DID FARINA REALLY JUST DECLARE WAR ON ATRs?

Multiple people have sent me copies of the Daily News piece from Sunday where Chancellor Carmen Farina said she is looking to make it easier to fire ATRs after earlier saying teacher retention is a problem.

Here is how Perdido Street School covers the contradiction.

Fariña pledged to announce in the next two weeks a big reduction in the number of teachers getting paid despite not having steady classroom jobs. Earlier this month 114 of the roughly 1,100 teachers — known as the Absent Teacher Reserve — accepted $16,000 buyouts.

Fariña said the numbers would dwindle further as principals are taught best practices for writing up teachers and beginning the arduous termination process.

 This threat comes just one paragraph after Farina talks about the importance of teacher retention:

She also expressed confidence she could improve teacher retention by restoring the dignity of the job. But it won’t be easy. A recent teachers union survey found that 32,000 teachers walked away from city classrooms in the last 11 years, with about 4,600 going to jobs elsewhere in the state — mainly to city suburbs that offer higher pay and less challenging teaching conditions.

Okay, so let me get this straight.

Farina says she wants to restore "the dignity of the job" in order to improve teacher retention but she intends to have her NYCDOE minions go around the city making sure principals "are taught best practices for writing up teachers and beginning the arduous termination process."

Anybody else see the contradictions here?

How do you restore "the dignity of the job" while having principals schooled in the ways to write up teachers in order to terminate them?

Seems to me that's the same kind of teacher-targeting that we got during the Klein and Walcott Years.

Thanks Perdido.  More to come on this as we receive more information. I know I am feeling very apprehensive about returning to work on Tuesday.

As for ATR assignments, I received this email from an ATR named Lisa about people being selected for persecution.  I'm new at this ATR business but I kind of agree with this piece.

When it comes to the mystery shrouded assignment process, perhaps some of you might do well to remember the old adage, "Never attribute to malice what can equally be attributed to by stupidity."

 

Two years ago, I was assigned to a school 12 minutes from my home.  Last year, the school was 20 minutes away.  This year I'm 12 minutes away.   Do I think I'm being singled out for "special" treatment?  Hardly.  During the last two years I have been assigned multiple times to schools on the border of Brooklyn and Queens, as well as Brooklyn/Manhattan where it took me an hour to commute in rush hour traffic.  Do I then think I've been singled out for special punishment?  Not at all  --  I just think of the selection process as a lottery and this week, I had crappy luck.

I could be totally wrong about this, however.  Two years ago a friend of mine was assigned to Washington Heights for the three week startup.  She lives in Brighton Beach and her commute was an hour and 45 minutes each way.  Is it possible the DoE targeted her for extreme annoyance and was trying to force her to retire?  Who knows?  Only the HR Connect can say, and they do not tell, either way.  

 

So, in terms of the paranoia and vitriol -- ladies and gentlemen --  pace yourself.  I know the startup is mentally and emotionally painful, traumatic and depressing, but we have a long school year ahead of us to deal with.  Try not to let your negative past experience cloud your perceptions of the new and as yet "undiscovered country".   

Here's wishing everyone a successful startup.

Lisa