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Aside from the fact that the people’s mic is a really cool thing to witness in person, it’s worth saying that this is what happens when only the semblance of community involvement in NYC schools is present. 

When meetings like this (granted only by state law a few years ago, mind you) become the ONLY outlet for parents and community members to express their concerns and the ONLY way for them to affect their schools, then a circus atmosphere (similar to what has happened in the past) is bound to occur. 

The big difference now is that tonight wasn’t a circus; it was organized protest. 

And to be clear, the protest is of too much centralized control with no real voice form community members and parents in how school policy is shaped in this city.

What I was told by DOE today was that this meeting was being hosted by the Chancellor and the PEP was invited to participate but that it was not a PEP meeting. There was no Q&A with the public but if people submitted their questions on index cards they might be considered to be addressed by the DOE or invited speaker, David Coleman, a consultant on the Common Core. So despite being billed as a “conversation”, there wasn’t going to be any dialogue.

I had every intention of joining the session in the break-out room to which I was assigned but the first public speaker in the auditorium pointed out that Coleman had used profanity in his earlier explication of the standards to State Ed. I did make sense to me that a K-12 educators ought to be able to convey their argument without resorting to profanity. So I sat down to listen more rather than join Mr. Coleman.

What is really sad is the fact the American flag is in the wrong place.   Typical of a Liberal Assembly!

well whatever they say goes so if they say it wasn’t a PEP meeting, I guess it wasn’t a PEP meeting

Let it be said: there was more real dialogue and discussion there tonight than there would have been if Walcott’s dog and pony show had been allowed to continue.  Parents were not consulted before adopting the Common Core and truly, our ideas are always ignored by this administration.  Let’s hope tonight was the first of many general assemblies.  And by the way: many of the students, as well as parents and teachers focused on the problems of class size and testing — not just teacher pay.

Ridiculous.  Parents don’t have to be consulted about this, just informed, which they were – this is a state mandate down from the federal level.  If they were there to protest, they should have at least listened to what was to be discussed.  I hope this movement changes its name quickly, because it’s giving the honorable “Occupy Wall Street” a bad name.  Of course there are issues that need to be addressed in this huge (1.1M students) and complex school system – but this balderdash is hardly the way to go about it.

“If these things are not done, then we won’t be able to be succeeded.”  – pretty much sums it up. 

I doubt you are a parent or a teacher. You have to be affiliated with the Board of Dread. Such a shame. The DOE is being run by people who have never taught and whose children attend private schools! Bloomberg and his cronies have ruined the school system! If we do not stick together..parents and educators..we will have a city of dummies.

EJ’s comments perfectly reflect the attitude of the people who are running our schools, in NYC, NY state and nationally:  Parents do not have to be consulted, they just have to be told what to do.  The people making decisions for our children are mostly billionaires — the 1% who send their own kids to private schools, while the 99% of the rest of us are powerless. -Our  school budgets are being cut repeatedly, and class sizes sharply rising, while Gates & Bloomberg  proclaim that resources and class size don’t matter,and send their own kids to schools where no classes top 16.

 It is profoundly undemocratic and inequitable, and it is getting worse as the corp reformers are further controlling school board races & other elections throughout the country thru their billions.  This is exactly what Occupy Wall St. is about, and we welcome their help and participation to unmask the corruption of the process and policies that have occurred in this city.

Education’s “tactic” to maintain the status quo is to do something, and then redo it ad infinitum (e.g., redo the curriculum in breakout sessions). The challenge is to make change, and at this point, sooner rather than later. Bravo to the people who are making it happen.

Fierpolo: the city has been provided with more than $2B in state aid, in the form of Contracts for excellence funds since 2007; this year more than $530 M, in exchange for their promise to reduce class sizes in all grades.

The DOE also estimated that it would cost only about $358 million per year to achieve the C4E goals of no more than 20 per class in K-3, 23 in 4th-8th and 25 in core HS classes on average across the city.  They estimated it would cost about $448 M to achieve these goals in ALL schools, plus more in capital funding.

Yet instead of using the C4E funds appropriately, class sizes have risen sharply in all grades, and are now far larger than they were in 2007. In the early grades, they are the largest in 11 years.

As for my disagreements with the UFT, I have openly expressed them several times.  One example is the agreement they made w/ Bloomberg to allow teacher merit pay tied to test scores in exchange for the pension deal.  I didn’t think that was a good deal for our kids or for our schools. 

Yet I am not big on arguing with the UFT, because in general I believe their policy positions are far more research-based, and far more positive and progressive than the administration’s.  They are fighting for more resources to go into the classroom, for smaller classes, for more accountability on the part of the DOE.  Why?  Because improving their working conditions,in general, means improving our children’s learning conditions.

Teachers are under assault and are being scapegoated in a way that is very damaging and destructive to our children’s futures.  I refuse to participate in this assault because it is unfair and because it is a distraction from the real ills that plague our schools.

If you want more info on class size in general, or on the C4E issues, check out my website at http://shar.es/bdbn5 or email me; I’m always happy to talk.
thanks, Leonie

Hum your a parent here are some suggestions.
1. Get rid of the mayor everything he has done has destroyed the education system
2. Charter schools need to pay their fair share.
3. Real administrators should run the schools not the 30 day business wonders.
4. Get rid of all consultants
5. Listen to parents,teachers and real administrators.
6. Work fairly with the unions for working reforms.
7. Give some of your time and work in a school so when you open up your mouth you will have some idea as to what your talking about.
8. Listen to real education advocates and do not get rid of programs that really work.
9. Get over you uft phobia and see what they have really done over the years.
10. Open up to other opinions and experience what is really happening in education.

