Marcos Breton - KJ Is It Time For Bromance Relationship Counselling | The Sacramento Bee

Marcos Breton: Accusations put City Hall culture in question | The Sacramento Bee:

Marcos Breton: Accusations put City Hall culture in question 

Marcos Breton - KJ Is It Time For Bromance Relationship Counselling 

Rarely has a city employee accused a Sacramento City Council member of sexual harassment. No one could recall it happening before Mayor Kevin Johnson and his close ally and friend, Councilman Allen Warren, both were alleged to have made unwelcome advances toward women working at City Hall.

That’s not to suggest that what would be considered sexual harassment today didn’t happen years ago – when workplace harassment of women was defined narrowly and was largely unpunished. It likely did, but people making formal claims of harassment and seeking damages against elected officials are uncommon for this city.

The accusation against Warren came to light on Monday and was provocative and detailed. As told by his accuser, Delia Chacon, it’s a narrative of “quid pro quo sexual harassment.” Chacon alleges that Warren used his authority “to repeatedly coerce her into submission to his repeated sexual requests.”

As Ryan Lillis of The Sacramento Bee wrote: “The claim states Chacon accompanied Warren on ‘sexual escapades to Atlanta, Jamaica, Reno and Oroville’ and allowed Warren “to grab and fondle her buttocks at work.”

Chacon’s claim also states that she tried to rebuff Warren’s advances but was threatened with termination if she did. She described herself as a single mom who couldn’t afford to lose her job.

The most disturbing allegation involved a trip Chacon says she made with Warren to his cabin near Oroville. She alleges that he brandished firearms that frightened her and that he laughed. “She feared for her life,” the claim states. “They proceeded to have relations. (Warren) told (Chacon) that at that cabin he could have done anything to her without anyone knowing.”

As Lillis wrote: “Chacon said in her claim that she was fired by the city on June 23 and that she was offered about $16,000 in a settlement agreement. However, it is unclear whether Chacon ever signed a settlement agreement or what issues the city would have settled over.”

In May, a female City Hall staffer claimed that Johnson touched her inappropriately and proposed they engage in a sexual relationship. Estrellita Ilee Muller sought $200,000 in her claim against Johnson. Sacramento’s city attorney and outside counsel hired by the city found the claim to be unsubstantiated.

Johnson denied the allegation and, very soon after it went public, Muller’s lawyer said Muller was “satisfied with the conclusion of this matter.”

The comment by Muller’s lawyer led to speculation that Muller and Johnson had reached some secret financial settlement. It sounds possible, given that Johnson had engaged in an inappropriate relationship with an underage girl when he was an NBA star. That relationship ended with a financial settlement that came with a gag order.

But we don’t know. Neither one is talking. Johnson has been press-shy this summer as negative headlines have piled up in light of Muller’s accusation and disputes over his emails and whether they should be made public.

Johnson and Warren deserve their presumption of innocence. But these are civil matters, not criminal ones. There is a process the city will undertake by hiring outside counsel to investigate the Warren matter. The process could take many weeks, and judgments should be withheld until its conclusion.

Nevertheless, these are two men who rose from economically disadvantaged neighborhoods – Johnson is from Oak Park and Warren is from Del Paso Heights. That they have found themselves accused of exploiting authority rarely wielded by African Americans in this city is dispiriting.

Johnson and Warren are not only friends and close political allies, they are both former athletes. Warren was a star, playing football, basketball and baseball at Grant High School. Johnson is, in my opinion, the greatest prep athlete ever to come out of the city of Sacramento. His number is retired at the gym at UC Berkeley, and he was an NBA superstar.

Sadly, accusations of sexual misconduct – be they harassment or infidelity or promiscuity – are not new, and not surprising anymore, in the world of sports and politics.

Former San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom is running for governor in three years, but he made headlines in 2007 for having an affair with the wife of his campaign manager. How do you do that? How do you have an affair with the wife of the guy working day and night for you? Yet that same year, Newsom was re-elected as mayor. In 2010, he was electedMarcos Breton: Accusations put City Hall culture in question | The Sacramento Bee:

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/news-columns-blogs/marcos-breton/article30003483.html#storylink=cpy

Seattle Schools Community Forum: The Ed Reformers

Seattle Schools Community Forum: The Ed Reformers:

The Ed Reformers

I thought it might be a good idea to review who's out there and what they have been doing.

