Diner Deals: How The UFT, DOE, and State of New York Conspired To Harm Teachers While Enriching Themselves....Oops, I Mean New York State...or Not You

 The conclusion of most, if not all the teachers and DOE employees I have spoken with, is that the new Danielson evaluation system stinks....should be thrown out pronto.

As I urged in my previous article, Movement Starts: Toward an End To Involuntary Payment of Dues to the UFT , dues-paying members of the UFT should look into stopping their waste of money into the pockets of UNITY hacks who do deals behind closed doors.

What has Mike Mulgrew done to help you? Yes, I mean YOU, if you are paying dues. If you cannot answer this question, shouldn't you try to stop paying Mike Mulgrew and start putting all of your dues money into YOUR welfare? Call the UFT Welfare Fund. Tell them you want all of your dues to go to them for your health and welfare.

Maybe those folks at 52 Broadway will start picking up the phone and really advocate for members, if their salary is merit-based and not automatic.

Give the UFT UNITY CAUCUS members MERIT PAY and/or a commission based upon the number of successful cases brought to grievances or 3020-a.

 Betsy Combier

 

Assembly Democrats are opposed to Gov. Cuomo’s new, $224 million line in the sand in the city’s teacher evaluation fight  

Some 60% of Assembly Democrats represent city districts, making the issue of vital importance to their conference

Comments (3)

BY KENNETH LOVETT / DAILY NEWS ALBANY BUREAU CHIEF, Jan 28, 2013

 

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ALBANY — Assembly Democrats are strongly opposed to Gov. Cuomo’s decision to impose a second strings-attached deadline on the city to approve a teacher evaluation plan.

The chamber’s Democrats — a majority of whom represent city districts — fear children could once again suffer as a result of Cuomo’s call to put another $224 million in state education aid on the line in the evaluation war.

RELATED: BLOOMY SLAMS UFT FOR POOR TEACHER EVALUATION PLAN, UFT FIRES BACK

City schools lost $450 million in state and federal funding when Mayor Bloomberg and city teachers union President Michael Mulgrew failed to reach agreement on an evaluation plan by a Jan. 17 deadline. Now, Cuomo has set a new deadline of Sept. 1, and his 2013-14 budget plan will yank $224 million in planned aid to city schools if it is not met.

“I thought he was going to be the lobbyist for the students,” a city-based Assembly Democrat cracked, making light of Cuomo’s boast from his 2012 State of the State address. “How does taking money away from school programs help the kids?”

RELATED: BLOOMBERG SUGGESTS CUOMO TO HELP IN EVALUATION DEAL

SMITH FOR NEWS

A source close to Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver indicated the conference of legislators in the Assembly representing New York City could side against Cuomo's new deadline for a teacher evaluation plan due to the risk of losing city education funding.

A source close to Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan) said the issue is vital to the conference, given that 60% of its members represent the city.

Assembly Democrats note that the state share of funding the city lost at the Jan. 17 deadline — $250 million — was a planned 4% increase in education funding in the 2012-13 budget. That depleted the city’s education aid base, they say, making city schools less able to withstand potential loss of the additional state funding Cuomo is dangling to coax a deal out of the two sides.

RELATED: BIG IDEAS BY THE DOZENS

“Compounding the cuts in the budget would be very difficult because ultimately it hurts children,” the Silver source said.

Cuomo defended his proposal last week during a discussion with the Daily News editorial board, pointing out that the city was one of only six school districts statewide that failed to adopt an evaluation plan by the Jan. 17 deadline.

“When 99% of the school districts figure out how to do it, I don’t think you can say the methodology has failed,” Cuomo said.

Mayor Bloomberg is expected to address the school aid controversy when he provides budget testimony at a joint legislative hearing in Albany Monday. It will mark the last time as mayor he will deliver such testimony.

klovett@nydailynews.com

 

Top aides to Mayor Bloomberg, Gov. Cuomo and union leaders reach historic agreement on teacher evaluations

Deal enables city to get millions in federal funds

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Comments (14)

BY KENNETH LOVETT AND BEN CHAPMAN / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

PUBLISHED: THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 2012, 12:08 PM

 

 

Top aides to Mayor Bloomberg and Gov. Cuomo and union leaders struck a historic agreement on teacher evaluations just before sunrise Thursday after all-night negotiations fueled by green tea and coffee.

