Compañerxs,
Hace unos días, hicimos circular esta carta invitando a compas en México a sumarse a una campaña de solidaridad con el movimiento de Occupy Oakland, en California, EEUU.
El 10 de noviembre la Comuna de Oakland cumplió un mes, y en las últimas semanas ha surgido como un espacio muy importante de resistencia y organización autónoma en una ciudad emblemática por su fuerte legado de militancia y activismo anticapitalista. Después del primer intento de desalojo del acampe el 25 de octubre, miles de personas marcharon y la policia respondió con brutal represión, usando “armas químicas” contra los manifestantes. El 26 de octubre después de otra marcha, en la Asamblea General de Occupy Oakland 3000 personas aprobaron una huelga general para el 2 de noviembre. El 2 de noviembre, la Huelga
Still, the tension between state and local control in New Jersey is nothing new, and both the legal critics and some local school leaders yesterday were cautious about the extent of the state’s authority politically as well.Elisabeth Ginsburg, president of the Glen Ridge Board of Education, has been an outspoken leader among suburban schools, and she said the new accountability systemThe Truth Slips Out
I missed this earlier this week, but Mike Petrilli really wrote a real humdinger:After its big referendum victory last week, Ohio teachers union vice president Bill Leibensperger said “There has always been room to talk. That’s what collective bargaining is about. You bring adults around a table to talk about serious issues.” He voiced an argument made by union supporters through the fight over Senate Bill 5 (and the similar battle in Wisconsin over public sector union rights): All employees want is the right to bargain; they are more than willing to make concessions during these difficult times.And to be sure, you can find examples of unions—of police, firefighters, even teachers
This was written by George Wood, superintendent and secondary school principal at the Federal Hocking Local School District in Stewart, Ohio. He is also the executive director of the Forum for Education and Democracyand chair of the board for the Coalition of Essential Schools.
By George Wood
“Dr. Wood, I need your help on this one.” My assistant is one of the most competent people I know, so when she asks for help I figure it is pretty important.
Read full article >>
Teacher Stories
Submitted on November 18, 2011 by Timothy Boyle
As I sat with our 4th grade teachers during a recent professional development, which introduced the Magnetism and Electricity module, I realized that I had figured out some important things about being a teacher. In my previous role as a science teacher, I had been successful. I
Writing in The Nation, Lee Fang reports:
Patricia Levesque, a top adviser to former Governor Jeb Bush, spoke to fellow reformers at a retreat in October 2010. Levesque noted that reform efforts had failed because the opposition had time to organize. Next year, Levesque advised, reformers should “spread” the unions thin “by playing offense” with decoy legislation. Levesque said she planned to sponsor a series of statewide reforms, like allowing taxpayer dollars to go to religious schools by overturning the so-called Blaine Amendment, “even if it doesn’t pass…to keep them busy on that front.” She also advised
Popout
It’s been two months since anti-inequality protesters first settled in at Zuccotti Park in a movement that became known as “Occupy Wall Street.” To commemorate education’s unique role in the activism, protesters chose the Department of Education’s headquarters, Tweed Courthouse, as a meeting point for a much larger rally taking place tonight in Lower Manhattan.
Just as many of the DOE’s top officials were leaving Tweed to head to the department’s monthly Panel for
| INT. CLASSROOM – DAY smf: In budget cycles past, 4LAKids broke out the California Budget Debate from the rest of the Education mess and placed in in a separate blog: “A state without a Budget, a government without a Clue”. 4LAKids was trying to keep the recession separate from recess – and to avoid depression altogether. This past year the state got a budget early, and after an initial hiccough got a another, “final”budget; close enough to on-time to escape a tardy slip. There was no |
DAVIS, California – Students have set up tents in the Quad at UC Davis, responding to police raids and brutality both here, at UC Davis, as well as at UC Berkeley. They have declared their solidarity with #OccupyWallStreet. We even have a mailbox!
I want you to think back to April of 1968. Many of America's cities burned, because Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis.
Perhaps you even remember why Dr. King was in Memphis - to help African-American sanitation workers who were on strike after two of their brethren, who had sought shelter during a rain storm in a compactor, were crushed to death.
The words titling this post were those on the signs of the 1,300 sanitation workers.
The man who led them, and to whose assistance Dr. King had come, was Taylor Rodgers.
He passed away on November 12. He spent many years after the strike in Memphis as an organizer for AFSCME - the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees.
AFSCME has put up this blog post, titled simply "Remembering Taylor Rogers."
Let me offer only two paragraphs:
During the 64-day struggle, Rogers and his fellow workers were beaten, gassed and jailed – along
Ever since I started writing my blog, I wondered when I would reach the end of my road and run out of things to rant about. It seems that every time I approach that point, something pops up to get me started again. As luck would have it, two such events occurred today. One incident happened early today and the second came later in the day. Of course, for dramatic effect I will begin with the later.
Late in the afternoon I had an appointment with my dentist for a cleaning. It’s one of the many ways my dentist has arranged for me to pay his rent. I see my dentist quite often. When I arrived at the waiting room, the receptionist greeted me with a big smile and three pages of blank forms. She apologized for inconveniencing me, but THE LAW required her to have me fill out the forms. I immediately looked at her desk and asked what
First Posted: 11/17/11 07:36 PM ET Updated: 11/17/11 07:36 PM ET
NEW YORK -- As college students took center stage at a Tuesday afternoon Union Square rally on Occupy Wall Street's two-month anniversary, a smaller but equally loud group of younger protesters refused to miss out on the action.
"We have power, we have friends, nothing will stop us, we fight till the end!" hollered Patrick Inosanto, a 10-year-old fifth grader at Brooklyn's P.S. 261. Inosanto was dwarfed by the throngs of protesters he marched with -- but they repeated his chants and amplified his cheers through the people's mic.
Inosanto's group calls itself the "children's brigade," after a similar protest action in Oakland, Calif. It is part of the 99% School, according to the group's spokeswoman Rivka Gewirtz Little, a movement started on Oct. 3 by parents in East Harlem that works in support of Occupy Wall Street by holdin