Time for people to change their minds about Easley | DeFENSE

Time for people to change their minds about Easley | DeFENSE

Time for people to change their minds about Easley

by admin

as presented to the North City Park Community Association meeting on February 22

Dear Neighbors of the North City Park Community:

Many of you may have recently been reading in the Denver Post about the campaign to recall Nate Easley, Ph.D., current president of the Denver Public School Board. Unfortunately, the authors of these opinion pieces have presented their views without contacting community groups to verify their suppositions for the genesis of this initiative. I want to take a few minutes to inform you of the real issues that caused members of the community to take this course of action as it relates to Dr. Easley’s performance as the representative of the Greater Northeast District of Denver. Many of the community members involved with this action are former supporters of Dr. Easley and campaigned on his behalf in his election campaign.

• Dr. Easley appears to have a conflict of interest with his additional position as Deputy Director of the Denver Scholarship Foundation while DPS Board member Theresa Pena serves on the governing board of

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Which side are you on? #wisolidarity #wiunion

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by Mike Klonsky

After his friend and former colleague, Diane Ravitch declared, "I Stand With the Teachers of Wisconsin," AEI'sRick Hess somehow felt compelled to make clear to his patrons exactly where he stands. No surprise there since Hess' organization is funded by union-busting billionaires like the Koch Brothers.

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Speaking of which-- Gov. Walker is now the laughing stock of Wisconsin after his recorded butt-kissing conversation with David Koch impersonator and Buffalo Beast editor, Ian Murphy. Trying to impress his patron with his cleverness, Koch revealed his secret plan to trick boycotting Democratic senators back to Madison for a

Madison police chief asks Walker to explain 'troubling' statements #wisolidarity #wiunion

Madison police chief asks Walker to explain 'troubling' statements

Madison police chief asks Walker to explain 'troubling' statements

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DEE J. HALL | dhall@madison.com | 608-252-6132 | (146) Comments | Posted: Thursday, February 24, 2011 9:36 am

Madison Police Chief Noble Wray

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Madison Police Chief Noble Wray Thursday asked Gov. Scott Walker to explain his "troubling" and "unsettling" statements captured in a secretly recorded phone conversation that he "thought about" planting troublemakers among the thousands of peaceful demonstrators at the Capitol.

The protests, heading into their 11th day, are aimed at a bill Walker proposed to strip most bargaining rights from state and local unionized employees in Wisconsin.

"I spent a good deal of time overnight thinking about Governor Walker's response, during his news conference yesterday (Wednesday), to the suggestion that his administration 'thought about'

Schools Matter: An attempt to manufacture a reading crisis in Wisconsin #wisolidarity #wiunion

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An attempt to manufacture a reading crisis in Wisconsin

by skrashen

On Feb 22, CNSnews.com proclaimed that "Two-Thirds of Wisconsin Public-School 8th Graders Can’t Read Proficiently": They stated that only 32% of Wisconsin eighth graders scored at the "proficient" level or above on the 2009 NAEP.

Actually, the percentage is 34%. And this figure is not shockingly low.

Gerald Bracey published several penetrating critiques of the NAEP performance levels (see, for example, his book Reading Educational Research: How to Avoid Getting Statistically Snookered) pointing out that NAEP's “proficient” level is set very high, and that other countries that consistently rank near the top of the world in reading would not do well on our NAEP: For example, only one-third of Swedish children would be considered “proficient” on the NAEP, nearly the identical percentage of Wisconsin's fourth (33%) and eighth (34%) graders

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Here’s a post from an unknown author that has become popular with teachers on Facebook. It speaks for itself. Teachers’ hefty salaries are driving up taxes, and they only work 9 or 10 months a year! It’s time we put things in perspective and pay them for what they do - babysit! We can get that for less than minimum wage. That’s right. Let’s give them $3 an hour and only the hours they worked; not any of that silly planning time, or any time they spend before or after school. That would be $19.50 a day (7:45 to 3:00 PM with 45 min. off for lunch and plan-- that equals 6 1/2 hours). Each parent should pay $19.50 a day for these teachers to baby-sit their children. Now how many students do they teach in a day...maybe 30? So that’s $19.50 x 30 = $585 a day. However, remember

Schools Matter: Corporate Full Court Press in Missouri: Teachers, Administrators, School Boards Fight Back

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by Jim Horn

Corporate lobbyists, corporate foundation stooges, and ed industry bottom feeders are descending on state legislatures across America, trying to take advantage of shortfalls in public funds following the Heist of the Century by Wall Street banksters in 2008.

Bare-knuckled tactics abound, pushing cheap vouchers, cheap charters, and cheap teaching, all under the control of corporate boards, foundations, and the local crooks hired to implement these testing factories that further segregate, contain, and behaviorally sterilize urban children.

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Fighting for collective bargaining rights. « Fred Klonsky's blog #wisolidarity #wiunion

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Dozens of Park Ridge Education Association members are heading to Madison on Saturday to rally in support of our union brothers and sisters in WEAC.

We’re doing it because an injury to one is an injury to all.

We’re doing it because Republican governors across the country have conspired to target collective bargaining

Biggest day of demonstrations in state history set for Thursday, unions say #wisolidarity #wiunion

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BILL NOVAK | The Capital Times | bnovak@madison.com | (21) Comments | Posted: Thursday, February 24, 2011 7:15 am

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Protests against Gov. Scott Walker's budget repair bill are spreading across the Badger State.

Thousands of people are expected to show up at rallies, vigils and town hall meetings on Thursday in what union officials are calling the biggest day of demonstrations outside of Madison in state history.

Labor officials announced on Wednesday that protests were being organized, and details were released Thursday on where and when the protests are set.

One of the more creative protests is a series of five rallies set to take place at 4 p.m. on bridges and overpasses in Green Bay.

In an e-mail from the state AFL-CIO, protesters at the Thursday rallies "will demand an end to the

The Answer Sheet - The day all the public schools died #wiunion

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This satirical post was written by Mark Phillips, professor emeritus of secondary education at San Francisco State University and author of a monthly column on education for the Marin Independent Journal.

By Mark Phillips

And if I laugh at any mortal thing, ‘Tis that I may not weep” --Lord Byron

Summer vacations will be extended in all public schools in the U.S. this year. They will now be year-round.

This announcement yesterday by the Secretary of Education, which shocked parents all over the country, has been directly traced to the combined effects of the government programs No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top. As one local teacher, now an applicant to teach on Mark Zuckerberg’s new Textbook, put it, “Now that the schools are

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I always get confused by February, by which I mean that March always sneaks up on me quicker than I expect, and this year is no exception. Which is why I only just realized that March 2 is only six days away.

March 4, 2010 saw a huge co-ordinated national day of action in support of public higher education, with well over one hundred campuses in more than thirty states participating. The March 2nd day of action, organized

Shanker Blog » A Wisconsin Moment For Our Education Policy Debate #wiunion

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There is an obvious, albeit somewhat uncomfortable connection between what’s happening in Wisconsin and what’s been happening in education policy discussions.

A remarkably high proportion of the discussion is focused – implicitly or explicitly – on the presumed role of teachers’ unions. The public is told that our school systems are failing, and that teachers’ unions are at leastpartially to blame because they protect bad teachers and block “needed” reforms such as merit pay. In this storyline, unions are faceless villains that put the interests of adults above those of children.

Wisconsin represents a threat to this perspective in at least three important manners.

First, and most basically, it is illustrating the weakness of one of the most important concepts in our debate – the idea that one can support teachers, but hate their unions. To some degree, the distinction is plausible: Disagreeing with the organization that represents a given profession certainly does not imply animosity towards its members, and not all teachers agree with everything unions do (as is the case in any democratic

On the Ground in Wisconsin - Bridging Differences - Education Week #wiunion

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Dear Diane,

I am trying to stay angry, so I won't be overcome by sadness, Diane. But last Saturday I found a way to overcome the sadness in another way—by joining a public action.

Writing about what's happening to our country (and our world) doesn't do it for me, and I have no daily responsibilities for educating our youth to keep me hopeful. But on Saturday I went, quite by accident, to Madison to join the demonstrators. It was the end of a fascinating week "on the road"—from southern Ohio; Chicago; Mundelein, Ill.: and Wisconsin. In the midst of the annual North Dakota Study Group (NDSG) gathering in Mundelein, Bob Peterson (of Rethinking Schools) came to talk about events in Wisconsin; when he finished, we all rose to applaud him and within 15 minutes we cancelled the day's remaining sessions, climbed into whatever vehicles we could find, and headed off to Madison—a two- to three-hour trip.

It was an amazing day as you can see from the two photos in this blog. (The photo below captures me—holding