only selected the teachers, but the kids as well, rejecting 6 of 7 applicants.  I am unimpressed with those who lead highly selective schools and then boast of their results. For those of us who teach in community schools and serve everyone, it's apples and oranges. If Fariña, or Moskowitz, or anyone reformy wishes to impress me, let them go to Detroit and work their magic on a crumbling school full of high-needs kids.

Until they do that, this whole blaming the teachers thing isn't going to make me jump up and down, let alone actually help children. And as long as Fariña is trying to fire her way to the top, Mulgrew's happy talk isn't going to resonate with those of us on the front lines. Maybe it's time for Mulgrew himself to be "counseled out," and turn over the reigns of our union to a working teacher.

This is gonna be great. No one will mess with me after this. Let me just drop this casually.

"I'm gonna be out tomorrow. I have to go testify against Mrs. Grubelwitz at her 3020a hearing. What's that? Oh, that's when we fire a teacher."

Heh. This one's a blabbermouth. She's gonna tell everyone.

Once this gets out, no one is gonna miss another voluntary mandatory meeting. That old bat Feinstein missed one last week, and I want to put a letter in her file. But that bastard Chapter Leader keeps saying that if I call the meetings voluntary people don't have to come. Doesn't he know that they are voluntary mandatory? Why does he keep harping on the voluntary part? Once we fire Grubelwitz, I'll put letters in anyone's file if they miss a voluntary mandatory meeting. Let me stop this new teacher.

"Hey I'm gonna be out tomorrow. Send me an email if you need anything. Yeah, I have to go and testify against Mrs. Grubelwitz. Yeah, we're gonna fire her." 

It's all finally coming together. I used to have to worry about bulletin boards but now, with almost everyone going to voluntary mandatory meetings, I have the bulletin boards full of all sorts of crap, with rubrics and everything. That damn mock election was a gold mine. I mean, here I am in New York City, with all those liberals, and I have all the bulletin boards covered with the life stories of just about every Republican candidate for President. I mean, sure most of them have lost, but where else is there an entire bulletin board full of stuff about Carly Fiorina?

The only thing is people keep talking about that bastard Walsh. Why can't he just go away? He looks old enough to retire. Everyone here is all, "Oh, why didn't you go to his ceremony?" The next time someone asks me that, I'll just say, "Hey, I had to prepare my testimony so I could support firing a teacher, and maybe you'll be the next teacher we fire." Screw with me, will you?

Look at them out there talking. They're starting to look worried. Yeah that's right, you could be next. Look at me the wrong way and I'll have you up on charges, you bastards.

I wonder what they have to eat around that place. I'm thinking Mexican. Maybe I can grab some enchiladas around lunchtime. Yeah, that would be good. Maybe I can get home early and take a nap. Here's another one I can tell.

"Yeah, I have to cancel our meeting tomorrow. Yes I know I've canceled five times, and it's been two months since I observed you, but I may be popping in again next period. Or maybe not. Who knows? Anyway, yeah I gotta testify against old Grubelwitz. Two strikes, and she is outta there! You like baseball don't you?"

This will be the talk of the department. They will tremble as I walk by. The voluntary mandatory meetings are gonna be full. That stupid Chapter Leader can shout that the sky is falling, but he can't stop mandatory meetings as long as they're voluntary. Jeez that guy is a pain in the ass. I hope the sewers of Rangoon back up in his breakfast. Wait a minute, let me strike up a casual conversation.

"Oh, hey, listen, Mr. Washington, I won't be able to attend your mandatory voluntary meeting tomorrow, but could you please take copious notes and post them on Google Docs? I'd like to check them out in between testifying against Mrs. Grubelwitz. Oh yeah we're gonna fire her. You see what happens to people who don't do voluntary mandatory meetings? Could you be next? You never know. Nah, just kidding. Or am I?"

Keep 'em guessing, that's what I say. This is gonna be a great week. And next year I'll get that bitch Feinstein too.

I'm getting just a little pushback from people I generally respect about my decision not to vote for Hillary. I decided this when I saw her say she wouldn't keep any school open that wasn't above average. Later, her aides "clarified" or something, saying she wouldn't keep schools open if they weren't good, or something.

I was also kind of disappointed when she announced that America was never going to get single payer. After all, it's plainly horrifying that Americans, unlike a whole lot of other countries, are still going bankrupt over catastrophic medical emergency. But then, of course, when I read she took $13 million from the health care industry, it became a little easier to understand.

It certainly gives me pause when I read that hedge-funders, you know the guys who support all things reformy, are supporting Hillary. I mean, even our good friend Charles Koch is starting to look favorably at a Clinton presidency. And of course our good friends from the Walmart family, you know, the ones who hate us and everything we stand for, are pumping money into her campaign. And why shouldn't they? After all, she was on the Walmart board for 6 years, right up until Bill became President. She's also got pretty longstanding connections to reformy Eli Broad, which concerned a whole lot of teachers. Broad was going to deny her contributions, but when she promised to support charters, he reconsidered.

Hillary's also come out in full support of Common Core. Like everyone who backs bad ideas, she blamed the disaster it's proven to be on the "rollout." In her favor, she's yet to say she'd punch us in the face and push us in the dirt if we opposed it, but even the guy who did that is no longer pushing Common Core. So what can educators expect from someone who talks school closings, supports not only the charters that undermine public schools, but also Common Core? Her new notion of experimenting with poor children by sending them to boarding schools is repugnant. 

A big argument, the one that trumps anything you can possibly say to Hillary supporters, is that she'll appoint someone better than Trump or Cruz to SCOTUS. I certainly hope that's true, but it's tough to say. After all, her top aides have lobbied for a whole lot of things that are antithetical to those of us who actually support working people. In fact, her top aide, John Podesta, is a big supporter of pretty much all things reformy. Maybe I'm slow, but it's hard for me to understand how a person like that could possibly have our interests at heart, let alone those of the students we serve.

As for trade, we all now know how well NAFTA is working out for working Americans. What about TPP? Well, she now opposes it, and I'm grateful for that, but here's a clip showing 45 times that she pushed for it. So I guess it's not popular anymore. But she's unable to let go of her support for fracking.

A lot of people insist that Hillary has never been influenced by the millions of dollars she takes from special interests (and no, unlike John King, I don't mean parents and teachers). Well, there was this bankruptcy bill that now-Senator Elizabeth Warren persuaded her to oppose. But waddya know, after Hillary took millions of dollars for her campaign, and millions of dollars in speaking fees from the industry, she came around and supported credit card companies over consumers.

I don't suppose I need to go into a lot of detail on her speeches to Goldman Sachs at 225K a pop. I mean sure, she and Bill made a few bucks giving speeches. But who knows? Perhaps Hillary will protect us from predatory banking practices. Perhaps they only hired her because they enjoy the dulcet tones of her speaking voice. Maybe it relaxes them. Of course, it that's the case, I'm mystified as to why she won't release the transcripts.

So maybe Hillary will do the right thing by us. Maybe she will appoint someone to SCOTUS who represents our interests, rather than those of her contributors and campaign aides. Maybe she will be guided in education policy by voices that aren't insane, as opposed to those of say, her campaign manager or well-heeled donors.

But I've yet to see the remotest evidence of any such thing. If you have any, please share. I'm all ears.

Full disclosure--I prefer Bernie Sanders head and shoulders over all other Presidential candidates. Lately I've been hearing and reading from a lot of people who think the NY State primary system is unfair. After all, only Democrats can vote in the Democratic primaries, and only Republicans can vote in the GOP primaries. Is that unfair?

I don't think so, actually. I'm a registered Democrat, but only because it allows me to vote in the primary. There is nothing stopping anyone else who'd like to vote in the primary from registering. It's not like you have to be invited to be a party member. It's not like I'm enjoying any special privileges because of my affiliation.

It's not like the UFT system where you have to be invited and sign a loyalty oath to be a party member. (Hey, that's a little reminiscent of communist societies where parties are elite and members have special privileges, isn't it?)

I distinctly recall Sanders supporters urging people to register as a Democrat so as to be able to vote in the primaries. In fact, I have a Republican friend who changed parties simply so he could vote for Bernie. If you waited until primary day to try to vote, only to find you hadn't registered as a Democrat, that's kind of on you. As long as the rules apply to everyone, they're fair.

I'm more upset with the idea that we have to register to vote. If I'm not mistaken, Bernie thinks everyone should automatically be registered and you ought to have to opt out only if you don't want to vote. I know, for example, Jehovah's Witnesses don't believe in voting, and they ought to have the right to opt out. But registration ought to be the default.

Hey, if you want to register as a Democrat, go ahead. It doesn't cost anything, and it doesn't oblige you to vote for every Democrat that comes down the pike. When they presented me with Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat who ran on a platform of going after unions, I knew he wasn't getting my vote. I discovered Howie Hawkins of the Green Party, for whom I've now twice voted. And after Barack Obama gave GW Bush a third term in education, I discovered Jill Stein of the Green Party. Maybe I'll vote for her again in November.

In some states, everyone's allowed to vote in the primaries. I recall reading of Republicans voting for Al Sharpton in order to screw with Democrats. I'm not really sure that's a great idea. I don't want to vote just to spite someone, and I don't really want people to vote just to spite me either.

Hey, if you want to register Democrat in New York State, go right ahead. Maybe this election cycle was a learning experience for some independents. And hey, I'd have loved to see Bernie beat Hillary. But we're all grownups here. I know the rules. If you don't, that's not really Hillary's fault. She didn't make the rules.

Maybe independents ought to be able to choose which primary they vote in. I think that's what they do in California. But the time to discuss that, and particularly the time to change the rules, if that's what it takes, is not right after a primary with results that disappointed you. 

I still support Bernie. I don't mind if you don't. After all, it's still nominally a free country. One thing, though--I've had it up to here with being called a "Bernie Bro" for not supporting Hillary. That's stereotypical and ignorant. Anyone who has to resort to ad hominem hasn't got much of an argument.

Of course, if it's true that 125,000 Democratic voters were systematically purged, that's another story altogether. 

I was pretty surprised by this poster. It was on an office bulletin board. Evidently, it's not a good thing to tell your students how smart they are. It's better to say they did this or that well.

Now I've got no problem saying any or all of the things on this poster. Of course it's good to tell students when they do things well. And of course it's good to acknowledge a positive attitude, something I've come to appreciate more and more in my old age.

Now a few of these things don't sound exactly like me, so I might not use those words. But that's not really my issue here.

I guess my issue is that I don't freely call people smart. I really say that to very few kids. But if I say it, it means I've noticed something very special in them. Kids who think fast, who come back immediately, who aren't afraid to say directly what's on their mind, and who have clever, creative or impressive things on said minds really impress me. I have to tell them how smart they are. I never know whether or not anyone else has told them, whether anyone else has even noticed, and I think they need to know.

Now I'll freely acknowledge that the smartest kids don't always do the smartest things, and don't necessarily have to be the best students either. Some of the most creative and brilliant people I've known have also been among the most self-destructive. You have to imagine that a mind working that fast is never quite at rest. Maybe they should do yoga or meditate or something. I don't know. But I think it's the least I can do, when I notice, to give them credit for this.

Oddly, being smart is probably not entirely an achievement. Kids are born that way, or nurtured that way, or guided that way or something. Just because kids are smart doesn't mean they will pass tests or excel in school, or even in life. Teenagers need guidance just like everyone else, likelier than not more, because it's such a tough stage. But anything you can do to help their fragile self-esteem can help. And when they're smart, when they think as fast or faster than you do, it's really tough to keep them on track. Of course it's kind of our job to do the best we can to help them reach their potential .

Of course you should give students credit for doing a great job. Of course you should encourage excellent work and good achievement. But that's not at all the same as telling kids they are smart. Great positive attitude will take people a long way. Smart people with relentlessly negative attitudes are not precisely the best people to be around.

But I think there's a time and a place for everything. Calling people smart just because they did the homework is kind of lazy on our part.

I'm kind of surprised someone produced a poster that fails to make that distinction. Maybe that person isn't smart enough to be a teacher. On the other hand, maybe that person didn't try hard enough, think deeply enough, or work hard enough to tackle this problem.

Me, I'm not psychic enough to discern which.

FROM ARTHUR GOLDSTEIN,
UFT CHAPTER LEADER
VOTE MORE/ NEW ACTION 2016

Dear colleagues:

There is a UFT election coming up. I am running for High School Executive Board with MORE/ New Action. Running for High School Academic Vice President is James Eterno, longtime chapter leader of Jamaica High School. James is one of the most competent and knowledgeable chapter leaders I’ve ever met. I often go to him for advice when trying to help members at Lewis. He seems to know everything.

We are running a great slate for High School Executive Board. While of course I would like you to vote for me, so that I can represent you both in and out of our building, we also have Mike Schirtzer, a friend of mine who’s dedicated himself for years to growing MORE, a relatively new opposition caucus. Mike helped lead MORE to a coalition with the oldest opposition caucus, New Action, which finally ended its long partnership with the controlling Unity Caucus. Together we expect to win these seats and finally achieve a real opposition voice in our union.

At the top of our ticket is Jia Lee, recently featured in the NY Post and on NBC news for defying the Chancellor’s admonition to not speak of opt out. I personally believe opt-out to have been the most effective pushback against the nonsense that’s been imposed on us over the last fifteen years or so. Also on our ticket are my friends Lauren Cohen and Katie Lapham, among other opt-out activists.

Unfortunately our leadership, Michael Mulgrew’s Unity Caucus, has supported, to one extent or another, almost every single education reform that’s come down the pike. They supported teachers being rated by test scores. They supported the Danielson Framework. They supported a contract that got us paid eleven years later than NYPD, FDNY, and most other city unions.

Teachers facing dismissal go through a process called 3020a. In the past, the city had to prove teachers were incompetent in order to fire them. Now, most teachers who face that process will have to prove they are NOT incompetent. I find this tantamount to being guilty until proven innocent and therefore un-American. Michael Mulgrew and Unity Caucus, amazingly, not only support this but have thanked the Assembly for enabling it.

Mulgrew’s Unity Caucus is an elite, invitation-only group that operates in secret. All of its members sign an oath to support its decisions. Those who fail to do so are thrown out. While I would love to be more active in union, like everyone in MORE-New Action, I refuse to sign an oath promising to support leadership rather than membership.

I’ve been teaching for over thirty years. It breaks my heart when young teachers approach me contemplating job changes, and that’s been happening more and more frequently. This is the best job there is, and it’s on us to keep it that way, Please vote for MORE/ New Action, and demand the common sense changes that we support, that Diane Ravitch supports, and that both we and our students need.

Best regards,

Arthur

President’s Report

Mulgrew welcomes us. Gets applause for saying we have next week off and an impending raise. Makes jokes about Sterling R. which he clearly deems hilarious.

National

Mulgrew thanks all who worked for Hillary. Suggests general election will be nasty and ugly, and that stakes will be very high. Ridicules GOP candidates for portraying Cruz and Katich in relative good lights. Says AFT will push hard nationwide. Says if other side gets in, they just want us gone. Says now it’s about making sure we take White House.

Mulgrew says SCOTUS decided Friedrichs, and tie is in our favor. Says there will be copycats, are close to 27 cases making same argument. If I bargain for your raise, I have deprived you of freedom of speech. Says we have to support Schemer pushing for SCOTUS justice while Obama is in office.

