Rahm Emanuel Also Has A Union Problem

[WildCat]

Now that he's Mayor Emanuel, he is on a collision course with the Chicago Teacher's Union:

No sooner had Rahm Emanuel taken the stage Tuesday night as mayor-elect than his thoughts turned toward restoring confidence in the city's fractured public school system.

Emanuel pledged to try to improve student safety in violent communities, boost the fortunes of struggling neighborhood schools and urge parents to take a more active role.

But Emanuel knows the problems at CPS, the nation's third-largest school district, run much deeper, and even before his sweeping victory Tuesday he made enemies of the Chicago Teachers Union with his strong support of charter schools and his plan to keep the school board under mayoral control.

The divide culminated last week when union president Karen Lewis stood before reporters and said: "The fact is Rahm Emanuel does not seem to support publicly funded public education as we know it." The union chose not to endorse a candidate for mayor.

The big issue with the CTU is Charter Shools. Charter schools are public schools, but operate independently of the school board and with each other. Most of the Charter schools teachers are not represented by a union, though they can unionize just 8 have done so. But even if they do unionize, state law states they can't be represented by the CTU, so they formed their own union affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers. The CTU doesn't like any of this.

Charter schools get to set their own hours, length of school year, have much greater flexibility to hire and fire teachers, set their own education policies, and set their own teacher's pay and benefits. All the things the CTU likes to set in stone in their contracts and control themselves.

Charter schools have been quite successful, and are so popular that students literally must win a lottery to get in. The rest of the public schools, by contrast, are extremely poor performers and a big reason why middle class families move to the suburbs when they have children of school age.

So the CTU is going to put pressure on Emanuel to stop expanding the Charter school program and force them to operate under the same rules all the other public schools in Chicago represented by the CTU have.

Conventional wisdom has it that if he folds to the CTU those schools will perform as bad as the rest of the school system does.

On top of that, later this year is when negotiations with the CTU begin over a new contract.

The most prickly issues likely will surround teacher pay, education experts say. In response to questions by the Illinois Latino Agenda, Emanuel floated the idea of creating a new salary scale for teachers tied to performance. The new proposal would allow the best teachers to reach top compensation in eight years, as opposed to regular wage increases, and gives the most effective teachers bonuses for transferring to low-performing schools.

The union will soon learn that Emanuel is a more formidable negotiator than Mayor Richard Daley, said Barbara Radner, director of the Center for Urban Education at DePaul University.

"The thing that's going to be different in Chicago is that Rahm Emanuel is not going to be making concessions," Radner said. "He's going to say what's going to happen, and then he's not going to wait around for people to come to a consensus. He's going to lead the way. But it may be an even bigger challenge than even he knows."

When an irresistable force meets an unmoveable object...

 

[Cobalt]

This is certainly going to get interesting....

 

[Puppycow]

Is this going to be a replay of what happened in Washington with Fenty and Michelle Rhee?

Heck, he could even hire her, as she's available now.

 

[MattusMaximus]

His problem is that he wants to negotiate with the unions? Wow, sounds crazy to me

 

[Tsukasa Buddha]

Charter schools have been quite successful, and are so popular that students literally must win a lottery to get in. The rest of the public schools, by contrast, are extremely poor performers and a big reason why middle class families move to the suburbs when they have children of school age.

That is not evidence of success. Studies have consistently shown that parents love charters, even when they don't perform better on any objective educational measurement.

A big problem is that they replace old neighborhood schools with small charters, which then push kids out to other crowded schools (sometimes with rival gangs).

Statistically, it is a wash. The Wiki says it best in this case:

Another study released in 2009 by SRI International, a California-based independent research institute, indicated that Renaissance 2010 schools have performed about on par with Chicago Public School-owned schools, with potential for further improvements. Demonstrating the divisive nature of the Renaissance 2010 plan, proponents have used this study to argue that the new schools are solid foundations for better education, while opponents have used this same study to claim that the new schools provide little to no gain for their cost and social disruption.

