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The imbeciles at the DoE are truly a bunch of sore losers.  Good luck with dealing with Judge Lobis.  

If the judge did not consider the dispute arbitrable, then she wouldn’t have urged both sides to accept binding arbitration.  All parties agreed on the selected arbitrator, the details of the dispute, and the remedy should the UFT and CSA prevail.

The mayor can, and probably will, close these 24 schools next year as part of the normal closing process.  Why delay implementation of the arbitrator’s ruling for even a week?  Doesn’t that do harm?

Cab’t find the Sternberg affadavit on the link provided?  Is it there?

Intended to post as a reply to cj’s post re “am I missing something”:

I think we’re all missing a lot of information.  But based on just the information we have, if I were this judge, the first question I want the DOE to answer is why they didn’t make this argument to me back in May when I was suggesting that the parties take the dispute to arbitration.  If I don’t get a good answer to that question — and I can’t imagine what a good answer could be — then I’m rubber-stamping the award unless the DOE can convince me in 60 seconds that it’s completely obvious that the arbitrator blew the jurisdictional question.

Is this what the rest of the year is going to be like, where everyone is watching closely as to what happens next?

This is how it’s been for me: I don’t know if any other Newtown student is following the story, but I have been especially paying attention to Gotham Schools for the past two weeks, and the situation only continues to escalate. I want to go on with my summer vacation without having to worry whether my school is going to be there next year!

This is going to be a long summer.

Perhaps you can say this if you are looking at this incident in isolation, but he has a rather substantial body of work to analyze. You see him as someone who will do everything he can to get something accomplished. I see him as someone unable to accept the fact that he cannot get everything he wants accomplished because he does not have absolute control- and I see this as something symptomatic of more serious problem in how sees his role as mayor.

When you look at his reign as mayor, you can actually see similarities between his way of thinking and, sometimes acting, with those rulers we now know as  ”enlightened monarchs.”

Getting the Council to throw out term limits to satisfy his whim, taking complete control of the education system, the disgraceful appointment of Kathy Black, and other non-educators as Chancellor, his reaction to the Council overruling his veto of the living wage act, his handling of the turnaround issue, his reaction to the arbitrator, Sodagate, and other actions and reactions show a man who is not at ease in a democratic, rule by law system. I’m sure others can come up with other instances where he has been heavy-handed, if you even want more evidence.

I actually like the way he approaches many social issues. Enlightened monarchs did good things too, but like Bloomberg, they abused their power at some point, even if it was for what they thought was a good cause.

Found this online- a comment about Bloomberg’s company from someone who worked there.  Substitute “teachers” for “developers” and “education” for “products” and it is an interesting read.:

“Decisions about products are made without much input from the developers… (M)anagers and business people were in a world of their own, and developers are treated as contractors when it comes to their influence over products.”

“Very poor testing and development environment. Time was never allotted for testing software, and the development environment was often broken or not a good proxy for the production system.”

The writer’s solution:

Advice to Senior ManagementYou hire a lot of very smart people. Try to let them use their brains. Maybe take a note from Google or Facebook on how to run an office full of developers.

”
The city voluntarily entered into the arbitration process in May”
Come on. Voluntarily? They will make the argument a shotgun was pointed at them. Or better, the devil made them do it.

In general, Mr. F., I appreciate your comments on this site.  I am pissed and angry about the way the teachers are being treated, but I need to hear an objective, legal perspective.  Thanks.

 The City is attempting the squeeze as much damage as possible until they are stopped outright. 

Nevertheless, asides from this phyrrhic victory, all schools will have gone through irreparable damage, which will be used by the DoE to hammer the nail at coffin of these historical schools.

It is possible that the City and the DoE will be stuck with costly lawsuits even after the Supreme Leader leaves, this is the worst part of it all, as city citizens will take a hit….this sort of dirty tactics are typical of private enterprise, to gamble with someone else’s money and lives.

I truly hope when all appeals have been exhausted that the City and the DoE will be hammered with  a  judgement that will cost their duplicity greatly.

Ms. Radovich, the new principal at Flushing High School is keeping the name Rupert B. Thomas Academy.  Doesn’t this go against the arbitrator’s ruling?  Who cares if they already have letterheads with that name on it.  I wish we would get a straight answer for a change. 

What the mayor did to our students, teachers, and schools
was unconscionable. The process by which the mayor chose to get rid of staff
has been compared to that of Nazism, Stalinism, and Napoleonism. The
psychological, emotional, and mental turmoil the staff and students of all these schools endured
during this process was heart-breaking. Our school was a fantastic
school with a terrific, upbeat, caring, smart, hardworking staff until this year, when we received a new principal to “clean out” the school (a pattern of his, I hear).
Guests used to comment on how wonderful our school was–on how great the
students and staff were. The behavior exhibited by some of these principals
would never have been tolerated in teachers, so why the double-standard? Of
course there were problems, but nothing compared to those of truly failing schools.
The mayor claimed that this process would get rid of “ineffective”
teachers. If that were the case, why were many of our best, well-loved, and
highly qualified teachers let go? Why were some teachers who were the heart and soul of our
school–who helped with extracurricular activities, tutored students every day,
worked on Saturdays, Sundays, evenings (with no extra pay), listened, guided,
advised, consoled, and cared, let go? Why were teachers who had never in their
careers had a bad rating suddenly given unsatisfactory ratings for things as
silly as not having an “Aim” on the board, and why were these
“ineffective” teachers not offered help to “improve” as per
the contract? Why did the “interview” process consist of the same
five questions, without allowing the teachers to speak about their
contributions, experience, and qualifications?  Isn’t the purpose of an
interview to allow the interviewees to sell themselves and not to regurgitate
rote answers to preselected questions? Why go through it at all when it was
obvious that whoever the principal wanted to stay stayed? We had excellent
teachers retire early because they didn’t want to end their careers being branded as “ineffective”. The
students of one of these teachers complained that the new math teacher who replaced
him “didn’t know how to teach” and they wanted their former teacher
back.

No, Mayor Bloomberg. Your reform is not about the students. If it were,
you would not send principals to these schools whose sole purpose is to demoralize,
humiliate, and fire teachers. You would send in leaders who encourage, support,
and inspire teachers to do their best and who help the weaker teachers improve.
But that’s not what it’s about to you, and now everyone knows it. Only 40+ of
approximately 200 teachers at our school were asked to stay. Are you saying we
had 160 ineffective teachers at our school? I think not. Your stats are flawed,
the standardized tests are flawed, the teacher evaluations you wanted to
implement were flawed, the four-year graduation rate plan is flawed, the Leadership
Academy principals are flawed, and the DOE leadership is flawed. Honestly. It
is the DOE that should be “turned-around”.

Well said!