Fact Finding Report

94 Comments:

• 1 get_me_a_contract
  · Sep 14, 2005 at 8:25 pm

  I am unimpressed. I think we were screwed. Too many givebacks…. too low a pay raise.

• 2 nightryder
  · Sep 14, 2005 at 9:09 pm

  We need more money, not more hours to work.

• 3 realitybasededucator
  · Sep 14, 2005 at 9:20 pm

  Atrocious.

  I will not give back three days, 50 minutes, or 10 extra coverages.

  Period.

  The PERB fact-finding report cannot be used as a basis for negotiation. What exactly does the city “give” in the contract? 11.4% is a joke after you subtract taxes and union dues. It adds up to about $91 dollars a paycheck for me after taxes. I am not working three more days, 50 more minutes a week, and doing 10 extra coverages a year for a lousy $91 dollars a paycheck.

  I do not know what Randi Weingarten’s plans are for this negotiation, but if anything close to what is in the fact-finding report is agreed to and put to a vote, you will see a mass teacher exodus to the suburbs.

  I am going to start looking right now. If I’m going to work longer and come back to school before Labor Day, I may as well make “real money.” And believe me, the garbage salary the city pays is not “real money”.

• 4 transcend
  · Sep 14, 2005 at 9:41 pm

  This is very bad news. As if we don’t work enough hours. People never take into account that we grade papers and make lesson plans for hours each day.

  We’ve had people from the superintendents office in classrooms 3 of the 5 days we’ve been teaching, berating teachers in front of the students, attacking bulletin boards, making us do group work every day, and the four square writing method every day… during our professional development time on Monday we were now told that we can only leave specific comments when grading students’ papers. Pressure like this is far less in the surrounding suburbs.

  There will be a huge mass exodus if this is what our contract looks like and if Bloomberg remains in office another four years.

  We also had $750,000 cut from our budget last Wednesday and had to layoff 15 teachers. This administration cares not for the students. It’s really a sad and dark time for NYC teachers.

• 5 EteacherE
  · Sep 14, 2005 at 9:57 pm

  What they offered is horrible! Why would anyone want to teach in this city? The pay raises don’t start until the end of the first year, then when they start they are nothing. Gas has gone up 53% in the same time that they want to offer us a bit over 11%. They offer nothing. I have a B.A., an M.A. and 60-P.H.D. credits and I will be making less than a bad secretary at any company. Why do I need more time for professional development? And 12-FREE coverage’s. God am I stupid to have ever done this job in NYC!

  My choices are start looking upstate or go to something else. There is no staying in this job. If your not done with 5-years, max out your T.D.A. then get out!

• 6 NYC Educator
  · Sep 14, 2005 at 10:39 pm

  This is crap. It’s a step up from the 8 page monstrosity, but barely. When you subtract the 6 percent that represents the extra time, and the coverages, and the 3 extra days, we’re getting less than what DC37 got.

  Clearly neither Klein, Bloomberg, or PERB values our services in any manner whatsoever.

  Reject, reject, reject.

• 7 dr_dru
  · Sep 14, 2005 at 11:31 pm

  I remember an old adage, “a lawyer never asks a question when she doesn’t know the answer.”

  makes me think of what kind of lawyer randi was…

  we start negotiations with givebacks and we are OK with this!!!!

  I am saddened by my union.

  dru

• 8 redhog
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 3:20 am

  Why, dr_dru, do you conclude that the Union is “o.k.” with the givebacks recommended by the fact-finders report? I attended a citywide chapter leaders meeting yesterday at which Randi expressed with intense passion and brilliant argument,all the choices available to us. She laid them out cogently, and though her analysis was tight, encompassing and composed, her personal indignation charged the air. From our leader in time of warthat is what is demanded. At the meeting, Randi not only tolerated but energetically solicited, with no screening, editing, filitering, censoring, or exclusion, the widest range of contributions from the chapter leaders. All our members will at the right time speak with one powerful voice. Like the gallant soldiers at Normandy, we must proceed like gangbusters only after the strategy is set and the weather understood.

• 9 a-realist
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 5:28 am

  Unfortunately, it is my firm belief that two of the three arbitrators are actually on Bloomberg’s payroll. If we deduct the percent increase that equals the additional time required to work, the increase is more within the 8% area for 37 months. This does not keep even with the inflation rate for the three year period, which is approximately 12% for the New York Metro region.
  Randi has her hands full with these recommendations, because it is too “pro Bloomberg.” The additional coverages on the secondary level equals about $150 per semester, or $300 per year in lost wages. Good luck Randi!
  ******************************************
  “Knowledge gained and not shared is knowledge wasted.”

• 10 realitybasededucator
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 6:41 am

  Now that I look at the fact-finding report details from the PERB board in the light of the morning, I’m starting to think it’s not a bad idea to just go without a new contract.

  For me, the givebacks are unacceptable. I am especially offended by the PD days before Labor Day and the 10 extra minutes a day added to the 20 minutes from the last contract to create a 30 minute block of time for “small-group instruction”. This sounds like a sixth class to me.

  I’m no labor expert, but I don’t think a strike is feasible either. First off, a strike is a P.R. nightmare. I believe that the public, which only has marginal sympathy for teachers now, will overwhelmingly back Bloomberg if the UFT were to call a strike. I also think some UFT members would break ranks during a strike and the whole thing would be a terrible mess.

  So if the UFT can’t make a deal with the Mayor without all these time, seniority rights, and Circular 6 givebacks and cannot feasibly call a strike, what can we do?

  How about we wait until Bloomberg is out of office to negotiate a new contract? I know 4+ years is a long time to wait, but Bloomberg isn’t going to be mayor forever. We know that any deal we make while Bloomberg is in office will be filled with atrocities and not worth making. But if we wait him out, I think we can garner much more public support AND get a better deal in the long run.

  I know it’s difficult for long-timers who are getting ready to retire to go without a contract and it is not any easier for the rest of the UFT members to go without a raise. But when I run the numbers of the 11.4% salasry hike offered in the PERB report and think about all of the contract concesions we’d have to make to get the money, I think we lose with this deal.

  What do the rest of you think? Is it worth making a deal with Bloomberg? Can Randi get more concessions from him? or are we stuck with the PERB board report findings as the basis for a new contract? And if we are stuck with the PERB report findings, is it cheaper in the long run to just work without a new contract until we can negotiate a fair one?

• 11 mvplab
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 7:28 am

  First of all we should wait until later today and see the position the mayor and Klein will take regarding the recommendations of the panel. They may reject them because they didn’t get what they wanted: to take back tenure and to impose forced transfers.
  So,here are the options as I see them: (a)Since this kind of negotiations shouldn’t be a zero sum game, what can we build from this roadmap for negotiation that benefits both parties? (b)Or wait, but if the Kleinberg team stay in office for another 4 years and we wait it out, there is no guarantee that we’ll get any better than the FF’s recommendations from some future mayor.And there may not be any retroactivity in a future agreement.The longer we wait the greater the possibility of more “zeroes” thrown into the package. (c)Or, work like hell to get Ferrer elected, but it seems a lot of unions have already endorsed Bloomberg, so this may be a steeper uphill battle than it already was gong to be. (d)Or, if the membership decides that enough is enough, then we should consider additional actions against the city. That will be costly to all sides of the equation with no guarantee at the end of it as well.
  My thoughts: If the city wants to negotiate, I’m for working from the framework set down by the fact-finders and take what we can get now. Minimize our losses as much as possible and make the Kleinberg team look like AH’s for the rest of their tenure. I think this agreement expires in the spring of 2006, so we may be back in the same boat very quickly. However, if they reject the fact finders package as a basis for a cotnract, then we may have to hit the bricks.
  Well, these are just my thoughts, but I haven’t hardened my position on any of the options. Are there any other options that I haven’t considered here?

• 12 Lucy2024
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 7:44 am

  I agree with everyone above. The Fact-Finding Report is a knife in the heart.

  Here I am, working 12 – 15 hour days as a teacher to help my students pass and the Fact-Finders want more? I feel like thousands of us are doing the Mayor a tremendous favor already. How does he not see it?

  I don’t know how to stop helping out my school, tutoring my students during and after school, spending hours creating what I consider great lessons, spending hours grading papers–writing comments on each, spending hours helping the new teachers, etc. without feeling bad for my students and my school.

  That is what I and the rest of us really need to do to send the Mayor a message. He has no idea how much extra teachers do already.

  Perhaps this is where the Union needs to focus–having the teachers cut out all the extras and only work the 6 1/2 hour days–no lesson planning or grading papers at home, no after school, Saturday or Sunday PD sessions, all meetings during school hours, etc.

• 13 institutional memory
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 8:38 am

  One thing we can do to immediately to express our displeasure with our current Republican Mayor is to endorse Fernando Ferrer, and pull out all the stops to support him. He may not be perfect, but if now isn’t time for a change, when is?

  It’s time for action, not whining.

• 14 xkaydet65
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 3:53 pm

  There will be no exodus from the DoE. There are not that many jobs in the burbs and too many folks have pebsion time invested to search private schools of out of state.
  Randi FUBARed this big time. She threw her eggs into the PERB basket, confident it would pin Bloomie’s ears back. Big surprise. She totally misread the mood of the general population about teaching.
  What do we do now? Well the contract has been eviscerated. This report is best case scenario and Bloomie will never give us best case now that he’s got us nailed to the wall. Strike? Only if you want to lose 2 for one and risk being hauled into court individually for violating a court order to return to work. With fines doubling each day. So how about this. We submit 80,000 resignations on day to be determined. No penalties, no court orders. The only thing more doubtful than the city’s ability to deal with that action is getting 10,000 teachers to agree to it. We’re not very united you see.
  So what’s the end result. Randi accepts the package in toto at a Monday morning press conference and let’s Bloomie refuse it. He will because like Steinbrenner, 90% aint enough. Then we agree to keep the current contract in force for hey the next four years.

• 15 xkaydet65
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 3:56 pm

  Sorry for the typos. The Jesuits taught me how to think not type. Line two + pension.
  \Line 3 of should say or.
  Line16 drop that ‘ from lets.

