NYSUT And The UFT, Allied Again With Cuomo, Spend Millions On Propaganda To Fool Their Members And The Public

Had some fun on Twitter yesterday with a couple of union hacks, one the PR guy from NYSUT, that went something like this:

@perdidostschool @edbobgreen @nysut Why do deliberately misstate our position and communications? Hard to debate nonsense.

— Carl Korn (@CarlKornNYSUT) January 23, 2016

My response:

@CarlKornNYSUT @edbobgreen @nysut Who's misstating? You say no state tests in evals. Regents exams are in evals.

— rbe (@perdidostschool) January 23, 2016

@CarlKornNYSUT @edbobgreen @nysut When you say there's a moratorium on state tests in APPR, you are wrong.

— rbe (@perdidostschool) January 23, 2016

There was no response from Carl Korn, but another union hack jumped in with this bit of genius:

@perdidostschool @edbobgreen @CarlKornNYSUT 3-8 NYS tests in my eval this year? Zilch, nada, bubkis. Union still supports my kids #optout.

— Don C. (@TchrNORPAC) January 23, 2016

My response to that:

@TchrNORPAC @edbobgreen @CarlKornNYSUT You do know CCSS Regents exams are in APPR, yes? Those don't count?

— rbe (@perdidostschool) January 23, 2016

Lace To The Top jumped in with this very relevant fact:

@perdidostschool @TchrNORPAC @edbobgreen @CarlKornNYSUT and 3-8 Eval scores will still be generated and be used as "advisory"

— lacetothetop (@lacetothetop) January 23, 2016

Which got this response from said union hack:

@perdidostschool @edbobgreen @CarlKornNYSUT Got it. Get it. Still work to do. Still making progress.

— Don C. (@TchrNORPAC) January 23, 2016

To which I responded:

@TchrNORPAC @edbobgreen @CarlKornNYSUT No, you get zilch, bupkis, nada - to use your own words back at you.

— rbe (@perdidostschool) January 23, 2016

@TchrNORPAC @edbobgreen @CarlKornNYSUT The victory rhetoric from both the UFT and NYSUT show how little leaders get.

— rbe (@perdidostschool) January 23, 2016

Here's the truth of things - Cuomo is sucking up to the union these days, what with his poll numbers in the toilet overall (39% job approval in the last Siena poll) and especially negative on education issues (68% of New Yorkers disapprove of the job he is doing handling education.)

The hacks running the union could care less about whether their members are harmed by APPR or not, they care only for their own power, prestige and perks.

They're happy to have the governor back on board, sounding almost like Mike Mulgrew when he talks about community schooling, well, that is progress indeed!

Unless you're a teacher affected by Cuomo's odious 2015 education law that requires 50% of a teacher's evaluation come from test scores - a law which Cuomo says does not need to be amended or repealed, a law which neither the UFT nor NYSUT plan to work to repeal.

So now, with Cuomo friendly with the union leadership again, the union heads have allied with the governor against their own members, spending millions of member dues on ads that are full of lies and propaganda (here's the UFT ad, here's the NYSUT ad.)

Even the governor himself has contradicted what the union ads are telling the public, saying back in December that test scores are indeed STILL part of APPR evaluations:

“There are teacher evaluations that are in the report and they are connected to tests, either state tests or locally approved tests,” Cuomo said on Sunday in Syracuse.

In case you're not willing to believe me or the governor, here's NYSED, via James Eterno at ICEUFTblog:

Footnote 10 in the SED Q & A states:
Teachers with SLOs that are based on Regents assessments will not be impacted and must continue to use SLOs with such assessments.

This is footnote 3 from the Q & A from SED:

Please note that teachers and principals whose APPRs do not include the grades 3-8 ELA and math State assessments or State-provided growth scores on Regents examinations are not impacted by the transition regulations and their evaluations shall be calculated pursuant to their district’s/BOCES’ approved APPR Plan without any changes. For example, a building principal of a CTE program whose APPR utilizes CTE assessments as part of the student performance component of their APPR will not be impacted by the transition regulations.

Yet the union ads - and the union hacks on Twitter - tell us differently, that the number of test scores in APPR evals this year is "zilch, nada, bupkis..."

I dunno about you, but I have had enough of the lies and propaganda out of NYSUT and the UFT, the harm they are doing to teaching, teachers and schools with the games they play with their ed deformer allies (see here for more of the games Mulgrew has played with Cuomo over the years.)

And if you think this is all hyperbole, that there's no way the union heads are playing a pro-wrestling "Good Guy/Bad Guy/Good Guy Game" with Cuomo - check out who's Number 4 on the all-time Cuomo meeting list and who enjoys late lunches with the governor to, you know, talk things over.

That would be one Michael Mulgrew of the UFT, the largest local in the state that can literally whack NYSUT leaders when they don't like what they're doing.

As I said above, I've had it with the games the union leaders play, the lies and deception they send out with every ad, every social media piece.

NYSAPE sent out this very informative tweet about where things stand today regarding state tests, the opt out movement and APPR teacher evaluations - you should send this tweet wide and far to cut through the self-serving jive and propaganda emanating out of NYSUT and the UFT, all of it using YOUR money to pay for it.

Do not be fooled, NOTHING has changed. Here is what you need to know: pic.twitter.com/cAKteQLtZI

— NYS Allies 4 Pub Ed (@NYSAPE) January 24, 2016

Back In The Day: Cuomo, Mulgrew, Iannuzzi, King Announce APPR Deal

As we await news of the latest teacher evaluation reform in New York State, let's revisit February 2012 for another big announcement on teacher evaluations by Governor Andrew M. Cuomo, former NYSED Commissioner John King, UFT President Michael Mulgrew and former NYSUT President Richard Iannuzzi:

ALBANY — Student test scores and classroom observations will be used to assess New York educators under a new evaluation system announced Thursday that Gov. Andrew Cuomo heralded as a national model.

The agreement between state officials and union leaders ended two years of tense negotiations and put a court battle on hold.

With the clock ticking on a tight deadline, Cuomo and educational leaders on Thursday said they had broken through the major logjams standing in the way of the new teacher evaluation system — which would also bring in approximately $1 billion in federal funding over the next few years.

The move also strengthens the role of the state Education Department, which must approve the evaluation agreements developed by each of the state's 700 school districts.

"Today is a great day for the schools in the state of New York. Government works today," Cuomo said, as he was joined by Education Commissioner John King Jr. as well as Michael Mulgrew and Richard Iannuzzi, heads of the United Federation of Teachers and New York State United Teachers.

"Today's agreement is good for students and fair to teachers," Iannuzzi added.

To get the federal funding, the new evaluation system must be completed and implemented by year-end. Unions and management of local school districts, including the vast New York City system, had been at loggerheads over the weight to give student performance on standardized tests and the appeals process for teachers who receive the lowest rating.

With that in mind, Cuomo said he would impose his own system in his budget plan if unions and department officials couldn't agree by Thursday — which marks the deadline for the governor's 30-day amendments, or final touches, to his budget proposal for the 2012-13 fiscal year.

The announcement followed an all-night bargaining session in which the warring sides appeared to compromise on two key issues. The New York City-based UFT and State Education Department agreed on a plan for appealing evaluations in which teachers scored poorly and might face firing; and NYSUT and the state resolved differences over the so-called local test portion of the evaluation.

Under the plan, teachers are evaluated on a 100-point scale: 60 points are based on classroom observations and student portfolios; 20 points come from scores that students get on a standardized state test; and another 20 points come from tests developed by the district or a third party.

Much of the fighting between the labor leaders and state officials was sparked by Cuomo's last-minute push to allow student test scores to count for up to 40 percent of an evaluation. Districts have the option to use state tests for up to 40 percent of an evaluation, but it must be bargained with the union. NYSUT's Iannuzzi said the union would likely end the lawsuit it filed last spring over the increased weight given to state tests once the new evaluation system is finalized.

