Randi Weingarten Arrested For Protesting Philadelphia School Closure Hearing (UPDATE)
Huff Post
03/07/2013
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, was arrested Thursday afternoon for blocking a school reform hearing in Philadelphia, an AFT spokesperson told The Huffington Post.
Weingarten reportedly stood outside the meeting of the Philadelphia School Reform Commission, in which the group was supposed to decide which Philadelphia Public Schools would close. Weingarten, whose AFT is the second-largest teachers' union in the country, made a surprise visit to fight school closures.
AFT spokesman Marcus Mrowka told The Huffington Post that Weingarten was arrested with 18 other community activists for blocking the entrance to the meeting. He added that Weingarten was in handcuffs.
The Philadelphia police department would not confirm the arrest, because the protest was ongoing. "I don't have any information at this point and probably won't until it's all dispersed," Lieutenant John Stanford said when reached by phone.
"There was a rally outside the building and they were probably blocking the entrance for about 20 minutes until police arrested them and escorted them away," Mrowka said. "She's in custody now."
Weingarten and teachers' unions throughout the country have protested school closure as a tool for reforming schools. Currently, the nation's largest cities are deciding which schools to close in a purported effort to save money and improve academic outcomes. But research shows that it's hard for school districts to recoup the closure savings they project, and a study from the University of Chicago's Urban Education Institute found that only 6 percent of students displaced by closed schools performed better in their new academic environments.
Activists have also protested school closures on civil rights grounds, saying that they disproportionately affect black and Hispanic families.v
"Kids have suffered cut after cut," Weingarten said at the protest, according to Mrowka's notes. "The powers that be don't care about opportunity for children."
"The people of Philadelphia have come up with a plan to improve schools and it has been ignored," Weingarten said, according to Mrowka.
Chicago, which also employs AFT teachers, is currently considering what would be the largest wave of school closures in its history. On Wednesday, the city's "Commission on School Utilization" issued its final report, which concluded that Chicago Public Schools could shutter about 80 schools. It found that "closing schools and moving students … are only justifiable if, as a result, students are moved into better educational environments," echoing the UEI research. The report also concluded that "CPS has a responsibility to ensure … the safety of students who are being moved."
UPDATE: At around 8:15 p.m., Weingarten tweeted that she had been released from custody, saying: "we must continue the fight for fixing&ensuring great public schools for all kids-in Philly &US."
UPDATE: 9:25 p.m. -- In an interview following her release, Weingarten said she knew blocking the meeting would get her arrested, but she saw it as a last resort. Along with a community group, Weingarten said she had vainly tried to get a meeting with the SRC and Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter.
"They refused to listen and would not even consent to a meeting with us," Weingarten said. (Nutter and the SRC could not be reached late Thursday.) Even during strike conditions in Chicago, Weingarten said she was able to converse with the other side.
Weingarten said she sees the school closure plan as siphoning money away from public schools, since the plan doesn't touch charter schools. "This was really a plan to eliminate public education," Weingarten said. "This is not about how to fix public schools, but to close them -- not how to stabilize but to destabilize public schooling."
Weingarten called the closings immoral. "When the powers that be ignore you and dismiss you, then you don't have any choice but try to resort to civil disobedience to try to confront an immoral act," she said.
So she joined parents and union activists to form a group of 19 people who blocked the entrance to the meeting. She said she intentionally told Philly teachers not to join, lest they lose their teaching certification, and discouraged parents who are undocumented immigrants from participating.
"The road to justice is long and the fight is not over tonight," Weingarten said. "Some schools were saved tonight, but at the end of the day, what I am told is that by all of us doing this together, reflecting on all the four corners of the community, people throughout the country are talking about it."
Showing posts with label . Weingarten (Randi Weingarten of New York schools). Show all posts
Showing posts with label . Weingarten (Randi Weingarten of New York schools). Show all posts
Tuesday, May 21, 2013
Monday, July 12, 2010
The “blame the teacher crowd” would rather “affix blame than fix schools
Randi's idea doesn't solve the problems created by individuals who can't handle their jobs. We need to put the right people in the right positions, not just pretend that we can fix any teacher. It's better to put a struggling teacher in a position with less responsibility, such as assistant to a master teacher.
The “blame the teacher crowd” would rather “affix blame than fix schools,” said AFT President Randi Weingarten as she outlined a sweeping plan to “build a system of public education as it ought to be,” at AFT’s biennial convention.
AFT Leader Outlines Vision to Build Better Public Education System
by James Parks, Jul 9, 2010
Saying America’s teachers would “lead and propose, not wait and oppose,” AFT President Randi Weingarten... spoke yesterday at AFT’s biennial convention in Seattle, which runs through Sunday. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka will address the convention tomorrow.
She told the more than 3,000 delegates that the “blame the teacher crowd” would rather “affix blame than fix schools.” These critics, she continued, “would have Americans believe that there is only one choice when it comes to public education: either you’re for students, or you’re for teachers,” which Weingarten called a “bogus choice.”
It’s simply wrong to suggest that there is an epidemic of bad teachers and at the same time to ignore poverty, budget cuts, the absence of curriculum, the huge attrition of good teachers—all things we know truly hamper student success.
No teacher—myself included—wants a bad teacher in any classroom. The AFT and our locals are taking real steps to solve the problem and to strengthen teaching...
The “blame the teacher crowd” would rather “affix blame than fix schools,” said AFT President Randi Weingarten as she outlined a sweeping plan to “build a system of public education as it ought to be,” at AFT’s biennial convention.
AFT Leader Outlines Vision to Build Better Public Education System
by James Parks, Jul 9, 2010
Saying America’s teachers would “lead and propose, not wait and oppose,” AFT President Randi Weingarten... spoke yesterday at AFT’s biennial convention in Seattle, which runs through Sunday. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka will address the convention tomorrow.
She told the more than 3,000 delegates that the “blame the teacher crowd” would rather “affix blame than fix schools.” These critics, she continued, “would have Americans believe that there is only one choice when it comes to public education: either you’re for students, or you’re for teachers,” which Weingarten called a “bogus choice.”
It’s simply wrong to suggest that there is an epidemic of bad teachers and at the same time to ignore poverty, budget cuts, the absence of curriculum, the huge attrition of good teachers—all things we know truly hamper student success.
No teacher—myself included—wants a bad teacher in any classroom. The AFT and our locals are taking real steps to solve the problem and to strengthen teaching...
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
New York's UFT president Randi Weingarten says unions and charter schools aren't mutually exclusive
CHARTER BOSS VS. UNION BOSS IS NO CONTEST
By YOAV GONEN Education Reporter
May 1, 2009
...An unusually conciliatory Randi Weingarten, head of the city's teacher union, took a flurry of jabs yesterday from Harlem charter-schools operator and former City Councilwoman Eva Moskowitz during a televised debate.
The powerful pair -- who for a decade have butted heads over charter schools, labor contracts and the fixes for the city's ailing public schools -- again showed the gulf between them, even as Weingarten appeared ready to extend an olive branch.
"You could call Mike Bloomberg tonight and you could say, 'Mike, I don't think tenure is working. Let's not have a system where teachers get lifetime job security irrespective of performance,' " Moskowitz told the labor leader on NY1.
"Let's not have a system where the standard -- and this bugs me so much about the contract -- the standard [for removing a teacher] is incompetence."
[Maura Larkins' note: Incompetence isn't even the standard. I've often wondered why my district never dismissed any of its incompetent teachers. I've concluded that the district feared that the targeted teacher would respond, "But look at these other teachers, they're clearly more incompetent than me." The district can't dismiss underperforming teachers because it doesn't know where to begin. As long as a teacher keeps quiet, the district seems to maintain a hands-off policy. The district only fires teachers for political reasons, in my experience.]
Weingarten deflected much of the criticism by contrasting states like Massachusetts -- which have strong unions and excellent schools -- with areas in the South that lack both unions and good schools.
"So it's not the unions and it's not a particular union contract" that's to blame, she said...
By YOAV GONEN Education Reporter
May 1, 2009
...An unusually conciliatory Randi Weingarten, head of the city's teacher union, took a flurry of jabs yesterday from Harlem charter-schools operator and former City Councilwoman Eva Moskowitz during a televised debate.
The powerful pair -- who for a decade have butted heads over charter schools, labor contracts and the fixes for the city's ailing public schools -- again showed the gulf between them, even as Weingarten appeared ready to extend an olive branch.
"You could call Mike Bloomberg tonight and you could say, 'Mike, I don't think tenure is working. Let's not have a system where teachers get lifetime job security irrespective of performance,' " Moskowitz told the labor leader on NY1.
"Let's not have a system where the standard -- and this bugs me so much about the contract -- the standard [for removing a teacher] is incompetence."
[Maura Larkins' note: Incompetence isn't even the standard. I've often wondered why my district never dismissed any of its incompetent teachers. I've concluded that the district feared that the targeted teacher would respond, "But look at these other teachers, they're clearly more incompetent than me." The district can't dismiss underperforming teachers because it doesn't know where to begin. As long as a teacher keeps quiet, the district seems to maintain a hands-off policy. The district only fires teachers for political reasons, in my experience.]
Weingarten deflected much of the criticism by contrasting states like Massachusetts -- which have strong unions and excellent schools -- with areas in the South that lack both unions and good schools.
"So it's not the unions and it's not a particular union contract" that's to blame, she said...
Sunday, August 19, 2007
Terrific idea: The teacher's union runs the school
UFT President Randi Weingarten (left)
with New York legislator Sheldon Silver
You can't have accountability unless you can figure out who is responsible. When administrators and teachers are pulling in different directions, either one of them can say, "If things had been done my way, we would have succeeded."
New York City schools have come up with a solution: let the teachers union run the school.
The UFT (The United Federation of Teachers)Elementary Charter School is located at 300 Wyona Street in East New York, Brooklyn. For the 2006-2007 school year, the school will enroll 225 students in Kindergarten through 2nd grade.
Why doesn't every teachers union run a charter school? Union leaders would gain new insight into problems in education. They would have to change some of their attitudes, such as belief in rigid political hierarchies, in order to succeed. To succeed, schools need merit-based decision making.
The Broad Education Foundation, founded by Eli Broad of Los Angeles, writes:
The Broad Foundation supports the start-up of the United Federation of Teachers' (UFT) first union-run charter schools in New York City. The UFT Elementary Charter School opened its doors in the fall of 2005 with 150 students in kindergarten and first grade. The school will grow one grade per year until it serves students from kindergarten through fifth grade. The UFT opened the UFT Secondary Charter School in Fall 2006, serving 226 students.. The secondary school will add a grade each year until it serves students from grades 6 through 12.
http://www.broadfoundation.org/investments/teachers.shtml
with New York legislator Sheldon Silver
You can't have accountability unless you can figure out who is responsible. When administrators and teachers are pulling in different directions, either one of them can say, "If things had been done my way, we would have succeeded."
New York City schools have come up with a solution: let the teachers union run the school.
The UFT (The United Federation of Teachers)Elementary Charter School is located at 300 Wyona Street in East New York, Brooklyn. For the 2006-2007 school year, the school will enroll 225 students in Kindergarten through 2nd grade.
Why doesn't every teachers union run a charter school? Union leaders would gain new insight into problems in education. They would have to change some of their attitudes, such as belief in rigid political hierarchies, in order to succeed. To succeed, schools need merit-based decision making.
The Broad Education Foundation, founded by Eli Broad of Los Angeles, writes:
The Broad Foundation supports the start-up of the United Federation of Teachers' (UFT) first union-run charter schools in New York City. The UFT Elementary Charter School opened its doors in the fall of 2005 with 150 students in kindergarten and first grade. The school will grow one grade per year until it serves students from kindergarten through fifth grade. The UFT opened the UFT Secondary Charter School in Fall 2006, serving 226 students.. The secondary school will add a grade each year until it serves students from grades 6 through 12.
http://www.broadfoundation.org/investments/teachers.shtml
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