Houston ISD paraprofessional wins wrongful termination grievance
By Jacob Santillan, Organizer, Houston Federation of Teachers
Remake Your Classroom
Remake Your Classroom – from Edutopia.org
1. Get Students Involved
Students are your primary users and should be at the center of such a remake process. To begin building excitement, reach out to them early and invite them to a weekend session at school (or someone's garage) where they can be involved from the beginning. Here are some specific ways to involve students:
Create Visual Inspiration
Speak Out June 2013
The Rightwing Attack on Public Employee Pensions
July 24, 2013 by The Progressive
"The rightwing argument that public employees bankrupted Detroit is incredible on its face. But it is part of an ominous national push to raid pensions, give away tax dollars to corporations, and impose austerity on regular working people."
Survey: US parents prefer public schools to other choices
A new nationwide survey shows that parents overwhelmingly believe that strong neighborhood public schools are a better choice for our children than vouchers or charter schools.
“Parents believe that public schools are the single most important institution for their community and for the nation,” said Louisiana Federation of Teachers President Steve Monaghan. “This survey shows that 77 percent of American parents support public schools, an opinion that cuts across political and class lines.”
SAVE THE DATE! A&R Annual Holiday Party Friday 12/6/13
Please save the date! A&R Annual Holiday Party will be on 12/6/13. More details to follow.
Parents want strong neighborhood schools, study says
AFT released a new survey of parents that shows that parents want politicians to support neighborhood public schools. Ted Kirsch released the following statement about the study.
In the Public Interest
“We are privatizing ourselves into one disaster after another. We’ve privatized a lot of what our military is doing. We’ve privatized a lot of what our intelligence agencies are doing. We’ve privatized our very prison system in many parts of the country. We’re privatizing the health system within those prisons. And it’s not working well.”
State Audit Shows TEA Not Adequately Monitoring Testing Giant Pearson
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From the July 17 Ed-Alert newsletter issued by State Rep. Lon Burnam (D-Fort Worth): |
LFT supports waiver to delay Common Core Standards
(Baton Rouge – July 17, 2013) Louisiana should take advantage of a U.S. Department of Education offer to extend the timetable for implementing Common Core Standards, according to the Louisiana Federation of Teachers.
Federation President Steve Monaghan said that the idea behind Common Core may have merit, but that like so many other education reforms that have been imposed recently, teachers and school systems have not been adequately prepared for the change.