Vergara case overturned in CA, though Mulgrew says FL. Says there was similar suit filed in Minnesota. Says one of major components in NY is Vergara in CA.

Mulgrew talks of supporting Verizon. Says we will do a resolution today.

State

Budget—1.4 billion in basic education, 1.8 billion total, second largest % increase. 525 million for NYC. When principal says he has no money next year, he is lying. There will be plenty of money in school system next year. Money must get to schools. Mulgrew speaks of UFT classes and importance of budget workshops.

GOP leadership threw 14 charter issues on table, says UFT fought back. Says they tried to hold up budget on these issues. Ironic GOP senators have no charters in their districts. Wanted districts to build buildings for charters. In end, they got 54 million increase but Mulgrew says GOP senators paid for it out of their own slush fund.

New group—“New Yorkers for a Balanced Albany,” set up by Students First, or Moskowitz, or someone. They were very involved in McGrath Cuminsky race. This group poured a lot of money toward McGrath, and bought commercials. Was not endorsement from state union. UFT did a push, as there are 7,000 UFT members and 7,000 more NYSUT members in that district. Said if you’re going to work with privatizers, UFT will oppose. Democrat won the seat.  Dem thanked parents and teachers who came out for him.

Regents—Several came to UFT and met with ESL teachers. Teachers told Regents they needed to know actual effects. Says they understood problems of Part 154. Says they were shocked that NYSESLAT was still being used in teacher evaluations. Says that’s why it’s important that they meet with real teachers.

At Regents meeting this week they will discuss alternate assessment and NYSESLAT. Says they are sick and tired of policies being changed on an annual basis. Says it’s very important that we get in “authentic student learning measures” for NYC going into next year.
City

Mulgrew says he had a “great legislative breakfast” this morning. Talks about positive learning as a result of debate on new discipline regs. Says under previous admin, if you reported incidents you were labeled “persistently dangerous,” so no one did. Says Bloomberg felt restorative justice and such was nonsense and cared only about test scores. Says he pushed “zero tolerance.”

Moving forward, Students First, FES, are saying our schools are out of control and unsafe. He says that’s because they can’t cite test scores anymore and that we are beating them on test scores. Says charter classes are half empty after third grade. They are left with this argument. Says schools are doing better but will never be ideal.

Issue for us is we need to get back to things that make a difference. Team approach to discipline is right approach. Refers to “positive learning collaborative” as great success. Says we want this program and we want to use it. Says restorative justice is helpful but won’t fix everything.

Evaluations—Basically HS evals are same as last year. Says we are fighting to change law because we “don’t want to go back to the principal is in charge of my life.” Says some schools have principal with 100% control, some are 80-20 and some are 60-40.  Refers all questions to Amy Arundell.

Family leave—we are continuing to negotiate. We will keep moving forward, city wants us to pay 200 million but should be closer to 20. Says city refers to “child acquisition.”

Next months DA to be moved to May 18th.

Tests still count for school accountability.

Paras will no longer be suspended without pay as a result of any arrest. City now has a different process in place.

May 7th is Spring Conference. Moderate applause. Says elected officials will come

May 4th—Wants parents and teachers to simultaneously do events nationwide. Says we’ve already done this in NYC, and that we meet with many varied groups. Says while LA is ground zero for charters, but in NYC we will move public education by being respectful and working together. Says there are 100 schools now cooperating.

Mulgrew concludes report.

Leroy Barr—reports 5K run raised 15K to go to disaster relief, will send $ to Ecuador. Says UFT ballots go out May 5th. Please tell members to look out for ballots. UFT wants high turnout. Ballots counted May 26th.

Says we should post Union Loud and Proud posters. Wishes us good break.

Questions:

CL—Asks about permanent certification. Will those with perm. licenses have to rectify?

M—Speaking of 100 professional hours, is a state issue, working with state to know what are the criteria for those hours. Says anyone under old criteria for 175 hours has to do that. Next year will encompass all teaching certificates and will be 100 hours. Believes PD should be in schools not in colleges.

Retiree—NYT had full page ad—says it’s looking to promote a third party. What effect do you think that will have?

M—Doesn’t think it will be successful.

Q—How can we bring new teachers in as we lose so many?

M—That’s why we have teacher leadership positions and PD. We need admin that thinks that’s important. Some schools people are valued, but in others they just say here’s the bathroom key and good luck. Says we want to keep 65% of this year’s teachers. Says we aren’t like other school systems. Teaching is always difficult but NYC has some of the greatest challenges and it’s harder here. Says those who come here understand what they’re getting into. Says we have programs to support new teachers, but it will be a long hard plan and we have to retain focus.

CL—Principal told us we were a focus school, and it is a problem. What is a focus school? Who can help?

M—About state test scores. Feds have changed law so now we have to change here. No state has yet changed law. We would like to be first.

CL—With passing of legislation in state for parental leave, how does it affect us?

M—Every person in state can pay in and pay for their own leave. Doesn’t go into effect for three years. Technically doesn’t work for us, but politically it does, because it’s becoming a big issue. Says Hillary spoke of it last night. Since everyone works, we need family leave. Same with retirement security. Says people are now asking these questions.

Q—Will retired teachers be required to get PD to keep their licenses?

M—Prefer not to discuss it, but we will look at it if necessary.

Motions

Delegate—for next month—moves to protect immigrant students. Says he passed copies around. I don’t have one, nor does anyone near me. Mulgrew makes many jokes about font on motion. Delegate reads motion. Reads a lot about concerns of deportation and need for services. Asks city to do more to protect students and welcome all. Bar ICE from entering buildings as has been done in CA. Asks for immigrant advisors.

Mulgrew asks to take this to immigration advocacy partners.

Delegate asks for vote, and for it to move to partners.
Dave Pecoraro—Has city got authority to ban ICE? Lawyer says no.

Motion is motivated.

Motion passes.

Resolutions

Sterling R.—Support of LA School District—Broad Foundation wants to convert schools into charters. Asks we support our brothers and sisters in that district.

Resolution passes unanimously.

R. Mantel—Michigan—Speaks of Flint water and Detroit Public Schools. Says governor appointed managers and results were a disaster. Says some people in Flint are being held accountable. Asks we support people in Michigan.

Resolution passes.

Emil P.—Speaks for resolution on discontinued probationary staff members. Wants to recommit that discontinued teachers have right to apply for jobs and go to work. Says they need a second chance.

Resolution passes.

Janella Hinds—Speaks in favor of resolution to support Verizon workers. Says they failed to honor NYC contracts, rejected offers to make savings in health care and job security and wants to outsource work, despite 39 billion dollar profits. CEO makes 200X wage of any employee. Want to eliminate benefits as cable and phone bills rise.

CL—If this passes, are we allowed to join picket line?

M—Yes.

Resolution passes.

Emil P.—Supporting healthy workplace, anti-bullying, says this would give employee tools to deal with bullies. Person on my right, asks, “Does that include principals?”

Delegate—Contingent of 25 teachers were up in Albany, met with legislators, were told it’s best to sign a memorandum of support for the bill.

Mulgrew calls him out of order.

Delegate wishes to amend own resolution. Mulgrew says he is out of order but he is being lenient today. Asks we resolve to sign memorandum of support on healthy workplace bill.

Emil P.—says we are NYSUT and we support NYSUT’s memorandum. Speaks against amendment.
Resolution passes without amendment.

Mulgrew adjourns. Says May 15th we will see a raise.

