Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.:
Fred All Week Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher
A poem for State Rep Laura Fine.
“The tax increase should be allowed to expire, as the law provides. The state made a promise to the people of Illinois and we need to honor that promise.” — State Rep. Laura Fine, D-Glenview A promise made by State Rep Fine Is not like one of your’s Or mine. Her promises seem to rely On whether your income is Low or High. To those of us in TRS Her promises mean much less. She promised retirees
Bob Peterson. A teacher union movement is rising.
- Bob Peterson is President of the Milwaukee Teachers’ Education Association. A revitalized teacher union movement is bubbling up in the midst of relentless attacks on public schools and the teaching profession. Over the next several years this new movement may well be the most important force to defend and improve public schools, and in so doing, defend our communities and our democracy. The mos
Keeping retirement weird. Memorial Day Weekend, 2014.
The backyard. Saturday morning, May 24th. Logan Square, Chicago, Illinois. Years ago on a trip to Rome, Anne and I spent an hour or so at a table outside a cafe in the Piazza di Spagna near the Bernini fountain. If memory serves me right, every Roman piazza has a Bernini fountain. We had some bar snacks. In Venice they would be called Cichetti. I don’t remember what the word for bar snacks is in
YESTERDAY
Mike Klonsky. The use and misuse of data to beat up on neighborhood schools, principals and teachers.
- Brother Mike breaks a story. There is no shortage of examples of the use and misuse of data to beat up on neighborhood schools, principals and teachers. But this one is pretty slimy. A must read. Are Prosser teachers ‘gaming the system’? Or is this reporter gaming them? “If anyone out there has been in Prosser for more than a second, they would see that you can’t make a Prosser teacher do anyth
CTU. Teachers, staff at Rogers Park elementary school learns of $300,000 in budget cuts on one-year anniversary of school closings
CTUnet: CHICAGO—The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) received information from members today who learned this morning about pending budget cuts at Gale Math and Science Academy in Rogers Park. After reports last week that more than $300,000 in funding will be cut from the school by Chicago Public Schools in 2014-2015, Gale will also lose its librarian, technology teacher and two classroom teachers ne
Did you know Rauner cheated on his first wife? Not if you rely on corporate media.
You know all those cute million dollar media buys with Bruce Rauner and his current wife, the alleged Democrat Diana? By the way, Democrat Diana is a major Tea Party contributor. Anyway. On May 5th Business Insider ran a story about Rauner’s first marriage. Turns out he was cheat. Back in the 90s they called this having a paramour. Apparently Rauner got that condo in the City for more reasons tha
The Chicago Way.
With a gun or a pen. Chicago is still Chicago. County Board President Toni Preckwinkle went down to Springfield yesterday seeking support for her pension theft. And to nobody’s surprise, she got it from the mobsters in the General Assemby and from their capo di tutti capo, Mike Madigan. Preckwinkle said the legislators were “remarkably receptive” to her plan for cutting Cook County employee pensi
MAY 22
Jersey Jazzman. Christie’s pension grab.
Jersey Jazzman blog: If you are at all shocked by this, you just haven’t been paying attention: In a stunning reversal, Gov. Chris Christie today announced plans to grab, over two years, $2.43 billion meant for public workers’ pensions to balance New Jersey’s ailing state budget. The plan threatens to derail one of Christie’s signature accomplishments in Trenton — a series of reforms to replenish
Chris Christie’s pension pay to play and how pension theft is a national scandal.
I have been accused of making Illinois’ pension theft too big a deal. Some have suggested that Illinois’ pension theft is just a local Illinois problem. But the scandal is a national one. And the fightback must be national too. Something to keep in mind at the upcoming NEA and AFT national meetings. Today Pando Daily’s David Sirota goes further into New Jersey Governor Chris Christie’s use of pen
Bev Johns. Illinois’ SB 16 threatens Special Ed funding.
- Beverley Holden Johns is a special education advocate and activist. SB 16 seems to say that education funding is only about which school districts receive money. SB 16 ignores the fact that State funds are now tied to actually doing something, to encouraging or requiring that those funds be spent for certain students or for certain activities. As amended, except for high cost students, Illinois
MAY 21
Democratic Party State Representative Scott Drury’s slippery definition of a promise.
Glen Brown posts about Representative Scott Drury.
