A friend of mine who teaches in the Virginia public schools noted that the only profession where government officials think it's okay to not pay the workers is in the schools. I didn't believe her, no one would do that, or so I thought. From OregonLive:

Leaders of Oregon's teachers union did not outright reject the governor's suggestion of unpaid teaching days but said each district would have to figure out a balance between using reserves and other cost-saving measures.

"If we ask school folks to work for free, it means we are going to affect the economy even more greatly," said Gail Rasmussen, vice president of the Oregon Education Association. "These folks, too, are part of the fabric of their communities."

Kulongoski's comments came one day after legislative budget leaders went public with a list of proposed cuts, including a reduction to public schools that would force many districts to close early by an average of five days.

There was also the North Providence School District in Rhode Island:

NORTH PROVIDENCE — The School Committee has garnered $664,000 in concessions from teachers, the equivalent of six unpaid work days, in an effort to erase about $3 million from a projected $13-million deficit for the budget year that ends June 30.

And some of the comments on the thread about teachers working UNPAID are just demoralizing. It's like we don't value teachers as a society but in reading the comments, it seems as if we're really saying that we don't value working with kids. I'm not sure which we value less as a society, teachers or children, perhaps it's both.

But there is something you can do. Well, at least if you live in the DC area. You can join the Washington Teachers Union (WTU) in the District for community mobilization. This Saturday, DC Teachers and supporters of teachers are taking to the streets with the teacher's local, and you can join in:

Where
United House of Prayer Charlotte Mission; 1721 7th Street, NW

When
Apr 25 9:30 am - 12:00 pm

As part of the United For DC Kids campaign, the Washington Teachers Union (WTU), labor and community allies are canvassing local neighborhoods to support teachers and improve the quality of education for children in DC public schools. “When we stand in support of the teachers who work in our public schools, we’re helping our children succeed,” says the WTU. “Please join us for a neighborhood walk and show your support for DC teachers by canvassing our community.” Lunch will be provided; email jeasley@aft.org to RSVP or click here to download an event flyer.

You can sign up for updates on the WTU site.

Teachers always get a bad rap. My daughter wants to go to college to become a teacher. She has an affinity for languages and wants to teach Arabic and Japanese, two languages she currently studies in high school. And here I am, wanting to discourage her from doing this because of reports I've just sited. Teachers are so undervalued in this society, but then again, I really think this is more of an issue of not valuing our children and wanting them to have the best possible education. In the end, the arguments against teachers are always that same...I don't want my taxes to go up. Wow, simply wow. Someday, I hope we can value our kids more than the change in our pockets.

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Crossposted with permission from Unbossed's Shirah

Is it, though? The mantrum you hear every where these days is: To get good workers and good work an employer must be able to fire workers. That means just-cause employment, tenure, and union grievance procedures are on the firing line, because, they, well, stand in the way of the “firing” line.

NPR reporter Claudio Sanchez can barely report a story that advocates this position. For example, on March 18, his story starts with:

Michele Rhee, the District of Columbia's public schools chancellor, has done a lot to shake up schools in the nation's capital.
. . .
So Rhee is intent on attracting young teachers who aren't vested in the old contractual arrangements with the teachers' union, which Rhee thinks is getting in the way of her reform efforts.

link

Now, it may be that Claudio Sanchez is just confused and doesn’t understand that all just cause, grievance procedures, and tenure get an employee is the rights to be fired

1. only because the employee has done a bad job or
2. only if there is business necessity, such as financial troubles and
3. only after a fair demonstration that these facts exist, otherwise known as due process

These rights do not get you a job for life.

They do not give the right to keep a job even when a worker is incompetent.

So essentially what Rhee wants and what Sanchez advocates is the right of employers to fire workers on whim and with no proof that the worker is not doing a good job.

They assume that workers will only do a good job if they are terrified of losing their jobs.

There is a lot to unpack about those assumptions about workers. It assumes that workers are slackers. It assumes that bosses are always right. It assumes that unions and tenure are our enemies. If Sanchez and Rhee and others who espouse these views are wrong, then they are leading us down the primrose path to bad outcomes.

These untested assumptions miss a lot about most workers. And because they miss key information, they will lead to a system that is detrimental to progress and productivity. Consider that the periods of highest union density in the US, from the early 1950s through the 1970s were also periods of progress and innovation.

