Magee – The Official Website of the PJSTA

My Union IS My Business

Recently somebody from NYSUT was kind enough to recommend that I share questions and concerns that I had been tweeting about, with the NYSUT officers, with the idea that answers from them might comfort me and perhaps quell the negative feelings I have had about our parent union. So on Friday I sat down and wrote out the following questions…

1. What are our strategies for deep organizing around having the Ed Transformation Act repealed?
2. In light of the increasingly stronger and successful actions taken by teachers not only nationally but globally, what are NYSUT’s plans for escalating statewide acts of civil disobedience and what is the plan to organize for actions of that magnitude?
3. What are the major cost cutting efforts underway in preparation of Friedrichs?… Will metro funding be reduced? Will it be proposed that we reduce the number of officers? What percentage of a pay cut can we expect the officers and board of directors to take? Will staff be cut? How will field services be impacted? What lines of communication are you opening with the rank and file to be sure that they have say in regards to what expenses are cut?

4. What is NYSUT doing to move from a top down, business unionism model to a union that is driven by it’s membership?
5. What suggestions does our leadership suggest for creating a more democratic union that is more representative of the rank and file’s voice?

6. How does a rank and file member go about seeing how VOTE-COPE funds have been spent?

To her credit, NYSUT President Karen Magee was quick to get back to me. Here were her answers…

Thanks for writing. While we are always interested in engaging our members in the substantive issues that you raise in your email, I’m sure you also understand from your position as a union officer that much of what you raise here is subject to high-level negotiations. In any negotiating scenario, it’s imperative for the officers to let the members know that they are fighting on their behalf, as we have done, but just as crucial that the ebb and flow of the actual negotiations remain at the bargaining table.

The questions you raise in your third bullet point, in particular, are topics that are the purview of the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors, and certainly not topics of general discussion.

I flatly reject the premise of your fourth and fifth questions, in which you suggest that NYSUT is neither “driven by it’s [sic] membership,” nor “representative of the rank and file’s voice.”

I’m confused by your question about VOTE-COPE funds; a check of our records indicate that you are not a contributor to VOTE-COPE, so I’m not sure about the nature of your concern. Should you wish to see how VOTE-COPE contributions are being used, you can seek an appointment with Executive Vice President Pallotta to discuss.

Please don’t hesitate to contact me with any further questions.

Ms. Magee’s response, unfortunately, was exactly what I expected. In essence what I was told was, “We are member driven and representative of the rank and file’s voice because I say we are. Also none of what we do is any of your damn business… and if you want to know how we spend VOTE-COPE money then you can come up to Albany!”

I am not sure why organizing strategies to repeal the Ed Transformation Act of 2015 would be considered “subject to high-level negotiations” at this point in time. We are well into budget season and there has been no apparent strategy to repeal the act, likely because NYSUT is choosing not to advocate for the repeal of the single most damaging piece of legislation that New York teachers have seen. Unfortunately Ms. Magee’s assurance that the officers are fighting on my behalf does little to instill confidence in me.

I find her response to be equally unacceptable when it comes to my questions regarding potential cost cutting efforts. There is a very good possibility that the ruling on the Friedrichs case will do tremendous financial damage to the union. As a result one would think that members had the right to know what cost cutting measures are being submitted. At the very least you’d believe that the rank and file’s input would, in some way, be encouraged as part of the process to develop a budget that makes necessary cuts. The problem is that the officers might not hear what they want to if they communicated with members over those issues.

It is important to remember that at last year’s NYSUT RA, Unity Caucus lead the fight to add an additional officer position. It’s also important to know that each NYSUT officer has a salary in the $250,000-$300,000 range with benefit packages that make the price tag soar even further. You’ll want to recall the current officers voted themselves a 2% raise only months after their election. Those are important considerations when it comes to where cost cutting measures should start.

