The New Yorker magazine has a contest each week. On the last page of each issue is a cartoon without a caption. Readers are invited to dream up a caption, and the best one wins.
Now here is our contest. Jeb Bush, Bill Gates, Mike Bloomberg, and Oprah are meeting at a swank island resort off the coast of South Carolina. The news story suggests it is a secret conference convened by Bill.
Question: Why are they meeting?
Ready, set, go.
A group funded by a rightwing think tank calls itself the “Commission on School Reform” and attacks Scottish public schools. The BBC reports the “findings” of the “commission” as objective research, not advocacy.
Sound familiar?
A teacher writes to explain how life in the classroom differs from his earlier life in another field:
I worked in industry for 15 years before switching careers and moving into education. I can honestly say I work harder as a teacher than I did in my job in the communications industry.
I do make comparable pay to my previous job now although it has taken 20 years of service to do it. There were some lean years when I started as an educator. I get paid for 9 months of work and it gets spread out over 12 months. I have yet to actually see “3 months” off. I may, if lucky, squeeze about 4-5 weeks off where I’m not responsible for something directly related to teaching or keeping my professional certification so I can keep my job.
That’s what I had in my previous job after 15 years. I could take my vacations when I wanted to then. I can only take my vacations between mid June and mid August now. I had a health plan that I paid into in my previous job that was very similar to the one I have at my current school. I had a retirement account through a large investment company which I paid into and the employer matched it. I was evaluated once per year in my previous job and had the option to join a union but was not required. I signed a contract each year which I had to negotiate with my immediate superior and the corporate lawyers. That was not easy and I got eaten alive on a few occasions by their New York lawyers. I was evaluated by my superior strictly on my performance in my job and how he as a professional in the same field thought I did.
If I had to base my pay and job security on one test given to a group of 7th and 8th graders who knew nothing about how I did my job, I would have left sooner. I watch my students take some of the state mandated tests and cringe when I see them drawing dot to dot puzzles on a scantron or sleeping during a timed portion of the test. That’s supposed to be a fair evaluation of my performance? No parent, no adminstrator, no other teacher will see that student’s indifference because I’m the one proctoring the test and I can’t influence them in my room while they are testing. They will only see the final numbers or the media spin on the scores.
I think we as professional educators can contribute in a positive way to improving our profession and not trying to excuse away the questionable parts. Our product isn’t perfect yet but we continue to improve on it and it will happen if we don’t have to put up with profiteers and politicians trying to cut the legs out from under us. We can’t do it if we have our ability to negotiate take away or if we have to negotiate with people who know nothing about what it is like to be in front of a classroom full of adolescents everyday. We are professionals. We know our craft as well, if not better, than a politician or a boardmember who was given the position. I work in a state where the legislature seems to have a vendetta against educators.
They have their high paid superpack working to help them stay in office and keep all their perks, which I also pay for. While the union I belong to helps me keep my job and some of the benefits, which as a tax payer I also pay for. But according to the politicians I’m over paid, under worked, and don’t deserve any benefits for the sacrifices I make to do my job in a professional manner. Several politicians who fit that description too. I didn’t go into education to get rich and 70K per year is by no means rich, especially compared to some of our elected officials.
The Chicago teachers deserve the terms they have asked for and the respect that should be given to them. In other countries, it is expected that students thank the teacher each day after class for taking the time to teach them. If we instill that value in our students about their teachers instead of publicly demeaning them, just maybe we could fix some of the problems and indifference that seem to be dragging our kids down and keeping us from being viewed as the best educational system in the world.
I posted a few days ago about a panel discussion in New York City where Paul Vallas made this startling statement: “We’re losing the communications game because we don’t have a good message to communicate.”
He spoke bluntly of the “testing industrial complex.”
Here Valerie Strauss briefly reviews Vallas’ role in Chicago, Philadelphia, and New Orleans, where testing and privatization were key elements of his reforms. It is difficult to see any of those districts today as a template for reform of the nation’s schools. Chicago is in dire straits, As is Philadelphia, and the only thing sustaining the myth of New Orleans is a massive disinformation campaign by the funders of privatization.
I know Paul Vallas and there was a time about a decade ago when I thought he was the most promising leader of school reform in the nation. I was impressed by his energy and his quick intellect.