An interesting study by Kelly Services, ironically, tells us why Rhee, Sanchez, and others who take this view are barking up the wrong tree and missing the forest for the trees and maybe in danger of setting on fire the trees that make up that beautiful forest.

The survey reveals a widespread desire for more meaningful roles in the workplace. Approximately half (51 percent) of those surveyed are prepared to accept a lower wage or a lesser role if their work contributes to something ‘more important or meaningful.'

Here are some of the summary findings of the Kelly Services study.

Around the world . . .

51 percent of Gen Y are prepared to accept a lower wage or a lesser role if their work contributes to something more important or meaningful.

62 percent of Gen X plan to look for a new job within a year.

46 percent of baby boomers say their career goals are not being advanced in their current job

In North America . . .

Across North America, 92 percent say they derive a sense of pride from their work, the highest of the three global regions in the survey.

Almost half (49 percent) will sacrifice pay and position for more meaningful work, with Gen Y and males the most willing to do so.

Some 45 percent say they intend to look for another job within the next year, however, the proportion in the U.S. (40 percent) planning to change jobs is the lowest of any country in the survey.

Some 40 percent are worried that their current job is not meeting their long term career goals, with baby boomers the most alarmed.

If you scroll down the Kelly Services report, you will see interesting differences based on geography and age cohort, but also many similarities of view.

So maybe what explains any successes in turning workplaces around and making them do good work is actually good leadership, inspiration, and meaningful work to do.

And that is because workers want is to be inspired. They want to be part of something bigger than themselves. They want to live meaningful lives, and work is part of what gives us meaning.

So, to get back to the untested assumptions trotted out by Sanchez, Rhee, and others, isn’t the issue why they think employers can only succeed is by firing good workers and by having no fair process to check whether the employer’s assumptions are correct. Only employers who are not good managers and unfair autocrats need these rights. Good employers will only want to fire workers who are not doing a good job or if there is financial exigency.

So, isn’t time we asked why we need to protect bad managers and bad employers?

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Got this in an e-mail:

Eastern Senior High School

1700 East Capitol St, NE

One Community. One Shared Vision of Success for All Students.

The Chancellor's Office of District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS) will host a community meeting on Wednesday, February 4, 2009 from 6:30 pm – 8:00pm to discuss the future of Eastern SHS. This meeting will be the first of a series of discussions about the plans to restructure Eastern's academic programs and to modernize the school building.

All members of the community (past, present, and future fans of Eastern High School) are encouraged to attend. Your input will help shape the overall design of the building and the programs that will be offered when Eastern re-opens to incoming 9th graders in SY 2010-2011.

If you need child care and/or language interpretation services (Spanish, Chinese, Vietnamese, Amharic, French and American Sign Language), please call or email Jennifer Nguyen at (202) 442-5191 (Jennifer.Nguyen@ dc.gov) by January 29, 2009.

So, Rhee has a reputation for trashing adults, so does this mean that she'll be there on Wednesday night? To actually talk to real live adults? I'm betting she'll make a brief appearance, if I were a betting woman.

This weekend, I had the great fortune to be eating at Mr. Henry's after psa105's monthly meeting. It was yummy, as usual. But as we sat there, I started to run through country names with my daughter and our German ex-change student:

Name 3 country's that start with the letter M.

Name 3 country's that start with the letter C.

Name two major African Rivers.

Name 2 mountain ranges in Europe.

okay, you get the picture. At the end of my quizzing, I added, name all 7 continents. My German ex-change student says, there are only 5 and then my kid says

no, there are 7 because Antarctica has land under the ice.

I'm proud, but still, no one has answered my question. That's when I hear the woman next to me say:

Hope you don't mind me interupting, I teach Kindergarten and I teach the kids to remember the 7 using a song that works really well.

She goes on to sing the song and my kid is just beaming. Music, can just make you smile.

Now, not being a shy wilting flower, I decide to ask if she's at DCPS, and as luck would have it, she is. So, I venture further:

What do you think of Rhee?

And she stops herself, trying to come up with the right words.

Teacher: I was filled with great hope when she came on.
Me: Now?
Teacher: I don't know.
Me: It's okay. I don't think much of her. What do you really think?
Teacher: She did have great promise of transforming the schools, making it easier to reach kids, but now, she thinks that teaching is a stop over, a place yuo go for a few years until your career starts. She thinks that the entire school system can be filled with Teach For America folks for 2 to 5 years and she's aiming at teachers like me. She wants to get rid of us because we made teaching our careers. She doesn't think you should or can and doesn't understand that anyone would want to.