Linky.

It is more a boring battle of ideology, and I don't like it.

 

[WildCat]

That is not evidence of success. Studies have consistently shown that parents love charters, even when they don't perform better on any objective educational measurement.

A big problem is that they replace old neighborhood schools with small charters, which then push kids out to other crowded schools (sometimes with rival gangs).

Statistically, it is a wash. The Wiki says it best in this case:



Linky.

It is more a boring battle of ideology, and I don't like it.

I counter with this: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/...epted-to-college-0217-20110216,0,805744.story

Know any other Englewood schools that get 100% of their graduates accepted into college? 2 years in a row? I bet you can't find one where even 20% do.

Chicago lost 200,000 residents over the last decade. A good chunk of them left for better schools. You shouldn't have to win a lottery to get a chance to go to a good school.

By now, Urban Prep's story has become a national wonder for its success in making college a reality for kids from tough, low-income neighborhoods where college rarely is an option. In Chicago Public Schools, the high school dropout rate for African-American males hovers at 60 percent, and only 1 in 40 black male grads earn a bachelor's degree by the age of 25.

Only 11 percent of Urban Prep's seniors were reading at grade level when they entered the school four years ago, King said.

 

[Tsukasa Buddha]

I counter with this: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/...epted-to-college-0217-20110216,0,805744.story

Know any other Englewood schools that get 100% of their graduates accepted into college? 2 years in a row? I bet you can't find one where even 20% do.

But that is another poor metric. The school actually doesn't perform any better on educational metrics, and it kicked out half of the class by the time they graduated.

Last time I looked, graduation rates are determined by simple mathematics. You take the number of students that actually graduate after their senior year and divide that figure by the total amount of students that enrolled as freshmen four years earlier. Unless the malicious remnants of ‘new math’ are used in Chicago, the true graduation rate from Urban Prep is 57 percent. If I am accurate, Urban Prep graduated its young gentlemen at a rate lower than the official CPS figure of 62 percent.

Certainly at this point liberal bedwetters, Duncan acolytes, and assorted African-American apologists are sharpening their rhetorical knives and googling my address because I am shining a light on a very popular untruth. Frankly, if the manufactured success of Urban Prep (UP) were just restricted to the fishy and juiced-up graduation rate, I could easily have ignored it and let this beleaguered city of perpetual failures dwell in the glow of a rare touchie-feelie moment. However, the deceit goes deeper than the academic performance of these 95 lads, and has dire consequences for those who believe it. Rachel Cohen’s article directed me to the Illinois Interactive Report Card for public schools and I went there and analyzed the charts and numbers.

I was stunned to learn that the celebrated Urban Prep Charter School failed to make its state mandated Annual Yearly Progress (AYP) goal. Furthermore, only 15 percent of its 450 students met state standards in reading and mathematics. I could pile on a bunch off other grim test statistics that paint a much more different picture of UP than their recent press coverage but there is no point in doing so. Why? Because those that prefer to live within the walls of a dark lie that is politically convenient here in Chicago will not be moved by the facts in this case anymore than they were moved by the facts in others. Chicago is a voluntary gulag populated by low intensity leftists that do not understand that corrupt government is not a midwest birthright. Furthermore, those who do want the truth have only to go to the Report Card website to verify the data for themselves.

Linky.

Chicago lost 200,000 residents over the last decade. A good chunk of them left for better schools. You shouldn't have to win a lottery to get a chance to go to a good school.

I agree, I just don't think charters have shown themselves to be an actual solution.

 

[Meadmaker]

Chicago lost 200,000 residents over the last decade. A good chunk of them left for better schools. You shouldn't have to win a lottery to get a chance to go to a good school.

