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Mike Meehan, social studies chairman at Construction Careers Center, a charter school in Missouri, explaining why he and his colleagues want to join the AFT.
It's time for a Friday Quick Quiz.
For decades, the AFT has helped educators expand their influence as school leaders and decision-makers. That commitment extends to:
A) The Queen of Brobdingnag, who reports high levels of job satisfaction.
B) Semiprime numbers, who deserve the same rights as other AFT members.
C) Jeets, who has a nice inside-out swing.
D) Charter school teachers and staff.
The answers can be found, here, here, here and (really) here.
Jonathan Gyurko at UFT has some really excellent analysis of Andy Smarick’s piece on the charter movement in Ed Next. If you read this blog you know that I’m openly hostile to the most anti-union elements of the charter school movement. I also have a lot of concerns that we’re not doing charter schooling right. But that's because I want us to do charter schooling right in a way that allows innovation, creates opportunities for children and teachers and is not done at the expense of the educational experiences of kids in the traditional school system. I don’t want a zero sum game, I want one where the whole system – every child, and every worker – can benefit. Gyurko's offering some glimpses of a vision that would get us in this direction, you should check it out.
While I'm at it, Michael Goldstein is talking some sense as well.
On good days I get to blog about people who are coming together, standing up for themselves and for the kids they teach. So today I’m celebrating the news about educators at Merrick Academy, a charter school in Queens NY. The staff there have united to petition for a recognition of a union in their school. Edwize has more, and the New York Sun reports on it as well. In addition, I wanted to let you know about the staff of the South Buffalo Charter School deciding to join our union in October. And Green Dot is coming as well. Things are starting to move on this front.
The Sun quotes Peter Murphy (that Peter Murphy) of the New York Charter School Association (yes that NYCSA) saying he doesn’t care if charter school teachers unionize. Murphy’s still on Atlantic Legal’s charter program’s advisory board. That’s a program that’s still distributing materials from the union busters at Jackson Lewis. Yet Murphy’s quote intimates that his only problem with unions is that we’re liars. Of course, it’s Jackson Lewis that says it’s ok for union busters themselves to lie. Congratulations Pete, you’re anti-union rhetoric has entered the 21st Century.
If you’ve ever wondered what union busters say when they are advising employers, the title of this post is one example. Art Levine attended a Jackson Lewis training where this and other gems were uttered. Levine wrote about it in the most recent In These Times.
A while back I helped Leo Casey with some blogging about the New York Charter School Association’s union busting activities, done in conjunction with the Atlantic Legal Foundation. ALF was the conduit to bring in a union busting consultant to talk to charter school managers. I've had harsh words for the people involved in NYCSA. You might recall that the union buster that NYCSA used was Jackson Lewis. Check out Levine's article to get a sense of how labor law can be folded, spindled and mutilated. For the people involved over at NYCSA, this is another reminder that these are the sort of stains that you don't wash away with soap. Luckily there are signs that NYCSA's efforts in the empire state aren't paying off. More on that later. (Via Yglesias. But see also James Parks at AFL-CIO Now)
While I'm at it, if you care about the social contract, then it's pretty likely that nothing being done in the last couple of days on No Child Left Behind was as important to you as what's happened on the picket line at General Motors. Based on what I'm reading about the tentative agreement, I'm reminded that sometimes it's better for a union to risk losing a fight than not show up for it. Mike Hall at AFL-CIO Now has more on how the issue of good jobs is at the core of the discussion. And Trapper John at Daily Kos has a great post on the healthcare piece. He also looks at how the UAW made it possible for his dad to go to college. In a time when famillies are increasingly on edge (and really, check out the whole series if you haven't already), this is still what it's about. And it's why charter school managers shouldn't be taking advice from people telling them it's o.k. to lie to their employees.
The Center on Education Reform, known for its charter school zealotry, also promotes itself as a repository for charter school statistics. Given CER's double standards for education research and its hyper-spinning of charter school achievement results, it's worth looking into CER's numbers.
One key statistic is the total number of charter schools nationwide. CER reports here that there are "nearly 4,000" charter schools. But CER's actual count, here, is 3,897. Okay, I'll grant that it's not too much of a stretch to say 3,897 is nearly 4,000. But is CER's 3,897 count accurate?
Maybe. Comparing CER's stats to those of the National Center for Education Statistics doesn't quite work. NCES data shows Indianapolis having 13 charter schools in 2004-05. Since CER is reporting later data, and since the number of charter schools is growing, it's not surprising that their number is higher. Indeed, I get 17 when I count the charter schools on CER's map of Indianapolis. But CER's count is even higher -- 20 -- when you put your mouse above Indianapolis on this map. (Complicating things further is the total number of 22 charter schools, which appears above the map you get when you click on Indianapolis. That number apparently includes three (?) schools outside of Indianapolis.)
It's quite possible I've made a counting error or there's another explanation -- two charter schools at the same map location? -- for CER's differing counts for Indianapolis. But I'd have more faith in CER's 'rithmetic if they did a better job with their 'riting. When you go to CER's charter school map, and put your mouse above Indianapolis, it reports 9 "elemetary" charter schools.
UPDATE: CER has a new number out just today and is now saying there are 3,940 charter schools. Apparently, 43 charter schools opened since I checked CER's Web site this morning. CER's amazing rate of growth -- 20 charter schools per hour -- would result in more than 200,000 charter schools by the end of next year.
The AFT Charter Schools Week statement, released today, includes this quote from AFT President Edward J. McElroy:
"Teachers in all public schools, whether traditional or charter, deserve the opportunity to bargain collectively for fair salaries, benefits and a voice in making their schools excellent. Students benefit when teachers and their unions are partners with their school districts."
The statement also announces the launch of the Alliance of Charter Teachers and Staff, or ACTS, to represent the interests of AFT-represented charter school educators nationwide.
Link to statement coming soon is here.
A private online school is recruiting homeschoolers by attacking online charter schools. Who knew there was a war between online charter schools and for-profits? 
The press release/recruiting flyer mentions "a recent report from a prominent homeschool advocacy group" that puts online charter schools in a bad light, but doesn't link to the report. Which may not exist. The scare tactics go like this: Public schools are bad! Online charter schools are worse! You must enroll your child in the Cambridge Academy! Now!
And the Cambridge Academy cares about education, not money. That's why they're having a half-price sale. And that's why the Web site says they accept Visa, Master Card, Discover and American Express (scroll down).
I read yesterday's Baltimore Sun story about charter schools in Charm City. While we're on the subject of organizing, I'll note that charter school teachers in Baltimore are covered by the union contract and are represented by the Baltimore Teachers Union. The Sun notes that the city's charter schools have a lower special education load than the traditional schools. The charter folks (a bit defensively) say this is because they are small. I agree. And, if the charter schools weren't part of the district I'd say it was still a problem. But they are part of the district, and the district authorized their creation. If the district is doing a poor job of dealing with this predictable issue, I wouldn't blame the charter schools.
The KIPP school in the article had the highest scores and retained 23 percent of its kids, compared to 7 percent for the system as a whole. Is this the norm for KIPP nationally? Does this policy count as a form of counseling out? And is that necessary for KIPP to work? I do like KIPP -- their first schools were opened in NYC under the UFT contract and the late Sandy Feldman was a board member. Also I once failed a lot more kids than that. But I am wondering how many of that 23 percent returned to KIPP. Did KIPP's decision mean that the kids were retained systemwide? Or could you switch from KIPP and land back on grade level? And does the district have any idea that this is an issue? I’d like to think so.
A lot of my concerns about charter schooling have to do with this sort of thing. The Sinn Fein (Irish for "Ourselves Alone") approach that a lot of charter schools take puts them in a position where the broader system is undergirding their efforts in ways that they might not realize or want to admit. It's one reason why I think that charter schools and districts need to be integrated or much more closely coordinated than they are now. As for Baltimore, I think it's the district's responsibility to see that the structure is set to allow KIPP to be KIPP while working alongside the other schools.
UPDATE: New York Charter Schools Association blogger Joe Williams misreads the tea leaves as he looks at an item on the AFT Web site about the Florida charter school teachers' vote. Joe seems to think there's something sinister going on, writing that the item "dutifully deletes all the two-way happy charter talk included in the other external press release version."
Well, here are a few quotes from that article:
BTU president and AFT vice president Pat Santeramo: "This vote is historic. It shows that charter school teachers and staff recognize that unions must continue to be partners in Broward's educational system."
AFT president Edward J. McElroy: "[The national union] believes all teachers deserve an opportunity to bargain collectively for fair salaries, benefits and greater input in making the charter schools of Pembroke Pines schools of excellence. This vote makes that possible."
Grace Thomas, a Pembroke Pines third-grade teacher: "We really love our schools and believe that by forming a union, we will make them even better. Our hope has always been that by negotiating a contract, we will be able to give all teachers a voice so our schools remain great not only today, but long into the future."
Charter school teacher Khea Davis: "With a union, we will have greater access to high-quality professional development courses, the latest resources and a massive network of other education professionals."
Sounds like "two-way happy charter talk" to me.
A group of charter school teachers in Florida yesterday voted overwhelmingly to join the American Federation of Teachers. A ninth-grade teacher at the school spoke about why her colleagues wanted to join the AFT:
"With a union, we will have greater access to high-quality professional development courses, the latest research and a massive network of other education professionals," said Khea Davis, a ninth-grade teacher at Pembroke Pines Charter High School.
The AFT's statement notes that the AFT already represents charter school staff in Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island, and that the United Federation of Teachers, the AFT’s largest local, runs two charter schools of its own in New York City.
The Miami Herald reports that teachers at the school report say the issues that led them to form a union were a desire for a greater voice in school policies and for more stability, not for higher salaries. (Nevertheless, a charter school operator is quoted in the article conjuring up scary scenarios about higher salaries.)
Edwize points out that the teachers had to overcome union-busting tactics from Broward County Commissioners. And Joe Williams sings the same old off-key song. (Dude, are you going to sing that song for our entire road trip?)
Posted by Matt
In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, 34 New Orleans public schools were taken over by the state-run Recovery School District (RSD). This school year, the RSD schools have struggled to recruit enough teachers. By the start of December, the RSD was still 45 teachers short.
The RSD’s recruitment efforts have been undermined by both poor planning and the ill-fated decision by school officials to fire nearly all of the district’s 7,500 teachers and other employees.
A report released in November by the AFT notes that because many of the city’s non-RSD schools have selective admissions policies or enrollment caps, the RSD schools may be functioning as “schools of last resort” which fail to provide a rigorous, high-quality education to their students.
Now, there is new evidence to support this “schools of last resort” concern.
State officials appear to be working with a charter-school initiative called teachNOLA to improve teacher recruitment. At first glance, this sounds like good news. Unfortunately, the ads placed on various websites by teachNOLA raise new concerns about the state-operated RSD schools.
One of these ads appears as a job posting at Idealist.org. Although the job description begins by saying that “teachNOLA seeks the nation’s most outstanding certified teachers,” a disturbing disclaimer appears a few paragraphs later:
"Certified teachers will teach in charter schools, and non-certified teachers will teach in the state-run Recovery School District." (emphasis added)
Why are uncertified teachers being directed to the RSD schools? Why aren’t the RSD schools setting the same certification standard for their teachers that charter schools are setting? Parents, students and other stakeholders deserve answers to these questions.
I consider myself an education policy generalist--I know a little bit about most educational issues. One issue I have not really developed any expertise in is charter schools. It just isn't my bailiwick. But, through the blog, I have learned more over the last year, and one thing I have noticed is that charter activists seem unimpressed by the AFT's usual sally, "Well, you know, Al Shanker first came up with the idea of a charter school back in 1988." The response is something like, "Yeah? Well, what have you done for me lately?" That is, they feel the AFT hasn't done much--if anything--to promote Shanker's original conception of schools that would foster educational innovation and, by sharing lessons learned, improve all schools in a district.
Things have changed--and hopefully charter school activists will take notice. The UFT is now running two charter schools, including one that is featured in a new documentary, Climbing the Crest, that was screened in DC this week. As UFT President Randi Weingarten said in her remarks, the charter school model has given them the freedom to put into practice the proven ideas that will foster academic success. She was also quick to point out that they achieved, "All this-and a union contract! Far from being an impediment, this contract is a foundation for the school's success."
Other union leaders may soon follow Weingarten's lead. United Teachers of New Orleans (UTNO) President Brenda Mitchell attended the movie screening and, as Joe Williams pointed out, she made it clear to the panel assembled to discuss the film (including Jim Shelton of the Gates Foundation) that the union is committed to rebuilding New Orleans' schools in a variety of ways--through professional development, innovative teacher recruitment strategies and yes, working with charter schools.
Will some charter school activists continue to be skeptical of union involvement in charter schools? Sure. But others are willing to recognize that these first steps are courageous and could mean a great deal to urban school districts and to realizing Shanker's vision.
Leo Casey at Edwize has a post up this morning about the conflict over charter school expansion in New York state. He cites some of my work (and has added some wrinkles himself). I’ve already documented the New York Charter Schools Association’s involvement with the Atlantic Legal Foundation in efforts to train charter school managers in union busting. Atlantic Legal is part of the State Policy Network (SPN), a nationwide group of state-based anti-tax/anti-public service groups. They promote vouchers, pension privatization, spending limits like TABOR and attacks on unions.
The main New York state branch of SPN is the Foundation for Education Reform and Accountability (FERA-NY). As far as I can tell, its chief tenets are support for tuition tax credits and a hatred of NYSUT. FERA-NY is the direct successor of the more conventional anti-tax/anti-public spending group Change-NY. It is led by Tom Carroll, who formerly led Change-NY. FERA-NY’s money comes in large part from foundations associated with Virginia Manheimer and Richard Gilder. Manheimer and Gilder are pillars of the Club for Growth. When I write about the charter school movement being a vehicle for right wing attacks on public services generally, I have these people and their work to point to.
Why do I bring this up? After all, the New York Charter School Association (NYCSA) is not a part of the SPN and is a distinct organization that supports expansion and improvement of charter schooling. But I want to connect a couple of dots using Guidestar, which is an online service that keeps track of the tax returns of non profit organizations. FERA-NY is located at 4 Chelsea Place, in Clifton, NY. When you type that address into Guidestar (free subscription required) you get both FERA-NY and the NYCSA as hits. It turns out that NYCSA's books are being kept at FERA-NY’s address. Change-NY, the School Choice Scholarship Foundation (a private voucher group), the New York Charter School Resource Center and the Brighter Choice Foundation also come up in the search results. Brighter Choice is associated with the single-sex Brighter Choice charter schools in Albany. Although NYCSA doesn’t receive Manheimer money and FERA-NY doesn’t receive Walton money, all of the groups in this cluster receive money from some combination of foundations associated with Gilder, Manheimer and the Walton family.
We don’t know what the exact relationship is among these groups, but when the Charter School Association's books are housed at Change-NY headquarters, my eyebrows go up, particularly when those books show they are funded mostly by the right. There is also a lot of cross pollination between boards of directors and staff, similar missions and common funders of these groups. To what extent is the NYCSA an extension of the anti-tax/anti-union infrastructure of the right-wing in New York state? I have some guesses. Take Peter Murphy for example. Prior to coming to NYCSA, he was an officer of the New ork Charter School Resource Center, which has transferred funds to FERA-NY. It’s a little bit like the Kevin Bacon game, but for right-wing nuts. (What’s your Richard Gilder number?).
And when I read this sort of article, that quotes representatives from both FERA-NY and NYCSA as if there is no relationship, I don’t know what to make of it. Given that New York Sun publisher Roger Hertog is a board member of the School Choice Scholarship Foundation, which is part of this cluster of folks, I’m left with some questions about this sort of thing as well. I mean couldn't Tom Carroll just get his own blog and cut out the middlemen?
A quick note on Joe Williams' portaying NYSUT as several different kinds of animal, all aggressive and unseemly. In his frame, the charter school community is shy and retiring. Of course, when I think of the political heft of the charter school movement in New York, my first thoughts are of the destitute, the meek, the just and the penitent.
Now some of the plutocrats backing the push to expand the charter cap are people like Paul Tudor Jones, David Einhorn and Joel Greenblatt whose good works are obvious, no matter how much I disagree with them on the point of whether--all else being equal--more charter schools is a good idea. And there are a lot of good people working hard every day in charter schools. Heck, I work for some of them. My point isn’t to say that the movement as a whole is nefarious. My point is that the charter school movement isn’t a powerless, shrinking violet. And when it pushes student achievement results that don’t include controls for factors like special education enrollment, and there’s a push back, that isn’t a case of being “sucker punched.”
I've been browsing through the New York State United Teachers' new report on charter schools. My own take, naturally, focuses on the data that is related to school finance. Some 63 percent of the kids in charter schools receive free and reduced lunch. Two percent are English Language Learners, and eight percent are special education kids. But the school districts where those charter schools are located have an average of 80 percent of the kids receiving free and reduced lunch, 12 percent are English Language Learners and 14 percent receive special education services. This demographic spread is similar to what the AFT found a few years ago when we were working on the charter school finance study for the Department of Education.
I want to be clear about this. I'm not saying that these statistics are the result of intentionality on the part of the people who run charter schools. Nor am I saying that any given charter school that is serving a more privileged swath of the student population is inherently evil, or any such thing. The theory that my co-authors and I had was this: Charter schools are trying, in effect, to do the work of a school district, but to on the scale of a school, and often a small school at that, which means there are diminished economies of scale.
What they want, decentralization, is inherently more expensive. That explains why our research showed them spending more per pupil on administration than traditional schools. One response is to adopt a bare bones educational model, which doesn't support programs such as ELL and special ed that have some dollars attached, but are net unfunded mandates. Your revenue profile shrinks, but your cost profile shrinks more.
I have sympathy for people in this position, but that doesn't make these numbers any less a fact, no matter how much it pains the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools. In this case, one of the consequences is that charter schools as a whole undermine the financial footing of school districts in New York state. These numbers put some meat on the bones of the argument I made here and here.
Afterthought: Because Joe Williams of the union busting New York Charter School Association (NYCSA) is once again pushing one of my buttons, I'll say this about student achievement. NYCSA's Peter Murphy is taking issue with the NYSUT report because it compares charter schools to demographically similar schools within the district where the charters are located. He seems to think a better comparison is to the district over all. NYCSA's comparison doesn't control for the demographic differences outlined in this post. That's weak. I'm not saying that the charter school population was born on third base and they think they hit a triple. Its more like first base and a single. But the logic applies. This is par for the course with Murphy.
Posted by Ed
A little bit is being written in the blogosphere about the Progressive Policy Institute’s recent gathering of charter school and union glitterati, which met to see if there is common ground between them. One of the things that strikes me about the charter school issue that I've been dealing with on the blog lately -- finance -- is that people, probably on both sides, have limited information about the facts. And, they don't necessarily see how their rational actions within their own sphere are affecting those in the other sphere. So, sort of like in the Middle East, or in the case of escalating gang tensions, it’s important to take confidence-building measures and to try to see what we can agree on. So good for Andy Rotherham et al.
I think Sara's right that you will be seeing more of this issue. I also think Julie is on to something with her thoughts on this, although that might be because I think the most fruitful discussions will eventually occur over a bargaining table.
But I have no idea what Coby Loup at the Gadfly means when he writes that the report says, "The unions, for their part, should quit strategically eliminating leaders with a moderate stance on charters." Eliminate? At least he didn't say they were "whacked." If you do read the report, it mentions that charter school leaders had a theory that "reform minded" union presidents in four districts had lost elections because of that "reform-mindedness." The report also notes that the union leaders pretty much dismissed this theory out of hand. In this theory, which I don't subscribe to, "reform-mindedness" had nothing to do with charters and everything to do with work rules.
But Loup gets at and reinforces some misconceptions about unions. Saying "the unions should do this or do that" is typically shorthand for "union elected leaders should do this or that." And the use of the word “strategic” implies central coordination. If that's the level at which Loup understands unions, he's missing a different and far deeper point. Unions are democratic institutions and members are going to run if they want, and will elect who they want. Other union leaders don't make those decisions.
Loup’s other statement: "But why would more charter schools (especially successful ones) invite divisive unions into their ranks?" reveals a similar misunderstanding about who does what in labor relations. The people who invite unions into their ranks are the employees. And its not really an invitation, it’s a creation. The decision is up to the staff, not the board, and not the management. Unless, of course, Loup is talking about this, which is shameful and immoral. People in Washington education reform circles seem to get this wrong on a fairly regular basis, so its worth underlining.
Note that Coby Loup is listed on the Fordham website as a former intern. He, understandably, might not have the best perspective or experience with these issues. But I suspect The Gadfly has an editor. And lack of understanding seems to be par for the course in the Gadfly's treatment of the labor movement.
Update: Sara at The Quick and the Ed responds here.
We have a treat today--a post from guest blogger David Hecker, AFT Vice President and President of AFT Michigan.
A recent report Ed Sector report, discussed recently at The Quick and the Ed, about Michigan charter schools is pretty much on the mark, although I do question the broad statement that while charters are not doing better than traditional public schools overall, they are doing better than the urban districts they are in. Are they doing better than some urban districts? Undoubtedly. Are they better than all of them? No way. We have examples of excellent schools throughout urban districts. What we need are the resources to bring all schools to this level of excellence.
The report highlights that three-quarters of Michigan charters are run by private for profit companies, which brings up the question of where the school's bottom line is--the education of the students or profit. I am not talking about the commitment of the teachers and support staff which, like all school employees, is focused on the students, but the priority of management.
It's also worth pointing out that those universities and other entities that operate charter schools get three percent off the top of the per pupil foundation allowance, which is a nice sum, especially if you are Central Michigan University which, sort of like the energizer bunny, keeps on chartering. Of course, that is until the cap on the number of university charters was reached (the cap is only on the number of university charters). Attempts to lift this cap have been numerous and have lead to unsuccessful and rather heated fights. The main point that the report does not make is that the original intent of charters was for them to serve as an incubator of new ideas and approaches, with the successful strategies being incorporated into traditional public schools. The point was not to develop an entirely separate system of public education--one with very limited accountability and that siphons money away from traditional districts. Another important point is that I do not know of anything going on in a Michigan charter that has not been--or cannot be--done by a traditional public school.
Paraprofessionals and School-Related Personnel
"Good for the teachers, good for the school and good for the students."
Charter Schools In NY Go Union
The labor board doesn't really care if people are lying
Editor: John
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The NCLB Blog was established by the AFT as a forum where public education advocates, policymakers and others can exchange information and express their opinions on NCLB and related issues. The views expressed here are not the official views of the AFT or any of its affiliates. All claims otherwise would violate the spirit and purpose of the blog. © American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO. All rights reserved. Photographs and illustrations cannot be used without permission of the AFT.