When I started out, it took me 2 years before I had good classroom management. It took practice and consistancy and it didn't just happen over night.

I have enough time in to retire, so we'll be fine, but the kids...

Me: She's very short sighted about schools.

Teacher: Yes, it's very short sighted.

This is likely her last year teaching after nearly 30 years. And she's only even considering it because of how badly Rhee is managing the schools. And sitting there, thinking about how she just taught a German exchange student about the 7 continents and made my kid smile, it made me worry about what we will lose as a city and what all of our kids will lose if Adrian Fenty wins re-election.

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I was reading an op-ed in the Detroit News (yeah, I know, a Right-Wing piece of garbage, but I read lots of things that I'd use to wipe shit off my shoes, really, I do). The Op-Ed is by Rev. Edgar Vann, pastor of Second Ebenezer Church.

Washington, D.C. has a transformational leader making great strides in their school system. Michelle Rhee is the appointee of Mayor Adrian Fenty. Her efforts to bring true reform to that school system have drawn acclaim from a wide range of supporters with a minority of usual suspects still stuck in the old paradigm. She has closed underperforming schools, fired more than 30 underperforming principals and given notice to teachers that there will be no lowering of academic standards -- putting the interests of the children first and making radical changes in the classroom.

Eighteen of nineteen high schools in Detroit are on the failure list; the graduation rates are absolutely abysmal, and we change superintendents and CEOs like changing socks. Well, let's ask ourselves some tough questions. Does the school district's leader have to be an educator? Should we take another look at labor issues that may be distractions to the reform process?

The Pastor writes a Faith and Policy column but for some reason, decided to go off the deep end with his fawning for Rhee. This appears to be a common affliction among many lately.

Take the Time Piece of crap last month...

In 11th grade, Allante Rhodes spent 50 minutes a day in a Microsoft Word class at Anacostia Senior High School in Washington. He was determined to go to college, and he figured that knowing Word was a prerequisite. But on a good day, only six of the school's 14 computers worked. He never knew which ones until he sat down and searched for a flicker of life on the screen. "It was like Russian roulette," says Rhodes, a tall young man with an older man's steady gaze. If he picked the wrong computer, the teacher would give him a handout. He would spend the rest of the period learning to use Microsoft Word with a pencil and paper.

The article goes on to talk about how Rhee formed a connection to the student and held a meeting at Anacostia High School. Here's the funny thing...his issue was computers and yet, there's no mention of new usable computers, just bad teachers. Because somehow, these two things are related.

In the year and a half she's been on the job, Rhee has made more changes than most school leaders--even reform-minded ones--make in five years. She has shut 21 schools--15% of the city's total--and fired more than 100 workers from the district's famously bloated 900-person central bureaucracy. She has dismissed 270 teachers. And last spring she removed 36 principals, including the head of the elementary school her two daughters attend in an affluent northwest-D.C. neighborhood.

Yep, she did release all of these folks, and then didn't replace them. So, classes started with no teachers and had random substitutes 5 to 7 weeks into the school year.

Right now, schools assess teachers before they teach--filtering for candidates who are certified, who have a master's degree, who have other pieces of paper that do not predict good teaching. And we pay them the same regardless of their effectiveness.

By comparison, if we wanted to have truly great teachers in our schools, we would assess them after their second year of teaching, when we could identify very strong and very weak performers, according to years of research. Great teachers are in total control. They have clear expectations and rules, and they are consistent with rewards and punishments. Most of all, they are in a hurry. They never feel that there is enough time in the day. They quiz kids on their multiplication tables while they walk to lunch. And they don't give up on their worst students, even when any normal person would.

I read the article, puked a little in my mouth, then re-read it, started this post and then again, puked in my mouth. I've started and stopped and started and stopped and then started again, all because I have this amazing kid who wants to be a teacher. And the manner in which a Rhee and a Fenty will treat her teaching abilities and connection with students gives me great pause and has made me actually disuade her from teaching, despite my brother and sister-in-law being teachers.

I'm afraid of administrators who focus on one aspect of schools without regard for any other. In DCPS, my daughter had a small class size at Green Elementary. 17 students. On any given day, there'd be 5 to 13 but I never recall all the students ever showing up. Most of the students who did come to class had no supplies. No pencils, no notebooks and often, she was not allowed to bring books home with her at the end of the day. The teacher often came in to school early to run packets of materials for the kids who did show up. The books my daughter did use were tattered.