Additionally, the State Education Department will now have veto power over evaluations that are deemed insufficient. Unions and school districts will also develop a "curve" for the point system by which teachers and principals are rated. Educators will fall in one of four categories: ineffective, developing, effective and highly effective.

Those rated "ineffective" could be fired if they do not improve.

King down played the concerns of some school administrators that the evaluation system would add significant new work to the strained staffing at many schools. He said the new evaluation system will also "dramatically change" the jobs of many principals for the better, by putting them in the classrooms where they can offer constructive feedback to their staff.

"The role of the principal is to provide their teams with instructional leadership," he said. "Principals should be spending significant time in the classroom."

So far, about 100 school districts statewide have agreed on evaluation plans and another 250 are close.

Still, questions remain about how the State Education Department will regulate this new system and whether it has the capacity to review and approve them all by year's end.

"Whether they are going to be able to approve these new evaluations as efficiently as it was described here today, I'm a little bit suspicious," said Tim Kremer, executive director of the state School Boards Association.

And Iannuzzi stressed that the relationships between school districts and their unions will still be a key factor in whether the evaluation plans go smoothly.

"The ingredient you can't write in law is the ingredient of collaboration and trust" between unions and management, he said.

It's interesting to see how much has changed in three years.

Where three years ago they were touting principals as the drivers of observations and fonts of educational wisdom, in the latest iteration of New York State teacher evaluations as pushed by Governor Cuomo, the principal has been superseded by outside evaluators.

Back in February 2012, they said principals would be in classrooms "where they belong", offering "feedback" to their staffs.

In the latest iteration, outside observers will drive by on some unknown timetable to observe teachers they don't know in schools they've never been to in order to provide meaningful evaluations of teachers.

Yeah, that'll work great.

Want to bet we'll be re-doing APPR teacher evaluations in a year or two again when the plan they're working on now turns out to be a miserable failure.

The one constant you'll notice in all the iterations of evaluations in New York State is that the union leadership is always there on stage next to Cuomo for the sell-out announcement.

Bet whatever comes in the next day or so that some teacher union head will offer some variation on the Iannuzzi prouncement from back in the day:

"Today's agreement is good for students and fair to teachers," Iannuzzi added.

Because rhetoric about how good the sell-outs they negotiate never gets old or stale in the mouths of teachers union heads.

How Randi Weingarten And Other Union Leaders Help Andrew Cuomo Bring The "Death Penalty" To New York's Public School System

Last year, Andrew Cuomo promised to bring the "death penalty" to "failing schools."

This year, Andrew Cuomo has called the public school system a "monopoly" which he plans to "break" in his second term.

Cuomo doesn't seem to like teachers any more than he seems to like public schools.

Cuomo has promoted a punitive teacher evaluation system that superintendents in the Lower Hudson Valley have said is a disaster that needs to be changed as soon as possible as one of the best in the nation.

Last month, Cuomo said that teacher evaluation system needs to be revised because too many teachers are being rated "effective" or "highly effective" with it.

Last week, a highly-respected 17 year teaching veteran filed suit against the NYSED commissioner after she was rated "ineffective" in this system as a result of her students' test scores - even though her students' test scores were high in comparison with other students' scores around the state.

Last week, Cuomo promised to make the teacher evaluation system that rated a highly respected teacher "ineffective" even more punitive by adding "real sanctions" to it.

Last week, AFT President Randi Weingarten defended Cuomo's "monopoly" comments by saying they were "campaign rhetoric."

Cuomo made these comments twice - he doubled down after the Daily News first reported them - so the comments seem less like "campaign rhetoric," more like campaign promises.

Yet Randi was running interference for Cuomo even as she was also mounting a symbolic battle against TIME Magazine over a cover they ran about teacher tenure.

This wasn't the first time Randi Weingarten helped out her buddy Andy during the election cycle.

Back in the spring, Weingarten, along with UFT President Michael Mulgrew, engineered a putsch within the NYSUT to toss out the old NYSUT leadership when it started to show guts and take on Cuomo over issues and replace them with a more Cuomo-compliant leadership.

Also last spring, union leaders put pressure on the Working Families Party to endorse Andrew Cuomo over Fordham President Zephyr Teachout when they threatened the party with dissolution and financial ruin if Teachout were given the party's ballot line.

You can be sure the UFT was not part of that pressure on WFP without Weingarten's okay.

This September, when internal polling showed Teachout's running mate, Tim Wu, with a real shot to beat Cuomo's banker lobbyist running mate, Kathy Hochul, in the primary, Weingarten joined NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio in making robocalls for Cuomo's running mate, Hochul.

Hochul won her primary - Wu said the momentum in the campaign turned against him when the robocalls started.

This morning on Twitter, Randi Weingarten defended her defense of Andrew Cuomo's comments, saying she had criticized him and what more could she be expected to do?


Well, what she has done is quite clear - and quite helpful to Andrew Cuomo.

To reiterate:

She helped engineer a putsch against the old NYSUT leadership and helped install a new, Cuomo-compliant leadership at NYSUT.

She helped other union leaders push for a Working Families Party endorsement for Andrew Cuomo, a huge thing that meant Cuomo wouldn't have to worry about a third party candidate from the left during the general election (and multiple polls had shown Cuomo losing a lot of support if that happened.)

She made robocalls for Cuomo's bank lobbyist running mate when it looked like she might lose and helped the bankster lobbyist win her primary.

And now she defends Cuomo's plan to "break" public schools by calling the comments (which he made twice) "campaign rhetoric."

As I noted above, Cuomo has promised to bring the "death penalty" to schools he considers "failing" - and from comments he made this week, he seems to think the entire public school system around the state is failing.

When Cuomo "breaks" the school system, when he takes a sledgehammer to the public schools and gives them the "death penalty," that sledgehammer will have the fingerprints of AFT President Randi Weingarten on it.

Cuomo: No Shift In Treatment Of Teachers In Second Term

From State of Politics:

Asked about whether he’s shifting his tactics post-primary, Cuomo said he wouldn’t change his approach to public workers and teachers labor organizations.

“I knew what I was doing when I did not cater to the teachers union. I didn’t have to take the endorsement of the teachers union the first time, by the way.”

This is the man that Randi Weingarten engineered a putsch for at NYSUT, overthrowing Dick Iannuzzi and the old NYSUT regime when they started to turn on Cuomo and replacing them with the compliant, pro-Cuomo Karen Magee and Revive NYSUT.

This is the man that Michael Mulgrew threatened the Working Families Party for, warning that he would pull UFT funding from the party if they gave their ballot nod to Zephyr Teachout instead of Cuomo.

This is the man that Randi Weingarten helped when she taped a robocall for his right-wing running mate in the waning days of the primary.

What are AFT, UFT and NYSUT leaders getting paid to stick the shiv in their members and work for the corporatist Cuomo?

I hope it's good, whatever it is, because they're selling their members out to a cretin out to destroy teachers, schools, and public education.

Remember, Union Leaders Did Their "Endorsement" Work During Working Families Party Convention

I keep hearing some NYSUT people brag how NYSUT refused to endorse Andrew Cuomo for governor and am hearing from the same people that NYSUT is making sure the AFL-CIO does not endorse him either.

All of this is fine, dandy and absolutely meaningless.

I want to remind everybody that when it mattered, when Andrew Cuomo absolutely needed the union leadership - including the newly minted NYSUT leadership - to back him, they did.

That was during the weekend when it looked like Working Families Party might actually endorse Zephyr Teachout over Cuomo for the general election.

Polls had shown that Cuomo was running away with the race against his GOP opponent Rob Astorino - unless a third party candidate from the left entered the general election.