Of course, the Big Daddy of ed reform (for elected officials) is none other thanArne Duncan.  He seems determined to stay (and stay the course) until the President leaves office.  But Duncan is seeing his "my way or the highway" backfire on him as time has gone by.  He rolled out Race to the Top to both lure and scare districts only to see that the heavy lift of applying made many districts turn away.  I've had yet to hear a news story that has extolled the successes from RttT.  As well, the rewriting of NCLB is likely to see the role of Secretary of Education diminish from the dizzying heights that Duncan took it to during his years as Secretary.


The private Big Daddy of ed reform is none other than Bill Gates.  Looking at his work list, I think you can see a lot of "I created this group and this group and this data cloud" on and on.  But what did he truly accomplish?  It's difficult to discern beyond the biggie of Common Core which was built on his financing of it.

A recent NY Times op-ed by Nicholas Kristof tried to imagine the pillow talk of Mr. and Mrs. Gates.

By my conservative back-of-envelope calculations, the world has saved more than 33 million children’s lives since the foundation was established (although obviously the foundation doesn’t get all the credit). And Bill and Melinda Gates foresee the world saving 61 million children’s lives over the next 15 years with the right investments, as child death rates drop more quickly than they ever have in the history of the world.

That’s the amazing news. In contrast, they acknowledge, the foundation’s investments in education here in the United States haven’t paid off as well.

“There’s no dramatic change,” Bill acknowledged. “It’s not like under-5 mortality, where you see this dramatic improvement.”

I would agree with Mr. Gates; giving a child a vaccine is a pretty quick and easy save.  Trying to understand what creates better public education is a much larger issue.   

Naturally, they have joined the bandwagon of pre-k.  Don't get me wrong, I think preschool is vital especially for at-risk students.  But it always bringing a smile to my face imagining the memo that either got e-mailed or faxed about a year ago that said, "New talking point - preschool."  The Gates say that now Seattle Schools Community Forum: The Ed Reformers:

Could Charter School Scandal Weaken The Kasich Campaign? | John A. Tures

Could Charter School Scandal Weaken The Kasich Campaign? | John A. Tures:

Could Charter School Scandal Weaken The Kasich Campaign?

Ohio Governor John Kasich got some good news, as he made the cut for the Fox News debate. He's also been rising in the polls. But a charter school scandal in Ohio could derail the Kasich 2016 Campaign.

During the 2014 election, three of Kasich's top donors were charter school operator David Brennan and his wife, Ann, and Brennan's company CEO, all of whom donated thousands of dollars to the Ohio Governor's re-election, enabling him to swamp his Democratic rival in fundraising, and later, votes.

Kasich's opponent, Ed FitzGerald, claimed that the Republican had cut money from public schools to give to charter schools which were allegedly performing poorly. His ads even claimed that White Hat Management, another charter school operation, donated thousands of dollars to Kasich in 2010, and got to write the charter school law. But Kasich easily bested his opponent in a good year for Republicans across the country, and Ohio.

After his reelection, Kasich vowed to clean up charter schools, the targets of investigations for a series of corruption scandals and poor academic performance, even as he announced his support for such education institutions.

In addition, Kasich claimed he would regulate charter schools, independently run schools with taxpayer money, having a site where viewers could compare the performance of charter schools and public schools.

Despite the concerns over the scandals and academic struggles, Kasich pushed to reward the charter schools with the prospect increased funding, to upgrade their facilities, with increases in the number of charter schools and their budgets, heading well above a billion dollars, in 2015.

A Washington Post report reveals that Kasich slashed public school funding by half a billion dollars, boosting state spending on charter schools, despite the quality concerns. In fact, the Ohio now spends more per charter school pupil than it does for public school student, while costs have been passed on to local government just to Could Charter School Scandal Weaken The Kasich Campaign? | John A. Tures:

State labor board issues complaint in charter school unionization effort - LA Times

State labor board issues complaint in charter school unionization effort - LA Times:

State labor board issues complaint in charter school unionization effort

California’s labor oversight board has issued a complaint alleging that the largest charter school organization in Los Angeles interfered with the right of its teachers to unionize.

The complaint filed by attorneys with the Public Employment Relations Board alleges that charter school leaders violated state laws by denying pro-union organizers access to school buildings after work hours, distributing documents that criticized unionization efforts and blocking emails to employees.

Alliance College-Ready Public Schools and United Teachers Los Angeles, which is working with a group of educators, have been locked in a battle over efforts to unionize teachers at the charter organization.

The labor board will try to mediate a settlement between the groups on Aug. 21. If an agreement is not reached, a formal hearing will be set before an administrative law judge.

Alliance teachers Elana Goldbaum and Oliver Aguirre said the labor board complaint reaffirms the right of teachers to organize at the campus without fear of reprisal.

“There is definitely an element of hope for me and other teachers as well that we can get a fair and neutral process so we can just have an open conversation,” Goldbaum said.

The teachers union filed charges with the state labor board in April accusing the charter organization of launching an anti-union campaign that violated state laws. By issuing a complaint, the labor board determined that the union provided enough information to merit a hearing.

Alliance leaders said they are not interfering with employees’ rights to unionize, but they will continue to State labor board issues complaint in charter school unionization effort - LA Times:

LAUSD Stop Supporting the Occupation And Militarization of Our Streets and Schools

LAUSD Stop Supporting the Occupation And Militarization of Our Streets and Schools

On Thursday, July 30th at the Los Angeles Unified School Board, the Labor/Community Strategy Center’s Fight for the Soul of the Cities Campaign members and leaders held a demonstration calling on the Los Angeles Unified School District to end the militarization of our schools by ending their relationship with the Federal Department of Defense’s 1033 Program and destroy all equipment received through this program. The Labor/Community Strategy Center’s Fight for the Souls of the Cities Campaign received a second copy of a letter dated June 19th from LAUSD Superintendent Ramon Cortines stating that the Los Angeles School Police Department has “discontinued” participation in the Department of Defense 1033 Program. We recognize that this letter is a critical advance by the LAUSD and LASPD in ending its relationship to this racist program of counter-insurgency. Yet, as a civil rights and human rights organization with deep ties to the 650,000 LAUSD students and many of their parents and teachers – we are obligated to get clear exactly what was done, when, what verification there is, and again what weapons does the LAUSD, if any, still have in its possession.

Support the Fight For the Soul of the Cities: Email Steve Zimmer today: steve.zimmer@lausd.net. Tell him to take a stand and make a motion get the school district out of the 1033 program

Project Fatherhood Builds on Strengths | John Thompson

Project Fatherhood Builds on Strengths | John Thompson:

Project Fatherhood Builds on Strengths

http://www.projectfatherhood.org/

It is not just the education sector that seeks simple solutions for complex, interconnected social problems. Schools aren't alone in hoping that cheap and easy silver bullets will solve intertwined challenges so that we can avoid difficult discussions of uncomfortable dilemmas. But, I read Jorja Leap's Project Fatherhoodfrom the perspective of an inner city teacher. For a less teacher-centric overview, read"Project Fatherhood."

Guided by the farsighted ex-felon "Big Mike" Cummings, Leap and the other founders of Project Fatherhood relearned that "'Everyone longs to connect.'" They organized a community of ex-felons in Watts and helped them face the deep wounds they suffered when growing up without fathers. As Leap learned, "These men - who routinely used guns and dealt drugs and brutalized women and went to prison and had no clue how to father their own children - needed first to be fathered themselves."

As inner city teachers should understand, there are complex reasons why so many of our students challenge us, defying our authority until we show that we are tough enough and, more importantly, care enough. Many students test us, but as with the case with these fathers, a key reason is a lack of trust. Our students are like Leap's fathers who challenge her in order to ask "are you 'for real?'" and "'are you gonna leave us, too?'"

Similarly, urban teachers rarely hear a negative word by a student about their mother. These fathers echoed students' devotion to their mothers which serves as the "protected territory of the hearts, demilitarized zone in lives of conflict."