Every year I offer a reading about a suggestion box and then open one for my students. Answers are anonymous. This year I made a mistake--in trying to simplify it, I asked my morning class what they liked and did not like, and what they would change. This resulted in answers like, "I like coconuts. I don't like fish." I will spare you most of those answers. In my afternoon class I asked, "What do you like about the class?" This worked out a little better. Though I've cleaned up grammar and usage a little, I've changed nothing else. Here's what my kids had to say:

I like it when we can study a lot, and be with our classmates. I don't like when the teacher gives us "zero." (To be clear, I may write a zero on a piece of paper and hand it to a student. It doesn't actually mean anything.)

The class is nice and the teacher is the best.

I like to talk about stories. I don't like to do classwork. I would change myself and speak more in class.

I like that we can make jokes with the teacher. I don't like when we do classwork only in a book. It's boring. We can do something different in class. And I hope the teacher can cut all his hair. I think that is better.

I like English class, because in this class we have a lot of good students and teachers. I never saw another teacher better than Mr. Goldstein. He's an interesting and funny guy. I don't like when somebody sleeps in class. It's terrible. I like everything.

I like everything about this class. I think everything is good and this class too.

I like chocolate and taking a break. I don't like noise. I want to change nothing.

In this class I like the teacher because he's funny and active. I don't like when the teacher screams at me and that's why I went to the doctor for my ears. I would like to change the seats and only have one period of English.

I like this schools because it's very big and I think that it's the best school in Queens. I don't like the food because it's bad and I would change only the food. Sometimes the teachers are nice and other teachers are bad. I like it here because I have friends and my girlfriend is here, but I don't like the gym because I like to sleep every day.

Why don't we get tests every day? We want more tests.


I like this class because sometimes we try to make the class funny but it never happens. I like that we learn a lot. Well, I don't know about other people but especially me, I learn a lot here. What I don't like is we never do something different and it's always the same. To change it we should make something different at least one day a week and the students are not gonna be bored in this class.

I like food. I don't like tests. I would change my brain.

I like to listen to English. I don't like to do group work.

I like vocabulary. I don't like tests. Let's go outside to learn English!

I like to learn vocabulary because it helps my English. I don't like to talk and fight with friends. I don't like the open window because it's so cold. I don't like someone but I won't say who. I think this class is very good, but not very great. If people could speak a lot of languages it would be great because people can understand what you say. And I want this class to have food and drink.

I like when we read in English. I don't like much homework.

I like this class because the teacher is funny and I think it's relaxing.

I think this class is good because it's very funny and the teacher is good. I think maybe this class needs more games.

Don't worry about guys who come 1-5 minutes late and give less homework.

I like English class because he is so funny. I don't have to dislike something. I don't want to change something that is so good.

I like how we learn. I like how the teacher helps us to learn. I think we should watch more videos and discuss them. Also sometimes we should watch a movie.

I don't like people so much. I like that my classmates and teacher are all friendly.

I like the teacher. I like this class.

This class is great. I think we should do more speaking practice.

I like this class because I have a good teacher.

I like inglish se explica bien.

My idea is some teachers are nice like Mr. Goldstein. He is so funny and a good teacher and I like class in English.

Why don't you bring us our favorite foods every day???

I like this class because the teacher helps me to learn English and I like everything about this class. I think the class is perfect because the teacher prepares the students how to pronounce the language and helps me a lot for my future.

New Yorkers u have a chance to make a strong statement against war, against Wall St, for doubling the minimum wage, for free college. Vote!

— Michael Moore (@MMFlint) April 19, 2016

So said one of my colleagues at the ceremony we held for our fallen friend Kevin O'Connor. This is a photo someone took of the thousand people who came to our courtyard last Friday to pay him tribute.

We get checklists, rubrics, numbers and most of us don't even understand what they mean. If they say, "effective," we sign the sheets and don't even bother to read them. What's really the difference? Students didn't come out there wondering how he did on 4C, or 2B, or not 2B. 

Students lined up quickly. The school provided 300 carnations to drop in his honor, and the kids snapped them all up well before the ceremony even began. He listened to me, they said. He understood me. Even when I was wrong, he listened. He didn't judge me, he helped me. He made me learn how to play the guitar. When I got into a fight he talked to me instead of just dragging me off and writing me up.

He understood them. He couldn't help it because he still had a lot of teenager in him. He still loved all the music he grew up listening to, and oddly, a whole lot of the kids seemed to love it too. One girl spoke in detail about their shared love of Pink Floyd. Even as a teenager they didn't appeal to me, so what do I know? But Kevin inspired her to learn Wishing You Were Here and that was exactly what she was feeling at the moment.

Students choked up and broke into tears as they spoke. One girl got up and read a poem about him. Our students were passionate and eloquent. A portrait of Kevin, drawn by one of our students the day before, adorned the stage.

A math teacher spoke of how he was a fixture in our school. His only fault, he said, was that he was a Yankee fan rather than a Met fan, but he was willing to forgive this, much as it pained him to do so.

A great teacher inspires. A great teacher touches lives. A great teacher makes kids want to come to school. It's abundantly clear that Kevin did all three. I saw some of my own students, ELLs who'd been here a very short time, crying inconsolably.

 I was very touched by things students said about him. I know he was troubled by the rating system, but I'm going to offer his final evaluation on this astral plane. The kids loved you, Kevin. There is nothing more important than that, not the grouping, not test scores, not Danielson, not the Quality Review, not rigor, not grit, not anything else we do. They counted on you for support and always knew you were there. They may or may not have had support at home, but they knew they could come to you. They appreciated you, and they will miss you.

And so shall we.

Holy crap. This can't be happening. And just when I had all my ducks in a row.

That bastard principal went and held a ceremony to make Mr. Walsh teacher of the year. Blah, blah, blah, he rushed into a burning building and saved a baby. So what? Anyone could do something like that. A few stories in the newspaper, a feature on a network or two, and the idiot principal gets all carried away and makes a big deal out of it.

Doesn't he know how inconvenient this is for me? Isn't it his job to look out for me, for chrissake?

Now they had a big ceremony, and I hear everyone was speaking about how wonderful he is, and no one gave me any credit at all for sitting through three observations with him. That's 45 minutes of my life that I'm never gonna get back. Sure, I may have napped a little, but I mean, Jesus, how could a guy that old be a good teacher anyway? I told the guy he should retire, because there was no way I was gonna give him a good observation.

And Walsh was so rude to me, just because he didn't understand my low inference notes, which I didn't have to show him in the first place. I mean, so what if I drew a few pictures? Was I supposed to actually listen to all that crap about the industrial revolution, and child labor and blah, blah, blah? Doesn't anyone understand how boring it is to sit through all these classes? I mean, I did it when it was in high school and that oughta be enough for anyone. What does this mean? What does that mean? How the hell am I supposed to know? I rated him ineffective and that ought to be good enough for anyone.

And now the principal is all, "Why didn't you go to the ceremony?" Like I have time to sit through that nonsense. I had an important date with a Shake Shack Burger. Man I love Shake Shack. It's really a lot better than Five Guys. I mean, you can't get cheese fries at Five Guys, and man I love me some cheese fries.

So anyway, now it's April, and I have to do one more observation on that Walsh guy. So what do I do? If I just go in and trash him again, I look like an idiot because he's a "hero" and all and everyone "loves" him. But if I go in and give him a great observation I look like an idiot because I trashed him three times before. A black eye either way.

Can I just go back and change those three observations? Does anyone actually look at that stuff? I know Walsh did. That son of a bitch. Him with all, "No, this didn't happen," and, "This happened and you didn't write about it." Like I give a crap. If I wrote about what actually happened, how was I gonna give him that rating? People just don't think anymore.

Do they know how hard I worked to get into this position? Do they know how hard I'm working to get out of it? Of course not. People don't appreciate what I do. It's all Walsh this and Walsh that. Pretty soon he'll get a promotion instead of me. Well I'm not gonna let that happen.