Then polls showed this:

Major elections in the United States are almost always two-party affairs. Yes, third-party candidates run, but they’re rarely competitive, and they almost never win. Still, there are exceptions, and the 2014 New York governor’s race may be one of them.

The progressive Working Families Party perceives Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo to be too centrist, and it will decide this weekend whether to field its own candidate instead of cross-endorsing Cuomo. (New York allows candidates to appear on multiple ballot lines.) An opponent from his left could put Cuomo’s re-election bid in at least some danger.

An average of early polls by Quinnipiac University and Siena College shows the governor garnering 38 percent support, Republican Rob Astorino 24 percent and an unnamed Working Families Party candidate 23 percent. That’s down from Cuomo’s average lead of about 30 percentage points over Astorino in a two-way affair.

As I detailed earlier this week, early gubernatorial polling of two-way matchups is pretty reliable — 30 percentage point leads are nearly impossible to overcome. But an early-stage 14 percentage point lead in a three-way contest may be a different story.

Cuomo was desperate to avoid that third party candidate from the left and his union allies were happy to oblige by threatening WFP activists that if the party nominated Zephyr Teachout over Andrew Cuomo, they would defund the party:

When Working Families Party state committee members gather at their convention tomorrow, far more than the endorsement for governor will be at stake.

The very future of the labor-backed party will be on the line, and according to one labor source, the damage done by the disagreement over whether or not to back Gov. Andrew Cuomo again may very well be irreparable.

“Regardless of what happens now, the way the party has conducted itself has done lasting damage to relationships with key (union) affiliates,” the source said. “It’s unclear if the party will ever be the same.”

Union leaders were burning up the phone lines this morning, discussing whether the time had finally come to pull their support of the party they helped create and have financially sustained since 1998.

According to another labor source involved in these talks, a number of the largest and most significant unions – including 1199 SEIU, HTC, the laborers, RWDSU, and the UFT – were prepared to call it quits with the WFP, knowing that their withdrawal could very well lead to the party’s “collapse.”

The Teamsters and TWU were also involved in these discussions, which were far enough along to warrant talk of drafting of a joint statement, although one was never actually released.

The UFT controls NYSUT - it was the UFT leadership, backed by Randi Weingarten, who instituted the Spring Time Putsch that dethroned the previous NYSUT leadership and replaced them with pro-Cuomo shills.

The Spring Time Putsch was all about making sure that the suddenly aggressive old NYSUT leadership would be replaced by a more compliant Cuomo-friendly leadership - which is exactly what happened.

That the UFT was part of the union leadership that threatened WFP if Teachout was endorsed and was behind the NYSUT putsch to get rid of the old regime that had turned on Cuomo tells you all you need to know about how much they've already helped Andrew Cuomo.

An endorsement by the UFT, the NYSUT or the AFL-CIO is not needed at this time because all the help Cuomo needed to win re-election - keeping a third party candidate from the left out of the general election race - was engineered by the unions, including the UFT and the NYSUT, last spring.

Buffalo Teachers Union Backs Cuomo Challenger, Zephyr Teachout - Why Won't The UFT?

State of Politics:

The President of the Buffalo Teachers Federation, Phil Rumore, said the BTF decided to pass petitions for Teachout and her Lt. Governor candidate Tim Wu, to send a message to Governor Cuomo.

“He’s supported charter schools, cut funding for public schools, and has said failing schools should face the death penalty. Our members don’t support those positions,” Rumore said.

...

“It’s a message I’m sure teachers across the state feel need to be sent,” Rumore said.

...

“I’m certainly interested to see if Buffalo’s support for Teachout could start a trend,” said Rochester Teachers Association President Adam Urbanski.

Dunno if BTF's support of Teachout will start a trend in Western New York, but it surely will not start a trend in NYC where the UFT leadership remain big Cuomo supporters.

The UFT leadership, along with AFT President Randi Weingarten and her AFT leadership, engineered a putsch within the NYSUT to knock out the increasingly anti-Cuomo leadership there and replace it with some more compliant Cuomo backers.

The UFT leadership also threatened to withdraw financial backing from the Working Families Party if WFP backed Teachout over Cuomo for their ballot line.

So the chances of the UFT backing Zephyr Teachout are about as good as my chances at getting elected president of the UFT.

Still, nice to see BTF back Teachout over Cuomo.

Karen Magee Indicates Cuomo Endorsement From NYSUT Can Still Be In The Cards

What do you make of these tough-talking words from our tough-talking new NYSUT leadership?

Karen Magee, a Westchester County union leader, was elected the third president of the New York United Teachers over the weekend and the first woman to lead the labor.

...

Magee said that for now there’s no desire to endorse Cuomo’s re-election bid, but she didn’t shut the door entirely.

“There’s no sentiment to endorse the governor,” she said. “There’s a lot of time between now and August.”

Ah, yes, the old "lots of time between now and endorsing season" statement.

Dunno about you, but given everything Cuomo has done to harm public education, traditional public schools, teachers and unions, I want a less equivocal statement out of the new NYSUT president her first week in power, especially since her slate supposedly ousted the old leadership because of a lack of aggression against Cuomo and the state's education reform agenda.

It's possible she's just being politic here before the push for evaluation tweaks, but those tweaks are going to happen no matter what NYSUT does or Magee says.

As has been pointed out here at Perdido Street School blog and elsewhere, the governor's stance that CCSS tests are not fit to be used on students but are fine for teacher evaluations and employment decisions won't stand up to public scrutiny or a court challenge.

Cuomo is not expected to go much beyond those minor changes to APPR, so I don't think there's any real good reason for Magee to play coy here about a potential future NYSUT endorsement of Sheriff Andy - you're not getting anything else out of him and frankly, even if he were open to some other "compromise" with NYSUT, I'm not willing to pay the price for it.

At any rate, if you're wondering where the Revive NYSUT leadership slate is looking to take NYSUT, you're already getting an indication from Magee's statement today. 

Weingarten Spins Iannuzzi Defeat As "Message To Cuomo"

From Jessica Bakeman at Capital NY:

ALBANY—A vote by a state teachers' decision to overhaul its leadership may be a sign of trouble for Governor Andrew Cuomo.

New York has already seen two education leaders ousted this year in elections that are rarely contested and typically undramatic.

Richard Iannuzzi, a nine-year incumbent president of New York State United Teachers, was defeated by a comfortable margin Sunday, and James Jackson, a member of the State Board of Regents, was pressured by lawmakers to resign last month; both are casualties of an emotional controversy that has erupted among parents and teachers and mobilized lobbies with a variety of political goals.

Next up facing re-election are Cuomo and state legislators, and education issues, particularly the implementation of the Common Core standards and related testing, will undoubtedly play a role in the contests. While Cuomo's has an insurmountable-looking lead in the polls and in fund-raising, his prospects of compiling an impressive margin could be compicated by determined opposition from a key component of the traditional Democratic base.

“What you're hearing is an unmistakable message to the governor that you can't pretend that education is important,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers and former head of the city teachers' union, which endorsed NYSUT's new leaders.

“I think you're seeing a level of anger that I frankly never even saw for Republican governors like George Pataki," she said.

I would agree that Iannuzzi's defeat is a message to Cuomo - it's a message that Randi Weingarten and Michael Mulgrew have his back, that nothing the union does this year will damage his re-election margins because they're looking out for him.

As we've said here at Perdido Street School and has been said at some of the other education blogs, Iannuzzi was taken out just when he was getting more aggressive against Cuomo and his education reform agenda, not because he wasn't getting aggressive enough.

Revive NYSUT was put together by the Weingrew forces to "revive" union support for Cuomo and nothing else.

Yes, they're talking like they're opposed to Cuomo and certainly the tone this weekend was anti-Cuomo at the RA.

But as Norm Scott always says about Randi and the AFT/UFT forces, listen not what they say but rather watch what they do.