As a Panel member I thought I may have some opportunity to pose questions so I did prepare by reading the transcript of Coleman’s presentation to the State Ed Dept twice, closely.   Sure, there are some good things about it, I agree.   There are some bad things.  Mostly I got the sense that it was completely unproven.  I wanted to ask Coleman the question that proponents of the Core refuse to answer.  Why is it being pushed on our kids without being tested?  Where’s the field test?

Coleman himself is clearly a show off but does he actually know what he’s talking about?   Sorry, kids don’t learn “linear algegra” in 8th grade.   And why does he need to use profanity to make his point?   In the transcript it’s been edited but on the tape it is clear.  He’s never taught a day in his life and it shows. 

Sorry, my kids and the families I represent deserve better than an unproven curriculum assembled by a Gates-funded consultant.   I notice his kids won’t be getting this curriculum. 

“One example is the agreement they made w/ Bloomberg to allow teacher merit pay tied to test scores in exchange for the pension deal.  I didn’t think that was a good deal for our kids or for our schools.”  
I agree entirely with that.  A horrible, horrible deal.  I take the rest of your response to mean that you’re generally in lock-step with the UFT.  Each to his own, I suppose, but I don’t find that a credible form of “grassroots” parent/student advocacy, given that there are some issues where the interests of public employees and children are sharply divergent.  I have no problem endorsing particular positions of the teacher’s union when I feel they are consistent with the interests of my children.  But a real grassroots parents advocacy group should be able to articulate and advance the interests of parents and children without any concern about offending the UFT or its members.  That’s clearly not the case with you, and so while you may have important and valid points, I have to meet them with the same kind of critical eye I would apply to the UFT or the DOE.  

For example, on the C4E issues you describe, I have to ask myself questions like:  Did the DOE “promise to reduce class sizes in all grades,” as you say, or did it promise to use C4E funds in an attempt to reduce class sizes?  Is the reduction of class sizes the only thing that C4E funds must be used for, as you imply, or are other uses of those funds, and if so, how much has the DOE actually been required to devote to class size reduction?  Has the DOE actually been given $530 million?  Is it reasonable to expect the DOE to reduce class sizes when state and federal funding decline by *more* than the amount of C4E funds targeted for class-size reduction?  And when expenses are blowing through the roof?  I have to do all of this analysis on my own because, frankly, I can’t trust that you aren’t just cutting-and-pasting from union talking points.

I understand why the teachers on this message board line up behind the UFT — even the ATRs who feel screwed over and abandoned.  They have no choice.  But I certainly do.  

Lined up behind the UFT? Are you living in a box? The blogs have been overflowing with criticisms of the UFT. If you want to just talk about class size, Ed Notes has chronicled 40 years of the UFT refusing to put class size front and center except for a few PR instances. I just found a newsletter I put out to my school assaulting the UFT for abandoning class size reduction and only chasing after salary raises. That was c. 1976.

“Is it reasonable” to reduce class size when the DOE spends billions on untested tech and merit pay schemes and consultants? Hell YES!

Not categorically opposed to common core but suspiciousI of experimentation on kids where the only certain outcome is enrichment of vested interests.

One parent who did attend the breakout session described it to me this way:

“The DOE explained how they have a team of experts and analysts from various fields developed this standard. However, when I asked them what metrics will they be using to measure success / failure of this new standard they have no answers. They responded DOE traditionally do not have a culture of doing that.

I asked how will I know if this new standard is working for my child? They told me if I’m a good parent, I should know. But there is no baseline, what am I comparing this new standard to? How will I know if it is better or worse than what we had before?

So they hired all these analysts to develop the common core standards for our children, without defining any performance indicators. Nobody will ever be responsible for the failure because performance will not be measured. There is no accountability whatsoever.

Maybe just like the math example they gave in the handout, DOE just have to ‘show their work’ with some pizza pies and never have to give us any real answers.”

AMAZING film coverage of the event here – see the event in total:

http://youtu.be/YbmjMickJMA

Can’t you do better than that, fierpolo?  Do a little research maybe?  Yes the law required DOE to reduce class sizes in all grades, and the DOE submitted a plan to do so. Yes, the DOE has been given $530 M.  this year. No these are not union talking points, these are my own words, and your implication otherwise is  insulting.  Read the links I provided on my website, unless  your only real purpose in all this is to denigrate my work.

in truth you sound like the editors of the NYPost.  The only tactic you seem to be able to muster is to brand those you disagree with as tools of the union.  Pretty pathetic.

As I said, I will do some research, because I have to.  You could speed that process if you gave me a link to a primary source showing the disbursement, or a link to the statute/regulation/court decision that you claim requires the DOE to reduce class sizes.  Or if you could answer my other questions that I posed below.  

I suppose these questions are rhetorical.  OK, I’ll go to your web site and look at the links and see for myself.  I’ll be charitable and assume that you don’t feel insulted because I’m questioning the substance of your statements.  (Does it happen so rarely?)  I do apologize if my tone has been harsh, though. 

It’s sad that so much time is wasted trying to save a lost mind. All I can say is ignore ignorance.
Flerpi work in a school for a week and then you can talk with some knowledge.
You would much rather chase ambulances.