Because he is so smart, I hold out hope that he might be the first of the “reform” A-team to see the light, as I did around 2005.
By his remarks at the forum cited in the links, he recognizes that teacher evaluation by formula is a mess. From his Philadelphia experience he may have learned that privatization is no solution. He inaugurated the nation’s most extensive experiment in privatization a decade ago, and it failed.
Now Vallas has another chance to get it right, this time in Bridgeport, Connecticut, a small district compared to his previous assignments.
Will he lead the way away from the failed status quo? Will he be first to renounce the failed status quo?
When Jacqueline Kennedy died, a dear friend read this poem by Constantine Cavafy at her memorial service. It is one of those wonderful pieces of literature that has remained with me. I hope you enjoy it:
When you set out for Ithaka
ask that your way be long,
full of adventure, full of instruction.
The Laistrygonians and the Cyclops,
angry Poseidon – do not fear them:
such as these you will never find
as long as your thought is lofty, as long as a rare
emotion touch your spirit and your body.
The Laistrygonians and the Cyclops,
angry Poseidon – you will not meet them
unless you carry them in your soul,
unless your soul raise them up before you.
Ask that your way be long.
At many a Summer dawn to enter
with what gratitude, what joy –
ports seen for the first time;
to stop at Phoenician trading centres,
and to buy good merchandise,
mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
and sensuous perfumes of every kind,
sensuous perfumes as lavishly as you can;
to visit many Egyptian cities,
to gather stores of knowledge from the learned.
Have Ithaka always in your mind.
Your arrival there is what you are destined for.
But don’t in the least hurry the journey.
Better it last for years,
so that when you reach the island you are old,
rich with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaka to give you wealth.
Ithaka gave you a splendid journey.
Without her you would not have set out.
She hasn’t anything else to give you.
And if you find her poor, Ithaka hasn’t deceived you.
So wise you have become, of such experience,
that already you’ll have understood what these Ithakas mean.
I am re-posting this appeal to help a great group of high school youth.
For their valiant, smart, witty efforts to save their schools and future generations from the blight of high-stakes testing, I name them to the honor roll as champions of public education. May they grow and flourish!
I am a huge fan of the Providence Student Union.
I just donated to them to help them continue their movement and to encourage students in other cities and states to organize against high-stakes testing.
Please consider going to their web page and supporting them. I love their energy, their idealism, their wit, and their creativity.
I share their belief that education should be engaging, exciting, and a source of inspiration and joy. They have energetically protested the soul-deadening emphasis on high-stakes testing in Rhode Island. And they have expressed their own vision for real education.
Best of all, they have mastered the art of political theater to publicize their work.
First, they held a zombie protest in front of the Rhode Island Department of Education building, protesting the state’s dead zombie policies.
Then, they persuaded accomplished professionals to take a test made up of released items from the NECAP test, which the state has inappropriately made a graduation requirement.
Just days ago, they delivered their First Annual State of the Student Address, describing their vision for real education. They timed it so that it was one hour before the State Commissioner Deborah Gist’s annual state of education address to the Legislature. Gist, you may recall, won national acclaim for threatening to fire every employee of Central Falls High School due to its low test scores.
Because of the PSU’s political theater, the Boston Globe came out against the use (mis-use) of NECAP as a graduation requirement.
The Providence Student Union represents the best of American youth. They are independent, creative, active, fearless. They are what we hope for our nation in the future. Help them thrive.
Here we go again. Another local school board race where the a billionaire a boys Club and Michelle Rhee create a massive war chest to beat an underfunded candidate. Monica Ratliff is a fifth-grade teacher. Please help her.
Monica Ratliff for Board of Education 2013
—
Dear Friends, Family and Supporters,
Thank you all for your amazing support of my desire and belief that we can make a difference. Your donations have all been instrumental in our movement to send a message to billionaires from LA to NYC and all the way to Australia. Yes, NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Rupert Murdoch along will Walmart king pins have all donated to an independent expenditure campaign supporting our opponent to try and buy a seat on the Los Angeles School Board. Why? Why do they want to invest over 1.7 million dollars? When that much money is spent, how can one not wonder “why”?
Let’s not wait and find out the “why”. All your generous donations have been so appreciated. They have helped us reach absentee voters and early voters. There is one last mailer we need to get out by this coming Wednesday, to election day voters!! We believe it is a special mailer that will resonate with our election day voters. When you join our ARM CHAIR FUNDRAISER no matter what amount you donate, we will send you this mailer as well. So that you can see, first hand, where your dollars are being spent.
