According to the Gotham Schools blog, Duncan “praised the state’s collaboration with NYSUT” and said: “What you saw here was folks working together. I think many people predicted this couldn’t work out, couldn’t happen, but this is union-imagined, working together to get the right points.”

Here’s the full blog post.

In a visit to NYSUT headquarters in August 2010 to discuss the union’s Innovation Initiative, Duncan “tremendous courage, tremendous leadership and a real commitment to changing the status quo” to do what’s best for students.

In addition to the blog link we posted, here’s a link to New York One’s coverage of Wednesday’s press conference.

Below is video that AQE produced.

Here also is a link to a Capital Tonight interview with the Education Law Center about the legal issues on the way school aid is distributed.

We need to keep up the pressure and one way you can help is by signing NYSUT’s petition. Here’s the link for you to tell lawmakers that competitive grants are no way to fund schools.

Cuts, cuts, everywhere are cuts. If so much state aid has been restored, well then why are there so many cuts? Because once that $250 million comes out of the $805 million aid increase, it’s only a 2.9 percent school aid increase  on average. Some get less. Here’s your handy calculator to find out what your district gets. For example, South Glens Falls schools only gets a 1.23 percent increase while New Paltz schools get a 3.2 percent decrease. Overall though, schools generally have to cut. Here’s just a small sampling of what districts are reporting.

Here’s the link to cuts at Canton, where sports, electives and extracurricular are threatened. Class sizes will balloon with 44 job cuts.

Here’s a link to what the General Brown schools are facing in the Watertown area.

Here’s the link to coverage from Batavia, were they are “significantly reducing opportunities for our kids to be involved.”

Here’s coverage of the East Ramapo schools, where 87 staffers were cut last year and layoffs are predicted again.

Here’s coverage of the dire straits of the Canisteo-Greenwood schools, where closing a middle school is a strong possibility.

Here’s reporting on what the Lockport schools are facing.

Small and rural school districts are really getting slammed, and because so few of those communities have daily newspapers, I have no links to coverage. NYSUT is sponsoring a special lobbying effort to get their stories out on Wednesday Feb. 29.

I’d like you to meet Jim Frenette. He’s more than my dad. He’s also a retired teacher.

In Tupper Lake, where I grew up, teachers were — and still are — a respected profession. It wasn’t just me and my family who looked up to him, whether he was wearing his school shoes or his hiking boots. He is a longtime community volunteer and leader in my hometown.

Daughter and dad: Liza and Jim Frenette. Photo by El-Wise Noisette.

Working in NYSUT’s communications department, it’s common to have stories about teaching families. It’s not surprising to hear that some of the most inspiring teachers came from teaching families.  Or read that teachers are married to teachers. Teaching is a calling and it does run in families. Here’s a link from 2003 where a granddaughter gets teaching tips from her grandmother. This teaching family even wrote a book.

If you’ve seen the “Generations” video, you can imagine how proud I am that it celebrates teaching families and that’s my father willing to stand up against a bad pension proposal.

He agreed to do the ad because he believes in fairness. He believes in justice — especially as a former town judge.

My dad taught at the elementary school in Tupper Lake, where my sisters Sarah and Margaret now teach.

My brother Peter teaches at Petrova Middle School in Saranac Lake, where his wife Jennie also teaches.

My father’s mother Anne Frenette was a teacher.

But I wonder what it will be like for my nieces who consider teaching as one career possibility. What will it be like for them?

Teachers aren’t asking for a handout or golden parachute. My Dad gets a small pension – it was part of the agreement he accepted because he loved teaching, and because he knew while his salary was not large, he would be helped along by a small pension when he retired.

If you want to keep public service pensions secure for the next generation, please call 877-255-9417 now or go to mac.nysut.org to take action. The phone number will patch you through to your lawmaker. Ask them to say no to a sixth tier that  diminishes pensions to an even lower level, and one that is not as safe for future workers.

The conference, sponsored by the Workforce Development Institute, will be go from 4:30-9 p.m., March 9, and from 8 a.m.-4:30 p.m., March 10, at The Desmond in Albany. U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand is scheduled to present a video message to participants, who will also be able to take part in more than a half-dozen plenary sessions and workshops on various issues important to working women. A “Women of the Workforce Fashion Show” will highlight diversity and the MopCo Improv Theatre will also perform.

The conference is free but seating is limited. You can register at www.wdiny.org. For more information, contact Susan Hains at (518) 272-3500 or shains@wdiny.org.

Parents were compelling and NYSUT’s Andy Pallotta drew strong support when he declared education is not a game show. The assembled citizens and  lawmakers added their voices to the swelling chorus of individuals who have signed NYSUT’s online petition. Our point: Competitive grants put the neediest students at a huge disadvantage and the state budget must be directed fairly to what all students need.. You can add your signature here in support.

Assemblywoman Annette Robinson cut to the chase on the issue and she provided the hed for this blog when she said “Children should compete for grades … not for money.” Robinson recalled her service on the New York City Council in the early 1990s.

