Tag: Pallotta

NYSUT’s VOTE-COPE “Campaign” Highlights What is Wrong with NYSUT

Two years ago, with NYSUT’s failure to oppose Governor Cuomo serving as “the straw that broke the camel’s back” PJSTA members followed the lead of their officers and stopped contributing to VOTE-COPE, the statewide union’s voluntary political action fund.  PJSTA President Beth Dimino has been vocal in describing her reasons for not contributing and this has drawn the ire of many Unity Caucus loyalists.  You’ll surely recall that last year Unity (the controlling caucus within NYSUT) used it’s blog to launch a personal attack at Dimino, labeling her “anti-union” among other things.

So this year NYSUT decided it’d try to step around Dimino in an attempt to solicit VOTE-COPE contributions from the PJSTA membership by sending out a form letter to each of our members asking for us to give to VOTE-COPE this year.  I want to be clear here… I do not have a problem with the leadership stepping around Ms. Dimino to approach our members about this.  The PJSTA membership made a strong statement about their confidence in NYSUT’s political action work when our members made their decisions to reduce their VOTE-COPE contributions to $0.  I would expect that to catch the attention of NYSUT leadership and I would expect them to want to contact those members about their decision.

The problem I have with their tactic comes in their chosen form of communication.  Nearly two full years after reducing our contributions, leadership’s response was to send each of our members a form letter.  There was no attempt to engage our members in discussion about our decision.  No reaching out to gauge our feelings on our statewide union, or to ask how they can better represent us.  No discussions about the broken union structures that lead to disengaged members.  No explanations for why they have generously donated to ed deformers like Andrew Cuomo and John Flanagan.  Just a simple form letter asking us to give them more money.  To be frank I found it insulting.  The idea that a form letter with all the usual rhetoric was going to suddenly sway me was simply astounding.

After reflecting on it, I think this incident really highlights some of the major problems with our statewide union.  Virtually all contact I have ever had with NYSUT is one-way communication where messages from the top are relayed down to me.  There is nearly zero back and forth.  No chance to engage our leaders in discussion about the state of our union.  No visits from the NYSUT officers to our schools to ask questions or to simply listen.  Sending form letters to request greater VOTE-COPE contributions is the very essence of top down unionism.  It’s ineffective, expensive, and does nothing to serve our members.

The fact that this happens is the result of of a broken union structure.  Andy Pallotta’s PAC work has resulted in teachers being held “accountable” via junk science through poorly constructed teacher evaluations over the past several years.  However there is no accountability for Andy Pallotta.  I am not sure whether or not STCaucus plans to run a slate in the coming NYSUT elections, but it doesn’t really matter.  Pallotta will run again for a NYSUT officer position again this spring and he will win.  This will likely be the case for a few of our other officers as well.  They are in a situation where they can’t lose because they will have the endorsement of the Unity Caucus.  In NYSUT’s rigged system of democracy the only thing that matters is the Unity endorsement.  The will of the members won’t matter.  The PJSTA membership’s VOTE-COPE reduction, which essentially amounted to a vote of no confidence in our leadership, won’t even be a blip on the radar when it comes to the election.

This is the type of stuff that turns people off to unions.  This is why it gets easy to become disengaged and apathetic.  I’ve had a lot of discussions about this sort of scenario with members across the state.  I’ll close with the gist of what I put in an email earlier today to one of those members about the only way I see to go forward and the only way that I can see transforming our union…

I think the way forward is to take our focus off of resolutions, leadership positions, and the NYSUT bureaucracy and focus solely on engaging and organizing the rank and file.  I think an engaged and active R&F will ultimately have a greater impact on the state’s public ed landscape than having a great leader at the top working within the same structure that has lead to a disengaged and apathetic membership to begin with.  By grassroots organizing you can ultimately increase your leadership capacity across the state and begin to cultivate local leaders who will challenge for leadership and delegate positions in areas that have traditionally been Unity strongholds (Syracuse, Rochester, Buffalo, Yonkers, UUP, PSC, etc.).  That is how you ultimately might win leadership positions within NYSUT.  More importantly, in the process, you will have organically grown an engaged, fighting union who is more powerful than we have ever knowN it to be.  It is a long slog for sure, with a tremendous number of obstacles in the way, and it requires the sort of person-to-person organizing that is neither glamorous or rapid in nature, but I believe it is the only way forward for us.

