Perdido Street School:
Andrew Cuomo Should Hire Michael Gove For The Cuomo Administration
It Pays To Associate With Governor Cuomo If You're A Lobbyist
Perdido Street School Week
Carson Vs. Letterman
For nostalgia's sake, with David Letterman announcing his retirement from The Late Show, here's one of my favorite clips from the The Tonight Show of Letterman suing Johnny Carson, Judge Wapner presiding:
Andrew Cuomo Should Hire Michael Gove For The Cuomo Administration
Governor Andrew M. Cuomo has shown himself to be the charter school governor here in NY State, cutting money to traditional public schools and sticking trad schools and unionized teachers with extra mandates even as he slings extra cash and power the way of the union-free charter schools and frees them from mandates and regulations. Cuomo ignores the vast majority of children in NY State, who atte
It Pays To Associate With Governor Cuomo If You're A Lobbyist
From WXXI News:Overall spending on lobbying related activities actually dropped by $10 million dollars after reaching a high point in 2011. The decrease is due to a decline in money spent on television ads. A lobby group closely associated with Governor Andrew Cuomo, the Committee to Save New York, spent millions of dollars on television ads promoting Cuomo’s agenda in the first two years he was
Weingarten And Mulgrew Look To Take Us Backward
If and when the pro-Andrew Cuomo forces backed by UFT President Michael Mulgrew and AFT President Randi Weingarten take over the NYSUT this weekend, the fight that NYSUT President Richard Iannuzzi and others in the NYSUT leadership have shown against Andrew Cuomo, SED Commissioner King and Regents Chancellor Tisch in recent months will disappear, replaced by complacency with the education reform s
YESTERDAY
Newark Star-Ledger Lays Off 25% Of Non-Unionized Newsroom Employees
Brutal:In a grim day of reckoning at the state’s largest newspaper, the owners of The Star-Ledger today said they were eliminating the jobs of approximately 167 people, including 25 percent of the newsroom. The sweeping job loss was part of a plan announced last week in an effort to greatly reduce costs and combine resources by consolidating the operations of The Star-Ledger, along with its sister
Cuomo Administration: Middle Class Is $300,000 A Year, Upper Middle Is $500,000
The Cuomo administration explaining its "middle class tax cuts":In defense of new regressive tax cuts in the most economically unequal state in America, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s top aide tonight told the Journal News that those making $500,000 a year are merely “upper middle class” and those making $300,000 a year are “middle class.” In fact, the median household income in New York i
De Blasio Says "Teacher Retention" Is Key Goal For Public Education Policy
From an interview with Chris Smith of New York:With pre-K and charters dominating the conversation, there’s been little attention to de Blasio’s fuzzier agenda for the million-plus kids already attending conventional public schools. “We’re going to focus on teacher retention, which I think is a huge difference-maker, because we’re hemorrhaging quality teachers,” he says. “Why is Finland so wonderf
UFT Contract Negotiations Update
Bill de Blasio in an interview with Chris Smith of New York:It’s obviously incredibly complicated, and there’s a lot on the line, and we want to get it right. So the conversations over the last weeks have been quite good, and substantive, and collegial. But it’s impossible at this moment to determine whether it’s enough to get us done by that point (June 30)."Collegial and substantive, but no
Common Core Contradictions
From a commenter at NRO:Common Core is, itself, a contradiction: it professes to help get kids ready for college and careers while at the same time it destroys the very tools they need to learn to do just that. For English standards, Common Core favors informational texts over fiction while completely deleting poetry and art interpretation from the curriculum. In Math, Common Core seems blatantly
Will Oklahoma Be The Second State To "Ditch" The Common Core?
From National Review Online:The Oklahoma state senate passed a bill Tuesday to withdraw the state from the Common Core standards. If the bill is signed by Governor Mary Fallin, Oklahoma will become the second state to withdraw from the Common Core.Indiana withdrew last week, with Governor Mike Pence’s signature.The bill to get the Sooner State was hugely popular in both houses. House Bill 3399 was
APR 03
PEF President Wants To See Someone From Left Primary Cuomo
Can you imagine anybody from the Mulgarten-controlled AFT/UFT (and perhaps soon to be NYSUT) saying anything like this?The state Democratic and Working Families parties should find a primary challenger to Gov. Andrew Cuomo, the president of one of the state’s top public-employees unions said today. Susan Kent, the president of the Public Employees Federation, said the Democratic governor hasn’t li
This Would Get Under Cuomo's Skin
From State of Politics:Former New York City Councilman Charles Barron this week filed paperwork with the state Board of Elections to run for the state Assembly seat vacated by his wife, Inez, records show. The move for Charles Barron is not unexpected. Barron, left the Council due to term limits, and had been telegraphing for months he would run for the Brooklyn-based district. The former Black Pa
What Did The UFT Leadership Get To Look The Other Way On Cuomo's Charter Deal?