“I remember challenge grants for cultural institutions,” she said, noting that what that meant was those institution who had the resources to have grant writers would get the funds “while those who didn’t were left with the challenge.”

Many lawmakers who spoke represented students and communities of color. They gave specifics about what they see when they tour schools. They called  awarding increases in education aid competitively a form of discrimination.

Assemblyman Jeffrion Aubry said “We can not have a separate but equal public education system. We need to correct the mistakes and the criminal behavior that is happening relative to black education.” The Queens Democrat who chairs the Assembly Correction Committee went on to explain “it is criminal because when you don’t succeed in education you end up being in jail for the most part. When you look at who is in jail in this state and around the country, it tends to disproportionally be people of color. Why? Because of the poverty, wealth and educational disparities that we see.  It’s directly attributed. Every study tells you that.”

Civil rights were invoked numerous times and the Alliance for Quality Education, which co-sponsored the press  conference with NYSUT and Citizen Action of New York announced that the New Jersey-based Election Law Center is taking over on the Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit. You may recall the CFE decision ruled that the state must provide a sound, basic education and that for years the state had short-changed students in New York City. (Gov. Eliot Spitzer and the Legislature  in 2007 enacted a new formula and multi-year aid increases to comply with the lawsuit. Cuts have since eroded that advance.)

Assemblyman Keith Wright invoked Langston Hughes, while Assemblymembers Marcus Crespo, Vanessa Gibson, Carl Heastie Guillermo Linares and others brought up specifics about what they had seen in schools. Sen. John Sampson and Sen Kevin Parker brought up sports metaphors. Sen. Sampson, the minority leader of the state Senate vowed action after noting how the competitive grants make sure there are not level playing fields for students “We can’t go home unless we make sure that we give (students) a better opportunity than we had.”

Zakiyah Ansari is a parent in New York City whose children should have seen the promise of CFE become reality, she said. Instead her students have seen two years of cutbacks and now “competitive grants that take away the very essence of the CFE decision” that all students have the right to the same resources, not just those districts that succeed at winning grants.

David Sciarra, executive director of the Education Law Center  said that if the competitive grants remain in the budget the center would look at what legal actions they could take. “We’re here to work with the legislators here, the advocates and others to make sure that this budget is revised to conform to the basic legal requirements of the New York constitution,” Sciarra said at the conference. The competitive grants proposed in the budget “are not consistent with the legislature’s foundation aid formulas.” Below are some of the comments. Sorry for my shaky hand!!

This is a television commercial created by the Schoharie Teachers Association as part of a grassroots campaign to spread the good word about New York’s public schools. It will air in the Capital Region shortly after winter break.

Why did they produce it? Because they were sick of hearing that New York schools are 38th in the nation and tired of scapegoating and blaming, said local president Martin Messner.

“It’s time we celebrate the hard work and achievement of our students. It’s time to let people see the real results of teaching and learning in our schools. Our schools, our teachers, and most of all our students deserve the truth.”

Messner knows a bit about messaging, as you can see from the ad.

“NYSUT does a great job for locals getting our message out on statewide issues,” Messner said. “That’s a heavy lift. So I think it’s time we as individual locals did something to help get out our message: That we are proud of our students, proud of our schools and proud of the work we all do together that gets us these high rankings.”

Together the STA and individual members scraped together $3,000 to air the ad in their local market. Now they hope locals across the state will help to spread it.

“With the high cost of television today, we know $3,000 isn’t going to be enough to change the course of the dialogue at the Capitol, but we thought that maybe if others would join us in this effort, we could expand.” Messner said. He mentioned it at a local conference. He noted that once individuals and retirees at that conference found out $50 would mean the ad could be shown another time, they pledged to sponsor spots immediately.

So now they are thinking statewide. Here’s what the Schoharie Teachers Association is offering. The ad is free of charge to locals that want to run their own media campaign. (Yes, all the legal sign-offs from the students involved in the filming and the production company are secured.) For smaller locals, if they would prefer, the STA will get the ad on TV for you in your market.

Contact Messner at 298 Colby Rd., Schoharie, NY 12157 or email him at mmessner@schoharie.k12.ny.us.

And remember, he is a full-time teacher so he may not get back to you until the end of the day.

The tip for you this week is to look outside your local union for help in getting your budget passed. Have you touched base with all the groups who have an interest in developing the budget? Parent groups, student clubs and sports boosters? What about parents of pre-school aged children? Pre-K and kindergarten programs may be reduced or eliminated. Make sure parents know as they will be the ones who will have to find, and pay for, day care if early childhood programs are cut. Have you talked with principals and department heads for their feedback on getting support for the developing budgets?

What about businesses that work with career and technical programs? What about outside groups that may use facilities? Any number of groups — from Boy Scouts  to veterans — could be impacted if access to school buildings is cut to save money. The district may need to charge a fee to keep buildings open, or increase fees already in place.

