Blow by Blow: Preliminary UFT Election Returns- Updated

Update: Sat, Apr. 10, 9am

Gotham has the results posted here. Thanks to Anna Philips for all her hard work.

11PM

Elem
Total sent 36,907
Ret 10,292 28%
Unity 7761 75.4%
New Action 978 9.5%
ICE 703 6.8%

Non slate 712


Retirees
Ballots sent Returned %
53,560 24,978 46.6

Slate
Unity 20,744 83%
New Action 2,234 8.9%
ICE-TJC 1,037 4.2%

Non slate 867

2010 Prorated .72
Unity 14,934
New Action 1,608
ICE-TJC 746


7:30PM
The % is skewed because I am using the total returns and not subtracting the non-slate votes. Will recalculate another time.

Things have really slowed up. Here are functional totals:

Ballots sent out: 45,889
Ballots ret: 10,629 - 23.2% ret
Slate
ICE 708 6.7%
Unity 7337 69%
New Action 1175 11.1%

Non-slate: 1332


3PM
Middle School vote:

Total ballots-11,697
Returned -2,881 18.6%
Unity 1,981 68.8%
NA 421 14.6%
ICE-TJC 248 8.6%
Non-Slate - 207


1:45pm
High School vote:

Ballots sent: 19,931 Returned: 5203 26%
Slate:
Unity 2595 49.9%
ICE-TJC 1369 26.3%
New Action 774 14.9%
Non-slate: 424 to be tabulated by individual vote

Prelim anal:
Unity vote up around 300, ICE down about 200, New Action up around 200 from 2007.
Looks like big endorsement of Mulgrew.


It's 11am and all we have are percentage of returns. I'm a novice excel user and my formulas may be off so take heed. Totals seem to indicate that around 30% voted all together including retirees which is not much more than last time. But the in schools the vote went up from 22% return to around 27%.

Ballots sent Returned %

Elementary (up from 24% on 07)

36,907

10,292

0.28%

Middle Schools (Up from 18.6% in 07

2010

11,697

2,881

0.20

High Schools (Up by over 700 - from 23% in 07

2010

19,931

5,203

0.30

Functional (Dropped to 20% from 21.4%

2010

45,889

10,629

0.20

Retirees (50% up from 44.7% in 07)- Only 18,000 count so figure around .7 a ballot.

2010

53,560

24,978

0.5

Totals

2010

167,984

53,983

0.30

Totals Elem+MS+HS
68,535 18,376
0.27%

ICE-TJC Totals Will Affect UFT Reaction to RTTT

Did you see the NY Times story today about the NY State disaster in the Race to the Top competition?

Confusion, Chairs and Charters Helped Doom Bid for Grant

A review of the state's application for Race to the Top money, and of the judges' comments, reveals a number of ill-fated moves.

It illustrates an important point. David Steiner said the focus will be on union support. And there is no RTTT without the union agreeing to charters galore and teacher ratings based on test scores. The pressure on the UFT will be intense.

Today's UFT election vote will have an impact on how the union responds. If Mulgrew wins overwhelmingly - in the sense that there is little change from the last election or any signs that ICE-TJC has not gotten any traction - then there will be less reason for Mulgrew to resist this pressure. Think of the UFT leadership as a balloon being squeezed from two directions. The opposition vote is a counter force in that if the trend would be a threat to Unity control at the school level (they are much more insulated at the top due to the distorted election process) would force the leadership to take heed before caving in.

Early Returns - Some Young, Some Old

I got a call from one of my retired colleagues last night, an 80 year old. "I voted for your slate," she said. I would bet that even though I have been gone from my former school for well over a decade, the people still there who knew me voted ICE-TJC.

Earlier in the day, I was told by young woman in her early 20's that one of her teacher friends had told her she and her colleagues in a small school housed in a large closing school had voted for ICE-TJC, mainly because of the ICE member who is chapter leader at the large school.
So we got at least a few votes from the 20-somethings and the 80-somethings.

These stories illustrate an important point. Wherever we have active people, we get votes. Most of our candidates are highly respected for a number of reasons, not the least of which is they are good teachers. Our problem? Not enough active people in enough schools. But that is an issue for the future.

I have no way to predict results but I will say right now a few hours before results come in that based on previous numbers and my sense of how far we were able to reach out, the chance to win even the high school Executive Board seats is very slim. We would need to at least double our vote from 1550 last time to around 3000 to have a chance. In the last election Unity had around 2200 and New Action had 550. A key issue is whether their votes will rise at all this time. I think that there are enough people wanting to give Mulgrew a chance to get Unity/New Action over.

With the fragmentation of large high schools and our limited reach to the younger teachers who occupy the new schools (compare that to the UFT ability to flood every school with their lit and also UFT officials visiting so many schools) I am not expecting us to come close to reaching that number.

I find it pretty ironic that the best we can do is win 6 seats on the EB out of 89. That's the real joke of this election. The opposition will never win without some structural change in the UFT (and that will never take place until the number of active - and I stress this word - active - people there are standing up to Unity). But an explanation of why this is so and what has to be done to change it is also for another time.

Today's vote count is the culmination of the UFT election process, a process that started for some of us ICEers with a meeting with TJC where we decided to work together over a year ago. I hope to write a lot more about the process we went through as a guide for people in the future. But that's also for another time.

If you are interested in early returns through the day, email me at normsco@gmail.com. I don't tweet or whatever but I do burp.


By the way, did you know that the Wall Street Journal now has a NYC beat ed reporter? She contacted me yesterday and we may meet up for coffee later today. That coverage should be interesting to watch. Wouldn't it be funny if it turned out more fair and balanced than the NY Times? Shouldn't be all that much of a stretch.

UFT election figures for New Action Over the Years

New Action Goes CURR
The non-Unity active membership has declared New Action a CURR (Caucus Under Registration Review). In dropping from 31 to 21% of the vote in 10 years ( a 32% decline) New Action has clearly failed to meet the standards. If there is no improvement in the next election, New Action will be closed and reorganized into a debating society.- ED NOTES, MAY, 2001

Wow. Call me Nostradamus or what?

I found some interesting stuff in the 1999 and 2001 election issues of Ed Notes.