 

Unity’s Attack on Dimino & Reducing VOTE-COPE

A few days ago, New York State’s Unity Caucus, the controlling caucus of NYSUT and the statewide extension of the UFT’s Unity Caucus, published a piece on their blog attacking PJSTA President Beth Dimino.  In the post Dimino is accused of  working for her own political gain while attempting to “squelch the voice of educators, SRPs, those working in higher education and health care professionals.”  The post goes on to label her “anti-union” and accuses her of siding with the Koch brothers and “other right winged-politicians” with the goal of killing the union.

The comically misguided post is clearly an attempt to discredit a respected labor leader with a well earned track record of being outspoken in her defense of public education and unionized teachers.  From trying to paint her as being on the side of the Koch brothers to the use of the word histrionics, whose use is rooted in misogyny, the Unity henchman was clearly trying to paint Dimino as a voice who should be ignored.  The reason surely being that Ms. Dimino’s ability to speak truthfully about the leadership of our parent unions, NYSUT, the AFT, and the NEA, has caused an increasingly large number of members to reduce their contributions to NYSUT’s political action fund, VOTE-COPE.

Ms. Dimino’s track record as an advocate is fairly well known.  She has been a vocal and visible proponent of the opt-out movement.  She is a conscientious objector, refusing to administer New York State tests.  This video of her lambasting former NYSED Commissioner John King has made her fairly well known in public education circles.  She has spoken all over the state as an advocate for teachers, students, parents, and communities.  I am sure Long Island Opt-Out founder Jeanette Deutermann or our friends at NYSAPE would vouch for Ms. Dimino as somebody who works tirelessly for teachers, students, and public education in general.  If you don’t believe me you are welcome to ask them.  None of these things tend to be characteristic of the circles that the Koch brothers travel in.  None of them are synonymous with anti-union activity.

Let’s now contrast Ms. Dimino’s record with that of the Unity Caucus.  Unity Caucus, for nearly the entire existence of NYSUT, has benefited from being the only party in a one party-system.  The caucus has always chosen the presidents and each of the other officers.  When they decided you were out, then you were out, as they have always been able to use the 800 UFT-Unity delegates as a voting block to elect who ever they have wanted to or to enact any changes within NYSUT that they have decided to.  You may be wondering why 800 people always have to vote the same way?  Well that would be because the 800 Unity-UFT delegates have signed an oath pledging to vote as they are told to.  Currently, every NYSUT officer and every member of the UFT’s executive board are members of the Unity Caucus.  Let’s take a look at some of their greatest hits from just the past few years…

  • Most recently, Unity Caucus has been using their twitter account to advocate for #TeachStrong, the newly formed group of ed deformers that our national unions have inexplicably partnered with, including Teach for America and Educators4Excellence.  These are the same groups that have helped to finance legislative changes that have done tremendous harm to teachers over the past several years.  Unity Caucus members will make the argument that “the tide has turned” and that these groups now want to work with us.  They should try telling that to the teachers in Buffalo in receivership schools who just had their contracts thrown in the trash in the name of “reform.”  If you are wondering what that sharp feeling is in your back, it’s the knife that the Unity slugs are pushing into it.  Here is Marla Kilfoyle of the BadAss Teachers take on #TeachStrong.  Here is Peter Greene’s take on the Curmudgucation blog.  Here was the renowned Michelle Gunderson, a leader in the Chicago Teachers Union, with her reaction…
  • John Flanagan, the senate majority leader in the New York State Senate, and the former education chairperson in the senate has been another friend of Unity Caucus.  Yes, the same John Flanagan who has declared opt-out parents a problem, claimed that charter school parents are the best parents there are, and whose highest campaign contributor is an ed deform group.  While NYSUT did not vote to endorse Flanagan when he last ran in 2014, that didn’t stop Unity Caucus’ Andy Pallotta from giving Flanagan money anyway.  Flanagan, who has received over $40,000 in VOTE COPE dollars over the years, received $7,750 in 2014.
  • Just this past spring Unity Caucus used their might to defeat a measure at the NYSUT RA that would have allowed all NYSUT locals to participate in NYSUT elections, as opposed to the 30% who did in the last one.  Unity Caucus doesn’t want any of that pesky stuff called democracy interfering in their ability to guide the union in the direction they want to guide it in.
  • In 2014, at the AFT Convention, the Unity Caucus’ Michael Mulgrew gave his passionate defense of the Common Core when he stated “I’m gonna punch you in the face and push you in the dirt,” if you took away the Common Core.  At the same convention fellow Unity Caucus members Karen Magee and Leroy Barr also stood up at the microphone in defense of the Common Core.  You can watch it here…

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  • Later in 2014 the Unity Caucus’ Michael Mulgrew marched in the New York City Labor Day Parade with Andrew Cuomo amongst “Labor for Cuomo” signs.

