Category: General

Know Your Friends… and Your Enemies!

I hope that everybody is enjoying their summer so far.  Whether you have been traveling, laying on the beach, working at another job, or just enjoying some extra family time it can be nice to have a few weeks away from the stresses of your day job.  With that idea in mind, while we are away from school the powers that be continue to look for new ways to disrespect and destroy our profession.  At the same time we have a growing number of friends looking to fight back against those powers that be.  Naturally those allies of ours will need as much help as they can get and we should be willing to provide just that.  If you are new to following this fight… or if you are not new but find the sheer volume of it overwhelming, don’t worry, thepjsta.org is here to help!

Beginning this summer, as our blog celebrates it’s first anniversary and enters it’s second year of existence, we will be looking for ways to improve how this site can benefit our members.  One of those ways will be through two new special series that we will be writing.  The purpose of these series, which will pop up throughout the year, will be to educate you on who are your friends and who are your enemies.  By this we mean who are the forces fighting to protect public education and who are the forces attempting to destroy it.  These two series will be appropriately titled, “Know Your Friends” (KYF) and “Know Your Enemies” (KYE).  We will cover people and organizations such as Bill Gates, Diane Ravitch, Michelle Rhee, Barack Obama, Arnie Duncan, Karen Lewis, Corey Booker, Teach for America, Badass Teachers Association, and many, many more.

Some of you may be surprised at who is a friend of public ed and who is not.  Understand that the lines drawn over public ed do not correlate with political party lines.  They often make for strange bed fellows as well.  However, going forward, it is essential for us to educate ourselves, know the issues, stand up for ourselves, attend rallies, engage in civil disobedience when necessary, and make our voices heard at the polls.

Vote YES Today!

I’m going to keep this very simple.

Vote “YES” on your school budget and visit the NYSUT Action Center on Facebook to help us spread the word and MAKE THE DIFFERENCE!

Today, in districts all over the state, we have an opportunity to vote on our local school budgets. Your “yes” vote can make the difference between your local schools–and your local students–winning or losing.

Vote “YES” on your school budget and visit the NYSUT Action Center on Facebook to help us spread the word and MAKE THE DIFFERENCE!

On Tuesday, May 21, please go to the polls and vote”YES!” Please make sure that your family, your friends and your co-workers go the polls and vote “YES!” And please post this message on your own Facebook wall to spread the word across your community and across the state

June 8th Rally Update

There are 50 PJSTA members registered to go to the Rally and we have room for more if you would like to join us… The PJSTA bus will leave from the Suffolk Regional Office at 7:15am… Please be punctual…
 
Rally Schedule & Location
The rally is scheduled to start at noon on the Empire State Plaza across the street from the capitol building and last for 2 to 3 hours, with buses departing the event as soon thereafter as possible.
The PJSTA Bus Will be leaving Leaving from the Suffolk RO in Hauppauge
Buses from this location are scheduled to leave at 7:15 AM and are tentatively scheduled to return at 6:30 PM.
 Automobile Parking – 
Drivers please be advised that NYSUT is recommending that you take the bus!! Parking will be very difficult at best and far from the rally location. Please let me know if you want to take the bus. Here is the link for parking garages and lots in the downtown Albany area. www.parkalbany.com.
Food
The PJSTA will be providing lunch on the bus. Light refreshments, coffee. and water will also be provided in the morning.
T-Shirts- wear your PJSTA  testing shirts!
 
NYSUT Web Site
A great deal of information regarding the Rally can be found at: www.nysut.org.

“Learning is more than a test score…” Tee-shirts

Just a reminder, PJSTA members should be wearing their “Learning is more than a test score” tee-shirts tomorrow for the first day of the 2013 ELA exam.

tees

North Bellmore’s BOE joined Comsewogue’s last week in issuing a resolution against the use of standardized testing in New York State.

Another Newsday hatchet job here.

Long Island Opt Out’s Jeannette Brunelle Deutermann responded with the following…

Newsday, you have missed the mark yet again. There is an awakening that has been occurring throughout Long Island, New York State, and the Nation. Parents are finally educating themselves on the state of our educational system, and we are horrified by what we have found. Excessive testing on educationally inappropriate material, an experimental common core curriculum which eliminates inspired and creative learning, selling of our children’s data without our consent, and a system which vilifies the only component in this equation putting our children first; the teachers. John King, whose own children do not take part in state assessments, claims his goal is “college ready learners”. Instead he is creating an epidemic of children who are uninspired, dispassionate, bored, and stressed; An epidemic of children who hate school. What is the use of “college ready” when our children won’t even WANT to go to college?

Educators warned the State years ago that if they continued to leave teachers, parents and students out of the equation, the parents would eventually rise up. And rise up we have. Newsday has discounted us as troublemakers and complainers. We are over 7,000 strong JUST ON LONG ISLAND, and our numbers grow by the day. We will no longer sit idly by while businessmen and politicians dismantle our educational system. We will take back our schools. Thousands of children across the State will not be taking part in this week’s state tests. Do not discount us. We will be heard.

Opting Out

Recently the United Opt Out movement has been gaining some steam as many states are gearing up for standardized testing.  This movement is beginning to take root in the community that we work in along with the communities that any of us reside in.  This movement describes itself as follows…

Members of this site are parents, educators, students and social activists who are dedicated to the elimination of high stakes testing in public education. We use this site to collaborate, exchange ideas, support one another, share information and initiate collective local and national actions to end the reign of fear and terror promoted by the high stakes testing agenda.

This blog first mentioned this movement back on January 22nd.  Certainly if you are a parent of school aged children who will be taking the upcoming tests you may be interested in exploring this further.

A Must Read Article, Opting Out, BOE Candidates, Karen Lewis

A MUST READ article on the Democratic Party, how they have embraced neoliberal education reforms, and the impact of the Chicago Teachers Union on this.

If any of our members are parents who wish to have their own children OPT-OUT of standardized testing this year, this link may help you.

If any of our members are interested in running for their home school district’s BOE, please see us… we can help you.

Finally, the CTU’s Karen Lewis speaking in Manhattan this weekend…

NYCORE Conference 2013 – Karen Lewis Keynote from Grassroots Education Movement on Vimeo.