Repeal NCLB, Letter to Hollister Teachers
Rich Gibson wrote:
That's right, George. Facts are facts and you, NEA, and facts have
nearly nothing in common.
However, having erred in the past, I am quite willing to entertain
the idea that I am ignorant. Let's see how dumb I can get:
Keep in mind, George, that I used to work for NEA affiliates. I saw
the inside. I trained NEA staff. I led school strikes, led building
school building seizures in the midst of contract battles, went to
jail for enforcing NEA picket lines, bargained NEA contracts,
organized locals from scratch, fought off the Teamsters in Florida
NEA. I have many friends on NEA and state affiliate staff all over
the US.
With six other people, I helped organize what is now the largest
local in the UAW. I taught labor relations at Wayne State in
Detroit. Still, I can live with your idea that I may be ignorant. I
have made many mistakes over the years.
Your comment that I am may be dishonest flies in the face of the
facts and is unacceptable. Indeed, your incessant procuring for the
official line of the NEA is open to question, as to your own
interests.
Reg Weaver is indeed paid $450,000 a year. Actually, it is a little
more, but in 2004 poor Reg only made a total of $445, 869 placing
him about 12th among the labor bosses, behind the presidents of
mobbed up unions like the UFCW and the ILU.
Those who want to try to traverse the US Department of Labor www
site can give it a try. I'll accept Labor Notes' facts for now. Keep
in mind that NEA and all public sector unions fight like crazy to
not disclose their expenses and salaries, etc., to the Department of
Labor, as private sector unions must. So, if you check, you will see
that only about 12 NEA state affiliates file LM2 disclosure forms,
thus keeping the salaries out of view of members. Moreover, NEA is
rife with stories about how to collect funds without having to
appear to collect funds.
George, some staff in NEA can easily live on their expense accounts,
and bank their paychecks.
I'd love to see Reg Weaver's expense vouchers, especially his meal
vouchers. Wouldn't you? Maybe as a local leader he'll pass them
along to you. After all, we both paid for them, didn't we?
For his fat pay, Weaver travels around the US in lovely suits,
stumbling over his own press releases which he seems unable to
memorize, mis-leading school workers, and now, hustling for the
On top of his salary, Weaver, while on the road, stays at spots like
the San Diego Hotel Del Coronado, where George W. Bush stays. Is
that how you think a leader of a union --which represents people who
must live in trailer parks because of their low pay-- should live?
NEA did in fact take out full page ads in the NY Times in
conjunction with the AFT and the Business Roundtable and the US
Chambers of Commerce and others demanding the regimented curricula
that became the NCLB.
NEA, AFT, and their partners on the Business Roundtable and the
Chambers of Commerce may tinker with NCLB, but they will do nothing
at all to disrupt the severe regimentation of daily life in schools
via scripted curricula and high-stakes exams. A nation promising the
world perpetual war is going to make peculiar demands on schools, >>> eh?
Nor will NEA actually organize any workplaces around the concept
that should drive unionism: employees and bosses have contradictory
interests. Nor will NEA unite all school workers with parents and
students, as the latter don't pay the dues that keep Weaver bulbous.
What could be more dishonest, or stupid, than that?
Disorganizing people fits perfectly with the NEA vision of "New
Unionism," the unity of government, labor, and big business in the
national interest," abandoning the most basic reason people join
unions, that is, the competing interests between workers and bosses.
Here is the previous NEA president, Bob Chase, explaining his view
the pact that the UAW made at Saturn Corporation, what the UAW calls
"Partners In Production."
Since Chase's speech, The UAW lost nearly a million members and did
nothing at all but smash the job actions of their own members, a
logical result of the policy of New Unionism which, in fact, rightly
represents the unity of interests of union bosses and corporate
bosses--against the work force.
A logical extension of New Unionism, that is, corporate unionism, is
the work that the AFT leadership, and NEA leadership to a somewhat
lesser extent, do with the National Endowment for Democracy and,
now, the affiliated National Democracy Institute. NED is a CIA
front, working all over the world to demolish indigenous workers'
unions, in the interest of US imperialism. Their latest venture was
in Venezuela, but they have been active in places like the Ukraine,
behind the bogus Orange Revolution, and recently in Iraq.
Again, why would US unions do this (bear in mind, again, the chief
culprit in this is the leadership of the AFT, but NEA is involved
and the entire AFL-CIO has been involved in this activity for
decades, colluding with groups like the American Institute for Free
Labor Development)???
US unions do this, in theory, for the same reason the early AFL was
organized; the belief that if you keep some workers out (usually
black workers and women in the case of the AFL) those few workers
who are "in," will do better. Internationally, this plays out as,
"US workers (read union bosses) will do better if other workers do
worse."
Part of Reg Weaver's salary, as he surely knows, is rooted in his
willingness to collaborate in this kind of work. He is a Labor
Aristocrat. Remember, hard earned educator dues pay for Weaver and
these overseas adventures. Weaver profits from imperialism, while
the rest of us pay the price, as do the real victims as in
Venezuela, Iraq, etc. While most of us have far more in common, for
example, with teachers in Iraq or Venezuela, than we do with George
W. Bush or Hilary Clinton, Weaver recognizes that the people who
butter his many loaves of bread are elites in the US, and elsewhere.
That makes him an enemy of the mass of people, a traitor in the
midst of the school worker force.
NEA is part of the Partnership of 21st Century Skills, a founding
member. Good friend of education Bill Gates thinks The P21Skills
president Weaver routinely chows down with the Business Roundtable,
even after the BR made fools of the NEA leadership
"Bait and switch"? (from your comment below that the Education
Roundtable petition may be some kind of scam). George, the big bait
and switch is that education workers are forced to pay dues to the
NEA on the grounds that it is a union.
In sum, NEA is not neutral about anything, contrary to your thought.
NEA leadership is on the wrong side.
Nobody needs to pay Reg Weaver or Bob Chase to surrender to a boss.
We can do that on our own.
Educators, and all workers, need organizations that recognize the
fact of class struggle in daily life and which try to really unite
people to win the power to build reasonable schools and a just
A critical mind is good. It's to your credit that you had "serious
doubts," about the Education Roundtable petition before Barbara Kerr
and Reg Weaver told you what to do, and an indicator of your state
of consciousness that you did nothing until they did.
At 06:25 AM 3/22/2007, George Sheridan wrote:
Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, but sometimes, at
least, facts are facts.
NEA leadership did not join the opponents of public education to
"force NCLB on the school work force." NEA was neutral, which was
cowardly, but which is certainly different from advocacy. NEA is
not neutral now and has not been for some time, which is why Bush's
first Secretary of Education called us "TERRORISTS," a word with
significant implications in the middle of a "War on Terror."
Reg Weaver is not paid $450,000 per year. The union reports
spending that much on his compensation and expenses. Most of the
money is expenses, primarily for traveling almost daily to union
meetings. I think that's what a union leader should do, and I think
that creating the implication that he personally profits from that
money is either ignorant or dishonest.
If you want to argue that asking union members to do anything "can
be seen as a threat," go ahead and argue and leave the judgment to
your readers. It is still a fact that Barbara Kerr did not tell
union leaders to "forbid" their members to sign the petition. In my
opinion such language is inaccurate and inflammatory.
CTA and NEA intend to change the Elementary and Secondary Education
Act. That law is now called NCLB, but NCLB is not just the things
to which we object. It is the whole law. That is also a fact, and
that's why some reactionaries have joined in calls to abolish it -
they want to get the federal government out of education. This is
not "dancing on the head of a pin." This is a basic question of
where we want to end up.
To encourage union members to sign the petition, knowing that we
don't want to abolish the ESEA, would be a kind of bait and switch.
I think it's too bad that we couldn't have gotten together on the
language before the petition was launched, but words do matter.