At every NYSUT event I have attended I have gotten some sort of NYSUT tote bag. Within days those bags typically ended up in the garbage or buried in the back of a closet. Typically filling those bags have been materials printed on thick, glossy paper that I may have casually scanned before they ended up in the garbage or buried in the back of the aforementioned closet. My point is that there are many places to shave considerable money off of before valued field services are impacted. I believe the leadership has an obligation to engage the membership in discussion about what we view as the most important uses of our dues money.

As I have shared on this blog before, at one time I gave about $200 per year to VOTE-COPE. The decision not to oppose Andrew Cuomo in the 2014 Democratic Primary when a worthy opponent in Zephyr Teachout was running was the final straw for me. After that I reduce my VOTE-COPE contribution to $0. In the year and a half since that time I have listened to NYSUT operatives stress time and again the need for increased VOTE-COPE contributions. Were I ever to reconsider my decision not to contribute, you can bet I’d want to see how that money is being spent. I don’t think that is an unreasonable expectation at all. What I did find unreasonable, was Magee’s “confusion” over my question and her suggestion of having to seek an appointment with Andy Pallotta if I wanted that information. Mind you, Mr. Pallotta’s office is at NYSUT headquarters in Albany.

All of this brings me to my biggest point. Ms. Magee stated, “I flatly reject the premise of your fourth and fifth questions, in which you suggest that NYSUT is neither ‘driven by it’s [sic] membership,’ nor ‘representative of the rank and file’s voice.'” This statement conflicts with nearly every aspect of the rest of her message. Other than my final question, which she answered with an unreasonable suggestion, she basically refused to answer any of my questions. To me, the refusal to answer questions or engage membership about these important issues are the very essence of top-down unionism. The decision not to organize around the repealing of the Ed Transformation Act is the very opposite of representing the voice of the rank and file, whose careers and students are being wrecked by the legislation.

It is still stunning to me that this is the sort of response we get from the union, despite the pending Friedrichs decision. As long as there is an opportunity to be a part of a union, I will always choose to do that. I firmly believe that belonging to an ineffective union is better than belonging to no union. At the very least it gives you a structure to work within to bring change. However, I know that there will be many who don’t opt to remain a part of NYSUT. When that happens the union only has to look at the, “It’s none of your business how we operate the union” sort of mentality that has pervaded it for far too long.

NYSUT’s Karen Magee Calls on Parents to Opt-Out

It’s hard to call it leadership when the rest of the state has been doing it for a couple of years now, however kudos go out to NYSUT President Karen Magee who today called on parents to opt-out of the coming New York state tests. This is certainly an interesting development given that the UFT’s Mike Mulgrew called the budget deal a victory. This is the first time under the current leadership regime that I have seen a NYSUT officer go again Mulgrew. Perhaps Magee knows she is only staying on for one term and has decided to start listening to the demands of the membership. That would certainly be a welcome development and one that I would happily support.

If NYSUT really wants to put their money where their mouth is we will see a NYSUT sponsored advertising blitz imploring parents to opt-out their children over the next two weeks leading up to the state tests.

NYSUT’s Favorite Local President

Earlier we covered the “secret meetings” between Karen Magee, Mike Mulgrew, and aides for Governor Cuomo. I mentioned my belief that the NYSUT and UFT ads would not not be pulled from the air any time soon. As I mentioned, it is important that they at least make it appear as though they are putting up a fight before ultimately capitulating to the governor and sticking us with a worse APPR scheme than we have now.

Still there is one thing that continues to stick in my craw about the entire situation. It certainly doesn’t surprise me to see him involved, but the presence of Michael Mulgrew at these meetings can’t possibly make any teacher in the state comfortable. Last spring, in the lead up to the NYSUT elections, Revive NYSUT went out of their way to claim that the UFT held no extra sway over NYSUT’s leadership and that the UFT were simply one of NYSUT’s hundreds of locals. They scoffed at the notion that the installation of new leaders (other than the UFT/Unity Caucus’ own Andy Pallotta, of course) was a power grab by the UFT leadership.