• 16 NYC Educator
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 4:22 pm

  I stand corrected–the extra time is only 2.5%. But add to that all of Bloomberg’s goodies, and the proposal is still crap.

• 17 MONTYPYTHON
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 4:36 pm

  If anyone in their right mind would ever agree to this crap they dont deserve to be in the union. Where exactly can we call this a raise when we get extra time and more free coverages. This is the continuation of the same crap some people voted for the last time when they accepted 20 extra minutes for extra pay- hello that also was not a raise ; if u give in for the 10 minutes this time the next contract will have the other 10/15 minutes and lo’ and behold u have an extra period of teaching; if you couldnt see this coming after the last contract you are pretty ignorant- maybe this union shoudl show some guts and go out how can they replace 80,000 teachers for a long period of time. Lets get a little tougher here instead of just using rhetoric.

• 18 xkaydet65
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 5:42 pm

  As far as backing Freddy, Bloomberg’s only concern is the size of his margin of victory.

  In years past there were two things that could kill the election of a popular politican, being caught in bed with a live boy or a dead girl. Barney Frank took care of the first and Teddy Kennedy took care of the second. So Bloomie’s reelection avalanche is not only unstoppable, but the result will give him an even greater Napoleon complex than he has already.

• 19 paulrubin
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 5:48 pm

  You win some, you lose some. Randi bet the farm on a favorable arbitration result and got bit on the backside. It happens. Unfortunately it comes on the heals of foolishly supporting Bloomberg’s quest for Mayoral control of the schools so now we’re the football and we just got sacked. Such is life. The solution is quite simple:
  (1) Wait out Bloomberg for 4 years. A moronic solution given that there will never be enough retroactive money to cover 6.5 years. A year maybe. Two doubtful. But 4 more? Come on

  (2) Go on strike now without any real notice, watch at least 20% of the teachers cross the picket lines and basically break the back of the UFT as a union (such as it is).

  (3) Prepare for a strike in September 2006 but the reality is that Bloomberg has no good reason to settle a short strike and a long strike under the Taylor Law will leave the system and all its participants in tatters.

  (4) Offer a private willingness to accept the deal with some minor modifications that makes it a bit less unpalatable but at least has a chance of a yes vote. One possibility might be adding a 4th year onto the deal for say 5% so at least both sides have some cooldown time before further warring.

  There’s little in this deal that I find positive. But we have nobody to blame but ourselves. Why it wasn’t obvious to our union’s leadership that handing over even more power to any politician is a bad idea, I’ll never know. Why we accepted the two year lag in contract negotiations as a precedent I’ll never understand.

  I’ll try to stay optimistic. A teacher on max comes out nearly $10,000 ahead on gross salary. A few extra coverages is but $300 a year. Monday’s suck as it is so I’ll simply do my 30 minutes of small group instruction a day for the benefit of my students and I’ll stop working on my lunch hours and preps with kids. I’ll come in my two days early for staff development which is a joke in and of itself and go out to lunch with my friends from work two days sooner. I’m a senior teacher so I probably won’t get stuck with lunch duty under this plan but them’s the breaks for everyone else. I’ll be even more diligent about staying away from students when there isn’t a bunch of them around so I can’t be easily but wrongly terminated. And life will go on. And at my earliest opportunity I’ll leave the system for greener pastures. But at least I do this with the amusing knowledge that this contract will chase the last of the Tier 1 and 2 teachers out of the system and with all the new teachers that will replace them for much less money, there will be more money for raises when hopefully new UFT leadership shows half a brain with future contracts. Or at the very least, the existing leadership learns something from the events of the past four years.

  I’m not angry. I’m not interested in punishing the kids. And I’m realistic about where we stand vis a vis Bloomberg. Stupid people deserve bad things to happen to them and as a group, we’ve been real stupid for a long long time. It’s time to smarten up.

• 20 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 5:51 pm

  I guess this is where you laugh so you don’t cry. Once upon a time if you were a city worker you knew that you voted Democrat. You knew that as surely as you knew to wash your hands after defecating. Democrats may not be perfect but they were better for workers than any alternative.

  Then came Giuliani, nothing but a nightmare for teachers and teachers actually voted for him, liked him and praised him for “cleaning” up the city. What he was really doing was cleaning out teachers’ pockets. Many who praised him for an “improved” city had to move out because they could no longer afford it here. Two years of zeroes were forced on us by dint of a DC 37 contract vote that turned out to be fraudulent. Indeed, the arhitects of the rigged vote, which totally met the mayor’s purposes eventually went to jail. That’s an example of how crime was down in the Guiliani era!! But permanent harm was done to the teachers.

  Now you have Mike Bloomberg, in so many ways Giuliani ll, a billionaire bastard who would take what little teachers have while purporting to be helping children. But remember he could not be in office if many employees of the DOE and their families and friends hadn’t voted for him. Indeed many were glad to do that in the last election after Bloomnberg was endorsed by who else? Giulianni

  I was personally appalled by many white teachers I knew who didn’t favor Freddy Ferrer in the last election even after Freddy called for a thirty per cent raise for teachers.

• 21 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 5:58 pm

  Adding a few days on doesn’t seem so bad at first blush,then you realize, teachers commute from much greater distances than they did a decade or so ago. And frankly they really can’t afford the gas for those extra days either!

• 22 xkaydet65
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 6:05 pm

  Giuliani does not need to be defended by me, but I remember this city in 1993. You couldn’t ride the subways at night, you put “no radio” signs in your cars. Pan handlers, drug addicts ran the sidewalks in many area of Manhattan. Citibanks had their own panhandling doormen. Now my daughter and her friends can go into Manhattan, see a show, shop Canal Street for pocketbooks, ride the subways at night with me feeling more secure at home that were she driving to a bar on Sunrise Highway in Rockville Center.
  No major business left this city after 9/11 and people all over the country want to live here. Did that happen because white people voted for Giuliani and Bloomberg because they were racist/ No! It happened because the Democratic Party in this city is as corrupt as New Jersey. Because they have had no new ideas on city government since FDR. Because they forgot the genius of Dems like Pat Moynihan, and followed the path of political correctness, special interests, and tax the rich. You have rich now to tax because of Giuliani. This town was a sewer in 1993 and was fast fading to life support. Peopl;e will vote for Bloomberg because crime is even futher decreased. Because the city is cleaner, safer,and it has the appearance, if not the reality of prosperity

• 23 get_me_a_contract
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 6:22 pm

  From today’s NY Daily News:

  While gaining many givebacks, Bloomberg did not embrace the raises, which would be mostly retroactive. “The problem we have is we’d like to pay our teachers a lot more, but the city has deficits looming,” he said.

  ALSO–there was a long article on how even some high ups in the Democratic party (one whose wife is the finance chairwoman of the DNC) are working actively for Bloomberg’s re-election.

  We are screwed. We will never see these recommendations as a contract. Bloomberg is a nasty, nasty man and will not even negotiate with us teachers. Yeah, Randi blew it big time, but she also has an adversary who is dishonest and disingenuous.

  I am not sure what the final offer will be, if there is one at all. Bloomberg is under no obligation to offer us a dime, and he is aware that he wins if we strike (which will never happen) and he wins if we sit with our contract for the next four years. However, we should not count on the pathetic 11 percent (with givebacks) that the fact finders recommended. He is probably still fixated on 4 percent.

  The wealthy in Manhattan don’t care. They don’t care about us. They don’t care about public school children. They don’t care about the poor and working class of NYC. They don’t care about overcrowded schools. They don’t care about micromanagement of teachers. They don’t care about anything relating to our students or the UFT (except they would like to see the UFT shattered a la NY Post).

  Sounds harsh, but it is true. They are the ones who finance the election and they are the ones who vote in droves. Shame on the ones featured in the NY Daily News today. They have shown what the Democratic party has become.

  My prediction is that we will be sitting with the current contract while Bloomberg stays in office. There will be no settlement and there will be no strike. As for teachers leaving for greener pastures….in four years, with salaries frozen at the levels they are, who will want to work the job when they can work in Walmart for the same wages and better working conditions? What you will find is that in four years, the schools will have a very high turnover rate and finding qualified teachers will be a great challenge for the DOE…but as I said before, the movers and shakers in NYC don’t care now and won’t care then.

  Finally, it is up to Randi to do something NOW…a strong public awareness campaign. Not weak, new “agey” tv commercials like the ones already aired. Not a post card campaign…but very harsh commercials saying that teachers in NYC make about 30 – 40 percent less than teachers in most of the surrounding areas…. large class sizes hurt our students….the workshop model is atrocious and directly injuring our students……

• 24 NYC Educator
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 6:35 pm

  Yes, God forbid rich people should pay taxes. Better we should saddle our kids with debt for generations to come. And we’ve certainly helped working people everywhere by hobbling unions all over the country. Look how many jobs we’ve created at Wal-Mart.

  And too bad we lost Moynihan, who brilliantly urged a special prosecuter to spend millions investigating Bill Clinton’s sex life. Good thing we didn’t fritter away those years enacting universal health insurance.

  And Rudy and Mike do a great job with our schools, too. Odd, though, that NY Newsday would report that school are just as troubled since Mike’s “reforms.”

  http://www.nynewsday.com/news/education/nyc-poll0913,0,6415647.story?coll=nyc-manheadlines-education

  Go figure. I guess by making working conditions even worse, Mike figures he can attract a better class of teacher. Let’s see, they’ve already tried in Spain, Austria, Jamaica, 800 numbers, subway ads–Perhaps next they can go combing the galaxy with Captain Kirk.

• 25 NYC Educator
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 6:36 pm

  Montreal teachers dressed in black one day a week last year. I wonder if that would get anyone’s attention.

• 26 dr_dru
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 6:58 pm

  All I can say is that we get the union we deserve.

  70% of us could not be bothered to vote for Union President, so we should not be suprised by this.

  Does anyone else think that this is a thinly disguised move to get rid of senior teachers? Then hire Union agnostic teachers and slowly erode whatever gains we made.

• 27 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 7:07 pm

  Let’s see the union get behind Freddy one hundred per cent. Maybe now all the jerks who have voted Rebuplican in the last elections will finally realize all the damage they have done to themselves. then again maybe not.