We've already seen them cave on the charter school issue in the budget battlet last month, essentially ceding total expansion powers to the charter entrepreneurs here in NYC without a fight.

Now Cuomo says he's turning his attention to APPR changes, with the system largely seen as a mess, especially around the Common Core testing, but as always with this stuff, the devil will be in the details.

Many rank and file teachers around the state want an end to APPR, have turned against the Common Core, and are enraged by the Cuomo budget and property tax cap that starve schools even as more mandates are thrown onto them by Cuomo and the state.

The new NYSUT president is already signaling less than staunch action against Cuomo:

Magee said she hopes to have a “fresh start” with Cuomo, opening a dialogue where perhaps there wasn't one before.

Magee said if there's no "progress," then the NYSUT will "take action" against the state over these issues.

But let's be frank here - the action was already taken when Weingarten and Mulgrew had Iannuzzi and his leadership taken out this weekend.

Message to Andy from Randi: We've got your back.

Solidarity Forever

Well, the results haven't been officially announced, but the pro-Andy Cuomo, Michael Mulgrew- and Randi Weingarten-backed Revive NYSUT slate has won the NYSUT election.

Given how many votes the UFT bloc of delegates had and how some smaller locals had fallen in line with the larger bloc, the results were not unexpected.

Despite her protests to the contrary, this was a Weingarten-engineered putsch from the beginning, a move to solidify her power in the NYSUT and ensure the state union remains pro-Andy Cuomo and pro-collaborationist with the forces of education reform, just as she maintains her hand on the UFT and ensures our NYC local remains Cuomo- and reform-friendly.

If you like the APPR teacher evaluation system, Race to the Top, the Common Core, Teacher Data Reports (with teachers' names named in the newspapers) - well, the same union folks who helped bring us all these "collaborationist" policies have taken back control of NYSUT just when the Iannuzzi leadership was beginning to fight against them.

The Revive slate has talked a good game about standing up to King and Tisch, not supporting Cuomo, and fighting the forces of reform that seek to destroy unionized teachers in NY State.

But even as they were talking that, the real power behind that slate, Mulgrew and Weingarten, did NOTHING of consequence to fight Andrew Cuomo as he ceded partial control of NYC schools to Eva Moskowitz and the charter school operators, gave more money to the privatized charters at the same time he starves traditional public schools of funding, and ensured charter schools in NYC will be 10% or more of total schools within just a few years by enshrining into law an absolute right of expansion with no independent entity to say no to them.

Watch what the new NYSUT leadership does rather than listen to what they say - there's a reason Weingarten engineered the NYSUT putsch just as the old leadership was getting aggressive against the state reform agenda, and you can bet it wasn't to make NYSUT even more aggressive against reform.

You'll hear lots of calls for "solidarity" from Weingarten supporters now that the election is over, but "solidarity" to these people means shut up and do what the leadership says and agree with what the leadership does no matter what.

We won't be following those calls here at Perdido Street School blog.

Instead we will be watching the new NYSUT leadership very, very closely and calling them out every time that they cave on an issue, that they take some action (or perform some inaction) that ensures Andy Cuomo remains governor, the state's reform agenda remains in place and the charter school privatizers continue to gain more power.

The solidarity I have is with my fellow teachers who toil under the burn and churn education reform policies brought to us through the "collaborationist" efforts of Randi Weingarten, Michael Mulgrew, Leo Casey and the rest of the crew at the AFT/UFT, not with the union leadership full of political expedients looking to maintain their power, privilege and "seat at the table" with Andy Cuomo so they can lap up the crumbs that fall from it.

My Take On Dennis Van Roekel's Common Core Backtrack

NEA President Dennis Van Roekel backtracked on Common Core today:

The nation’s largest teachers union is pulling back on its once-enthusiastic support of the Common Core academic standards, labeling their rollout “completely botched.”

National Education Association President Dennis Van Roekel said he still believes the standards can improve education. But he said they will not succeed without a major “course correction” — including possibly rewriting some of the standards and revising the related tests with teacher input.

“In far too many states, implementation has been completely botched,” Van Roekel wrote in a letter Wednesday afternoon to his organization’s more than 3 million members.

Van Roekel’s statement suggests quite a rocky road ahead for the Common Core standards, which are meant to instill more rigorous language-arts and math instruction in public schools — and which have been a priority of the Obama administration

He goes on to say that 70% of teachers now say CCSS implementation is going badly in their schools.

Van Roekel is not totally off the Common Core - he says states where CCSS implementation has been strong, teacher support for it remains strong, but that is not enough states.

So here is what Van Roekel suggested going forward:


In states that have made a commitment to involving teachers up front and providing teachers with the time, training, and resources they need to make the standards work, educator support for the standards is strong.

So if better teaching and learning is our goal, then policymakers need to implement educators’ common sense recommendations to get implementation on track:

1. Governors and chief state school officers should set up a process to work with NEA and our state education associations to review the appropriateness of the standards and recommend any improvements that might be needed.

2. Common Core implementation plans at the state and local levels must be collaboratively developed, adequately resourced, and overseen by community advisory committees that include the voices of students, parents, and educators.

3. States and local school districts must place teachers at the center of efforts to develop aligned curriculum, assessments, and professional development that are relevant to their students and local communities.

4. States must eliminate outdated NCLB-mandated tests that are not aligned with the new standards and not based on what is being taught to students in the classroom.

5. States must actively engage educators in the field-testing of the new assessments and the process for improving them.

6. In any state that is field-testing and validating new assessments, there must be a moratorium on using the results of the new assessments for accountability purposes until at least the 2015-2016 school year. In the meantime, states still have other ways to measure student learning during this transition period—other assessments, report cards, and student portfolios.

7. Stakeholders must develop complete assessment and accountability systems. It takes more than one piece of evidence to paint a picture of what students are learning. Testing should be one way to inform effective teaching and learning—not a way to drive it.

Okay, we can give points for movement in the right direction here, with Van Roekel acknowledging how many of his members are pissed off over what Common Core is doing to their schools and profession.

And we can give points too for suggesting the CCSS need to be revisited and redone, that there are flaws, especially around appropriateness.

As far as I remember, that's further than Iannuzzi went in the NYSUT withdrawal of support for CCSS and further than Randi Weingarten went with her call for a moratorium on high stakes attached to the CCSS tests.

I don't think either of them actually questioned the appropriateness of the CCSS, just the botched implementation.

Still, there's an awful lot of faith in Van Roekel's statement about the need to re-develop the assessments, re-do the assessments, field-test the assessments, and therein lies a problem I have with Van Roekel's statement - it continues to place an awful lot of faith and emphasis on a test-based education system.

But as Peter Greene noted in his Van Roekel reaction piece, that's probably because the NEA is still "ploughing the road for NEA's Helmsley-fund financed partnership with PARCC and SBA."

In the end, I think this is a good first step for the NEA, to acknowledge that many of their members are miserable over CCSS, that many want a "course correction" with the direction the NEA itself has taken over CCSS, that the implementation has been botched and the standards themselves may need to be revisited.

That said, we have a long way to go before the NEA leadership gets this completely right - the problem is not just the CCSS implementation or the appropriateness of the standards, the problem is also with the heavy emphasis on testing and data collection, the push for standardization in the first place.

Still, let's give credit where credit is due - Weingarten started this with the call for a moratorium on the high stakes connected to the CCSS tests, Iannuzzi continued it by withdrawing NYSUT support for CCSS until the NY State Education Department accomplished a list of demands he made around implementation and testing and now Van Roekel goes further by saying the standards themselves may have to be revisited.

UFT Stands For - Utterly Failing Teachers

James Eterno posts that he received the following note from a teacher passing along an administrator's demands to the staff for Danielson walk-throughs:

Dear Staff,

Please note that I will be looking at the following in a walk through tomorrow.

Please have these items labeled in a central location where I do not have to interrupt instruction.

