It is amazing how many of the 1% are willing to spend millions to remove due process from teachers, most of whom work harder and earn less than said zillionaire’s secretary or chauffeur.
According to this article by Jennifer Medina in the “New York Times,” David F. Welch is a telecommunications executive who has spent millions to create a group called Students Matter to launch a lawsuit in California intended to strip teachers of due process rights.
John Deasy, the Los Angeles superintendent, testified that the union contract prevents him from firing as many teachers as he would like. Presumably, he would fire thousands of teachers if he could.
Will anyone introduce testimony to demonstrate the allegedly superior education available in states where teachers can be fired at will, as Deasy would prefer?
In many communities, the word “evolution” will not be mentioned in science classes. Books that challenge the mores of anyone in the community will not be taught. If due process ends, so will academic freedom.
Shame on the craven Mr. Welch and his all-star team of lawyers, gunning for teachers.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It is a pogrom against teachers. We are the new “enemy of necessity”. Tyrants must have someone for the people to hate more than the tyrant himself.
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well said, Michael
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Looks like a “house cleaning.”
Okay, then, let’s start FROM THE TOP and work our way down.
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Here are some other good articles on Vergara:
First, by David Cohen:
or this one — “Eight Problems with the Vergara Lawsuit” :
or another, longer article by Thompson:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-thompson/why-a-nice-philanthropist_b_4598322.html?utm_source=Alert-blogger&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Email%2BNotifications
or this from Gary Ravani
http://edsource.org/today/2014/declaring-war-on-teachers-rights-wont-improve-childrens-access-to-a-sound-education/56538#.Uu8aXvY7h2L
And this from Bruce Baker which, while it doesn’t address Vergara by name, attacks the arguments behind Vergara:
http://schoolfinance101.wordpress.com/2013/10/09/notes-on-the-seniority-smokescreen/
Here’s another good one from Lorraine Richards, one of our fellow union sisters in Montebello Teachers’ Association:
http://www.sgvtribune.com/opinion/20140124/lawsuit-wrongly-targets-teachers-guest-commentary
“Yet none of the statutes identified in Vergara are depriving students of anything, nor are they violating anyone’s constitutional rights. Years of chronic underfunding, devastating cuts and skyrocketing class sizes may very well be, but fortunately current increases to school funding are starting to turn things around.
“But this lawsuit isn’t concerned with school funding, resources, class sizes, training or anything else actually proven to improve the quality of our schools. Instead it’s cynically attempting to use the state constitution as a weapon to strip away rights, rather than to protect them.
“Stripping away rights and attacking teachers and labor is really what this is all about. The forces behind Vergara are some of the same corporate education ‘reformers’ who have spent the last decade blaming teachers, attacking unions and undermining public schools instead of addressing actual problems facing California students. Supporters of ‘Students Matter,’ the organization behind Vergara, are a Who’s Who of privatized charter and anti-union advocates, represented by a high wattage public relations firm tied to Wal-Mart.”
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At least it was reported in an even-handed manner unlike the LA School Report.
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In this lawsuit, the plaintiff’s are only nominally “parents”… the real plaintiffs are billionaires and money-motivated privatizers who are out to destroy our nation’s teachers.
This lawsuit has nothing, NOTHING, NUH-THING to do with providing children with high quality education, or high-quality teachers… that’s just the facade, and the puppet-masters pulling the string know this… they are trying to play the public and court system to advance their ignoble ends.
That’s not hyperbole. This is EXACTLY what is going on.
THESE PEOPLE WANT TO DESTROY THE TEACHING PROFESSION AND THE SYSTEM OF TRADIONAL PUBLIC SCHOOLS—schools that are transparent to the “public”, that educate all the “public”, and that are accountable to the public via democratically-elected school boards.
Regarding the destruction of our profession, I first heard words to that effect two-and-a-half years ago at UTLA’s LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE (August 2011) in a speech delivered by Warren Fletcher, my current union president:
(go to 06:30)
———————————————-
WARREN FLETCHER, UTLA PRESIDENT:
“Well, I’ve been through a lot. In the past our reactions to each successive wave of bad educational ideas would have been what you might expect: ‘We’re professionals. We’ll do what’s best for the kids despite these bad policies. We’ll just get through this.’ That’s what professionals do!
“But the challenges we face today in Los Angeles are different. THE GOAL of the phony ‘reform’ movement IS NOT TO CHANGE YOUR JOB; IT’S TO ELIMINATE YOUR JOB.
“THEIR GOAL IS NOT TO CHANGE THE TEACHING PROFESSION; IT’S TO ABOLISH TEACHING AS A PROFESSION.
“Teachers are college educated professionals. You are not easily taken in. You see what the current school board majority is trying to do to your profession and to your students. I know that every one of you is ready to stand up and take this fight to the District, ready to take back our schools.
“You are not alone. Your union stands with you.
“We are public school teachers and we are proud of it!”
– – – – – – – –
Indeed, one of the goals of the “reformers”—a goal that goes hand-in-hand with overall privatization—is change teaching from…
————————————-
CATEGORY A … a profession with requires exacting education, extensive expertise, a demanding training period before actual practice… much like that of doctors, lawyers, engineers, etc. … a career job that last decades…
and convert it to …
CATEGORY B… nothing more than a low-level service job that requires the most minimal education, almost no expertise, and little if any training period (just gimmicks from godawful books written by “experts” like Doug Lemov) … like fast food, retail sales at a store, janitorial, etc. … not a career job… and with no job protections, or due process for firing… a few years and out you go, to then be replaced by a next round of similarly poorly-compensated, short term workers…
—————————————–
CATEGORY B need only be paid a pittance and can be abused and over-worked with impunity, while CATEGORY A requires considerably more compensation. If the money-motivated privatizers are going to make a decent profit while taking over all or much of what is now public education, the the work force has to be the latter.
I remember talking to a TFA Corps Member at a school site, telling her that doctors, lawyers, and engineers need exacting education, extensive expertise, a demanding training period before actual practice… and so should teachers.
Her reply, “Yeah, but those are different from teaching; those are REAL professions.”
THUD! Sound of my jaw hitting the floor. (That’s part of what they’re taught during their five weeks of training… oy vey!!)
The other agenda is that corporations—including those not engaged in raping and pillaging of public educatin—and rich folk will have their taxes drastically cut as a result of all this. Those corporations will have higher profits, higher price for their stock, and happy stock-holders as a result. THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED IN CHILE… thanks to decades of the dictatorship there, and no democratic process to stop privatization.
That’s why the so-called “corporate reform” privatizers are spending hundreds of millions of dollars vilifying the current teachers and their unions—documentaries, movies, op-eds, foundations, etc. Those unions are getting in their way of their rampage towards profits. The privatizers desperately need to destroy the public’s faith and confidence in teachers, and pass so-called “right-to-work” laws that will destroy unions. They want to do to education what they did to the housing industry, and to Wall Street… education is the next realm to conquer, rape, and pillage. These are the same folks.
However, you’ll notice that in the schools that these well-heeled folks send their own kids, you have teachers with multiple degrees, decades of experience… schools that include full-time dedicated libraries / librarians, arts teachers/ program, music teachers / programs..
Unlike the McSchools they want for the kids of the middle and working classes, these schools have small class sizes, and no (or very little) time spent in a cubicle with on-line or digital teachers. 100% (or close to it) of their kids’ instructional time is spend with live teachers of CATEGORY A above, and because of the small class sizes—12-to-1, 10-to-1, that attention is often 1-on-1… again, totally unlike the McSchools they want for everyone else’s kids.
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I agree with everything you’ve written.
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Oops… I forgot to embed video link of Warren speaking. Here it goes again.
Regarding the destruction of our profession, I first heard words to that effect two-and-a-half years ago at UTLA’s LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE (August 2011) in a speech delivered by Warren Fletcher, my current union president:
(go to 06:30)
———————————————-
WARREN FLETCHER, UTLA PRESIDENT:
“Well, I’ve been through a lot. In the past our reactions to each successive wave of bad educational ideas would have been what you might expect: ‘We’re professionals. We’ll do what’s best for the kids despite these bad policies. We’ll just get through this.’ That’s what professionals do!
“But the challenges we face today in Los Angeles are different. THE GOAL of the phony ‘reform’ movement IS NOT TO CHANGE YOUR JOB; IT’S TO ELIMINATE YOUR JOB.
“THEIR GOAL IS NOT TO CHANGE THE TEACHING PROFESSION; IT’S TO ABOLISH TEACHING AS A PROFESSION.
“Teachers are college educated professionals. You are not easily taken in. You see what the current school board majority is trying to do to your profession and to your students. I know that every one of you is ready to stand up and take this fight to the District, ready to take back our schools.
“You are not alone. Your union stands with you.
