Dear Colleague,
The California budget is now public and there’s lots of
money in it for education. The $171 billion budget includes $88.3 billion for
all K-12 education programs, a 4 percent increase from last year. Per pupil
spending has increased to $10,643, which is $3,600 more than in 2011-12. To
read more, go here - http://laschoolreport.com/8-things-to-know-about-education-funding-in-the-new-california-state-budget/
AB 934 is dead. The tenure and seniority bill would have placed
poorly performing teachers in a program that offers professional support. If a
teacher received a second low performance review after a year in the program,
they could be fired via an expedited process regardless of their experience
level. Also, permanence would not always be granted after two years, and
seniority would no longer be the single overriding factor in handing out pink
slips. Teachers with two or more bad reviews would lose their jobs before newer
teachers who have not received poor evaluations. But CTA did not approve and went
into action, eviscerating the bill. Ultimately it was killed off in the state’s
Senate Education Committee. For more, go to http://laschoolreport.com/teacher-tenure-bill-defeated-in-committee/
The Supreme Court has decided not to rehear the Friedrichs case, which was deadlocked
4-4 due to the untimely death of Antonin Scalia in February. Had Scalia lived,
he would undoubtedly been the deciding vote in favor of the plaintiffs. Needless
to say, Terry Pell, president of the Center for Individual Rights, the
non-profit public interest law firm representing the teachers, was disappointed:
“Today’s decision was not a decision on the merits of our case nor was it
accompanied by an opinion. We continue to believe that forcing individuals to
subsidize political speech with which they disagree violates the First Amendment.
We will look for opportunities to challenge compulsory union dues laws in other
cases and continue our efforts to stand up for the rights of teachers and
public sector workers across the country.” To read the entire CIR press
release, go here - https://www.cir-usa.org/2016/06/supreme-court-denies-friedrichs-petition-for-rehearing/
Former Florida
governor Jeb Bush wrote a very interesting piece for National Review in which he lays out his vision for the future of
education in the United States. He states bluntly that, “We must massively
disrupt our education system if we want to ensure our long-term national and
economic security.” Several of his proposals:
There are no more assigned schools. Parents of all income
levels are able to choose from a robust marketplace of options, including
traditional neighborhood schools, magnet schools, charter schools, private
schools, and virtual schools. Information on their performance is readily
available, and they are held accountable to parents and communities.
We have a system that rewards success, replicates it, and weeds out failing schools. It is a system based on the simple premise that all students can learn, and that it is up to us to figure out how. In this new school system, the current model of funding bureaucracies has been replaced by a new regime in which the money follows the child, guided by the decisions of parents.
In this new school system, the current model of funding bureaucracies has been replaced by a new regime in which the money follows the child, guided by the decisions of parents.
To read the rest of Bush’s provocative ideas, go to http://www.nationalreview.com/article/436478/jeb-bush-education-school-reform-future-disruption-technology
We have a system that rewards success, replicates it, and weeds out failing schools. It is a system based on the simple premise that all students can learn, and that it is up to us to figure out how. In this new school system, the current model of funding bureaucracies has been replaced by a new regime in which the money follows the child, guided by the decisions of parents.
In this new school system, the current model of funding bureaucracies has been replaced by a new regime in which the money follows the child, guided by the decisions of parents.
To read the rest of Bush’s provocative ideas, go to http://www.nationalreview.com/article/436478/jeb-bush-education-school-reform-future-disruption-technology
Though the
teacher union war against education reform-minded Wall Street hedge fund
managers is not new, AFT president Randi Weingarten is ramping up the attack.
The union leader has influence over more than $1 trillion in teacher
pension plans, many of which traditionally invest in hedge funds. In a recent Wall Street Journal article, she bluntly states, “Why would you put your money with someone who
wants to destroy you?” Weingarten’s #1 target is Daniel Loeb, founder of
the $16 billion Third Point fund. Loeb has been a financial supporter of the
successful Success Academy charter school franchise, run by Weingarten’s avowed
enemy, Eva Moskowitz. Weingarten has also accused Loeb of being involved with a
group that is “leading the attack on defined benefit pension funds.” To read
more about Weingarten’s war on hedge fund managers, go to http://www.wsj.com/articles/teachers-union-and-hedge-funds-war-over-pension-billions-1467125055
Weingarten is not
alone in her offensive. She has enlisted the support of the “Hedge Clippers,”
which claiming to be a “grassroots” group, is really nothing more than a union
owned-and -operated entity. Writing for
The 74, David Cantor reveals,
Few would guess from the ragtag, grassroots
feel of the protest that Hedge Clippers’ organizers have been funded with
millions of dollars from teachers unions — or that the group is led by a
teachers union lobbyist and based at the Broadway headquarters of that union,
New York City’s United Federation of Teachers.
All told, the UFT and its upstate colleagues,
New York State United Teachers, along with their national affiliate, directed
$5.5 million over the last five years to the groups that created and
collaborate most frequently on the Hedge Clippers project — led by $2.5 million
to Strong Economy for All, a coalition of labor and advocacy organizations.
To read Cantor’s exposé, go here - https://www.the74million.org/article/united-front-teachers-unions-quietly-spend-millions-on-grassroots-groups
On the subject of teachers unions, there have been some very
damning videos circulating, courtesy of investigative journalist James O’Keefe.
With four videos available online and several more to come, his Project Veritas
has delivered a devastating blow to several union honchos who obviously were
not aware that their misdeeds were being recorded. In one of the videos, a
union president and VP are seen trying to help a teacher who claimed to have physically
assaulted one of his students while uttering a racial epithet. Upon seeing the
video, a union official became defensive and accused O’Keefe of doctoring the footage.
But after watching the uncut version, the Inspector General of Yonkers, NY – the
locale of the misdeed – has recommended that the involved union officers be
terminated. To read more about this story, go to http://projectveritas.com/2016/07/11/yonkers-inspector-general-vindicates-project-veritas-video-and-recommends-termination-of-union-officials/ To learn more about Project Veritas and see
all their videos go here - http://projectveritas.com/2016/07/11/yonkers-inspector-general-vindicates-project-veritas-video-and-recommends-termination-of-union-officials/
How about a Yelp for schools? That’s the type of feedback Jacqueline
Elliott, cofounder of PUC Triumph Charter High School in LA’s San Fernando
Valley, solicits to improve instruction.
The focus
group-style exit interview Elliott's conducting has become part of the year-end
ritual at PUC (which stands for "Partnerships to Uplift
Communities"). Over five weeks, Elliott spoke with all of the roughly 260
seniors graduating from the charter network's high schools in the San Fernando
Valley, including Triumph. The network's other co-founder, Ref Rodriguez,
interviews the seniors at PUC's high schools in East Los Angeles.
Since 2010, the
first year Elliott says they began the practice, their questions to the seniors
have been simple: what about their school is working? What about it is not? The
co-founders then share the answers with campus administrators — and those
answers have even occasionally prompted changes to how PUC schools are run.
To learn more, go to http://www.scpr.org/news/2016/07/06/62064/like-yelp-but-for-school-how-a-charter-network-s-l/
Strive, a unique after-school
program located at 9124 S Main St, L.A., 90003, is seeking retired or currently
employed teachers who have a conservative approach for part time work teaching
students in grades 1 through 12. For information on all the open positions,
please call Don Anderson at 323-779-7501 or email him at don@strive-la.org To learn more about this terrific
organization, please visit their website – www.strive-la.org
If you are
interested in giving CTEN brochures to colleagues, you can print them right
from our home page - http://www.ctenhome.org/PDFdocs/CTEN -
Brochure.pdf Or, if you prefer, we will be happy to send
you as many preprinted ones as you need.
Also,
anyone wishing to donate to CTEN can do so very simply through check, money
order or PayPal - http://www.ctenhome.org/donate.html As a non-profit, we exist only through the generosity of
others. Thanks, as always.
Sincerely,
Larry Sand
CTEN President
Larry Sand
CTEN President