Domestic abuse is deeply rooted in the lives of Leap's and Big Mike's fathers. As one said, "My daddy hit my mama, and my stepdaddy hit my mama, I guess I was used to it." The same dynamics perpetuate child abuse. Project Fatherhood is especially Project Fatherhood Builds on Strengths | John Thompson:

Sacramento Democratic Party calls for ethics reform in wake of scandals | The Sacramento Bee

Sacramento Democratic Party calls for ethics reform in wake of scandals | The Sacramento Bee:

Sacramento Democratic Party calls for ethics reform in wake of scandals

Sacramento’s Democratic Party leadership is calling for the creation of an ethics commission with enforcement powers in the wake of two sexual harassment complaints made against elected officials at City Hall.

At the same time, the party expressed frustration with a City Council-appointed committee that has been meeting behind closed doors for months exploring potential “good government” measures, including an ethics commission and an independent commission tasked with drawing City Council district boundaries. That committee has not released any findings yet and is expected to continue meeting into the fall.

A former staff aide to Councilman Allen Warren filed a sexual harassment claim against Warren on Friday, alleging he threatened to fire her if she stopped their sexual relationship. The claim also charged that Warren requested the staffer – Delia Chacon –and other city employees work on business for his private development firm, New Faze, during normal city business hours. Warren has declined comment on the claim.

Warren is the chairman of the City Council “good government” committee.

The claim against Warren was filed three months after a City Hall staffer accused Mayor Kevin Johnson of sexual harassment. Johnson denied the claim and a city investigation determined the accusations were unfounded.

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.

Kerri Asbury, chair, Democratic Party of Sacramento County

“The latest allegations of sexual harassment and misuse of public funds by a member of the Sacramento City Council demonstrates a disturbing and disgusting pattern to abuse power and people hired to serve the public,” Kerri Asbury, chairwoman of the Democratic Party of Sacramento County, said in a written statement. “While the councilmember in this latest incident is presumed innocent until proven guilty, the complaint details a shocking work environment that no person should be forced to tolerate.”

Asbury also took aim at Johnson’s well-publicized use of staff aides in his effort to gain control of the National Conference of Black Mayors (NCBM), calling it an attempt to “promote his personal brand and ego” and “a slap in the face of every taxpayer in this city.”

“Enough is enough,” Asbury wrote. “These allegations need to be independently investigated, outside of the political influence of the City Council or the City Manager’s Office. The Sacramento City Council needs to immediately establish an independent ethics commission, with enforcement authority to address complaints of wrongdoing by the mayor and City Council.”

Local watchdog group Eye on Sacramento, the League of Women Voters and other community organizations have held a series of forums in recent months as they explore crafting their own ethics reform package. The groups say they’re hopeful the City Council will agree to adopt their recommendations, but have said they could go to the ballot with their proposal if the council doesn’t go far enough.

Councilman Jay Schenirer, who serves on the council committee, said the group has “talked a lot about an ethics code and strengthening that.” However, he said the committee wants to meet with Eye on Sacramento and the League of Women Voters “to let those guys make a case” before settling on a plan.

“They’ve done a lot of work,” he said. “We want them to come meet with us and talk about their ideas so we can formulate something together that we bring to the council as a whole.”Sacramento Democratic Party calls for ethics reform in wake of scandals | The Sacramento Bee:

Parents Hate Common Core Math—But They're Also Going Back to School to Master It - The Atlantic

Parents Hate Common Core Math—But They're Also Going Back to School to Master It - The Atlantic:

When Parents Are the Ones Getting Schooled by the Common Core

Grownups are hitting the books and taking classes just so they can help their kids with their math homework.

“It feels like a dark time,” wrote the comedian Louis C.K. in a tweet last April. “I’m pissed,” he wrote in another, a few minutes later. C.K. was, indeed, very, very angry. And this time, it wasn’t his own “yucky” existence that was making him fume. Rather, it was a different kind of “massive stressball” irking him: the Common Core State Standards.

In his now-famous rant, the middle-aged father of two lamented the controversial academic benchmarks and the accompanying onslaught of rigorous testing in New York City’s public schools, where his daughters were enrolled. Specifically, C.K. was exasperated by the Common Core’s overhaul of math—a subject his kids, he noted, once loved. “Now it makes them cry,” he tweeted, posting pictures of his then-third-grade daughter’s apparently mind-boggling homework. “Thanks standardized testing and common core!”

