Arthur Goldstein wrote an interesting piece today about overcrowded music classes in I
would assume his school, Francis Lewis HS. I was not aware that HS music could have 50 students in one class. I have always been aware (and I could be wrong) that even in elementary, Phys. Ed could have 50 students with one teacher.

Which brings me to elementary music or the appearance of it in one Bronx elementary school. Two years ago I wrote about Aaron, a teacher that was written up for bullshit and a failed attempt (gratefully) at suicide during his 3020-a hearing.

Aaron was the music teacher in his school at the time of his troubles.  In fact, Aaron was in my school for a year as an ATR music teacher about ten years ago. In that one school year at my school he put in a grant in and received about a dozen keyboards. The kids loved Aaron and loved going to his class. Sadly, when the year ended Aaron was not kept on.

At the school he was at when I came across him in my ATR travels and as of the basis of the writings above Aaron was yet again the music teacher and no longer an ATR. The school was damn lucky to have him. He gave of himself, going above and beyond constantly. The Christmas Spectaculars he put on were the talk of the community. Sadly, his principal did not care for him and wanted him out.

If Aaron Judge comes up to the plate without a bat, he won't get a hit, correct? Well, Aaron's principal decided not to supply him with the necessary accoutrements for him to succeed as a music teacher. Namely, he was not supplied with any musical instruments at all. Nada. Bupkus. Nichts.

What did Aaron have? He had iPads. What was on the iPads? Garage Band. That's it. No YouTube. No nothing else. How is a music teacher supposed to introduce and teach the appreciation of music with just an app? Why didn't the principal supply Aaron with the materials that would give him, not only the chance to succeed and shine, but to stimulate the minds of the students? The students were to learn keyboarding and whatever else, on an iPad.

I am all for integrating technology into the curriculum. But there has to be training. Aaron had ZERO chances or offers of professional development. Aaron was set up to fail.

Aaron is a professional musician. He has played on Broadway countless times and has played in several prominent jazz bands. Aaron as a deep love and historical knowledge of music, though I am perplexed at his lack of knowledge of Rush. Aaron is without a doubt a principal's dream to have on staff as a music teacher.

But the principal didn't care for Aaron. He wasn't part of the "cool kids" clique. Aaron had to be brought down at the expense of the students.

It's been some time since I took the UFT and it's "leadership" to task, but now is as good as time as any.

I was looking forward (As are all of us) to my retro pay coming up in a few weeks. Even better, I was going to get a double retro check due to me being suspended (But technically "on leave") when teachers got their first checks in October 2015.

I was told, specifically, by several within the UFT that I was to get TWO payments with the upcoming retro check. Yes, more taxes will be taken out, but a double check would be nice.

So about last week I was reading Arthur Goldstein's blog and saw something that raised an eyebrow. Those who were on leave or whatever in October 2015 will not be getting a double check.

I checked with a good person within the UFT and I received confirmation.

Then a few days later Chaz the Blogger called me up to share the news.

Then I told my wife. YIKES!

Yeah, it is true. Anyone considered on leave when the first retro checks came out in 2015 this year's check will be considered their first payment and next years the 2nd and so on and those of us affected by this inanity will have to wait until October 2021 to be made full.

According to my sources the UFT never shared this part of the agreement with the rank and file. It is deeply embedded in some super duper double secret part of the MOU.

The UFT does it to us again. Just for the f*&*ing seat at the table. Just to f*&*ing acquiesce to the f*&*ing city once again.

"NO! You can't get your retro all at once, we might bankrupt the city. There are too many UFT members. You are not entitled to retro," goes the gibberish from 52 Broadway.

BULLSHIT!!!!

It takes two parties to agree to no retro. It takes one party to cower like a scared UFT President Dunsel to give into the city this f*&*ing ridiculous, moronic retro schedule!

DC 37 has as many members if not more than the UFT and they got their retro checks in one lump sum. So did the cops, the firefighters, the sanitation workers, the shit cleaners, and everyone except the UFT thanks to President Dunsel.

Who the f*&* came up with this idea of paying us over the course of 5 years? And worse, if you are terminated, quit, or die you get nothing! Bupkus! You are then royally f*&*ed!

So come 2021 when I get that last check, my son will be starting his junior year in college, the Jets will still be without a quarterback (I'm not a Jets fan), mass murders will increase, Trump will be in a mental hospital, and the UFT offices, thanks to Janus, will be down to a 250 sq ft office storefront. Now located next to Sizzler's on Tremont Ave in the Bronx with President Dunsel sitting a high school desk.