And I got to contrast the teaching in DC with that of the teaching at Sheridan Hills in Richfield Minnesota. And the teaching was comparable, in fact, her three teachers at Green were better than her 1st grade teacher at Sheridan. But the really big difference is that at Sheridan, we had more than enough home room parents. When we had back to school night, all the parents showed up except my ex-husband who lived in another state. My daughter was the ONLY kid in class with divorced parents and the social worker at the school found that she had a group of single moms whose kids had the same kind of self esteem issues so, she got all of us together and we formed our own support group to help the kids out.

At Sheridan, parents volunteered for evening events, clubs and sports. We had a carnival, the kids made books in 1st grade, my daughter could tell time and was reading and she was behind all her other classmates, in 1st grade, and then we moved to DC. In 2nd grade she was way ahead of everyone and went to class every day. For back to school night, I think there might have been 20 parents in the cafeteria including me and my neighbor, Carol. For my duaghter's class, it was me and a Dad and he was really worried about how far behind his kid was at the time and his behavior problems. He was worried about behavior problems at school and home.

Rhee's approach to the problem of DC public is a one trick pony and the writer of the Time piece isn't much better. The answer to the problems within the schools isn't teachers or principals or Rhee, it's about responsibility and moving forward together, something that Rhee just doesn't seem to understand and clearly something she needs to work because teachers aren't in this alone. We're all in this together.

Perhaps a few words from President Obama can bring this into focus:

Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

This is the journey we continue today. We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions - that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.

We can make DCPS better, stronger, faster, but Rhee isn't the answer. It will take all of us and that is something that's been lacking the entire time my daughter attended DCPS. I'm hopeful that my fellow citizens will now rise to this challenge. But I'm also ready for Rhee and fenty to stop blaming workers for the ills of all society. We have to work together to pick ourselves up and help to dust ourselves off. Together, is really the only way.

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So, not too many folks showed up yesterday to rally in front of the WTU. In fact, there were 8, according to the Wire. Didn’t hear about the Demonstration? The Post reported on it:

The rift is playing out in a blizzard of cellphone messages and e-mails, Facebook entries and posts on teacher blogs such as D.C. Teacher Chic and Dee Does the District.

Some of the teachers who want "green tier" salaries plan to demonstrate this morning at teacher union offices on L'Enfant Plaza.

Older teachers aren’t necessarily bad teachers. But Like I’ve said before, blaming teachers for why students perform badly on tests or administrators for why kids aren’t showing up, well, it’s like claiming that no one else matters in this equation, and that’s not true.

A few days ago, I talked about what it’s like being a parent with a child in DCPS. I wrote about other parents who often treated school more like a babysitter than a school. I talked about how, until we can make school the center of community again, firing administrators and teachers, well, it’s like blaming the nails for why the house fell down and not the builder constructing it. Without parents and community, we’re all screwed.

But, I digress. This post is about WTU and communication and for that matter, lack of communication.

So, let’s look at the DC 8 again. Sure, not many showed up, but like all unions, the WTU should be responsive to its membership. So, when the 8 showed up, WTU didn’t turn them away, Parker met with them.

All of 8 public school teachers, interested in the sizeable salary increases placed on the table by Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee, turned out at Washington Teachers Union headquarters on L'Enfant Plaza. They met for about 90 minutes with union president George Parker and emerged satisfied that they eventually would get a chance to vote on the pay package, which offers $100,000-plus salaries for tenured teachers willing to risk dismissal by going on probation for a year. Teachers unwilling to relinquish tenure would still get significant raises under the proposal.

"All my questions were answered," said Heather Migdon, a fifth-grade teacher at Nalle Elementary in Southeast. "I feel better about things." Migdon said that she wasn't concerned about the sparse turnout, and that it was to be expected with teachers still scattered on vacation and the last-minute notice (the gathering was called yesterday afternoon).

Instead of getting mad, signing on to nebulous groups like “strong schools,” why not actually approach the union in a more constructive way? They represent teachers. They are the voice of teachers in all negotiations. So, why not be more active and proactive with the union?

I’ve been thinking about this because of comments left on a previous post of mine. What struck me about Peter Poer’s comments wasn’t his support of Strong Schools (he’s a member and listed on their website) or that he’s an alumnus of Teach for America, it was that he noted this:

First, you write that Teacher have a voice in the negotiations -- their union. As a member in good standing with the WTU, I have not once been asked my opinion about the new contract. There have been no surveys, phone polls, emails, or any other means of communication between the WTU and me in which my opinion was asked for. How can the WTU claim to represent me if they don't know my opinion? The teachers who are working for Strong Schools DC are all teachers in DCPS, and therefore their voices are just as important as the voices coming from the unions.

To which I replied:

If "good standing" means that you pay your dues, then your voice isn't being heard because you aren't speaking up.

This holds true for all unions, but it holds doubly true for those of you out there who hate paying dues because you’re anti-union or don’t feel the union represents you, individually. If you feel this way, do something about it, again, from Peter’s comments:

I would also point out that teachers in DC must be represented by the WTU, whether they want to be or not.

Snip

Fundamentally, my problem is that the WTU leadership frequently makes decisions that I disagree with, and I have no other option but to deal with those decisions. If the union operated as an unbiased body that truly reflected the opinions of all of its members, then this would be fine.

Here’s the issue, Peter and perhaps 8 other DCPS teachers feel as if the union is not representing them. If there are more DC teachers out there happy or sad about the way the negotiations are going, they don’t seem to be communicating those feelings to the general public, so I’m assuming (and you know what they say about assumptions) that they are making their concerns and feelings known to the WTU, privately. This includes my forwarding of the exchanges with Peter over to WTU leadership (all of them) currently listed on the staff page. And in an effort to improve communications, if I get a response, I’ll post it here. If I receive no response, then I have to find that Peter’s other comments:

Feeling like I should put more effort into communicating with the union, I went to the website (www.wtulocal6.org). I should mention that, although I have never attended a union meeting, I've also never been asked to attend a union meeting. I have attended the meetings at my school, but these are infrequent and don't tend to discuss much actual union business. Anyway, looking at the website, there is no place to find information about when/where meetings take place. I have never received an email or letter telling me when meetings are.

I’d like to think this is an issue isolated to DC, however, another reader who is also in a teacher’s union in another state said this:

I love your site, especially reading about the DC teachers, Michelle Rhee and DC Voice, and could stay on it all day.

Though I am definitely pro-union, and have been a union member most of my life, I find that my union is unresponsive and undemocratic -- even unethical in certain areas. My main goal is to get the union to institute a list serve or an online bulletin board so that members can communicate with each other. Of course, I have larger goals for unions and our country, in general. But this goal is so basic and so ignored by most people in labor that I want to focus on that. If you have any suggestions and I can get this one little (but huge) thing done, then I will have psychic and other energies freed up to do the bigger stuff.

Is this an issue with AFT or is this a local’s issue? The fact that it’s teachers e-mailing me and leaving comments about this has me thinking that this is isolated to teachers and at this point, the new leadership at AFT has really got its work cut out for it.

To Peter and my other readers, I know it can be frustrating and you can feel like you aren’t being heard, but you are. It might just take more time to move your organizations toward the kind of communications you want to see and have and on that note, let me know how I can help. And WTU, send me a note and I’ll post it. Communication is a two way street and if your site isn’t getting the job done, then drop me a line and we’ll help.

In Solidarity- bendygirl

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I opened my e-mail to find this little ditty from DCLabor:

LABOR IN THE NEWS: Teacher Lobbying by Outside Group Raises Ire of DC Teachers: DC teachers and their union, the Washington Teachers Union (WTU) Local 6, are accusing a newly-created community group of inappropriately interfering in the ongoing teacher contract negotiations, reported Bill Turque in Wednesday’s Washington Post. The group, which has members with past ties to School Chancellor Michelle Rhee, has hired teachers to lobby co-workers to support the Chancellor’s controversial pay-for-performance plan that would end tenure rights for workers who take it. "We think it's inappropriate to interfere with the union's communications with its membership about a future contract," Local 6 President George Parker told the Post. Teachers have also voiced concern that Chancellor Rhee’s ties to the group may indicate she had a role in orchestrating the lobbying campaign.

From the Strong Schools website:

Strong Schools DC is an independent, informal group of individuals who came together last spring to support strong public schools and great teachers in the District. Through community meetings, literature distribution, and outreach to teachers, we have learned what teachers are looking for in a new teaching contract, and we have provided a solid, independent information source for teachers. Our mission is to support the growing movement to make Washington, DC the best place to teach in the country.

We are now eagerly awaiting the completion of negotiations for a new contract. When an agreement is reached, we will be prepared to mobilize support for the contract and to continue our role as a pro-teacher community advocate and source of independent information.