“We are public school teachers and we are proud of it!”
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The oligarchy will not rest until its members can make whatever decisions they wish to make about the lives of others on their absolute and sole authority.
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Once upon a time, for example, scholars, researchers, curriculum designers, curriculum coordinators, and teachers could make decisions about learning progressions and outcomes to be measured. But Achieve appointed David Coleman, by divine right, absolute monarch of English language arts in the United States and now, he has made these decisions for everyone else. Replacing EVERYONE ELSE’S THINKING with David Coleman’s is called “implementing high standards.” Astonishing, but true.
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Freedom or absolutist tyranny. That’s what this whole struggle over education deform is really about.
The need to strip K-12 teachers of any remaining vestiges of autonomy and academic freedom is, the deformers believe, a given. Teachers need to be obedient to their masters. They need to read their scripts. Soon enough, they will be replaceable. Teaching? There’s a computer-adaptive app for that.
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Coleman Needs to GO AWAY and get a Life and quit ruining others’ lives. This is really SIC. How can the DEFORMERS hurt our most vulnerable?
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I feR that the loss of academic freedom is the point!
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We are dealing with people who have no conception of academic freedom, professional calling, public institutions, or society in general as things that are bigger than their own petty market minds can conceive.
This is the part where capitalism consumes itself to death. All those silly Bolsheviks merely delayed the inevitable process of decay — when all they had to do was stand back and watch it happen of its own.
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Due process allows teachers to speak up for their students. L.A. Unified fired over 100 teachers last year, and another 200 resigned rather than go through a process they most likely would lose. Deasy CAN fire teachers, especially if administrators do their job and document the problems with poor teachers. But having some contract protections allows any teacher to go to the mat if they need to, fighting for what is best for their students. I believe this is just another attempt to demean teachers, eliminate their union, and then steamroll the public into accepting for profit education statewide – subsidized by taxes of course.
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Not only “bad” teachers lost their jobs. A huge proportion of those departed teachers were over 50, I’m talking about 90%. Also disproportionate numbers of disabled teachers, teachers of color, LGBT teachers and especially those close to earning life-time health benefits and those at the top of the pay scale. I was one of them and I attended many meetings and heard their stories. The local media is in the pocket of the “billionaire and millionaire philanthropists” as they are reverently referred to. In 2004 the financial whiz kids at LAUSD came up with a study claiming that the district would go bankrupt paying the pensions of all the baby boomer retirees. As a result the campaign of degradation and harassment began, accelerated under Superintendent Cortines (for his back story Google him), and really picked up steam under Superintendent Deasey. The latter claims that to get a teacher dismissed costs the district up to $400,000. Hundreds have been hounded into retiring or resigning costing the district nothing. He says he got rid of (dismissed) 200 last school year. If the costs were what he claimed, that would be up to $80 million. The math is absurd. Of course in a district where $1 billion for iPads is seen as reasonable, maybe the $80 million is seen as chump change.
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Charlotte Vrooman is a friend and a cellmate of mine in LAUSD teacher jail. For news and information on our struggle check out UNJUSTLY JAILED LAUSD TEACHERS. A lot more of the disgusting details will be posted in the near future so add us to your bookmarks.
I also blog at As Mean as a Snake
http://asmeanasasnake.blogspot.com/
I’ll do my best to publicize the dirty dealings in the LAUSD as it works to rid itself of senior career teachers. I won’t spare our union, UTLA which has done nothing for us up to now.
This fight concerns all career teachers.
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OOPS. I should have put UNJUSTLY JAILED LAUSD TEACHERS on Facebook. I’m not an iPad.
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Charlotte.
I think you are right on the money with this comment.
This is the exact same tactic they used when the textile mills were running long ago..They would fire the workers before they had to pay them their pension…Total disregard for the lives of these people..
My mother told me about several people this happened to…
I honestly can not believe what I am seeing…right before my eyes.and for the sake of $$$ and more $$$$ for the oppressive educational regime… This is truly a sad day..
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The LAUSD “teacher jail” sounds amazingly similar to what we used to have here in NYC under Mayor Bloomberg, only ours were called the “rubber rooms”.
Many teachers were placed in there under the flimsiest of charges, while they waited for an indeterminate amount of time for a hearing, many not even knowing what they were charged with.
Not that there aren’t teachers that should be removed from the classrooms ( in cases where it can be proven that there was gross negligence or evidence of physical/sexual abuse, etc), but to remove teachers from the classroom by labeling them is “incompetent” or a “bad” teacher, whatever that means? Does that warrant humiliating a person , and trying to deprive them of their livelihood?
Don’t know how teachers became the victims of these witch hunts, and became the fall guys for everything wrong with our society.
What does this say about all of us collectively, when we allow this to happen? Very sad. If these “reformers”: actually get what they are aiming for, what kind of society will we and future generations be left with?
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Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Remove tenure and what you have left is absolute power.
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Remove tenure and I can fire you because I don’t like that you’ve been teaching evolution;
because you disagreed with me in a staff meeting, in front of others, about what sort of questions to ask during guided reading, and my feelings were hurt;
because you insist on teaching The Grapes of Wrath, which I think of as some sort of Communist Manifesto;
because you voted for a candidate I don’t like;
because you posted on Diane Ravitch’s blog;
because I want to give your job to my mistress. . . .
But that’s how the oligarchs think it should be.
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If I’m the boss, my power should be absolute.
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I commented on the Tennessee teacher Tape before I read your comment Robert…I was thinking EXACTLY the same…It is absolute power…..
The picture becomes clearer and clearer as these teachers begin to speak..
What we are witnessing is barbaric…and is totally unbelievable..
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You need to look better in tight pants.
You dare give an A- to a politician’s son.
You benched the school board president’s son for breaking team rules.
You gave a test during the family’s vacation to Europe.
You expect too much.
You expect too little.
You have too many gray hairs.
You date the wrong people.
You took a day off for a sick child.
Shape up. Or the beatings will continue until morale improves.
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Yes, Robert, all true, but there’s much more that will now constitute “Firing Offenses”:
– You’ve turned down every invitation I’ve ever extended for a private dinner at my apartment; a weekend away at my cabin; an excursion to a warm water resort during winter break, when most women would be thrilled I was offering such an opportunity.
– My good friend and fraternity brother has a nephew who just graduated and the poor kid needs a job. Haven’t you been here long enough anyway?
– I’m not firing you. I’m just eliminating duplicative positions and under our new system—based on our own opinions posing as “research”—we’ve concluded that a child can do just as well in a class of 90, as she can in 30 or even 15. Therefore I had no choice but to let two of the three 5th grade teachers go. Why duplicate functions?
– It’s for the children’s own good. I mean, you’ve gained so much weight that you are a very bad adult role model for students who should be healthy and in good physical shape. And the new teacher is a 25 year old who minored in Dance and bikes to work every morning. The kids will like that…(and so will this middle-age, frustrated principal.)
– I saw that book you took out of the public library—now that I have access to that too—and the ones you were careless enough to leave on your desk and in the front seat of your car. Anyone reading about feminism or animal rights or (fill in the blank) should not be teaching children!
– Well, it may appear to you that I’m dismissing you simply because you’re a gay, black, Mormon, Republican who loves Al Jolson, Richard Pryor and reruns of “Full House”. And although you’re correct about my hatred for such things, I assure you that all of that is incidental. I’m firing you for…well, you can read the paperwork later.
– Oh, just because I feel like it. At least I do today, at this moment. And that’s the whole point: I DON’T NEED A “REASON”! I love the idea of being able to dismiss anyone, at anytime, for any reason or non-reason. On a whim, or just to show that I can do it and no one can stop me.
It just feels SO GOOD to have that kind of power, control and dominance over other human beings—yes, I’ll admit, it thrills me like nothing else. When I have the ability to end your career you’ve worked for for decades, just to watch your reaction, or when I know that your family’s economic survival could be shut off—like THAT!—whenever I feel like it, and knowing I don’t have to justify WHY to anyone, that’s called “Free Enterprise!” and that’s the key to every single child in America getting into a superb college and then immediately after graduation beginning careers that will last for decades, without interruption, as engineers, software developers, physicians, attorneys, corporation executives and so forth.
Pssstt…I’ll let you in on a little secret: The MAIN reason I hate tenure is that it reduces fear, terror, gossip, factions, favoritism and playing politics in the school. And how can I, as a CEO, eh, I mean “principal” demonstrate to the higher ups that I deserve more money in my own check without reducing it in someone else’s?
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PSP, You forgot one:
You’re over 50 and you always gotta pee.
How does that stack up with the Civil Rights Act?
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My point exactly.
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I feel optimistic that the courts will uphold the legal binding of our contracts. We need to stand firm, and hopefully this house of cards will fall upon itself.
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I must say that making this a lawsuit brought by students was an inspired piece of political theater.