• 28 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 7:16 pm

  It still largely works like this no matter what anyone says, in the New York metropolitan area the more caucasion the student body, the higher the salaries. Meanwhile Mike Bloomberg would never send his kids to public school nor would the chancellor no matter how much they “improve” them, with tyro teachers who more often than not couldn’t even tell you how Times Square got its name

• 29 realitybasededucator
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 7:26 pm

  A demoralizing day today.

  The temperature was over a hundred in my classroom. I have only three windows so there’s not much of a breeze and I’m on the 9th floor in the direct path of the sun. I have one electrical outlet and two fans, but one of the sockets is broken so I don’t get much air circulation from the fans either.

  The kids were pretty cranky. I was pretty cranky. I nonetheless stayed patient, taught my lessons, conferred with seniors about college admissions essays, spent my prep period helping a kid write a scholarship essay, and skipped lunch to mark Regents papers.

  A colleague of mine came into my room at one point, covered in sweat from the heat and humidity, and said, “What the hell are we doing this for? We’re sweating our butts off, working hard, and staying professional and they treat us like wage slaves. How do they expect to get good people to do this?”

  I had no answer for him. But it’s a good question. How will they get good people to do this job? I’m fed up. I would have no problem putting up with the terrible working conditions in my school if I was given relative autonomy in my classroom and treated with respect. But the mayor has decided that teachers are due neither autonomy nor respect, so why continue?

  The truth is, I love my job and I love my kids. I really enjoy working with an urban population, I dig helping kids from the projects go off to college and make opportunities for themselves in the future.

  But I can only put up with the disrespect for so long. I am not a martyr. I am not a saint. I am simply trying to make a living at something I am good at while paying my rent and making my student loan payments on time. The PERB recommendations are really the last straw in a long line of “**** you’s” from the city.

  So enough. I will find somewhere else to teach. I have talked it over with my girlfriend, who is also a teacher, and we have decided that we will look at other states and try to find a good situation for ourselves. We will take our time. We will do some research. And we will do the best we can. We still want to teach, but we both know we’re not limited to New York City. There are no perfect situations, but there are better ones than this…

  Unfortunately, I will miss the kids. But life goes on and there will be other student populations to teach and other challenges to take on. And I’m quite certain the DOE will survive without my girlfriend and me as well.

• 30 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 7:34 pm

  A SPECIAL THANKS TO ALL THE “SMART’ TEACHERS WHO VOTED REPUBLICAN IN THE LAST THREE MAYORAL ELECTIONS. IN MOST CASES ITS SOMETHIHNG OUR PARENTS NEVER WOULD HAVE DONE!!!!!!!!!

• 31 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 7:45 pm

  to the commentor who notes the city was a sewer in 1993

  It was far more affordable for teachers than it is now. Does sushi in the Time Warner buidling or at Nobu’s have anyting to do with our teachers? Cam they even contemplate the prix fixe dinner at Per Se? This is as far from their ken as a suite at the Carlyle or a dinner at “21″. In fact, a fair number of our teachers have never heard of those places and it is just as well because they can’t afford to go to them anyway. As someone who snared a rent stabilized apartment in the l970′s and is still here to tell about it. The city is far worse now than it ever was for ordinary people because it is just plain unaffordable. And is has a lot less soul and spirit as well after twelve years of gestapo rules and police tactics. It is merely a bizarre adult Disneyland for the very well heeled. Thatis no one under $150.000 per year if not quite a bit higher

• 32 mrirwin121
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 7:59 pm

  Perhaps the time has come for our union “leaders” to worry less about Walmart, Cope contributions, poorly chosen endorsements, etc and spend just a bit of time working for the members that are forced to contribute almost $1000 per year for this outstanding representation. I am fed up! When is the next election?

• 33 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 8:05 pm

  Randi put her heart and soul into everything she did. The fact is that Republican administrations are much more hostile to unions than their Democratic counterparts. That is the reality. Hardly a difficult concept, if you ask me. If the billionaire mayor can’t find that extra 5.5 per cent for teachers even as he finds millions for his campaign, it just serves every teacher right who voted for Republican administrations. Remember the last time the Republicans had this much power was in the l920′s We all know what happened after that!!!! If teachers were smarter, they never would have trusted Bloomberg or his Repulican predecessor, Guiliani. Now we are truly screwed.especially any body stupid enough to have had a family on a teachers’ wages. Now that is dumb

• 34 get_me_a_contract
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 8:07 pm

  I just want to add that many teachers don’t vote in the mayoral elections because they don’t live in the city. So many of the younger teachers in my school still live with their parents on Long Island or in Westchester because on $40,000 they cannot afford both an apartment and graduate school.

  In my 18 years of teaching I have never seen so many new teachers cry or feel dejected during the first week of school–between the micromanagement, the bulletin board mandates (which have nothing to do with students learning), the heat and humidity and the low morale, I doubt that many will return next year. Also, so many teachers in my building are talking about leaving after this year. I don’t think this is idle chatter. I agree with realitybasededucator–I love working with my students, and I can even deal with the low salary (well, I can but my landlord and credit card companies might not be able to), but I cannot deal with the lack of autonomy and the joylessness that has been permeating the teaching profession in the DOE….

• 35 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 8:22 pm

  Yes, I agree with you. Part of the “improvements” that have occured in the city is that teachers can no longer afford to live here. How that is better is beyond my “ken”!!! Now however sedulous the new teachers, in the vast majority of cases I find they couldn’t pair Mr. Loewe with Mr. Lerner anymore than they could match Nora with Nick. Not only don’t we have teachers we can afford to live in the city. we have lost a tremendous amount of intellecutal capitol in the past years with three especially demoralizing mayoralties.

• 36 redhog
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 8:24 pm

  Far worse then being reckless and cruel, it is absurd to blame Randi and our leadership for the grave status quo. Remember that firefighters, more than 300 of whom were incinerated at WTC, have been without a contract far longer than we.They haven’t had a raise since the supreme sacrifice of so many of their comrades, and Bloomberg won’t even offer them parity with the sickeningly shortchanged cops. No matter how hard-nosed former mayors were, there was always an ultimate recognition that unions play a vital and worthy role. We have never before faced such a Reichsfuhrer.

• 37 get_me_a_contract
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 8:30 pm

  Redhog is right about the the firefighters…

  The problem is this–there is no publicity.

  There are no commercials, no banners on the subway, etc. that state that the firefighters are being screwed and dishonored by Bloomberg.

  The same goes for the teachers. We have zero sympathy from the public in this instance because we are not presenting our case to the public. There is no heat on Bloomberg. The fact is that firefighters deserve a big raise. Ads on tv stating the obvious would help. Same for teachers.

  Here is what I envision for us:
  Mayor Bloomberg said in July at a public meeting that teachers in NYC would return this September with a substantial pay raise. He never followed through and never got in touch with the union. Are you a liar Mr. Mayor???? Teachers in NYC earn up to 50 percent less than teachers in surrounding areas do and work under much more adverse conditions. Mr. Mayor–are you a liar–negotiate with teachers now! Give teachers a fair contract and that substantial raise you mentioned.

• 38 xkaydet65
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 9:08 pm

  In a sewer all the swill is afforable. And if you knew anyone who actually was visited by the Geheime Staats Polizei you might be somewhat less than eager to employ that ridiculous metaphor. Oh and Nick was a drunk.

  Maybe if more teachers viewed the world through something other than the rose colored tunnel vision of socialism they might realize how the world actually works and be better able to deal with it, rather than rage agaist it.
  Oh and as far as the Clintons are concerned, well guess who was the first guy into Vince Foster’s office after they found him slumped over that cannon in Rock Creek Park. None other than the guy that got his job as White House counsel, Joel Klein. His bona fides hardly make him a member of the ruling class. As a matter of fact he’s a true Clinton Democrat and boy he does care for the teachers doesn’t he. And don’t think Bill and Hillary didn’t have something to do with his becoming Chancellor. Do you think Bloomie looked him up in the phone book?

• 39 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 9:25 pm

  Frankly, to my mind Bill Clinton was the most effective REPUBLICAN president in history. And that hawkish wife of his, I want her to send Chelsea to Iraq. That is part of the problem.

  How does thw world really work? If your parents are both attorneys and you are born in Cold Spring Harbor how does the world work? Most of our teachers are unfortunately from too impecunious backgrounds themselves too even imagine such a scenario

• 40 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 9:29 pm

  To all the New York City teachers who have voted Republican in any or all of the last three mayoral elections this life long Democrat just says

  HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA

  And you have YOUR OWN CHILDRENyou are trying to get through school HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA AH HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA

• 41 xkaydet65
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 9:42 pm

  No parent sends his/ her kid to the military. The kid makes that choice.And yeah it’s a choice. There are easier ways to get college money than humping an M60 LMG through the desert.So I have no problem with Hillary not asking Chelsea to go. As for my own daughter. She talks about it sometimes. Were she to do it I’d give her a hug and a kiss and say Go with God! OOH RAH!Oh and I just lost a kid who was killed serving with the 69th NY, and 20-25 of my kids from Catholic School days were at ground zero on 9/11, two of them didn’t make it out.And I do eat at Four Seasons and Capsuto Frere, buy orchestra tix for B’way shows and do this with other teachers with whom I work. We all don’t wear sackcloth and ashes and curse the guy driving a Lexus SUV who may be the Social Studies teacher in the classroom next to mine.

• 42 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 9:58 pm

  Children base their decisions in no small part based on family values. In my family with my WW11 Marine vet dad no one was going to any stupid wars. As for your idea that God somehow accompanies and blesses people on their way to war, it’s a great arguement for atheism. Next time I am at The Rour Seasons, i will be sure to ask how many teachers they count among their regulars. Or for that matter how many regulars they have from anything who don’t receive raises for more than three years.

• 43 postit
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 10:13 pm

  Add to the indignities heaped upon us by the chancellor and mayor,fact-finding panel,Daily News and The Post the fact that elementary school teachers, secretaries, paras, and others will get screwed in this contract AGAIN because high school teachers don’t want a 6th period. TRY 8!