Yes, the cynical, self-loathing comedian was stumped by the Common Core. And if the flurry of responses commiserating with C.K. is any indication, so are thousands, if not millions, of other child-rearing adults across the United States. As The Washington Post noted last year, parents are finding themselves “flustered” by their inability to comprehend their kids’ homework. The Common Core standards stress “the application of knowledge through higher-order thinking skills” in math and reading and, although they technically don’t prescribe curriculum, they have incentivized schools to adopt new materials and instructional tactics designed to be more in synch with the new standards. That’s why “old-fashioned” arithmetic methods such as the carry-and-borrow techniqueare being phased out. That’s also why, in large part, the country has seen an outbreak of desperate Facebook pleas, indignant op-eds, talk-show commentary, and mass testing boycotts from parents seeking nothing short of a Common Core apocalypse.

Parents are going back to school—or somehow continuing their education—just to try and make sense of it all.

But amid all that handwringing, another curious and perhaps amusing phenomenon has emerged: Parents are going back to school (or somehow continuing their education) just to try and make sense of it all. School districts across the country are hosting parents’ nights to get them acquainted with the new academic strategies. Nevada’s Clark County School District, for example, has offered twice-monthly, taxpayer-funded seminars devoted to helping parents understand Common Core math. On top of Khan Academy’s resources, parents also have at their disposal a plethora of how-to videos and tip sheets, practice exercises and “road maps.” There’s Common Core Math For Parents For Dummies(with accompanying online videos) or the more general Common Core Standards For Parents For Dummies (sans videos). Or, to change it up, there’s Parents’ Guide to Common Core Arithmetic: How to Help Your Child. For those who really want to Parents Hate Common Core Math—But Their Also Going Back to School to Master It - The Atlantic:

“Children have the capacity to see the wonderful in the ordinary.” – Prof. Philip Jackson | Reclaim Reform

“Children have the capacity to see the wonderful in the ordinary.” – Prof. Philip Jackson | Reclaim Reform:

“Children have the capacity to see the wonderful in the ordinary.” – Prof. Philip Jackson

Posted on August 5, 2015by Ken Previti

“He believed in creating school experiences that provided children access to wonderful lives, because he believed children have the capacity to see the wonderful in the ordinary,” said Catharine Bell, PhD ’07, Jackson’s former doctoral student and friend.

Philip W. Jackson, Professor Emeritus at the University of Chicago, was a true, internationally respected education expert who was dedicated to the education of all children. He died on July 21, 2015 and is marvelously memorialized in a University of Chicago News obituary which draws our attention to his humane educational efforts for educating our children as children.

Unlike the inhumane, data driven, corporate-education-reform, TV talking heads and the political/corporate appointees disguised as education experts, Prof. Jackson actually knew and lived the education processes which are far from standardized.

Prof. Jackson himself was proof of the absurdity of U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s arrogant statement, “We should be able to look every second grader in the eye and say, ‘You’re on track, you’re going to be able to go to a good college, or you’re not.’”

As part of the full obituary we discover the brilliant Prof. Jackson’s personal background.

“Born Dec. 2, 1928, in Vineland, N.J., Jackson was adopted and raised by a family of chicken farmers in rural southern New Jersey. His adoptive parents could not but notice his irrepressible talents, particularly in singing and 

“Children have the capacity to see the wonderful in the ordinary.” – Prof. Philip Jackson | Reclaim Reform:

What Voteria Taught Me

Voteria Project:

What Voteria Taught Me

Big Education Ape: Whatever you call it, bribing voters is a bad idea - LA Times http://bit.ly/1HQdySc

Afew months ago I was approached by Antonio Gonzalez the President of Southwest Voter Education Registration Project to help with a project that eventually became named “Voteria”.   The concept while controversial was simple.  Southwest Voter, a nonprofit dedicated to voter engagement for the last 40 years, would offer a $25K cash sweepstakes that anybody in LAUSD Board District 5 would be entered into if they were registered or became registered and voted in the May 5th election.

The controversy that followed was predictable while the outcome was not.  Personally, like most in the small group of people directly involved in leading the project, I was skeptical of it.  But I was always taught that skepticism is good and should not be a barrier to discovery, so I joined the effort.  The contest moved forward and in fact there is a study conducted by Center for the Study of Los Angeles on the impact of the Voteria that you can see here.  

