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Virginia: #Red4Ed Fights a Valiant Uphill Battle

By dianeravitch
February 11, 2019 //
16

 

 

While the state of Virginia is engulfed in a crisis of leadership, friends of public education are pushing to launch  a statewide protest on behalf of public education, reports Rachel Levy. 

After years of underfunding, grassroots activists have begun their campaign, hoping to ignite a movement that leads to equitable movement. The leadership crisis makes the battle for #Red4Ed even harder in what issuer to be an uphill battle.

Levy writes:

“The #Red4Ed movement has kicked off in Virginia: On January 28, as many as 5,000 public school teachers, educators, workers, parents, students, and other stakeholders marched on the Virginia state capitol in Richmond to demand fully funded public schools. The march and rally, organized by Virginia Educators United, a “grassroots campaign” of teachers, staff members, parents and community members, was one of the largest to descend on the state capitol in the last century.

“The well-organized event was supported by strategic use of social media and a user-friendly website. The group’s demands include restoring funding for education to pre-2008 recession levels, increasing teacher pay to national averages, paying education support professionals competitive wages, recruitment and retention of highly qualified teachers and more teachers of color, more funding for school infrastructure costs, and ensuring sufficient numbers of support staff like counselors and social workers….

“There is broad, bipartisan support for public education in Virginia, despite terrible funding. This support is not a sign that Virginia as a whole is getting “bluer.” In fact, support for school privatization is stronger in places like Richmond with more socially liberal but gentrifying, market-friendly forces. The problem is also that in more conservative, traditionally Republican-voting areas, while support for the institution of public education is strong, support for the policies that will make public schools more equitable, integrated, and better funded is not. And in more conservative areas, there is an inherent discomfort with advocacy and activism—I know from my own research that most people seem to understand advocacy to mean being supportive and uncritical of decision-makers.

“At the rally on January 28, David Jeck, superintendent of Fauquier County public schools, stated that, “the localities are not at fault here.” But such a statement lets wealthier communities off the hook. Local districts in Virginia have also made cuts to education, and did not restore pre-recession funding. And local districts in Virginia are hindered by restrictive proffer policies that make it difficult to collect revenues from developers or otherwise leverage sufficient taxes on businesses and non-personal property. Better-heeled parents support their local public schools not by advocating for more funding, but by funneling donations and in-kind donations directly to their school via parent groups and local businesses and foundations.

”At the state level, the structure of the General Assembly itself poses obstacles. Virginia has a part-time “citizen” legislature. And even though in 2017 a record number of women, people of color, and progressives were elected to the House of Delegates, the capacity of citizens, such as those connected with Virginia Educators United, to engage in advocacy is limited. Participants must be available at any time, including during weekends, holidays, early mornings, and late nights when the General Assembly is in session (for forty-five days and ninety days, alternatively). This means that most such advocacy efforts are left to professional lobbyists, organizations, and associations.”

It will take widespread support to get the attention of the legislature to the state’s crisis of funding.

 

 

Categories Accountability, Education Reform, Funding, Privatization, Resistance, Virginia

Jesse Hagopian: What the Los Angeles Teachers Won

By dianeravitch
February 11, 2019 //
1

 

Jesse Hagopian, a teacher activist in Seattle, immersed himself in the UTLA Strike in Los Angeles to learn what teachers won. He interviewed Gillian Russom, a history teacher at Roosevelt High School and member of the United Teachers of Los Angeles Board of Directors, about how the strike was organized, the significant gains it made for students, and implications for the ongoing uprising of teachers around the country..

This is what he learned.  

The key lesson is that the model was the zchicago strike of 2012. Even though Karen Lewis stepped down due to her health issues, she and her vision continues to inspire teachers.

There’s been a long history around the country of progressive caucuses fighting for unions to be more active, and to have a broader vision and a broader set of alliances in our struggles. The Chicago 2012 strike and the work of CORE—Caucus of Rank and File Educators—leading up to that strike really helped to educate so many of us around the country and clarified our direction. I’ve been a teacher and union activist in Los Angeles for eighteen years and I studied what worked in Chicago and joined together with others to help bring those lessons here to LA.

In 2013, we pushed for a referendum within our union calling for a campaign for the “Schools LA Students Deserve.” This was modeled off of the Chicago teachers who based their strike around their own “schools our students deserve,” aiming to draw in parents, students, and the community.

Our agenda for union transformation basically came down to transforming the union from a top-down service model to an organizing model. We were crafting our agenda of union demands in conversation with community allies so that it would be an agenda that would draw the active participation of people beyond our own union membership. Up until 2014, we still had a model of one union rep for every school, including massive high schools of like 100 teachers.

 

 

Categories Chicago, Los Angeles, Resistance, Teachers, Unions

West Virginia Teachers Authorize a New Walkout If Legislature Passes Offfensive Bill

By dianeravitch
February 9, 2019 //
9

Teachers in West Virginia warned that they are still united and #55Strong and prepared to renew their walkout if the legislature passes a bill that contains obnoxious provisions that affect their working conditions and charter schools.

Last year every school in the state’s 55 counties closed down and teachers marched on the State Capitol to demand a 5% pay raise. The governor agreed he would not permit charter school legislation.

The legislature, however, passed a bill that authorized both charters and vouchers.

The announcement comes a day after the House Education Committee approved a stripped down strike-and-insert version of Senate Bill 451 — as compared to what was passed earlier this week in the Senate.

The House Education Committee’s version removes many of the provisions opposed by educators and the leaders of their unions, including provisions that would force members to sign off annually on the deduction of union dues, education savings accounts, and withholding pay during a strike. A non-severability clause — which would make the entire measure null and void should any of its provisions be struck down in a court challenge — was also pulled from the committee’s proposal.

Other provisions in the bill — including the establishment of charter schools — have been significantly altered through amendments in the committee.

While union leaders say they are happy with the bill being whittled away, nothing is final until the legislation is signed by Gov. Jim Justice. The House Education Committee’s strike-and-insert amendment is also merely formative until it is adopted on the chamber floor. If approved with any changes to the version passed by the Senate, the bill would be sent back to the upper chamber.

The teachers of West Virginia have the fighting spirit of the coal miners of that state.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Resistance, Teachers, Unions, Vouchers, West Virginia

California: Board of West Contra County Schools Debating Charter Moratorium

By dianeravitch
February 5, 2019 //
2

 

Following the passage by the Los Angeles schoolboard of a request for a charter moratorium, other counties in California are taking a look at doing the same.

 

 

Charter Moratorium to go Before School Board

WCCUSD Trustee Consuelo Lara is bringing a resolution supporting a Statewide Moratorium on the Growth of Charter Schools and strengthening oversight and transparency of current charter schools.

The resolution puts the WCCUSD in step with the recent resolution passed by the Los Angeles School Board joining with the NAACP, the Journey for Justice Alliance, Black Lives Matters and many other organizations and governmental bodies which have demanded a stop to the expansion of Charters at the expense of publicly run schools.

The meeting will be Wednesday 2/6

Lovonya DeJean Middle School
Multipurpose Room
3400 Macdonald Avenue

It is expected that the Charter Schools will use their money and buses to turn out in force to oppose this resolution. Supporters of public schools must be heard.

“Co-location” Means Closing Neighborhood Public Schools

For three years, PublicCore has been warning that continued WCCUSD approval of charter schools will lead to the closure of neighborhood schools. Now that chicken is coming home to roost. Unless neighbors and concerned community members rise up and say “NO!” El Sobrante will lose its middle school.

Pinole Middle School has already been forced to share its site with Voices Charter School as part of a practice known as “co-location.” Across the freeway in El Sobrante, Crespi Middle School has been forced to share its facility with Invictus Middle School. According to Prop 39 (aka “the charter school law”), each February, charter schools must make their anticipated facility needs request to the school district in which they are located. WCCUSD superintendent Matt Duffy has announced that both Voices andInvictus will be asking the district for more space in the 2019 – 2020 school year.