With 9 DAYS left til May 21st, election day, please come to our ARM CHAIR FUNDRAISER Any donation of any amount will help us reach election day voters.
So stroll across your living room until you reach your ARM CHAIR, have a seat, take out your check book and send a check to MONICA RATLIFF for BOE General Election – 10420 Parr Ave. #5 Sunland, CA 91040 or grab your laptop or tablet and go to http://www.MONICARATLIFF2013.com and hit the DONATE BUTTON credit cards are accepted here. The money you save on gas alone by not driving to a fundraiser is worth a $25.00 donation.
Help us let the voters decide this election –not outside interests. Help send a message that PUBLIC SCHOOLS ARE NOT FOR SALE!
Monica Ratliff Fifth Grade Teacher, Endorsed by: The Los Angeles Times (twice), The Daily News (twice), present and past board members, Democrats and Republicans, Principals, Parents and 30,000 classroom teachers, and most important YOU – with YOU, our friends, family and supporters, we can make a difference.
Help us bring down Goliath. We cannot do it without you.
Sincerely,
Monica
http://monicaratliff2013.nationbuilder.com/
Monica Ratliff for Board of Education 2013 · United States
From a reader:
Globalization has been the ingenious “get out of jail free” card the corporations have played:
As these “savvy businessmen” go global to freely impose the conditions which appalled America a century ago (The number of confirmed dead from the Bangladesh garment factory collapse and fire Is approaching and will certainly surpass 1000,)
I offer this:
The Triangle Shirtwaist Fire of 1911
At the time of the fire the only safety measures available for the workers were 27 buckets of water and a fire escape that would collapse when people tried to use it. Most of the doors were locked and those that were not locked only opened inwards and were effectively held shut by the onrush of workers escaping the fire.
As the clothing materials feed the fire workers tried to escape anyway they could. 25 passengers flung themselves down the elevator shaft trying to escape the fire. Their bodies rained blood and coins down onto the employees who made it into the elevator cars. Engine Company 72 and 33 were the first on the scene. To add to the already bleak situation the water streams from their hoses could only reach the 7th floor.
Their ladders could only reach between the 6th and 7th floor. 19 bodies were found charred against the locked doors. 25 bodies were found huddled in a cloakroom. These deaths, although horrible, was not what changed the feelings toward government regulation. Upon finding that they could not use the doors to escape and the fire burning at their clothes and hair, the girls of the Triangle Shirtwaist Company, aged mostly between 13 and 23 years of age, jumped 9 stories to their death.
One after another the girls jumped to their deaths on the concrete over one hundred of feet below. Sometimes the girls jumped three and four at a time. On lookers watched in horror as body after body fell to the earth. “Thud — dead; thud — dead; thud — dead; thud — dead. Sixty-two thud — deads. I call them that, because the sound and the thought of death came to me each time, at the same instant,” said United Press reporter William Shephard.
The bodies of teenage girls lined the street below. Blankets that would-be rescuers used ripped at the weight and the speed the bodies were falling. Fire Department blankets were ripped when multiple girls tried to jump into the same blanket. Some girls tried to jump to the ladders that could not reach the ninth floor. None reached the ladders. The fire escape in the rear of the building collapsed and trapped the employees even more.
A wealthy Bostonian who had come to New York for a Columbia University graduate degree, Frances Perkins (April 10, 1882 – May 14, 1965) was having tea nearby on March 25 when she heard the fire engines. She arrived at the scene of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in time to see workers jumping from the windows above.
Her words, spoken a little more than 50 years later, capture her own feelings and those of her contemporaries. “I can’t begin to tell you how disturbed the people were everywhere. It was as though we had all done something wrong. It shouldn’t have been. We were sorry. Mea culpa! Mea culpa! We didn’t want it that way. We hadn’t intended to have 147 boys and girls killed in a factory.
This scene motivated Perkins to work for reform in working conditions, especially for women and children. She served on the Committee on Safety of the City of New York as executive secretary, working to improve factory conditions.
Frances Perkins met Franklin D. Roosevelt in this capacity, while he was New York governor, and in 1932, he appointed her as Secretary of Labor, the first woman to be appointed to a cabinet position.
