The days are getting longer, otherwise the bleak, chilly days seem to be modeling the political climate. One day Trump is thinking about giving DACA kids permanent status the next swooping down and snatching immigrants off the streets, the next day probably messing with Social Security and Medicare, is that whirring sound sucking sanity down the drain?
The Democratic mayoral primary, June 25, will heat up as more candidates enter the race, ranked choice voting, you can “rank” up to five candidates, and each candidate can receive up 8:1 matching fund for contributions up to $250. The Governor keeps trying to ratchet up her favorability ratings, Cuomo about to enter the mayoralty race and teachers keep trudging to the citadels of learning, and for some, “congestion pricing.” is effectively a reduction in salary.
Winston Churchill allegedly said “Never Let a Crisis Go to Waste,” while eyes are on the news behind the scenes, in whatever has replaced “smoke filled rooms,” deals are made.
There’s wonderful song in Hamilton, “In the Room Where It Happens.” Listen here
No one really knows how the game is played
The art of the trade
How the sausage gets made
We just assume that it happens
But no one else is in the room where it happens
No one really knows how the parties get to “Yes”
The pieces that are sacrificed in every game of chess
We just assume that it happens
But no else is in the room where it happens
And Mulgrew, who somehow negotiated the Class Size Reduction law and stymied the Governor in her attempt to eliminate the charter school cap, thereby saving thousands of jobs, knows how to find “the room where it happens.”
The UFT opposition caucuses released their election platform, and planning to strike is at the top of the list. Somehow or other if teachers strike manna will flow from the heavens, more likely an opportunity for Elon and friends to hook up personal chatbots to kids, and we become superfluous.
Not “scare tactics,” a reality, as Generative Artificial Intelligence grows and grows we’ll have to be “in the room where it happens” and figure out how to include it in our educational tool kits.
Management, the Department of Education, is not the enemy, yes, incompetent principals exist and the union is in the forefront of “fighting the fight.”
In October all the Superintendents and UFT District Reps met at the UFT Headquarters along with Chancellor Banks and Mulgrew. How can the Department and the UFT increase collaboration, work together to make all of us more effective teachers and school leaders? The District Rep in District 5 and the Superintendent arranged for a conference, principals and UFT school reps, led by a CCNY professor who is a national leader in Teaching Migrant Children and Working with Migrant Families. CCNY offered District 5 teachers 15 CTLE credits, free, in activities and engaging migrant children and families.
Yes, the UFT battles for better wages and “fixing Tier 6,” as well as closing the leadership competency gap in schools, teachers as partners not workers on an educational assembly line. In my own school the Assistant Principal left, the department asked the principal to allow the department to select a department chair, similar to a college, he agreed, We elected a steering committee to meet weekly with the teacher selected as department chair, and, an option, in lieu supervisory observations, peer visitations, teachers teaching the same subjects observing each other We never got to the Peer Review stage, teachers assessing other’s performance, true professionalism. The CSA eventually objected, the powers that be assigned a licensed AP.
Of course with 1800 schools one size fits no one. Maybe we’re beginning to professionalize our schools, moving away from a “factory model.”
In many exemplary school systems, senior teachers run the school, should that be our goal? See The Teachers’ Lounge here.
With Trump hovering and Cuomo in the wings as the next mayor we need a union leader who understands both the needs of members and how the “game is played,” in perilous times you need a union leader “in the room where it happens,” not planning suicidal strikes.
Ed in the Apple: Blogging on the Intersection of Education and Politics Title 