Perdido Street School:
Perdido Street School Week
Municipal Labor Committee Backs UFT Contract Agreement
Message To Alexander Nazaryan: Teachers Held In Much Higher Esteem Than Journalists
If anybody out there was hoping opposition from the other unions would put a shiv into the UFT contract agreement announced on Thursday, that hope was dashed yesterday: Leaders of the city's municipal labor unions gave their blessing Friday to a proposed teachers contract imposing $1.3 billion in health care savings, but several unions of cops and firefighters signaled unease with the deal. By a v
Message To Alexander Nazaryan: Teachers Held In Much Higher Esteem Than Journalists
An insult tweet from Newsweek journalist Alexander Nazaryan was sent Arthur Goldstein's way after Arthur jumped into the fray between Nazaryan and Louis C.K. over Common Core:@TeacherArthurG People like you are the reason teaching isn't respected more.— Alexander Nazaryan (@alexnazaryan) May 3, 2014Nazaryan's been getting beaten up for a few days now after he insulted Louis C.K. for criticizing th
Governor Cuomo's Complicity In Christie Bridgegate Scandal Gets Some Scrutiny
Cuomo already has to worry about Preet Bharara's nosing around in his Moreland Commission wreckage and now there's this:It hasn’t been a great few weeks for New York governor Andrew Cuomo. He got in a public spat with U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara for closing down an anti-corruption commission, his budget was roundly criticized by many in his own party, and a new poll shows him losing serious ground
UFT Contract Open Thread
Pretty negative reaction to the contract news at my school.The feeling I get is, quite a few people are angry enough to vote no.What were you hearing out there?
Here's How You Know The UFT Contract Deal Is A Bad One - The NY Post Likes It
One of the measures of any UFT contract deal is what the neo-liberals at the Daily News and Times and the neo-cons at the Post think about it.If these editorial boards, who never saw a merit pay proposal they didn't like, a teacher they didn't want to fire or a traditional public school they didn't want to turn into a non-unionized charter school, like the new UFT contract deal, then you know ther
Will UFT Members Approve This Teachers Contract With So Much Delayed Compensation?
James Eterno at ICEUFT has all the details of the tentative UFT contract and you should go over to ICEUFT blog and get the scoop.Yesterday I focused on two parts of the tentative agreement I find very troubling - the termination proceedings ATR's will face if they don't find permanent placement after two "trials" in schools and allowing the city to run 10% of NYCDOE schools outside of th
MAY 01
Raises In UFT Contract Delayed For Years
Perhaps you've been hearing in the news that teachers are receiving an 18% raise over the course of a nine year contract, with teachers receiving the 8% they are owed from the 2009/2010 pattern that every other city union got.Well, guess what, folks - those raises from 2009/2010 are actually delayed for YEARS - not just the retro owed on those raises from 2009-2014, but also the changes to your sa
At First Glance, A Disastrous Contract Deal Made By Michael Mulgrew, UFT
A few years of zeroes, they threw the ATR's under the bus, they just enshrined merit pay and they are set to allow 200 schools to operate without UFT contractual rules, allowing for longer schools days/years and other "innovations": The new contract would begin, retroactively, on November 1, 2009, and provide retroactive four percent pay raises for 2009 and 2010–comparable to the increas
De Blasio, Mulgrew Announce New UFT Contract Deal
And so, we have a deal:Mayor Bill de Blasio, confronting a key challenge of his first year in office, announced what he called a “landmark” labor deal on Thursday with New York City’s largest teachers’ union that officials said would provide a framework for dozens of other outstanding contracts with the municipal work force. The deal, hammered out in marathon negotiations this week, will grant $3.
UFT Contract Update - New Work Rules, Including "Expedited Termination Hearings" For ATR's
Not a done deal, but here's an update, via Daily Politics:Details are not final, but three sources briefed on the contract outlined significant changes to work rules and new projects in the city schools that could be covered in the contract, including:-- The city could open dozens of new schools free of some teachers union contract rules and city regulations to help foster innovation. Parent-teach
UFT Contract Agreement Has Hitches
Juan Gonzalez details the fissures between the "uniformed" unions and the "civilian" unions over the tentative UFT contract deal:The tentative UFT deal includes two years of 4% retroactive pay increases for teachers, who have been without a contract since November 2009 — longer than nearly all other city unions. Increases in subsequent years would be far smaller — about 1% per
APR 30
NY Times: Other Unions Pissed At Mulgrew, UFT Over Teacher Contract Details
The NY Times has an interesting report on what's holding up the contract announcement between the UFT and the city - the other unions:Mayor Bill de Blasio and New York’s main teachers’ union are on the verge of announcing a deal to settle a nearly five-year labor dispute in which the union has sought more than $3 billion in back pay from the city.The agreement would include retroactive pay equival
NY Times: UFT, De Blasio Set To Announce 9 Year Contract For Teachers
Just in:Mayor Bill de Blasio and New York’s main teachers’ union are on the verge of announcing a deal to settle a nearly five-year-long labor dispute in which the teachers’ union has sought more than $3 billion in back pay from the city.Two officials said a deal could be announced at City Hall on Thursday, with one official involved in the talks saying the two sides would announce a nine-year con
More Evidence Cuomo Campaign Is Running Scared
They're moving early to try and smear opponent Rob Astorino as a right wing fringe candidate/bigot:Rob Astorino must have Andrew Cuomo more worried than we thought. How else to explain two just-released attack ads suggesting the Republican is a bigot?One is called “Contempt.” It describes Astorino as the only county executive found “in violation of anti-discrimination laws.” The other, called “Die
Here's Part Of Mayor Bloomberg's Legacy
This is it, in a nutshell:The city's poverty rate sat at 21.4% in 2012, barely unchanged from a year earlier, according to a report released by Mayor de Blasio's office and the Center for Economic Opportunity on Wednesday.The rate increased across nearly every demographic group between 2008 and 2012, the report found.Notably, New Yorkers of Asian descent saw the rate rise 6.6% to 29% and non-U.S.