One of the options the district is considering is to close Crespi Middle School, move those students to Pinole Middle School, and allow Voices and Invictus to take over the Crespi site.

PublicCore is vehemently opposed to this option, as it gives public school students and their families fewer choices and takes away El Sobrante’s only middle school.

What you can do:
—Read the concerns of Joseph Glatzer, 7th grade history teacher at Pinole Middle School (see below)


—Contact the WCCUSD Board of Education [tom.panas@wccusd.net, stephanie.hernandez-jarvis@wccusd.net, valerie.cuevas@wccusd.net, clara@wccusd.net, mister.phillips@wccusd.net]


—Attend the WCCUSD Board of Education meeting on Feb. 6 at LaVonya DeJean Middle School


—Attend “Closing Crespi: a Town Hall with Trustee Phillips” at 6 pm onMarch 14 at Hilltop Church of Christ, El Sobrante

Letter from Jospeph Glatzer:

I’m Joseph Glatzer, 7th grade history teacher at Pinole Middle School. I’m here to oppose Voices getting any more of our classrooms and deepening their occupation of our campus. My criticism is with the charter system, not individual families.

I noticed in reading Mr. Duffy’s report that it says our enrollment at Pinole Middle is down. It had been down the past few years due to charter encroachment, but because of the amazing job our staff has done, our enrollment is up pretty significantly this year. Is the board aware of that? Parents are fed up with the lack of actual teaching at Summit, and we get kids coming back from them nearly every week.

Also, we know you’re not trying to close Crespi until 2 years from now, but that doesn’t make it any better.

How much smaller could our classrooms be if we weren’t hemorrhaging money to charter schools for their own profit?

Hiding behind the law and saying you have no choice doesn’t make any sense. Voices is not holding board meetings in Contra Costa County. They’re in violation of their charter and it should be revoked. The dangerous driving, traffic and noise is out of control. Our students are being hurt by a de facto private elementary being artificially wedged into their school.

It’s time for the school board to adopt the NAACP resolution for a moratorium on charter schools, which was just endorsed by UTR. Are you going to be on the side of the NAACP or on the side of a deeply segregated de facto private school which is taking our desperately needed public funds?

The argument has been that if you don’t approve these collocations then we’ll get sued and that’ll cost the district a lot of money. But we’re already losing tens of millions of dollars from approving all these charters and co-locations. We’re going to have severe financial challenges, like we see in Oakland, if something doesn’t change. So we might as well unite with other districts and fight for what’s right.

Prop 39 can be challenged as unconstitutional under the California state constitution, because it guarantees children the right to an education, which charters are endangering.

This is a civil rights issue and a human rights issue. We learned from Gandhi and Martin Luther King that respecting unjust laws is an immoral act.

Don’t take away any more of our classrooms at Pinole Middle. Thank you.

Categories Accountability, California, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Privatization, Resistance

Kansas: Students Walk Out to Protest Tech-Based Summit Learning Program

By dianeravitch
January 31, 2019 //
29

 

 

Mark Zuckerberg and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative funded the Summit learning program, which is computer-based online instruction. not personalized learning.

Students in Kansas sent a message to Zuckerberg:

 

Another student #walkout vs #SummitLearning – this time at McPherson MS in Kansas. Like earlier one in Brooklyn, protest was sparked by students’ frustrations about inadequacies of the online Learning program http://midkansasonline.com/news/?id=23280

https://www.mcphersonsentinel.com/news/20190130/mms-students-stage-walkout-to-protest-summit

Waving signs and chanting “No Summit, No Summit, No Summit,” the students spent their afternoon out of class venting their frustration with the changes in their curriculum…. “It’s a learning program that is supposed to be a better way, but you are just on a computer,” said Drake Madden, a seventh grader. “Every time I get home, my head starts hurting.” he said.