Here are pages of the May 1999 edition of Ed Notes, along with the April and May 2001 issues, which contained Marian Swedlow's election analysis and comments and a report card from me on New Action. OK, I was pretty critical of them even at that time for the way they didn't seem to be building an opposition. (Click on images to enlarge.)

In 1999, New Action received 11,400 votes – 1700 coming from retirees, 1900 from non-classroom functionals, 2463 from elem, 1710 from middle schools and 3000 from high schools. (There was another opposition caucus that ran and got just over 1000 votes.) They won all 6 high school exec bd seats.

In 2001, the totals for New Action were pretty much the same but Unity went up as more people voted. The drop for NA from 1991 when they were getting about a third of the vote to around 21% was behind their move to become a house opposition under the control of Unity. How has that worked out for them?

Ed Notes, April 2001

In 2007, New Action received a TOTAL of 3520 votes: 1600 from retirees, 543 funct. 562 in elem., 273 in middle schools and 521 in high schools. With Unity endorsement, they received 3 high school EB seats and 5 at large seats for a total of 8. Thus, in the undemocratic UFT, you can lose 75% of your support in the schools and actually end up with more Executive Board seats.

Look at these numbers over a 6 year period from 2001 to 2007:

A drop from 3000 to 521 in the high schools, from 1700 to 273 in MS and from 2463 to 562 in elem. over 8 years. While they stayed consistent with the retirees, New Action's loss of support with working UFT members was awesome.

What will the 2010 numbers show for New Action?
Unless New Action makes a comeback this time, Randi Weingarten's brilliant legacy may turn out to be her destruction of the long-term opposition in the UFT.

You can see our spreadsheet comparing the 04 and 07 elections here.

Ed Notes New Action report card, May 2001.

UFT Elections: The Anti-Randi Factor

I was at dinner recently. "I didn't vote for ICE," said one of my friends. "I voted for Mulgrew. They say he's a nice guy. He should get a chance. He's a teacher. At least he's not a lawyer," she said with a sneer - an indication that the move from Randi to Mulgrew may give Unity some breathing room. Coming from a rank and file teacher who does not often show much union consciousness, the hostility directed at our former leader is another iteration of how deep RandiWear runs in the UFT.

The anti-Randi comments emanating from throughout the union - the rank and file and internally - I truly have not heard one positive comment said about her from within and without Unity Caucus- are an indication of the total sense of defeat people in the schools feel. When you talk about UFT policy errors to union officials, you get "Randi's not here anymore." You hear things like "Mulgrew doesn't take things personally like Randi did." A good thing. Who needs the angst? Randi seemed to read everything that people on the blogs said. What a waste of time. Mulgrew doesn't seem to give much of a crap what is said. Another good thing.

From the perspective of someone who is not involved in the daily machinations of the UFT as many of us are, the logic of my friend is not off the chart because she views Mulgrew as an individual and is not aware of the Unity machine and how Mulgrew is a product of that machine - a machine that endorsed and promoted and defended every single policy Randi espoused -and still espouses. Just watch all 800 Unity Caucus members traipse to Seattle to the AFT convention in July and cheer every word and awful policy she puts forth. We'll ask observers who are present to check the votes and watch 100% support for Randi from the NYC Unity crew.

The consciousness of Unity Caucus as an entity has not penetrated too deeply into the schools. Surprising you might think considering they have run the union for 50 years. That is part of the Unity strategy. Ask people in the schools if their chapter leader is in Unity and they often don't know. My sense is they are told not to tell their members. Or make much of a deal that many of them are going to Seattle this July to the AFT convention with our dues paying the freight.

It is the job of the opposition to make these connections and disseminate them far and wide and one of the failures has been to do this only every three years at election time, when there is easier access into schools. Now, if every UFT member read Ed Notes diligently, they would be fully aware of Unity and would see clearly that Mulgrew as a product of the machine will turn out to show cosmetic changes only.

So with the UFT election count just days away, the watch will be on to see whether Mulgrew is really more popular than Randi and if he is, does he have coattails for Unity as a caucus, which may take some hits for the conditions in the schools. Some people might show their dissatisfaction with Unity but vote for Mulgrew by choosing New Action. One chapter leader even told me some people in his school were voting for Mulgrew and the rest for ICE-TJC. That seemed pretty strange.

The drop in Unity votes over the last few election cycles is worth noting. I looked at the Ed Notes election report issues from 1999, 2001, 2004 and 2007 and will do some follow-ups over the next few days. The figures are fascinating to wonks like me.

Peter Lamphere on UFT Elections

http://socialistworker.org/2010/04/01/will-the-uft-stand-up-to-bloomberg

Comment: Peter Lamphere

Will the UFT stand up to Bloomberg?

Peter Lamphere, a high school teacher in New York, looks at the key issues in the union election that's drawing to a close. [Peter is a candidate for High School Executive Board on the ICE-TJC slate.]

April 1, 2010

THE 200,000 members of the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) received their ballots for the citywide union elections this March, in the midst of some of the fiercest attacks on our union in decades.

The state legislature is threatening between 4,000 and 8,500 layoffs, Chancellor Joel Klein is attempting to fire teachers for poor student test results and Mayor Michael Bloomberg is intervening in current contract negotiations by publicly pushing to eliminate job security provisions in order to lay off high-seniority--and better-paid--teachers.

The key question in the UFT elections is what strategy to take against this rising tide of attacks. The UFT has been dominated for decades by the Unity caucus, which has made major concessions in work rules and job security in exchange for pay raises. In opposition, a variety of groups have sprung up to challenge this concessionary agenda and demand a mobilization of the membership to resist the city's demands. Greater union democracy is also a key part of the opposition's platform.

The teachers, guidance counselors, secretaries, paraprofessionals, nurses, home child-care workers and other educational workers in the New York City school system must choose between current President Michael Mulgrew and opposition challenger James Eterno. Mulgrew, the candidate for the Unity caucus, has been president for a year, appointed in his position by the UFT executive board when previous president Randi Weingarten ascended to the presidency of the American Federation of Teachers.