I swear when I tell friends who are members of other unions how the UFT operates they just don't believe it. This shit can't be made up!

It is time, with Janus on the horizon, that the UFT starts to heed the wants and needs of the rank and file.

A few weeks ago I touched on, and broke down the idiocy, of Chalkbeat's latest ATR missive. In the last few days,  Chalkbeat again showed it's cluelessness as well as the DOE's official mouth piece, the NY Post. The New York Times also chimed in, but it was a little less shrill.

All of these articles came out within the last 3-4 days and I so much wished to comment on them, to break the down the BS and expose the truth. But in a way, it'll be beating a dead horse. There must have been some way I can shed light on the truth without just rehashing the reality yet again.

Arthur Goldstein today helped me unlock what I been wanting to write about for some time but never found a proper segue to put fingers to keypad and share.

Arthur wrote...

It's important to note that any teacher can be brought up on charges at any time, and that even if the charges are nonsense it's likely some minor one will be sustained. Maybe you used your phone in the school, or did something equally inconsequential. That's enough to fine you a few thousand bucks and place you into the ATR. Then you're doomed, if the Post gets its way.

This is every ATR's nightmare. Yes, other teachers have this nightmare as well, but with an ATR it is especially magnified. One thing, one mistake, one act taken out of context can at worst, have charges brought against you or at best, a letter to your file in which no matter how trivial and how much great work you do the rest of the year will bring you a U rating.

This past December, my 3rd day in my assigned school, I was bringing a 5th grade class upstairs from lunch. I had never had this class before. They had no clue who I was. There was one young man you was quite attention seeking and was quite boisterous the walk up four flights of stairs.

When we got to the class I lined the students up and asked for quiet until I would send them in. Most of the class complied as I sent them in four at a time. In the meantime this student, and for the sake of keeping his anonymity will henceforth be known of Shlomo Epstein was getting more and more obnoxious.

With him and three other students the last ones to be asked to go in the classroom not only was his obnoxious level rising, but his obnoxiousness was rubbing off on the other students. Their teacher was in the classroom and she heard and saw of my issues yet did not lift a finger to help. It was her prep. A MADE UP PREP. I was on my own.

I asked Shlomo to step off the line. I walked up to him, whispered in his ear and stepped back. I was about 12-18 inches from him when he finally complied and walked to the other side of the hall. As he walked by me he tripped over his own feet, on purpose, and then threw himself into the wall. He turned around and screamed, "WHY DID YOU THROW ME INTO THE WALL????"

Then the teacher got involved. She asked one of the students if he had seen anything and he feigned ignorance. Great. 

My heart stopped. I knew it was BS and so did he. But, and I heard this later, his mother is a para for the DOE and she sees no wrong in Shlomo. And, I heard from other teachers that he has pulled this fake thrown into the wall act in the past.

At the end of the day the AP wanted me to give a statement. Just the facts. I wanted a UFT rep there with me. Not the one in the school (She was way, way too inexperienced) but I got hold of the Bronx UFT and was told that for a statement I did not need a rep. But I did it anyway.

The AP appeared sympathetic to me, but that could have been a ruse. It seemed that the adminstration was more concerned with mom and wished to share with her what had happened when she came to pick Shlomo up.

I immediately reached out to my District 7 rep and he assured me that when and if I met with the principal he will be there to rep me.

Days went by, I hated the wait. It was about 3 weeks until I got the notice to meat with the principal. At least it seemed that OSI bounced it back to the school. But I was still nervous.

When we met with the principal I signed the waiver to be able to read the statements of the other students. There were 11 statement and every single statement except one exonerated me of throwing Shlomo into the wall. Shlomo's statement was the only one still insisting that I had.

I was fortunate. My DR knew what to do and how to handle the situation. I doubt at anytime the school's CL could've done the same. I got no letter, no nothing. The principal was quite fair to me and treated me with dignity.

I am sharing this for a few reasons. One is how quick something so inane, so baseless can ruin a teacher's career in an instant. Second, that being an ATR, especially when you first arrive at a school you are basically an island onto yourself. You have ZERO support. Nothing, nada, bupkus. You are on your own. At this school there were a few teachers I knew from over the years and this helped. But too many ATR's are left alone and vulnerable in their schools and worse they are ignored and/or chastised.

