This passes for good news these days when it comes to union membership, but the National Education Association is down 70,000 members compared with this point last year. The reason it is relatively good news is because the union budgeted for a loss of 130,000 teachers and 10,000 education support employees in the 2012-13 school year.
(Washington Examiner) — Michigan state senators voted Thursday to allow citizens with concealed carry permits to carry their weapons on school property, but the American Federation of Teachers argues that the Friday shooting in Connecticut proves people shouldn’t be armed at school.
“Firearms have absolutely no place in our schools—the Dec. 14, 2012, tragic massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., is a chilling and heartbreaking reminder of this,”wrote Randi Weingarten, president of AFT, and AFT Michigan president David Hecker in a letter to Gov. Rick Snyder, R-Mich.
“Permitting firearms in schools—visible or concealed—enables a dangerous set of circumstances that can result in similar tragic outcomes,” Weingarten and Hecker added in calling for Snyder to veto the legislation. “We should be doing everything we can to reduce the possibility of any gunfire in schools, and concentrate on ways to keep all guns off school property and ensure the safety of children and school employees.”
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While a guest on a local Chicago radio show, Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) VP Jesse Sharkey was questioned over his recent participation in the Midwest Marxism Conference and refused to answer why he was there and what relationship the Chicago Teachers Union has with the conference and sponsoring organization, the International Socialists Organization. Sharkey, who was documented by Breitbart News attending the Marxist conference at Northwestern University last month, appeared caught off-guard and struggled to respond to the question.
WLS radio’s Bruce Wolf and Dan Proft had Sharkey on their show to discuss the ongoing school closing battle between the CTU and the Chicago Public Schools. Sharkey had been discussing the Chicago Teachers Union’s network of coalitions that supported the recent teachers strike, when Proft asked him to address the union’s relationship with “revolutionary movements.”
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Forget zero tolerance. Bay City Public School teachers for years could be caught repeatedly under the influence of illegal drugs or alcohol without being fired.
Teachers in possession or under the influence of illegal drugs could be caught three times before they lost their job, and they got five strikes if they were drunk on school grounds before being fired. A school district official said the language in the union contract that protects teachers for those instances “was incorporated into the teacher Master Agreement in 1997.”
Those protections also were included in the Bay City Education Association teacher’s contract that was agreed to in January. That contract expired June 30 and negotiations on a new contract are ongoing.
Students weren’t given as many chances. The code of conduct for middle school and high school students states that if they are found to be under the influence or in possession of illegal drugs, they get a 5-day suspension or a 3-day suspension with counseling on the first offense.
A teacher caught selling drugs in class would get a 3-day suspension without pay with mandatory counseling, but wouldn’t be fired unless the teacher did it a second time.
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Kelly HS Teachers Support The CTU Because The CTU Believes In "Neiborhood" Schools...
The smartest parents in Chicago right now are those whose kids attend charter schools, private schools, or parochial schools. Those institutions don’t employ Chicago’s unionized public-school teachers, who went out on strike this morning for the first time in 25 years.
The coverage of the strike has obscured some basic facts. The money has continued to pour into Chicago’s failing public schools in recent years. Chicago teachers have the highest average salary of any city at $76,000 a year before benefits. The average family in the city only earns $47,000 a year. Yet the teachers rejected a 16 percent salary increase over four years at a time when most families are not getting any raises or are looking for work.
The city is being bled dry by the exorbitant benefits packages negotiated by previous elected officials. Teachers pay only 3 percent of their health-care costs and out of every new dollar set aside for public education in Illinois in the last five years, a full 71 cents has gone to teacher retirement costs.
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SPENCER — After reviewing a video in which a North Rowan High School teacher tells a student he can be arrested for speaking ill of President Barack Obama, the Rowan-Salisbury School System said it can be a learning experience.
Meanwhile, an expert on politics at Catawba College says the social studies teacher just doesn’t have her facts straight when she insists speaking your mind about a president can get you charged with a criminal offense.
Although two students provided the name of the teacher, the Post is not publishing it because officials within the school system would not confirm her identity and she could not be reached for comment.
The video captures audio of the dispute but does not show the teacher or anyone else. It appears to have been shot with a phone or other device as the camera pointed at the ceiling the entire time.
Rowan-Salisbury spokeswoman Rita Foil confirmed the teacher is still employed with the district and has not been suspended for disciplinary reasons. Foil emailed this statement to a Post reporter Friday on behalf of the school system:
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As thousands of teachers face layoffs across the country, teachers in Buffalo, New York are getting lipo? Yep. And nose jobs and whatever else they want. All on the taxpayers’ dime. How is this happening?[… ]
The sweet deal that all the 3,400 teachers in Buffalo are eligible to get under one of their insurance plan options, they are billed nothing for any plastic surgery procedure, such as botox, liposuction, tummy tucks, and there is no deductible.
Linda Tokarz teaches second grade and says she gets regular treatments. She says, “I think its great for us. I wouldn’t want to see it taken away.”Meanwhile,there isn't enough money for after school tutoring and some schools have had to stop ordering supplies.
At Bennett High School, the after-school tutoring that had been offered to students all year long has stopped.Besides the ridiculous medical benefits teacher's unions negotiated, the Buffalo school system lost $9.3 million in federal funds because teachers unions wouldn't agree to a reasonable evaluation system.
Teachers at International School 45 -- and Bennett, and four other schools -- no longer have permanent subs assigned to their building so that they can attend professional development sessions or have time during the day to coordinate lessons with their colleagues.
And ordering most new supplies has ground to a halt at six of Buffalo's lowest-performing schools.
Why are the city's most struggling schools being hit by spending cuts in the middle of the school year?
In January, the state education commissioner suspended $9.3 million in federal funds because Buffalo had failed to submit adequate agreements with its unions for principal and teacher evaluations. District officials say they hope revised union agreements will be good enough to persuade the state to restore the funding. But in the meantime, they are taking steps to cut back on spending at those schools -- a move that is causing concern.
Let’s return to the MacIver Institute claim.
The conservative think tank said the average annual compensation for a Milwaukee Public Schools teacher would exceed $100,000 in 2011. As of July 1, 2011, according to the school district, that figure will be $101,091.
MacIver’s claim is True.
(WaPo)- But the Virginia Education Association, Virginia PTA, the Virginia Association of School Superintendents, the Virginia School Boards Association and the Legislative Black Caucus, except for Howell, were opposed, saying the state should restore public school funds before granting tax breaks to corporations to send children to private school. Read more here.
(Politico)- The Democratic National Committee’s Organizing for America arm — the remnant of the 2008 Obama campaign — is playing an active role in organizing protests against Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s attempt to strip most public employees of collective bargaining rights.As an example, employees nationwide paid 13%~27% (see page 5) of the cost of their employer sponsored health care. Wisconsin teachers currently pay only 4%~6%.
OfA, as the campaign group is known, has been criticized at times for staying out of local issues like same-sex marraige, but it’s riding to the aide of the public sector unions who hoping to persuade some Republican legislators to oppose Walker’s plan. And while Obama may have his difference with teachers unions, OfA’s engagement with the fight — and Obama’s own clear stance against Walker — mean that he’s remaining loyal to key Democratic Party allies at what is, for them, a very dangerous moment.
Many of the hundreds of Madison East High School students didn’t know why their teachers brought them to the union protests at the Wisconsin Capitol Tuesday.
But they knew they were just happy to be out of class.
The state-appointed authority overseeing Buffalo public school finances says taxpayer-covered cosmetic surgery rung up by the city's teachers totaled nearly $9 million in 2009.
The Buffalo Fiscal Stability Authority reports that last year's costs for such elective procedures as chemical peels and other skin treatments are up $8 million over the 2004 tab for cosmetic surgery provided under the teachers' union contract.
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The president of the teachers' union says the union has agreed to give up the benefit in the next contract.
