It doesn't take that many protestors to make waves! On July 13th, the Caucus turned out a group to protest Arne Duncan's recent appearance in Philadelphia, and the press took notice.

"We are protesting the high-stakes testing that are a part of this 'Race to the Top' [grant] damaging our schools," said Academy at Palumbo nurse Eileen Duffey, who held a poster that read, "School nurse says 'no' to Arne Duncan's high-stakes test."

Check out the full story here.

Caucus members learned earlier that Secretary of Education Duncan will be visiting Philly tomorrow, and Philly teachers will be there to tell him what we think of his pro-testing, anti-public education policies. 

Working Educators is encouraging people to join us at the DoubleTree Hotel (Broad and Locust) to protest Duncan's policies from 12-1pm. However, if you are unable to make it, there will be Caucus members at CCP from 10-11am as well. 

Duncan will be making two stops, first at CCP from 10-11am, and then from 12-1pm at the DoubleTree Hotel at Broad and Locust. These visits were just announced publicly today via a City of Philadelphia press release. 

Duncan has been an avowed supporter of corporate education reform interests. At last week's national NEA Conference, the country's largest teacher union officially called for Duncan's resignation.

Bring signs, sign-making supplies, noisemakers, and most of all- your passion and vision for a robust and equitable public education system in Philadelphia. 

It is hard to imagine, but the PA House advanced a state budget in Harrisburg that is far worse for public schools than the budget Governor Corbett proposed earlier this year. Call Harrisburg this week to tell them this is unacceptable. 

Our friends at Education Voters of Pennsylvania are putting together a Statewide Call to Action on Friday, June 27th and Monday, June 30th. Please spread this info far and wide, and make sure to call your representatives.

As Ed Voters writes, "advocates must speak out loudly and with one voice in support of responsible funding for public schools this year. If we do not speak up now, public education will likely receive little more than scraps in the budget this year."

Please see the letter below for more info and full details on tomorrow and Monday's call-in days.

--

Friends and Allies,

On Friday, June 27th, and Monday, June 30th, Education Voters will be holding the next "Call to Action for Public Education" days!

It is hard to imagine, but the PA House advanced a state budget in Harrisburg that is far worse for public schools than the budget Governor Corbett proposed earlier this year.

The PA House is calling to eliminate the $241 million increase in state funding for proposed Ready to Learn Block grants and replace this with a paltry $70 million increase in Basic Education Funding. Under the House budget, PA school districts would lose about 70% of the increases in state funding they were expecting to receive this year and that they were relying on to balance their budgets.

The House budget is irresponsible and unacceptable.  It does not call for a shale tax or a cigarette tax.  Instead, it relies on the sale of state liquor stores (which the Senate has so far not supported), gimmicky sources of one-time funding, and the suspension of selected tax credits to balance the budget.

Budget negotiations are just beginning. While the budget is still fluid and negotiations are taking place, advocates must speak out loudly and with one voice in support of responsible funding for public schools this year. If we do not speak up now, public education will likely receive little more than scraps in the budget this year.

As with previous Call to Action for Education days, we are asking for broad participation from all organizations and individuals across the Commonwealth.  It is incredibly important the legislators in Harrisburg see that people are paying attention.  Communities are using these call-in-days to help spread the word about what is happening to our schools, so please join us again! 

I have attached materials that you can share as-is or customize, including how to make a good call and key points about the how legislators can improve the proposed budget, so people are prepared to call in. If there is anything we can do to support your efforts, please let us know.

You can always check our website where we have information and materials.

WHEN:  Friday, June 27 AND Monday, June 30, 2014

WHAT:  Call to Action for Public Education – It’s time for a fair budget for PA’s students!

HOW TO PARTICIPATE:  Mark your calendar and plan to ask your own network to take action

Suggested communication schedule

- Put the date on your calendar today

- Send a “Get Ready” email on Thursday, June 26 or Friday, June 27 with action materials

- Send a Take Action email on Monday morning and promote the day on social media. Twitter:  #educationpa and #pabudget

Thank you for your support of our public schools. Please contact me if I can help you with this in any way or if you have questions.

Susan Spicka

Sample “Get Ready” email

On Monday, June 30, the Caucus of Working Educators, in collaboration with Education Voters PA, will be participating in a statewide call in day, to call Harrisburg.

Join thousands of parents, students, teachers and community members from across the state to SPEAK UP in support of our public schools on Monday, June 30^th.  

Under the proposed House budget, PA school districts would lose about 70% of the increases in state funding they were expecting to receive this year and that they were relying on to balance their budgets.

Budget negotiations are just beginning. While the budget is still fluid and negotiations are taking place, advocates must speak out loudly and with one voice in support of responsible funding for public schools this year. If we do not speak up now, public education will likely receive little more than scraps in the budget this year. We know that just 10 calls in one day to one legislator can make a difference in what a legislator pays attention to. 

Mark your calendar today for Monday, June 30th – and do 3 things in 10 minutes to make a difference! Click here for your legislators' phone numbers. Click here for tips on how to make a good phone call.

1.      Call your State Senator.

2.      Call your State Representative.

3.      Call Gov. Corbett's office at (717) 787-2500.  

Ask them to:

• Support the adoption of a shale tax, cigarette tax and any reasonable measure to raise revenue and close tax loopholes.
• Support an increase in the Basic Education Funding line that is equal to what was in the proposed Ready to Learn Block Grant.
• Support and advocate for state funding for charter school reimbursement to be restored.
• Support SB 1316/HB2138, the special education funding and accountability reform bill.  (Additional information about this bill can be found atwww.educationvoterspa.org)  

 Want to double your impact?  Ask a friend to make a call that day too!  

Please take 5-10 minutes on Monday, June 30^th  to help ensure a bright future for Pennsylvania! 

Visit us on the web at EducationVotersPA.org where you can Sign Up for Updates

Follow us on Twitter at @EdVotersPA and #educationPA

You may have seen the City Paper report about FSAS' breakfast protest. Below is a description of how that protest went from idea to reality, courtesy of Caucus Member and FSAS Building Rep Amy Roat.

Why We Protested

In September, my principal and the Food Service manager asked the staff at our school to serve breakfast to the students in Advisory.  We had no staff to keep them safe before school, and there was a promise that we would get another Food Service employee if our breakfast attendance increased. It was a lot of hard work on the part of Advisors, and there were unintended consequences – a serious mouse and cockroach infestation.

Not only were we denied another employee after increasing our breakfast attendance 77%, but rumors abound that there will be a cut in staff in the cafeteria for next year.

How we Planned the Protest

Most importantly, teachers should develop relationships across the school – food service, school police, custodial staff and safety staff.  Spend some time chatting -- it is not difficult to find common ground.  We were all experiencing the ill-effects cutbacks of supplies and staff.  We all feel disrespected and know that 440 is totally disconnected from our reality.

When I heard that we had won a $3000 prize for improving our breakfast attendance, I congratulated our Food Service Manager and found out the rest of the story. For some reason, the district was not allowing us to keep the money, and people from 440 were showing up for a photo op. That got everyone talking at lunch time. 

By the next day we had a plan.  I emailed a description of what was going on and described our protest plans. More importantly, teachers at every lunch period talked it up and reminded each other to wear red. The combination of an email and face to face communication is most effective. It is common for me to receive texts during the day that say ”did you know…”  We are in the habit of communicating and taking action.

The day before the protest, two of us approached the food staff and told them how much we cared for and respected them.  We were upset about the situation and were planning a protest, but we would not tell them the details to protect them.  We contacted a reporter and offered him an exclusive if he guaranteed a story. 

The day of the protest, we gathered behind closed doors and discussed exactly what we would do. Then we walked in together. A teacher took the pictures and emailed them to the reporter.

A solid protest requires trust, knowledge, discussion, agreement, publicity and action. This one took about three days to plan.

 Looking for ways to bring inspiring projects to your school? Check out this write up from caucus member Tom Hladczuk of Stephen Girard Elementary about a project that involved both art and civic engagement.

The project started When I met Sarah Kodish-Eskind and Jackie Quinn, two artists who run the Art Cart, a mobile art display and selling space that they use to display and sell the work of local artists. I asked if they would like to work with a school and expand the community concept to working with children and getting their community more engaged with the school.  They had been thinking along similar lines, so we set about planning it.

In cooperation with Girard teacher Kristy Katz, we applied to Public Citizens United for Children and Youth for a PICASSO arts project grant to fund our idea. We wanted to expand our students' experiences at the school and show the community what they were capable of. The two artists who started Art Cart had this vision as well, independently, and had been doing it to empower local artists.  Kristy had the experience of working with the grant before, and doing an engaging art project through PCCY funding.  PArt of PCCY's mandate is to do advocacy as well.  So we planned it together.

We had never done this kind of project at my school before, and it was fantastic! The grant made art classes possible for the students. They designed their own personal symbol and used it to make their own pencil cases and posters. They told their story by working together to create, design, write, edit, problem-solve and sew.

With the budget crisis looming at our school, we decided to make the project a political one as well. We sent letters stamped with the designs you saw to the local elected officials, and we went on visits to City Council Offices with a parent and student in tow.

The purpose the project was use art as a way to engage the community, give children a voice, and show what public schools can accomplish what they do best when not held back and forced to do rote learning and test prep for standardized tests of low-level skills.

If you are inspired by this project, you can support our students by buying a pencil case! They will be sold at Ultimo Coffee on Saturday, June 14th, at 15th and Mifflin Streets, from 10:00 AM-3:00 PM and on Saturday, June 21st, on Rittenhouse Square.

Caucus member Luigi Borda is many things. He is a parent, social studies teacher, and PFT building representative at Masterman Elementary. He is an avid runner who has been very involved in local politics as a tireless advocate for our city's children. Luigi has combined these two interests to help make some very powerful statements for the need for full and fair funding for Philadelphia's students. 

From the outside, the vote on whether to turn Luis Muñoz-Marín public school over to a charter operator seemed like a done deal. But when the call went out to Working Educators for spanish-speakers who could help call parents and gauge their support, I quickly learned that the opposite was true. Spending Wednesday evenings in the basement of the PFT offices, calling family after family, WE volunteers quickly saw that parents powerfully supported keeping the school public.

“Buenas tardes, me llamo Max y soy un profesor con el distrito escolar de filadelfia. Estoy con la coalición para mantenerse pública la escuela Muñoz-Marín, y queremos saber si podemos contar con su apoyo?” Can we count on your support? 

“Claro” was the most frequent comment I heard. Of course.

We spoke to block captains who had been mobilizing their neighbors, mothers who did not want to see their favorite teachers gone. “My daughter is in special ed”, one parent mentioned to me. “I don’t know what will happen to her under ASPIRA. All special ed parents should be concerned”.

Longtime Muñoz-Marín volunteer and retired teacher Vivian Rodriguez wrote for the WE blog about the community’s fight to keep their school public: confusion over the vote being pushed back, alienation of teachers who had to choose whether to stay at a school that might not exist next year, frustrating accusations about school leaders.

Despite the challenges, last Thursday the parents at Muñoz-Marín voted overwhelmingly to keep the school public.

If parents hadn’t courageously come out for their beliefs, would the community’s support for their public schools have been lost in history? Could this story have looked like the other charter takeovers we hear about every day, in which community opinion garners only a short quote at the end of an article filled with the voices of politicians and (so-called) education experts?

My experience volunteering as a WE member with the campaigns for Muñoz-Marín and Steel Elementary demonstrated the powerful voices of parents, communities, and school leaders in the battle for public education. These are the voices that have been marginalized and ignored in the corporate reform movement, but are increasingly gaining power in cities like Newark, Chicago, and now Philadelphia.

When families and communities are asked, they decisively want adequate funding for our public schools, not to turn them over to private companies.

We know that parents and communities are not usually asked for their opinions, though. From the outside, corporate reform will continue to look like a done deal, such as in the ongoing school ‘transformations’ at Blaine and Kelley. These schools make it clear that our work is just beginning.

However, the victories at Muñoz-Marín and Steel this month show that we can make sure our voices are heard, regardless of whether they are asked for. When a diverse coalition of parents, teachers, and community leaders come together despite the alienation and frustration, we can show that corporate school reform is far from a done deal.

Join WE this Friday, June 13th, to celebrate this year’s victories together -and plan for new ones!- at our End of Year Happy Hour at Frankford Hall.

WE volunteers call Muñoz-Marín families ahead of the big vote.

By Vivian Rodriguez

What is it like to fight a charter takeover? Below is the story of life inside the school for the past two months, from a longtime volunteer.

The News

On April 1^st, our school was hit with a sledgehammer: The district proposal to turn Luis Munoz Marin into a Renaissance Charter, operated by ASPIRA of PA.

Most emphasis has been placed to our community of parents, and understandably so, because their children are the ones who stand to lose the most. But little has been mentioned about how the proposal is affecting our staff.

The timing of the vote is not a coincidence. Site Selection started in the middle of April and ended on May 30^th. Because of the possibility that Munoz Marin would not be a public school next year, teachers were considered forced transfers and were expected to select a new school.

The staff was heartbroken! Theoretically, they needed to go through with the process of applying for a new school, but by doing so, it felt like they were giving up on Marin. Like the PFT said, this is the kind of turmoil that the District was trying to create.

From day one, we knew that this would be an uphill battle against ASPIRA and the District Charter School Office. After a few days of emergency meetings, we began to put together our own Parent Proposal for the next school year.

The First Presentation

On April 15^th, Dr. Hite came to kick off the meeting. His presentation was remarkably simple without visuals. Our parents were not convinced. They asked questions and made comments in favor of keeping Munoz Marin a SDP public school.

Deputy Superintendent Paul Kihn went next, and presented a PowerPoint with all sort of graphs showing why Marin was selected for this potential turnover. A highly subjective and out of context presentation, of course. I would have rather seen a graph with all the schools that were considered before the selection took place and a photograph of Mr. Calderon selecting Munoz Marin out of that group of schools.

Our presentation was next, and it went well. The whole School Leadership Team presented and a well-written plan mostly based on our actual school improvement plan for the year 2014-15.

Next came ASPIRA.

ASPIRA Executive Director Alfredo Calderon came into the Auditorium with his entourage and security guards that look like bouncers. ASPIRA presentation with 10+ graphs and tables showing their “improvements” and our “failures.”

The SDP Charter School Office was supposed to check all these graphs and verify their accuracy before allowing ASPIRA to present their manipulated data to our parents. But that did not happen. ASPIRA’s plan for Marin was essentially to paint the school, buy new furniture, put more cameras, etc. Their plan did not include specifics about how they were planning to improve our PSSA scores.

Throughout the meeting, the parents in the audience were highly critical of ASPIRA and their attempted takeover. Had the vote happened that day, I know how it would have gone.

So why did the vote get moved?

The Delay

On April 22^nd, Mr. Calderon, from ASPIRA, was interviewed by Univision. The interview was in Spanish.

In that interview, Calderon said was that he was already working on a delay of our voting day. That was six days before our administration and SAC Team were informed of the switch.

On April 28^th, the day of our 2^nd Parents Meeting and 3 days before the vote, our principal received a call from Mr. Peng Chao, our contact person from the Charter School Office. She was informed that the voting day was changed and that Councilwoman Maria Quinones-Sanchez was coming to address the reason for the change.

Our school did not welcome the councilwoman. Most of our parents didn’t even know who she was. Her recommendation was to delay the vote because parents had called her telling her that the process was rushed, and parents needed more time.

She was attacked left and right.

How many parents called? How can you verify that these were LMM parents? How are you related to ASPIRA?

Quinones-Sanchez answered: even if I one parent called I would have listened. I am a proud “ASPIRAnte”. Both Mr. Kihn and Mr. Chao were present, but didn’t explain the reason for the change. At one point, she denied that this was all political, but she did admit that she was once the director of ASPIRA.

At the very end of her speech, Councilwoman Quinones-Sanchez stated that she was sure that Luis Munoz Marin’s parents would see that ASPIRA was a better choice, and openly endorsed ASPIRA in front of all of us.

Our teachers fell apart. They had to accept their positions in the new schools by May 30^th, without knowing the fate of Marin.

The Waiting Period

Parents received some kind of communication directly from the CSO about the change of date from May 1^st to June 5^th. In order to give more information to our parents about the proposals, there was an understanding that a series of meetings were going to happen.

Such official meetings never occurred. Instead, ASPIRA’s staff was outside our doors during admission and dismissal time. The distributed flyers with attacking Marin advertising three meetings at the local recreational center. They sent a bus almost every day to take parents to visit ASPIRA’s schools including their own schools, Pantojas and Hostos.

When our administration called the CSO to complain about ASPIRA’s aggressive tactics, We were told that ASPIRA had the right to be there, and that they would look into the flyers.

It took weeks of harassment and an extremely serious attack on Marin’s Staff on their last flyer to make them stop. That flyer insinuated that Marin’s principal and staff were going to be arrested because they cheated on the PSSA. They were desperate!  

Right Before the Vote

So what was ASPIRA’s next move?

One week before the vote, Mr. Chao attended a School Advisory Committee (SAC) meeting and somehow arranged a meeting with the SAC and Mr. Calderon. The meeting was supposed to take place on Monday, June 2^nd at the Luis Munoz Marin School.

When the SAC Team president and some of the members realized that this was not a mandated meeting, they cancelled the meeting via voicemail and email. The CSO insisted in having the meeting for any parent interested in speaking to ASPIRA, but no parent showed up.

At this point, Mr. Calderon has filed a grievance, which you can read about here if you like. The truth is that Mr. Chao shouldn’t have attended a SAC meeting to arrange such communications between ASPIRA and our SAC. The SAC shouldn’t meet with Calderon. They were mandated to visit ASPIRA’s schools and attend one of the two Parent’s Presentations, and they did. If any of the members, as parents of LMM, felt that they wanted to speak to Mr. Calderon in person, they could have attended any of the three extra meetings held in the area (although almost none of them did).

The vote is set for Thursday June 4th. The staff awaits the results, hoping that their school will be saved and that they will be able to stay at Luis Munoz Marin.

Vivian Rodriguez is a retired special education teacher with 30 years experience in the School District of Philadelphia and the city’s Latino Community. She has spent the last 5 years as a volunteer at Luis Munoz Marin Elementary.

We the members of the Caucus of Working Educators (WE) of the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers, decry the unjust treatment of our colleagues at the Blaine and W.D. Kelley Elementary Schools. We protest the use of a non-existent “Transformation Model” to justify the wholesale forcing out of the faculties of both schools.

The School Reform Commission has never voted to approve “Transformation” as a turnaround model. There were no community meetings announced by the district. 

How could this happen? In a reprehensible bait-and-switch, the two schools were invited to apply for funds from the Philadelphia School Partnership (PSP), which could help them to adjust to significant enrollment increases brought about when nearby schools closed.

The SRC voted in August 2013 to accept a $1.5 million PSP grant for each school. Although Deputy Superintendent Paul Kihn told a NewsWorks reporter in March that the money would come with “no strings attached,” PSP essentially went shopping for two schools whose principals would take their money as long as they agreed to discard their teachers. 

To be clear: nowhere in the application for PSP funding did Blaine Principal Gianeen Powell suggest that teacher quality or teacher technological skills were lacking at Blaine. Nowhere in the grant agreement between PSP and the School District is there a requirement for a complete turnover of the faculties.

Teachers at Blaine and Kelley were not told until March 7, 2014, after months of planning for the new grant, that they would have to reapply for their positions because their schools had been named as “Transformation Schools.”  Many parents told union members just days after the district’s announcement that they knew nothing about the transformation, and were shocked that teachers were being forced out.

Teachers and staff have not been afforded due process in this phony turnaround scheme. The educators who have dedicated their professional lives to the care of some of the most vulnerable students in the city are being forced to suffer the emotional distress at having to leave their students behind, and at having to deal with the disruption of their own careers in order to further the mission of the corporate “reformers” who do not have the best interests of our children at heart. 

As members of the WE Caucus, we see the violation of the rights of the Blaine and Kelly teachers as a wake-up call to all educators in Philadelphia: this can happen to you and your school. 

We must strengthen our alliances with community and parents to stop this from happening to any school which PSP chooses for “transformation.” We must build on the victory of the parents and teachers who fought to keep Steel Elementary a public school.

Educators, students, and parents have been working for years across the District to transform their schools.  The Caucus of Working Educators believes that local communities and those affected by school reform should be looked to for the wisdom and knowledge to transform their schools. This process should be bottom-up, participatory and highly democratic to engage schools and communities in school improvement. Philadelphia has had enough of "transformation models"  imposed by outside forces.

The WE Caucus demands a full explanation by the district about how this bait-and-switch was perpetrated.  We demand that the SRC explain why they are allowing this blatant injustice, under the guise of a non-existent turnaround model, to continue.  We demand that the district afford the teachers at Blaine and Kelley the due process rights to which they are entitled.

For more information:

Lisa Haver's SRC testimony on Kelley/Blaine

Notebook/Newsworks article on transformation schools

City Paper article on PSP- a glimpse into PSP's involvement

into the privatization of Philadelphia public schools

Kristen Graham's article on Kelley /Blaine

The following is an extended version of a letter that ran in response to The Philadelphia Inquirer's coverage of the recent events at Bartram High School.

Dear Ms. Graham & Mr. Purcell,

First, I want to thank you for your in-depth article in today's paper on the troubles at Bartram High School. It was heartening to see that you had interviewed teachers and students rather than solely relying on the input of district and union officials.

As a former teacher at Bartram, however, I saw the real story at the very end of the article. You quoted a teacher who said, "There's a lot of talented, intelligent kids that are getting the bad end of the stick."

In my experience, this is the entire story.

When we talk about education in this city, first we talk about budget crises, then about labor disputes, then about school safety and unspeakable tragedies in the neighborhoods, and finally, if there's any time, we talk about the incredible success stories of the lucky few.

The one thing we neglect to talk about is that our students are just kids. They have favorite subjects and favorite teachers. They hide from teachers whose homework they haven't done. They gossip with their friends and have crushes on their classmates. They are just like any other students in Pennsylvania, except that they are only given half the chance.

When I worked at Bartram, I was asked the same question constantly, by friends and neighbors and strangers on the street, "Isn't that a bad school?" I was not naive enough to believe anyone was referring to quality of education or the poor physical condition of the building. They meant to ask, "Isn't that a school full of bad kids?" The question broke my heart every time it was asked.

As I stated at the start of this letter, I am grateful the safety of our students is being addressed by the Philadelphia Inquirer and other local media. It is an issue that needs to be made public, and addressed meaningfully by this city. I would love more than anything, though, to see our students portrayed publicly as the human beings they are, rather than statistics, the victims and perpetrators of violent crime. There are, in fact, a great number "of talented, intelligent kids" at Bartram High School, and I'd like this city to see them, to know them, and to give them the attention and the education they deserve.

Best,
Bernadette McHenry

Bernadette McHenry taught at Bartram for the 2012-2013 school year and was then laid off. She no longer teaches in the School District of Philadelphia.