Bianca cites a litany of anti-teacher-anti public education legislation the Republicans in the state Senate have endorsed that are awful including support for expansion of charter schools, keeping the horrible teacher evaluation system, denying public schools proper funding, an education tax credit for private schools and more. Granted, the Democrats haven't been much help to us either and there are Republicans who support public schools but the Republican caucus in the state Senate led by Senator Flanagan offers us basically nothing. Bianca concludes with this:
Is this the cost of a seat at the table? If so, $109,600 is a large chunk of change to sit at a table where we are being served up.
This blog agrees but still can't figure out what NYSUT political "genius" Andy Pallotta and company were up to here.
I was speaking with a source who confidently told me the DOE is keeping the ATR pool because they need a reserve pool of educators including teachers, guidance counselors, social workers and secretaries fearing a huge shortage in the very near future. The ATR pool is being kept to have a "reserve" of educators when the huge shortage occurs. By having the Atr POOL THE DOE will be able dispense the pool to keep things going until the DOE can go overseas to recruit future educators. The situation is worse than any of us thought and the DOE is all over it. The result of the research has forced the DOE to keep the ATR pool as an insurance for the upcoming teacher shortage. So, when the shortage hits the ATR pool will be dispersed as the insurance the DOE needs to keep classrooms and social worker offices afloat. This makes perfect sense now and could possible explain why the DOE continued to keep the pool even after Bloomberg left. The data is pointing to a huge shortage if you look at education departments in higher education institutions. Translation, you better have insurance in the form of educators to fill the huge gaps that are feared to become a reality.
ReplyDeleteI do believe there will be a teacher shortage but I do not think this is related to the ATR pool. By the time we have the shortage most of the ATRs will be retired. I was around the time when the DOE was recruiting teachers from Romania. Our high school received four teachers. Two left after the first month because they said their life was better in Romania than here. The third stayed because she is could not go back for personal reasons and the fourth stayed for the same- personal reasons offered her sanctuary in America. Then, we received teachers from lain American Countries and the islands and they promptly left. They left faster than TFA teachers. This was before the sky high real estate and rental prices which is one of the reasons native born teachers are leaving New York City among other reasons. So I am not sure these 1500 teachers will make a dent in the teacher shortage. There are plenty of reasons to leave teaching. You would need an ATR pool of 20000 teachers if the pool was an insurance policy.
ReplyDeleteStill nobody has an explanation on why we are donating to the Senate Republicans? Maybe some of the right wingers who comment here are too happy to say anything.
ReplyDeleteANSWER: BECAUSE THE DEMOCRATS HAVE PROVEN TO BE NO FRIEND TO EDUCATION OR THE UNIONS
ReplyDeletethen you are with the UFT on this one.
ReplyDelete