Video here: https://www.ksn.com/news/local/mcpherson-students-protest-against-summit-learning-platform-tuesday-afternoon/1738023228

https://www.kwch.com/content/news/Students-at-McPherson-Middle-School-walk-out-to-protest-new-curriculum-505062721.htm

Categories Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative, Resistance, Students, Technology

Virginia: Why Teachers May Strike

By dianeravitch
January 28, 2019 //
16

 

Who deserves more money? Amazon or Virginia’s teachers and children?

In Virginia, many students are learning in trailers while the state offers Amazon a huge tax break.

The Guardian reports that teachers are about to strike sue to low salaries and a huge underinvestment in facilities over the years.

“Due to overcrowding, more than 22,000 students in Fairfax county receive their education in cheaply constructed plywood trailers, often with visible signs of green mold, like those parked next to the baseball fields next to McClean high school.

“Those trailers, the poor state of school funding in general, low teacher pay and now the huge tax breaks the state is giving to lure in Amazon have led the teachers to strike on Monday, the start of the latest in a series of strikes by educators across the US.

“In Fairfax county, the third richest county in America, there are over 800 trailers serving as temporary classrooms because the school district cannot afford to build new classrooms….

”Throughout Virginia, school districts own thousands of cheaply constructed trailers that present health and safety risks. The trailers are often poorly heated, their plywood construction makes them susceptible to mold, and in some schools, students have even reported accidentally falling through their floors.”

The Governor Ralph Northam supports education, but is not offering the schools as much as Amazon.

”While Virginia’s Democratic governor Ralph Northam is proposing to increase education funding by $269m, he has proposed to spend nearly three times as much, $750m, to lure Amazon to northern Virginia. The offer was made to secure Amazon’s “HQ2” – the tech company’s second headquarters which it split between Virginia and a second – equally controversial – site in Long Island City, New York.

“Teachers are pushing back and now are going out in the first statewide teachers’ strikes in Virginia’s history.

“Inspired by a wave of #RedforEd strikes that have swept the nation, teachers in Virginia, who make $9,000 less than the national average, are calling on Northam to nix the tax cuts and instead invest the money into eliminating trailer parks outside of so many of Virginia’s schools.”

 

 

Categories Education Reform, Funding, Resistance, Students, Teacher Pay

Los Angeles: Please Help Jackie Goldberg Win Election to LAUSD Board

By dianeravitch
January 27, 2019 //
6

This post is an unabashed appeal for your contribution to a vital political race in Los Angeles. The billionaires (Broad, Walton, Hastings, etc.) have poured millions into buying control of the LAUSD board. That board hired a clueless hedge fund manager, Austin Beutner, who is bringing in every Reform retread to help him figure out how to do maximum disruption to the district.

I am asking you here and now to send Jackie Goldberg whatever you can afford.

The race for the empty seat on the LAUSD board is important for Los Angeles, but it is also important for California and for the nation. If Jackie wins this seat, her voice and her experience and knowledge will command a Quisling board.

Jackie Goldberg is a dynamo. She taught for many years, then won a seat on the Los Angeles school board. She then ran for the State Assembly and eventually became chair of the Education Committee. She retired from public service, but she was called back to active duty by her many admirers because of the crisis in Los Angeles.

The LAUSD board has seven seats. The billionaires bought four of them, the last time with the most expensive school board race in American history, when they spent upwards of $15 million to oust Steve Zimmer, the board president, and replace him with a TFA person. For a brief while, the Reformer Billionaires held five seats, but one of their board members was indicted and convicted of money laundering. Now that empty seat, representing District 5, will be decided in a special election on March 5. Jackie Goldberg used to represent District 5, and she is well known as a progressive firebrand in her district.

I attended a fundraiser for Jackie in her district, where she was surrounded by teachers and community members who love her. I spoke briefly and said that Jackie and I were sisters “with different mothers.” Which is to say, we had an hour-long conversation when I was in L.A. in December, and I found we saw eye-to-eye on the issues.