One more thing. If you go into a discipline meeting, unless you have a strong Chapter Leader, whatever you do go into any discipline meeting with you DL.

UPDATED 2/22/17: The views expressed in this blog post are mine and mine alone. At no time did anyone from MORE or any other union member ask me nor attempt to coerce me into writing this blog post. 

One more thing. The kitten on the left represents ALL teacher union members across New York State.


The beginning of this month we shared on these pages that NYSUT VP Andy Palotta will be running for NYSUT president as the Unity candidate against  Michael Lillis, presidential candidate for the Stronger Together caucus.

Recently, both Arthur Goldstein on his NYC Educator Blog and James Eterno on ICEUFT Blog have both queried why ST does not have any UFT members on their slate.

Arthur writes;

"When I realized that Stronger Together was running four people against five, I saw an instant solution to my problem, which is that they have no UFT representation whatsoever. They could run Jia Lee, who bravely faced an uphill battle against Michael Mulgrew last year. They could run James Eterno, who got the majority of high school votes for High School Vice President, but who isn't VP because UFT Unity rigged elections....

And James;

"I'm not happy that ST didn't agree to support any of us UFT dissidents for NYSUT office, particularly since some of us joined ST when it formed back in 2014. Arthur Goldstein (Chapter Leader Francis Lewis High School in Queens) ran for Executive VP back then against Pallotta."

Now while I have the utmost of respect for both Arthur and James I have to agree with Arthur and truly believe that MORE UFT presidential candidate Jia Lee should have been on the slate for ST. Mind you that the ST slate only has four candidates whilst normally there are five.

Why is Jia not on the slate? 

Jia not only has a great reputation throughout NYC, but across the state and nationwide. Jia has testified before the United States Senate, has close ties with the anti-establishment locals, close relationships with New York State legislators, Badass Teachers, and just as importantly, received 20% of the vote in the 2016 UFT elections. No small feat when going against the entrenched machine of Unity. And let's not forget what Jia has brought to not only the Opt-Out Movement in NYC, but just about everywhere.

Yes, unseating and winning the NYSUT elections is a tall order for anyone not backed by Unity. The 2017 RA is on Unity's home turf at the Hilton in Manhattan and we all know how anyone associated with Unity will vote. But why not give those who are against Unity an outside chance?

There are some indisputable facts in the upcoming election that we must heed. NYC, Yonkers, Albany and Rochester will vote Unity. That's a given. On the other hand Buffalo, Long Island, and the North Country will and should be behind ST and even more so if Jia were a part of the slate. The Southern Tier will probably be split between Unity and ST, as well as the Hudson Valley. With Jia ST will without a doubt give Unity a run for it's money. Without Jia it'll be another Unity triumph for sure.

But let's say that ST does pull it off. Then what? Without NYC representation the doors will be slammed shut in Albany and Washington DC. There will be no clout. Nada. Bupkus.

MORE in the previous election lifted ST. Where is the reciprocity from ST? Arthur however brings up an interesting question in his blog post which bears a ponder;

"Could their (ST) negative relationship with a single MORE member have led them to stereotype us?" (Hmmmm, could this be someone who does not play and work well with others?)

Whatever the reason ST did not choose a UFT member, let alone Jia, not only it is ST's loss but more importantly, and much, much worse, but a major setback for the teachers and students of New York State.

 

Last week Arthur Goldstein shared on his blog how the Stronger Together caucus Michael Lillis to run for NYSUT president whilst at the same time trying to make a deal with Unity.
nominated

Arthur is not please with ST because ST is not only keeping the UFT out but, refusing to include MORE. Arthur writes;

"My best guess right now is that Stronger Together doesn't wish to be mixed up with weirdos like us in MORE, because we are pretty much one of the last bastions of vibrant resistance to top-down unionism. Being mixed up with us would hurt ST's chances of a deal with Mulgrew, who didn't send us Christmas cards this year."

But there are more (no pun intended) machinations happening within NYSUT this year.

The Crack Team has learned from an extremely reliable source NYSUT that Andy Palotta, NYSUT's executive vice-president will be throwing his hat in to be the next NYSUT president.

Now you may ask, what about Karen Magee? The Crack Team's source shared that Unity has never been happy with Karen because she has not been "the puppet" they had wanted.

At press time we here at SBSB do not know if Karen is running for president. Some have said she is, while some sources have shared with The Crack Team she is not.