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That was my first thought when I saw the picture from the article. Those families were vetted and bought by the corporate forces trying to privatize education. It reminded me of those pro-charter rallies where everyone had a “protest” sign made with the same markers and handwriting.
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The fascists are always big on staged events. Mass rallies, exemplar workers, etc.
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The deformers are going about this in entirely the wrong way. Ideally, teachers would be so well educated, so knowledgeable, so dedicated, so good at their jobs, that no one would dream of micromanaging them. So, how do you get there? You create high barriers to the profession requiring that teachers demonstrate mastery of their subjects, of child development, and of the cognitive sciences of learning. You pay teachers really well. You give them long apprenticeships under master teachers. You create time in teachers’ schedules for them to submit their practice to ongoing critique and refinement via something like Japanese Lesson Study. You give them enormous autonomy. You honor and revere them.
But the deformers think that they can improve teacher quality on the cheap. They don’t think that they need such exceptional individuals in the classroom. They think they need robots performing scripts and doing precisely as they are told to do. That’s because they think that learning is simple. It’s mastery of the bullet list in preparation for the test. All that’s required of a good teacher is a script and a bee-eater attitude. They believe that pimply adolescents can be trained (Sit up. Roll over. Good boy.) to do that in a five-week workshop.
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OMG…..
You need to coin yet another RS original.
“All that’s required of a good teacher is a script and a bee-eater attitude. They believe that pimply adolescents can be trained (Sit up. Roll over. Good boy.) to do that in a five-week workshop.”
NAIL ON THE HEAD!
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One serious disagreement here, Robert: You seem to imply that the deformers (A.K.A. “Privatizers”) are sincere about wanting to improve the quality of teachers and teaching.
I couldn’t disagree more. That’s just a PR tactic they’re using to hoodwink the public and the politicians. They couldn’t care less about the quality of teachers nor the results for the students.
If they felt they could advance their REAL agenda—the corporate takeover of public education—by doing exactly the opposite, they’d employ that instead. What they “really” believe is irrelevant; even to the privatizers themselves. It’s entirely about what will “work” in getting the ball further downfield, in whatever way they can, until the end up in the end zone where it’s all about the money, as they’ve done with medicine, housing, transportation, and everything else in what was once a very good country for all income levels.
But I’m not pessimistic. We’ll win in the long run; once the handful of billionaires decide this is “old hat”, especially when their initial expectations of “just add billions” doesn’t bring the results they expected. They’ll be on to the next thing, in a desperate attempt to leave some “legacy” of egotism, private control and ideological mendacity, attached to their dubious names.
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The article states that until recently no states allowed teachers to be evaluated according to the progress of their students, but that is not correct. California has had the Stull Act since 1970, which requires teachers to be evaluated based on student progress. Hopefully this lawsuit will stress the fact that Deasy didn’t observe this law and maybe didn’t even know about it.
The supreme irony of John Deasy testifying is that he is the superintendent of the most poorly managed district in California and maybe even the United States. Even after he made a huge and expensive “mistake” with iPads, his contract was renewed!
This lawsuit should show that really dysfunctional districts like LAUSD hire carelessly, fail to support new teachers, hire inexperienced teachers with “emergency” credentials even when fully qualified, experienced candidates are available, fail to supervise teachers (e.g. Miramonte) and fail to follow due process procedures for dismissing ineffective teachers.
With this lawsuit, citizens ought to get a good insight into why the Los Angeles Unified School District is one of the most poorly managed in the nation.
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Good point. By what objective system does the state of CA evaluate superintendents? Test scores?
Let the courts first focus on the effectiveness of the superintendents.
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Congrats Linda for another great letter to the editor of the LA Times today. A music teacher colleague of ours today sent me emails re Teresa Watanbe and her dismissal of an article on the loss of Arts programs. I will post that later. She is so pro charter, and pro Parent Rev and no one she woos for interviews should ever waste their time and get involved with her…she does not deliver. Only Blume puts forth some truth despite the pro Deasy editorial writer who is in charge of them all.
We all stand with Charlotte Vrooman and Michael Dominguez above who are in teacher jail. So glad to see your comments which are absolutely ‘horses mouth’ truth.
The Hammer is giving an elitist forum on School Privatization on Feb. 6 but did not choose to invite a singe ‘boots on the ground educator’ to be on the panel. They have 3 think tank theorists, two are directly associated with Gates, and they will talk about colllege loans. It is disgraceful in LA how little input educators have, particularly those who are anti Deasy.