I could go on, but I am not really sure that’s necessary.  There is a clear divide between the top down, business unionism model that is represented by Unity Caucus and the grassroots, member driven unionism espoused by Ms. Dimino and the Stronger Together Caucus of which she is the chairperson.  Still the blog post on the Unity website was written because of the fact that Ms. Dimino has openly advocated for the idea of NYSUT members reducing their VOTE-COPE contributions.  The blog post implies that every PJSTA member did that simply because they were told to.  I am here to tell you that is not the case.

I have been a PJSTA member in good standing for 14 years.  I tend to think of myself as being fairly independent minded.  I don’t do things because my president tells me to.  I generally do things because I believe them to be the right things to do.  Members of our executive board can vouch for the fact that there are many times I disagree with Ms. Dimino and I am not shy about it.  Like Ms. Dimino, I am not a right winger and anyone who knows me would assure you that I am not anti-union.  Throughout the first 12 years of my career I gave faithfully to VOTE-COPE.  As much as $10 a paycheck for a few years.  Last fall, fresh off NYSUT’s decision not to endorse Zephyr Teachout, a clear advocate for public education, in the Democratic Primary I decided to reduce my VOTE-COPE contribution to $0.  I did so because I no longer had any trust that a Unity Caucus controlled union would represent me or the interests of my fellow classroom teachers very well.  In addition to giving money to candidates who hurt us and falling on the wrong side of so many of the important issues facing public school teachers, I got sick of seeing NYSUT’s legislative action wing be so woefully ineffective.  Whether it be the creation of Tier 6, the creation of test based teacher evaluations, the inability to get allies of public education elected, or the inability to prevent such a disastrous and harmful state budget from passing last year, I simply have no confidence in a legislative wing controlled by Unity Caucus’ Andy Pallotta.  Instead I donated my money to Zephyr Teachout, purchased NYSAPE Opt-Out signs, and used some money in ways that directly benefited students.  I was in control of the money and was, therefore, confident it was going to causes that I believed in.

So if you are on the side of Randi Weingarten (who came up through the Unity ranks), Mike Mulgrew, Andy Pallotta, #TeachStrong, Common Core, and test based teacher evaluations, then support Unity Caucus (you can’t join, it is invite only) and keep funneling your hard earned money into VOTE-COPE.  But if you are like me and you are tired of your profession being trampled while your union “leaders” compromise and collaborate with coroporate  privatizers who seek to destroy public education, then go ahead and reduce your VOTE-COPE and join STCaucus (open to any NYSUT members).  It literally is about the only say you have in your parent unions.

NYSUT, School Funding, and the Coming APPR Sellout

Yesterday NYSUT held a Moral Monday rally on the Million Dollar Staircase in the state Capitol.  Kudos to them for protesting funding inequities that rob our students of the education they deserve.

One thing I noticed in the coverage of yesterday’s events was that, deservedly so, there was lots of tough talk aimed at Governor Cuomo.  From Andy Pallotta to Mike Mulgrew to Randi Weingarten, Cuomo was being called to task for his record as an ed deformer.  What was unfortunate, however, is that none of this tough talk came last year when it mattered most.  When there was a viable alternative to Cuomo in the race for governor the three aforementioned “unionists” weren’t talking tough about Cuomo.  Instead Mulgrew was threatening the Working Families Party with dissolution if they didn’t endorse Cuomo and marching with the governor in the Labor Day Parade.  NYSUT was hiding under a rock and throwing their money at reformy John Flanagan and Randi Weingarten was making robo calls on behalf of Cuomo’s running mate.  So pardon me if their tough talk now rings a bit hollow to me.