If she is not running, it is entirely plausible that she is being forced out, told not to run by Unity. Unity holds the cards.

Our source also shared with The Crack Team that along with Unity, the Yonkers Federation of Teachers will vote en masse for Palotta but the key to stop this so-called coronation is votes from Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse. This can be difficult.

The NYSUT RA this year is being held in Manhattan. Whom does this favor? The UFT and Yonkers. Not too far to travel for either delegation. And basically free. No reason to shell out big bucks for travel and Manhattan hotels.

We here at SBSB are sure this is going to get much more interesting.

Several days ago, in what then was a tongue in cheek blog post, we here at SBSB suggested that my cat Sparkles, run for UFT president.

Apparently when we were all asleep Sparkles manages to read that post and sat down with me to discuss the possibility. She has spent the last several days contemplating a run and today decided to sit down with members of The Crack Team to announce her decision and share her policy points.

Here now is the entire "presser" held by Sparkles, with myself offering the translation from cat talk to English, completely unedited.

Sparkles, you called us to your home today telling us you have a major announcement. What is it?

I have decided to throw my hat in the ring and run for president of the UFT

Which caucus nominated you? In fact which caucus are you with?

Careful there bub. I have yet to be nominated. I find it presumptuous to nominate oneself or even influence others to nominate me.

As for which caucus I am aligned with, that would be the MORE caucus. You can say I represent teachers that are cat owners. 

And just what is it you have done for teachers that own cats? 

I have started the UFT Kitty Alliance FB page (Well I didn't start that someone else did), Don't Tread on Teacher Kitty Owners, I have been there for teachers when they need to talk to someone about their kitty coughing up hair balls, I have begun many websites and list servs as well.

And have you engaged in any picketing in favor of teachers that own cats? 

No. Basically it is a waste of time picketing a school with only 8 people and one of those 8 are wearing a Captain Picard uniform. Picketing is all well and good but basically, without community support, or the "real" media involved, you basically look like a bunch of schmucks out there.

It's better to establish a presence within the school to hand out information extolling the caucus, i.e. when are meetings, people to contact, etc... Also to reach out personally to other groups in the community. Picketing, unless you truly narrowly target where you are picketing, such as an unexpected place, makes you look like a bunch of schmucks. 

Now mind you, there are cat owning teachers that have been discontinued, brought up on 3020-a charges, are being harassed, but empty gestures can only raise their level of expectations which in the end will disappoint them.

So all these social media pages have they affected any change within the DOE or the UFT?

You're joking, right?

Why do you expect to be nominated?

I don't. If I do, fine, if I don't fine. Democracy rules. I can honestly tell you there are people more worthy than myself to be UFT president. My owner has listed them here.

Speaking of which, I feel blogs have more (Pardon the pun) influence and more reach, at least the popular ones, such as Ednotes, Chaz, NYC Educator, SBSB, Raging Horse, ICE, DOENUTS, than picketing and all that stuff. The above blogs are what the people read!

Some say that James Eterno will be nominated. What would you do if he is? Will you put up a fight?

I will graciously step aside and support James. Remember, anyone can own a restaurant not everyone can be a 5 star chef and it is the chef that brings in the people to the restaurant.

And on that note James once made me a liver, chicken and cheese påté that was to die for!

If James is not nominated and you are, would you offer James the position of UFT Secretary?

I don't know if James would accept that job. I would like to have James be my closest advisor, much as Clark Clifford had been to many presidents. Anyway I am thinking of having my good friend, Bill the Cat be secretary.

Editors note: It was at this point that Sparkles got distracted by birds flying by the window and then she decided to clean herself. 

And if you are nominated, what can we expect?

You can expect to have someone there to work their butt off for every UFT member there is and I will put in place throughout the entire UFT only those that will put members first. I will not have an ego, I will allow anyone to come to me if they disagree with me and I will not be vindictive, I will not have a hissy fit, and I will be mature with those who are of independent thought.

Last question, what can the rank and file expect from a Sparkles presidency? 

It will be a union run buy the teachers, for the teachers. If I become president, God willing, I will stand before the rank and file a humbled kitty. That all egos will be checked at the door and that each member of the union is as important a cog in the wheel as me or anyone.

Thank you for allowing me this time. I now want to take a nap. Godspeed to all. 

And there you have it. Sparkles threw her hat in the nominating process.