The 5:30 a.m. deal broke the tense stalemate between Bloomberg and United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew over the appeals process for teachers given low ratings.

Left unresolved at that moment was Mulgrew’s demand that Bloomberg cancel plans to shutter as many as 33 struggling schools.

As the city was coming to life, Bloomberg and Mulgrew faced each other over three cups of coffee at the Viand Cafe, a mayoral favorite on the upper East Side.

“I just kept filling the cups,” said waitress Roxana Colla, 46.

Neither side gave ground on the closures, though, leaving a crucial decision to Cuomo, sources said.

But the governor decided the fight over the closures was not his — and said the evaluation plan was a done deal.

All sides praised the agreement, which clears the way for the state to qualify for nearly $1 billion in federal education money, including $60 million designated for struggling city schools.

“This is a win-win-win for the kids and for the adults,” Bloomberg said at an afternoon press conference, acknowledging that the city and union still need to hash out some details of the state’s hard-won agreement. “Every one of us should have a smile on our face. We did something really good that’s going to make the school system in New York City that much better.”

Negotiations heated up Tuesday after Cuomo — who threatened to implement his own ratings plan in the budget if the sides didn’t come together — declared the relationship between the city and UFT “toxic.”

“The governor was being a coach. He was working the room,” said one source. “It was a combination of (nudges) and hugs.”

Mulgrew, chief city lobbyist Micah Lasher and others hunkered down in Cuomo chief of staff Larry Schwartz’s office starting 8 a.m. Wednesday, sources said.

The talks, held in person and over the phone, then stretched until the wee hours Thursday when the appeals process for city teachers — modeled after one in New Haven — was finalized.

Under the terms of the groundbreaking deal, which settles the state teachers union lawsuit against the 2010 evaluation law, 60% of instructor evaluations will be based on measures of teacher performance, such as classroom observations.

The remaining 40% will be based on student achievement, with at least half of that component coming from student progress on state exams.

Cuomo also wrote into the plan an appeals process for city teachers who earn poor ratings, the bone of contention that caused talks between the city and UFT to break down Dec. 30.

Under the new agreement, city teachers rated ineffective will be monitored by an independent validator.

If the principal still rates the teacher poorly after a second year and the validator agrees, then the teacher must fight the firing. If the monitor disagrees, the city needs to prove that the teacher should be canned.

Under the new system, the union will have the right to appeal up to 13% of the first-year ineffective ratings with an independent panel.

Until the city and the teachers union officially ink a deal, a 4% increase in state aid for city schools still hangs in the balance.

The remaining sticking point is the 33 schools where, in his State of the City address, Bloomberg threatened to fire half the staff in an effort to collect the federal funds endangered by the evaluation impasse.

A source said city officials feared Mulgrew would torpedo the evaluation deal over the issue. But he stood by Cuomo as he announced the accord in a 12:15 p.m. press conference.

“We’ve had 10 years of education reform through destruction,” said Mulgrew, who added that the union will “challenge each and every one” of the mayor’s school closings.

With Edgar Sandoval, Tina Moore and Rachel Monahan

bchapman@nydailynews.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



 

 

Mike Bloomberg Says Bill De Blasio's Campaign is Racist...He Should Have Hidden His Bi-Racial Marriage???

 

Mike Bloomberg

What was Mike Bloomberg thinking?

In a wide-ranging and unfiltered interview with New York Magazine's Chris Smith, New York Mayor Bloomberg charged that Public Advocate Bill de Blasio, the front-runner for the Democratic nomination to succeed him, is running a "racist" campaign. He also criticized de Blasio for using his family — he's white, his wife is black and they have two mixed-race children — to make a race-based appeal to voters.

Here's the exchange:

Then there’s Bill de Blasio, who’s become the Democratic front-runner. He has in some ways been running a class-warfare campaign—
Class-warfare and racist.