What I learned is that many people, organizations, and institutions base their political strategy on the fact that Latinos vote in numbers far below our potential.

The study stands on it’s own, but what I personally learned from the effort is an area not yet explored by that study or any study.  What I learned is that many people, organizations, and institutions base their political strategy on the fact that Latinos vote in numbers far below our potential. In addition, I learned that not all of the entities betting on our lack of participation are conservative.

There were certainly critics who were philosophically opposed to offering financial or material incentives for civic engagement and they posited fair and reasoned objections.  However much to my surprise the vast majority of the Voteria critics were concerned that the contest would actually work.  I heard with consistency from people who openly worried that Latinos would turn out and vote for a candidate who had not been endorsed by their favored leadership. Quite frankly, that is a position that I find to be shameful. While there are legitimate arguments against Voteria type efforts, worries that it might get people to the polls is not one of them. I believe that hoping Latinos won’t vote so your candidate can win is even worse than what the LA Times Editorial board referred to as “bribing” people to vote.

Look at the first L.A. Times editorial criticizing Voteria, which stated that if the effort were to be successful that it would be “… a troubling precedent that could easily devolve into an arms race among interest groups trying to get out their votes to influence an election.”  Now wouldn’t that be an unprecedented shame?

Someone should let the LA Times editorial board and others know that interest groups spend Voteria Project:

How to Handle a Bully? - Lily's Blackboard

How to Handle a Bully? - Lily's Blackboard:

How to Handle a Bully?

My friend asked me, “How can you stand him speaking about us like that?!” She was upset because she felt as if Governor Christie wasn’t just speaking to me as president of the National Education Association, but to all the teachers, and all the education support professionals, and all the principals, librarians, and counselors who are members of education unions.

Specifically, in response to a question about who on the national level deserves a “punch in the face,” the New Jersey governor who would like to be the next president of the United States said, “The national teachers’ union.”

Educators recognize the tactics of a playground bully – someone who tries to intimidate with name-calling and threats of violence in order to impress a crowd. I always told my 6th graders not to give bullies power by sinking to their level.

So when this story hit, I took a deep breath and thought long and hard about how to respond to the absurdity of his interview and of the governor’s silly—yet disturbing insults. He seems to desperately need for voters to think that educators are bad people because we tend to speak truth to power; the truth is his education policies have been disastrous. Privatize. De-professionalize. Standardize.

Ignore the fact that parents want to humanize education—not reduce it to a number on a high-stakes test. None of his policies are working, and we’ve not been shy about saying so. If the facts are on your side, you argue the facts. If common sense is on your side, you argue common sense. If nothing is on your side, you call your opponent names.

So he had to call us names.

The facts and common sense are on our side, and he needed to deflect blame for his political decisions. It is why my friend was so upset. She has worked so hard for her students. Our unions have fought for needed textbooks and teaching materials; for class sizes that allow teachers to build a personal relationship with students; for school buildings that are healthy and clean, and support professionals like tutors, librarians and school nurses so kids have all the services essential for success.

We’ve fought against the toxic testing that tells us so little about out students, and yet sucks so much learning from a day. Time that could have been spent organizing a project, or creating a work of art, or collaborating and debating and deciding in small groups the multiple solutions to some real problem—things that defy the standardized A, B, C or All of the Above insanity to which too many politicians and bureaucrats have reduced our classrooms.

The governor is not one of my 12-year-old 6th graders. He is a man. He’s a politician calling teachers—mostly women—who stand up for themselves and their students, insulting names. He doesn’t like us.

We will stand and use the collective power of our union to speak the truth to powerful people, whether they be governors or presidents—or governors who wish they were president. I believe Governor Christie when he says he How to Handle a Bully? - Lily's Blackboard:

Teacher: I’m not Tom Cruise but my job is a lot like ‘Mission Impossible’ - The Washington Post

Teacher: I’m not Tom Cruise but my job is a lot like ‘Mission Impossible’ - The Washington Post:

Teacher: I’m not Tom Cruise but my job is a lot like ‘Mission Impossible’

David Lee Finkle is a middle-school teacher in Florida who draws the comic strip “Mr. Fitz” for the Daytona Beach News-Journal. He has done some unusual work in this space, including this moving series of cartoons in which he tells the story of his own depression, which he says is the the result of the changes reform has brought to his classroom and his profession. Finkle is the author of books for teachers on student writing and of three young adult novels: “Making My Escape” as well as “Portents” and “Portals” (co-authored with his son, Christopher). His comic strip can be found online atwww.mrfitz.com and at the Facebook page Mr. Fitz Comic Strips, and you can follow him on Twitter @DLFinkle. He blogs at The Real Mr. Fitz.