Long before Barbara Kerr or anyone in NEA leadership urged us not
to sign the petition, I had serious doubts about the petition for
this very reason.
At 12:17 AM 3/22/2007 -0800, Rich Gibson wrote:
George,
CTA and the NEA national office are attacking the modest and
reasonable petition offered by the Education Roundtable and
attacking Susan Ohanian personally.
To suggest otherwise, as you do, is simply wrong.
What would Kerr or the $450,000 per year NEA president Reg Weaver
care if people sign that petition?
They care because they cannot tolerate opposition, and fear it. As
unsophisticated and largely unorganized it may be, there is a
rising tide of school workers who recognize the connections
between the NCLB, war, and capital itself. They hate the NCLB.
They are beginning to recognize that it was the leadership of NEA,
the AFT, the US Chambers of Commerce, the Business Roundtable,
combined as one voice, that forced NCLB on the school work force
in the first place. They are also learning that the union
leadership is nothing but quislings, traitors, in their midst.
Even small steps toward that realization are dangerous to the top
NEA bosses like Kerr and Weaver. And their actions belie your own
words.
Kerr's cowardly comment, which you quote,
"We ask CTA members not to sign this petition.Instead, members are
encouraged to write or email their members of Congress and
support our Positive Agenda for ESEA Reauthorization."
can easily be seen as a threat by union members who have enough
experience to have witnessed NEA exercise political control over
whose grievances get filed, acted on, taken to arbitration, etc.
This dancing on the head of a pin that suggests that abolishing
NCLB will abolish education the ESEA is flatly nonsense. Surely
Weaver and Kerr know that, if you do not.
As usual, rather than organizing anything significant in schools,
where school worker power lies, NEA and CTA urge people to
supplicate themselves before the fully bought class of politicians
in D.C., a maneuver that will win nothing at all since Democrats
and Republicans are as united on social control via schooling as
they are in their absolute commitment to maintain control over the
Middle East oil fields. But even if that electoral work did win,
what would sustain it, if school workers never get around to
organizing for control over the processes and products of their
work?
There is a reason NEA and AFT and CTA never get around to that
jund of organizing, as such organizing would make the union
leaders irrelevant, wipe out those highly-paid jobs, and make it
difficult for them to sell out the membership.
Kathy Emery's work in organizing and in writing significant
material that is of vital use to all educators stands far above
anything that Barbara Kerr or Reg Weaver will ever achieve.
At 10:45 PM 3/21/2007, George Sheridan wrote:
Kathy:
As president of a local teachers association, I can state
categorically that
neither Barbara Kerr nor any other CTA officer or official has
told us to
"forbid" our members to sign the petition. The absurdity of such
a report should
be evident on the face of it, since local union presidents have
no way to enforce
such a prohibition if we were to decree it. Furthermore, Barbara
has no
authority to order local presidents to take any such action. We
are elected by
the members of our associations and are answerable to them.
I attended a meeting with Barbara Kerr and several dozen other
local union
presidents on Monday. As usual, Barbara spoke of the harms caused
by the
so-called No Child Left Behind Act.
So how did this rumor begin? In February, Barbara Kerr wrote to
chapter
presidents pointing out that NCLB, the so-called "No Child Left
Behind Act," is
now the official name for the Elementary and Secondary Education
Act, which since
1964 has been a major source of federal funding for public
schools. "Dismantling"
NCLB means dismantling ESEA. That is inconsistent with the policy
we adopted by a
sizable majority vote, after extensive debate, at the 2006
Representative
Assembly. She concluded by saying, "We ask CTA members not to
sign this petition.
Instead, members are encouraged to write or email their members
of Congress and
support our Positive Agenda for ESEA Reauthorization."
CTA is supporting NEA's legislative priorities for ESEA
reauthorization,
including.
1. Inclusion of multiple measures in a revised AYP
accountability system so
that AYP is not based solely on standardized test scores.