Student folder
Display of work inside and outside of room
Comments on work
Date on work

Conference notes
Lesson plans
Student desks
General environment
Outside bulletin board
Leadership binders
Scaffolding of learning - charts
Rubrics
All assessments posted on line and analyzed
Inquiry binder for each grade - grade leaders
Inquiry notes for your struggling students
Discipline chart
Writing process chart

James asks where the UFT is when the administration can get away with asking for all of these mandates, but it's a rhetorical question.

The UFT is doing little-to-nothing to stop this insanity, in fact was still defending this nonsense in emails to teachers as of last September, saying stuff like this:

As you all are aware, this new system was the result of binding arbitration presided over by state Education Commissioner John King when we could not come to an agreement with Mayor Bloomberg on a teacher evaluation system required by state law. Mayor Bloomberg never wanted an evaluation system that could help teachers. He only wanted a system to beat up teachers

But the state teacher evaluation law is clear in its intent to support the work teachers do inside the classroom, and that is exactly how we plan to see it used in New York City.

The UFT claims to be grieving various overreachs by the DOE, as Pogue notes in a comment at ICEUFT:

Oh, the UFT has 17 grievances currently on file. They're on file, that's a crumb to throw the rank and file to keep them out of our hair.

So far, nothing has changed at the school-level, however. Pogue says:

Thank you, UFT leadership, your useless announcements keep us heartened you're "thinking about" NYC teachers' well-being.

Utterly
Failing
Teachers (citywide)

I see various UFT and UFT-allied figures on the Twitter backing up the UFT-allied slate in the coming April NYSUT elections, claiming that the current NYSUT leadership has done nothing to protect teachers from the ravages of reform and a change is needed.

The "change" will be the slate backed by the folks at 52 Broadway who have allowed this kind of thing happen to NYC teachers (a list so insane that I repeat it once more):

Dear Staff,

Please note that I will be looking at the following in a walk through tomorrow.

Please have these items labeled in a central location where I do not have to interrupt instruction.

Student folder
Display of work inside and outside of room
Comments on work
Date on work

Conference notes
Lesson plans
Student desks
General environment
Outside bulletin board
Leadership binders
Scaffolding of learning - charts
Rubrics
All assessments posted on line and analyzed
Inquiry binder for each grade - grade leaders
Inquiry notes for your struggling students
Discipline chart
Writing process chart

That's the kind of "protection" the UFT has provided for NYC teachers - and now they want to bring that same kind of "protection" to teachers around the state. 

UFT - utterly failing (NYC) teachers, soon to utterly fail teachers state-wide.

The Common Core State Standards Themselves Are Flawed

A commenter in at the Times Union:

What both the Regents and Cuomo have a blind eye to is that the standards themselves are flawed. Until they accept this fact, the parents will never rest. They are the ones who have to directly deal with the abuse of their children being foisted under the guise of reform. Neither of them stops this. A delay of testing repercussions is a panacea to the unions, a feeble attempt to divide and conquer opposition to the CCLS.

The delay might have been an attempt at placating the teachers union, but it didn't work with the current NYSUT leadership:

ALBANY, N.Y. Feb. 10, 2014 – New York State United Teachers said a Regents' task force that worked to fix the failed implementation of the Common Core acknowledged problems, but only skimmed the surface of the significant course corrections parents and educators have been seeking.

"Instead of listening to parents and educators who are grappling with the fallout from the State Education Department's disastrous implementation, the task force dismissed their concerns with a report that, in the end, adds up to a 'we know best' collection of minor adjustments," said NYSUT President Richard C. Iannuzzi, who noted - contrary to a comment by the governor - that the Regents did not pause or delay anything that is not already in law.

The union leadership has yet to come around to the problems with the Common Core themselves, but many of their members certainly have, as have many parents.

In the end, the changes the Regents announced yesterday won't end the protests coming from parents and teachers over the Common Core, the testing, the evaluation system, etc.

And that's because the core of all of these reforms - the Common Core State (sic) Standards - are themselves flawed.

A Nice Morning Round-Up On The Mulgrew/Weingarten Shiv On Iannuzzi At NYSUT

ICEUFT:

In an interview in Capital Pro, NYSUT President Dick Iannuzzi says directly that the challenge to his presidency is nothing more than a UFT power grab. 

Speaking about the April election (Iannuzzi) told Capital on Monday that the race "is not about policy.  It's about concentrating power and potentially limiting voice."
 
He said Andrew Pallotta, his No. 2 who is spearheading a slate of candidates running against him, including presidential candidate Karen Magee, is "a U.F.T. selection," referring to New York City's teachers' union, the United Federation of Teachers.  Pallotta was a U.F.T. official before coming to NYSUT.
 
"I get that.  I respect that," Iannuzzi said.  "My job, my responsibility is to be sure that any group of elected officers represents the entire state, and that's what I plan on doing."

I would so enjoy seeing Iannuzzi win and then watching what he and his team would do at NYSUT without being tied to Mulgrew or Randi Weingarten. It would be a whole new world.

Norm Scott at Ed Notes:

Randi Weingarten ‏@rweingarten 

@perdidostschool-...if the divisiveness wasn't so sad, the blog post would be a fun piece of fiction to read cc: @NormScott1

Thus Randi tweeted in response to PerdidoStSchool when he posted my contention that she is behind the entire thing. She contended the AFT was neutral -- note she said AFT not her -- parsing, as usual.

...

 This is the same Randi who bought off the opposition in 2003 so they would not run a candidate against her and had her Unity Caucus attack ICE as her successor had them attack MORE for "being divisive" for criticizing the Unity led leadership.

Read the comments below from Andy Pallotta. Let's see now, Andy goes from being District 10 Rep -- a mid-level UFT/Unity Caucus functionary to NYSUT VP under Randi's watch as UFT President before she went to the AFT. Does anyone think he just decided that on his own? Does anyone think he is making this move on his own?

Check out this criticism of Iannuzzi --

For example, critics have argued Iannuzzi's push for a vote of no confidence against Education Commissioner John King came too late and was in reaction to the upcoming contested election.

This is the RBE argument that in this world up is down when we hear Mulgrew praise King to death but not supports the argument that Iannuzzi should have called for no confidence earlier. Has Mulgrew put forth such a resolution to the UFT? Call me when he does.

As I tweeted back to Randi -- we have observed the UFT/NYSUT/AFT machine in action for over 40 years and that top-down control set up by Shanker to Feldman to Weingarten to Mulgrew has not changed one iota. The UFT tail wags the NYSUT dog and that combination wags the AFT. Why she and Mulgrew would decide to blow up NYSUT over Cuomo is beyond me.

And finally, NYC Educator:

Here's what NYSUT has done lately--for one, it's not at all clear they're planning to endorse Governor Andrew Cuomo, the guy who came into office swearing to go after unions. They're also taking a strong stand against Reformy John King and Common Core. Where have these people been all these years, as teachers have wondered what the hell was going on?

That might be a question "Revive NYSUT," the new group that wishes to upset NYSUT leadership is asking, but it isn't. Actually Revive NYSUT is sitting Executive VP Andy Palotta and a bunch of people he's recruited to defend his visionary decision to spend thousands of dollars of our money buying a table at some Cuomo fundraiser.

After all, it's important that our union leaders hobnob with top Democratic officials. Actually, that's true, but it's not necessarily important that we give them money before they come up with positions we support. We live in a state where teacher and parent concerns are routinely ignored, where John King and Merryl Tisch tour the state and hear nothing but criticism of Common Core, and where they mutter little things like we might tinker with this or that, but we're staying the course.

That's unconscionable. We, as teachers, have the very same interests that parents do. We serve the same purpose--helping public school children.