Racist? 
I mean he’s making an appeal using his family to gain support. I think it’s pretty obvious to anyone watching what he’s been doing. I do not think he himself is racist. It’s comparable to me pointing out I’m Jewish in attracting the Jewish vote. You tailor messages to your audiences and address issues you think your audience cares about.

This is bizarre for several reasons. A key reason is that it's a political gift to de Blasio, who has been getting tremendous traction with Democratic primary voters by painting himself as the anti-Bloomberg. Now he gets to spend the last four days of the primary campaign defending himself against Bloomberg's baseless charge of racism.

Bloomberg also helped de Blasio by declaring that The New York Times was right to endorse Council Speaker Christine Quinn in the Democratic primary. Though Bloomberg and Quinn are politically aligned, he's previously avoided explicitly endorsing her, probably because his endorsement actually hurts in the Democratic primary. Now she has it, to her detriment.

And then he echoed Mitt Romney, saying de Blasio's "tale of two cities" message is wrong because "this city is not two groups, and if to some extent it is, it’s one group paying for services for the other."

Buried deep in this statement, Bloomberg has a valid point: New York City depends heavily on its tax base of rich bankers and businesspeople to finance a generous welfare state, and it should enact policies that grow that tax base. But framing the city's wealth divide in makers vs. takers terms only makes de Blasio's message more appealing to the large majority of the electorate that does not consist of high-paid bankers.

When I finished reading this long interview — which includes a defense of basically every unpopular thing Bloomberg has ever done, from appointing Cathie Black as schools chancellor to trying to build a football stadium on the west side of Manhattan — what I most wondered is why Bloomberg agreed to give the interview at all. It's a trainwreck, bad for his legacy and bad for his preferred candidates to succeed him. Why didn't he just keep his mouth shut?

I think the answer is that Bloomberg is angry. He thinks he's been a great mayor — perhaps the best mayor in New York City's history. And he's had to spend a year watching the field of candidates to succeed him lambaste his record — a field he sees as so mediocre that he reportedly tried to invite every high-profile potential candidate you would think of, plus some you wouldn't, like ex-Philadelphia Mayor and Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell.

E-Accountability. It's Time.

As we head into the campaign season, let's all remember the people who have stood up and said "No" and "No way" to Mayor Mike Bloomberg for 12 years. Then we all should - no, must -hold Mayor Bloomberg, Joel Klein, Cathie Black, Dennis Walcott and all their willing subordinates accountable for denying employees, parents and children their due process rights while in office. 

Definition of ACCOUNTABILITY: the quality or state of being accountable; especially : an obligation or willingness to accept responsibility or to account for one's actions."

Accountability matters. Anyone "suddenly" changing his or her mind now in order to curry favor is not worth voting for, in my opinion.

Betsy Combier
Editor of NYC Rubber Rook Reporter
President, The E-Accountability Foundation, a 501 (C) 3 which holds people accountable for their actions online

Education, Vision and the Mayor’s Race

By THE EDITORIAL BOARD

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The Democratic candidates for New York mayor, whirling around the boroughs on the debate-and-forum carousel, have been struggling for advantage and the attention of tuned-out voters. But they have had no trouble infuriating the Bloomberg administration, which seems to be getting touchier about criticism as it heads to the exits.

Exhibit A was a candidates’ forum on May 11 with the United Federation of Teachers, where they took turns blasting the mayor’s record on school reform. It was five Democrats — and Adolfo Carrión Jr., who’s running on the Independence Party line — in pursuit of an endorsement, so flattery and incumbent-bashing were expected. But the jabs made the mayor go all-but-apocalyptic in reply: “If the next mayor really is serious about kowtowing to demands from some radicals in a union,” he said, “then this city does not have a future.”

Mr. Bloomberg’s schools chancellor, Dennis Walcott, called the criticism an “unconscionable” assault on the Education Department and accused the candidates of lacking vision. On Saturday, at a conference in Brooklyn for school administrators, he foretold a “tragedy” if the next mayor did not continue Mr. Bloomberg’s policies.

But after 12 years, this mayor’s ideas are due for a counterargument. The critiques the candidates are offering hardly shock the conscience, and their complaints about the Bloomberg administration can be heard from teachers and parents in any school in the city.

The school system has indeed gone overboard in relying on standardized testing. Tests need to be a means to the end of better instruction, not the pedagogical obsession they have become. Yes, Mr. Bloomberg has shown disdain for consultation, as in his rush to close underperforming schools without the full and meaningful involvement of affected communities. The system needs to strengthen neighborhoods’ connection to schools and reconnect with parents who feel shut out. And while charter schools can be a path to excellence, they can also cause problems. Shoehorning them into existing school buildings over local objections can alienate parents and reinforce among students a harmful sense of being separate and unequal.

When Mr. Bloomberg won direct control of public education in 2002, it was a historic and necessary victory, ending a system of local districts that was grossly dysfunctional and unaccountable. The candidates should not be allowed to downplay or deny how bad things were when nobody was in charge.

But there can be truth in applause lines. Comptroller John Liu spoke for many at the forum when he told of his frustrating inability, as a parent, to give input to school officials. And William Thompson Jr., a former city comptroller, answered Mr. Walcott in a statement on Saturday by noting the incompleteness of educational gains: “For 12 years, the mayor has vilified teachers, shut out parents, turned classrooms into test prep centers and closed community schools. We have tried those policies, and our kids are still not receiving the education they deserve.”

The candidates are not above campaign mushiness and overpromising. While they support a long list of desirable things, like arts and music, smaller classes and community schools that provide health and social services in poor neighborhoods, they have been vague about how to pay for them. When asked at the U.F.T. forum to embrace the union dogma that only an educator can be chancellor, they all did, except for City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who said, sensibly, “Not necessarily.” Nobody vowed to be tough in negotiating a new teachers’ contract. But that wasn’t going to happen before this group anyway.

The Democrats have work to do before the September primary to persuasively show how — and with what money — they would make the city’s schools better. They will be competing not only with a defensive mayor, but with voters’ inattention and distractions, especially if former Congressman Anthony Weiner cannonballs into the pool.

They have begun laying out ideas. Mayor Bloomberg and his aides are upset that the visions aren’t his. But they should not deny that alternate visions could exist, or the possibility that they could be better than the one we have.

Daily News Editorial: Anyone Re-assigned Should Be Terminated

From Betsy Combier: 

Most people have an idea about the Bloomberg administration and tenure rights: chop off "their" heads!! I mean, of course, all teachers with tenure.

The NY Daily News is the public relations rag of the Bloomberg juggernaut, and as usual its' Editors scream in unison with Bloomie and his puppet Dennis Walcott about how keeping alleged criminals on the payroll is unconscionable.
See below. Oh - and I have a bridge to sell you, if you believe the guk the NY Daily News Editors come up with.

Betsy Combier

 

Bounce ’em all

EDITORIALS

Saturday, October 20, 2012

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Yes, the Education Department has whittled the number of allegedly incompetent or wayward teachers warehoused in rubber rooms to just 220 or so.

And, yes, the department and the United Federation of Teachers are resolving the charges lodged against idled instructors a good deal more quickly than they had in the past.

But, no, all is not well.

Responding to the Daily News’ disclosure that school system was still warehousing a large number of teachers at a cost of $22 million annually, Bloomberg admitted Friday:

“I know it’s galling, and it is real money.”

He’s got that right.

Teachers are removed from classrooms and placed in so-called reassignment centers when administrators conclude that they should not have further contact with children.

Charges are then adjudicated in an extraordinarily unwieldy arbitration process.

Most should be given support assignments, but many pass the time staring at the walls — to the department’s discredit.

The system is so cumbersome that administrators file charges against only a minuscule percentage of instructors and school leaders.

Around 200 educators a year are charged with incompetence or misconduct in any given academic year — a measly one-quarter of 1% of 80,000 teachers and principals.

On the brighter side, when the department does proceed against teachers, its batting average is better than you might expect.

During the 2010-11 school year, the disciplinary system closed 419 misconduct or incompetence cases. Forty-four percent of the targeted teachers and principals got fired or quit.

Departures by those charged with poor performance were particularly prevalent. Roughly 80% left the schools, and the rest were deemed suitable to return to classroom duties.

The lesson for Chancellor Dennis Walcott: File more charges.