Gee, the way this site is written, it does sort of sound as if they intend to lobby teachers to get them on board instead of involving them in a crocess or collaborating in general. Teachers have a voice in negotiations with the Mayor and Rhee, they have their union. And one of the best things the union can do for them is to protect tenure, not for the scapegoat, "the poorly performing teacher" but for the next generation of teachers to come. But there's more than just tenure involved, there's safety, there's coordination, there's community, all subjects that DCVoice has been advocating for since 1998.

Growing up in rural Ohio, I know what it's like to have community involved in the school. All events centered around the school. From parties to girl and boy scouts to language classes, PTA meetings and plays, just to name a few. Together, we reinforced the idea that we really were all in it together. To organize a lobbying effort during district and teacher's negotiations sens a strong message to me, a DC parent, it tells me that you don't care about the teachers and aren't looking to work with the community. It says that you're willing to spend money to sway opinion, like the oil lobby or the insurance lobby. Is that the message you really want to send Rhee? If that what the entire message is Fenty?

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“NCLB has outlived whatever usefulness it ever had. Conceived by accountants, drafted by lawyers, and distorted by ideologues, it is too badly broken to be fixed.”

I couldn’t agree more with Randi Weingarten in her remarks delivered in Chicago.

Randi Weingarten, the new president of the American Federation of Teachers, declared war on the No Child Left Behind Act in her speech to delegates today, saying it has become, for many members, “a four-letter word.”

Wow, did you catch that? The New president of the American Federation of Teachers at her conference speech.

Did you notice? No?

Randi Weingarten is, well, SHE’S A WOMAN.

It’s TRUE and she’s not the only one, either!!

The top 3 posts at AFT are now held by women, and I love it!! Take the short mini-bio-paragraphs in the Chicago Tribune:

Lorretta Johnson was reading to her kids and others in the library of a mostly black Baltimore elementary school when she decided to ask for a job helping teachers. That was over 40 years ago.

About the same time, Antonia Cortese wasn't sure if she wanted school work. But she gave it a chance, starting out as an elementary school teacher and social worker in a poor rural district near her upstate New York home.

Over 20 years ago Randi Weingarten quit a cushy Wall Street lawyer's job to do legal work for the New York City teachers union. Wanting to know what it was like in the classroom, she took a part-time job teaching social studies at a largely black and Latino high school in Brooklyn.

These are amazing women. Women who wanted to make a difference and in doing so, moved toward the union, not away. In that move toward being unionists, they worked to make the lives of kids and their families better as well as the lives of teachers and teaching para-professionals (often called teaching assistants).

Not only have these women moved toward their roles in the union, including their own personal leadership role, but they are the first to lead a major union. Again, from the Chicago Tribune:

Their election would mark the first time three women will hold top positions in a union whose membership is more than 70 percent female. Similarly, no other major union in the U.S. has such a female-driven leadership, AFT officials point out.

And somehow, we still aren’t done yet. Again, from the Chicago Tribune:

As for the union's future, all three women talk of signing up more early childhood workers, paraprofessionals and charter school workers. They talk of stepping up the union's political activities so that schools get support from state and local lawmakers.

They also want to expand teachers' roles in their own professional groups.

One issue for Weingarten is helping workers deal with discrimination.

After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, for example, she felt a drop-off in women serving in top union positions in the New York City area. Her only explanation was that the tragedy triggered a harkening back to "more traditional roles."

She faced her own fears about discrimination when she announced at a public meeting in New York City last October that she was gay.

"I never hid my sexuality, but I never talked about it," she said.

She had hesitated, she explained, because "the things that most people are afraid of, I was afraid of too."

Much to her pleasure, the response, she said, was overwhelmingly supportive.

So, not only do we have these amazing women leading a huge union, but one of them is also an openly gay woman who makes as one of her goals to ensure that workers no longer face discrimination?! OMG!! This is FREAKING AWESOME!

It’s thrilling to see this sort of enthusiasm and excitement about the work of organizing and ensuring the rights of the membership as well as empowering these same workers to establish links in the communities in which they serve along the lines of services that I recall having at school when I was growing up. From the New York Times (login may be required)

Ms. Weingarten >snip< lays out a “new vision of schools for the 21st century.”