However, I must add to this discussion on billinoaire David Welch, the backer and instigator of this lawsuit that Diane writes about, since it is going astray. Welch is the face of the billionaire contingent pressing Vergara. The issue is not directed at teachers per se, but at shutting down the teachers’ unions…now and forever. (Almost pathetic when we know how ineffectual UTLA is.)
This may turn out to be the landmark case as important to public education as Brown v. Bd. of Ed was. It will probably end up with SCOTUS….which is harrowing considering the makeup of the current activist court including 4 + 1 = 5 Right Wingers. It has the potential to be the final coffin nail in the American union movement which built the middle class. Teachers being fired is a by product but the main direction is to finish off unions permanently. The rationale of ALEC and their proponents is that teachers unions are the weakest in the nation and the easies to kill. Once finished, these oligarchs intend to go after all unions in the US.
Mercedes Deutsch has published much of this and can review her site for more information.
These billinaires and their power house lawyers have the endless funds to keep chipping away at this until all hope for public education is gone. It is a major stepping stone in privatizing it all.
When you see out former bully mayor Villaraigosa standing outside the courtroom being interviewed, he who is in the pocket of
Eli Broad, and who conspired for the last years to hire and support Deasy in all his misdeeds at LAUSD, he who bragged he would shut down as many public schools as his could during his tenure of office, he who admitted publicly that he only got into UCLA due to affirmative action, he who could never pass the Bar Exam after taking it multiple times, he who now works for pyramid scheme Herbalife which hurts the Latino community with its business plan, he whose cousin is Speaker of the House in California…all this, that this failed mayor who wants to be Governor of California, does makes it additionally clear that the heavy economic hitters, the multi billionaires are putting forward all their cards to defeat public education both in the courts and at the ballot box.
It is an assault on democracy..
Ellen Lubic…(not my collie Woof)
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Thanks, Ellen. I love spending my retirement years advocating for teachers, who work so tirelessly and selflessly on behalf of the nation’s children.
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Loved meeting you a year ago with the start up of Joining Forces for Education. You make a difference and are a role model for retired teachers everywhere.
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And Deasy can waste millions of taxpayer dollars….but he’s protected. Any other CEO would have been fired. But since Deasy is in the pocket of the Reform Movement, he’s an asset.
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Actually that’s part of his backers’ plan. Drive the district into bankruptcy, loot the employee health care trust fund, eliminate the union and the Collective Bargaining Agreement, then steal more by way of bankruptcy court. I can’t forget to mention the real estate that can then be had at bargain (for them) prices through bankruptcy. When it’s all over the huge district will be split into smaller districts based upon income and race. Nineteenth century here we come!!!
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Michael…glad you mention the real estate involved. Rahm Emanuel took advantage of the Chicago school closings to implant for profit charters in these schools at virtually no cost to anyone but the taxpayers. He also, it has been reported, sold some land to developers for condos and shopping centers at rock bottom prices.
Eli Broad and the Chinese magnets who are buying up Los Angeles, see today’s LA Times business section, are surely salivating over the properties that will be available for pennies on the dollar if LAUSD collapses.
Where are the taxpayers? Why isn’t the Howard Jarvis group screaming? Why aren’t all Anglenos screaming?
Ellen
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Let’s tell the people of Los Angeles on Tuesday at the BOE meeting.
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Keep it going Michael…… and others….you have support all the way from Syracuse, NY where we have (this morning) an undefeated basketball team.
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Mike…will you be at the BoE meeting? I am trying to re arrange my schedule so I can attend and TRY to get a Speaker’s slip this time to give testimony, but weeks ago agreed to a meeting talking about all this at an inner city venue…so if we can change that to a different date, I hope to see you at Beaudry. But if I cannot make the change, please take notes and give us the straight scoop. Although they offer streaming video…they somehow always manage to either garble it or cancel so the public does not get it online.
Maybe we should wear old dead black roses behind our ears (for mourning the death of public ed) to identify each other, the way the Deasy’s shills wore the yellow daisies last Oct. 29.
Ellen
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OMG…greed and meanness reign. Who raised them?
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Wolves???
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Serpents
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Hence the name of my blog, As Mean as a Snake
http://asmeanasasnake.blogspot.com
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You guys are being unfair to wolves and serpents.
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Trudat.
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And what does Mr. Welch gain from this, I wonder?
Must be money in it for him, no doubt…….