Our friend Reality Based Educator had a good observation yesterday as well.  Lost in all of this talk about funding inequities has been the fact that there has been little if any talk about the Cuomo and Tisch APPR agenda.  As RBE points out on his Perdido Street School blog, it’s likely due to the fact that a big APPR sellout is on the way.

The union leadership puts together a rally with a message focused on the inequities between rich and poor districts.

Speaker Silver says education funding will be a “top priority” in this legislative session.

But there’s little-to-no pushback on the damages of test-based evaluations or redoing the evaluation system to make tests 40% of the entire rating (and really 100%, since if you come up “ineffective” on 40%, you’re ineffective overall.)

You can see how this will play out in negotiations, can’t you?

If you’ve been a teacher and have watched these kinds of fights for a while, I bet you can.

The unions and Assembly Dems will trade Cuomo’s evaluation, tenure, and 3020a “reforms” for more “education funding.”

And of course Cuomo will get his increase of the cap and funding for charter schools – that goes without saying.

…

It’s a lot of noise meant to fool the rank and file into thinking the union leaders plan on trying to protect them in upcoming negotiations.

Make no mistake – they don’t.

They plan on selling you out, giving Cuomo and the charter school entrepreneurs most (if not all) of what they want on the charter cap and charter funding, giving Cuomo and Tisch most (if not all) of what they want on the evaluation system “reforms” and 3020a changes in return for a few extra dollars in “education funding.”

We’ll hit on the coming sellout more in the coming weeks.  For now one other thing to note…

Why is NYSUT giving VOTE-COPE money to John Flanagan?  The Republican senator, who chairs the senate’s K-12 education committee, is a noted ed deformer and member of ALEC.  He is on the take from reform group StudentsFirst and has been in the news for backing changes to the APPR that would take local control away from school districts.  Flanagan has supported the idea of eroding tenure rights.  He was also the senator who complained to Comsewogue’s administration that Beth Dimino needed to speak to him in a more deferential tone.  He was not endorsed by NYSUT as there was literally no reason to endorse him.  So one certainly wonders why NYSUT contributed $7,750 to him in this past election.  That made them one of Flanagan’s top donors.  Not issuing an endorsement is sort of pointless if you are going to then fill the coffers of that candidate anyway.

Pallotta and Flanagan

If You Can’t Trust Your Union…

Several years back, when discussing the work of our local union I had a colleague say to me, “If you can’t trust your union, who can you trust?”  I, of course, agreed wholeheartedly.  Years later I can still agree with this statement in regards to my local union.  Over the course of my career the PJSTA has provided me with wonderful working conditions, a good living wage, and excellent benefits.  On top of that they have represented my voice well in matters regarding public education and legislative issues that impact our profession.  They have advocated for the students we teach and the community that we serve.  The PJSTA, over the course of my 13 years as a member has undoubtedly earned my trust.  Where things change, however, is with my other unions.  My parent unions.

There was a time when I would go to the polls with a list of NYSUT endorsed candidates in my pocket and vote accordingly, believing that they had made endorsements only to those who would be fighting for quality public education.  Additionally I would give generously from each pay check towards VOTE-COPE, with the belief that this money was going towards those candidates who would fight for the sort of public education system that I could be proud of.  The type that benefited our students and communities.  After all, if you can’t trust your union, who can you trust?

Unfortunately I have learned over the past couple of years that I can’t trust NYSUT and I can’t trust the AFT.  I say them separately, though the elements that make them untrustworthy tend to be one and the same (The UFT leadership’s Unity Caucus, which controls both NYSUT and the AFT).

As we sit here, a week into 2015, the public education landscape looks bleaker than ever.  We have clear adversaries regarding the attacks on our profession and what is perhaps most disturbing is the way in which our parent unions have, in many ways, been complicit in working with those adversaries.

For example, let’s look at Governor Cuomo.  Cuomo was a clear enemy of public education throughout his first term in office, even going so far as to say that schools whose test scores weren’t good enough should receive the “death penalty.”  By now we all know the litany of other offenses on Cuomo’s part.  It goes without saying that Cuomo should have been public enemy #1 for NYSUT.  If they were representing the voice of their membership he certainly would be.  Let’s take a look at the NYSUT timeline of events regarding Cuomo over the past year…

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.