  It’s time for elementary schools to join the NEA

• 44 dean
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 10:27 pm

  How can you anyone say the UFT is not presenting our case to the public? The UFT spent millions on subway ads, radio spots, and television commercials (and good ones this time.) What you should be saying is that the public doesn’t care about teachers no matter how strong a case we make for ourselves.

  I think the fact-finding report SUCKS! I don’t want to exchange time for money. I don’t want to do 10 more free coverages! I don’t want to give up anything, but what choice do we have?

  If we reject this recommendation, what little public support we have will evaporate. Do you think that the average New Yorker is going to sympathize with us after we just turned down a top salary of $90,000 a year? Most of our public school parents don’t make half that!

  And one last thing. While Randi is far from perfect, she is the only person I want running this union now. Who could do better? The crackpots who claim that they could walk up to Bloomberg and get him to give us everything we want with a meancing look are all talk.

  This recommendation is lousy but I may be our only choice.

• 45 dr_dru
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 10:34 pm

  redhog says,”it is absurd to blame Randi and our leadership for the grave status quo.”

  from the UFT website:
  Randi Weingarten is president of the United Federation of Teachers, representing more than 140,000 active and retired educators in the New York City public school system since 1998. She is also a vice-president of the 1.2-million-member American Federation of Teachers and a board member of New York State United Teachers.

  Weingarten, a vice-president of the New York City Central Labor Council of the AFL-CIO, also heads the city Municipal Labor Committee, an umbrella organization for some 100 city employee unions. The MLC negotiates benefits on behalf of the unions’ 365,000 members.

  So randi is unable to marshall any resources???

  It is absurd NOT to blame her!

  She has the entire organized labor movement in NYC behind her. How she could or would not talk to Jill Levy, Pat Lynch, et. al. to have a united front is beyond me.

  Bloomberg is running on his supposed business savvy, but somehow he can’t negotiate a contract with these unions…and we let this slide!!

  Randi and Jill can’t bury the hatchett and start any job action!!

  As I said before, we get the leadership we deserve.

• 46 R. Skibins
  · Sep 15, 2005 at 10:46 pm

  After reading the fact-finding panel’s recommendations, I have one question to ask: How much did Mayor Bloomberg bribe them? They are way off base in their findings. First of all, why should we add more time to the school day? We already work a longer day than most of the surrounding school systems, and under brutal conditions. Most teachers don’t even want the current extended time which we have now, which was added on due to erroneous findings that we don’t spend as much time in front of the class as teachers in suburban schools. Whenever a teacher was sent in to take a small group due to overcapping violations, or a child was pulled out for special services, they found that we weren’t working in front of a whole class. Never mind that even when students were pulled out, we still had 10-15 more students per class than in surrounding systems. Don’t fall for this again!

  The arbitrators recommend the elimination of the right to grieve letters in the file. So what will happen when some jerk of a supervisor writes a trumped-up letter? I personally know of teachers who have received letters because the supervisor didn’t like the color marker that they were using, the supervisor didn’t like the way in which the bulletin boards were arranged, the teacher went over the mini-lesson by a minute, a student made a mark on his folder without permission, and, get this- the teacher of a group of students, many with learning disabilities, received a letter in her file because the level of student work was not up to grade level. One teacher in my school even received a letter in the file which was a complete work of fiction. If the UFT makes the mistake of allowing this in a contract, then all a principal has to do is place a few trumped-up letters in your file, and you will be terminated.

  The panel recommends that circular 6 be eliminated. Does it make sense to pay a teacher 40-70 thousand a year to stand in the lunchroom, or guard the toilet? Circular 6 freed the teachers up to work in the classroom with students! It would be foolish to eliminate it.

  The panel recommends that we work three additional days for staff development. This makes no sense at all. We have too much staff development as it is. And while it is true that some suburban schools have staff development for a couple of days before Labor Day, they also end their school year a week before we do!

  Seniority transfer? Why shouldn’t we have the right to transfer to a school closer to where we live? And the argument that seniority transfers would cause new teachers to be bumped doesn’t hold true.

  I recommend that the UFT reject the panel’s findings outright. It is flawed to say the least. A contract with such givebacks would be a fatal blow to the UFT leadership, and would split the union, which ultimately is Mayor Bloomberg’s goal. Also, any contract agreement before Election Day would assure Mayor Bloomberg’s re-election. Don’t make that mistake. I urge the UFT leadership and the rank and file members to reject any contract with givebacks. We don’t need to sell out again.

• 47 mvplab
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 12:54 am

  I don’t know how to phrase this, but I wonder how we should proceed. If we recall, the Kleinberg administration hasn’t really sat down to negotiate with us. We didn’t get these fact finder’s recommendations from the city. It was an independent group of arbitrators. We can grouse about how they must have been in the pocket of the administration because we don’t like some or all of their recommendations, but where does it get us.

  Neither party has to accept these recommendations because we didn’t agree to a LOBA (Last Offer Binding Arbitration) like the police who got screwed this year. So why do all of you assume that the mayor will go for this package? He didn’t get what he and his buddy Klein wanted!

  He doesn’t want to pay us 11.4 percent even with all the time added to the contract. He thinks we should get paid less; he thinks that we shouldn’t have tenure,and that due process rights should be eliminated as should any “just cause” provisions. He wants to have the managerial prerogative to transfer you to more “needy” schools so if you’re a reading teacher in eastern Queens you could find yourself working in Staten Island.

  And he thinks that the length of the workday could be decided by the district and the principal. In other words, he wants to control our working conditions and eliminate clauses that protect us in the workplace. He feels that a union should not be in a position to determine work rules.

  So as hard line WallStreeters, the Kleinberg administration wants to reduce the influence of public sector unions. So I’m not sure where we go with all this, but I think we are in a fight for our lives and the decisions we will have to make in the next few days/weeks will be critical to our futures and the future of public schooling in the city.

  I agree with earlier posts that we should work like hell to elect Ferrer and return this city to a Democrat as soon as possible, but I disagree with the divisive attitude I’m reading in some posts. This is not the time to verbally frag our leaders. It gets us nowhere.

• 48 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 1:50 am

  And I’ll say it again, there was a time a union member knew to vote Democrat, the same way you know to wipe your ass after you shit, it was just something you knew to do, a basic of life.
  But in the last few elections Republican mayors have gotten elected with teachers’ votes, very, very foolish teachers I must add. Randi is smart. As good as we can get. But what can she do when teachers are so stupid they vote Republican?

  Hey if you think we are dumb. Look at the firemen. They supported Bush and look at where they are.

• 49 NYC Educator
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 5:55 am

  Actually, I’d be happier with less money, and no 30 minute “small class instruction,” which would inevitably be turned into a sixth class with ten extra minutes in the next contract.

  I’ve always worked nights and weekends, and I’ve never been able to live on this job anyway.

• 50 mvplab
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 6:47 am

  I think if we can get 1199 and UFT members behind Ferrer, then we have a slim chance of taking back Gracie Mansion. Maybe I should have gone to meds last night instead.

• 51 Lucy2024
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 7:15 am

  I am so upset with this Fact-Finding Report.

  I am upset with the Union.

  The teachers could do something if we wanted to. Complaining is not enough even though I realize that we need to let off steam. We need ideas, work as a union, and follow through by every single teacher in the system.

  Kleinberg and CO. need to realize what a bargain they have already. I don’t think we can depend on the UFT to do this for us.

• 52 anjulim
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 7:27 am

  This proposed contract is an insult.
  They have no right to ask us to give up any more time or to go back into the lunchroom. Randi and The Union continue to fail us. I have long believed that they are “in Bed together”. I hope that teacher don’t jump at 11% thinking of the retro pay because after that what is the increase? $30 a month? Randi needs to have a salary that is only 10% above the top teacher and not a six figure salary. If her salary was tied to our contract then she might actually fight for us. Randi you have failed us repeatedly and you have sold us out to the polichickens. We callfor you to finally do right by us and STEP DOW…RESIGN Randi RESIGN. That is the only way you can help the UFT now…

• 53 misterbarreto
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 8:51 am

  Our union is a joke ! Think about it… We are all hoping that our elected leaders who are making a hell of a lot more money than us are going to get us a better contract? Who are we kidding? We all teach our students that actions speak louder than words. Let’s do something about our situation. I have been in the system 18 years and more than ever am I willing to strike. I am struggling to pay the mortgage and other bills now. What the hell is the difference if I lose a few days pay. They take us for granted and we continue to let them. We can do a borough by borough sick out or alternate between Elementary and HS. What do you think?

• 54 cuingoa
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 9:01 am

  The thing I find MOST upsetting about the Fact Finding report is the elimination of members’ ability to grieve material in the file. Does everyone understand the power this gives principals? Does everyone understand that this would allow any principal to write whatever she/he wants and that this could only we challenged when disciplinary action was imminent? The principal doesn’t like you……you are OUT!!!! A couple of letters stating your LO was faulty, or you were sitting at your desk, or you stepped out in the hall and you have a U rating….What then???? we NEVER win at U ratings!!!! If you’re untenured, you’re out. If you’re tenured, you have a lousy year and cannot move up to the next step. I would rather wait four years then give in to this crap!!! But if I have to, I’m on the streets with the rest of my school.

• 55 deenawisotsky
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 9:36 am

  I can’t believe the arbitration panel proposes no increase in the first year of the contract and only 2% in the the second year. That is only a 1% increase for the first 2 years. The UFT should b vigorously opposed to this proposal. It is a total disgrace when you combine insult to injury with the proposed givebacks.

• 56 Rocco
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 11:13 am

  After finally reading the FF report, my thoughts are: why the shock that klein and bloomberg are trying to crush our union? duh. look how the city has treated the cops and firefighters. look how they socked DC37, the early sacrificial lamb.
  but 11.4 percent is not bad. twice as much as other city civilians and about the same as the cops, who totally sold out all their incoming members.
  bottom line: i’m feeling a lot of anger … but I’m not going out on strike over this. so let the venting continue. I call it blog-therapy. But I’m taking my anger out in november. Even tho I like a lot of what bloomberg has done, I will now vote for Ferrer.

