Save Our Schools (SOS) March: Anything But Grassroots
This is the second article in a series by Anthony Krinsky about July 28th’s ‘Save Our Schools’ march. [Part 1, Part 3]
What is particularly irksome is that the organizers call it a “grassroots movement”. Wikipedia defines “grassroots” as “natural and spontaneous” versus “orchestrated by traditional power structures.” Is that what this is? If the media dutifully portrays this as a grass-roots protest it will prove that they’ve learned nothing from 40 years of teacher union political activity.
For a moment, let us consider what seems “grass-roots” about the event. The website is semi home-made looking website and the posters could and might have been created by a sixth grader. Adorable.
In addition, the organizing committee careful excludes senior teacher union staff from its official roster.
The usual “who’s who” of apologists and union school monopoly stalwarts are “endorsing” the rally as of course are the national teacher unions and their state and local affiliates. The organizing committee appears largely volunteer and not just from the United States. In fact, the volunteer coordinator, Elisa Waingort, is a Canadian labor activist showing solidarity with her southern brothers and sisters.
Diane Ravitch says she’ll be there and her partner in public school myth-making, Deborah Meier, will be there too. As we saw in Wisconsin, most of the protesters will be teachers, including those from impoverished Los Angeles where average total compensation exceeds $100,000 per year but the school year can’t be lengthened even one day into summer time (in fact, to pay for raises last year, the school year was shortened). An open question is how many of America’s 4 million vacationing and/or retired teachers will show up? DC is muggy in July but there are lots of air-conditioned museums and fun things to do. Who knows.
With a lot of behind-the-scenes union support, teacher activists will be running this show. To suggest that these folks are “grass-roots” however, is utterly absurd. After watching the Wisconsin spectacle, Americans must now know that political activism is a second profession for hundreds of thousands of our public school teachers. By the time they retire, each active teacher unionist will have participated in as many as 50 elections or protest events (fewer in small towns). Teachers are the back-bone of hundreds of thousands of school board, local, state, and national campaign organizations every year. If you’ve read teacher union propaganda, seen one of their campaigns, or spoken to a union activist teacher, you appreciate depth and completeness of their political training.
Only the top 0.1% of the teacher union members actually work for their unions at any one time. It is common for union activists to slip into paid roles when they are elected and often return to district payrolls when their terms are over. Notorious “reform” unionists Adam Urbanski collected a second salary from the district for decades. Around half of American teachers are active in their unions but all have a material stake in preserving their own jobs.
The line between teacher unionist and teacher activist is an artificial, technical distinction. Asking teacher activists to march on Washington is like winding up a toy mouse and telling it to shuttle across the floor. The behavior programmed; they’re doing what they’ve been trained to do. By downplaying professional involvement, the event is actually more similar than different to other teacher union campaigns. Instead of fronting their attack on NCLB with a broad coalition of allies who have little credibility talking about classrooms, the teacher unions are using teacher activists… and hoping we’ll make a distinction.
Why the “grass-roots” pretense? There are two reasons. First, and significantly, groups of non- teacher union aligned parents around America are finally doing something that political and economic models do not predict: they are speaking out and becoming politically active. Teacher unions have a device that makes free-loading on association activities expensive: compulsory dues. They also have a compelling material interest in the outcome. Parents, on the other hand have no mechanism through which to exercise their collective displeasure and no device to finance it. Organizations like Students First and Parent Revolution are for the first time articulating the voices of downtrodden parents. Their voices have credibility and weight for policy-makers. In rooms where only self-pitying teachers could be heard in the past, parents are now speaking up with rhetorically devastating power.
As a result, the NEA has funded a competing “parental” advocacy organization called Parents Across America (PAA). Like the less radical PTA, PAA dutifully represents teacher employee interests one-to-one. The SOS March committee is cut from the same cloth.
Anthony Krinsky writes at StopUTLA.com and at EdObserver.
7 Comments
It is pathetic that one must resort to slanderous remarks when they have no facts.
1) No union has ever paid me a dime–not for fees, not for expenses, not for amy reason. Your remarks are slanderous. Any further remark disparaging remark which ypu publish that qyestions my character using lies will be routed to counsel.
2) Your gross mis-characterization of those who differ in their perspectives with you only destroys your credibility.
Yes, I am a Chamber of Commerce member, President of my own business, former F100 firm for 23 yrs, I led PTAs and School Adv Councils for many years and still do. I sit on a St Sen Educ board and I sit on Academic Adv Board for 10th largest School Bd on the nation.
I am my own represent pub school children. I speak for them . I am not a union mouthpiece.
Get your facts straight or retain an attorney.
I apologize for typos. Wanted to reply immediately and predictive text jumps ahead of me on my phone.
Might I ask where you volunteered your time the past 16 yrs as I did in public schools? I did so while working full-time, being the sole support of the family as a widowed mom? I am not looking for medals, or more awards. or. Rather I am responding to your slanderous, offensive character assassination.
Channel your energies towards helping children, not casting aspersions on innocent people. I have nothing to hide. My experience is that people who do have things to hide write articles like yours.
Now you have the facts. No excuse remaining for slander.
Rita,
Your threats are ridiculous but characteristic of your bullying union associates.
And yes, I’m deeply sorry that your husband died and that you have you’ve been raising children alone. Thankfully, the community in Boca is very warm and welcoming — one day I might move there myself.
Now about your claim to have special knowledge about business and improving schools. Your public persona raises questions and offers few answers.
Please do us all where you workd and what you did there. What were your responsibilities? What did your company do when employees weren’t cutting the mustard? Did you run a charity employment agency like the public schools do?
Also, tell us exactly how your PTA and advocacy worked out. Did you light up your schools? Did you create opportunities for poor children with dim economic prospects? How’s the quality of the teaching staff at the school? Make a dent on that? How much work have you done in inner city schools? So, you think that PTAs in New York, or Detroit, or Philadelphia, or Los Angeles — in the “bad” neighborhoods — are going to turn things around? Is it the Wall Street bankers who are stopping major improvements from blooming?
How about doubling funding on your existing public schools down in Boca? Would student learning sky-rocket? Has quadrupling funding over the last 50 years helped much?
You are the “business voice” in the SOS progressive circus. Please do make a business case for the status quo or if you’re making it, offer a few more details so any of us have reason to take you seriously.
Anthony
The PTA is essentially banned in school’s where working poor children attend classes. A sort of unwitting group of pawns are stationed in parent centers by doing p/t supervision. They are urged to represent parents on committees. They are nice people, but none of them have much education and many don’t speak English. They need their jobs which pay wat they’d earn working full time as wage slaves. They are clearly intimidated..as are teachers. I am not sure who either of you ar. I have been impressed by SOS efforts but with so many fake groups enlisted to file fraudulent lawsuits and impersonate parents I feel like this is some Orwellian subplot.
I can’t be sure who is who. I don’t much care for your tone, Anthony. You do your cause more harry than good by being arrogant rude. Boca, by the way, is not really an exclusively affluent community. It’s nice, but has modest suburban areas that are hardly 1% real estate. Frankly the climate in California is better in every sense. With that said, this widow may be blessed by her husbands thoughtful deference to her needs in the event of something awful . She may be an exceptional business woman. Just because she may have money and prudently protects her privacy doesn’t mean she’s a hired hand for the philathropists. She may be a mercenary mole out to plant chips in first five students for Bill Gates to track. I dunno. You, however, are spinning your wheels. I know schools from the inside out and believe me it’s a complex system. To make such sweeping generalizations and spew to the man fallacies is reckless and irresponsible.
I’m not sure what your angle is , but attacking active parents and dissing Diane Ratvitch with something as glib as ” myth maker” isn’t going to win you the favor of parents, teachers, or taxpayers ( I am all 3) . I sure don’t appreciate the unions betrayal orbwanton theft of my dues. I loathe the districts white chalk crime spree and i am appalled by these freaking philanthropists, but you have not mentioned children once in the blogs I have read so far. If you are just a contrarian getting your fix, do the world a favor — fixate on Ron Paul or Michelle Bachman. Public education is serious.
Rene,
Your concerns about tone are well-taken, thank you. Rita and I have exchanged words privately and she has recently shared her business background on her various bios. I wish her a long and happy life.
I raised legitimate questions about parent front groups in this piece, which have been proven prescient. The teacher unions are now, more fully than ever, exploiting their power pyramid by asking more from teacher activists and drawing more parents into their dragnet. Through the Title I parental involvement program, they’re tapping into public financing as well. SOS and others are picking up where PTAs have left off. The “T”s are more powerful today than ever, which you probably support, no?
In the context of “parent empowerment,” I find anti-parent, pro-employee union policies embraced by these groups and their leaders, plainly deceitful. Who is telling Americans that rewarding success, punishing failure, and school choice are bad public policy or that philanthropists fighting for poor children are ill-willed?
The teacher unions, their proxies, and their allies have a near-perfect record of blocking meaningful reform in America — and they ought to. They collect $2.5 billion/year in dues and have ferocious political operations wherever teachers work. They’ve exploited employee self-interest and compulsory unionism well enough already but still want more power: cue SOS et, al. There is no end in sight to the vicious power asymmetry versus parents who want out of failing schools and failing class-rooms.
Should you wish to take me seriously, I’ve come by my views honestly and would consider myself squarely in the Romney camp. Had I not done Americorps and seen what public employees do to vulnerable children, I’d still be a Democrat.
Anthony
To those who come across this article and wish to engage and/or disagree with Anthony Krinsky please read this and take the advice given.
Anthony is severely mentally ill. He is bi-polar. He created a world in which he believes he is at the center of and a pathological liar as well.
Do yourself a favor, ignore him.
Read Krinsky’s Huff Posy comments to see how out of touch he is with reality
http://www.aol.com/social/Anthony_Krinsky/michelle-rhee-dc-schools_b_845286_83596649.html
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