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It’s the same old canard: What’s good for teachers must be bad for students.
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What if a student gets kicked out of a “public” charter school? How’s that workin’ for their civil right to an education? I mean, c’mon. I mean what, charter schools and public schools have a right to kick out students for any infraction they see fit? Whose rights are at stake there, the students or the schools?
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There exists but one Goal….One Standard…One Objective….for all of the Plastic Non-Educational Leaders of 2014……It is.,……
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ to infinity and beyond…
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What no one seems to understand is that even with due process, it is relatively easy for a principal who does not like a particular teacher to get rid of that teacher. The job demands have become so intense that we all drop the ball from time to time, that is, unless we are willing to work 18-hour days. If you are in good standing with a principal, these transgressions are overlooked. If for whatever reason you are on the principal’s hit list, you are guaranteed to be put on a “plan”, which is the first step in the dismissal process. I have seen teachers who were esteemed by one principal forced out by the first principal’s successor. Surely those teachers did not change how they taught so dramatically in such a short time spam.
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“Dropped the ball,” is unnecessary. I endured ten years of this abuse and I have held firm because I could tell that they were changing the rules at every turn. Unless you are married to a principal, they are as trustworthy as snakes. Principals are ordered to do this by the higher ups and if they don’t they could lose their jobs. In LAUSD we have the example of a central office administrator directly in charge of submitting cases to the board of education for teacher jail suspension/dismissal. He began to ask too many questions about the quality of the evidence he was ordered to submit and this got him demoted down to assisstant principal. The only way to fix this in my opinion is to increase the number of years in the classroom before being promoted to principal from the current 8 and increase teacher say so at the school site. Teachers should be running their schools.
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And adding to this Michael, is the fact that many principals, particularly in high schools, have been trained with the Broad Academy business model. They are destroying the collaborative programs designed bottom up, and are instilling only top down edicts.
Also, a wonderful commentator here who used to teach in LAUSD, had a principal who put religious belief above the law of the land. This excellent long time teacher was gay and he was so demeaned by his principal that he finally could not take the abuse and quit. He moved to another state where he was welcomed as the highly trained excellent teacher that he was.
Principals are key in all of this. I do not agree though that solely teachers should run schools, but rather it should be a cooperative effort between the principal and the teachers. A dedicated principal who had been a long time classroom teacher can be a huge asset if they do not have the Broad Academy perspective.
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Woofie,
You’re telling my story. That’s okay.
I don’t wonder how your friend felt about his defense and support by UTLA. There was none.
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Woofie, the rot runs deep. How does your friend feel about the “vigorous” defense that United Teachers Los Angeles provided to him? No need to answer, UTLA provides no defense, no support. One dues payer pays what the next pays and the officer get their money no matter what.
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Mike…write me at
joiningforces4ed@aol.com
so we can talk about it without getting sued. I have more to tell and I am sure you have also.
Ellen
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This is a show trial in which Deasy, purportedly testifying in “defense” of LAUSD, is trying to provide evidence in support of the plaintiffs to justify his own failed “leadership”. Notice that he was called as the first witness by the plaintiffs. His testimony about the difficulty of dismissing teachers is, to be blunt, false. The primary reason poor teachers are difficult to fire is because administrators like Deasy are incompetent.
Deasy is an example of an administrator who has been out of the classroom too long — and it is questionable whether he ever should have been in one in the first place. Indeed, his teaching experience is scant and completely unrelated to the challenges of LAUSD.
Deasy’s Resume shows the following:
TEACHING EXPERIENCE – SECONDARY SCHOOL
1983-1986 Science Teacher and Resident Dormitory Counselor, Coach for Track and Cross Country: LaSalle Military Academy, Oakdale, Long Island, New York – Population: 800 Students
So, Deasy brings his three years of “experience” teaching at a private military academy that has 100% control over the students it admits to LAUSD and orders teachers to do a better job. Of course, Deasy’s orders would be easier to follow if he had any clue about the challenges of actually teaching in a troubled LAUSD school.
Deasy’s “management style” is consistent with his background in military academies. He appears to believe that giving orders will produce results. Thus, he orders teachers to “be effective”; however, such an order can’t be followed until teachers are given the power to order their students to learn. Oops — learning isn’t part of Deasy’s business model for a successful school — only “objective” results from “data driven” models can determine if a teacher is “effective.”
Like most incompetent managers, Deasy blames subordinates with generalized accusations. However, without specific allegations, teachers are unable to respond because there are no objective means to evaluate improvement — except for standardized testing. And the circle goes round and round ….
The press coverage describes the kinds of teachers who need to be fired as those who fall asleep, read newspapers in class, and show YouTube videos. For these transgressions, one needs to ask “where is the administrator who did not see this in the two year probationary period?” If the teacher has tenure, where is the administrator who did not see this and document it?
Lastly, Deasy’s testimony that teachers are difficult to fire is contradicted by the evidence. Testifying that teachers are “grossly ineffective” is a conclusion, not evidence. Indeed, this trial is an example of how LAUSD substitutes its beliefs for facts. Furthermore, there are several instances where the charges against a teacher have failed to satisfy the three member panel called the Commission on Teacher Competence that dismissal is warranted. However, Deasy usurps the function of the School Board and unilaterally orders that the teacher will not be returned to the classroom.
In conclusion,
I believe that “ineffective teachers” — such as inexperienced and minimally qualified but well intentioned Teach For America” graduates — should be provided an opportunity to improve to meet objective standards of competence.
I believe that any teacher with tenure who fails to meet objective standards should be provided the opportunity to improve as provided by the California Education Code. If the teacher fails to meet objective standards within the 45 or 90 day period provided, he or she should be dismissed in accordance with law.
And I believe that any teacher who acts inappropriately with a student and every incompetent administrator who disregarded complaints from parents and students or was unable to identify such behavior should be fired.
Lastly, I offer a suggestion to help obtain evidence: Cameras in every classroom. I had them in mine. When my principal questioned me, I told him they were legal because everyone knew they were being video recorded. When he said that they might catch me doing something improper, I responded: “If I do, then I should be caught.”
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Deasy is Gates’ lapdog. He was put there by Gates. He answers to Gates not the people of LA nor the teachers in his service.
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Actually he was put in as Asst. Supt. under the outgoing Cortines…and it was Eli Broad who did the deed with Villaraigosa. There was no search, and Deasy was annointed Supt. with nary another candidate allowed to apply. He segued into LAUSD after about a year working for Gates.
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It always bothers me when administrators say they “can’t” fire a teacher due to tenor. Tenor is just the right to due process. If that many teachers are that bad, then the administrators haven’t been doing THEIR job !!!
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These billionaires will do whatever it takes to privatize our public schools. Teachers and parents should be outraged. I attended a meeting about three years ago and listened to a presentation by the superintendent of our local school district.
Upon arrival, I saw the power point with a presentation by Bill Gates. I was outraged and troubled. It didn’t seem to me that the board members realized that is goal is to destroy public schools.
All of this is very disturbing and unless the masses speak out against this potential take over, we may see public education taken over by the likes of Gates and his cohorts.
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“every child has a constitutional right to a quality education”
I believe there is complete agreement on that. Just have the courts define quality education and have the legislature fund it. Problem solved.
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For more regarding the problems w/ Vergara lawsuit, please see:
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David, the biggest joke about this is the fact that once tenure is destroyed and the filthy wealthy people get what they want, the schools in these difficult areas won’t be able to keep teachers in the building. The turnover will skyrocket and the children who are being used to peddle this garbage will have numerous different teachers in one subject during a school year. They will probably be taught by unqualified subs. They will actually get an education inferior to the one they had before. Look no further than the EAA in Michigan and you will see the future in LA schools. You have to incentivize teachers to put up with the day to day stress in these schools.
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Dee Dee..it is happening already. 20% fewer higher ed students applied for teaching majors last year. We will have far fewer teachers coming out of our California university systems…and choices to take jobs will not reflect the most adept at teaching, in many cases.
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The National Mathematics Advisory Panel in 2008 found that Teachers account for 12 to 14 percent of the success of students. Hardly enough to determine a students future success and be held accountable for a students economic earnings.
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The privateers define success and they must be challenged.
Is it failure for a working class person of color to graduate from one of the nations top colleges (Pomona College, Claremont, Ca), receive an MA and teaching credential from California State University, Los Angeles, plus an administrative credential from CSU Dominguez Hills and then “throw it all away,” by teaching children for 27 years? According to the privateers the answer is yes. Teaching and learning are not occupations that they want us to associate with success. Success for them only can be measured by money. Graft, corruption, and theft of the people’s money all facilitated by the government that they bought is success AND THEY MUST BE CHALLENGED LOUDLY.
THIS IS WHAT WE FACE IN THE LAUSD TEACHER JAIL.
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