Frances Perkins called the day of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire “the day the New Deal began.”
——————–
The Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union burst into the national consciousness in 1909 when 20,000 shirtwaist makers went on strike in New York City. .
The 1909 strike lasted 14 weeks, Union membership grew to 25,000 by the strike’s end.. Most of the larger factories had settled with the growing union, and conditions for workers seemed to be improving.
But the owners of the Triangle Waist Company, the largest blouse factory in the city at the time, led the opposition to the 1909 strike, hfiring thugs and prostitutes to harass the workers as they picketed.
Triangle was among the few nonunion holdouts when the factory went up in flamesMarch 25 of 1911, killing 146 workers.
“Everyone noticed that the Triangle factory, the one nonunionized shop, was the place of the fire. The company’s refusal to work with the unions was especially poignant, because a decent fire escape, and factory doors that opened outward, had been among the strikers’ demands.
——–
http://www.laboreducator.org/stevens.htm
http://www.forward.com/articles/136018/
.
http://www.csun.edu/~ghy7463/mw2.html
Cornell University – ILR School – The Triangle Factory Fire – Legacy – Legislative Reform
http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/trianglefire/legacy/legislativeReform.html
http://womenshistory.about.com/od/triangle/a/perkins_fire.htm
Angie Sullivan, a kindergarten teacher in Las Vegas, sent the following message to members of the Nevada legislature to mark Teacher Appreciation Day:
It’s been a long, long time since my district has had positive educational leadership.
I watched this short video of Interim Superintendent Skorkowsky – and I wept. Something unusual – to NOT receive abuse and berating – but instead a positive uplifting message. I weep because my heart is breaking for my profession that is being destroyed – and not being replaced with anything of value to kids.
I don’t know when the “witch hunts” for the infamous “bad teacher” started but it’s now become harrassment for everyone.
I don’t know when it became sport to hurt women who teach people to read.
I don’t know when everyone became convinced that testing is teaching and. . . now there is NO MORE teaching. . . only testing.
I don’t know when we started paying “reformers” without research to “fix-it-up-chappie” our schools instead of being willing to pay for retirement for professionals who were dedicated for decades.
I don’t know when it became OK to privatize by charter . . . but not hold charters accountable . . . even though they use tax payer funds.
I don’t know when it became OK to fail an entire city and not recognize significant amounts of poverty and obstacles. Cities full of people, families and kids that did not graduate – most likely because they couldn’t understand English?
I don’t know when the textbook companies and computer software manufacturers took over and decided the nation must be standardized to common core – not because we would all benefit – but most likely to sell more product nationally.
I don’t know when people became convinced that some silly rich people became MORE knowledgeable than trained professionals about my classroom.
I don’t know when politicians started taking money from Students First, TFA, The New Teacher Project, ALEC, and other union busters – to privatize instead of fund our schools.
But I’m grateful to hear from a leader who was a TEACHER first and sounds like he remembers – and knows how important the front line – LABOR – is to public education.
So as you decide to legislate – could you please ask someone in the CLASSROOM their opinion? Please ask my union. Please ask an educational leader. Please encourage the school boards to hire educational professionals – not unionbusting businessmen in disguise. Our problems are significant. I will fight this war as I beg for support. But I’m drowning in impossible mandates in a sea of needy five year olds. So I weep.
But I’m grateful someone powerful thanked me today.
O God, hear the words of my mouth. Let hardened hearts be softened to hear the cries of women who love children – and the children in need.
Angie Sullivan
The latest administration of the SAT has been canceled in South Korea, due to allegations of widespread cheating. The nation is known for its “hyper-competitive academic environment.”
Test questions that were on the exam scheduled for May 4 were circulating in test prep centers. Staff members at some test prep centers were detained for questioning.
Thousands of students were affected.
The article says:
“Though academic cheating is a world-wide concern, high-profile scandals over unfairly earned or bogus qualifications are commonplace in South Korea. Those seeking top government office are among those who have been caught with plagiarized dissertations or fake degrees. Huh Tae-yeol, the chief presidential secretary, issued a public apology in February—when he was still a nominee for his post—for copying part of his doctorate degree in 1999. He argued that standards at the time weren’t as stringent.”
South Korea has the highest number of college graduates among the advanced nations of the world and high scores on the international assessments.