  • Summer- At around the same time NYSUT was failing to endorse and contribute to Teachout’s campaign, it was revealed that the NYSUT officers quickly and quietly worked out a double pension deal that Cuomo curiously signed off on very quickly.  (Norm Scott, who broke the story, wondered if the trade off for Cuomo’s support for their double pensions was remaining neutral in the campaign.)
  • September- Only days before the primary, AFT President Randi Weingarten (former UFT President and Unity Caucus member), made robo calls in support of Cuomo’s running mate Kathy Hochul, a back door endorsement for Cuomo if there ever was one.
  • September- At the Labor Day parade in Manhattan, UFT President, NYSUT Board of Director member, and the Unity Caucus’ Mulgrew marches with Cuomo.
  • September 9th- Cuomo and Hochul beat Teachout and her running mate Tim Wu in the primary.  Teachout garnered 34% of the vote, Wu 40% despite the fact that Cuomo spent 40 times (!) as much as Teachout.  NYSUT was busy throwing their VOTE-COPE money at ed deformers like John Flanagan, who is well funded by StudentsFirst, the pro-charter, pro-voucher Jeff Klein, and the indicted Thomas Libous.  They chose not to give a dime to Teachout who could have desperately used the funding to help combat Cuomo’s Wall Street funded campaign.  Teachout, of course, could have also benefited from an endorsement that would have gone out to NYUST’s 600,000 members (you’ll recall that Cuomo’s margin of victory was less than 150,000).
  • November- Cuomo wins re-election with only 53% of the vote.  Of particular note is the fact that he had the Working Families line on the ballot.  If Teachout had gotten that endorsement back in May and ran to the left of Cuomo she likely would have pulled a considerable number of Democratic voters with her and severely harmed Cuomo’s chances of winning the election.

The names of the organizations may have changed in the above scenarios, but the faces behind them are essentially the same.  Randi Weingarten and Michael Mulgrew pull the strings more than any other.  In NYSUT, Executive Vice-President Andy Pallotta mostly does their bidding while the other officers fall in line.  Pallotta, Mulgrew, and Weingarten have all taken the Unity Caucus oath and have all benefited from it tremendously.  That’s why they won’t act in opposition to Cuomo.  They won’t act in opposition to the Common Core.  They will do very little to benefit the members (though Martin Messner may save you money on your car insurance!).  It’s only a matter of time before the statewide APPR sellout comes.  Unfortunately not many of our statewide members benefit from the work of Unity Caucus.  Most of us are actually hurt by it.  That’s why I can say that I don’t trust my union.

The only way for things to ever change within NYSUT is to defeat the statewide Unity Caucus and their “seat at the table” brand of unionism.  We need leadership who is driven by principle, by the desire to see our schools strengthened, and by the collective conscience of our rank and file membership.  Not by an oath that they took to vote along party lines.

We are getting pretty late into this game now.  Things are becoming more dire by the day.  Maybe the coming APPR sellout will be what finally galvanizes our members to stand up and take back their union.

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…

mageecommoncore

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.

Zephyr Teachout and Tim Wu.

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.

Arthur Goldstein Shakes Up the NYSUT Election Scene

Arthur Goldstein

We have learned this afternoon that Arthur Goldstein, who has been referred to by none other than Diane Ravitch as “NYC’s best teacher-blogger” is throwing his hat into the NYSUT election ring with the intention of running against incumbent Executive Vice President Andrew Pallotta.  Pallotta, who curiously thought all NYSUT officers but himself needed to be changed, recently cobbled together the “Revive NYSUT” slate to challenge the other incumbent officers.  Coincidentally, I am sure, he made sure to leave himself in a position he believed would be uncontested.  Now, however, he will have a contested election on his hands against a very qualified candidate.

Goldstein will be familiar to readers of this blog as the author of the blog NYC Educator where he has been blogging about education since 2005.  It is a blog we frequently have referenced on this site.  Additionally he has written articles about education for the Huffington Post (see here) and the Daily News, among other publications.  Goldstein works as an ESL teacher at Francis Lewis High School in Queens where he is also a UFT chapter leader.  Those of you on Twitter may very well be familiar with him as he is a frequent participant in education related topics under the handle @TeacherArthurG.  Be sure to give him a follow if you don’t already.  While a member of the UFT, Goldstein has been outspoken in his criticism of the Unity Caucus leadership of his local.