Yet yesterday we read about Mulgrew being involved in these secret meetings. Again, this isn’t suprising. Anyone with even a passing interest in NYSUT understands that the head of the UFT calls the shots in both the UFT and NYSUT. Mulgrew’s presence in the Cuomo meeting only furthers that notion. It’s why they shouldn’t be allowed to get away with claiming that he is simply just another local president. If that were the case there are hundreds of other local presidents they could have called on. Virtually all of them would have had more classroom experience, and therefore be more in touch with our membership, than Mulgrew. As a matter of fact, I am sure our very own Beth Dimino, who was busy teaching science last week, would have cleared her schedule to send the governor a message. Dimino, after all, has some skin in the game, as they say. She will be evaluated, just as her members will be, by whatever APPR scheme New York’s teachers end up with. That doesn’t apply to union elites like Mulgrew or Magee. After all it’s doubtful they have been inside many more classrooms than Cuomo has this year.

Cuomo and Union Elites Meet Secretly- Now What?

These meetings apparently aren’t as secret as the ones that secured double pensions for NYSUT officers, however the NY Daily News reported yesterday that NYSUT’s Karen Magee and the UFT’s Michael “Take my Common Core and I’ll punch you in the face!” Mulgrew have quietly met with aides for Governor Cuomo recently.

Via the Daily News…

Shortly after unveiling ads last week attacking Gov. Cuomo’s education plans, the heads of the city and state teacher unions met with aides to the governor, the Daily News has learned.

City teachers union President Michael Mulgrew and New York State United Teachers President Karen Magee attended the meeting on Friday at the state Capitol.

Sources say the unions during the meeting may have agreed to temporarily pull their attack ads, leaving some insiders to question whether the sides are trying to hammer out some type of agreement on how to move forward.

Today the New York Post reported that the unions are not, in fact, pulling the ads…

The union leaders said the talks were not unusual and insisted they were not pulling back on their TV ads and social-media outreach attacking the governor’s proposals to strengthen teacher evaluations, streamline disciplinary hearings and expand charter schools.

“We talk to elected officials all the time,” said UFT spokeswoman Alison Gendar. “We . . . are engaged in the largest grass-roots campaign in recent memory to empower teachers and to protect our students.”

NYSUT rep Carl Korn added its campaign is “accelerating.”

Over at the Perdido Street School blog, Reality-Based Educator has several good posts up already on this topic. Be sure to head on over and check them out.

Norm Scott of Ed Notes Online warns that a sellout is coming…

Sources say the unions during the meeting may have agreed to temporarily pull their attack ads…

This goes into the category of Mulgrew “threatening” to go to court to enforce the CFE lawsuit over state funding that was “won” 10 years ago. Threatening. Why not wait another 10 years to go to court?

Cuomo puts outrageous demands on the table and the unions put nothing on the table. So they negotiate from where Cuomo started and even if they split the baby — 4 year tenure instead of 5? 35% based on eval instead of 50%? It is – as Fearless Forecaster often says — a LOSS.

There is a lot to process here. One publication says the ads may be pulled as part of a deal. Another publication quotes a NYSUT spokesperson saying that the campaign against Cuomo is being accelerated. I don’t honestly believe that the ad campaign is being pulled. I think that even NYSUT and UFT officials know they can’t do that. They have to at least continue to give the appearance that they are fighting for their members. Pulling the ads now would be virtually impossible for them to do. Particularly since it is certain that doing so would only ramp up the anti-Cuomo actions that are being planned and carried out around the state by the rank and file NYSUT members. Nothing would make NYSUT leadership look as out of touch with the rank and file as calling off a fight while it’s dues paying members ratchet up the intensity of theirs. Cuomo surely knows this too.

What I think will ultimately happen is that NYSUT will continue to run it’s ads and use it’s #InviteCuomo and #AllKidsNeed hashtags while behind closed doors our surrender is negotiated. We will end up with an APPR agreement that continues to erode tenure and is worse than what we currently have. Because it will be somewhat less damaging than the one Cuomo proposed in his budget NYSUT and the UFT will claim “victory!” Of course a “victory” in which every teacher, student, and community in the state loses out on will ring as the hollowest of “victories.”