• 57 art-teacher
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 2:07 pm

  Bashing our Union does us no good….They have done alot for me as a 2nd time in 3 years excessed teacher.
  I can accept some recommendations of the FF such as eliminating Seniority Transfer..hell every school should be an SBO by now…giving one free coverage a month…we already do 2 free ones 8 more is minimal in the scope of it…streamlining the way we elimate bad teachers, we all know of the ones who should never be in the system but then again if Principals do their jobs correctly the really bad ones would be gone during the three year probationary period…and Circular 6R if schools need lunchduty and home rooms and hall patrol they can always VOTE THEM IN with 55% of the schools teachers asking for it..
  BUT 3 DAYS AND 11% PLEASE……

• 58 xkaydet65
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 4:23 pm

  I tell my daughter to Go with God when she leaves for school in the morning, so you can be sureI’d do the same if she left for the military. I’m sorry your dad thought WWII was just another stupid war. If he did it’s certainly a lesson you learned well. Oh and BTW I hope you enjoy the fact that your pleasant rent controlled /stabilized apartment drives the cost of every non controlled flat up and up. It’s called supply and demand. Simple comcept really, you should have learned it by trading baseball cards. As far as atheists go, I work with good friends who accept that proposition. the also accept Objectivism do you? And get off your high horse and stop acting like a JHS kid. Use some sense of agrument and deliberation and far less invective and respond in a civilized manner. Got it??

• 59 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 7:59 pm

  Your reading comprehension leaves a bit to be desired. I said my dad, a WW11 Marine Vet would not let any of his children go to any stupid wars, i.e Vietnam! We now of course have Vietnam ll in Iraq where essentially no politician children of either party go just like my dad wouldn’t let his child or grandchild go that crap. That’s different, however, than saying WWll was a stupid war. (I personally am a Dorothy Day style Catholic)
  However because my dad was a vet I received many unfair advantages: a big house to live in, parents who both went to graduate school etc.
  As for my rent stabilized apartment right in the center of Manhattan in fact, I have used this to give more service to others. I have MA plus 130 at least. procuring much additional education for which the city does not compensate me one penny, as I would be in say Garden City or even Hempstead.

  I have also used the extra funds to travel the planet extensively and bring much richer experiences to my classes.
  I also give heftier donations to the needful of my time and funds than I could do if I paid a market rent. I have also shared my apartment from time to time with people down on their luck or in transition. (one friend had a dad waiting for a liver transplant and could no longer afford per diem hotels never knowing from day to day when the new liver would arrive.)

  On some level my apartment is no different than say a nun’s convent. Yes, it enjoys special tax status, but on the theory that the work of the nuns justifies that exception. Hence what looks like pure supply and demand at first blush is actually a tad more complex than that at least.

  I do not mean to be uncivil per se. Hey, I am at top salary and am networked to get at least thirty per cent more than that each year. Why my salary almost looks like a teacher’s in say Sayville when I get done and I have zero dependents. Frankly even combining that with arent stabilized apartment, is still pretty Spartan in present day hyper priced Gotham.

  But as for all of you often at less than top salary with less access to additional compensation in many cases than I and families to support to boot, my heart aches for you. Now if there are teachers still too stubborn or just too stupid to realize that this and the prior mayoralty have been the mortal enemies of teachers’ compensation and benefits in all its forms, what can I say. Go ahead elect more Repulicans!!! That’s what went on in the l920′s and we all know where that led. But history repeats itself, as Clarence Darrow( a man who himself wouldn’t even be part of the ken of too many of our new teachers these days), said “History repeats itself, that’s the bad thing about history.”

  Now that may not be what you want to hear but it was a least civil, I hope.

• 60 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 8:01 pm

  FREDDY! FREDDY! FREDDY! FREDDY! FREDDY! FREDDY FREDDY FREDDY FREDDY FREDDY
  FREDDY! FREDDY!

• 61 ihatebloomberg/klien
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 9:39 pm

  No respect!! The Money Mayor runs comercials talking about education gains during his administration. Who the hell does he think is educating these students!! Its not him and his buddy Klien. This is another kick in the mouth to the great teachers of NYC. And they wonder why so many teachers leave the NYC Public School system every year. Bloomberg needs a Michael Jackson accusation before the election or its four more years of Mayor Money and his court jester Joel Klien.

• 62 institutional memory
  · Sep 16, 2005 at 10:16 pm

  As I have said in other Edwize threads, the Republican mayor is beatable. Republicans are outnumbered 5 to 1 in NYC. We need to unite behind the Democratic candidate, pulling no punches, showing no fear of retribution, renouncing the politics of appeasement. Did someone say FREDDDY? We need to say it with one unified voice, starting at 52 Broadway, resounding from every media outlet, echoing from 1100 schools into the homes of a million students. Victory will follow!

• 63 xkaydet65
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 12:18 am

  The use you put yur property to, while commendable and caring, does not increase the supply of housing. How many other rent stabilized units in your bldg are put to normal usage? Rent control creates a two tier system of landlords just making it if at all, and landlords making it big time because they can charge market for their uncontrolled properties in areas of low supply and high demand.

  As for your heart aching for underpaid teachers with less resources than you, I have just completed paying $25K for my daughter’s high school education while paying $6K per annum in school tax. I’m not crying as she received a far superior education at Kellenberg than she would have gotten at any LI HS, and having taught at Manhasset I can testify to the truth of that. That education was provided by a group of dedicated, knowledgeable, and thoroughly professional men and women, with familes to raise, who make, in the main, less than the starting salary in our NYC schools. So money and salary is not the whole or even large part of the story.I spent 13 years as one of those underpaid , in financial terms only, Catholic School teachers.I learned that the personal rewards in education do not consist of salary. Is it a sign of respect by your community? Of course, but if that’s why we’re in the game we should quit, I would think you would accept that.
  As far as my reading comp, return to your post and see if there is any other war mentioned besides WWII. You may have meant to imply Nam, but you clearly did not.
  As to republican mayors, Bloomberg is a Republican like I am Devil Rays fan. When they beat the Yankees they are convenient to root for. His social policies are purely liberal. As for Democrats, didn’t that great Democrat Abe Beame treat the UFT well back in 75? He beat their brains out in that strike and laid off 14K teachers. As for Dinkins, we did real well with him. We paid for our lousy 5% raise out of our pension futures and then loaned one per cent back to save 5,000 jobs. And Koch, how does he rate on the respect the teacher scale?He called and still calls us part time workers. Who else? Do you think there is a concern other than election returns? Freddy could promise the moon, and he may even want to deliver, but at the first hint of big deficits he’ll be faced with cut services and or pay, or raise taxes. On who? Wall Street? Hoboken awaits with open arms. Jersey and Delaware are waiting for that scenario like Jaws for Robert Shaw.Commuters? Maybe if the Dems take the Senate in 06, but I think newly elected suburban Dems might like their jobs enough not to tick off the folks who elected them to Albany. Borrow? Hey John Lindsay did that and only the folks who hung out in the JVL Club on Main Street knew it was a ponzi scheme designed to get John elected President. What happened to NYC after he would have left was little concern to Dick Aurelio and Sid Davidoff et. al. I don’t think Freddy’s that stupid or cynical. What’s left? a call to sacrifice. “Hey I know I promised a raise but…”
  One thing does trouble me. Any sense that your life and its relative pleasure is the unfair result of your dad’s service in the Corps and your parents’ education is truly upsetting. Their lives are the results of their effort, and too many Marines never made it off the beach. We all don’t begin life at the same starting line. I always wonder where I’d be had my mom not died when I was 11. Maybe to West Point and a life in the Army. That’s what i wanted and she would have pushed me to fulfill my dream and for her I would have responded. But I never think it unfair to my life that she died, beyond losing the person you loved most. My life is mine successes and blemishes. It’s not the result of of any advantage or disadvantage over which I had no control. Your life is the result of your inputs. Your successes are yours. You are your parents’ success Have to go as I’m being paged on Free Republic.

• 64 a-realist
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 7:24 am

  Why a strike could be in our worst interest?

  In order to understand both Mayor Bloomberg and Joey Klein one must be able to think similar to a street person. Randi is too nice to deal with these two very shrewd gentlemen. The Mayor has been able to “play� and string along each union since he has been elected. He is truly a talented fellow, indeed. One does not rise to his position by thinking similarly to the average person. He got where he is by taking calculated risks that were worth the effort. He understands that short term pain is sometimes necessary to achieve long term goals. It is clear that the Mayor’s ultimate goal is to destroy the UFT to the point where it is ineffectual. municipal unions have already been neutralized by the Taylor Law. If I were Mayor, I would make every effort to show the unions that “I am always willing to negotiate.� This keeps him in favor with the general public. As Mayor, nothing would work better for me than to have the teachers strike. This would work just wonderfully for me. Now I can really get rid of many teachers by the thousands. The union, by authorizing and supporting a strike would be working right into my plan for total destruction. First, not all teachers will walk the picket line. Those without tenure or within a few years of retirement can’t take the risk. Second, those teachers financially strapped with mortgages and college tuition payments can’t take the hit. Therefore, it is unlikely all schools will close. To the public, the strike would make the teachers look like the greedy ungrateful pigs and me, the Mayor, look like the good guy. I could then ignore the teachers who strike and hire replacements that will work for me. Yes, as Mayor, I would love the teachers to strike. It would be the last blow with the hammer that brings the house down. In the end, the UFT will be destroyed and my power will increase. As Mayor, I can’t wait for the teachers to strike. I will take the chance that it may only disrupt the educational process for a short time, but the long term benefits to the City and the effect on the other City unions make it worth the game.
  So, go ahead teachers, strike. Please strike!

• 65 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 8:53 am

  Well, it is good to try to look for common ground. Yes, even the Democrats have not been too great for teachers I agree, And don’t even get me started on Mayor Crotch. But they are the lessor of two evils unfortunately and tragically. They certainly didn’t assault tenure in many ways the “sin quo non” of teaching when you think about it. That is no small difference right there. Yes, I know Freddy-who spoke about a thirty per cent raise for teachers in the last campaign would have constraints on him once in office. Still that’s very different than attacking tenure incessantly and not even wanting teachers to have the right to grieve a letter in their file, allowing any administrator to create a Jabberwocky paper trail on a few weeks notice for teachers.