Even Eric Zorn admits Lisa Madigan’s police powers argument is nonsense. Though he still drinks Civic Committee Kool-Aid.
Responding to the suits by the IEA, IRTA, IFT and others representing teachers and public employees, Attorney General Lisa Madigan admitted that pension theft violates the pension protection clause of the Illinois Constitution. The state has a right, Speaker Madigan’s daughter argues, to ignore the Constitutional protections because the financial situation is dire, ignoring the state’s tax breaks
“Twelve Months Later: The Impact of School Closings in Chicago” examines myriad of CPS’s Broken Promises.
CHICAGO—The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) released today a report on the state of Chicago Public Schools (CPS) one year after the Board of Education (BOE) voted to close 49 elementary schools and one high school program, the largest, one-time school closing action in U.S. history and a decision made in the wake of massive opposition and protests throughout the city of Chicago. The study, titled “T
MAY 20
Ten minute drawing. Four things that will make you gay.
Think Progress: Common Core may not be a well-intentioned set of improved educational standards, as supporters would have you believe, but instead a trojan horse designed to turn every schoolchild in Florida, if not America, gay. This ominous warning came at an anti-Common Core event in March courtesy of Florida State Rep. Charles Van Zant (R). Speaking at the “Operation Education Conference” in
Where is the all-powerful Mike Madigan now?
Back on December 3rd Michael Madigan had no problem getting the votes he needed to pass pension theft. Senate Bill 1 had little support among Republicans because they thought the larceny didn’t go far enough. It actually left some coins in the jar. They wanted it all. But Madigan’s Democratic Caucus backed him up. Many admitted that they knew it was morally wrong and probably unconstitutional. M
John Dillon. Teacher life after Senate Bill 7 and PERA.
- John Dillon is a retired teacher, activist and blogger at Pension Vocabulary. A Dinner with an active colleague in May, 2014: Sorry, you guys, but while you have been fighting for us in pensions, they’ve come under the cracks in the door. You missed what happened since you left, since the Performance Reform Evaluation Act. The classes you remember no longer exist. The teachers you remember no l
MAY 19
Another story of a good teacher rated as bad by a system our union leadership helped create.
IEA Executive Directory Audrey Soglin. Today’s Tribune features a story by Dawn Turner Trice about Gage Park high school teacher Victor Harbison. The Gage Park High School teacher wants his students to succeed academically, but he also wants them to learn how to solve problems affecting their lives and community. In short, he wants to teach them to be good citizens. It’s an area of teaching that’
John Broderick, Jr. Pensions are not a gift. They are a promise.
- John Broderick Jr., a former chief justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court, notes that the views expressed are his own and not necessarily those of the University of New Hampshire Law School, where he serves as dean. Note that New Hampshire does not have the constitutional pension protection clause that the Illinois Constitution contains. May 13, 2014 There is talk these days in New Hampshi
Drugs in the war on poor kids.
“For now, we’re left with one of the ironies of income inequality: a rare instance of poor children getting more of something than they need.” More than 10,000 American children ages 2 and 3 are being medicated for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). They are mostly poor kids. This is a finding in a report from the Center for Disease Control released last Friday. Is ADHD a label give
MAY 18
Sunday reads.
Pension theft is now called “pension smoothing.” You never would have thought I would have good words to say about principals. But I’m never too old to change. The gathering resistance to standardized tests. Danny Glover on Freedom Summer. Rahm’s fundraising loop-hole is very lucrative. If you are wondering whether Duncan and his team have been affected by the new research (or even the old VAM re
MAY 17
Gresham sit-in ends with a sense of purpose. The unfinished work of Brown versus Board of Education.
Gresham Principal Diedrus Brown. Following a meeting with CPS officials, parents and community folks ended their sit-in at Gresham elementary school at a little after midnight. Up until that point, police and CPS security had prevented any arriving supporters from entering the school. There were no arrests. Gresham is being closed and is being handed over to the Academy for Urban Leadership – fir
Keeping retirement weird. It’s the knees.
Since retirement I work out at the gym pretty regularly. Two days with a trainer, Mike. I started doing it because – well – I wanted t live longer. But to my surprise, it has given me immediate gratification. I feel better now. I can do things I haven’t been able to do in years. I don’t wake up with back pain. I can bend down to pick up the penny I dropped. I can tie my shoe laces without grabbin