This all may very well end up as what Arthur Goldstein heard a few weeks back. That an APPR deal was likely done and that it would either raise test scores to 40% of teacher evaluations or give the entire state the awful deal that the city teachers have dealt with for the past couple of years. Arthur also outlined the likely spin coming from NYSUT and the UFT, that by holding Cuomo off of 50% this is some how a “victory” for our teachers. Via NYC Educator…

I don’t have a lot of time right now, but several sources I trust tell me there is already a deal in place for a new APPR plan. They think it will either be a 40% junk science plan, or that it may be a statewide model based on the NYC plan. The NYC plan, while we in NYC don’t much like it, is a better one than those in a few upstate cities that were poorly negotiated. It is not nearly as good as those many small locals came up with.

…

An agreement could actually still be made to make an NYC-style evaluation statewide, which Mulgrew alluded to at the last DA, or 40% statewide junk science. In either of these scenarios, UFT/ NYSUT could argue that Cuomo wanted 50% and we kept it down to 40.

All of this makes one thing crystal clear. The one and only weapon left to fight back corporate education deform in New York State is the refusal movement. Here in Comsewogue last year, where we had in excess of 60% of our students who refused to take the grades 3-8 assessments, very few teachers received growth scores from the state because not enough of their students took the exams. The message is simple. If you deprive the APPR machine of the data it needs, the entire evaluation scheme breaks. It is the last remaining weapon at our disposal and it is the one thing that every New York State teacher should be picking up.

De Blasio, Weingarten, Magee, Mulgrew: 4 Biggest Reasons for Cuomo Victory

I have a lot of thoughts to share on the role of our unions in yesterday’s Cuomo victory in the Democratic primary. Within the next day or two, when I have the time to sit down and get those thoughts on paper I will share them. In the meantime our friend Reality-Based Educator who blogs over at Perdido Street School absolutely hit the nail on the head in his piece today.

Via Perdido Street School…

The only group of people who did more work than de Blasio to help Cuomo and his bank lobbyist running mate win the primary?

The UFT/AFT/NYSUT leaders:

1) who engineered a putsch at NYSUT to make sure the old leaders who had turned on Cuomo were ousted

2) who threatened the Working Families Party with dissolution if WFP gave their ballot slot to Zephyr Teachout

3) who refused to endorse Teachout in the primary and provide much needed cash and support for the Teachout/Wu campaign (as PEF did) and

4) who made robocalls for the campaign.

De Blasio, Weingarten, Magee, Mulgrew – four reasons why Andrew Cuomo will win re-election this year handily in the general election and his bank lobbyist running mate will ride along with him into power.

Head on over and read the entire thing. There are some good quotes from Tim Wu as well on the role that De Blasio played.

Bombshell Rocks NYSUT Officers

I came to school early to work in my classroom this morning. I wasn’t intending to post a blog until later on. But then I read Norm Scott’s bombshell over at Ed Notes that was posted late last night.

To summarize, in very quick fashion NYSUT got legislation pushed through the New York State Assembly, the New York State Senate, and the governor’s office that allows NYSUT to pay the school districts that current officers used to work in, to keep those officers on as active employees on leave from those Districts.This allows the officers to continue to accrue time in the New York State Teachers Retirement System. This would further allow the officers to collect not only their NYSUT pension when they retire, but also a much more lucrative pension from the State than they should actually be entitled to.