Eva Moskowitz Full Of Crap As Usual
Eva Moskowitz raised $7.75 million dollars from her Wall Street and corporate backers at the second annual spring fundraiser for Success Academies.Think about that number for a minute - $7.75 million.Then, as she was thanking the governor and the legislature at her spring fundraiser for forcing New York City to either co-locate her schools or pony up money for rent, she said this about the battle
Cuomo Campaign Starting To Sound Desperate
What do you make of this story?A Chinatown civic leader claimed today that a member of Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s office interrogated him before Republican rival Rob Astorino made a campaign stop at his association’s headquarters this morning. Eddie Chiu, the senior director of the 114-year-old Lin Sing Association, told Mr. Astorino and reporters that a person from Mr. Cuomo’s office, whom he declined t
APR 29
Tell Me Again Why Eva Moskowitz Can't Pay Rent?
Eliza Shapiro at Capital NY:The Success Academy charter school network raised more than $7 million at a spring dinner headlined by former Florida governor Jeb Bush last night, according to a report in Business Insider. About 750 people attended the second annual spring benefit at Cipriani 42nd Street, which a spokesperson said was intended to be closed to the press.The attendees included board mem
Clueless Elwood District Officials Double Down On Decision To Cancel Kindergarten Show
More educrats who ought to be forcibly removed from office and hit with a restraining order to stay away from anyone under the age of 18:Elwood school officials Monday night stood behind the principal's decision to cancel a traditional Harley Avenue Primary School kindergarten event due to scheduling constraints. "I believe we made the right decision for the right reason," Superintendent
King, Tisch And The Regents Still Don't Get It
The Board of Regents held a meeting yesterday and other than Regents Betty Rosa and Kathleen Cashin raising questions about the current reform agenda policies, it was pretty much full speed ahead for reform as King, Tisch and at least one other Regent staunchly defended the Common Core tests:Regents chancellor Merryl Tisch and education commissioner John King defended the tests. King explained tha
APR 28
What Are Some Things You'd Like To See In The UFT Contract Agreement?
The Daily News reported that the UFT and the city are going at negotiations over the new contract pretty hard and heavy, which makes sense because Mulgrew has told us that he wants a contract agreement done that can be voted on by the membership before the end of the school year.I posted earlier about something that I don't want to see in the agreement - extra time added to our workday for PD. The
Daily News Says New UFT Contract Will Add Time To Teachers Schedule For "Professional Development"
Here is what the News says may happen: The city is closing in on a multiyear contract with the teachers union that could include significant retroactive raises, sources said. One deal being discussed with the United Federation of Teachers would give them retroactive raises for most of the five years the contract has been expired at a rate of 4%, 4%, 0%, 1% and 2% — although it is unclear how the p
APR 27
A Reader Says Farina, Mulgrew Did Not Say Teachers Should "Embrace" Teacher Evaluation System
As I posted earlier today, the NY Post reported this surprising news today:Meanwhile de Blasio, Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña and teachers union boss Michael Mulgrew spoke of “unity” at the United Federation of Teachers spring conference Saturday at the New York Hilton....Mulgrew and Fariña agreed that teachers should “embrace” the new evaluation system — one critics say was badly weakened when
Is NYSED Admitting EngageNY Modules Are Crap?
Chris Cerrone tweeted the following this afternoon:Is NYSED admitting modules are flawed? Do taxpayers get a $12.9 million refund? http://t.co/Y1SUna6f9b via @AlbanyBizReview— Chris Cerrone (@Stoptesting15) April 27, 2014Megan Rogers of the Albany Business Review reports this:The New York state education department wants teachers to revamp the state's online curriculum resources for the Common Co
NY Post: Mulgrew, Farina Say Teachers "Should Embrace" New Evaluation System
This is buried at the bottom of a pierce about the city paying three leases for Eva Moskowitz and Success Academies:Meanwhile de Blasio, Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña and teachers union boss Michael Mulgrew spoke of “unity” at the United Federation of Teachers spring conference Saturday at the New York Hilton.“For me this has been a natural partnership,” de Blasio said at the lovefest.Mulgrew a
APR 26
Judy Garland And Mickey Rooney In The Age Of Common Core
Imagine, if you will, an updated serial version of Babes in Arms, the 1939 movie musical that starred Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney in a plot that is described like this at Fandango:This fun-filled spin-off of the Rodgers & Hart Broadway musical by the same name, features Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney as two young children of vaudevillian parents who aren't included in their parents travels,
Cory Booker, Mitch McConnell Have Same Donors
If you're even dimly aware of the fevered ego that is neo-liberal Senator Cory Booker, you're not surprised by this news:Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) share at least one thing: campaign donors. Booker, a Senate newbie, and McConnell, the Senate minority leader, show up dipping into the same donor pool more than any other opposing-party members of Congress.They shared 74 do
All The Good Walmart Does
Former Bloomberg DOE minion of school closings in NYC, Marc Sternberg, is featured prominently in this morning's NY Times piece on the Walton philanthropy-industrial complex and charter schools:In 2013, the Walton foundation spent more than $164 million across the country. According to Marc Sternberg, who was appointed director of K-12 education reform at the Walton Family Foundation last Septembe