Developing school budgets is increasingly complicated. Here’s a lengthy letter Timothy Kremer of the New York State School Boards recently penned for the Syracuse Post-Standard. Click here for the full link about why the $250 million in competitive grants should be directed to general aid to schools. Here is an excerpt:

If these were better times — and schools were not coming off three or four years of aid reductions — a competitive grant program could be a great way to stimulate progress. Indeed, we must make marked improvements in the number of high school graduates who are college and career ready.
But this year, the Legislature should seek to redirect the governor’s proposed $250 million grant program toward further basic operating aid, especially for high-needs districts.
When school districts that have been playing by the rules all along start questioning their ability to remain “educationally solvent,” the state needs to extend a helping hand — not redesign the game or up the ante.

With that tone in mind, have you talked with your local board members to see if they would be willing to write similar letters to their local newspapers? In this budget fight, we need every warrior we can find to advocate for what kids need.

Earlier today, I read this blog post about the many hits that state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli was getting today. So I called his office in Albany at (518) 474-4044 to thank him for standing up for workers and retirement security and against another new pension tier. They were quite pleased to hear from me. In fact, that number will be open until 7 tonight, so why don’t you chime in?

By the way. He is also on Twitter @NYSComptroller and that social media never closes. I’m sure he’d love a mention of support that way too.

If you need the facts about pension reform, check out the state AFL-CIO website.

By the way, here’s a link to more reporting, that includes statements of support from CSEA and the state AFL-CIO. Go to the end to find out that DiNapoli knows a lot about the reality show “Survivor.”

Here’s CSEA President Danny Donohue full statement about how the business special interest groups are misrepresenting Tier Vi.

The Business Council (the lobby for Big Business in New York State), Unshackle New York (another front for big business interests) and Billionaire NYC Mayor  Michael Bloomberg are all taking shots at state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli for standing up for working people in the Tier 6 debate.  DiNapoli has raised legitimate concerns that a 401K style pension option will lead to greater economic instability.

Once again, the corporate interests and the 1 percent are at it trying to demonize anyone who stands up for fairness and consideration of what’s right.

Here are the facts:

• Historically 83 cents out of every pension dollar has come from investments not taxpayers.
• The problem is not excessive benefits – it’s Wall Street greed  - When investments tanked, they got bailed out and New Yorkers had to make up the pension shortfall.
• We’ve all seen enough damage to retirement security tied to 401K plans.
• Changing the public employee retirement system to put all the risk on employees and will encourage even responsible companies to erode heir pension plans.
• Wall Street stands to make a windfall on administrative fees if Tier 6 is enacted.

It’s a good thing for all of us when retired workers stay in New York and spend their modest pension benefits here after decades of service.”

Yes, the deadline looms this week for an agreement on teacher evaluation. Here’s an interesting take on New York City’s negotiations from the elected public advocate.

This week, NYSUT will release a video about the impact of a pension on one teaching family. It’s part of an integrated campaign to get the real story to the public about proposed pension “reforms.” We’ll provide a link once it’s up.

The fight continues about school aid. Here’s an interesting article from the Syracuse Post-Standard about how districts don’t qualify for competitive grants. Here’s another one about school board members saying the grants don’t provide equity.

At 11:30 a.m. Wednesday, a group of lawmakers who are members of the Black, Puerto Rican, Hispanic and Asian Legislative Caucus join with NYSUT, AQE and New York Communities for Change to speak against the governor’s proposed budget. The groups will note how cuts in state aid to education have had the greatest impact on needy school districts, which lost two to three times as much in state aid per pupil as wealthy districts.

That advocacy continues through the weekend.  Friday starts the 41st annual association weekend of that legislative caucus. A number of NYSUT officers, members and locals participate in those events and, in fact, are featured in five workshops. The full schedule is posted here.

Back to Wednesday, the Ticonderoga schools invite folks in to see about the bleak budget picture they face at 7 p.m. in the high school cafeteria. The problem is, staying under the 2 percent tax cap will mean deep cuts. They could try to override that cap, but that would require 60 percent of voters to say yes. That’s up in the north country. From comments on the blog comes this news from Brian at Port Jefferson Station on Long Island: “It includes a 4.5% tax increase which will still result in 20.6 (out of our 307 members) teaching jobs lost. We are hoping that, after the community tells the district that they can’t live with these cuts, our BOE will put up a higher number. At that point, it is up to our membership to do the leg work to get 60% to pass it.”

So yes, a busy week ahead.

“This is about all workers and the security provided by defined-benefit pensions,” New York State AFL-CIO President Mario Cilento sums it up. “Government should set an example for what we aspire to be, not what we fear we may become. Far too many have already learned the hard way that a 401(k) is not enough.”

The labor federation launched a campaign this week. Follow this link to a full array of information about the truth of our state’s pension systems, various fliers featuring real people, articles and editorials.

Voicemails will fill up quickly, but until they do, you can try calling over the weekend. (877) 255-9417. Press 1 for the governor’s office.  Press 2 gets you to the state operator. Press 3 will get you to the Assembly operator. It will help to know who your lawmaker is, if you don’t already.