What is amazing (and alarming) is the speed in which this was all done and the fact that it was done secretively. On June 9th the bill was referred to governmental employees. By June 19th it had passed the assembly. It passed the senate on June 20th. It was delivered to the governor on July 11th and he signed off on it on July 22nd. Astounding. Andy Pallotta has had virtually no legislative victories to benefit NYSUT’s 600,000 members, yet in just over six weeks he had a victory that ensured double pensions for his cronies. Additionally it seems to ensure that should Karen Magee, Martin Messner or Paul Pecorale, none of whom are close to retirement age, ever lose their NYSUT positions they will have teaching jobs to go back to. Contrast this to former NYSUT Secretary-Treasurer Lee Cutler who lost April’s election and has no job to return to. The officers are no fools. They saw how that could happen and apparently made it a priority to ensure their jobs and double pensions within the first few months of taking office.

All of this begs a few questions:

What did the NYSUT officers promise to legislators to get them to sign off on this so quickly? Is this why they endorsed a pro-charter, pro-voucher, reformy Jeff Klein? Or why they endorsed the indicted Tom Libous?

What was Governor Cuomo promised, by NYSUT Officers, to get him to sign off so quickly? After all, they have gone out of their way to tell us they oppose him. Why would he want to help them? Is it in exchange for not endorsing Zephyr Teachout in the Democratic Primary and not donating VOTE COPE funds to her campaign?

Did NYSUT promise that they’d support the Common Core that is favored by so many politicians in order to get this done? Curiously, the time when Cuomo received and signed off on the bill, was sandwiched right around the AFT Convention, where Karen Magee claimed that we would have no direction without the Common Core.

How much money in membership dues was spent to get this deal done?

How much VOTE COPE money will be going to elected officials who helped to move this bill through so quickly and quietly?

When will NYSUT release a detailed report of every dollar that has been spent since they took office, of every VOTE COPE dollar donated, and of the officer’s compensation packages?

This scandal is really just breaking. Plenty more questions will arise. Who knows if we’ll get an answer to any of them. What is blatantly clear, however, is that despite running on a platform of transparency, the NYSUT officers have secretly prioritized using our money and time to win a legislative battle that benefits only themselves. It is a betrayal on the grandest of scales. It is absolutely unconscionable behavior and may very well warrant a call for their resignation.

NYSUT Refuses to Oppose Cuomo But You Still Can!

It’s been a shade over four months since the new NYSUT officers took office. They were elected, largely due to the UFT Unity Caucus’ loyalty oath, after running a campaign in which they made big promises. They spoke of a “grassroots” slate of candidates, “member driven” unionism, and spoke of how our statewide union needed to change course (except Andy Pallotta’s position, of course) and set a new direction. After the beating teachers had taken the previous few years, who could argue with such statements? After defeating a slate of several incumbent officers, many of their supporters expected big changes. The first warning sign should have been the fact that within hours of their victory they shut down the website where they had listed their campaign promises and re-directed it to nysut.org. Fortunately someone was wise enough to snap a photograph of their campaign flyer. Let’s take a look…

After leading with a bullet about being “Against Common Core” Karen Magee made sure to speak up in support of the Common Core at the AFT Convention in July. Magee feared that without the Common Core all her members would just engage in a “free-for-all” where “Everyone does as they please” because that is certainly what we all must have been doing way back in 2012 before we had the Common Core. It was a curiously odd way to show that she was “against the Common Core” as her campaign literature assured us she was.

However the real hot topic of the campaign was Governor Cuomo. In fact Cuomo was so important of an issue that the officers formerly known as Revive NYSUT referenced him not once, but twice in their literature! First off they told us that they were “Against Cuomo.” Seems pretty straight forward to me. They then followed up by reminding us that, “We are not Pro-Cuomo. We have called him the Scott Walker of NY.” Again, a pretty clear statement. There was no guessing when it came to where they allegedly stood on the topic of our governor. So it would have been reasonable for the average rank and file member to assume that their VOTE COPE funds would be used “Against Cuomo” this fall. That’s why it is rather disconcerting to see that NYSUT chose not to endorse anyone running against Cuomo at their endorsement conference this week.