There are 10 candidates in the race. If Jackie wins 51% of the vote, there will be no runoff. The billionaires are waiting to see if there is a runoff, and if one is needed, and they will throw their millions against Jackie.

Jackie frightens them. She knows the legislature. She knows the district. She is knowledgable and articulate. She could stop their nefarious effort to destroy public education in Los Angeles. Even though she would be part of a three-vote minority (Scott Schmerelson and George McKenna, both experienced educators), their experience and expertise would shame the billionaire’s threadbare and vacuous four votes.

Jackie needs and deserves our help. Send $5, $10, $25, $100, whatever you can.

Categories California, Corporate Reform, Education Reform, Los Angeles, Resistance

Eric Blanc: Five Big Lessons from the Los Angeles Teachers’ Strike

By dianeravitch
January 25, 2019 //
14

Eric Blanc has covered the wave of teachers’ strikes that started in March 2018. He has been on the ground at everystrike, talking to the rank and file to get their perspectives as working teachers.

In this article, he describes the big lessons of the strike on Los Angeles.

He begins:

It would be hard to overstate the importance of this victory in the country’s second-largest school district. Against considerable odds, Los Angeles teachers have dealt a major blow against the forces of privatization in the city and nationwide. By taking on Democratic politicians in a deep-blue state, LA’s strike will certainly deepen the polarization within the Democratic Party over education reform and austerity. And by demonstrating the power of striking, LA educators have inspired educators nationwide to follow suit.

With new walkouts now looming in Denver, Oakland, Virginia, and beyond, it makes sense to reflect on the reasons why LA’s school workers came out on top—and what their struggle can teach people across the United States. Here are the five main takeaways.

Strikes Work: For decades, workers and the labor movement have been on the losing side of a one-sided class war. A major reason for this is that unions have largely abandoned the weapon of work stoppages, their most powerful point of leverage against employers. Rallies, marches, and civil disobedience are good, but they’re not enough.

Like the red state rebellions of 2018, the depth of the victory in Los Angeles underscores why the future of organized labor depends on reviving the strike. LA also shows that the most powerful strikes, particularly in the public sector, fight not only for the demands of union members, but on behalf of the broader community as well—an approach the United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA) calls “bargaining for the common good.”

The Status Quo Is Discredited: LA’s educator revolt is a particularly sharp expression of a nationwide rejection of decades of neoliberalism. Unlike many labor actions, this was not primarily a fight around wages—rather it was a political struggle against the billionaires and their proxies in government.

Like the electoral insurgencies of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders, the upsurge of Los Angeles rank-and-file teachers, and the overwhelming support they received from the parents of their students, shows that working people are looking for an alternative to business as usual. Work actions like LA’s will be an essential part of any movement capable of defeating Trump and the far right.

That’s only lesson number one and two.

Keep reading to learn the other lessons.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Los Angeles, Privatization, Resistance, Teacher Education, Teachers, Unions

Los Angeles: How the Resistance Undermined the Propaganda About Teachers

By dianeravitch
January 20, 2019 //
12

Sara Roos, aparent in Los Angeles whose children are no longer in school, muses about the major impact of the Teacher Revolt. It seems there is overwhelming public support for striking teachers (as there was last spring in Red states).

Remember the bad old days when Michelle Rhee, Campbell Brown, and Raj Chetty (not to mention their billionaire funders) were demonizing teachers? I recall a PBS interview with Melinda Gates in which she confidently asserted that “we” (she and Bill) knowhow to make better teachers.

Where are they all today?

How many of the Reformers arespeaking out for more funding and smaller classes?

Let me know if you find them.

Roos, the Red Queen in LA, writes:

To and from today’s tremendous rally in front of LA’s City Hall, you could feel overwhelming support from random people, everywhere. On the expo a stranger tosses out: “Good luck with your strike”. From bus drivers in uniform and lunch couriers in beat-up Hondas, waiting at every intersection from downtown to our neighborhoods blares the staccato horn of support. Professional cameramen trained to remain unfazed and neutral nevertheless emanate waves of sympathy. Business and car windows display signs of solidarity. Workers at City Hall open their windows to hear. Supersaturated among our populace is a pent-up frustration with where we’re at politically, and how to get ourselves heard.
This is Resistance writ huge. This is our women’s march, the march of our teachers. Our teachers are leading the way and giving We the People a voice here in LaLaLand.