Oh man, I've gotta take charge of this situation. If I don't want Walsh rated ineffective, I guess I could go in and observe him like maybe five times and say they were all great. But it's so boring to sit in classes. Maybe I could just copy some of my buddy's good observations without going in. Then I could just present them to Walsh and ask him to sign them. Would he do it, or would he make a big stink about my not having gone in?

You can never tell with guys like Walsh. Why the hell did he have to save that baby? Doesn't he even think about how much trouble that causes me? What an inconsiderate bastard he is. But if I don't make him look good, then I look bad. If I don't make him look bad, I can't get rid of him. What to do?

I'm gonna call Domino's. I have that coupon that gets two for one. Two with everything. It'll help me think.

In our school we have a monthly PD day. That's how we get all the indispensable info Carmen Fariña, who loves her some PD, insists we get. After all, when you're at 200% capacity or more forever, you can't just roll the 80 minute teacher torture on Monday, or even the 75 minute Tuesday. So you shorten the day once a month and hope for the best.

On Wednesday we had some woman from some company talk about formative assessment. You know, that's when you figure out what the kids know before you grade them, so they can do better. This is, of course, an absolute necessity when dealing with kids, especially if they are troubled. On the other hand, the same supervisors who so revere this process will do drive-bys on working teachers, label them ineffective, do nothing whatsoever to help them, and helpfully suggest they ought to resign or retire. Because rigor and grit.

So anyway, we were sitting there listening to this woman read a laundry list of ways you could do formative assessment. You know, because simply handing us the booklet and asking us to read it would not earn her company the big bucks they get for sending the likes of her in here. My friend, a language teacher, was sitting next to me and we suddenly noticed her skin was turning red. We couldn't figure why. She had eaten what she usually eats for lunch.

We moved on, and I got called into an impromptu conference with my supervisor. My friend knocked on the door. She was worse. She wanted to drive home. I told her no, let me take you to the urgent care. I asked Siri, who directed me to one half a mile away. I took her over and stayed with her until her husband came to meet her.

I went back to a PD run by teachers, which was better thought out in every way than the one for which our school likely paid a fortune. "Boy, this place is hard to find," I said, but I'm not at all sure anyone believed me. After all, I've been in that building over 20 years. But that always seems like a good excuse to me, at least.

An hour later, my friend showed up back at the school, looking a little woozy, but a lot clearer. She told us they'd given her a steroid shot but released her. She also waved around a note which she claimed the doctor issued, declaring she was allergic to PD. I'm not at all sure it really said that, but if it did, I'm pretty sure there will be a stampede as 220 more teachers rush to that urgent care, even if the co-pay is up to 50 bucks.

After all, you get what you pay for.

I go to a lot of meetings. The whole chapter leader thing places you on all sorts of committees at the school and every time anything happens there's a meeting about it. And then there are UFT chapter leader meetings. I usually go to the borough high school meeting and the DA. But when the HS VP comes to Queens I try to see her too.

Last night I got to Queens UFT around 3:30. I walked into the meeting room and it was empty. I was a little early, but that never happened before. But lo and behold, there were all kinds of sandwiches and salads and drinks. I figured I'd eat all the sandwiches and then call for an adjournment. It would be the fastest meeting ever, depending on how the sandwiches were.

I gotta say, the turkey was very good, but the eggplant looked and tasted like a dishrag. Anyway, a little after four, people started coming in. Three of them. There went 75% of my sandwiches. Eventually ten or twelve people showed up. It was disappointing because I like when the VP comes to Queens. In my opinion, she should hold all of her meetings there. But how do we persuade her when only a dozen people show up?

Well it turned out that Randi Weingarten was downstairs giving pep talks about Hillary, for whom UFT is phonebanking. I voted for Randi once. It was some time in the 90s. I was not at all involved in union politics but I had some primal instinct that told me union was a good thing, so when our President showed up at the school library, I ventured upstairs to listen.

She called Rudy Giuliani a prick, which very much endeared her to me. After all, I read the papers, and it was absolutely clear to me that Rudy was a prick. But I'd never heard anyone just say it out loud before. How perceptive, I thought.

She was with the High School VP, who at that time, I think, was John Soldini. Soldini got up and made a stirring speech about how there was absolutely not truth the the rumor that the UFT was going to make anyone wait 25 years to hit maximum salary. Anyone who told you such a thing was a filthy liar. I raised my hand.

"How come, if UFT doesn't want it to take 25 years to reach maximum, did I receive something in the mail from Sandy Feldman urging me to vote for a contract that called for a 25-year maximum? Didn't she say I must be smoking something if I thought I could do better?"

Soldini, clearly, had not been expecting that particular question. He hemmed and hawed for a few moments. Randi walked in front of him and gave some kind of answer. I don't remember what it was, and I don't remember it being particularly persuasive, but at that moment I really respected her for getting up to answer the impossible question. I decided she was the smartest person in the room and I had to vote for her.

That year, I spent 45 minutes splitting my ballot. I voted Randi for President, and everyone I could find in New Action for everything else. Sadly, my enthusiasm for Randi's negotiating skill began to wane around 2002. I thought it was a very, very bad idea to barter time for money. I remembered the zeros we'd gotten from Rudy and thought such raises could easily be washed away in another tide of zeros.

2005 was the year I finally woke up. It took me twenty years of teaching, which makes me question how successful the loud and proud campaign is gonna be.

Last night I was talking to a union rep. We got out on the 4th floor and someone came out to hush us. Randi was talking. Should I go in and listen?

Nah.

I worked with Kevin O'Connor for thirteen years. He always had a kind word for everyone. The kids loved him. For the last two years he worked as a lunchroom dean, and everyone knew him. I know this because in my class yesterday, my students asked me about him. We talked about him for twenty minutes. It's kind of remarkable, because my kids have been here only a short time and don't tend to  know so many people around the building.

And all over the building, every kid with whom I speak remembers him.

"He was the first person I met here. He showed me around the building."

"I was in his first period class two years ago. He was so funny!"

"He was great. Whenever I felt bad I could talk to him and I'd feel better. Who am I gonna talk to now?"

On Monday I was texting one of his social studies colleagues, and she told me he had died over the weekend. He was sixty-one years old. I used to go out with him on parent-teacher nights to Gyro World on Northern Boulevard, which he loved. Last time we wandered from there over to an Asian cafe a few doors down. He was thrilled because they were playing the Allman Brothers. When the song finished, he asked the barista why there was no more, and she told him she had no control over the radio. He didn't seem to understand why.

He loved being a dean, and he loved the AP security. He always spoke about how he'd helped him out in times of need. It's so rare for a chapter leader to hear a supervisor being praised, but that's really the way it ought to be. We should be partners rather than adversaries. Too bad the great minds who run New York State prefer to indulge in a gotcha game with us as the target.

Last year he ended up with a .8 dean schedule because he took over for someone who'd left in kind of a hurry. He was thrilled. No Danielson for him. I dropped hints to anyone who'd listen that there would be no complaints from me if that were to happen this year, but for whatever reason, it didn't. But now there will be no more Danielson for Kevin O'Connor, ever.

He was 61 years old, and looking forward to retiring next October on his birthday, so the Danielson wouldn't have fundamentally affected him anyway. But he felt bad about it. I felt bad about it. Everyone, pretty much, feels bad about it.

He was a larger than life character, and of course our school will go on. But it won't be the same.

That's the question the Daily News asks. After all, the stakes are pretty low, as the state has agreed not to count the results for a few years. This is true for students and in many cases for teacher ratings as well. So what's the big hooplah, the News wants to know. Why don't these goshdarn kids just sit down and take their tests?

