The staffer at the UFT said true, but it’s only the stuff in the real file that can be used “against you.”

I am still pretty frustrated at the denials or the naivete of these staffers/execs who are supposed to be defending our rights but have not been on the receiving end of the abuse we’re getting when principals and district people want us out of their schools. They’re not only going after teachers whose skills are not up to par. They’ve also been attacking great teachers who don’t accept the educrap promulgated by the DOE . And they go after older teachers, and teachers who don’t play nice with the principal, and chapter leaders. Many of those are serving time in the rubber room or who have had near misses with that kind of thing.

What the staffers do not understand, because they’ve never experienced anything like what’s going on now under this current DOE administration when they were in the classrooms full-time many years ago, is how entirely demoralizing it is to be on the receiving end of such numerous and often unfounded attacks. And how well can the membership be served when the CL himself is intimidated into silence by the frequently unethical, union-busting tactics installed or tolerated by Tweed. CLs on the receiving end of a variety of negative attacks — from plain rudeness of so many administrators, to real disciplinary actions, to excessing, and to U-ratings — simply cannot serve the membership too well when their hearts are in their throats every day they walk into their buildings.

In a response to this staffer, I was complimentary to the district rep who had intervened so strongly on my behalf while I was being harrassed last year. Part of his simplistic answer was: “I am glad [X's] intervention helped – her authority came from the contract and our ability to stand together when one of our members is injured.”

How miopic and disingenuous some of these people are who are running our union! And if it is not miopia, then they are purposely looking the other way and refusing to see it from our end.

THERE IS A LOT OF ANGER OUT HERE. THOSE WHO HAVEN’T BEEN FIGHTING IN THE TRENCHES ARE COMPLETELY OUT OF TOUCH.

I am posting here my latest response to this staffer, because it is not just for his ears.

“[The District Rep's] authority came from the contract, but she helped me because I was a CL. District Reps don’t have enough hours in the day to service the dozens and dozens of members that need a similar degree of protection. Although some teachers are bad eggs and misuse the system, others just rub the principal the wrong way and need the help of skilled representatives. Not all the CLs have the clout or the skills. I mean, there is a level of lying out there that leaves me dumbfounded. My own principal last year got me to sign the vacancy list for the SBO, then added names after I signed. Pure fraud. He was willing to lie in print and to our face. My former principal at [a central Manhattan MS] lied through her teeth the whole year. Tweed is creating administrators with some pretty nasty skills, and CLs in this current clime are growing weaker. They’re being badgered, and many are in the rubber room, as you know. I was virtually silenced while they were harrassing me last year. Filed no grievances, couldn’t serve the teachers at all, except in private meetings to “educate” them how far the principal was trespassing on their rights. Those young people didn’t even know the rules the principal should have been playing by, but I couldn’t fight their battles. I was fearful every day I was in that building, knowing there was a campaign against me.

“Letters in the file that have lies in them and are allowed to stay there for 3 years are terrible for the teacher. It is the very act of filing a real formal Grievance — even a Step I — that puts the whole thing on another level, a legal level. You’re asking us to accept that a written response to a letter in the file has the same weight as a real Grievance. You’re not living in the real world. Try it out here.

“As CL at [that MS I mentioned above], I used to go to the principal threatening several grievances at a time. To avoid a deluge of Step I’s, she’d fix some of the problems before I filed. Grievances for letters in the file (though very damaged in the past few years by the DOE’s attempts at removing the impartiality of the hearing officers) is nevertheless stronger than anything you’re intending to put in place. You guys are allowing them to peel off a layer of protection, and those of us who are in the classroom need every layer we already have. You’re wrong to spin it as something we can afford to lose.”

No answer yet.

Comment by Kombiz — October 9, 2005 @ 3:26 pm”

There were a lot of retirees voting Tuesday. I certainly wasn’t “plain wrong”. But I am very upset. I don’t understand why they were there or why THEY VOTE ON THE UFT PRESIDENCY!!! Randi needs to go. Retirees voting on teaching issues that we eat on a daily basis needs to go.

Roll Call needs to be instituted in the future.

I know that a petition of no confidence in my school is being started. She simply needs to go. Her railroading of that DA meeting on Tuesday was the worst example of Democracy I’ve ever seen.

Vote this contract down. Educate your collegues.

Comment by mvplab — October 13, 2005 @

The new teachers should remember that as they write out their checks paying for their costly Master’s degree courses.

Some would argue that we are doing better than the pattern but not by much.

The police and sanitation workers all hit maximum at 5 and a half years. So even if the newborns started at a lower salary (while training), their salary jumps up signicantly 6 months thereafter.

We should not be treated like the other City workers during salary negotiations.

The sanitation workers lost some of their overtime rights, they have agreed to layoffs, and will work more hours and longer routes, with less workers on top of what I mentioned in the comment above. The lead teacher program is a UFT designed program that’s been pretty succesful with teachers, and parents in the Bronx.

I sympathize with your point about the male/female ratio but I don’t think they did better, considering the 4k cut for their newborns. I sat down with two close friends one who is a labor organizer and the other was a TFA teacher who is now on her fifth year. They think Randi and the negotiating committee did amazing work considering the forces arrayed against them.

I’m here to get questions answered, and jump in where I can help. The larger point from my comment above is that the pattern, ie. where one city union settles and all other unions are set to those standards, is so difficult to overcome.

-kombiz

From the Daily News this morning:

“Some workers will go solo on trucks that boost and unload Dumpsters. Workers who take on that assignment can earn up to $16,000 extra annually…”.

That sure beats out a “lead” teacher’s extra pay…and they don’t need 2 advanced degrees for that career. I’d say they did pretty well. The Mayor sure is a man’s man.

We all know the male/female ratio of all these “careers/jobs” that have recently settled their contracts, don’t we?

Sorry that’s how I see it…

Despite the 17% increase the sanitation workers like every contract reached recently is consistent with the pattern. It includes huge trade offs that saved the city a great deal of money.

It includes removing some overtime from workers. It reduces the crew size from two to one man crews while lengthening the route. Salaries for new sanitation worker’s (the unborn) get cut from 30k a year, to 26k a year. Bloomberg, like his predecessors has managed to impose a pattern on more hard pressed group of workers. The reality is that despite how much Bloomberg talks about education, he tried to keep teachers to the same pattern as the other unions in the city.

You want to go back to law school? you must learn or re learn how to stengthen and weaken arguements of course? Your big point here is this as good as it will get. Well, guess what sanitation just got 17 per cent spread over 51 months which works out to a full four per cent per year.

We got nothing and we should tell Bloomberg where stick this shit. Better to walk away with pride than eat a shit sandwhich.