Here is a new post from him about being a teacher, looking at the job as it is today from a different point of view. A version appeared on his blog.

By David Lee Finkle

My family has been having some summer fun catching up on the “Mission: Impossible” movies and seeing the new one,  “Mission: Impossible, Rogue Nation.” In nearly every one of this films, there is a mole in the Impossible Missions Force, or a betrayal in IMF, or a shutdown, or a disavowal. Ethan Hunt, Tom Cruise’s character, is nearly always on the run from his own organization. He is blamed for its failures. His successes are never really appreciated, or at least only appreciated during the last five minutes of a given movie before it all goes downhill again in the next one. In nearly every movie, he not only has to do his job, he has to work against his own organization’s dysfunction to get it done. Why does he even keep working for the IMF? It’s ludicrous!

But Cruise/Ethan just keeps on going, through near drownings, car chases, motorcycle chases, skyscraper climbs — and even death (getting resuscitated not once but twice). He keeps on going in the face of attempted IMF shutdowns and despite being made a scapegoat, going on the run as a desperate fugitive. He keeps doing it because he… believes in the mission.

And then I realized that maybe the series wasn’t so ludicrous after all.

As a public school teacher, I work for an organization that often betrays its own ideals. It often betrays mine, that’s for sure. I work for an organization that numerous other organizations are working hard to shut down. I have to go undercover sometimes, or go rogue. If I were in this profession for the pay, the ease of the job, or any overall measure of job satisfaction, I would quit. But I keep going.

I believe in the mission.

As public school teachers, we may not be sneaking into secure facilities and engaging high speed chases and shootouts, but our mission is just as urgent as the IMF’s, and the things we’re up against are often nearly as sinister.

Public school teachers: your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to Teacher: I’m not Tom Cruise but my job is a lot like ‘Mission Impossible’ - The Washington Post:

CURMUDGUCATION: The Human-Proof Classroom

CURMUDGUCATION: The Human-Proof Classroom:
The Human-Proof Classroom

I am a big believer in having a teacher toolbox chock full of many and varied tools. I also believe that just because a tool doesn't work well for me, that doesn't mean it can't work for someone else.

            Nevertheless, there are some approaches that simply don't belong in a classroom ever.

Take scripting. Scripted lessons have been with us for a while, even before the folks at EngageNY decided that having teachers travel in lockstep through units was somehow a good idea.

            Scripting has always had apologists. Way back in 2007, Georgia teacher educator Michelle Commeyras took to the pages of the Phi Delta Kappa magazine to make a half-hearted case for scripting. Commeyras traces the modern scripted lesson back to Siegfried Engelmann and Carl Bereiter, "who in the 1960s developed the direct instruction method of teaching reading to raise the academic success of inner-city children." This is unsurprising; rich school districts will be looking for teachers who know what they're talking about, not those who need a script.

            Commeyras shared my attitude--at first. But she insisted that the more she watched teachers work from scripts, the more she saw good teachers who made individual choices. In other words, they worked over and above the script. Beyond the script. Off the script. Which is kind of my point. If you need a script to work in a classroom, you don't belong in a classroom.

            Commeyras was writing in 2007, before the newest, biggest wave of reformsterism hit the beach like a tanker full of whale carcasses, each one of those carcasses stamped "teacher-proof." Publishers promised programs that could not be bollixed up by a teacher. Just open the box, hand out the materials, read the script, and deliver the content.

            Commeyras offered an analogy that has been oft-repeated--it's just like having an actor read a script, bringing the character to life through the actor's choices, movement, reading, and action. Different actors can still make different choices; Ryan Gosling and Mel Brooks would make very different Hamlets.