That's a much more reasoned approach than that taken over at the Post, where they concoct a ridiculous strawman argument suggesting that parents who opt out are simply petulant, over-privileged, self-serving lunatics who don't want their kids to fail. At the same time, they are helicopter parents making ridiculous demands for their pampered children. Patrick Walsh had a great piece on his blog in response: 

Its always a good sign when shills for those who are systemically attempting to undermine public education, the better to privatize it, are reduced to making public arguments that read like they are written by a person on a six day drunk.

Read the whole piece.  I'll just address the piece at the News, which makes a more reasonable argument. There's actually a pretty reasonable answer, too.

Midterms are usually written by teachers. They’re usually graded and returned to the students, so the students can see how they did and what they may have done wrong. That’s not the case with these tests, whatever the stakes. And if the stakes are so ridiculously low anyway, a better argument might be that they ought to simply be canceled.

A lot of us are labeled as anti-testing, when that's not precisely the case. We are against high-stakes tests that don't really help our children. And while it's true that there is a temporary reduction in the stakes, the tests still don't help our children. I don't know much about these tests, but from what I'm reading, even disregarding the fact that our kids will never get them back or learn anything from them, they don't appear to be of very good quality.

They don't necessarily test what kids need. They aren't necessarily developmentally appropriate. And the notion of kids sitting indefinitely to take these tests appears not so much a concession as an implement of torture. 

But even more important is the fact that we won't be fooled. You can't just tell us, hey, we won't count it for a few years. Please drop your organizing and go away. Maybe that's not what the Daily News editorial board had in mind. But it certainly appears to be what Cuomo had in mind.

And to Governor Cuomo, I have just this to say. We did not just fall off the tomato truck from New Jersey.

And we are not going away.

Math rep: You know, all the delis are disappearing. Deli Masters, just a few blocks away, is gone. They used to be everywhere.

ESL rep: Well, you know, people just aren't eating red meat anymore. It's bad for you.

Me: No it isn't. What's bad for you is that green and blue meat with white fuzzy stuff growing on it.

PE rep: Yeah that's right. I only eat that once a month these days.

  Jesus do I hate this. The stupid contract says I have to actually meet with teachers before I give them their observations and I just had one thrown out because I forgot. That's not gonna happen again. Stupid contract. I don't see why I even have to go in their classrooms at all. I could just write the observations and email them to the stupid teachers. Don't they know how busy I am?

"Thank you for coming here today, Ms. Feinstein. Remember I'm always here to support you in any way I can."

"You'd support me more if you didn't rate everything I do ineffective," she says. The bitch.

"Of course I'm very sad to do that," I say.

"Why did you do it then?"

"For one thing, you didn’t differentiate your worksheets. What about the ELLs?"

"There aren’t any ELLs," she says. Wise ass.

"That’s not the point. How do you know every one of your students is on the same level as that worksheet?"

"I have 34 students in that class." Sheesh. Always with the excuses.

"How many of them are ELLs"

"None."

"Well that's not the point. The point is you didn't do enough formative assessment."

"Isn't it formative assessment when I walk around the room and correct the kids' work?" Again with the excuses. If I get rid of her I can probably hire my high school girlfriend. She'd dress up the place for sure! I make a serious face.

"What I'd like to see is something more interactive, like the green and red cards, for example. I love the green and red cards. You can't go wrong with the green and red cards."

"What are you talking about?" How can she ask me that? Didn't I give an entire meeting on the green and red cards?

"Well you give them green and red cards, and if they understand they put up the green cards. If they don't they put up the red cards. You can't go wrong with the green and red cards," I tell her, with a knowing nod.

"What if they hold up the green cards when they really don't understand?" Smartass.

"Then you use the cards again until they admit they don't understand," I tell her.

"What if they simply say they understand over and over and you don't find out they don't understand until they take a test? Isn't it better if I just look at their work and see what they can and cannot do?"

Man is she a pain in the ass. You know what I could go for? One of those Fiber One cheesecake bars. Man I love me a Fiber One cheesecake bar. But NO. I'm stuck sitting here with old Feinstein.

"JESUS CHRIST WILL YOU JUST USE THE DAMN GREEN AND BLUE CARDS? WHAT THE HELL IS THE MATTER WITH YOU ANYWAY?"

Oops. Maybe I shouldn't have said that. Everyone in the outer office is looking at me. I look back at them and they all turn away. I look again. None of them are gonna rat me out. They know they'll pay for that.

I wonder how long it will take before I'm finally rid of this old bat. 

If you're happy with how things have been going, you can vote for Michael Mulgrew and his gang of 800 loyalty oath signers. You can let them know you love being under a microscope. You can tell them you love being judged by a rubric, and it makes no difference to you whether or not supervisors even understand it. You can tell them it's swell that you can't address supervisory fabrication in observations until and unless you receive an ineffective rating.

You can tell them you're pleased they failed not once, but twice to oppose autocratic billionaire Michael Bloomberg as he bought Gracie mansion. You can pat them on the back for supporting his mayoral control not only at its inception, but also after it was proven to be an abject disaster. You can thank them for not only supporting charter schools, but also for creating and even co-locating them.

You can let UFT Unity and Michael Mulgrew know that you have no problem with their sitting on their hands as Joel Klein established a Leadership Academy and trained a small army of administrators to paint targets on the backs of working teachers. You can tell them you approve of being judged by test scores of students you may or may not even teach. You can let them know that you think it's a great idea to be judged on what Diane Ravitch and the American Statistical Assiciation regard as junk science.

You can pat UFT Unity on the back for having handed you a contract that ushered in second tier due process for ATR teachers, the most vulnerable among us. You can tell them you're pleased to wait until 2020 for the raise that NYPD, FDNY and most city workers got in 2009. You can say, "Thank you sir, may I have another?" as they make teachers on leave wait at least two years to get the small portion of retro pay we received a few months ago.

In fact, you can thank them for their failure to actively support or promote opt-out. You can listen to Mulgrew take credit for the cosmetic changes Cuomo proposed, the ones that were actually inspired by opt-out activists like those in this video, Jia Lee, Lauren Cohen, and Kristin Taylor. You can pretend that Cuomo is afraid of Mulgrew instead of the vibrant grassroots opt-out movement that has tabloids all over the state in a frenzy.

On the other hand, you may wish to support the future, and you may wish to repudiate the reforminess that has infected and degraded not only our profession, but also the education of our children. That's what I'm going to do, and I'm going to do so by voting for not only Jia Lee for UFT President, but also the entire coalition of MORE/ New Action. I'm tired of being told that black is white, that hot is cold, that day is night.

If you are too, you will join me in demanding fundamental change in our union. MORE/ New Action has a slate of hundreds of activists who will stand up for what we know to be right. That's why I'm proud to be running with them. Vote for them, vote for me, and vote for a long-needed new direction in our union, the United Federation of Teachers. 

I have a love/hate relationship with my school mailbox. I always approach it with a mixture of dread and respect, and sometimes I can't really differentiate between the two. It's become really acute since I became a chapter leader. Often, there are business-sized envelopes with my name on them containing messages like this:

Dear Mr. Teacher:

I have set aside time to meet with you on Thursday, April 7th, in my office.

This meeting is to discuss an allegation that you threw a cheeseburger at a student in your 4th period class.

You may wish to bring union representation, as this meeting may result in disciplinary action.

Very sincerely,

The Principal

Now this means I have to locate Mr. Teacher and find out what happened. Did he really throw that cheeseburger? Is it on video? Is he sorry and it will never happen again? Is he glad he did it and is he going to do it again tomorrow? Will he claim the First Amendment protects his right to hurl cheeseburgers as a political statement? Or did the kid just make it up and it never happened? Did an overzealous administrator tell the kid to make it up, and is Mr. Teacher so kosher he would never lay a hand on a cheeseburger?

You never know.