Eterno, the chapter leader of Jamaica High School in Queens--which is slated for closure--leads an opposition coalition of two groups, the Independent Community of Educators (ICE) and Teachers for a Just Contract (TJC). This alliance is fighting to hold the line on seniority and tenure rights, reduce class size and end harassment by principals.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

ESSENTIALLY, THE opposition groups want the union to stop making concessionary deals with the city, and instead galvanize the membership to take a stand against the attacks from Bloomberg and Klein.

For example, when the union's contract with the city expired in October 2009, the UFT had the opportunity to publicize the city's draconian union-busting demands to its membership and the city at large amid a closely contested mayoral election. Instead, the union sat out the election and chose the passive option of going through a fact-finding procedure at with the state labor board.

The same fact-finding procedure resulted in major concessions in the 2005 contract. This time around, members were kept in the dark by a negotiating committee sworn to secrecy about the negotiations--that is, until the mayor trumpeted his contracted demands in a nationally publicized speech. To date, there has been no hint of action on the contract talks.

Meanwhile, the city has moved to shutter a number of high schools on the thinnest of educational justifications. This has forced the leadership to make some token mobilizations, including a series of rallies at individual hearings at schools and rally at the city's Panel for Education Policy meeting on January 26. Now that a successful lawsuit by the UFT and the NAACP has temporarily halted the closings, it is an open question whether mobilization will continue, or the UFT will continue to simply rely on the courts.

In this environment of increasing attacks on public education, new activists are joining the ranks of those who see the UFT leadership as an obstacle to struggle. Two new groups, Teachers Unite and the Grassroots Education Movement (GEM), have in particular made their presence felt in the past year, even though they are not directly involved in the elections.

Teachers Unite is a membership-based grouping mostly of younger teachers, organizing around a variety of issues. For its part, GEM has fought against the school closings and the encroachment of semi-private charter schools, particularly in Harlem, where they have been crowding out traditional public schools.

The opposition groups are in an uphill fight against the Unity machine, however. Unity has vast patronage resources at its disposal, including after-school jobs only open to caucus supporters and convention junkets to reward loyalists. Run on iron discipline-- members must forswear any external dissent--the caucus has maintained more-or-less absolute control over the union for decades.

However, there's growing anger and ferment among rank-and-file teachers as we see job security slipping away and no clear strategy from our union leadership to stop the erosion of our rights. Even if an opposition victory is almost impossible at the moment, a vote for ICE-TJC will help sent a message to our leadership and members across the city that fighting back is possible.

As ICE candidate for executive board Arthur Goldstein put it in a recent letter to his chapter:

We act in the interests of working teachers, and we don't fret over whether or not it will get us invited to the next convention or gala luncheon...We don't believe in dumping every gain we made over twenty years for a few points above the pattern. Nor do we believe in negotiating a 10 percent compensation increase for 10 percent more work and calling it a raise.

Catching Up

I got a call yesterday from ICE colleague Julie visiting her daughter in LA asking why I wasn't blogging so she could keep up with the breaking ed news. (Check out her talented daughter Lucy's preview of the upcoming release of her next album.) Why does a retired educator still feels the need to take off for the break? When you think of it, we develop this habit from the day we enter school a 5 year old, so it is hard to break.

With wrapping up the UFT election distribution, dealing with the 25 people who invaded my house for a Seder on Monday - with an age range of 1.5 to 92, going to a friend's funeral, dealing with the loss of a cat, wrapping up the FLL robotics tournament and trying to control my 92 year old dad's interest in young women - which in his case means women in their 80's - it's been a busy few weeks and I haven't had much time for blogging. Or maybe it's all the Manischewitz Extra Heavy Malaga wine I swill all day. We still have an 18 and a half year old cat who is hanging in there and we're trying to decide whether to bring her in to the vet for a checkup or just let things lie. My hot yoga teacher, who has often cared for the cats, told me we were crazy and just let her be. As long as the cat keeps tearing up all those Staples bags, which my pals at the local store's copy center give me, I figure she is doing a OK.

(Here is Pinky feigning semi-indifference towards her late sister, Pippin, who she generally ignored when she was alive, but still is checking to find out where she went.)



There's so much to write about with the ed news that has been coming in from all over the place. In election news, here is a message from the UFT's Ray Frankel, who has run the elections for almost 40 years:

The ballot count will take place on Wednesday, April 7, at the Park Central Hotel, 870 Seventh Avenue (55th Street), the Manhattan Skyline Room. The count is scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. with the opening of two envelopes.

This count is done by the American Arbitration Association and we will be there observing. Anna Philips from Gotham promises to be outside to pick up tidbits she can report. I told her I will trade tidbits for food.

No matter what the results, it is always fun to watch the process, especially with Unity and New Action always taking the results so much more seriously than ICE and TJC. Unity wants to keep ICE and TJC off the Exec Bd even it only the 6 HS people where we have the best chance. New Action is even more desperate to stop their slide and if they lose the high school seats, they will still have 5 EB seats handed to them by Unity, but they will be even more inconsequential than they are. There are still people who vote New Action thinking they are an opposition and Mulgrew's total will reflect the Unity plus New Action count and so will be higher than Unity alone. There is hope he can beat Randi's numbers which if it happens will make her cry.

ICE and TJC see the election as part of a building process from the ground up and most of us were more involved with the grassroots activities of GEM than with the elections. Most GEMers did run and were active in promoting the elections in their schools. The numbers of activists - the true test of building an opposition - are still small but the greater interest and outpouring of people handing out lit, while it may not translate into votes, is a sign of building up a new infrastructure (which was lost when New Action sold out to Unity). As some of our younger activists pointed out, this was a learning process for them. Thank goodness. Next time I can just put my feet up and enjoy the show.

The court case and school closings are at the top of the list of news here in NYC. Leonie's listserve has been active as usual and there's so much good stuff I want to save and publish, I just can't keep up, though I did put up a load of stuff on Norms Notes (which you should check out even over the past week for some great articles), which is where I try to throw up as many interesting articles and posts from others as I can. One of the most interesting was an advance copy of Rethinking Schools' article on Teach for America, which led to this comment:

Alice Mercer said...

THANK YOU! Our district is looking at bringing in TFA even in the face of what was originally 700 layoff notices. I had "heard" about this piece and I'm glad we will have it in time to share with board members before the next meeting.

There was the NYCORE conference a few weeks ago and my appearances at some schools to talk about the elections. Steve Conn from Detroit has been in touch and is urging a group from NYC to go on the march in Washington on April 10 calling for Arne Duncan's resignation. I attended the Diane Ravitch Manhattan Institute luncheon on Wed. which I will write about later and met up with ICE-TJC Elementary school candidate Yelena Siwinski afterwards for a few hours of good ed chatting, followed by an evening robotic year end wrap up at Credit Suisse. I wore a jacket and tie for the Ravitch event and actually looked like a teacher for a change. I ended up in a dumpy pizza joint at 9pm for some greasy pizza.

My attempt to diet has really suffered in the midst of all this. Lucky I had my physical a few weeks ago at my low weight. The doctor, who is now treating almost all of our friends, does not take kindly to fat, cholesterol laden people. I better jump off that Snickers bandwagon real fast before my next blood test.


Follow-ups:
I am working on dealing with the anti-Randi factor in the elections - does anyone in Unity and without have something nice to say?

Also some thoughts on the Ravitch event and some issues I have to take with where she is coming from. I am in the midst of the book and may do chapter by chapter summaries and comments.

NYC Educator Trashes Gotham Schools Election Coverage

I'm cross-posting this from NYC Educator. I had a conversation the other day with Anna Philips who wrote the piece. I'm giving her the benefit of the doubt as this is part of a series. But it is troubling to have her say that the UFT is in trouble of the opposition vote rises when the exact opposite is true. A rising tide will lift the UFT boat, not sink it.

GothamSchools Trashes UFT Opposition, Determines 22% Voter Turnout Not "Too Apathetic"

I was kind of amazed to go to GothamSchools yesterday and read " If the population currently teaching in the city’s classrooms starts to stray to opposition groups, or is too apathetic to vote, the union could be in trouble."

First of all, the article itself states only 22 percent of working teachers voted three years ago. Doesn't a 78% lack of participation already indicate apathy? Or is the accepted standard 79%? I haven't been to journalism school, but perhaps it's written in some highly regarded textbook somewhere.

Be that as it may, I'm also astounded by the contention that the union could be in trouble if too many working teachers stray to opposition groups. Despite what Unity sources may have told the Gotham reporter, we too are union, we believe fervently in union and we think the union is already in trouble. We think many of our troubles began when the UFT/ Unity aristocracy ignored James Eterno's advice and decided to go to PERB in 2005.

Or perhaps GothamSchools simply thinks we are trouble. Maybe Unity told them we were trouble and they're simply reporting it unattributed. Hard to say, since they didn't see fit to explain.

This piece could well have been written by the Unity propaganda team, already up to its elbows in cutesy and blatantly unfair manipulation---and this on the even of the election. ICE/ TJC presidential candidate James Eterno just commented here that today is the very last day to persuade people, and the preposterous contention masquerading as news at Gotham is neither welcome, accurate, nor helpful.

The Unity dynasty, propped up by chapter leaders who've signed away their free will for a couple of trips to conventions, does not much need Gotham's help.

Why don't members vote? Because they've given up. Because they think the election is in the bag and it doesn't matter what they do. The more I read things like that column, the better I understand why they get that feeling.

Perhaps in part two of the Gotham-Unity interview, they'll ask why high school teachers can't select their own VP. Probably they won't. In any case, taking the choice away from high school teachers is not without precedent. The technique of widening the pool to make sure no former slaves got elected by mistake was used with some success after the Civil War. Doubtless when Unity does it to unpredictable high school teachers, it's pristine and pure democracy.

I look forward to the next installment. Perhaps we'll hear not only from the Unity folks who signed the loyalty oath, but from New Action folks as well. We can learn how New Action props up the facade of democracy with fake opposition blatantly and cynically designed to divert folks from troublesome activists who stand up for what they believe, as opposed to what Unity tells them to believe. Maybe they'll express it some other way.

"We believe it's the responsibility of an opposition to support the status quo candidate so we can get jobs and political positions." Perhaps they won't say it that way either.

Whatever they say, I can't wait to see what comes next. I love hearing both sides of an issue, and it's particularly riveting when both sides are spoken out of the same mouth.

ICE SAYS YES—

•To small schools that can offer the same range of services as large schools
•To large schools that strive to offer students and teachers the same intimacy of small schools
•To protecting teachers from reactionary principals
•To effectively organizing school chapters
•To building strong alliances between teachers and parents and students at the school level.
•To strong chapters that cannot be built in isolation
•To teacher autonomy, control and power without which strong chapters cannot exist
•To declare class size reduction a priority contract demand supported by parents and community
•To a democratically run union where power emanates from the schools and chapters, not from a narrow top down decision making body.
•To organizing teachers at the chapter level so they feel they have real power to influence union policy instead of being asked to follow a pre set line dictated from the top.
•To fully protecting UFT members in the schools from the kinds of vicious attacks those with abusive principals face
•To an end to all power to the principal
•To a massive fight back in every school that has a charter inserted like a growing cancer– including the UFT charters – so the UFT can take a stand against the privatization of the public schools.
•To a fightback against school closings on all fronts including massive organizing and not just court cases that complain that procedures weren’t followed this time, impying it is ok to close schools if they are
•To progressive change in the union and the school system
•To a contract that goes beyond money and impacts on classroom and working conditions
•To a serious fightback against paperwork overload and No to phony paperwork reduction committees that do nothing
•To a seniority system that preserves teaching as a career and an end to ATRs


So the next time Unity or New Action slander ICE as the party of NO, think of all these YESES. Unity (with New Action’s support) are the ones who have said NO to these reforms.

The ICE-TJC candidates are amongst the most progressive teachers in the system. People who have been for the kinds of reforms that will make the NYC schools work for teachers, students and parents. They are writers and thinkers and fighters for change.

There are 3 days left to get ICE-TJC leaflets into your school.

Don’t let Unity be the only voice heard.

UFT Election Update: Unity Caucus Gets to Redo NY Teacher Ad

It's nice to be king. Unity Caucus owns the NY Teacher. All caucuses get to put a two page ad in two consecutive issues of the paper. We were told we had to have a camera ready ad in by Feb. 22. But Unity gets a second chance to answer the ICE-TJC ads in the current edition. We would protest - if we thought anyone actually reads the NY Teacher.

On another affront. Unity district reps feel free to go into any school with an ICE or TJC chapter leader and stuff mailboxes with Unity/Mulgrew material during the school day on union time. When we call Michael Mendel to complain about schools that do not let us in during the day, Michael always comes through - except that he tells us he can only guarantee us entry before or after school days. Since Unity sends out packages to every chapter leader to stuff mail boxes, it is fun to observe the UFT's increasingly narrow interpretation of our rights. The union FINALLY sent out a letter to schools affirming the right to place materials in mail boxes- people began receiving them in the last few days. But the letter was dated March 8. That US postal services is sooooo slow, you know.

Most principals don't seem to care one way or another. But Unity chapter leaders often take umbrage with the whining, "You should have had the courtesy to inform me you were coming." Sure I told one. I hit 20 or 30 schools a day and don't exactly have time to call you with a heads up. He actually turned out to be a nice guy, though he was quaking in front of his principal, who had insisted he be present while I stuffed the boxes, even sending up a teacher to cover his class. I was astounded when he told me he doesn't put even union material in the boxes without asking the principal. This is the party in power yet.

But our long term strategy is to develop contacts in as many schools as possible who will not only distribute our materials but become active promoters of what we have to say. Yesterday I was asked by one of our young activist teachers to come to her small high school to meet with the teachers after their own faculty meeting which ended at 4:15. I was surprised at the number that stayed until after 5. Some even voted for ICE-TJC right there. They did not listen because of our ads or out election material but because they have enormous respect for our representative, who is in her first year at the school, is running with us and has the kind of enthusiasm about building a democratic union from the bottom up. I learned a lot yesterday about the climate of small schools and was thinking about how that climate could be created in a large school without breaking it up. (There was an interesting debate on Leonie's list serve yesterday involving Deb Meier in defense of small schools and others who were critical.)

Last week I made an appearance at an elementary school where one of our 5 year activist teachers work. Having them work with us and build strong chapters has been the best part of this campaign. But I will point out that both work in schools where teachers feel they have a strong voice and are happy with their principals. They put in a lot of hours very willingly and that is an issue that we have to address at some point. One of the high school teachers, who had left a large high school with an awful principal 5 years ago, was pregnant and I wonder how things will shake out for her when she has to head home after school to see her baby.

After the meeting I went to CUNY to join the GEM meeting where Puerto Rico teacher union (FMPR) president was the guest speaker. The meeting attracted about 50 people. Afterwards about 20 of us went out to eat.

The response to the election has been much higher than expected, though I don't know if that translates into votes. I finished working on our main leaflet less than two weeks ago, the day before ballots went out. We printed an initial run of 20,000 and by the end of the weekend most of them were out of my hands. Almost every day last week I had to order another box. We are up to 40,000 and that isn't counting the number of people who went out and printed their own copies. Since we are only distributing for 10 days ending this Friday, that seems pretty amazing, compared to previous years. But again, I don't think all these leaflets necessarily translates into votes. In the last election I can't tell you how many people said they voted ICE-TJC but the totals were far below one would have thought. My guess is that people fill out their ballot and just forget to mail it. And then there were those 2 thousand invalid ballots.

That was why we focused on getting people to vote correctly (Unity copied us in their latest ad) and also to remind them to send in their ballots. If you are an ICE-TJC supporter don't just accept it when people tell you they voted for us. Make sure they send in their ballots. Unity chapter leaders are actually holding raffles for people who bring in their ballot to be mailed. Not wanting people to forget who hand-picked Mulgrew, the winners get a print of the famous Klein-Randi (Remember her?) cartoon in Ed Notes.

Related: See the ICE blog for a take on the UFT ad.
UNITY CHANGES THEIR NY TEACHER AD; WE MUST WORK HARDER THAN EVER TO GET OUT THE VOTE

NOTE: I have not been doing much analysis on the election and what it means but will do a lot more next week and after the results are announced on April 7.

Don’t Forget to Vote by Arthur Goldstein

Guest columnist

It’s UFT election time again, and we’re all pretty busy.

In schools, that means a whole lot of flyers telling us who to vote for. Basically there are three slates—Unity, New Action, and ICE-TJC, a coalition of the Independent Coalition of Educators and Teachers for a Just Contract. And election time is now, so I’ve read all of them. They’re not much different from the things you get in the mail when your friendly local politicians want jobs.

Who are these folks? No one denies Unity is the big dog in this race. Every UFT President has been a member of Unity, and the invitation-only Unity Caucus has dominated the UFT, well, forever. New chapter leaders are offered free trips to conventions and recruited. They then sign an application, which specifically states that members will “express criticism of caucus policies within the Caucus” and “support the decisions of Caucus / Union leadership in public or Union forums.” Critics call it a loyalty oath.

In his book The Teacher Rebellion, former AFT President David Selden writes, “Its decisions must be followed by the members in every detail. Several members have been expelled because the opposed the Vietnam War or were not supportive enough of the union’s opposition to community control.” Albert Shanker, the UFT’s first President, was one Tough Liberal indeed.

There are tangible benefits to joining Unity. On the lowest rung of the ladder, you could go to conventions. When I became a UFT delegate a few years back, a teacher told me, “You know, I’d like to become a delegate.”

“Really?” I asked. “I’m surprised. I didn’t think you were interested in union politics.”

“I’m not,” he said. “I just want to go to the conventions.”

That wasn’t the best way to earn my support, but at the time, he may have known union politics better than I did—he’s got Unity buddies.

The oldest opposition party is called New Action. When I started teaching I voted for them. Their pamphlets made it clear they were outsiders, and that appealed to me. Unity put out particularly nasty flyers, calling them “No Action,” which I found juvenile. From what I heard around the lunchroom, they had no chance of winning anyway, so I figured what the hell, and voted for them. They did have a few seats on the UFT’s policy-making Executive Board, mostly representing high schools, and for a while even junior high schools.

Soon after I started teaching (in 1984), they surprised everyone and took the High School Academic Vice Presidency. After Mike Shulman won, Unity forced a revote in which Shulman won by an even larger margin. After Shulman failed to be re-elected in the next election, they forced a rule change. High school teachers no longer select the High School Academic Vice-President. Now, not only all teachers, but also home day care workers, the administrative law judges and other non teachers, including retirees living it up in Boca Raton, vote for all vice-presidents. It’s kind of like having Oklahoma and Texas help New York choose representatives—the results became much more predictable.

In 2003, New Action made a deal with Unity. They would no longer oppose the Unity presidential candidate, and Unity would no longer oppose them for the six high school seats on the UFT Executive Board, seats New Action had won by narrow margins time and again. They couldn't resist this sure bet. Also, New Action leaders, for the first time, were given union jobs.

Some members of New Action, disenchanted with this move, left to join a group of non-affiliated activists to form the Independent Community of Educators, or ICE. In 2004, they teamed up with another caucus, Teachers for a Just Contract (TJC). They defeated New Action and took high school seats that Unity had not opposed. This resulted in the unspeakable—unapproved minority representation in the UFT Executive Board. Though this represented only 6 seats of 89, even that was unacceptable. The Unity Caucus didn’t want to be pestered by Executive Board members James Eterno and Jeff Kaufman—as they vigorously opposed things like the 2005 contract, merit pay, and mayoral control. It’s so much easier to run an organization without meddlesome dissenters—ask Mayor Bloomberg.

To make sure this wouldn’t happen again, Unity cross-endorsed New Action candidates in the 2007 election. Though ICE/ TJC outpolled New Action 3 to 1 in high schools, New Action won several Executive Board seats representing high schools while ICE/TJC got none. Clearly, the Unity cross-endorsement had paid off.

ICE/TJC is running a slate including presidential candidate James Eterno, Jamaica’s UFT chapter leader, and former UFT executive board member. (Full disclosure—I’m running for the UFT’s Executive Board representing high schools.) ICE/ TJC now seems to receive the all the love that used to be reserved for New Action, largely characterized as perpetual naysayers. It’s true we oppose the appeasement of anti-teacher, anti-union demagogues like Mayor Bloomberg and Joel Klein—but that’s because it’s been repeatedly proven not to help us.

Still ICE/ TJC supports a lot of things—a fair contract, placement for teachers whose schools close, democracy in NYC as well as the UFT, and a driven chapter leader named James Eterno for UFT President. We support transparency. We support teachers, guidance counselors, secretaries, and paraprofessionals. We support working people and the future of the teaching profession.

We support union, a strong union that stands up and fights those who baselessly attack us in the media. We support fighting fire with fire, speaking truth to power, and using the power of the UFT for something more productive than creating cute little cartoons that air during the Today show.

We are writers, thinkers, and doers. We are real live activists, who don’t need to organize an advisory committee or ask permission before demonstrating in front of Mayor Bloomberg’s house. When there’s a fire, we’re not on our Blackberries emailing Randi Weingarten for directions before we evacuate. We act in the interests of working teachers, and we don’t fret over whether or not it will get us invited to the next convention or gala luncheon. We are proactive, not reactive.

We don’t believe in buying dear and selling cheap. We don’t believe in giving up everything but the kitchen sink for an extra point. We don’t believe in selling out new teachers by promising three percent of their salaries to Mayor Bloomberg for an extra 17 years. We don’t believe in dumping every gain we made over twenty years for a few points above the pattern. Nor do we believe in negotiating a ten percent compensation increase for ten percent more work and calling it a raise.

We hope teachers vote, and we hope they think carefully before doing so. The machine is getting a little creaky.

It’s time for new blood.

Elfrank-Dana Letter to Bergtraum Staff

It’s that time again- the UFT elections. You should get your ballot in the mail.

Only about one quarter of us will vote if trends continue. It’s a problem I brought up to the union leadership (including Mulgrew); this lack of participation. They were at a loss as to why or what could be done about it.

It’s one of the reasons why I joined the ICE/TJC opposition. We need strong democratic unionism to move us forward. The Unity Caucus (Randi Weingarten and Michael Mulgrew’s political machine) may have gotten us more money from contracts, but have given so much away in terms of rights that sticking around long enough to enjoy the benefits seems impossible.

The days of accommodation, we want to be on your team, approach must end. We can’t rely on the strategy of the benevolent mayor (dictator) to save us; which has been Unity’s approach. We need to stand on the fundamentals of democratic unionism. We must organize for confrontation. However, we must be smart, patient and brave about it.

I think the ICE/TJC slate, with James Eterno for President, is our best hope. I know James personally. He’s been a valuable source of information for me. He’s an experienced chapter leader and man with principles. He gets it.

You can see James and what the ICE/TJC ticket stands for at: http://uftelections2010.blogspot.com/2010/02/james-eterno-ice-tjcs-candidate-for.html

Please feel free to pass this message along to any other UFT members you know.

In solidarity,

John

John Elfrank-Dana
UFT Chapter Leader
Murry Bergtraum High School
www.Elfrank.com/UFT

The Dreaded "D" and the UFT

Yes. D for Discontinuance. Once you get it on your record you cannot be hired. Any principal it seems can doom you for life. If someone offers you a job and asks for your records, the DOE will not release them. Why? Because they require a letter that you have a job offer which no one will give you without seeing your records. Yossarian would be left scratching his head at this one.

Now on to the UFT. If you find you are blacklisted by the dreaded D and ask the UFT for help you will get 12 different answers. The most common is: Don't worry, that is only for your district. You can be hired by another district. NOT.

How shameful that the Unity Caucus/UFT just lets people hang out to dry like this. In purgatory forever. A fighting union would make a big deal out of this. But the people with D's are the nontenured and the few, so why bother?

One word of advice people get is to resign before they get the dreaded D and get re-certified in another license. Some choice.


Distribution update:
ICE-TJC leaflets are going like hot cakes. People have been making copies and putting them out in their schools without even letting us know. It would help to know so we don't duplicate but if people get the stuff twice we are still behind the Mulgrew murder of entire forests. The latest is a letter from your Unity chapter leader and the district rep telling you to vote for Unity.

I finally got into Fort Hamilton yesterday where the Unity CL had told the school aide at the desk not to let me in. The principal invited me into her office and we had a lovely chat.

I spoke to two lunch hours at an elementary school with a Unity CL, who was not the one to invite me. A few younger teachers and we had a good chat about numerous issues beyond the election. Very invigorating - for me at least.

Some Unity hacks are telling teachers who want to invite me it is not allowed. Pretty funny when the entire Unity machine waltzes into schools at will. "No electioneering" they tell ICE supporters, another Catch-22 for Yossarian.

The Distributive Law

I spent part of yesterday going around schools putting ICE-TJC election lit in mailboxes. I wish I could tell all the stories but I don't want to give away too much to the Unity/New Action slugs/thugs that troll this blog.

But one story is worth sharing:

I went to Grady - Mulgrew's old school - where I expected some problems. Sure enough the security guard wouldn't let me in until she got the CL - said he went ballistic the last time someone came in. I challenged that he had to be called- I said he was the Republicans and I was the Democrats and he had no right to interfere - and some other guards backed me up. One of them escorted me to the mailboxes and the slug/ thug passed us - "that's him" she said. I called to him and said we were monitoring the boxes and if the election were close we would challenge on the basis of no equal access if the leaflets were pulled.

"You have no right to come in my building" he said. Sure. I went in and stuffed the boxes, expecting them to be pulled

After I stuffed the boxes I decided to call Michael Mendel from the UFT who is the contact person and does a good job making sure our rights are enforced to tell him that the CL had no right to tell the security guards not to let people in. Just then the Unity slug/thug walked into the mailbox room and took out a leaflet and tore it up - then another. I told Mendel he was doing it as we spoke and the slug said he was just tearing up the ones on his box. I told Mendel we would monitor the Grady boxes and protest the election if close in the high schools. I also told him this guy was not exactly the best face even Unity would want for the union. If I have to go back there every day I will.

On the way out I got smiles and thumbs up from some of the security guards. Unity slug/thug is not well loved it seems.


Once the UFT election ballots went out on Friday, ICE went into full distribution mode for a the next two weeks. Our partners, TJC, have been out there for a few weeks but our strategy was to wait for people to begin receiving their ballots before hitting the schools.

There has been some criticism directed our way for not going out much sooner to stuff mail boxes, which have been flooded with Unity and New Action material.

I have never been convinced that the mailbox stuffing has much of an impact. Unity doesn't have to send out hordes to stuff. All they do is send it to chapter leaders and they get 95% penetration. And where they know an ICE person is present they send in the district reps to stuff. New Action has a horde of 20 retirees out there stuffing. ICE has 3.

So with many of the ICE core being involved with GEM and fighting the charter and school closing battles, we decided to husband our resources.

Look at Unity in the last election. They stuffed and stuffed, as they are doing now.

Unity received 6200 votes out of a potential 40,000 elementary votes, 1500 votes out of potential 13,o00 votes in middle schools and less than 2200 out of 20,000 in high schools. That's pretty slim.

New Action also stuffed last time and their totals were: HS 521, MS 273 and ES 562.

ICE-TJC totals were: HS 1550, MS 444, ES 1337

You can see the comparison of the 2004 and 2007 elections here.

Considering Unity is Bloomberg and we're Tony Avella, the totals were pretty weak for Unity compared to us. They might do better now that the increasingly despised Randi is gone - even though Mulgrew was her personal choice. The behind the scenes Unity campaign is: He's NOT Randi.

So the idea of spending 6 weeks racing around schools for weeks before teachers who mostly couldn't care less about the elections or even have any knowledge about it didn't make sense. But the 2 weeks after they get their ballots did make sense. Remember that 77% of the teachers in the schools did not vote last time. So if they see a flier now it might connect a bit. Hopefully, they connect by checking the ICE-TJC box.

UFT Elections: The Young Uns are Coming - Teachers Unite/NYCORE Endosrse ICE-TJC

Maybe they're not coming quick enough to affect this election. But they are coming. The Teachers Unite/NYCORE candidates forum drew a nice crowd over a week ago. Check out the final 10 minutes in this video I posted:

ICE, TJC, Unity, New Action at TU/NYCORE Candidate Forum

Both groups then endorsed the ICE-TJC slate in the election.

On Thursday night they held a "Get out the vote" event which drew some teachers. Just drops in the bucket so far, but the first signs of movement on that end in a long time. Maybe I can really retire soon.

I received a request from one of the participants, a first year teacher, to send her ICE-TJC lit for her school. I have two invitations to speak at schools this week from two other participants, teachers in the system for 5 years or less.

As I said, this awakening may be too little too late - for this election. But as one participant said: This is a great training ground for me for the future. I knew almost nothing about the UFT before this. Our role is to provide whatever assistance the new generation of union activists need.

So many people have told us they just forgot to vote. It is not enough to put leaflet in mail boxes. Unity CL's are actually offering raffle tickets to anyone who brings them their ballot.

Here is a GOTV questionnaire TU/NYCORE made up to get people to vote.

1) Did you receive the ballot for the UFT election in the mail? Ballots are mailed March 12

2) Do you know who you’re going to vote for?

3) What are two things that would improve your working conditions?

4) What other issues are important to you?

5) What do you know about the different caucuses and slates?

Organizing union

We want to help build an organizing union that mobilizes all of us to fight against pay-for-performance policies and budget cuts, while fighting for a contract that guarantees us a cost of living wage increase and no give-backs.

Teachers have a voice

We need to show our union leadership that we teachers have a voice that must be heard.

Teachers Unite and NYCoRE endorses ICE-TJC

Teachers Unite and NYCoRE have endorsed the ICE-TJC slate because they have actively fought for a democratic, transparent union that mobilizes its members, makes their voices heard, and leads UFT decisions.

Unity

Unity has led our union since the 1960s and we feel their bureaucratic style is undemocratic and conciliatory. Unity is the current leadership of this union that comes up short in the fight against the injustices facing our schools and communities. In addition, Unity has agreed to givebacks on teacher time as well as coming out in support of merit pay for test scores and charter schools.

6) Can I count on you to vote for ICE-TJC?

7) [If “no” or “not sure” to the question above] Can I count on you to vote at all?

8) [For the very enthusiastic]: Do you know five other colleagues you can talk to about the UFT election? Who?

9) Did you know that over 2,000 ballots were invalidated in the last UFT election because people made a check mark by both the individual candidates AND a slate?

Ballot

[Show your ballot and how to vote for the ICE-TJC slate]

10) Would you bring your ballot in on [specific day/date: ] so we can vote together and show our co-workers the importance of our vote?