I don't know where NYSUT's newfound social conscience came from, and I don't care either. The fact is they are right. They are not only right, but they are on the right side of history. American parents are not going to stand for the baseless nonsense and endless testing that is Common Core. New York parents have heard enough from Reformy John King and Silent Merryl Tisch. We know what's good for our children, and we need advice neither from them nor their army of privately paid interns, accountable to no one.

Revive NYSUT is a misnomer. NYSUT has revived itself. It's our job to keep it alive. And it will be a tough job indeed, with 40% of NYSUT delegates being instructed how to vote by UFT leadership, which appears to believe the only good NYSUT is a dead NYSUT.

Doubtless a future Unity meeting will entail telling 800 of the 2000 NYSUT delegates how to vote, and will make absolutely sure folks like you and me get no representation whatsoever. Because that's what passes for democracy in our UF of T. 

Weingarten can talk about this being "vibrant democracy" all she wants - it's a power grab, with her fingerprints all over it, although Mulgrew and his UFT cronies are making the moves.

And as I noted on Sunday, this is all about Weingarten's self-interest, her staying relevant with the statewide Democratic Party (i.e., Andrew Cuomo), her maintaining her power, privilege, access and influence.

It's good to see so many recognizing this Revive NYSUT jive for what it is - the Mulgarten contingent looking to clamp down on dissent and keep the pro-reform Andrew Cuomo happy and healthy in campaign cash.

NYSUT President Iannuzzi Condemns "Sit And Stare" Education For Children Who Opt Out Of State Tests

Very important statement from NYSUT supporting the right of parents to opt their children out of state tests and not have those children punished by the districts or schools:

ALBANY, N.Y. Feb. 3, 2014 - New York State United Teachers President Richard C. Iannuzzi today called on school districts to abandon educationally unsound and unconscionable policies that force students whose parents have decided to opt them out of state testing to "sit and stare" instead of providing them with a constructive alternative.

At least 15 school districts on Long Island - and, reportedly, others statewide - have recently adopted or are considering such damaging policies ahead of April's state standardized testing in English Language Arts and math, Iannuzzi said.

"NYSUT strongly condemns the policy of 'sit and stare'," Iannuzzi said. "This policy aimed at students whose parents elect to 'opt out' their children from state standardized testing is unconscionable. It would be spiteful and counter-productive for any school district to require an administrator or teacher to direct a child to 'sit and stare' at a blank desk while other students are taking exams because of a choice made by a parent."

Iannuzzi added, "This is cruel to those students not taking the exam and a distraction and disservice to those who are attempting to complete it. Punishing or embarrassing children because their parents exercised their right to choose not to have their children participate in tests they consider inappropriate is, frankly, abusive."

NYSUT Vice President Maria Neira called on the Regents and State Education Department to deliver to school districts clear guidance that protects children against detrimental and abusive testing policies. "This is an opportunity for the Regents and State Education Department to step in and protect students from harmful policies that result from parents exercising their right to decide what's best for their child," she said.

NYSUT strongly supports a parent's right to "opt out" of state standardized tests if the parent believes state testing is inappropriate and may be harmful to his or her child.

Iannuzzi said the union would provide guidance and support to parents - or parent groups - unfairly singled out or harassed for advocating the right to opt out and added, "We will vigorously defend any NYSUT members who are subject to any negative employment considerations for choosing to opt out their own child or who advocate, to the extent permitted by law, for others who opt out of state standardized tests."

Of course the "sit and stare" policy is encouraged by SED and the Regents (wink, wink, nod nod) because they want to discourage as many parents as possible from opting their children out.

Iannuzzi knows that, which is why he is calling on the Regents and SED to put a stop to this harmful and punitive practice.

Good to see NYSUT call for this.

Ed Notes Online: Randi Weingarten Is Behind The Rebellion Against NYSUT President Dick Iannuzzi

When the stories of the rift between the UFT contingent in the NYSUT and the Iannuzzi supporters first surfaced, I thought there was no way UFT President Michael Mulgrew was behind the plot without Randi's okay.

I have never seen Mulgew take any actions that weren't already Randi-approved - from the Thompson endorsement in the 2013 NYC mayoral election to the APPR deal Mulgrew and Iannuzzi made with Cuomo in 2012 to refusing to rule out a Cuomo endorsement in 2014, every major decision Mulgrew has made is the same kind of decision that Randi would have made when she was heading the UFT.

This was why it didn't make sense to me that Mulgrew was making a powerplay for the NYSUT without Randi's okay, though Norm Scott and some other people on the Internets were saying that it didn't make sense Randi was behind the Iannuzzi shiv.

Tonight Norm reports he has multiple sources telling him that Randi Weingarten is indeed behind the Iannuzzi shiv:

Randi is behind the so-called NYSUT insurgency multiple and trusted sources have informed us. I don't have particulars but this info came in response to my comments the other day in this post (The Battle for NYSUT: Ebbs and Flows)

While some think Randi must be behind the move of the UFT to take over NYSUT completely and totally (they pretty much have a lot of control now) this doesn't have her fingerprints. What does she have to gain from trying to push out Iannuzzi - who she helped put in? Or pushing out Maria Neira who she promoted from the UFT Exec Bd to a NYSUT VP?

You know, I should have trusted my instincts all along but the total level of how nonsensical this is in terms of Randi's own self-interest led me out of the real world into fantasy land -- that Mulgrew might have stepped out on his own. These quotes from Reality-Based Educator:

Literally up is down and black is white. The less aggressive "challengers" are getting supported because the Iannuzzi regime hasn't been aggressive enough.....Orwellian beyond belief - but par for the course at the AFT/NYSUT/UFT. ...  Reality Based Educator at PerdidoSS

My sources say that Randi could not accept Iannuzzi and crew's blatant rejection of Cuomo which would leave her without a role to play with the big boys on the state Democratic Party level. My sources say that it more important to her than even considerations of splitting NYSUT.

Of course Randi's staying relevant and having a role at the state Democratic Party level is more important to her than anything else, even considerations over splitting the NYSUT.

That's because when it comes to Randi Weingarten, there is nothing she does that is not completely in her self-interest - it's always about her, whether she's making deals as a union head or pushing little kids out of the way so she can grab a microphone and hog a stage.

Couple of days ago, I had a back and forth on the Twitter with some folks over Rand.

The point I tried to make over and over (not sure how effective I was with 140 characters) is that Randi Weingarten cannot be trusted, that she specializes in betrayal and deception, and nobody should look to ally with her in the battle against ed reform, CCSS, etc. because her word is worthless and she will turn on you in a split second.

I had the NYSUT battle in mind when I was saying this because I just knew that even as Weingarten was hailing Iannuzzi on the Twitter for getting a "no confidence" vote on King and withdrawing support for CCSS that behind the scenes she was having a shiv stuck into him for those very moves.

And of course this is all about Cuomo - both Mulgrew and Weingarten refuse to criticize Cuomo because they want to continue to have access to him (and yeah, I know Randi was at an anti-Cuomo protest last week, but her criticism of Sheriff Andy was so mild as to be almost useless.)

This is all about maintaining power, maintaining access, maintaining privileges - as I said earlier, Randi's self-interest.

And the Orwellian part of all of this is that even as the "insurgent" slate backed by Mulgrew and Weingarten look to do Iannuzzi and his group in for not being "aggressive" enough against the state reform agenda, they are really doing him in because he is being too aggressive against it.

It's making Cuomo unhappy, and Cuomo doesn't like to be unhappy, and if you watch closely enough, you'll see that neither Randi nor Mulgrew like it when Cuomo is unhappy either.

So they're taking care of business, making sure Sheriff Andy gets happy, gets a couple of bags of campaign cash with UFT and NYSUT stamped on them, making sure that there is no real criticism of APPR or the tax cap or any of the other Cuomo reforms that are really hurting schools.

This makes Cuomo happy and that means Randi and Mikey still have access to him, though I don't exactly know why anybody would want access to a politician who only allows access to him if you agree with him 100% already, which is kinda where Cuomo is on a lot of things.