These teachers are actually kinda the same old apple-faced Good People they always ever were. There hasn’t been some gigantic social evolution. It’s just the propaganda that’s changed; the underlying reality, not surprisingly, is robust, centered on social service for the betterment of us all. Our teachers haven’t changed, only the corporate, capitalist-centered narrative surrounding all of it has.

By the way, it turns out the long-sought after solution to LA’s traffic gridlock may be simply: stop sending kids far afield to some school of “Choice” and choose to value and invest in your own neighborhood. Anyone else notice how empty the streets have been all week long? When parents aren’t racing their kids hither and yon in a frenzy of Choosing Excellence, everyone’s lives get a little more deeply vested in their surrounds. It is everyone’s right to have the same excellent education as the next families’. But education isn’t a value added commodity to buy off the shelf whether the salesman peddles snake oil, false promises, educational spyware or a social panacea. Like democracy itself it’s a collective activity valued by the value which we each add.

Categories Los Angeles, Parents, Propaganda, Resistance, Teachers

Picketing with UTLA: A Great and Inspiring Morning

By dianeravitch
January 17, 2019 //
18

I had a very exciting morning with teachers, parents and students who were picketing outside Alexander Hamilton High School in Los Angeles.

Teachers and parents walked in front of the majestic exterior building, on the sidewalk where cars could see them. Several people held up signs saying “Honk if you support teachers,” and there was a cacaphony of honking horns as cars and trucks passed by.

As the minutes passed, the crowd grew to be hundreds of people, and they chanted “Hey, hey, Ho, Ho, Austin Beutner’s got to go!” And many other inspiring lines about supporting teachers and public schools.

The UTLA understands exactly what’s going on. Its President Alex Caputo-Pearl and his members understand that the billionaires bought the school board so they could expand the non-union charter presence. Charters now enroll 20% of the district’s children.

A day earlier, the UTLA held a mass rally in front of the California Charter Schools Association, the billionaire-funded lobbyists intent on destroying public schools in the state while prohibiting any accountability for charter schools and fighting any limits on charter school growth.

The billionaire-bought LAUSD has starved the public schools, which helps the charters.

The picketing stopped for short speeches. Parents, teachers, a celebrity (Rock Star Stevie Van Zandt) spoke. So did students, both of whom are seniors at Hamilton. One young man said, “We get it. They are targeting black and brown communities. They are trying to destroy our schools by denying us the education we need and deserve. They are dividing our district into haves and have-nots.” Another senior asked the audience to imagine what it was like to be in classes with nearly 50 students, where there were not enough chairs or desks. She said she took a chemistry class and sat on the floor all year because there was no other place to sit. She couldn’t get into an AP class because there were not enough chairs or desks.

The national media says the strike is about trachers’ pay but they are wrong. No one mentioned salaries except a parent speaker. The really important issues are class size, lack of money for full-time nurses in every school, lack of money for librarians and counselors, lack of money for the arts.

When I had my few minutes to speak, I pointed out that California is probably the richest state in the nation, but the latest federal data show that it spends less than the national average on its schools. California spends about the same, on a per-pupil basis, as Louisiana and South Carolina.

That’s shocking.

The good news today, aspesker said, was that a poll conducted by Loyola Marymount, reported that the strike has the support of 80% of the public.

Even if the national media misses the point, the people of LA understand that teachers are striking for their children and for future generations. They are fighting billionaires like Eli Broad, Reed Hastings, the Waltons, the Koch brothers, and other billionaires, for the survival of public education.

The whole world is watching.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Democracy, Education Industry, Education Reform, Los Angeles, Parents, Privatization, Resistance, Students, Union
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