2. Use of growth models to measure changes in student performance.
Allow every state to implement a transparent growth model
methodology that
recognizes continuous improvement for all students, grants
schools credit for
improving student achievement at all points on the achievement
scale (for
example, credit for schools that move students from below basic
to basic or
from proficient to advanced), and for improving student
achievement over time.
Such systems could track individual student performance or
cohort performance.
The Federal government should not designate the specifics of
such a system, but
should grant states flexibility to develop growth models,
subject to state peer
review and review by an independent expert body, such as the
National Council
on Measurement in Education, the American Psychological
Association, the
American Educational Research Association, or the Joint
Committee on Testing
Practice.
Data from growth models in an accountability system should be
used exclusively
to improve instructional and curriculum decisions and
professional development
for educators.
3. Shift AYP from a system that labels and penalizes schools to
one that rewards
success.
A school that falls short in just one or two criteria would
be required to
develop and implement a targeted improvement plan for the
specific subgroup
of students.
If a parent exercises his or her rights to have their
children opt out of
taking required tests under state law, then eliminate any
associated
penalties against schools and districts.
Provide supports and assistance for schools, including
financial support
and technical assistance, with assistance targeted to those
schools and
districts most in need of improvement.
Allow districts in need of improvement to be approved as
supplemental
service providers.
Target both Supplemental Educational Services and public
school choice to
students in the particular subgroups that do not make AYP.
Provide a separate funding stream for public school choice
and supplemental
educational services requirements so funding for these
programs does not
divert funds from classroom services.
Improve the quality of SES services by allowing school
districts to monitor
provider quality, ensure that SES providers serve both
students with
disabilities and ELL students, and require that they be
fully covered by
federal civil rights laws.
4. Provide additional common-sense flexibility for assessing and
counting test
scores from both students with disabilities and ELL students.
Allow the IEP teams to determine the appropriate assessment
and standards
(regular, alternate, or modified) that the assessment
should be based on
for each child; remove the current arbitrary 1 percent and
2 percent
limits.
For newly arrived immigrant ELL students, for whom native
language
assessments in the required core content subjects are not
available, extend
to three years the period of time before their test scores
are included in
AYP.
5. Add a separately funded class size reduction program with
class size limits of
15 to improve student learning, with priority given to high
poverty schools and
which could be phased in over time.
6. Increase flexibility for meeting the "highly qualified"
teacher
requirements, including teachers of multiple subjects, special
education and
rural educators.
Deem fully licensed/certified special education teachers as
highly
qualified.
Recognize social studies as a core academic subject.
Expand current flexibility provided for rural education
teachers.
7. Advance teacher quality at the highest poverty schools by
providing
funding to attract and retain quality teachers and improved
teaching and learning
conditions.
When Abraham Lincoln was urged to replace George McClellan as
commanding general
of the Army of the Potomac, he asked who his visitor would name
instead.
"Anybody," was the reply. That, Lincoln said, was the crux of the
problem.
"Anybody will do for you, but I must have somebody." The same
thing is true of
federal education law. "Dismantling" NCLB is not enough. We must
propose
something. The debate now should be about what best to propose.
Harold Berlak's
suggestion of a Family and Student Testing Protection Act is a
good start, but in
my opinion federal policy on education must also include all the
positive
elements that will enable ESEA once again to promote student
achievement,
especially for disadvantaged students.
To view NEA's comprehensive Positive Agenda for ESEA
Reauthorization, go to:
At 12:58 PM 3/19/2007 -0700, Kathy Emery wrote:
The educatorroundtable petition is an excellent organizing
tool. organizing
teachers in your school to sign it will lead to direct
confrontation with the
state's union leadership. Barbara Kerr has apparently told CTA
union
presidents to forbid their union members from signing the
petition -- this is
the kind of position you want to unmask when organizing. such
a ridiculous
response reveals how the highest union leadership has been
coopted -- making
the powers that be and their tools respond in this way is the
beginning of
radicalizing teachers to rethink their positions.
kathy
George Sheridan