But as I wrote before, this is how it works in AFT/NYSUT/UFT land where war is peace and betrayal is loyalty and you should never ever trust anything Randi Weingarten says - anything - because she is full of crap 100% of the time.

Here we have just one more example of it in the NYSUT battle.

But as Norm says, the plus side of all of this is, it may open up the eyes of some people around the state when the new "more aggressive" slate comes in and gets less aggressive than Iannuzzi and we go back to business as usual in AFT/NYSUT/UFT land.

What "Vibrant" Democracy In The AFT/NYSUT/UFT Looks Like

Randi Weingarten said somewhere on the Twitter last night that the inter-union fight in the NYSUT is just an example of "vibrant democracy" in action and anybody who sees anything else in the battle between the Mulgrew/Weingarten-backed "grassroots" challengers and the Iannuzzi slate is plain wrong.

Brian from Port Jefferson Station Teachers Association has an interesting perspective on the "vibrant democracy" that is the AFT/NYSUT/UFT and left this comment on a post I wrote about Phil Rumore, the Buffalo teachers head, telling Capital NY that he was thinking about supporting the Mulgrew/Weingarten-backed "challengers" because the current NYSUT leadership hasn't been "aggressive" in pushing back against the SED/Regents reforms:

Rumore is now just doing what you are going to see a lot of NYSUT locals due- back Pallotta's slate because they are going to win. It's pretty simple, with 800 NYSUT delegates, the UFT has 40% of the voters in the election. With all of those delegates being "invite only" Unity Caucus members, Mikey Mulgrew won't allow any dissent, so all 800 will vote for their endorsed Pallotta slate. That essentially seals the election. Pallotta fills out the rest of the slate with a few others from around the state who are intoxicated by the lure of power, going from small locals to statewide "leaders", to make it seem as though it is a "grassroots movement from across the state" yet it really consists of a few more hacks beholden to Mikey Mulgrew and Unity Caucus. So who ever is backed by Mulgrew automatically wins. Therefore locals fall in line behind him so as not to get on the bad side of the "new" administration. But of course in the UFT/NYSUT/AFT world "new" and "change" mean business as usual. Ironically once Iannuzzi no longer felt beholden to Mulgrew, due to the challenge from Pallotta's slate, he got aggressive, as Rumore's BFT wished he had been earlier. Rumore's BFT responds by backing the same powers who ruled the passive Iannuzzi. But we live in a world where many "leaders" would rather be in the good graces of those in power than to truly stand up for their members.

Nothing will change until there is no longer a one party system at the state level. The unorganized 60% of the state needs to become organized. They need to bond together to oppose the Mulgrew run Unity Caucus. The good thing about this year's election is that some of the smarter people from around the state are beginning to become aware of the rigged nature of these elections. Hopefully the awareness leads to necessary changes.

There is nothing "vibrant" or "democratic" about the way the AFT/NYSUT/UFT currently works. 

The bosses make the decisions, the party hacks vote the way the bosses want, the smaller unions join suit so as to be on the right side - and the patronage is handed out and punishment doled out for any who do not comply.

Some might call that kind of operation a "vibrant democracy".

But it that doesn't sound like a "vibrant democracy" to me.

It sounds like "rigged" democracy.

And, in point of fact, that's what it is.

I'm not an Iannuzzi guy, like Rumore I think he failed to be as aggressive as he should have been against the SED/Regents/Cuomo reforms.

That said, the "grassroots challengers" come from the even-less aggressive UFT-wing, the group that continues to support Andrew Cuomo, likes the APPR teacher evaluation system, was happy SED Commissioner King got to impose it on NYC and blames every problem in the system on Bloomberg even though many of the problems the rank-and-file are most concerned with have been brought to us not by Bloomberg but by Cuomo, Tisch and King.

Even as other unions like CSEA and PEF get more aggressive against Governor Cuomo, Michael Mulgrew and the UFT "remain on good terms" with Cuomo, as State of the Politics put it today.

Does anybody really expect them to get more "aggressive" against the reforms when they're taking out Iannuzzi for getting more aggressive against Cuomo, Tisch and King, raising money for Cuomo as we speak and thinking about endorsing Sheriff Andy for re-election?

As Brian writes, it will be "business as usual" when the "change" slate takes over.

Surrender Is Victory In The AFT/NYSUT/UFT World

Two points to make in the world of AFT/NYSUT/UFT politics:

First a tweet from one of the UFT cronies who launched the challenge against NYSUT President Dick Iannuzzi

Make some noise to save our services! Save our schools! pic.twitter.com/CLF6wjTPi1
— Andy Pallotta (@AndyPallotta) January 29, 2014

This was at the Public Employees Federation, Civil Service Employees Association and NYSCOPBA union rally protesting Cuomo's anti-union policies, particularly the policy to downsize human services in the state by getting rid of union workers and replacing them with non-union workers.

In a reply tweet, I pointed this out to Pallotta:

@AndyPallotta @tfarley1969 So wait, you're raising reelection funds for Cuomo, but protesting him too?
— realitybasededucator (@perdidostschool) January 29, 2014

And of course he was just raising funds for Cuomo a couple of weeks ago:

MEMORANDUM

 TO:        NYSUT Board of Directors

FROM:  Andy Pallotta, Executive Vice President

DATE:   January 15, 2014

RE:        NYSUT’s Legislative Reception

On Monday evening, January 27, 2014, NYSUT will host a Legislative Reception and briefing in the Observation Deck of the Erastus Corning Tower at the Empire State Plaza.  The reception will be held between6:00 PM – 8:00 PM.

 The Governor and his executive staff, members and the executive staff of the Senate and Assembly will be our invited guests.

 Light refreshments will be served and a cash bar will be available.

 A copy of the invitation is attached.  If you are interested and your schedule allows, please RSVP to Karen Rhatigan at (518) 213-6000 x6626 or by e-mail, krhatigan@nysutmail.org.

In other AFT/NYSUT/UFT news, Jessica Bakeman reports the following at Capital NY:

ALBANY—Teachers in Buffalo will likely join their peers in New York City in supporting a slate of challengers to the current leadership of New York State United Teachers, a powerful statewide union.

NYSUT President Richard Iannuzzi is losing ground in his contested April election, with two major urban teachers' unions throwing support to challenger Karen McGee, a local union leader in Westchester. Andy Palotta, the current executive vice president and a force in Albany, is running for re-election and backing McGee.

Philip Rumore, president of the Buffalo Federation of Teachers, said his members are frustrated that the current leadership wasn't as aggressive as they'd hoped in responding to the state's rollout of the controversial Common Core standards.

“Many of the Buffalo teachers have not been satisfied with the positions that NYSUT has taken,” Rumore told Capital on Wednesday. “Let's put it this way: If anything, we are leaning toward a change in direction, but we haven't made a formal decision yet.”

Iannuzzi has gotten aggressive these past few weeks, calling for a "no confidence vote" on NYSED Commissioner King, withdrawing support from the CCSS until a list of demands are met by the state, and criticizing the governor's budget.

Pallotta, the UFT functionary helping to push the "challenger" slate against Iannuzzi, has been raising money for Andrew Cuomo.

I left this comment on the Bakeman piece at Capital NY:

Iannuzzi has gotten more aggressive in the recent weeks while the Pallotta/Mulgrew slate is still hanging out with Andy Cuomo and giving him bags of cash for re-election. The Orwellian nature of AFT/NYSUT/UFT politics never ceases to amaze. Literally up is down and black is white. The less aggressive "challengers" are getting supported because the Iannuzzi regime hasn't been aggressive enough.

You can't make this stuff up - Rumore is going to back the challengers who have been raising cash for Andrew Cuomo because Iannizzi and his slate hasn't been aggressive enough against Cuomo, even though they have ratcheted up the aggression in the past weeks.