It is this simple fact that led me to be an ardent supporter of school choice. Never mind that charters or vouchers cannot work miracles. That isn't the point. Here in Detroit, if you were a parent of a four year old child, and you were anything other than completely and totally poverty stricken, you left the City of Detroit.

You can't rebuild a city when that's the case.

As charter schools have become more common a few more middle class residents have chosen to stay in Detroit.

Our local teachers' union took a huge hit a couple of years ago. They went on strike at the beginning of the year, and were stunned when there was a massive increase in charter school enrollment.

 

[WildCat]

This pic was in today's Chicago Tribune:

You'd think the teacher's union lackeys would at least know the difference between "whose" and "who's" and how to put the punctuation mark at the end of the sentence.

 

[carlitos]

LOL @ that pic!

 

[Newtons Bit]

This pic was in today's Chicago Tribune:

[qimg]http://home.mindspring.com/~a.lo/sign_fail.jpg[/qimg]

You'd think the teacher's union lackeys would at least know the difference between "whose" and "who's" and how to put the punctuation mark at the end of the sentence.

Think??

No, you are not.

 

[WildCat]

Here's the current procedure for firing a bad teacher in Chicago, Chicago Tribune graphic:

This could use some serious streamlining. Bad teachers usually hang on until retirement, because principals don't want to go through this byzantine procedure.

 

[Kestrel]

Here's the current procedure for firing a bad teacher in Chicago, Chicago Tribune graphic:

[qimg]http://home.mindspring.com/~a.lo/CPS_firing_chart.jpg[/qimg]

This could use some serious streamlining. Bad teachers usually hang on until retirement, because principals don't want to go through this byzantine procedure.

It it typical to dismissed teachers to take the appeal all the way to the Illinois Supreme court, or did the person who made the graphic just lie about that?

 

[C_Felix]

His problem is that he wants to negotiate with the unions? Wow, sounds crazy to me

Remember, if you thought that talking and netotiating with SH before the US invasion of Iraq was a good idea, you were a pinko, commie, liberal, organic-yogurt eating wuss.


Like I've said in other posts.

It takes two to tango.

The unions just don't go to the gov't and say, "here it is, sign it!" and the govt' says, "Okay."

Shame on people for wanting to find a middle ground! Shame on them.

 

[WildCat]

It it typical to dismissed teachers to take the appeal all the way to the Illinois Supreme court, or did the person who made the graphic just lie about that?

Of course not. Typically, no attempt at all is made to fire a bad teacher because starting this process is expensive and time-consuming.

Far easier to let them fail class after class after class of children. Hey, this creates jobs for cops, prison guards, and public aid workers! It's win-win!

 

[Newtons Bit]

Of course not. Typically, no attempt at all is made to fire a bad teacher because starting this process is expensive and time-consuming.

Far easier to let them fail class after class after class of children. Hey, this creates jobs for cops, prison guards, and public aid workers! It's win-win!

It would be nice to see the percentages of teachers at each stage of the process, once it is started, however.

 

[carlitos]

It it typical to dismissed teachers to take the appeal all the way to the Illinois Supreme court, or did the person who made the graphic just lie about that?

The person who made the graphic said it was typical? Can you please circle that on the graphic for me?

 

[WildCat]

And one other thing, the Chicago Public School day is just over 5 hours, and the school year is 170 days. Both are among the shortest in the nation, no doubt this affects how much kids learn. And it is the Chicago Teachers Union that set these hours and days.

There is a bill in the legislature seeking to make hours and length of school year non-negotiable when contracts expire, of course the CTU opposes this bill.

 

[Kestrel]

The person who made the graphic said it was typical? Can you please circle that on the graphic for me?

The line in bold near the top of the graphic:

Here is how a typical case in the Chicago Public Schools system proceeds

 

[WildCat]

The line in bold near the top of the graphic:

If it proceeds. The system is designed so that cases don't proceed at all.

eta: Typicalkly, the bad teacher is left in place or shuffled from school to school, a process known as the "dance of the lemons".