  As for your saying that even Manhassat doesn’t provide THAT great an education, many of those affluent Long Island high schools are quite drug infested in fact from what I have heard. I knew another Catholic teacher very depressed when her daughter went to Garden City High School saying she considered the education quite mediocre and uncaring at best. That however, only strengthens the arguement, that New York City teachers are terribly underpaid vis a vis the surrounding suburbs since what they offer isn’t markedly better when you think about it than New York City schools.

  There was nothing liberal about Mayor Bloomberg’s policies during the Republican Convention, thousands of unwarranted arrests occured with myriad allegations of mistreatment. Many lawsuits have been lodged against the city for civil rights violations on his watch. (Although nothing like the previous mayor , the son of a convicted felon with his police commissioner the son of a prostitute, who have cost the city a fortune in legal judgements and fees due to their unlawful- as adjudicated by the courts not me=behavior.) There was nothing liberal about his doubling of regressive taxes and fines. Of course he supports things like abortion and gay rights, because his constituency demands nothing less. The fact is those are really fringe issues at best with little to do with most people’s everyday lives.

  For that matter in a Roman Catholic Manhattan church you are less likely to hear strident denounciations of abortion or gay rights either as you might in a suburban parish.Then too in the Phillipines the Catholic Church doesn’t denounce child prostitution too loudly either. Any business tweaks its product for the local market. As someone with an MBA I can tell you that emphatically in fact.

  No matter how hard I ever worked in life, I had far too many unfair advantages starting with my skin color. Conservatives always have a problem with that concept I find. But let’s see if I can’t make this any easier for you to understand. After all as a teacher I should be able to do this.

  Now you are a man who clearly loves your daughter and wants to do right by her in every way possible. I mean most people wouldn’t even entertain 25K for high school.

  Now lets consider Caroline Kennedy who gets to work at the Metropolitan Muaseum of Art and hangs out with Joel Klein and his wife. Or how about Rory Kennedy, Robert’s daughter who makes documentary films that are shown on HBO among other venues? Are those types of opportunities going to be available to your daughter? Anything is possible, yes. But it is extremely unlikely for your daughter, where those possibilities for the Kennedys, if they haven’t destroyed themselves, are just a given. Their grandfather stole enough to make that all possible for them. Things that you can never make possible for your daughter no matter how hard you work aren’t hard for them to obtain at all.

  Yes, there are exceptions. People come from the most prosaic of backgrounds and do extraordinarily well, I know. But those are exceptions, they are not the rule. A well educated person should be able to distinguish between the two.

  As for me for all my faults, at least I am savvy enough to know the advantages I had in life I in no way deserved. For some people though that is a harder concept than Physics at MIT!!

• 66 xkaydet65
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 10:18 am

  What you call unfair, I call life, and I am not anguished over the differences that exist.Would the advantages enjoyed by the Kennedys be more acceptable had Joe’s money been obtained in a more honest way? My daughter was born the same year as Alexa Ray Joel. Her parents made their fortunes honestly. It is not unfair that BIlly had talent and Christie had beauty. And yes my daughter does not summer at the Hamptons, she lifeguards and sells stuffed bears. Seven to ten days in Greenport is her summer out east. Yet would she trade places? I think not. Your point I think, and please correct me, is your anger at the existence in America of people of great means and those suffering in poverty. That fact to a Christian is unacceptable, but it does not imply that it is unfair tht you live comfortably while others are in poverty. It mandates that you do something to change it out of mercy not guilt.
  Getting back to the Kennedys is it unfair for them that two fathers were taken in publicly violent manner,. That one mother was emotionally abused and driven to drink. That expectations have been placed upon them that are never placed on the children of ordinary people.There are some of those kids, I think, who would look at my family with a touch of envy.
  Two more thoughts emerge as I type this. Please don’t pass on the sins of the father. It may be tempting to atack Rudy for his actions, and incases quite justified. I am still quite angry that the only people he did not commend after 9/11 were those teachers who evacuated 6,000 kids to safety.But his father’s connections with the wiseguys is really irrelevant. I used to be asked in my old school which contained maybe one Italian kid per grade, if I were in the Mafia. I usually responded that most Italians in places like NY, Boston, Jersey are two phone calls away, I was one call away.We can’t help who our parents are and certainly our parents misdeeds can never be used to condemn us.
  And finally I didn’t mean to imply that I spent 25K per year. I’d have to be certifiable to have done that. But you will find many people on LI and in the city making that effort. While Catholic elementary schoos are onlife support, the HSs are thriving even here in the land of celestial school taxes and supposedly great schools. And the reason the LI schools are so recognized has much more to do with the kids than the school.And the same is true for the successful Catholic schools. It goes back to Coleman, it is the home. I’ll share one anecdote. When my daughter was in kidergarten we sent her to an excellent PS in Middle Village, but when we wanted her to learn to play and swim we took her to 12 Towns YMCA in Cypress Hills Brooklyn.She made the swim team which was an amalgam of families of every race and color in the area,and but all bound by one thought. Do the best for your kid. Whatever lessons she learned about people and life she learned in the pool at 12 Towns. We lost touch in the years since leaving Queens, but I’d like to think those kids who busted a gut learning the ‘fly’ have done pretty well.

• 67 lodis25
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 10:56 am

  This report is horrible. They want to add days to our school year. There isn’t any school district in the tri-state area that has so many days that the teachers have to be in school. Some schools in New Jersey start one-two days before Labor Day but they end June 16-20 NOT JUNE 28. Adding 10 minutes per day in High Schools to tutor students, that means taking minutes off the instruction time, ISN’T INSTRUCTION MORE IMPORTANT!!!. How can we allow in 6 coverages a term. Al Shanker tried years ago in one of his proprosals to add more coverages and it was defeated immediately. TEACHERS THINK DON’T JUST LOOK AT THE RAISE IN SALARY?? HOW MUCH WILL IT REALLY COME TO IF THEY GET ALL THESE ADD ONS!!!

• 68 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 11:23 am

  I understood the 25K was for four years. Of course, Rudy’s daughter and Caroline Kennedy and Tommy Hilfigger’s daughter among others got to go to Convent of the Sacred Heart and that does cost in the neighborhoos of 25K per year. But again that is something a New York City teacher can’t give their child. Then too I am among the minuscule minority of current New York City teachers that knows the difference between Kellenberg and convent of the Sacred Heart. (the latter of course not being just here but all over the world. Check out their Greenwich school not far from Manhattanville next time you are up that way. See what some kids get to call high school.)

  As for Rudy, the son of a convicted felon, who then wanted to run around arresting everyone, I always say the fruit doesn’t fall very far from the tree.
  I often hear conservatives make that arguement too particulary with the poor who can’t defend themselves. But I guess you don’t like it here because it would not be self-serving for you.

  Now let’s get back to the business at hand. Before we get involved in any illegal strikes, Mike can be beaten and its up to us who actually live and vote in the city to make that happen. Perhaps though some of the suburban teachers can think of creative ways to help too.

• 69 WebMachiavelli
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 1:17 pm

  I have asked this before and no one seems willing to answer this but why are teachers so opposed to allowing management send good teachers to underperforming divisions?

• 70 a-realist
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 1:24 pm

  Webmachiavelli,
  I think its the idea of being forced to the schools that are underperforming, rather than having the option to make that decision. Of course, many of us began in an underperforming school. Personally, I would not be opposed to paying experienced teachers significantly more money to work in an underperforming school. But this is my opinion and teachers have there own reasons for opposing such a system. Would I work in a So. Bronx underperforming school for an additional 10% per year in salary? Yes, I would consider the option.

• 71 institutional memory
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 2:47 pm

  Remember, the Chancellor’s District offered increased pay to teachers who were willing to work in low performing schools, in exchange for an extended work day and a longer work year. There were many, many volunteers, and the schools showed continual improvement. Joel Klein dismantled the Chancellor’s District about 15 minutes after he took office.

• 72 a-realist
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 4:38 pm

  Institutionalmemory,
  Recently, Congressperson Rangel from NY, suggested that the DOE pay teachers additional money for working in poor performing schools. Check Google for the story. Perhaps it was no more than two weeks ago. Then, a day or two later, I read that Klein was warming up to the idea.

• 73 a-realist
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 4:43 pm

  Institutional memory, here is the title of the article written in the NY Times.

  METROPOLITAN DESK | September 7, 2005, Wednesday

  Lawmaker and Educator Propose Incentive Pay for Teachers in Troubled Schools

• 74 institutional memory
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 4:57 pm

  Thanks, a-realist. I hope something along these lines materializes if and when the Republican mayor chooses to meet with the UFT negotiators.

• 75 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 6:23 pm

  Let’s beat Mike Bloomberg!!!! We can do it!!!!!! Think of the 4th plane on 9/11 and how brave those passengers were!!!! We can do this thing!!!! Really we can!!! Everybody vote!!! Talk to family and friends!! Tell them how important their vote really can be. Tell them how we suffer in the schools with the billionaire friend of George W. Bush

• 76 WebMachiavelli
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 6:58 pm

  institutional memory,

  You do realize he is actually a democrat right? Just because he registered as a republican to run for mayor dooesn’t really make him one. I’m a republican from the Texas. I consider myself mostly moderate compared to his liberal views. What is amusing to me the most is there is a democrat in Gracie mansion and the unions are crying because he is unwilling to bend over backwards for them because he understands the city can not continue to overpay on union contracts. Do not take that to mean I think teachers do not deserve a raise but I also think UTF is too concerned with protecting the status quo than allowing the city to improve the quality of education the children are getting.

  Simply it is my impression the people want to support the teachers getting more money but we all know that in the real world to get something more often than not you have to be willing to give up something. It seems to me the people posting on this board are unwilling to give up anything. Because of that unwillingness you have lost support from the average person because the average person will always take the side of the child and thier education as long as the perception is the child isnt getting a quality education.

  A perfect example of the inflexible nature of the people posting here was someone saying I would work in an underperforming school if I was paid more. Most employees would not get extra money. The choice would be do it or get fired.

