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Monday night, I stopped by the Teachers Unite kick-off and orientation event, interested in learning more about ways that teachers and community based organizations are working together across the city.

“Public schools should and will reflect the communities they are in,” said organizer Sally Lee. “The role of teachers is to work with members of the community to create an educational space that reflects the values of that community.”

To that end, Teachers Unite plans to partner with community based organizations to use teachers’ unique knowledge and skills to strengthen the work of these organizations. (more…)

Image courtesy Gotham Gazette.

With the city cutting parking permits for teachers from more than 63,000 to about 11,000 — though not cutting the number of available spaces — I’m curious how readers think this change will affect teachers. Will more take public transit or carpool?

Principals and union reps are supposed to meet to decide a fair system for each school, to take effect in early October. Teachers: what would you like to see? Should permits be distributed according to seniority? Length of commute? Lack of public transit options? Other factors such as family needs? Or should they be given out by lottery, on a rotating basis, or in some kind of shared pool?

Leave your ideas in the comments, and, as the school year gets started, keep us updated on how this plays out.

Photo from Biden's Senate webpage.

“I sleep with a teacher every night,” said Barack Obama’s running mate Joe Biden in a Democratic primary debate in February 2007. He was talking about his wife, Jill Biden, a former high school English teacher. Has this relationship provided Biden with intimate knowledge of education issues? You be the judge.

At OnTheIssues, a quick look at excerpts from speeches and debates shows Biden consistently in support of increasing teacher pay to make the profession more appealing to top undergrads. In considering merit pay, he seems to understand teachers’ concerns about being evaluated fairly by administrators. And he thinks the solution to the racial and economic achievement gap is to improve early childhood education, lower class sizes and provide the best teachers to disadvantaged students.

His voting record shows yes votes for many education spending measures, (more…)

• The DOE is piloting several new assessment options for children in grades K-2. (Times)
• Through the city’s new Campaign for Middle School Success, struggling middle schools qualify for “improvement grants” from the city, and all middle schools will be encouraged to follow a “blueprint” based on programs at successful schools. (Daily News)
• The city reduced parking permits for teachers from around 63,000 to about 11,000 this year; permits will be allocated by individual schools rather than centrally. (Times, Post, Daily News)
• Nationally, SAT scores this year matched last year’s. New York state and city scores dropped slightly, possibly because more students took the test. (Times, Daily News, Post)
  
• Morning Edition looks at one school with a surprisingly high number of students getting a perfect SAT score. (NPR)
• In a forum at the Democratic National Convention yesterday, Michelle Obama and Joe Biden declared the need for health care and high quality education for all. (Sun)
• Chicago state senator James Meeks says he’ll drop his schools boycott if top state Democrats back a plan to aid failing schools. (Sun-Times)

The UFT has posted the full text of Randi Weingarten’s speech last night to the Democratic National Convention, which ran a full 64 seconds over her time limit. Most of Weingarten’s speech was what you might expect from the head of the nation’s two largest teachers unions, but she included a subtle dig at Sunday’s “Ed Challenge for Change” event, which featured much union-bashing, when she said that students sometimes “bring their empty stomachs, untreated ailments, and life experiences that can chill you to your core” when they come to school, making teaching and learning untenable. Earlier in the day, however, Weingarten told Education Week’s Michele McNeil that she thought the Ed Challenge for Change event was “a cheap shot” against unions and said she was “really pissed” about it.

What does NBA player Tim Duncan have to do with teaching? It's all about the poker face, says Jose Vilson.

The start of school is fast-approaching, and teachers around the “edusphere” are offering advice to newbies.

Here in NYC, Jose Vilson writes a sharp, good-humored letter to new Teaching Fellows, advising them to be humble, reflect on their strengths and weaknesses, observe other teachers, keep emotions in check, and stay out of school politics.

Coach Brown, starting his eighth year in California, says it’s all about doing what’s best for kids, and this takes hard work, preparation, finding your own style of teaching, and knowing how to pick your battles. Don’t waste your students’ time, he warns:

Students are some of the best judges of good teaching that exist. 95% of all students actually want to learn. They tell you in means that are not typical but will tell you immediately if you are doing it “wrong”. …However, students will always have a positive response to work they find meaningful.

Jamie Huston, a high school literature teacher in Las Vegas, offers 50 Things New Teachers Need to Know. (more…)

iPod Touch by Mike Rohde

Looks like I was born too soon — my middle school is considering giving an iPod touch to every student and teacher. All the school ever gave me was a spiral-bound planner filled with motivational platitudes!

Culbreth Middle School in Chapel Hill, N.C. is hoping to raise $230,000 in private funds to become the first K-12 school to give an iPod to every student. Detractors say the potential for abuse and the initiative’s price tag outweigh any possible benefits. But Culbreth’s principal maintains that any tool that keeps kids engaged and allows teachers to “meet [students] where they are” is worth experimenting with.

Apple’s “App Store” is stocked with tools that a middle school student might find useful, such as foreign language dictionaries and a graphing calculator. I’m not sure whether any well-designed programs that are specifically aligned to middle school curricula exist for the iPod. But if they did, the iPods could be tremendous learning tools, particularly for students who prefer a hands-on approach to understanding new material. I spent time recently with a friend who is in her third year of medical school. She recently bought an interactive set of anatomy flashcards for her iPhone — and promptly learned many of the body parts that had escaped her memory in the past. She said having the physical experience of poking at the kidney’s medulla and being able to study whenever she had a chance, not just sitting at a desk, improved her retention.

Plus, she said, studying suddenly felt more stylish.

• Ten elementary schools will pilot a three-year, K-2 intensive reading curriculum based on the Core Knowledge program, Chancellor Klein announced yesterday. (Times)
• Chancellor Klein gave an overview of his opinions and policies in a recent interview with Children’s PressLine. (Daily News)
• Two teachers who drew fire for organizing illegal trips to Cuba for students at Manhattan’s Beacon High School have resigned. (Post)
• A former regional superintendent has been fined for violating the city’s rule that city officials may not have business dealings with their former employer for a year after they leave. (Post)
• A former Bronx principal illegally manipulated the DOE’s bidding process into landing his consulting firm contracts worth nearly $2 million, investigators say. (Post)
• Some school districts are starting the new school year with new policies limiting or even abolishing homework. (Houston Chronicle)
• The new head of school food in Baltimore is hoping to bring Berkeley-style fresh and local cuisine to the city’s school cafeterias. (Gourmet Magazine)

Randi Weingarten

As commenter ECF noted this morning, UFT and AFT president Randi Weingarten is speaking at the Democratic National Convention this evening in Denver. She goes on sometime a little before 9 p.m. ET, just a few speakers ahead of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. I’ll be checking the speech out, if not in real time on CSPAN, then online tonight, and will sum it up tomorrow — feel free to contribute your responses in the comments tonight!

I think we can expect some variation on Weingarten’s speech to the AFT last month where she proposed turning schools into full-service community centers. But whatever she says, it may be a tough sell. Traditionally the party of labor, the Democrats appear comfortable piling onto the teachers’ unions this year, according to reports from last night’s “Ed Challenge for Change” event, which featured Chancellor Klein and other signatories to the Education Equality Project. Michele McNeil of Education Week’s Campaign K-12 blog writes that “anti-union sentiment” persisted through three hours of standing-room-only press conferences and panel discussions. “Cory Booker of Newark attacked teachers unions specifically — and there was applause. In a room of 500 people at the Democratic convention!” reports Mickey Kaus of Slate (emphasis his). Over at the American Prospect, Dana Goldstein covers the event in detail and offers advice for unions that are struggling to stay relevant as their teacher-members start adopting tenets of Education Equality Project-style reform.

The PS 22 Chorus performing last year at the Tribute WTC Museum. Courtesy of PS 22 Chorus

“A week from tomorrow, the games begin,” Chancellor Joel Klein told an audience of a few hundred teachers at a welcome event this morning at Lincoln Center’s Avery Fisher Hall. Speaking of New York City students as “my kids,” Klein encouraged teachers to “teach them well and they will do well on these exams.”

In addition to speeches by Klein, UFT Secretary Michael Mendel, Deputy Mayor Dennis Walcott, and others, the event featured performances by city students, including the music of the PS 22 chorus from Staten Island, double dutch by Stan’s Pepper Steppers, and foxtrot, swing, and mambo by the Dancing Classrooms Youth Dance Company.

Pointing to the accomplishments of his fifth grade choristers, music teacher and chorus director Gregg Breinberg told the audience, “I know many of you are entering the profession, and I just want to tell you — reach, reach, reach.” Other speakers echoed that message of high expectations for students — and for oneself as a teacher.

“Quite frankly, we don’t have room for so-so teachers, we don’t have room for that mediocrity in our schools,” Deputy Chancellor Marcia Lyles said. She recalled the way her sixth grade teacher made each child feel like her favorite. Lyles honored 33 teachers chosen for the Gotham Graduates Give Back Award, a $1,000 prize given to select teachers who graduated from New York City public schools. (more…)