Since Randi Weingarten put AFT's full weight behind both the Clinton Campaign and the passage of the charter school and CBE stimulus bill that passed through Congress as ESSA in 2015, AFT has been shopping for a new focus to move attention away from the fact that both AFT and NEA are now entirely on board the corporate education reformer gravy train.
By the summer of 2016, it was obvious that the corporate education unions had glommed on to the civil rights initiatives inspired by Black Lives Matter. AFT's SOS March and DC Talkathon in July featured a number of high profile civil rights speakers, and the choice of the Lincoln Memorial as staging area was intended to symbolize the folding of education issues within a larger, amorphous social justice context. If AFT could not pretend to lead a march against corporate initiatives that it supported, it could put some big money behind the largely ineffectual protests of Black Lives Matter.
What has become clear since July is that AFT is still on the move to alter the perceptions of many teachers who believe AFT and NEA both have sold dues-paying members down the corporate revenue river. As a result, Weingarten and NPE have now managed to coopt the agenda of United Opt Out, which, heretofore, has been the only legitimate organization that has stood, until now, against CorpEd since 2009.
Just as Weingarten took over BATs, she has now neutralized UOO, thus eliminating another threat to the corporate reform/corporate union status quo. What is the evidence? Look no further than AFT's most loyal Houston affiliate, which is sponsoring a joint meeting with UOO in October.
If you have been a past supporter of United Opt Out because of their fierce opposition to the oligarchs' education agenda, standardized testing, and segregated classrooms, you need to look elsewhere for that kind of leadership.
UOO administrators who left UOO: Morna McDermott, Tim Slekar, Peggy Robertson, Michael Pena, Rosemarie Jensen
UOO admininistrators who remain at UOO: Ceresta Smith, Ruth Rodriguez, Denisha Jones
Not to despair, however. The real resistance lives on and grows stronger.
By the summer of 2016, it was obvious that the corporate education unions had glommed on to the civil rights initiatives inspired by Black Lives Matter. AFT's SOS March and DC Talkathon in July featured a number of high profile civil rights speakers, and the choice of the Lincoln Memorial as staging area was intended to symbolize the folding of education issues within a larger, amorphous social justice context. If AFT could not pretend to lead a march against corporate initiatives that it supported, it could put some big money behind the largely ineffectual protests of Black Lives Matter.
What has become clear since July is that AFT is still on the move to alter the perceptions of many teachers who believe AFT and NEA both have sold dues-paying members down the corporate revenue river. As a result, Weingarten and NPE have now managed to coopt the agenda of United Opt Out, which, heretofore, has been the only legitimate organization that has stood, until now, against CorpEd since 2009.
Just as Weingarten took over BATs, she has now neutralized UOO, thus eliminating another threat to the corporate reform/corporate union status quo. What is the evidence? Look no further than AFT's most loyal Houston affiliate, which is sponsoring a joint meeting with UOO in October.
The continued challenges of public education and the teaching profession have only been exacerbated by past and current policies and practices. Moreover, the gulf between civil rights organizations and education activists has not helped to provide workable solutions. UOO and HFT will bring together various civil rights organizations and activists groups to discuss the shifting landscape of public education and its impact on civil and human rights and civil society. The focus will be on creating alliances, building solidarity, and promoting a unified stance around the following issues: standardized testing, digital instruction, student and parental rights, allocation of funding, teacher quality, and the corporatization of public education. Ultimately, the goal is to see our consensus realized on the local, state and federal levels in terms of policies and practices.You should note, too, that even though the new dubious alliance is shrouded in the same civil rights rhetoric as July's SOS and NPE charade, there is no mention of segregation, segregated classrooms, or segregated charters.
If you have been a past supporter of United Opt Out because of their fierce opposition to the oligarchs' education agenda, standardized testing, and segregated classrooms, you need to look elsewhere for that kind of leadership.
UOO administrators who left UOO: Morna McDermott, Tim Slekar, Peggy Robertson, Michael Pena, Rosemarie Jensen
UOO admininistrators who remain at UOO: Ceresta Smith, Ruth Rodriguez, Denisha Jones
Not to despair, however. The real resistance lives on and grows stronger.
Where is the real resistance? Pray tell. I view support of ESSA and Opt Out as an inherent contradiction. How does one purport to feed the testing beast with one hand and starve it with the other? It is the same claptrap being used to describe HRC as a progressive supporter of labor. Cunningham is proclaiming the virtues of segregation and poverty. Any day now there will be a movement to reinstitutionalize slavery. We live in scary times.
ReplyDeleteAbigail Shure
I left UOO before leaving UOO was cool. Hell, I designed the damn logo.
ReplyDeleteAnother case of Divide and Conquer. And may I ask why July was a charade? I would have hoped for larger crowds, and more success, but a charade?
ReplyDeletecharade: an absurd pretense intended to create a pleasant or respectable appearance: talk of unity was nothing more than a charade.
DeleteSee AFT/SOS/NPE. Why do these orgs represent absurd pretenses? Because their official positions on important education issues, i. e., ESSA, are entirely at odds with their rhetorical commitments.
It is a charade when Randi Weingarten pretends to represent the interests of working public school teachers while simultaneously advocating for ESSA, HRC, merit pay and school choice. I would like to make a more potent statement about the charade, but my mother taught me to mind my manners. For the record, I am a teacher in Newark.
DeleteAbigail Shure
I think it rather disingenuous that you write such a blog that castigates people of color without having open dialogue with any of us.
ReplyDeleteI think it entirely ignorant that you would pretend that any evaluative comment should be judged as castigation that requires prior dialogue.
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