• 77 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 8:57 pm

  Does WebMachiavelli know local Geography? Do you know an Amagansett from a Yaphank? If you did you would realize there are contracts in place that allow top teaches to reach over $120,000!! on Long Island right now. There is little talk of givebacks!! The suburban teachers work in newer buidlings and have more equipment with little exception. Even in impoverished Long Island districts it would be difficult to find a pay scale that did not top out above $90,000!!! We are laughing stocks our pay scale is so low. Even a new top of $90,000 would leave us more than forty per cent behind some suburban districts. Why should this be? Aren’t all students entitled to the same quality education under the state constitution? Didn’t the judges so rule? Have you ever bothered to read the State Constitution? Or is it beyond your ken?

  As for Mike being a Democract he was a total supporter of George W. in the last election and the Iraq War.(which of course no one in his family would go to)

  And why do you think pray tell the firemen have no raise? Don’t they work hard enough? No, Mike’s policies are about keeping the mnney in the hands of fewer and fewer,not spreading it about as civil service is somewhat designed to do.

  Hey but if you enjoy higher fees and regressive taxes for everything from parking meters to tolls to fines with no raises so be it. Enjoy

  But working more for a raise is not really a raise. Someone working at McDonald’s with no Master’s can work more hours add more days and get more money. You don’t need to get a contract ratified for that one.

• 78 institutional memory
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 9:16 pm

  If our current Republicn mayor were an actual Democrat, the G.O.P. would never have accepted him into their fold. He was unsuccessful in his attempts to gain the Democratic mayoral nomination, and had no choice but to switch parties. He has been a strong financial supporter of Republican candidates in recent elections. He is no friend of labor, which has traditionally been the hallmark of Democrats in the northeast. Freddy Ferrer is significantly more of a populist, and would be considerably more sympathetic to teachers.

  And whatever do you mean when you characterize yourself as “mostly moderate compared to his liberal views?” Is “moderate” to the progressive side of liberal, or to the liberal side of progressive? I just don’t get it, but then again, I never was fluent in Texan.

• 79 get_me_a_contract
  · Sep 17, 2005 at 10:24 pm

  Sadly, there is no guarantee that Ferrer will be any better than Bloomberg.

  I read online that the mayor who screwed us the most–Abraham Beame–was a NYC school teacher for 15 years. According to his obituary, he taught “accountancy” at Richmond Hills High School for 15 years.

  Here is the link:
  http://www.obituary.com/beameabraham.html

  So–for 15 years he was one of us, but he still screwed us royally and almost single-handedly destroyed the public school system of NYC–

  What is Ferrer’s position on us teachers and on our contract, anyway?

• 80 WebMachiavelli
  · Sep 18, 2005 at 1:00 am

  shouldhavegonetomeds

  I know it well enough to know that that is like comparing apples and oranges. Just because Amagansett happens to be in the same state doesn’t exactly mean those two school districts have the same resources available to them. We all know about the funding disparity between urban and suburban districts in every state in the union so why would there be any difference in New York.

  And I also know enough about local politics to know Mike Bloomberg was a live long democrat who found it an easier road to Gracie Mansion to run as republican so he could get through the primary without having to take on the democrats political machine until the general election. Since the republican have a weak pool of candidate to draw from in NYC it was probably the smartest pure political move I’ve ever seen in 15 years of campaign work. And if anyone thinks he isnt a democrat you need look no further than his staff to see what poltical bed he really sleeps in.

  And though your union isn’t getting you the money you think you deserve I fully support his effort to keep every penny he can. Consider the budget shortfall he had to deal with coming in I think this guy has done a great job. I do not care if someone has to pay a little more for a parking ticket because chances are they actually were parked illegally. Dont break the law you won’t be paying more. And I know we all know this city was over taxed and over regulated decades before Mike became mayor.

  All I see this guy doing is protecting the citizens of this city from another bad union deal. If you can show me where I am wrong in this thinking I will be happy to reconsider my position.

• 81 a-realist
  · Sep 18, 2005 at 6:10 am

  Although Freddy may not be able to significantly raise teacher salaries there would be a great difference between Freddy and the present two shrewd gentlemen. The present City Hall team desires to destroy the effectiveness of the City’s unions. Teachers must understand that these fellows have an ultimate goal of making our unions so weak that they can do what they please with the employees. Freddy, on the other hand, would respect the negotiating process and sit down and talk. He would treat us with respect. He, too, could demand a little extra back from us. However, he is more likely to pay us appropriately for our extra time. There would be a feeling of mutual respect that does not and will not exist with the Bloomberg administration. So, yes, Freddy will have to worry about the budget deficit too thereby limiting our pay increases.
  ******************************************
  Education is the power to think clearly, the power to act well in the world’s work, and the power to appreciate life.
  – Brigham Young

• 82 Tracy2151
  · Sep 18, 2005 at 7:35 am

  I think it is very unfair to blame our UFT President for the fact-finding recommendations. She couldn’t have possibly known the outcome. Besides, what other choice did she have? The City refused to negotiate. Fact-finding is the next step. Doesn’t anyone think it just a little suspicious that the City wanted so badly to wait for the recommendations?
  After working for three years without a raise, I have adopted the following philosophy: I did not become a teacher for the money. Would I like a raise? Absolutely but not under the circumstances that the City would like to give me a raise. So, I’m resolved to go another four years without one and I sincerely hope my fellow UFT members will do the same. We cannot allow the Mayor and his flunky Chancellor break us. Collectively, we must vote down any contract that trades money for time. That is not a raise. When we voted on the last contract, all many of us saw were the dollar signs. We did not look at the big picture to realize that it wasn’t a raise after all. Furthermore, we cannot give in to the City’s insane demands of more time and extra days. NYC teachers don’t make a lot of money to begin with so why should we give up the one thing that makes teaching in this City worth it? Our summer vacation?
  Mayor Bloomberg likens himself to a latter-day Ronald Reagan. He honestly believes that his legacy is to break the teacher’s union the way Reagan broke the air-traffic controllers union.

• 83 Lucy2024
  · Sep 18, 2005 at 9:42 am

  WebMachiavelli is correct in stating that Bloomberg is a Democrat. He sides with Democrats on several issues. But I don’t really care at this point. People should vote on the issues not party affilation.

  Bloomberg has been awful for teachers and most middle class New Yorkers. I don’t know where Ferrer stands on Education issues.

  I don’t want to knock the UFT. I just want some leadership, direction, and guidance.

• 84 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 18, 2005 at 12:13 pm

  Freddy’s wife is a principal. In the last round of bargaining he had proposed a 30 per cent raise for teachers.

• 85 xkaydet65
  · Sep 18, 2005 at 12:18 pm

  And here I thought were were coming to a feeling of mutual acceptance, if not respect, and you drop your ad hominem last line. I don’t think I ever said or intimated that the poor are poor and it’s their fault. There is a cycle of poverty and that is accepted by right and left. The solutions to breaking it are different. There is no cycle of crime in families. It’s a choice, and Giuliani especially went after those with whom his father had been involved with. I don’t think you would use the fact that Joe torre’s father was a violent abuser of his wife and family to attack Torre should he do something to upset you, say endorsing Bloomie.

  BTW I am quite aware of the CoSH. In 1981 one of my girls at St. Frances De Chantal in the Bronx won a scholarship, and this year the daughter of one of my co workers did as well. And I’ll still take the education at Kellenberg. Spiritual substance over material quality.

• 86 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 18, 2005 at 12:21 pm

  I really like Lucy 2004;s comments. Ok Bloomberg doesn’t support Roberts for the Supreme Court for example. So What!!! He has been terrible for teachers and his regressive tax policies, such as doubling parking tickets, the rules of which can change frequently suck for all who make under $100,000

• 87 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 18, 2005 at 12:43 pm

  For those who are attacking Abe Beame’s record, remember what he did to teachers was during a terrible fiscal crisis considered second only to the Great Depression by many historians. The current situation is quite different. We are told that the economy is performing very well. Those few of us left in Variable A, have seen more than a twelve per cent return on our money in the last year. Housing prices are exploding (When Abe Beame was mayor a teacher could have moved into a doorman Manhattan building with little difficulty) Gasoline, toll prices and other costs of transportation are exploding. Increasingly, our teachers commute from greater and greater distances because they just can’t afford present day New York City. They will be deeply impacted by the costs of transportation from now until a subsequent contract is settled. It is with Jeans selling in SoHo for hundreds of dollars a pair dinners at Per Se at hundreds of dollars a plate, a night at the Waldorf Astoria costing s small fortune that the while billionaire Jewish mayor can’t find money for a raise of less than four per cent for teahers of largely poor Black and Hispanic children. The state’s highest court has already noted that this type of approach to funding is in violation of the State Consititution. Teachers who accept the routine underfunding of urban schools might be well served to READ that document.

• 88 fromthemainland
  · Sep 18, 2005 at 4:36 pm

  Listen, the issue is not what happened in the past – it’s what’s happening now. Has anybody read what the other unions in this town accepted – either through negotiations or arbitration? The fact finders’ report, best of all, protects new teachers from lower salaries.
  These are strange times for sure – when people brag here that Bloomberg is really a Democrat and good for NYC. If a city worker wrote that, I’d find it hard to believe! Bloomberg is a rich man – good only for himself and his socio-economic class – running for re-election on the backs of city workers, bragging about how scores went up and crime is down, etc. So then, if we all did so well for the city, how come he screwed the cops in arbitration and tried the same with us in fact finding? The city’s bargaining demands have been for wage increases lower than the cost of living in spite of a huge budget surplus. It’s easy to espouse that viewpoint when you live in an east side townhouse and you don’t scrape together your dollars each month to pay rent and raise a family!
  Given what he’s done to the rest of the city’s unions, the fact finders’ report serves us very well – that is, if the arrogant, self-serving “@#$^%!” would even come to the bargaining table.
  Maybe we have to give Bloomberg a taste of our arrogance – at the ballot box! And losing Klein in the bargain would be a bonus!

• 89 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 18, 2005 at 4:48 pm

  This business that Bloomberg is some sort of a Democrat because he supports things like abortion and gay rights is just inane at best. The fact of the matter is you can’t be mayor of this city if you don’t support those things, so he is really giving you ice in the winter. I do understand and respect our conservative members who are adverse to those things, yes. but the reality any New York mayor HAS to be accepting there, he really isn’t giving anything there.

  Furthermore, they are really fringe issues if heated ones. Most of us aren’t interested in having abortions anymore than we have desire to live in gay relationship. We do need a contract with an appreciable raise and no givebacks

• 90 firefly
  · Sep 19, 2005 at 8:10 pm

  shouldhavegoneforthemeds,

  Excuse me…are you saying that a woman’s right to choose to have an abortion and that gay rights are “fringe issues” just because you aren’t interested in either having an abortion or a gay relationship? Both of those issues are human rights issues by the way.

  You sound like a heterosexual man who really could care less about issues of democracy, freedom and justice for all, etc. I suppose civil rights are a “fringe issue” as well? Geez….I hope you’re not a history teacher…you’re scarry. Dangerous, in fact.

  I think I’m dropping this board….a real disappointment.

• 91 wattyler
  · Sep 19, 2005 at 8:40 pm

  Someone on this blog said it’s hard to know what else RW could have done, and that she couldn’t have known what the factfinders would come up with.

  I’ll tell you one thing she could have done and should have done– she could have prepared us for real action, outside on the streets, pickets, serious concerted and wildcat actions, SOMETHING to have the mayor think he has a union to be reckoned with, instead of a club.

  Some time ago RW said that they (mayor et al) are the ones with the power, implying that we don’t have power. Any union head who thinks that might as well just resign–in fact they ought to resign. Are you going to win a contract by playing nicey-nice with Bloomberg? Ha. And who the hell invited that unionbuster to the Labor Day Parade?

  When our contract expired two and a half years ago THAT was the time to start actions. Instead, we are looking at zero percent for the first year after it expired. What happened to prices and the cost of living during that year? Was inflation (REAL inflation) zero percent?

  For high school teachers that ten minutes is undoubtedly going to be a sixth teaching period!!!! Let’s not kid ourselves. And in the next contract the city, further emboldened by our weakness, will no doubt ask for ANOTHER ten minutes, and this time perhaps we’ll have to have 25 students or even 34!

  We have to say NO to this report as the basis of a contract. It’s full of give-backs of things that the union worked hard to win. With the breaking up of schools into mini-schools, the charter schools, the non-union contract schools, our union is in great danger right now. Losing the right to grieve a letter in your file?!! They want to bleed more and more out of every person who works and doesn’t live off investments and other people’s labor, like Bloomberg. We have to show some unified backbone here. We have tremendous power if we work together, but we need a union leader who will organize us, not for pajama parties and Madison Square Garden events where the public doesn’t see us or hear us, but OUT ON THE STREETS, even taking further action too.

• 92 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 19, 2005 at 9:53 pm

  And here I thought you were very intelligent and well read. How can you say there is no cycle of crime in families? Any research I have ever read indicates when a parent is incarcerated it is not only very traumatic for the defenseless child but it very tragically , is far more likely for that child himself to end up in the criminal justice system one day. The fruit just doesn’t fall very far from the tree.

  Imagine what it was like for our erstwhile mayor sitting in Cathollc school with uniforms and confining desks, formidable icons, , the monks and nuns decked in full medieval regallia, unsettling if not just terrifying talk of sin and hell, flames, et al. thinking he must be the only child in the class who had a father in prison, so ashamed, so embarrassed(For that matter how many of your daughter’s classmates at Kellenberg had a father in prison?)

  He must have felt so bad, when he grew up……. when he grew up…… when he……. grew up, why he would go around arresting everyone! That’s it, arrest everyone,for every little thing!!!! The problem is the former mayor, the son of a convicted felon, and his police commissioner, the son of a prostitute,( as I say, the fruit doesn’t fall very far from the tree) made so many arrests that the court found ultimately illegal (you know that occasionally inconvenient document The Constitution, never actually one of Rudy’s favorite things) that the city has had to shell out more millions and millions as a result of this unlawful conduct (That is unlawful conduct as adjudicated by the courts not me) than for any other mayoralty. Indeed these millions would be enough to cover a significant part of the money that just isn’t there now, per Mr. Bloomberg for the teachers’ raise. (Mr. Bloomberg to his credit, seeing the backlog of lawsuits against the city by dint of the unlawful conduct of his predeccesor, has settled many of them relatively swiftly over his four year.)

  Of course, one of the most unlawful things that happened in the Rudy years was something he wasn’t directly caught doing. But the rigging of the DC37 vote by the eventually imprisoned leadership with two years of zeroes, exactly what Rudy wanted, than foisted and hoisted on teachers and police are no small part of the reason the city and burbs have the dramatic pay gap they do today and some of the mess we are in.

  As for your Joe Torree comment they strengthen,not weaken, my position. My understanding of Mr. Torre’s actions anyway is that he is going public because he feels domestic violence and abuse runs in cycles in families. Again, the fruit doesn’t fall very far from the tree. He wants to out it. This too is why his siblings particularly his sister, an Ursuline nun at first objecting have diffidently gone along, in the hopes of ending this cycle in other families. Again, the fruit doesn’t fall very far from the tree.

  I am glad to hear you knew of two young ladies who got scholarships to COSH. I know some RSCJ’s who work very hard to assure some poorer kids get to attend the schools. Incidentally I once watched Gwen Verdon be interviewed by a Jesuit, joking about the line from the Broadway musical, “Chicago”, “she was granted one more start, the Convent of the Sacred Heart!!1

  PS You might want to revisit the plays of one of New York City’s most famous students ever- Arthur Miller. His themes are often the sins of the father impacting chidren, i.e., “All My Sons”, “The Price” Again, the fruit doesn’t fall very far from the tree. It’s not my original idea by far.

• 93 xkaydet65
  · Sep 20, 2005 at 3:44 pm

  It’s still the child’s choice. You and I both know many more kids who chose not to follow a path to incarceration than those who did. If I were to accept Miller than I’d accept Sophocles that Fate is the deciding factor.

  Ilegal arrests and lawsuits damages have been part of NYC life for many many years.The amount of bucks paid out in damages while large pales when compared to the amount of investment resulting from the steep decrease in crime brought about by Bratton and Jack Maple .
  Regarding my daughter’s classmates, this is an open forum so I cannot tell publicly answer your query without revealing far too much of another person’s life, but I can tell you that at various times when I taught Catholic school in Ridgewood I had two brothers whose dad was on the FBI top ten wanted. A brother and sister whose dad was knifed in prison, not to mention the seven or eight kids whose fathers had been in the Waffen SS and Wehrmacht. None of them, as far as I know, and I do try to keep up,are on the road to perdition even though quite a few of my Ridgewood kids have succumbed both spiritually and, I’m afraid mortally to the darker sides. In their cases prediction by parent would be a losing bet.

  But in a serious moment. If you folks are desirous of doing something in this teacher crisis it would be a good bet to 1) accept the fact finders and 2) work really hard to elect Ferrer. Rejecting the fact findings places Freddy in the position of being the pawn of the union. Few folks will know the contract comes up in six months so Freddy will be under less appearance of pressure if we accept. And if you want to go after Bloomberg will one of you make some inquiry into his dealings with ratner, Woody Johnson, the New Your Times and every other land swindle the guy has been involved in. It hurts my good conservative heart to see a statist guy like Bloomie kick decent hard working folks out of their homes to pay off his rich elitist friends. Now with Kelo he doesn’t even have to wait, he can bulldoze immediately. You want to raise people’s consciousness get out there with the story of Bloomie’s land deals and paint freddy as a real populist friend of small business, small landlords and ordinary folks. Take Bloomies clothes off.

• 94 shouldhavegonetomeds
  · Sep 20, 2005 at 9:35 pm

  COMMON GROUND!!!!!

  Bloomberg is just awful. Yes, I know about the real estate deals he concocts. As I say the city just becomes less and less affordable all the time for everyone under 200K. I earn in low six figures even sans the new contract. I do not smoke, drink, use drugs or take any expensive medicines or treatments. I don’t own a car and I do have a rent stabilized apartment which I share. Frankly, I can scarcely afford present day Manhattan.

  Last week I saw “Pillowman” at the Saturday matinee, a lone orchestra seat purchased at the last minute cost me $91. Trust me there were very few New York natives in the audience, just tourists. (A corporate lawyer sold me his extra ticket; he was a New Yorker. Little chance of finding a teacher in the audience. I wouldn’t mind having a share of Microsoft for every teacher in our system who wasn’t even aware of the play)

  I think your ideas for potentially unseating Bloomberg are reasonable. Personally I think coming back in the last week of Auguat casts a very different pale on things. That was always a very slow week in the city. A nice week for the beaches to then conclude with the Labor Day Holiday. If you have to go back earlier that will really ruin the whole last week I think and even make the Labor Day weekend a bit less nice.

  Of course, when people do not like Bloomberg I always love to point out he is the hand picked successor of the last mayor. Furthermore, while we all make our own realities, objective reality does exist. Objectively speaking the lawsuits resulting from the last mayoralty and the lawsuits where the mayor was named personally in the last mayoralty exceeded all others in NYC history.

  I am always tickled when those who work in education or health care, describe themselves as ”conservative” Everything we have, is based on union contracts, government spending and law, items which flourish much better under the Democrats as bad as they may be.

  Last year the State Legislature passed a bill that would add penalties when the city just won’t negotitate a contract moneth after month after month. If we can’t strike OK but what are the sanctions for the city’s foot dragging indefinitely? Will the Repubican governor sign this bill which really doesnt’ have to cost anything? I doubt it!! (I thought our endorsement of him dumb) Bastard Bloomberg is of course lobbying against the bill.

  A teacher’s pension is very decent and far more than most people have yes but it really is best served as a main course with a nice side dish of Social Security. Just the pension by itself, especially for those who live extended periods of time in retirement, would be far less tasty.

  I would like to work very hard to help Freddy. But of course Bloomberg knows that nowadays very few teachers can afford to live in New York, so he has less to worry about.

  Give me the old nitty gritty New York of O Henry’s stories any day. Incidentally, The Village Voice and other similar periodicals that warm the cockles of my heart, have called attention to Bloomberg’s shameless land deals.

  You must respect that those of us who actually live here may well have a different perspective than people who just work here and/or visit for theater, dinner, etc.
  Thanks!!