The UFT and the Inability to Admit Wrongdoing
On the other hand, I knew it immediately upon seeing it. I had just started this blog, with the specific intent of trying to counter the crap I was always reading in the tabloids. I had gotten a few columns in NY Teacher and was interested in supporting the union. I knew almost nothing about union politics. When Edwize appeared, I was excited. I thought this was a great step for the union, and I was getting ready to dump this blog and start writing for Edwize instead.
The 05 contract changed everything. It turned out neither Edwize nor NY Teacher wanted to hear how awful the new contract was. The ATR was just a temporary problem. This was not the first time it had happened. No one in leadership seemed to know that Joel Klein would continue to hire new teachers even as our colleagues lingered as longtime subs. No one in leadership seemed to understand that a raise was doing the same job for more money, or that if you worked extra hours, did extra tasks and received extra money, that this was not a raise.
The thing that's problematic about our leadership is this--they never make mistakes. While they may admit to doing something wrong ten years ago, that has no bearing on the present. So what if they negotiated a junk science law, the beauty of which was that we could negotiate a good portion of the junk science? So what if, when that didn't pan out, we left it in the hands of fanatical ideologue John King?
It was a great victory when we fought Mayor Bloomberg and made all Danielson domains were part of observations. It was also a great victory when we changed that and made only 8 domains part. It was a great victory when we gave teachers the opportunity to use artifacts in NYC Educator: The UFT and the Inability to Admit Wrongdoing:
