teaching and politics

AFT works with Gates to destroy union

2010-07-11T19:07:00.005-04:00

Weingarten & Gates - Class Collaboration

The speech by Bill Gates at the general session of the AFT convention on Saturday July 10 was an insult to teachers who work hard every day in the face growing attacks by the ruling class. The invitation by Randi Weingarten was nothing less than the act of A CLASS TRAITOR! Bill Gates makes his billions of dollars by exploiting the workers of Microsoft (a non-union employer). He has led the attack on public education, spending millions of dollars on programs that attack our union, work to privatize schools, and prepare working class youth for a future of war and fascism. Our union should not be working with our bosses to destroy our students.

We are workers--our needs are different than those of the bosses.

The U.S ruling class is currently fighting 2 wars to protect its interests in the oil and mineral resources in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is also preparing for its next war, in Iran or Korea or South America. The bosses are facing a strengthening competition from Europe, Russia and a growing China. At some point soon the U.S. is going to have to take on these other capitalists. If not the bosses will lose their standing as a world power. In order to do this they must commit resources to the war machinery rather education (or healthcare or other services for workers). We, as workers, gain nothing from these wars, except to see other workers like us maimed or dead.

Why does this matter to us?

At the same time they must train the next generation of workers for their future. Workers must be won to working for lower wages, working more hours and joining the military in much larger numbers. To do this the bosses use the education system that they have bought and paid for. The ruling class needs teachers who have bought into their system, so they are strengthening their political indoctrination. At the same time they are working to convince teachers that there is no difference between us and our bosses. Having teachers evaluate each other, rule on hiring and firing, and doing away with the due process protection of tenure are all steps to blur the line between worker and boss.

Look at the main motion pushed by the AFT leadership and at Bill Gates’ speech. They both talked about class collaboration—teachers being evaluated by other teachers, and teachers working with administrators to develop plans to evaluate teachers in order to destroy tenure and bust the unions.

We have been lied to by the liberals, Weingarten, Obama, Duncan and Gates. Under the guise of anti-racism and the fight for better schools for all, we are being convinced that our job is to help them build this fascist system of evaluation and school closings and mass firings. These liberals are using fascist and racist teacher-bashing to force us to work harder and longer for less money, in competition with each other, and with other schools and other states. We need to organize as class without the illusion that these bosses are our friends.

Irony is alive and well at BP

2010-06-08T21:38:00.001-04:00

'nuff said.

Workers get Lay-offs and Pay Freezes, Banks make Billions

2010-06-02T20:12:00.003-04:00

Today the NYC DOE and the UFT (our sellout union) announced a two year wage freeze for all teachers. This could really be almost 3 years since our contract expired 7 months ago. This agreement will stop any lay-offs of teachers and guidance counselors. This does not mean schools are unaffected as aides and other DC37 workers have already lost 500 positions earlier this year, and there are more to come. Other city workers are facing lay-offs of thousands of positions, especially as the courts have ruled that the city cannot back out of contractual obligations that were negotiated.

So the UFT was given the choice of lay-offs or a salary freeze. These are the choices as long as we let the ruling class pose the question. But let’s take a step back for a minute. What industry is at the heart of New York? What industry depends on the services of New York to continue to provide safety for its workers; healthcare for its workers; education for the children of its workers? Well we know the answer to this – Big Banks! That’s right the same people that caused this financial crisis. The same ones that have received hundreds of BILLIONS of dollars in bailouts. The same ones that are once again turning record profits of tens of billions of dollars each quarter!

How are these things connected? Well, here’s a couple of interesting facts: NYC has debt in the form of bonds. These bonds are bought mostly by big finance. Paying this debt will cost NYC $2.469 billion in financial year 2011. (http://council.nyc.gov/html/budget/PDFs/2011/pbr_omb_2011.pdf)

NYC also has a projected deficit for financial year 2011. That deficit was projected to $1.191 billion dollars. (http://www.comptroller.nyc.gov/bureaus/bud/Summary_budget_report.shtm)

So let’s do the math….If the city were to suspend its debt service for this year they would not only cover this year’s deficit but make a huge dent in the 2012 projected deficit. Yet, no one talks about this option.

THIS IS CAPITALISM. Profits come before people.

Vanishing Students, Rising Scores: Middle School Charters Show Alarming Student Attrition Over Time

2010-05-29T18:45:00.002-04:00

Here is a wonderful study from the EDWIZE blog on how charters dump students who will pull down test scores.

Vanishing Students, Rising Scores: Middle School Charters Show Alarming Student Attrition Over Time

The Gulf oil spill and education. What's the connection?

2010-05-27T21:11:00.005-04:00

What does the BP leak in the Gulf of Mexico have to do with the future of education? Bear with me and I’ll try to work through this.