            But the actor analogy doesn't hold up. Actors and playwrights collaborate to bring a character to life, to put a living breathing human in front of the audience. Manufacturers of teaching scripts are doing the opposite--doing their best to erase every tiny piece of real, live human from the teacher's performance. Shakespeare wrote lines and it makes all the difference who reads them. But it's supposed to make no difference at all which "actor" delivers a Success for All lesson.

            But reading Edushyster today made me realize just how much worse things have gotten.Amy Berard's account of being coached in the No Nonsense Nurturing school of schooling is CURMUDGUCATION: The Human-Proof Classroom:

Winning International Competition

Hey, look! According to reporting in the New York Times and the Washington Post, some jobs are coming back from China. I wonder why that is.

The NYT piece by Hiroko Tabuchi focuses on the textile industry. Currently some Chinese companies are opening plants in the American South; the piece is anchored by a look at a worker from the Chinese plant training American workers to do her job in a highly automated plant that may use as few as 500 workers.

Why is this happening? Are the heads of these corporations saying, "Wow! Now that a generation of workers have grown up with the Common Core and had their educational achievement certified by high stakes standardized tests, we totally want to come employ these workers who are clearly bastions of international competitiveness." Or perhaps the bosses are saying, "These Chinese workers just don't have the deep level of educational achievement that

Well, no. They're not. From Ana Swenson's piece in the Washington Post:

Even when adjusted for productivity, Chinese manufacturing wages have risen by 187 percent over the decade. Industrial electricity costs have grown 66 percent, while natural gas costs are up 138 percent.
 
In the same time frame, U.S. wages have risen only 27 percent, while natural gas costs have fallen 25 percent, according to Boston Consulting.

Yes, shockingly, the international competition is about what it's always been about-- money. Having textiles manufactured in China by workers who work for peanuts in the cheapest of manufacturing conditions used to be the winning formula. Now Chinese want more pay, and demand has pushed up the cost of running manufacturing facilities.

Competing for those jobs is not about having the best public school educational standards. It has never been about that. It's about mustering a competent work force that will work cheap in cheap 

Winning International Competition

Superintendent Scarice addresses the powerful and ugly truth about SBAC testing charade - Wait What?

Superintendent Scarice addresses the powerful and ugly truth about SBAC testing charade - Wait What?:
Superintendent Scarice addresses the powerful and ugly truth about SBAC testing charade

With Connecticut’s State Department of Education refusing to release the results of the 2015 Common Core Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) in a timely manner – other states released their state wide results at least six weeks ago – Madison, Connecticut Superintendent Thomas Scarice speaks the truth about the unfair, inappropriate and discriminatory SBAC testing scam.

Scarice is widely recognized as a leader in the effort to provide parents with accurate information about their rights when it comes to opting out their children from the SBAC testing scheme and 86 percent high school juniors in Madison did not take the test design that was purposely defined to label them failures.

In his latest commentary piece, Scarice addresses the most fundamental failure of all when it comes to the SBAC test.

You can find and comment on Superintendent Scarcie’s MUST READ piece on the CTMirror at: SBAC: Data but no meaning, when meaning matters most

Madison Superintendent Thomas Scarice writes;

I can still feel the slap of his small leather batting glove in the palm of my hand as he rounded first base.  By the time he reached home plate, occasionally touching the ground in route, my 8-year-old son, Owen, and I shared a moment that cannot truly be captured by words, and by no means, captured by numbers.

Owen hit a grand slam …over the fence… in a baseball tournament watched by a generous crowd of his closest friends and teammates.  A volcanic eruption of joy.  An eternal moment between a father and son.  The slap of our hands in mid-flight, a celebration marked by a selfless love that can only be felt by a parent.

Although we possess a breathtaking picture, a moment frozen in time, the depth of pride and mutual excitement can never be held or touched, nor could it ever be quantified.

A boy clutching his dad.  A boundless, timeless, indescribable bond.

Moments like this define us in profound ways, big and small.  Their meaning deepens as a result of context.  It deepens as a result of the story behind the moment. Viewed in isolation, with a faceless boy and faceless adult, this moment loses all of its meaning.  In a sense, this moment can be dehumanized with numbers and symbols replacing the faces and stories, with callous 

Superintendent Scarice addresses the powerful and ugly truth about SBAC testing charade - Wait What?: