Retribution - by any means necessary

June 4, Looks like they couldn't get to me legally regarding my published political opinions, except by forcing an attack of dubious reasoning, on the school counseling website I made for my schools parents, kids and the department: www.vhmscounselors.com. This was also built on my own time, on a private server because the DO said we were almost out of space on the school server. The name is even registered to me. You'll see that www.vhmscounselors.com is gone as a favor to my new principal. Even though CWA the department over counseling had requested that each school have their counseling department build it's own web site. Only two Moreno Valley MS's don't have Title One money. Title One schools can and have used this money to hire an out side agency to build and maintain websites for them. Cost only $3000.00 a year. My principal is a nice guy stuck between a rock and a hard place. The powers that be even had him quoting statements from an email or letter from my after hours political blog - you know the one your reading - saying they supposedly came from the counseling web site. They must have known he hadn't taken the time to look it over even though it was still under construction. He admitted he hadn't read the page (or the web site) even though I asked, more out of proof that I could do it than anything. I then asked him if he would go over the site page by page so I could better understand the problem but he declined for another time. I was particularly taken to task regarding my statements regarding the changing voter's attitudes toward public schools and asking parents to please become more informed and more involved.

Oh how could I be so brazen. Further, I had a picture of the "unknown comic" from the eighties on one page. Just for fun, a person with a smiling grocery bag (as in gag) over his or her head. As well as a picture of myself dressed for Halloween as a Roman Senator, you know Rome! Aligned with the sixth grade curriculum. I was told that someone at the DO found it offensive! No names were given, see also "blackey Houston's Moreno valley" and most anything written by 'MVgordie.' This all occurred two days after the hail storm of critical commentary from the readers of the Press Enterprise's timid report on Victoria Baca's arrest. I admitted (in my blog and the P.E. commentaries) to having seen Mrs Baca engaged in some very racist comments of her own. In doing so I probably gave my ID away. I have always made it clear that I am a concerned educator in Moreno Valley. No problems, I too ms. Baca have a right to freedom of speech. Anyway, the principal was told "someone" from the DO would be putting paper (a reprimand) in my file." Further, he asked me to go home and made it clear that I wasn't to return until I had a doctor's written "clean bill of health." I asked what he meant and he just told me the same thing again. " a clean bill of health. I returned to Friday morning with the note. and went about my day. The first day of my vacation. I was left a message from the Principal to call him. I needed to come in and move my stuff from my office so it could be painted. Knowing this was the whim of our guidance clerk and the DO was broke. I sent a letter to the lead custodian and one of the head painters saying that I really didn't want. MY office painted. Never the less The Principal came in and immediately called me. Telling me to come in on the first day of summer break. Lets see what "retribution" is in the works come August.

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Cuts cost L.A. Unified its Teach for America instructors for next year

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Al Seib / Los Angeles Times

Libby Pier, a Teach for America teacher, works with a student Marisa Solano on Thursday. She was one of many in the program in Los Angeles Unified School District to receive a pink slip from the district, which is cutting one-third of its current TFA teachers and is taking no new ones next year.

The district, facing a steep budget shortfall, says it won't be able to afford new teachers from the program, which places college graduates in low-income schools.

By Seema Mehta
June 19, 2009

The financially strapped Los Angeles Unified School District says it cannot afford to hire any new teachers next year from Teach for America, a prestigious program that places high-achieving college graduates in low-income, underperforming schools.

The district has worked with the nonprofit since the early 1990s; more than 600 Teach for America members have taught in L.A. Unified classrooms since 2004. Now, in addition to taking no new teachers from the program next year, the district is considering laying off a third of its current 67 first-year Teach for America members.

• L.A. school board votes 4-3 on motion to ease teacher firing

"Over the years, Teach for America corps members have made a tremendous impact on the students and schools they serve," said Deborah Ignagni, L.A. Unified's administrator of certificated employment operations. "This impact toward improving student achievement and the social condition of their school communities is immeasurable."

But for now, the district's decision means that in Teach for America's Los Angeles region, which is among the organization's largest nationwide, most members will teach at charter schools, not traditional public schools. Charters are publicly funded schools that operate independently and are free from many state and district regulations.

"So long as we are serving students from low-income settings in public schools, we are agnostic about the governance model of those schools," said Brian Johnson, executive director of the nonprofit's Los Angeles operation. "We want to have a significant presence in traditional public schools. However, if there are no vacancies in traditional LAUSD schools this year, we want to ensure that we are still bringing top talent into classrooms in Los Angeles."

Teach for America is a highly selective program that places recent college graduates in low-income classrooms across the nation.

Some educators are critical of the program, saying its young teachers lack the training of traditional teachers and sometimes use the time to add an altruistic flourish to their resumes before they move on to more lucrative careers.

Supporters point out that teacher turnover in troubled schools is high regardless, and that after Teach for America members finish their two-year commitment, two-thirds continue to work in education. Research also has shown that the Teach for America members are as effective as teachers with conventional credentials.

For the coming school year, the program accepted 4,100 out of 35,000 applicants for placements across the nation. About 140 of these teachers will be based in the Los Angeles area, and more than 100 of them will be placed in charter schools.

The program's 14 placements in the Compton Unified School District for next year appear unchanged for now. But 13 placements in the Pasadena Unified School District are uncertain as the district struggles with state budget cuts, officials said.

"All things told, we have . . . felt very fortunate to have the caliber of teachers we were able to bring on the Muir staff from TFA," said Tim Sippel, assistant principal at Pasadena's John Muir High School, where five were placed this year. "We desperately hope we can retain them in the midst of the budget crisis we are facing as a district."

In Los Angeles, the Teach for America members who recently received pink slips are among some 2,500 employees in the district facing layoffs as the district struggles to find $132 million in additional cuts this school year, and $143 million more for the coming year. Teachers in the program are paid $39,788 annually, the same as other new teachers with alternative certifications. The district also pays the organization a $3,000 training fee for each member it hires.

Libby Pier, 22, an eighth-grade English teacher at Los Angeles Academy Middle School, was angry and hurt when she received her layoff notice in the mail. The Boston native, who graduated from Northwestern University last year, said her year of teaching in South Los Angeles has been rewarding and challenging, and a learning experience.

"I've fallen in love with my school, with my kids, and the idea of being able to help even one student and make a difference in their lives and make them love learning," said Pier, who has interviewed at four inner-city charter schools and may pursue a doctorate in educational psychology if she can't find a classroom position. "I was definitely planning on remaining in teaching. . . . Now, I don't have a job."

seema.mehta@latimes.com

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What CFT Members Can Do About the State Budget Crisis - Print E-mail

What (We and) CFT Members Can Do About the State Budget Crisis:
(sorry it's hard to find good info let alone tactics from CTA)

Background of the budget gap The news is bad for the state budget...again. In 2008, in response to a projected deficit of 17 billion dollars, the governor and Legislature produced a disastrous state budget. The Republicans abdicated all real world responsibility as legislators, refusing to consider any taxes at all. The Senate and Assembly Democrats, anxious about the suffering of the most vulnerable Californians as the state budget was shut off, caved in to the governor's proposal and the Republicans' obstinance. Only the Assembly Democrats offered, along the way, a reasonable revenue proposal, which included returning income tax rates on the very wealthiest Californians ($300,000 per year income and up) to the rates they paid in the 1990s, which would have raised six billion dollars per year. But this proposal was dropped. The CFT worked with the Education Coalition to raise public awareness of the devastating impact a budget without any new revenues would have on the quality of education in California, but to no

avail this year.

Now the same factors that produced the budget crisis last year are being enormously compounded by the national economic crisis. To his credit, the governor has added the small progressive tax on oil into the mix with his regressive sales tax proposal. But the problem is deeper than just this year. We have a structural gap in the California state budget, varying year by year, but running in the billions of dollars.

Solving the budget gap in California requires a reasonable solution—one that the governor is pointedly ignoring, along with his role in creating the problem. This is a large state, with the largest population in the United States, and an economy that, if it were a country's, would be the sixth largest in the world. The budget problem can't be solved by cuts anymore, because state program reductions of such a magnitude hurt the people most who can least afford them. Indeed, such cuts threaten the future well-being of California.
We need instead to increase state revenues with carefully considered tax increases, especially closing tax loopholes for those who can most afford to pay: the wealthy and large corporations. Taking these actions will allow us to fund the social programs we need.
What created the problem?Mostly undiscussed, but crucial to understanding California's problem, is that the state legislature, to get a recalcitrant minority of anti-tax legislators to pass state budgets, gave up taxes on the top brackets and the much-maligned vehicle license fee (VLF) during the height of the dot-com bubble. Each year since 1991, the state budget's ability to generate revenue has been compromised by rescinding one or more taxes. This meant the accumulated loss of many billions of dollars in revenue, contributing greatly to the current deficit.
Indeed, the VLF alone was worth $4 billion per year when Schwarzenegger, to great applause by the legislative Republicans, eliminated it. The VLF today is estimated to be worth close to $6 billion. Add up the loss of that amount each year since Schwarzenegger's election, and you have the budget deficit. Until last summer, Schwarzenegger clung to the position that he would not raise taxes. (Technically, the VLF is a fee; but since he called it "the Gray Davis car tax" throughout his recall campaign, that's what it remains in the public mind.)

Public services in general, and public education in particular, have been underfunded in California since 1978 and the enactment of Proposition 13. This law substantially shifted the burden of funding many locally delivered services to the state, without providing appropriate mechanisms to pay for them. Increased spending on education in the late 1990s and into 2001 was finally beginning to address years of neglect. Now the gains of these years have been reversed. Per pupilfunding in California now ranks 46th in the nation.

What to do about it: 1) Progressive Taxation the revenue options below would raise an estimated $16 billion per year, essentially solving the state's structural budget problem:
Bring the top income tax bracket (people who make more than $300,000) back from 9.3% to 11% ($5 billion)
2)Reinstate the vehicle license fee ($6 billion per year)
3)Re-assess non-residential real property ($3 billion per year)
4)Limit mortgage interest deductions to $50,000 in interest ($47 million per year)
5)Require that large corporations file as corporations, not “S” type partnerships ($500 to 600 million per year)
6)Enact severance tax on oil produced in California ($.5 billion per year)
7)Extend sales tax to Internet purchases ($20 million)
These are each worthy proposals. But the real problem that needs to be addressed to solve California's budget problems is Proposition 13. It builds in inequities between residential and commercial taxation, and, depending on when a homeowner buys a house, inequities among homeowners as well. Reform of Proposition 13, which locks in a broken budget system, is an urgent priority.

The "two thirds" problem: blocking democracy. The problem with these ideas is that in California, any tax increase must be approved by a supermajority of 2/3 in the state legislature. California is one of just three states that require more than a simple majority to raise taxes. Each year a small minority of legislators, opposed to tax increases on ideological grounds, can block the will of the majority and prevent a balanced approach to solving the budget crisis. That's what happens every year, including last year, once again. Legislators should be able to enact a necessary tax increase with a simple majority instead of wrangling endlessly with hard core anti-tax ideologues.
Over time we must convince our legislators and the governor that only progressive tax reform can solve the long-term crisis. The problem isn't "overspending." This is a simplistic analysis of a complex problem. California is a big and growing state, and needs big revenues to function.
We are currently witnessing the return of the Gilded Age, in which the wealthiest among us continue to increase their riches at the expense of the rest of us. The top one percent of wealth holders in the United States owns one third of the assets of the country. The top ten percent owns 70% of the wealth. That leaves the bottom ninety percent of wealth holders–the overwhelming majority–with less than a third of the country's wealth. When Barack Obama spoke of "spreading the wealth around," this is the reality to which he was referring.
Don't let people tell you that "we don't have the money" for a decent public education system. The money's there. It's just in the wrong pockets. Tell your legislators.

Other Resources on the State Budget Crisis

Education Coalition
California Budget Project
California Tax Reform Association
Strategy for Effective Communication With Your Elected Officials (4K pdf flyer)

From CFT president Marty Hittelman

A message from CFT president Marty Hittelman, or otherwise know as - when is the CTA going to get off it's ass, stop squandering the 70 million a year it takes from us and do something to save jobs~!?
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I am asking you to take a few minutes out of your busy life to contact your legislators. We must act now to help prevent massive reductions in funding to public education and social services.

Send a letter to your legislators

California is facing the most severe budget crisis since the passage of Prop 13 in 1978. In many ways it is even worse today, as we have already experienced many years of large cuts to public education and social services.
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L.A. teachers arrested in civil disobedience protest Print E-mail

utlacd2

May 15 — Several dozen members and leaders of United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) were arrested when they sat down in the street in front of the Los Angeles Unified School District headquarters and refused to leave. UTLA had scheduled a one-day strike to protest budget reductions, layoffs and soaring class sizes, but had to revise their plan when a judge issued a restraining order that would have fined teachers and threatened revoking their credentials if they struck. Instead, teachers demonstrated before school at their sites and staged a sit in.
Read more...

CFT files suit to protect schools, community colleges Print E-mail

May 8 — The California Federation of Teachers, AFT/AFL-CIO yesterday filed suit in San Francisco Superior Court to force the state to repay nearly $12 billion slashed from the K-14 public education budget over the past two years. The CFT was joined by Service Employees International Union Local 99 in the lawsuit, which seeks to enforce voter-approved Proposition 98 minimum funding guarantees.

The CFT filed the suit following an announcement by Governor Schwarzenegger threatening to cut another $3.6 billion from the education budget. The plaintiffs said that going to court to restore school funding is a better option than passing Propositions 1A and 1B in the May 19 Special Election.