Join us Tuesday, Sept. 28 to protest Education Indoctrination, NBC's non-stop propaganda

I'm all excited. My co-editor on the new video going up now deals with the GEM/CAPE – Real Reformer rally at the theater showing WFS.

Lots of discussion of the film today at the NBC sham Education Nation. I neglected the issue until today when I focused on Brian Jones' great work sitting right next to Michelle Rhee and a few feet away from Randi Weingarten, with Steve Brill in between and the head of the Gates Foundation along for the ride. Viewers might have thought Brian and Randi were allies, but of course Brian ran with the opposition to Unity and is with Teachers for a Just Contract. And has been somewhat active in GEM. Brian made a stand on merit pay and Randi waffled. Brian is a Real Reformer (he was at our rally on Friday - see my video interview with him in post below). Randi is not. I view her as a quasi ed deformer who in many ways has more in common with Rhee (who actually taught longer than Randi) than she does with Brian.

Many bloggers have been out there on this issue - see my blog roll - Failing Schools, Flowers and Sausages, Accountable Talk to name just a few.

But let's get to Tuesday's events: GEM meeting at CUNY at 4:30
But before that at 4pm:

Join Parents Across America, Class Size Matters, GEM, CAPE, and the NY Charter Parents Association at a press conference tomorrow, to protest Education Nation’s total exclusion of NYC parent voices and its unilateral presentation of views, unrivaled in its propagandistic flavor since the days of the Soviet Union.



Ed Notes will be there to tape it.

Here is a message from Leonie:

Since Sunday, NBC and MSNBC have been running a non-stop series of programs called Education Nation, touting the top-down policies of school closings, privatization, charter school expansion, teacher-bashing and high-stakes testing that have failed so miserably here in NYC to improve the quality of our public schools.  (For more on our recent test score debacle, and how NYC has fallen behind other cities since the Bloomberg/Klein policies were put in place, see my testimony today at the City Council hearings.)

At the very same time as members of the City Council, the Bronx BP Ruben Diaz and the UFT head Mulgrew were lambasting the fraudulent use of data by the DOE and the lack of positive results in terms of student achievement, MSNBC gave Bloomberg 15 minutes of uninterrupted time to read a speech on air, in which he touted the progress of schools under his command, without reporters being allowed to ask a single question.

They have invited not a single NYC public school parent onto any of their panels, and have excluded prominent critics including Diane Ravitch.   Brian Williams spent two thirds of tonight's nightly news, with rosy segments about charter schools and the movie "Waiting for Superman.”

The straw that broke the camel’s back for me was when MSNBC scheduled a show, originally entitled, “Does Education Need another Katrina?”   (For more on this, as well a critique of "Waiting for Superman," see my Huffington Post column, Education Indoctrination. )

Please join Parents Across America, Class Size Matters, GEM, CAPE, and the NY Charter Parents Association at a press conference tomorrow, to protest Education Nation’s total exclusion of NYC parent voices and its unilateral presentation of views, unrivaled in its propagandistic flavor since the days of the Soviet Union.

When: Tuesday, Sept. 28 at 4 PM

Where: 50^th and Rockefeller Plaza, in front of the ticket booth for the Observation deck; map here . (subway: take the B, D, F, M to Rockefeller Center.)

Please join us tomorrow and make your voices heard! 

And whether you can make it to the press conference, please send a message to  the President of NBC News, by signing the letter from Parents Across America,  here:

Email me at leonie@att.net if you’re interested in making a statement at the press conference tomorrow, and please forward this message to others who care..

Thanks,

Leonie Haimson
Executive Director
Class Size Matters
124 Waverly Pl.
New York, NY 10011
212-674-7320
classsizematters@gmail.comwww.classsizematters.org

http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leonie-haimson

Follow me on twitter @leoniehaimson

GEM's Brian Jones on MSNBC at 4:30 - streaming live

Brian Jones who works with GEM and ISO will be on a panel today at NBC - unless they shoot him - with Rhee, Randi and Canada. Ed Deform apologist and slug Steve Brill will be moderating.

Brian was at our rally at WFS on Friday and I did an interview with him and another teacher from his school on how the invasion of one of Eva's schools has impacted on their school.



Brian has written a piece for the International Socialist web site that is as good as it gets. There is so much good stuff in this essay that you have to read it 3 times. He closes with this:

There's a racial dimension to these questions that can't be ignored, either. It irks me to no end to hear hedge fund managers refer to the charter school cause as the "civil rights movement of our generation." Education Secretary Arne Duncan says that Waiting for Superman is a "Rosa Parks moment."

Interestingly, Black voters in Washington, D.C. and in Harlem recently--and overwhelmingly--rejected pro-charter school candidates. That's why I think it's more appropriate to call this a Glenn Beck moment. That is, a moment when we should realize that these people are wrapping themselves in the mantle of a movement to which they bear no relation.

Dr. King once said, "The forces that are anti-Negro are by and large anti-labor." Apparently, Black voters are beginning to think that the reverse is also true.
But folks from the business world have an extremely hard time shaking off their faith in free-market principles and their hostility to unions. Evidence and research be damned.
There is more than a slight element of hypocrisy here. To hear the billionaire school reformers tell it, class size doesn't matter, resources don't matter, and experienced teachers are standing in the way of success. But when these same people spend five figures to send their kids to private schools, what do they insist on? Small classes, excellent resources and experienced teachers.

How can we make every public school a great school? Those three things--the things that the wealthy demand for their children--would be a perfect place to start.

NYC Teacher Brian Jones: What I want to say on NBC today: Stop scapegoating teachers

Answer No. 1: Stop scapegoating teachers

September 27, 2010

As part of its "Education Nation" summit, NBC invited New York City teacher Brian Jones to participate in a panel discussion on the future of the teaching profession. Joining him on the panel are Michelle Rhee, the Schools Chancellor of Washington, D.C.; Geoffrey Canada, CEO of the Harlem Children's Zone Project, a network of charter schools; Allan Golston, president of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; Dennis Van Roekel, president of the National Education Association; and Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers.

The title of the panel is "Good Apples: How do we keep good teachers, throw out bad ones and put a new shine on the profession?" The discussion will stream live at MSNBC.com today at 4:45 p.m. (Eastern time).

First, though, Brian has a few thoughts to share before the bell rings.

The entire essay at Norms Notes: