Mr. Talk Predicts: Your Guide To 2013

As many of you are aware, I have an uncanny knack of predicting the future of the NYC public schools. I don't wear this fortune teller's hat because it's a babe magnet, you know.

We have an interesting year ahead of us, with a contract to be negotiated, evaluation talks, an outgoing mayor, a union election, and more. Here are some of my prognostications for the new year:

Despite the fact that "Waiting for Superman" failed to influence anyone and "Won't Back Down" earned less money than I currently have in my couch cushions, the reformers will once again try to use entertainment to sway public opinion. Reformers will pick a new genre, as documentaries and fictional movies have failed to click. To that end, StudentsFirst will present "Rhee-formers on Ice", an entertainment extravaganza starring Michelle Rhee as the Ice Queen, who will skate a bloody figure 8 into a senior teacher's chest in the finale. Kevin Johnson will co-star as the uncle no one will let near their children.

The UFT will continue breaking off large chunks of our contract and handing them over, gratis, to the city. Mulgrew will call each of these events a victory, and talk about how glad he is to have a seat at the table, even as he pulls the chair out from under teachers.

Teacher's Choice will survive, but in a new format. Rather than giving each teacher the current whopping $45 a year for classroom supplies, the city will finally increase that amount to $1000 per teacher. Unfortunately, that money will come directly from teacher salaries. Michael Mulgrew will promote this idea because "teachers already spend more than $1000 dollar a year each, on average. Making it official gives us leverage with companies like Staples, who want our business." The UFT will declare this a victory for teachers.


Despite no contract, a sellout evaluation agreement, and a loss of vacation days due to Sandy, Mulgrew will win re-election as UFT president. Only 25% of UFT members will vote. The other 75% will express surprise that there was even an election. This will be the only victory that the UFT will declare in 2013 that will actually be a victory, albeit not for the teachers themselves.

In a surprise move, Anthony Weiner will throw his hat into the mayoral race. He will immediately grab his hat back when he realizes it was the only thing covering his genitals. His campaign slogan, "Go Big with Weiner!" will be a huge hit with bloggers everywhere. The UFT, in keeping with their history of supporting wieners in elections, grants him an endorsement. Weiner will win the election and Mulgrew will declare that his endorsement gave Weiner the momentum he needed to thrust himself to victory, causing the city to come together.

To no one's surprise, this blog will continue making Weiner jokes in 2013.

Mayor Weiner will choose erstwhile Gotham Schools blogger and celebrated E4E asshat Ruben Brosbe as Chancellor. He will cite Ruben's extensive experience at not achieving tenure as a major plus. "None of our three previous chancellors had any real experience in the classroom," Weiner will say. "Brosbe actually taught and failed to achieve tenure, which will inspire future teachers not to expect tenure, either."

Although there will be no new teacher's contract in 2013, it will be a year of innovative deals, such as giving in on teacher evaluations in exchange for a promise of 'economic credit" in the event a contract is ever signed. This will lead to a pinky swear on the Danielson Framework, a cross-my-heart-and-hope-to-die ATR agreement, a hand-to-God paperwork reduction agreement, and a swear-on-my-mom's-life no charter school pledge. Mulgrew will hail all these innovations as a victory for the union. In a shocking turn of events, Mayor Bloomberg will reveal that he had his fingers crossed the whole time. Anthony Weiner's "No Take Backs" pledge will turn the tide in his favor and sweep him into the mayor's office.



Some quick predictions to round things out:

• At least one of your admins will be a dick.
• Cathie Black's emails to Bloomberg will finally be released.  The most damaging revelation will be that she referred to the mayor as "Poopsie".
• Reformers will claim that everything they do is for the kids, even if they propose tying students in potato sacks and beating them with ball peen hammers.
• Eva Moskowitz will begin planting flags in the public schools she wants to take over and claiming them for "The Country of Moskovia".
• Evan Stone and Sydney Morris will marry, but only so they can spawn more members for E$E.
• Diane Ravitch will continue to defend public schools and sound educational policy by typing more on her blog and Twitter feed than seems humanly possible. It will be revealed that she also types with her feet.
• Arne Duncan will bring phonics back to schools, but only after he gets tired of everyone pronouncing his name "Arn" instead of "Arnie".
• Mayor Bloomberg will continue to increase class sizes while pushing a law to reduce the size of a "large fries" to whatever can fit in a urine sample cup. 
• The mayor's push to eliminate guns will take up a larger and larger amount of his time. This will result in dramatic improvement in the schools.
• Michael Mulgrew will declare all of the above a victory for teachers.

Add your own predictions to the comments, and happy new year!

Superman Gets Riddled With Bullets

As I mentioned a while back, the Harlem Children's Zone schools didn't fare so well with the recalibrated ELA and math tests. They also didn't score well on the city's report card, with one school scoring a C and the other a B. Remember, these are the schools touted ad nauseum by Waiting for Superman and the Oprah show as the model we all should follow. Here's some reporting by the Times that makes the point a bit sharper:

But most of the seventh graders, now starting their third year in the school, are still struggling. Just 15 percent passed the 2010 state English test, a number that Mr. Canada said was “unacceptably low” but not out of line with the school’s experience in lifting student performance over time. Several teachers have been fired as a result of the low scores, and others were reassigned, he said.

Even more shocking than these pitiful results is the fact that these schools are blessed with advantages that city public school teachers can only dream of, to wit:

In the tiny high school of the zone’s Promise Academy I, which teaches 66 sophomores and 65 juniors (it grows by one grade per year), the average class size is under 15, generally with two licensed teachers in every room. There are three student advocates to provide guidance and advice, as well as a social worker, a guidance counselor and a college counselor, and one-on-one tutoring after school.

Are you kidding me? Two teachers in a class? Class sizes of 15? And you get those dismal results? This is a disgrace. THIS is the solution to all our educational problems? This is the model the entire nation is supposed to follow? And let's not forget that in order to get even these awful results, Canada dismissed an entire grade that wasn't meeting his "standards".

In my school, we have class sizes that range from 28 to 35, with just one teacher per room. We don't have any huge grants from billionaires or backing from Oprah, but our passing percentage was over four times higher than the results posted by the Times. And yes--we are those dreaded public school teachers who must be gotten rid of in favor of the charter school teachers that Mr. Canada prefers.

Screw Teacher's Choice! Amazing New Funding Source Discovered!

Already spent your paltry $110 bucks from Teacher's Choice? Never fear! As always, Mr. Talk has the answer.

As you know, this blog and others have been urging you to boycott DonorsChoose for their shameless support of the film Waiting for Superman. They offered a five dollar bribe to anyone who pledged to see that POS movie, which could be donated to a teacher project of your choosing.

Now they've upped the ante. They are offering $15 for a ticket stub to WFS up to a maximum of four per person. Think about that a minute. The movie is donating more per ticket than the tickets themselves cost! Either they should be Waiting for an Accountant, or some big hedge fund people are dropping big bucks in the hopes that people will see this film.

So here's what you can do. Organize your own SuperStub party. Find out when WFS is playing at your local theater, and get all your friends and family members to show up at the theater when the movie lets out. Then ask people to donate their stubs to help support your local school (i.e., you). If you bring 20 people and each collects 4 stubs, you can earn $1200 in one fell swoop by having them donate all that swag to you! And the best part of it is that you don't even have to see the movie!

Of course, all this assumes that 80 people will show up to see this drek film at a single showing, which is unlikely. Still, whatever you may earn from this, you'll have the pleasure of knowing that you picked the pocket of an ed deformer, and you can't get that kind of satisfaction at your local teacher supply store.

Waiting for SuperScam

Even Gotham Schools has fallen prey to the phonied up numbers put up by the ed deformers behind the film Waiting for Superman. In a recent article there, the claim is made that our boycott of DonorsChoose has "fizzled" because a public relations rep there said so. There have been 29,000 "pledges" to see the movie, vs. (now) 45 people who have joined the boycott.

Well, suppose I promised that for every person a teacher could get to pledge to support the boycott I would add five dollars to to their Teacher's Choice allocation. What do you think would happen? Might I have just a few more pledges? You bet I would.

That is exactly what the movie is doing. They are offering anyone who hits the "Pledge" button on their website 5 dollars that they can put towards any project that Donors Choose is hosting.

So, if I'm trying to buy a computer for my classroom and I can get 100 of my facebook friends to hit the button, I get $500 clams. Not a bad inducement. Many of the people making pledges have no clue what the movie is about, and it's a safe bet that most of them won't be running out to see the film just because they pressed a button.

So far, this unreleased movie has managed to get almost 30,000 people to hit that button. That will cost them $150,000 before the movie is even released. More than that, there is a tote board that would allow up to a MILLION people to pledge, at a cost of 5 million dollars. Just where is a documentary film getting that kind of money to throw around? Could it be the very hedge funds that run the charter schools?

Just so you know, the movie was not offering any money before our boycott began. While we may not have a lot of members, this matter did get a lot of coverage. Cause and effect? I honestly don't know. But I hope so.

To join the boycott, click PLEDGE. You won't get any money, but doing the right thing is priceless.

An Open Letter to DonorsChoose.Org

UPDATE: If you want to boycott DonorsChoose after reading this post, click here.

I was rather surprised to see a reply from DonorsChoose.Org in the comments section of my post accusing them of having stabbed teachers in the back. I do welcome the response, however, because if it is genuine, perhaps there is an opening to set the record straight. In brief, DonorsChoose has seen fit to urge their members--who are teachers--to pledge see the film Waiting for Superman. In return, DonorsChoose will get money for every pledge. Apparently, DonorsChoose sees nothing wrong with this, but I know a lot of teachers do, as well as some of my fellow bloggers, such as NYC Educator. I'd prefer to continue the dialogue here, in public, as DonorsChoose themselves claim to want to spur debate. So here's my open letter to you, DC--I'd love to hear your response (in email as well--I want to be sure you're really who you claim to be).

Dear DonorsChoose.org:

Thank you so much for replying. I'd like to respond by asking you a rather simple question: Why do you exist?

I'm not being facetious--I am dead serious. In my view, you exist because of the sorry state of public education funding today. In NYC, public school teachers receive a measly $150 a year for supplies, which for many of us works out to less than a dollar a year per child. We don't get a pencil, or a piece of chalk, or a sheet of paper unless it comes out of our own pockets. Many of us work in dilapidated classrooms and trailers, with no air conditioning in the summer and not enough heat in the winter. We work in severely overcrowded classrooms--the highest average class size in the state--and we take on any and all comers. No child is ever refused entrance to a public school, even if they're disruptive and completely unmotivated. Public schools take on this challenge every day, and we do a damn fine job.

On the other side of the coin, we have charter schools--the kinds of schools being touted in films like Waiting for Superman. Charters are often given the most prime locations in their neighborhoods, frequently pushing out public school kids. I have never heard of a charter classroom being run from a trailer. Similarly, I have never heard of a charter school that didn't have more than adequate supplies. They are given the basics that are denied to public school teachers. Add to that the fact that many charters cherry-pick their students, and the ones that don't can kick out unruly children or even kids who don't perform up to their standards. When they are thrown out, guess where they go? Back to public schools.

Despite the huge advantage for charters, they show no better results than public schools nationwide.

Michelle Rhee and Joel Klein are pictured as the heroes of Waiting for Superman because they want to "reform" schools. By reform, they mean they want to eviscerate teacher contracts, eliminate seniority and tenure, and create charters where teachers are hired as will employees who can be fired at the drop of a hat. Check out any review of the film--this one by Roger Ebert, for example--and you will see that teachers and unions are cast as the villains in this script. According to the reviewers, teachers are seen as do-nothings who hide behind their union for protection. The truth is that all teachers are hired by the system, and the system has 4 years to evaluate whether a teacher is good enough. After that, if they believe a teacher is incompetent, there is a process to remove teachers by giving them a due process hearing.

What message does it send to teachers when an organization like yours, that claims to be working in the interests of teachers, accepts money from the producers of a film that casts public school teachers as the enemy?

Now, I'll be the first to admit I'm no Superman. There's no S on my chest--just a little chalk dust. I do my best to instruct whatever students show up in my room, in whatever numbers, and with whatever paper I can buy at the dollar store. I've been doing this for more than two decades. The vast majority of my 80,000 colleagues do the same thing, day in and day out, even when the roof is leaking.

So yes, DonorsChoose, there IS a superman, but if you're looking for red boots and a cape, you'll surely be disappointed. But if you peek into the typical public school classroom, you'll see dedicated teachers working hard every day. They are your members, and they want you to lend us a hand in a very difficult job--not to add another brick to an already far-too-heavy load.

If you want the support of teachers, reject the funding of those who want to see us lose our jobs.

I look forward to your reply.

Sincerely,

Mr. Talk

Summer Rants

First of all, happy summer to everyone!

Here are a few rants, as I'm just too lazy to write anything longer:

You know how Klein always says charter schools are better because they have such high application rates? Well, the truth is that there were about 50,000 applications to charters last year. Considering there are over a million students, that's a pretty low percentage. Compare that to the fact that there were 26,000 applicants for teaching jobs in NYC despite the fact that almost no one will be hired. This must mean we are the greatest teaching force in the world!!!

I suggest that we hold a lottery for these prospective teachers, just as we hold lotteries to see who's going to get into charter schools. (Doesn't the word "lottery" just scream out the idea that if you don't get chosen, you're a loser who has to go to a lowly public school?) I'd further suggest that we make it a real lottery, and sell lottery tickets to these applicants at about $1000 a pop. That would raise 26 million for our cash strapped schools. I know what you're about to say--that a lottery does nothing to ensure the quality of applicants. Perhaps not, but since most teachers are gone in a few years anyway, it fits in perfectly with Klein's high churn rate strategy. Charge them to get in, then deny them tenure. Rinse. Repeat.

Bloomberg opposes taxes on the rich to pay for teachers because he fears the rich will leave and take their tax dollars elsewhere. Many of the wealthy have already begun scoping out properties in other desirable areas where the super-rich tend to gather, such as Cheboygan, Michigan. The heck with going to the Met--the rich can instead first-night in style at the Cheyboygan Opera House, which saves tax money by also serving as city hall, police headquarters, and a fire station. That's the kind of fiscal restraint that the rich are looking for.

The mayor has no objection to taxing things done by the poor and middle class. The state has implemented a huge new tax on cigarettes and tanning salons with nary a peep from Bloomie. You see, rich people smoke less, and the rich who tan, like House Minority Leader John Boehner, often have their tans applied by servants wielding orange Crayolas.

When informed of the new taxes, Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi immediately responded. "Cigs and tans being taxed? Why not just tax my frickin' pouf or casual sex and get it over with?" Upon hearing Snooki's remarks, Governor Patterson immediately implemented a Pouf Tax, although he decided against the Casual Sex Act Act, just in case. Snooki's response was immediate. She took her tax base, moved to Michigan, and started a new reality show called Cheboygan Shore, co-starring Bill Gates (Billy G) and Rush Limbaugh (RushFat).

In other economic news, the price of an early screening to the Michelle Rhee love fest known as Waiting for Superman has been slashed to $25. In response, Mr. Talk has announced that tickets for his long awaited summer blockbuster Waiting for Kryptonite can be had for $1.19, or for free if you swipe him into the subway with your Metrocard.

In what may be related news, the docs have upped my meds.

Waiting for Kryptonite

A lot of ed deformers are eagerly anticipating the release of Waiting for Superman, which appears, from what I can gather, to be a celluloid piece of anti-teacher propaganda dressed up as a documentary. It's about the "failing" public school system in this country and its wait for a superhero-like savior, such as Michelle Rhee or Arne Duncan. Reality Based Educator blogged about how the movie--not even released yet--is being positioned as proof positive that teachers stink on ice.

Rather than some lame press release like we usually get from the UFT stating how unfair the flick is, I propose that we take some of the beaucoup bucks the union collects and invest them in an anti-reform film ourselves. To get the attention we need, I propose that we hire some of Hollywood's hottest names to portray the film's main characters.

The film, called Waiting for Kryptonite as a counter to the deformers, would be a typical Hollywood portrayal of a hard-working teacher who manages to triumph every day and teach incorrigible students against tremendous odds. Just for argument's sake, we'll say the main character is one Mr. Talk, a devastatingly handsome and dedicated teacher with brooding good looks, played by Taylor Lautner.

Here are some of the other characters (any similarity between these fictional characters and real life humans is highly unlikely, as the people they are based on aren't human):

Miss Shelley Rhee, Champion Ed Deformer and arch nemesis of Mr. Talk. Her evil powers include the ability to convince people she is expert in areas she knows nothing about. She will be played by Khloe Kardashian, who, like her character, is mostly known for marrying an NBA star. When Khloe/Rhee doesn't get her way, she threatens to fire everyone or to crush them with her enormous ass.

Joe K. Lion, a once proud laywer who turned into the Chancellor of Darkness once he lost his full mane of gray hair in a tragic bikini waxing accident. Determined to ruin the careers of teachers everywhere who retain any gray hair whatsoever, Chancellor Lion attempts to strip away Mr. Talk's tenure, but instead strips away his shirt to reveal a set of rock hard abs developed through years of bending over backwards to help his students. The part of the Chancellor will be played by Howie Mandell after we roll him down a jagged mountain.

Arnie Doorknob, a former basketball player who also loves Miss Rhee. He mistakes her enormous ass for a couple of basketballs and attempts to slam dunk her from the free throw line. Miss Rhee then spurns him and marries her NBA star. Arnie decides to win her back by becoming the Secretary of Education and implementing all her policies. At first, the affable Doorknob has difficulty being so nasty, but decides to complete his evil turn when at least 11 teachers at an education conference ask him "Why the long face?". The role of Arnie Doorknob will be played by Lurch from the Addams Family.

This triumvirate of evil--Chancellor Joe, Shelley, and Arnie--sometimes called the Lion, the Bitch, and the Doorknob--join forces with the diabolical billionaire Mayor TurdBloom of Metropolis (who was to have been played by Gary Coleman) to bring down Mr. Talk and his dream of educating children. They hit him with a slew of fiendish initiatives, including such hellish measures as unrelenting testing, running records, conference binders. student portfolios, and PD on Brooklyn/Queens Day. Mr. Talk and his abs are almost defeated when he remembers his ally, Randy Winebottle (portrayed by the Gollum). Mr. Talk believes that Randy can help, and she offers him a magic scroll. Imagine Mr. Talk's horror as he takes the paper and sees the words "2005 Contract" scrawled across the top in blood.

Will Mr. Talk triumph in his quest to give students a decent education? Or will they become educational zombies, staggering to school each day brandishing a fistful of sharpened #2 pencils to do the bidding of the evil deformers? And is there enough liposuction in the world for Miss Rhee be able to fit her ass through the door?