11) I’m going to check back with you on [specific day/date ] to follow up.

UFT/Unity Uses Paid Employees to Suppress Opposition in Union Election

UPDATED, 8:40 am, Mar. 11

It has long been known how the UFT/Unity machine uses paid personnel in union elections. As most schools have Unity chapter leaders, they have a ready means of keeping control of the schools. But when they are faced with an independent chapter leader they use the district reps to try to intimidate them into not putting material in the boxes. And of course, we have constant reports of Dist. Reps going into these schools on union time to stuff Unity material in the boxes. If they see ICE-TJC lit, they even pull them out themselves.

For people who are not committed ICE or TJC activists (who they don't dare bother), these actions by the Dist Reps can be intimidating because in the union hierarchy the DR is the single most important person the CL, especially newer ones who feel very insecure in their knowledge, must deal with for help.

Now the use of this personnel has been standard operating procedure for the Unity machine.

What people don't realize is that the elections every three years for union officers are not as important as the elections for chapter leaders which occur the year before (next elections are spring 2012, which is where serious battles will take place when it becomes clear that Mulgrew will be as big a sellout as Weingarten). This is not an accident. Unity pulls in all new chapter leaders into training and uses those sessions to recruit them into Unity just in time for the big election the year after, which in most cases shuts down the ability of the opposition to reach those schools without schlepping physically into those buildings. Since ICE-TJC are working teachers, the ability to impact the vast majority of schools is minimal.

But even if they could get a leaflet into all the schools, that is minimal compared to having a thousand Unity people in the buildings actively bombarding people with pro-Unity material and intimidating people who are sympathetic to the opposition. In fact, Unity chapter leaders often just pull out the leaflets from the boxes after the ICE-TJC rep leaves. One ICE chapter leader who stuffed boxes throughout her district sent me this email:

Three years ago, in my district, many school chapter leaders who are Unity pulled out ICE-TJC literature and thrown them away. I have had teachers that I know call to tell me and even a security guard. Who knows what will happen this year?

Well, we know what is already happening this year. Yesterday I received this email from a non-ICE chapter leader who is an independent critic of the UFT leadership. It got ugly.

My district rep gave me an argument about putting ICE flyers in mailboxes. She said that everything gets back to her. I said that I have the right to do this, just as the New Action person had the right to come to my school and distribute, and that she had the right to come to do this.

She said that she doesn't see how I can think that a chapter leader could run the union. I pointed out that Mulgrew was a chapter leader, and so was she.

She was disgusting. Told me I am a member of Ice (you and I know that I'm not). I pointed out that Weingarten laid the groundwork for many of the problems that we are dealing with now. She said Weingarten isn't there anymore. I said that RW handpicked Mulgrew.

I mentioned Diane Ravitch. She said that Ravitch is mentoring Mulgrew. !!!!!!

Are they very threatened?

Now this District Rep (I am protecting the CL from retaliation of giving no support) is notoriously incompetent. When we blitzed her district in 2004 we were stopped at every single school by the Unity chapter leader, who told the principals we didn't have the right. Or they created so many delays on purpose that it just wasn't worth the time. So they win that battle. For now.

As I said, the opposition must have a critical mass of chapter leaders who will stand up to the Unity goons to make a dent. To all those who talk about the need for more ICE literature and advertising they are missing this essential point. I hear some say, "look at how Obama won!" Again they miss the point. Obama had a massive machine to support him. Over the past few years ICE and TJC have understood that and have focused on building this machine, which they had to start building from scratch when New Action, which had 40 years to build a machine, abandoned the fight and joined Unity. Much of the New Action vote, which was less than ICE-TJC last time, comes from this machine. Now that many NA people are retired, they have about 40 people going around schools pushing their stuff. And some people are not aware that they have sold out and just check the NA box thinking they are still the opposition - just this weekend a retired friend asked me if he should vote NA to vote for me. I gagged.

I can't tell you how many independent or ICE-leaning people are frightened to come out of the closet. We get anonymous pleas to put out lit but they don't send us their names and schools so we can get it to them.

Since I am available during the day, some people have asked me to come to their schools during lunch or come to a union meeting to give our point of view. Their Unity CL throws up all sorts of road blocks - like that's not allowed - but every Unity slug can come into the building at any time.

With ballots going out tomorrow (March 12) and must be returned by April 6 (the count is on Apr 7 and open to any UFT member), the consciousness about the election should rise. Since only 22% of the working teachers voted in the last election (the drop in Unity votes (and New Action too) was palpable while there was a rise in ICE-TJC votes, but still fairly negligible.

This year, we have focused on getting out the vote in the buildings we have people. For the first time we have attracted some newer teachers, including even a former Teach for America, to run with us. Still just a small group but a beginning of building that machine into the newer teacher crowd.

Teachers Unite and NYCORE have gotten involved by reaching out to their younger teacher constituency. They held a fabulous candidate forum last Friday with all 4 caucuses represented by Michael Fiorillo, Megan Behrent, Leo Casey and Michael Shulman (see a 10 minute slice:
ICE, TJC, Unity, New Action at TU/NYCORE Candidate Forum).

Today they are holding a Get Out the Vote training session (see side bar but you must rsvp as there is little space). I will be there to explain the process and take some video.

ICE, TJC, Unity, New Action at TU/NYCORE Candidate Forum

On March 5 candidates from each of the 4 caucuses in the UFT held a candidates forum sponsored by NYCORE and Teachers Unite. There's a lot I could say about this event but for now I'll leave the videos talk for themselves. There is about 2 hours worth and since you-tube has 10 minute limits I will put them up in sections, unedited if possible.
Here is the final summing up where each rep got 2 minutes each.




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpkggISk4v0

Download the ICE UFT Election Leaflet for Your School

Forward to your friends.
Make a donation to the campaign. Make copies for your colleagues at schools. Stop by nearby schools to put some in the mail boxes (you have the right in the election season.) If you wish we will send you copies. Email ICEUFT@gmail.com with the number of copies you need. Or call Norm at 917-992-3734.

ICE UFT Election Flyer

http://www.scribd.com/full/27389047?access_key=key-1v1201we990j0wsemxwo