The Obama administration has been taking a beating for “not acting fast enough.” This is true, but doesn’t really explain the relationship between the U.S. government and “Big Oil”. Oil drilling is no longer three guys on the Plains looking for gushers. It is a highly technological, scientific endeavor. This “gusher” is at the bottom of a column of water as deep as the Grand Canyon. To monitor these wells, and to fix any problems are major undertakings and require a well developed technical/engineering know-how. This is something that the U.S. government has been more than happy to allow the oil companies to fund and basically have let the oil companies self-monitor. This has become the practice over many years and continued by the current administration.

The problem for anyone who takes the time to think about this is that oil companies are driven by the basic DNA of capitalism – MAXIMIZE PROFIT. It is becoming clear that BP knew about problems with this rig, but did not act on them. They chose ways of dealing with issues that were “faster” (i.e. cost less money) rather than safer. It is clear that the “fail-safe” devices were not correctly tested in order to save time.

The role of government in all of this? To help these companies make those profits (BTW – BP profits before this disaster? $45 million/day). Politicians don’t get to run by taking on big business. In this system government protects profit!

So what does this have to do with education? Our union has given up on any form of mass movement. Our leadership has had only one plan of action – rely on these same politicians. What we get is a system of education “reform” that is bad for both teachers and students. So who is it good for? BIG BUSINESS!

In 2008 the AFT invited Arne Duncan to speak at their national convention in Chicago. Let’s look at his history there and his actions as Sec. of Educations. He destroyed almost all of the protections that teachers had won through hard fought battles. At the same time he instituted a program of aligning high schools with the military. Over two dozen schools have programs where students required to participate in JROTC programs. One of the new plans being floated by the U.S. Dept of Ed. Is to set up 2 levels high schools – some 2 year schools leading to “technical diplomas” and some 4 year schools leading to academic diplomas and college. This would provide a guarantee to businesses about the level of achievement of high school graduates and college students, while at the same time providing even more workers whose choices are severely limited and who are more likely to become cannon fodder in future wars.

Big Oil, or Education it’s all about maximizing profits for big business.

Stop Texas from rewriting history

2010-04-05T22:32:00.002-04:00

The Texas Board of Education is about to vote on the most wide ranging change to its state education standards in recent memory. This will bring a shift to the right among publishers that will affect text books across the nations. Go to Change.org to sign the petition to stop this.

Start a Petition »

Heterogeneity vs Tracking - Is the pendulum swinging back?

2009-08-31T21:00:00.007-04:00

On Sunday Aug. 30th, the New York Daily News published as its lead Op-Ed piece a "critique" of heterogeneous class and a call for a return to tracking of students. In this article Anna Penny, a teacher for all of 3-and-a-half years decries her inability to motivate students in a 12th grade Literature elective. What is the cause? Could it be a society that does not value reading? Could it be class sizes of 30-34 students? Could it be a system that throws new teachers into a class with little or no support?(her principal taught for all of 2-1/2 years before getting his job through the "mis"-Leadership Academy) NO! It is the fact that she had a heterogeneous group of students with a wide range of reading skills.

It is not that I am not sympathetic to Ms. Penny's ordeal. I have taught Chemistry and Physics to heterogeneous groups of students for many years. Believe me, I KNOW what it is like to have students who are ill-prepared and unmotivated. The thing is, there is a history to heterogeneous grouping that is very important to remember. The tracking systems that were being used in the past were inherently racist. Statistics showed that many more black and latino students were being kept out of college-prep and honors tracks than white students. The placement of student was based on the whim of teachers, guidance counselors and administrators or the results of tests that were culturally biased.

I remember my elementary school P.S. 165 in Manhattan. All of the classes were numbered: 5-1, 5-2, 5-3 etc. Everyone knew who the "smart" class was. And guess which class got the extras, like trips or the most experienced and motivated teachers- It wasn't 5-10. So for many years progressive educators, students and families fought to bring and end to tracking. We fought to allow all students the opportunity to take courses that would prepare and allow them to go to college. We fought for heterogeneous classes.

Are heterogeneous classes a panacea? No. They are more work for teachers. It is always easier to teach a more homogeneous group of students especially if they are motivated. But we should not stop heterogeneity because it is hard. We need to fight for ways to make us more effective teachers. We have to fight for the resources that our students really need. So if you have a 12th grade student with a 2nd grade reading level in an elective lit. class (as Ms. Penny claims) the struggle should be for the literacy support that this student obviously needs. Did her school have a pullout literacy program? If not, why not? Was this a full class of 34 students? Why aren't more teachers, parents and students fighting for smaller classes so that we can give all of our students the attention they deserve. For too long we have accepted it when the UFT leadership says that we can't negotiate for smaller classes in the contract. OF COURSE WE CAN! We just can't use it as trade-off to get higher wages.

I'll end with some questions that I hope you respond to.
Why did the NY Daily News give such primo space to this article?
How does this tie in with Obama's "Race to the Top" call for more testing and an end to tenure?
How do we motivate students, parents and teachers to get involved in these struggles?

Real, uncensored effect of BloomKlein budget cuts

2009-08-24T20:37:00.007-04:00

I teach at new high school. Last year we had 112 students and a budget of $1.2 million. This comes to just over $10,400/student. Our student body is 100% English Language Learners and 100% Title 1 (an indicator of poverty level) although we did not get any Title 1 money last year because we were a new school.

This year we will double our student register to 225, still all ELL and all Title 1. Our budget for this year - $1.6 million including the addition of Title 1 money. This comes to just over $7111/student. This is a cut of 32%!

$7111 per student. The next time you see that campaign ad for Bloomberg that claims he has done great things for education in NYC think of this - our school, with 100%high need students, will get 32% less money than last year. We will get approximately half of what schools in places like Scarsdale NY get. Half the money! Yet, in three years our graduates will have to compete with those from places like Scarsdale for college entry. This is the definition of de facto racism.

It is not hyperbole to say that these budget cuts are racist and anti-working class. They will affect black, latino and poor whites disproportionately. Schools serving these students are already struggling behind those in middle-class or rich areas. Our students need more services. Their families can't afford private tutors or "college admissions coaches".

Top universities get to say that they are not racist, it's just that there are not enough qualified black, latino and poor white applicants. As if all students start from a level playing field. That is the real danger of this kind of racism. No one stands up and talks about "those people". Everyone gets to look like they are only concerned about "merit". And blame gets put on the victims - they're just not good enough. This is the racism that too many people close their eyes to because it is easy to ignore.

Why we need healthcare reform

2009-08-22T23:28:00.006-04:00

I am not going to give you all of the statistics or generalities that fly around the Internet. I want to deal with this from the personal. As someone once said "the personal is political."

Seven months ago today my mom had a stroke. What happened to her illustrates some of the best and most of the worst in how this system treats patients - and my mom had what is considered a good insurance with Medicare and her union supplement.

When she suffered the stroke she was taken to one of the best stoke centers in the Northeast. She received very good treatment initially and through her stay in ICU at the hospital following surgery. However, onece she left the ICU and began to need extras (like therapy) the hospital moved quickly to discharge her to a rehab center - sending her out with an active MRSA infection.

At the rehab center, again considered one of the best in the Northeast, the doctors and nurses did not want to deal with a patient who was sick. They ignored her symptoms for 48 hours until she went into congestive heart failure. She was taken to a local hospital, almost died and again entered an ICU. Once again she received very good emergency care, but when she began to need "extras" that the hospital could not bill medicare for it was time to send her back to the rehab center.

Once again she was not really ready for rehab, and still more work that the doctors and nurses really wanted to deal with. Another "crisis" happened and mom was sent back to the hospital. Three more weeks in the hospital and on to a second rehab center/nursing home. Here she finally started therapy, but the home was so short staffed that inside of three weeks she BACK in the hospital due to DEHYDRATION!

One week later and it was on to rehab center/nursing home 3. Here she has received excellent therapeutic care, although the nursing staff is over worked (a 25:1 ratio on the sub-acute floor) and her doctor has missed at least one near decent back towards congestive heart failure.

All of this is with a health insurance policy that is considered on the best short of having several million dollars to pay for all of this out pocket. Health insurance does not work in this country. As long as it is profit based hospitals and nursing homes will push patients out before they are well. They will cut staffs in areas that not money generating.

The only way to guarantee health care for all under this capitalist system is with a single payer plan. Anything else will perpetuate "for-profit" health care. In the U.S. that means profits before patients.

Who am I and why am I doing this?

2009-08-22T23:14:00.003-04:00

The first part of this question is easy. I am a science teacher in a public high school in the Bronx. I am a truly native New Yorker and a product of the NYC public school system. I am also someone who has been active in progressive/left politics for as long as I can remember (the term used to be "red diaper baby").

The second part is harder. What do I have to add to the vast noise in the bloggesphere? I don't know, but my voice is not there now. The funny thing is the final impetus for me was watching "Julie and Julia". I mean if people can be moved by someone cooking all of Julia Childs recipes in one year then I should be able to reach some people out there.

I will write about what I observe in my life, cause isn't that what this is really all about. I promise NOT to write about my current school, administration, co-workers or students because I really don't want to piss off people I have to work with every day. I also will not write about my wife or our relationship. So if it is personal dirt you want go to TMZ or some other gossip site.