“Can you imagine a federal law that promoted community schools — schools that serve the neediest children by bringing together under one roof all the services and activities they and their families need?” Ms. Weingarten is expected to ask in the speech, a copy of which was provided by the union to The New York Times. “Imagine schools that are open all day and offer after-school and evening recreational activities, child care and preschool, tutoring and homework assistance,” the speech reads. “Schools that include dental, medical and counseling clinics”

>snip<

Ms. Weingarten’s speech says, “Sisters and brothers, this is an idea whose time has come.

“Imagine if schools had the educational resources children need to thrive, like smaller classes and individualized instruction, plentiful, up-to-date materials and technology anchored to that rich curriculum, decent facilities, an early start for toddlers and a nurturing atmosphere,” she says.

>snip<

“We all have to work tenaciously to eliminate the achievement gap and to turn around low-performing schools. But the folks who believe that this can all be done on teachers’ shoulders, which is what No Child tries to do, are doing a huge disservice to America.”

Leadership, mission, and the vision to get it done, I think this pretty much sums up Antonia Cortese, Lorretta Johnson and the new AFT President, Randi Weingarten. I’m so excited to see what these accomplished, activist, unionist women can do for AFT, America and the labor movement. Tall order, huh? But these are women with the kind of shoulders to carry this burden and excel at it!!

Congratulations AFT! Congratulations!!

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So, there’s talk in the news about the recent moves in DC concerning DC Public education and the firing of District employees, teachers, and now principals. In the past, Rhee, the school’s chancellor, had offered buyouts to teachers, it does not appear that principals will receive the same treatment because they are on year-to-year contracts. Which to me sounds “at-will,” yuk.

As I read about the firings of principals, something caught my eye in the Post

Recruiting and retaining high-quality principals have been longtime challenges in the school system. In 2005, then-Superintendent Clifford B. Janey said 25 to 40 percent of the system's 140 principals "are not the caliber they need to be."

My child is a product of DC public and I wasn’t going to let her continue down that path. She’s now on scholarship at a private school in the district and she LOVES it. Going to a DC Public school made her feel bad about herself, left her suicidal, had her in therapy, and saw this bright usually happy child avoiding homework and reading in class instead of learning. She went to an elementary school where her principal was beaten by two fourth graders so badly that he was hospitalized with broken ribs and a broken arm. Principals who take on the worst schools, like Anacostia High School, PR Harris and Green Elementary are then asked to turn around a school with little to no parent interaction, where kids are virtually warehoused, waiting to enter the workforce with no ability to do pretty much anything.

My kid was lucky. I had the determination to be involved in the PTOs and PTAs, the open houses conferences and it didn’t help. I couldn’t get her out of the hell she was in, so with no other choice, she went to a charter school. I became even more involved in the school, volunteering, PTO work, you name it, I did it. And even then, it still wasn’t enough. There were 28 to 30 kids in each classroom and my kid was getting almost no additional assistance with math or science which had been her favorite subjects, so on she moved to another charter school. This one worked better. It had smaller class sizes but no science program. For 8th grade, she went back to DCPS and there she was placed with the worst kids. Kids with criminal records, an inability to read, poor math skills and worse, with behavior issues so severe that she was constantly bullied, threatened and pushed around until she finally just completely closed off into the world of books where everything could be perfect.

So, when her high school accepted her and offered a scholarship, we jumped at it. The scholarship was contingent on her ability to perform after the 1st semester. Coming from DCPS and the charter school system, she was behind in English and only at grade level for Math, so she needed to be able to play catch up and if it didn’t work, there was always Woodrow Wilson High School.

But for the thousands of kids in DCPS, I can’t help but wonder what is achieved through the changes that Fenty and Rhee are now undertaking with DCPS. I just don’t think any of it will work. It won’t work because it seems more political than centered in making learning environments for kids. Take how the Principals not being renewed found out:

A form letter over Rhee's signature went out to the principals identified for firing yesterday afternoon. It was to be followed by a series of one-on-one meetings between the principals and instructional superintendents, their immediate supervisors, said Rhee's spokeswoman, Mafara Hobson.

If you treat your employees like yesterday’s news, exactly why would we think that you’d be out there for the kids?

DCPS has a lot of issues. From violence to behavior, to simply teaching and learning, but all of this can be turned around, I just don’t think it’s going to happen with Fenty and Rhee. I think it takes making the schools as important a part of the community with events and gatherings. If school isn’t community, then you lose out on so much community building that should be taking place. The real issue isn’t with failing schools, it’s with failing communities. So, when are we going to start helping each other?

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