Let’s be clear, Cuomo’s Republican challenger is not a better choice. Given his love for charter schools (“We need more charter schools in New York, not fewer.”) and his desire to re-write the Triborough Amendment, Astorino would have been a disastrous choice to endorse. However we are fortunate enough to have other choices this year which would have made opposing Cuomo a no brainer and an easy campaign promise to keep.

On September 9th, Cuomo will be opposed in the Democratic primary by Zephyr Teachout. Her running mate for lieutenant governor is Tim Wu. There’s a lot to like about Teachout’s stance on public education. Some of the ideas Teachout is running on:

a. Full and Equal Funding for Public Education

New York spends $8,700 less per pupil in poor districts than we do in rich ones. That makes New York the sixth most unequal state in all America when it comes to school funding. This also means that New York is in violation of its own Constitution, which requires the government to provide a “sound, basic education” to every student, no matter his zip-code. I believe this constitutional obligation should be our floor, not our ceiling. New Yorkers have a right to demand the best public schools in the nation, with small class sizes, arts, and physical education for every child.

I would work to make funding more fair and equitable. Despite a promise to the contrary, Governor Cuomo has actually widened the funding gap between poor and wealthy districts.

b. End High-Stakes Testing

Under Governor Cuomo’s leadership, we’ve seen a culture of test-and-punish overthrow actual teaching and real learning. New York State entirely botched the implementation of Common Core, which has ushered in an unrelenting regimen of tests. Governor Cuomo’s system of basing teacher evaluations on student tests has corroded actual learning.

We should slam the brakes on the barrage of high-stakes testing. This means halting both the new Common Core tests and tests that are part of the teacher evaluation system. We need to undertake a thorough reevaluation of all high stakes tests, with full input from educators and parents.

c. Protect Against Privatization

Governor Cuomo has promoted a private takeover of public education policy, by opening state coffers up to charter schools, which serve only three percent of New York’s students. In New York City, meanwhile, he has mandated that city taxpayers pay rent for privately run charter schools to the tune of $11,000 per pupil, thus fueling their massive expansion at the expense of public schools.

We should protect our public schools from privatization schemes, including the diversion of state funds to private schools through vouchers or back-door tax credits. We should repeal provisions enacted in 2014 that hijack control of decision-making about charter school co-locations out of the hands of local governments and that mandate that New York City pay for charter school rent.

d. Empower Local Communities

I would eliminate the undemocratic provisions of the cap on local school budgets— falsely sold as a tax cap even though it caps nobody’s taxes. Specifically we should hand back to local voters the right to control their own school budgets, by eliminating the requirement of a 60 percent supermajority. We should return to the principle of one person, one vote in school budget elections.

e. Suspend the Suspension Pipeline

We must end the ‘school to prison pipeline’ where excessive use of school suspensions for minor infractions deprive students of education, leaving them behind. Suspensions actually increase behavior problems and decrease school safety. In many urban communities there is a school suspension crisis—with huge racial inequalities in suspension rates. Greater suspension rates lead to higher expulsion rates and to increases in school-based arrests. This cycle starts with high suspension rates for young students, even as young as pre-k and kindergarten. We need solutions, not suspensions. We need to transform the culture in school buildings to support teachers and students, foster collaboration, teach problem-solving, engender real responsibility and accountability and keep students in school. This approach, called “restorative justice,” has proven highly effective. Due to a local community organizing effort in Buffalo, the implementation of these reforms have already led to a 30 percent reduction in suspensions. Students cannot learn if they are not in school.

Reading Teachout’s education platform makes one wonder what exactly it was that NYSUT leaders disagreed with? Maybe it’s because she opposes the Common Core (that Magee feels we desperately need, even though she promised she was against it)? There was certainly more than one local president at the endorsement conference who asked for an endorsement of Teachout in the primary. Our own Beth Dimino was one of them. That brings me to another option for NYSUT. Dimino suggested that if Teachout were to lose to Cuomo in the primary, NYSUT should support the Green Party’s Howie Hawkins and Brian Jones for governor and lieutenant governor. We covered their education platform back in May. So NYSUT had two separate options to oppose Cuomo and they chose none. Despite pleas from their membership and presidents from locals around the state, Magee, Pallotta, and the rest of NYSUT’s board of directors decided in their private meeting yesterday that they would not oppose Cuomo. In the process they broke another major promise from their campaign.