Orwellian beyond belief - but par for the course at the AFT/NYSUT/UFT.

Will NYSUT Re-Announce Support For John King & Common Core After Mike Mulgrew And The UFT Oust Iannuzzi?

The NYSUT board of directors announced a vote of no confidence has been issued against SED Commissioner King and support for the Common Core State Standards has been withdrawn until a set of demands around the implementation, testing and budgeting of the CCSS are met by the state.

This sounds all well and good, but there is a civil war going on within the NYSUT between the Dick Iannuzzi wing of the state union and the wing run by the UFT and as Brian from the PJSTA noted in a comment here at Perdido Street School, with the Mulgrew faction expected to win an April vote and wrest control of the NYSUT from Iannuzzi and his faction, official NYSUT policy will change back to pro-John King/pro-CCSS:

Many believe Mulgrew to be behind the insurgency slate challenging Iannuzzi for NYSUT presidency. That slate, dubbed "Revive NYSUT" and being billed as "grassroots" (even though an incumbent exec vp is on the slate) just received an endorsement from Mulgrew this week (shocking!). Because of the split with Mulgrew and the UFT/Unity crew, many believe Iannuzzi is now moving further away from what had been the party line of support for CCSS. The belief is that without being beholden to Mulgrew and UFT leadership, a new term for Iannuzzi would look drastically different. Of course we likely won't find out, as UFT/Unity holds 40% of the NYSUT delegates and the other 60% is largely unorganized. So Mulgrew's slate of Andy Pallotta, Martin Messner, Paul Pecorale, and Catalina Fortino will likely win. That is the crew who seems to want to endorse Cuomo. It's a very nuanced situation for those unfamiliar with NYSUT inner-politics. Norm Scott has done a great job at Ed Notes Online keeping track of the story.

The State of Politics blog covered this story yesterday, so you can go there or to Ed Notes Online for more background.

But as Brian wrote, the NYSUT vote of no confidence and withdrawal of support for CCSS is meaningless if and when Mulgrew and Company - supporters of CCSS, APPR, Cuomo and all things reformy, including NYSED Commissioner John King - take over complete control of the NYSUT in the spring and change the NYSUT party line back to the pro-reform, pro-CCSS, pro-APPR one they pursue here in NYC.

NYSUT Issues "No Confidence" Vote On SED Commissioner King, Withdraws Support For Common Core Until "Course Corrections" Are Made

From the Times Union:

The state’s largest and most powerful teacher’s union on Saturday issued a declaration of “no confidence” in state Education Commissioner John King, a symbolic but unprecedented gesture calling for King’s removal from his post by the state Board of Regents.

New York State United Teachers’  80-member board of directors unanimously approved the resolution Saturday during the board’s regular meeting.

The resolution states that the board declares “no confidence in the policies of the Commissioner of Education.” Earlier this month, NYSUT president Richard Iannuzzi announced that he would seek the action  in an interview on Time Warner’s “Capital Tonight” program.

NYSUT’s  board also withdrew its support for the state’s new Common Core learning standards “as implemented and interpreted in New York” until the State Education Department “makes major course corrections” and “supports a three-year moratorium on high-stakes consequences from standardized testing.”

“SED’s implementation plan in New York state has failed,” said Iannuzzi in a statement. “The commissioner has pursued policies that repeatedly ignore the voices of parents and educators who have identified problems and called on him to move more thoughtfully.”

While these moves will not make the Andy Cuomo contingent of the state union happy - namely Mike Mulgrew and the UFT leadership - they surely will make many in the rank-and-file around the state happy.

Frankly, I wish the NYSUT had withdrawn support from the CCSS for good, but I understand why they're taking the tack that they will withdraw support from the CCSS until SED "makes major course corrections” and “supports a three-year moratorium on high-stakes consequences from standardized testing.”

Given how SED is not going to do either of those, the NYSUT pretty much just withdrew support for Common Core today.

Here is what NYSUT wants done in order for support for the CCSS and the SED Commissioner to return:

• Completion of all modules, or lessons, aligned with the Common Core and time for educators to review them to ensure they are grade-level appropriate and aligned with classroom practice;
• Better engagement with parents, including listening to their concerns about their children’s needs;
• Additional tools, professional development and resources for teachers to address the needs of diverse learners, including students with disabilities and English language learners;
• Full transparency in state testing, including the release of all test questions, so teachers can use them in improving instruction;
• Postponement of Common Core Regents exams as a graduation requirement;
•  The funding necessary to ensure all students have an equal opportunity to achieve the Common Core standards.  The proposed Executive Budget would leave nearly 70 percent of the state’s school districts with less state aid in 2014-15 than they had in 2009-10; and
• A moratorium, or delay, in the high-stakes consequences for students and teachers from standardized testing to give the State Education Department – and school districts – more time to correctly implement the Common Core.

The Times Union reported SED had no comment on today's events.

Mulgrew, UFT Leadership Worried About Office Bugging

Your UFT dues money at work:

Something’s bugging teachers-union boss Michael Mulgrew — or, at least, he thinks so.

The United Federation of Teachers president blew a huge wad of union cash to play out a paranoid James Bond fantasy when he paid $17,849 for a security team to sweep his headquarters for bugs, documents show.

A crew from Protective Countermeasures & Consulting Inc. was hired to sweep for listening devices at the UFT’s offices at 52 Broadway, a review of union spending reports reveals.

The payments were made in January and March of last year, just as the union leadership grappled with key strategic decisions such as labor-contract negotiations and who to support as the next mayor.

The union would not say if any surveillance devices were found.

Some union members thought it was unlikely anyone would bug the union — and that it was ridiculous that Mulgrew is using Cold War tactics to play a game of “Tinker, Teacher, Soldier, Spy” in the UFT headquarters.

“I have no idea why they’re doing it. It’s very odd,” said James Eterno, a dissident UFT member who ran against Mulgrew for president in 2010. “I didn’t know we were like the CIA and have to keep secrets. I didn’t think we were that important. It’s not like someone is going to get killed if something leaks out.”

Let's dispense with the question of who they think might be bugging their offices for a moment and focus on this question:

What exactly are they discussing at 52 Broadway that they don't want to get out to anybody else?

Sure, I know the Post article says " key strategic decisions such as labor-contract negotiations and who to support as the next mayor," but doesn't it seem a little over the top to have the offices swept for bugs at least two times over that stuff?

Seriously, it didn't take a genius to see who they were going to endorse - I called it months before, and believe me, I'm no genius.

As for labor contract negotiations, which one's are they talking about?

If I remember correctly, they sent the contract negotiations to non-binding arbitration at the PEP board after years of impasse with Bloomberg and the DOE.

So what exactly were they discussing at 52 Broadway that they feared being overheard?

It's over a year ago that Mulgrew had 52 Broadway first swept for bugs, but Norm Scott did report last week that Mulgrew and his merry men and women at the UFT have launched a guerrilla attack against Dick Iannuzzi and the NYSUT Executive Board via the UFT/Unity slug at NYSUT, Andy Pallotta

Norm has more today that reports the fix is essentially in and Mulgrew and the UFT will probably get their way when the vote comes around in spring.

Now I don't think the counter-surveillance contracting was directly linked to the NYSUT machinations.

But I do think it does point to the kind of underhanded stuff they discuss at 52 Broadway that they don't want to get out.

If you watch the union leadership closely, you know they could give two hoots about the rank and file membership - they care only about their own power and privilege.

In the end, I don't know exactly what they were discussing that they didn't want overheard anymore than I know who they feared might be bugging them.

But I do know this - whatever conversations they were trying to protect and keep discreet were not one's that benefit rank and file members of the union.

Mulgrew had 52 Broadway swept for bugs because he was worried something he and his merry men and women in the leadership were doing would come back to haunt them.