I’ve found out, since returning in Sept that senior teachers, great teachers, the kind you’d want your kids to have, were given Us for failing to be “standard setting”. I just got a counseling memo that my word wall was not interactive and that my agenda did not contain a closing.

No attention was given to the fact that the kids were actually working and lerning something. But I’ll look at Art 24 and see if it’s woth filing a grievance. Thanx!!

Upon arrival I discovered that America’s Choice removes choice from the teacher. I post my aim, my mini lesson, my task, and my share out, oops that was changed Tuesday to closing. Heaven help me if I deviate. I teach Soc St, but the ELA teachers have their AC binders with the script, the questions, and which way they should turn when the ask a Q, and what tone of voice they should use. Student assessment is uniform. We all must have out TANs, unless it’s special ed, then it’s our SEANs. Teachable moments no longer exist, and we should all be on the same page. Independent decision makers? Hell we’re no longer even the lowest of professionals.

We tell our kids to look at the bigger picture. It’s time for us as labor to the same. If we believe that the assault on unions including the CSA stops there, we indeed are drinking the kool-aid. Neutralizing the CSA is just the first concerted step in dismantling labor as a whole.

Once Bloomberg and company are finished with the CSA, you can rest assured that we are next. The Feds have redefined what constitutes a supervisory position to include any position where independent decision making is performed. That’s us, folks. The UFT is already weakened as a body with many of our senior colleagues having left and so many newbies entering without the institutional memory needed in the struggle.

I, for one, am not at “peace” because management has selected another opponent du jour.

Maybe a few principals will succeed by actually working WITH the teaching staff and modeling the paradigm of a successful school

The health benefit issue is a non-starter. Such benefits are negotiated separately and have been for years. I fully expect to be sold out further but it wouldn’t impact my decision to vote for or against THIS separate deal.

And why all the handwringing. The nonbinding arbitration deal was confirmation that pattern bargaining will be used as a weapon against us until such times as it doesn’t suit the needs of the politicians. That means our efforts need to be focused on changing the politicians, moreso than on negotiating since these days DC37 now negotiates our contracts and we simply tweak their leftovers. You can’t find that without resorting to your ultimate weapon, your services themselves. Since these deal’s not horrible, why waste time mustering support that won’t be there.

All I can hope for is that Randi and company ASK US whether WE support Mayoral control of the NYCDOE and whether WE support politicians in favor or against that philosophy. I hope she didn’t promise something we have a philosophical argument with to further her own career.

How does this new contract affect the CSA? They’ve been without a contract for 3 and a half years. Are we helping to dismantle that union?

• 7.1% salary raise for every member next school year
– 2% effective Oct. 13, 2007
– 5% effective May 19, 2008
– applies to all rates and longevities

• Up front cash payment for every member
–$750 one-time lump sum payment (pensionable)
–payable Jan. 1, 2007

This is what I know so far. The complete salary charts for all titles and levels will be published in the next NYTeacher

I am also speaking for the teachers in my school who were surprised that this contract did not return basic rights. But we are all interested in knowing the final salary increase.

You must have some idea of the numbers being discussed? Why the secrecy?