Via his guest post on our blog, “Reviving Unionism”…

It’s funny to hear people in NYSUT complaining about democracy. I’m chapter leader of one of the largest schools in NYC, and neither I nor anyone in my school gets to vote or participate at all in NYSUT or AFT. Though I’ve been elected twice, that means nothing. The only way a city teacher gets to be part of NYSUT is to be part of Unity, an invitation-only caucus that has run the union for over 50 years. I’ve never been invited.

The reason for that, I suppose, is my public point of view. I’ve been published in the Daily News, at Huffington Post, at Gotham Schools, on Schoolbook, on multiple blogs, and in local Queens newspapers taking positions contrary to those of UFT leadership. For example, I wrote a column labeling mayoral control mayoral dictatorship. Though giving Michael Bloomberg absolute power was a bad idea, the UFT supported it. After he used it to close schools all over the city, aiding no one but privatizers, we supported it again.

I also oppose value-added ratings for teachers, since they have no basis in science, and since great teachers have lost jobs as a result.  I can’t support Common Core, no matter how many millions of dollars Bill Gates pours into it, as I don’t believe it helps the students we serve when we fail most of them and use said failure to label working teachers as defective. Brilliant education historian Diane Ravitch shares my positions, and it’s ironic to be excluded from not only UFT, but also NYSUT and AFT for the crime of sharing her opinions.

It appears as though Goldstein will now circumvent the lack of a Unity Caucus invitation as he attempts to have his voice heard in his state union.

This, ladies and gentleman, is an example of true grassroots unionism.  A rank and file teacher, who has been in his classroom teaching today, finding an avenue to make his voice heard.  Bottom up, member driven unionism at it’s finest.  Goldstein will now give NYSUT delegates a very appealing alternative to Andrew Pallotta, who has seen Tiers 5 and 6, along with the tax cap on his watch.  Goldstein’s frequent and harsh criticism of Andy Cuomo also stands in stark contrast to Pallotta who used $10,000 in VOTE COPE funds to secure a table for his Revive NYSUT cronies at Cuomo’s birthday party.

We will have more on this situation as it unfolds and as we move closer to April’s NYSUT election.

Andy Pallotta and Reformy John Flanagan

If you are a regular reader of this blog you know that we have touched on John Flanagan quite a bit.  Flanagan, a New York State Senator who represents portions of the Comsewogue School District, is also the chairman of the New York State Senate’s Education Committee.  You may remember that in November we rallied outside Senator Flanagan’s office while he cowardly hid inside.  You’ll recall that an editorial in The Smithtown News referring to New York’s education reform agenda said…

Call it the King/Flanagan agenda, and it stinks.”  They added, “Ever since NYSUT refused to endorse him for re-election in 2010, Mr. Flanagan has been out to get public school teachers and he is hell-bent on taking the public school system down with them.  He has jumped to the center of the charter school bandwagon, which drains money from public schools, he has fostered implementation of an inherently unfair and flawed APPR system, he has ushered in the misguided and premature implementation of the Common Core Learning Standards and he has allowed the implementation of the abusive testing of students.

By now you know the story of Flanagan calling Comsewogue District Office to complain that one of their teachers, Beth Dimino, did not speak to him in a deferential tone.  You know that Flanagan has known ties to ALEC and that his top campaign contributor was Michelle Rhee’s organization Student’s First.  Suffice it to say John Flanagan is certainly an enemy of public education.

So imagine my surprise last night when the tweet below scrolled across my Twitter feed…

Ah yes, Revive NYSUT’s Andy Pallotta, cozying up to the reformy John Flanagan.  Pontificating about how “we” will support all children.  You may remember that Flanagan wasn’t endorsed by NYSUT in his bid for re-election in 2012.  However that did not stop Andy Pallotta from sending him $3,000 of VOTE COPE funds anyway.  That seems to be Pallotta’s way of doing things.  Don’t worry about who NYSUT has voted to endorse or what is best for the rank and file, make sure you fill the coffers of your reformy pals.  We already know he has contributed $10,000 to “Cuomo 2014”.  It makes you wonder how much money he will give Cuomo, even if NYSUT votes not to endorse Cuomo in his re-election bid.

Despite the fact that NYSUT elections are rigged because of the Unity Caucus stranglehold on the UFT leadership, we must find a way to oust Andy Pallotta from his office of Executive Vice-President.  Rank and file members around the state should be contacting their NYSUT delegates and telling them “Vote NO to the Revive NYSUT slate!”

Pallotta's feelings of Flanagan.
Pallotta’s feelings of Flanagan.
The PJSTA's thoughts on Flanagan.
The PJSTA’s thoughts on Flanagan.

State of Politics Picks Up NYSUT Story

Via State of Politics… 

But there’s also chatter that what this is really all about is an effort by the UFT to wrest control of its parent union once and for all. This theory is primarily being pushed by the pro-Iannuzzi faction, which thinks Mulgrew, who has a close relationship with Gov. Andrew Cuomo, is particularly miffed that Iannuzzi is apparently unwilling to even entertain the possibility of endorsing the governor for re-election this fall.

…

“I will be in this until the end,” Iannuzzi replied. “I’ve been part of NYSUT for 40-plus years, and I know what NYSUT is. It’s an organization that has a really delicate balance between New York City and the rest of the state. It won’t be NYSUT if this crowd takes over.”

The Tangled NYSUT Web

Pallotta (L) and Mulgrew (R)

The NYSUT drama continued to roll on this week.  It is quite a nuanced debate, particularly for those people who aren’t familiar with the inner workings of the statewide union.  We’ll try and connect some dots for you…

Earlier this week former Executive Vice-President Alan Lubin wrote a letter backing Pallotta.  Lubin clearly made a significant attempt to put to bed the notion that this is a “UFT take over of NYSUT”.  He made the point that the UFT would only hold two of the five officer positions.  He failed to make the point that all of the officer positions would be hand picked by UFT/Unity hack Andy Pallotta.  For those people who have believed that Lubin has always been the one pulling the strings of Pallotta, this did nothing to silence them.

Yesterday Revive NYSUT posted an endorsement from UFT President Michael Mulgrew.  “We support the Revive NYSUT Unity slate. We have heard the voices from locals across the state and agree with their call for change.”  Two days earlier, in a love letter to Governor Cuomo letter to his members addressing Governor Cuomo’s budget proposal, Mulgrew said “The governor’s budget proposal is a good start for the legislative process, one that puts the needs of New York’s children and educators at the center of the debate.”  This is the same Mulgrew whose UFT DA last week refused to rule out a Cuomo endorsement.  For people who believe that Pallotta’s slate wants to endorse Cuomo, the Mulgrew endorsement was more fuel for the fire.  Revive NYSUT claims to promote “grassroots unionism”.  I wonder how they felt about Mulgrew’s refusal to debate his opponent last spring, a true grassroots unionist, Julie Cavanagh.

Today, over at Ed Notes Online, Norm Scott continued his brilliant coverage of this topic.  Scott received a copy of a letter sent from UFT rank and file members to NYSUT President Dick Iannuzzi.  In it they say…

The influence that the UFT has on the decisions of NYSUT must be countered. Andrew Cuomo is not a friend to teachers.  Andrew Cuomo isn’t even close to being fair to teachers.  If Michael Mulgrew wants to support Andrew Cuomo, he should do so by writing a personal check.  We are certainly not the only UFT members who feel abandoned by the UFT.  It is time for NYSUT’s locals to unite against the useless behemoth of a local called the UFT and take steps to protect the hardworking teachers of NYS.

One of the teachers who sent that letter, Roseanne McCosh, also had this to say…

I worked with Andy Pallotta when we were both Dist 10 chapter leaders and I continued as chapter leader while he was the Dist 10 rep. I am no longer chapter leader but I was replaced by someone strong and on the right side of the issues.

On a personal level I have a lot of good things to say about Andy. But this UFT/NYSUT situation ain’t personal— it’s business, and I completely disagree with Andy on how vehemently we should be fighting those looking to eliminate teachers’ unions and wreak havoc on the day to day conditions under which we must try to teach.  I spoke with Andy this past summer and expressed my frustration with the lack of leadership on tackling Albany and the DOE head on.  Andy’s a peacemaker.  I’m a fighter.  We disagree on tactics.  He had a VP from the UFT call me (For the life of me I can’t remember her damn name)  and I was given lip service that the UFT was on top of this whole eval system.  I knew I was being placated and ended the conversation noting that time would tell how ahead of all of these issues the UFT would be in the months to come.

To get an in depth look at the evaluation system that the UFT was “on top of” you can take a look here.