Michael Fiorillo on the news confirmed today by the NY Times that the UFT leadership did nothing to fight the charter school protections Cuomo wanted enshrined in the budget that give charters unlimited expansion rights, free rent in NYC public school buildings or the tab picked up by the NYCDOE and other goodies that the charter entrepreneurs wanted:Does this (mis)leadership ever fight anything?S
Cuomo Was Behind The Organization Of The Eva Moskowitz/Success Charter School Rally
There have been some stories out that it was Governor Cuomo who pushed for the charter school giveaway rally in Albany - those stories are now confirmed in the NY Times:It was a frigid February day in Albany, and leaders of New York City’s charter school movement were anxious. They had gone to the capital to court lawmakers, but despite a boisterous showing by parents, there seemed to be little cl
UFT Didn't Fight Cuomo's Charter School Giveaways
In this morning's Times analysis of how and why Cuomo pushed through so many charter school protections is this:A lot was riding on the debate for Mr. Cuomo. A number of his largest financial backers, some of the biggest names on Wall Street, also happened to be staunch supporters of charter schools. According to campaign finance records, Mr. Cuomo’s re-election campaign has received hundreds of t
APR 02
De Blasio Says He Sympathizes With Parents Opting Children Out Of State Tests
Earlier this week, Regents Chancellor Tisch attacked Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino for opting his children out of the state tests, saying he had no standards and was contributing to the decline of Western Civilization.Mayor de Blasio, on the other hand, said he sympathizes with parent frustration over the testing regime:“I understand their frustrations. When my children were participat
Eva Moskowtitz As Freedom Rider
Good piece by Eliza Shapiro at Capital NY on the use of civil rights rhetoric for education issues by both charter advocates (particularly Eva Moskowitz and her Success Academies) and the de Blasio administration.Success Academies compared their pro-free charter school rent rally in Albany a few weeks ago to the freedom rides while the de Blasio administration called the universal pre-K drive a ci
Don't Accept Minor Tweaks To APPR Teacher Evaluations
Andrew Cuomo issued a statement yesterday saying he and the legislature will revisit the APPR teacher evaluation component that is tied to Common Core tests now that the CCSS tests have been de-linked from high stakes for children for a couple of years.There was much surprise around the Internets and the Twitterverse and not a few "What is this, April Fools?" comments.And why not - Cuomo
APR 01
Cuomo Says Teacher Evaluations Tied To Common Core Tests Need To Be "Addressed"
Maybe he's sick of twisting himself into a pretzel trying to defend no stakes for children on the CCSS state tests for the next two years while teachers have 20% of their evaluations based upon these same test scores and can potentially lose their jobs if the scores are low enough?When the state Board of Regents in February proposed a plan to allow teachers to use the highly criticized rollout of
Look How Comon Core Gets Characterized In Mainstream Media Political Accounts These Days
From John Dickerson's Slate column on why Jeb Bush may have trouble running for president:The final problem is that Bush has taken policy stances against his party’s grass roots on the hot button issues of immigration and education. Bush is an advocate for pathways to citizenship and residency for illegal immigrants, positions that House Republican leaders didn’t even want to debate in this electi
Opt Out Movement Grows In NY State
No wonder education reformers like Merryl Tisch and StudentsFirstNY were so shrill in their criticism of Westchester County Executive/GOP gubernatorial's announcement that he and his wife were opting their children out of the state's Common Core ELA and math tests that begin today.Astorino and his wife are just two out of thousands of parents across New York who are opting their children out of th
Chancellor Tisch Attacks Rob Astorino For Opting His Children Out Of State Tests
Yesterday the Cuomo Campaign sent State Senator George Latimer out to attack Westchester County Executive and GOP gubernatorial candidate Rob Astorino for announcing that he and his wife were joining with thousands of other parents around the state and opting their children out of the Common Core state tests starting today.Today the Daily News reports that Regents Chancellor Tisch launched an atta
MAR 31
Cuomo Has Crony Attack Astorino Over Common Core Opt Out Video
Earlier today I posted video of Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino announcing he and his wife had decided to opt their children out of the Common Core tests that start tomorrow.According to State of Politics, the Cuomo Campaign didn't wait long to launch a counterattack:Sen. George Latimer, a Westchester County Democrat, has been deployed to respond to County Executive/GOP gubernatorial can
Sheldon Silver Says Charter School Protections In NY State Budget Are "Onerous"
From State of Politics:“I think the charter school material is a little onerous on the city of New York, unprecedented compared to any other part,” Silver told reporters on the floor of the Assembly. They are "onerous" - they give charter school operators in NYC (and only NYC) the right of unlimited expansion on the city's dime and there's nothing the city can do to stop them.If Silver s
Charter School Sector Set To Thrive In NYC
The NY Times reports the budget deal giving charter schools the right of unlimited expansion in NYC threatens de Blasio's education goals - and of course, that was always the point:Under the deal, the city would be required to find space in public buildings for charter schools, which operate independently of the school district but receive public funds. If the city could not, it would have to cove
NY Times Editorial Criticizes Charter Provisions In The Budget
They say the legislature and governor shouldn't water down mayoral control and there should be a counter to unchecked charter expansions: The 2014-15 budget, which is due by midnight Monday, is expected to provide Mayor Bill de Blasio an important victory and a setback. He will get about $300 million for prekindergarten in New York City this year, allowing him to fulfill his major campaign promise
MAR 30
New York Goes From 8th To 20th In Education Performance Under Andrew Cuomo
Interesting piece of data in Pedro Noguera's Time-Union opinion piece decrying the Cuomo budget:With Gov. Andrew Cuomo emerging as a champion of charter schools, what does it mean for the 97 percent of students in New York who attend public schools?Outside major cities, most people have never heard of a charter school. They are focused instead on their local public school, where the situation is o
Making Andrew Cuomo Pay For His Budget
Arthur Goldstein dubbed Andrew Cuomo's budget this:@kenne2 @noahegotbaum @rweingarten @AFTunion It would be great if we could publicly label it the Moskowitz budget.— Arthur Goldstein (@TeacherArthurG) March 28, 2014And indeed, it truly is the Eva Moskowitz budget.Cuomo told Moskowitz's Albany rally a few weeks ago that he would protect charters and help them to flourish in NYC, and he certainly d
MAR 29
Mulgrew Responds To Budget Agreement
From the NY Times:Michael Mulgrew, president of the United Federation of Teachers, the city’s teachers’ union, said the changes proposed on Saturday amounted to favoritism for charter schools at the expense of students in traditional public schools.“They can’t be second-class citizens in their own school system,” Mr. Mulgrew said.Now they are.Eva Moskowitz can now expand her schools as much as she
How Opt-Out Works In Carmel Schools
From Gary Stern at LoHud:It is up to districts to decide whether students not taking the tests can read or move to another room or must sit quietly. Education Department materials note that districts are not obligated to provide an alternate location or activities.A letter to parents from the Carmel schools said students who don't take the tests will be given a test booklet and no alternate activi
Common Core Moratorium Watered Down In Budget Bill?
From State of Politics:The Democratic-led Assembly this month passed a measure that would impose a two-year delay in aspects of Common Core when it comes to student and teacher assessment. The education budget bill introduced this morning does not appear to go nearly as far on that delay. Here's what I see in the bill relating to assessment for 3rd-8th grade:THE COMMISSIONER SHALL PROVIDE THAT NO
And Now The Budget Agreement Is Said To Be Complete
Just moments after I posted that the education spending bill was holding up the state budget comes word that the budget agreement is now set:ALBANY — Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and legislative leaders have reached a deal on the next state budget that provides $300 million to expand prekindergarten in New York City, officials said on Saturday.The agreement, which followed exhausting but relatively peacef
Education Budget Bill Still Not Finished
Apparently they're still wrangling over the education issues:Gov. Andrew Cuomo and top state lawmakers appeared to come to an agreement on much of the state budget late Friday, but a bill laying out more than $20 billion in education spending wasn’t introduced before a key midnight deadline.Both the Senate and Assembly printed eight bills just before 11:59 p.m. Friday that would implement most of
Former Christie Aide Bridget Anne Kelly Says She'll Talk To Feds
No wonder Christie was so bombastic at yesterday's press conference - he sees the end is near: Gov. Chris Christe's inner circle continued to implode on Friday with a close ally abruptly resigning and his former deputy chief of staff now willing to talk if she gets immunity. David Samson, a top Bridgegate figure and the target of a federal probe, quietly surrendered his post as Port Authority chai