I am not going to pretend to be surprised by this development. Any regular reader of this blog knows that we predicted things like this long ago, at the very start of the campaign. Still, it’s no less infuriating. A friend of mine who belongs to the UFT and has been shut out from having a voice in his local has told me, “I love my union but my union doesn’t love me.” Well that’s how I feel about NYSUT. I love my statewide union, but their actions clearly show that they have little regard for rank and file members like myself. I am sure it’ll personally benefit Karen Magee, Andy Pallotta, and other members of the board of directors somewhere down the road to go easy on Cuomo this fall. But it certainly doesn’t help the 600,000 of us who pay NYSUT dues and enable the hefty compensation packages of the NYSUT officers.

The silver lining in all of this is that others are becoming wise to how the NYSUT officers operate. Supporters of theirs are already starting to realize that the slate formerly known as Revive NYSUT is not who they claimed to be. This will only continue as Magee, Pallotta, and company continue to toe the company line that Mike Mulgrew dictates. All the while an opposition will have ample time to develop and grow to a size that can rival the New York State Unity Caucus by the next NYSUT elections in 2017. Social justice unionism is spreading across the country, starting in Chicago and spreading to places like Los Angeles. By the next NYSUT elections there is a very real possibility that the Stronger Together Caucus, representing social justice unionism, will topple the Goliath known as Unity Caucus and usher in real change to NYSUT leadership. At that time I truly believe we will look back on the first few months of Magee’s presidency as the time period that started her undoing.

If you want to donate to the Teachout/Wu campaign click here.

If you want to donate to the Hawkins/Jones campaign click here.

If you want to vote for Teachout over Cuomo in the Democratic primary on September 9th you must be a registered Democrat. If you are not you can change your party affiliation, but your registration must be postmarked by tomorrow, August 15th! Click here to access a registration form.

James Eterno of the ICEUFT Blog covers the NYSUT story here.

Reality Based Educator over at Perdido Street School talks about NYSUT’s decision to endorse an indicted Senate Republican here.

Mike Mulgrew plays tough guy in defense of Common Core

We have written at length on this blog about the failure by our parent unions to adequeately represent the rank and file membership. We will be addressing this issue in depth at our conference day this year and over the coming months, along with providing a potential solution. Nowhere, however, was the disconnect between our leadership and our members more glaring than at this summer’s AFT Convention.

You will recall that in May the PJSTA Representative Council unanimously passed a resolution to oppose the Common Core State Standards. Well many teachers headed to this year’s convention with the same idea in mind. However the resolution brought to the floor of the convention was a resolution that essentially asked the AFT to continue their support of the Common Core. Below is video taken by MORE’s incomparable Norm Scott. The video shows supporters of the Common Core and opponents of it. Watch for yourself…

First of all seeing members of the New York delegation fight in favor of the Common Core is absolutely nauseating. It is exhibit A of how out of touch our leadership is with the membership. Secondly, the performance by UFT President Michael Mulgrew was reprehensible. To have a representative of teachers stand up and say they are going to “punch you in the face and push you in the dirt” if you try to take away the Common Core is beyond unthinkable. It flies in the face of everything we try to represent as educators. Finally, only mere months ago, then candidate Karen Magee ran for NYSUT President as being “Against Common Core” yet there she was on this video shamelessly supporting the resolution in support of the CCSS. If you read this blog regularly you know that I am not surprised by Magee openly lying to membership. Still, it’s important for our membership to see her flip flop on the issue.

The above video showed one very interesting thing. The three people who spoke in favor of the CCSS (Mulgrew, Leroy Barr, Magee) are all union “leaders” but spend no actual time in the classroom. The people who spoke against the CCSS (Timothy Meegan, Pia Payne-Shannon) are both people who spend their time in the classroom teaching. It’s a connection that can not be ignored. If we are going to take back the direction of our parent unions, it must come from the in the classroom, rank and file teachers.

The ICEUFT Blog and NYC Educator blog both wrote about Magee’s flip flop back in July.

You can read about Mulgrew’s tough guy act here (NYC Educator), here (Ed Notes), here (Perdido Street School), along with here, here, and here (all Fred Klonsky).

And finally a reminder of Magee’s campaign promises…

What I Want From NYSUT

Earlier today we posted about NYSUT’s Karen Magee asking to hear from the membership about what we want from our union. It was a nice gesture. Below is the letter I submitted to her. I am sure most of my requests will be met. I encourage all NYSUT members to submit your own ideas to Karen as well. Feel free to share them with us as we’d love to see what your thoughts are as well.

My submission…

Dear President Magee,

Thank you for taking the time to ask what NYSUT members, such as myself, want from our union. Below is a list of the things that I would like from my union.

I would like a union who places the needs and interests of the rank and file membership ahead of the needs and interests of the Unity Caucus.

I would like a union who fights against those who seek to harm us, rather than one who compromises and collaborates with them.

I would like a union leadership who works with grassroots organizations to demonstrate against Governor Cuomo and corporate education reform rather than sitting in their ivory tower in Latham, New York claiming they were never invited to those demonstrations.

I’d like none of my VOTE COPE money to go towards Cuomo, John Flanagan, or any other anti-teacher, anti-labor candidates.

I’d like NYSUT officers to take significant pay cuts, rather than raising our dues AGAIN. While rank and file teachers across the state are taking 0%’s and step freezes along with paying more towards their health insurance, NYSUT officers have compensation packages that exceed $250,000. There is no good reason for any officer to make more than $150,000.

I’d like NYSUT’s leadership to return phone calls to my local president. Ignoring our local’s needs because of a grudge the leadership holds against us is a slap in the face to all of our members.

I’d like a Suffolk PAC that is run by an active teacher who has been elected by the rank and file.

I’d like it if UFT Unity Caucus delegates, bound by a caucus oath, were not allowed to vote on at large delegates from Long Island or other portions of the state. That way when Long Island delegates overwhelmingly vote for a candidate to represent them, that candidate will get to do so.

I’d like a leadership who openly and publicly criticizes the fact that our largest local has a caucus oath that stifles democracy both inside their local, inside our statewide union, and inside the AFT.

I’d like our union to strongly denounce the Common Core State Standards, just as my local union has.

I’d like the spending restrictions that Dick Iannuzzi placed on Andy Pallotta’s use of VOTE COPE funds to be enforced by this administration as well.

I’d like a statewide union who proves competent at mobilizing the rank and file.

I’d like a statewide union who will not support the candidacy of Randi Weingarten at the 2014 AFT Convention. The message needs to be loud and clear, “If you are not working for us you will be removed from office.”

I’d like a statewide union who uses every tool at it’s disposal to support the candidacy of the Green Party’s Howie Hawkins and Brian Jones for governor and lieutenant governor in this fall’s election.

I’d like NYSUT photographers who are allowed to take pictures of anti-Cuomo signs.

I have several more suggestions as well, but this list is a good starting point. Thank you so much for taking the time to hear what we want from our union. I eagerly await the needed changes to NYSUT.

In solidarity,

Brian St. Pierre

Port Jefferson Station Teachers Association

What Do You Want From Your Union?

In this week’s NYSUT Leader Briefing Karen Magee asks, “What do you want from your union?” Here is the link for you to fill out an online form and tell Ms. Magee what you want from your union. I am going to get started on my list now. It will be quite lengthy and will start with having a leadership who leads rather than selling us out.

Below is Magee’s message regarding this request. Nice to see that she has already heard from her political base… UFT retirees.