But then there are other messages you get. I've been published in the Daily News a few times, and there's always a little blurb that says where I teach. So every few weeks I get envelopes with hand scrawled letters, full of newspaper clippings that prove one cause or another. Often I get accused of being a communist. I'm thinking this is because what I write is pro-labor, and anyone who works must be a communist.

Sometimes I get long screeds on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. After all, I have a Jewish last name, so I must know about that stuff. Also, I must be on this side of it. Or maybe that side. But it's important I know the writer's side, and there are frequently clippings to show me the way.

Also, I used to get not only a record of every person who's been appointed to any per-session or comp-time job, but also a record of everyone who failed to get it. That can be fifty letters on a good day in a big school like mine. Recently they've taken to sending those records to my DOE email, so my box is just a little less bursting. And if I miss something important in my DOE email, I can always say I was busy reading 500 letters about postings, whether or not it's actually true. So there's that

Very early on, long before I was a chapter leader, I had a student named Rolando who saw me frustrated with a bunch of mail I had to pick up. He asked me what was wrong and I told him. He said the problem was that I actually looked at the mail. He told me that if I didn't look at it I wouldn't have to worry about it. In fact, Rolando was a proactive young man. He made sure I wouldn't be bothered anymore by entering the teacher check in room each and every morning before I arrived and dumping all my mail in the trash.

It really worked. I would get called into an administrator's office and asked why I never returned this or that form, and I would tell the secretary or administrator that I never got it. "Those monitors put everything in the wrong mailbox," they would say, and I'd fill out whatever the form was in front of their faces. Of course, who knows how many forms I didn't have to fill out because no one ever followed up?

I wonder where Rolando is today and what would happen if he were still around.

I learned a lot about APPR complaints this weekend, but having been through several of them, I was pretty well versed in what they can and cannot achieve. I'll take you back to the plenary, where I listened to genial Paul Egan discuss the miserable percentage of people who vote in the United States, and in New York. He regaled us, in great detail, about all the sacrifices people made to procure our vote. He spoke about the excuses people make to not vote. I forgot, they say. Or I don’t like the candidate. Or I don’t care. Whatever.

He pointed out how convenient it is for people to vote. Often we pass by our polling places whether or not we vote. It’s not like we have to walk 20 miles carrying weighty buckets of water or something.

He pointed out cases of people who won for only a handful of votes and suggested it was ridiculous for us to assume our votes have no value. He told us that even in cases where people won by landslides, they could claim they had a mandate. He showed that Adolf Hitler was elected with 89% of the vote. I hope I'm not invoking Godwin's Law when I look at Trump's success and see that’s not necessarily surprising.

Egan was absolutely right. It’s a disgrace that so few of us vote, particularly when you consider that other countries have voting percentages that approach 100%. He pointed out that in 2012, more people voted in American Idol than for President of the United States. People really care about that, evidently, even though I don't. (My daughter watches it, but when I see twenty-year-olds showing off their voices with Beatle songs, I want to get a gun and shoot the television.)

Bad politicians, he said and displayed on a PowerPoint, are elected by good people who don’t vote. He told some colorful stories about egregiously crooked politicians who got elected despite being on trial and clearly criminal. You are more likely in NY State to lose your seat by being convicted of a crime than by losing at the polls, he said.Think about Silver and Skelos, both just indicted. (I don't know about the rest of the room, but I got all wistful hoping Cuomo would follow in their footsteps.)

This, of course, led up to a plea for COPE. I contribute to COPE myself. But I am one of the awful people he referred to who says, “I’m not sure if I want to contribute.” I have to count myself among those who have second thoughts, as we’re now supporting a presidential candidate who’s said she’d close any school that wasn’t above average.

Now I vote every chance I get. I will certainly vote in the Democratic primary, and I will certainly vote in the general election too.

But the elephant in the room, and I have no idea exactly how many people saw it, was that fewer than 17% of working teachers could be bothered to vote in our last union election. I don't know how Paul Egan feels about that, but I'm personally horrified by it. This, rather than Friedrichs, ought to have inspired a union awareness campaign. The fact that 52% of UFT votes came from retirees, who are most definitely smarter than we are, is also outrageous. Maybe we ought to call ourselves the United Federation of Retirees.

We'll see if we can wake up the sleeping giant that is the UFT this year. If that happens, Unity could be in more than a little trouble. Because even people who voted for that stinker of a contract hate them for it.

Last weekend I went to a chapter leader training in Rye, NY. To the left you can see a view from my room. It was really very nice, and you can never know too much. It turns out I'd been through quite a bit of what was discussed, though I picked up a few things here and there.

At the plenary on Saturday morning, Michael Mulgrew got up and said that some people wanted to have principals have total control over teacher ratings. I was pretty surprised that he had given that no thought whatsoever, spouting out the same nonsense I’ve seen on Twitter. Once again he went to the numbers, that there were 2,000 poorly rated teachers then and are only 700 now.

Mulgrew clearly wasn’t concerned about burden of proof shifting from the DOE to teachers. Like everyone else I’ve seen spouting the Unity talking point, he didn’t even seem to recall that part. What’s the big deal about people being guilty until proven innocent? What’s the big deal if few 3020a hearings used to be resolved in favor of the city, and there’s a strong possibility that few future ones will be resolved in the favor of teachers.

Mulgrew did share some pearls of wisdom. “You can’t go on TV if your head is shining way too much.” That got a laugh from most of the crowd, but having heard him make a clear slander against people I work with and respect, I wasn’t laughing so quickly.

Mulgrew spoke of Karen Lewis, and of how, according to him she asked, “Mulgrew, can you imagine Rahm Emanuel being the good guy against the governor” He said it would be like us saying Bloomberg was a good guy.

I guess he forgot about Randi going to the baseball game with Bloomberg, or Klein hugging Randi (if it were me I’d have washed my whole body with Brillo pad) or that we approved Bloomberg's mayoral control not only at its inception, but also after it was pretty much well-established to have been an abject disaster. Maybe he forgot that we approved the ATR, or the raises that weren’t really raises because we worked more time to get more money. And let’s forget about the miserable deal he himself negotiated with a mayor we deemed to be friendly.

Then he spoke about the success of a school that had given up the “top-down craziness.” I, for one, am not a strong supporter of “top-down craziness,” and that’s precisely why I won’t be voting for Michael Mulgrew and his loyalty oath-signing band of 800. Mulgrew spoke about how so many principals made so many demands, and how people complied, but with no real passion. Of course he’s right.

But my passion comes from within. That’s why I can’t join Unity. Who the hell wants to be part of a group that’s as top-down as the principals Mulgrew criticizes? Well, 800 or more, evidently. Thanks, but I’ll take James Eterno. Thanks but I’ll take Jia Lee, and Lauren Cohen, and Mike Schirtzer, and Jonathan Halabi, and Kit Wainer.

Mulgrew asks what we can do for the chapter leader. For my money, he can liberate them. He can stop tying them to a failed philosophy and requiring them to support any damn thing he feels like. Now I didn’t get up and say that, and maybe that’s on me.

But even more telling, to me at least, was at one of the final sessions. I was sitting with a bunch of mostly Unity chapter leaders who were astounded that I had over thirty years and wasn't planning to retire. Several spoke of the 25/55 initiative of a few years back. One looked longingly back to it, wishing he had joined up. He said, "At the time, I had no idea this profession was going to s**t."

You know, if even the Unity chapter leaders know what we're feeling, it's almost inconceivable that folks like Mulgrew have managed to not to see it. I guess if you're a chapter leader, teaching every day and talking to working UFT members, you can't really avoid it. But it kind of makes you wonder how Mulgrew can thank the Heavy Hearts for making our system even worse.

How do you sign a loyalty oath to Unity and publicly espouse positions you know firsthand to be untrue?

That old bat Feinstein keeps confounding me. No, not confounding, vexing. Yeah that was the word. After all, Penguin used it on the latest episode of Gotham, so it must be a good word. No one vexes the Boy Wonder!

But she didn't know I had an ace up my sleeve. After much pleading, the stubborn principal had finally come to his senses. Jeez, it takes too much time talking him into stuff. He always wants me to explain everything.

Jeez, what's up with that? What am I, some kid taking a test? I'm an assistant principal already. No way should I have to explain myself.

Anyhoo, he agreed to fold her mediation program, because we have a SPARK counselor,  who the hell cares about conflicts between kids anyway, and the upshot was she would lose her stupid comp-time job. She would now teach five classes instead of just three. We never wanted to give her that job anyway. She just got it because of "seniority." Well, when I'm principal, no one will have seniority. Once anyone started to even look senior, they would be history!

Anyway, this was great! I could give her two freshman classes, put them anywhere in the damn building, and she hadn't taught those classes in years. Even if the principal actually observed her like he promised, she was sunk before she even began. New classes in the middle of the semester? The kids would be nuts from day one, and I'd hand-pick them just to be sure. Soon I'd be rid of that wretched harridan. So I dashed off an email, because the idiot principal insists we inform people when we change their schedules. Jeez. What a pain in the ass.

Dear Ms. Feinstein:

Due to circumstances beyond our control, your position as mediator has been discontinued. Therefore you will be assigned two new classes in our new classroom, B-49.

Best and fondest regards,

Mr. Wonder

Heh. It was perfect! That room was in the basement right next to the boiler. There was no ventilation except for an indoor air-conditioner that blew out the power every time it got turned on. It was foolproof! And her with her heart condition and the asthma she was always bitching about, maybe she would just give us all a break and retire already. The class she had before that was in the computer room on the third floor. How the hell was she gonna drag her old ass down three flights of stairs and across the building to the basement in four minutes, especially with all those stupid bags she carried? You don't see me carrying stuff around.

But son of a bitch, that Chapter Leader ruined everything. He had a bunch of scumbags from the union inspect the air quality in all the converted closets, and had a written report saying that the room reeked of diesel and was unfit as a classroom. So we had to move the class to a real classroom. Damn. With windows and everything. Every time I try to get her out, they keep dragging her back in!

And now she's filed a grievance just because I have her in four different classrooms. The spineless principal says I have to find her real classrooms and that she shouldn't be running up and down the stairs all the time. Americans with Disabilities Act or some such nonsense. Where do they come up with this stuff? Man, I hope Trump wins. He won't pander to these geriatric bullies.  Jeez, if the old biddy can't walk a few staircases, she ought to be home growing flowers, or whatever the hell it is that old people do.

Now she's complaining that I shouldn't have ended her job via email. Oh, she wants the personal touch, does she? Well, I'll walk in and observe last period the Friday before vacation. And it doesn't really matter what she does because I'm just gonna copy the observation my best bud did when he trashed one of his teachers. Let her whine about how she didn't do this or that. It doesn't matter. Once I say she did it, she did it. I guess I'll have to change a few words to make it look like it was her subject. Man do I hate to write.

Ya know what I'm in the mood for? Maybe an egg roll. Or some of that moo goo gai pan. I'm gonna have to head out to that takeout joint. They cook pretty well for old people.

"Listen, if anyone is looking for me, tell them I'm out observing."

But boy do I love this system. It's tailor made for guys like me. And when I'm principal, every teacher on staff is gonna know just how I use it. No more wasting time with American with Disabilities Acts, or Chapter Leaders, or old geezers.

It's gonna be sweet!

I am pretty amazed at the stuff I read nowadays. Puff Diddy is starting a school and getting all around swell guy Dr. Steve whatever to manage it. You know, Dr. Steve is the guy who manages to make 100% of those who complete his other charter school to go to college. He does that the old fashioned way, by dropping every single person who isn't going to college out of his program. So this is a win-win. It gets Dr. Steve attention, and Diddy gets to be in charge of a school or something.

I, for one, hereby promise to give Diddy's next album every bit of attention I gave his last one. After all, I'm doing that for fellow charter school guy Pitbull too, so why not? One cool feature of Diddy's new school is that there aren't gonna be any teachers. Instead, there will be "illuminators." Except, of course, in math, where they will be "denominators." And if the kid doesn't pass a test, in which case there will be "dementors," to quickly relocate said kid to the public schools from which Diddy is graciously saving them. 

Anyway, a friend of mine is thinking of joining. He told me he wanted to be the gym illuminator. Then he asked me what the difference was between being a teacher and being an illuminator. I could only conjecture, as I've never had any experience being an illuminator. After over thirty years, I'm still just a lowly teacher.

One difference, I supposed, is that there would be no due process for illuminators. After all, Dr. Steve is not really a tenure sort of guy. Maybe they have yearly contracts, or maybe you can be fired for a bad haircut. Who knows? And anyway, the illuminators are not really the draw here. The important thing is the chance to see Diddy, and to be part of his Great Project. After all, he's changed the name of teachers to illuminators, and as the immortal bard asked, what's in a name? Everything, I guess. Who the hell wants a teacher when you can have an illuminator?

I myself am waiting for the Vanilla Ice Charter School. Except I read somewhere that he's in jail or something so I just may have to wait.

Meanwhile, I'm gonna become a rapper. I figure I'm just as qualified to be a rapper as Puff Diddy is to start a school. After all, I've never done it before, I don't know anything about it, and I have no idea what to do about it. But as soon as Vanilla Ice gets out of jail, or wherever he is, I'm gonna get him to put his name on it. You know, like Dr. Steve did for Diddy.

And maybe I won't be just a rapper. I'm gonna be a "wrapper." Yeah, that's the ticket.

It's refreshing to at least read about opt-out in NYC. While the Chancellor grants it lip service, it's pretty clear she portrays the cosmetic changes as significant. Being unable to look into her soul, I can only assume she actually believes it. Sadly, that doesn't speak all that well of either her judgment or how well-informed she is.

Governor Cuomo pretends to be a student lobbyist while pretty much being at war with public education. He vilifies teachers, supports hedge-fund backed charters, and only makes superficial changes in response to public outcry. Sadly almost none of that outcry emanates from my union, undoubtedly the most powerful in the state, the United Federation of Teachers.

All over Long Island, parents get letters from teacher unions not only advising them to opt out their kids, but also including forms making it easy to do so. UFT stalls, hems and haws, and can't decide whether they support the activist opt-out position or Arne Duncan's threat to withhold money from districts that don't sufficiently subject their kids to tests that are developmentally inappropriate, tests that may or may not be used to rate teachers on junk science.

It's very significant that MORE/ New Action is running a presidential candidate who's an opt-out activist, a candidate who travels all around the state speaking to opt-out. UFT Unity tried to buy her off when she went to DC to address the House, but failed. They did manage to get a UFT-Unity rep to voice their watered down, wishy-washy message, but they couldn't buy Jia Lee.

There's still time for the UFT to get on the right side of history. I only worry that it may be too late. Now I'm stunned to hear Mulgrew speak against Common Core, even after he offered to punch our faces if we didn't support it. But he only did that after Cuomo made some new commission to study the standards, change the name, and pretend it isn't the same old crap it always was.

It's gonna be an uphill battle to popularize opt-out as long as our leadership insists on remaining years behind the times. I hope there are whispers in the Unity monopoly that actually see what's going on and what's yet to happen. But given their ardent support of charter schools, high stakes testing, junk science teacher ratings, mayoral control, the ATR, the current APPR, the future worse APPR, pay eleven years late with no interest, higher copays, and more, I'm less than optimistic.

With new leadership, everything can and will change.