UFT CANDLELIGHT VIGIL : Monday 5 PM : TWEED COURTHOUSE 52 Chambers St. ____________________________________________________________________________
TO EVERY TEACHER, PARENT AND CITIZEN IN NYC
BE A PART OF HISTORY
STAND AND BE COUNTED
MONDAY NIGHT AT 5 PM - RAIN OR SHINE
NOTHING LESS THAN THE FUTURE
OF THE NYC SCHOOL SYSTEM
HANGS IN THE BALANCE
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THE CITY IS DESTROYING THE RANKS
OF NYC'S MOST EXPERIENCED
AND DEDICATED TEACHERS
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ALL CONCERNED CITIZENS
MUST STAND AND BE COUNTED
BRING YOUR FRIENDS AND CHILDREN
BRING YOUR PASSIONATE ANGER
TO STOP THE WAR AGAINST
NYC'S DEDICATED TEACHERS
ONE DAY, ONE HOUR, ONE CHANCE
TO SAVE OUR SCHOOL SYSTEM
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BE THERE - DO YOUR PART
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PLEASE FORWARD NOW
UFT CANDLE LIGHT VIGIL : NOVEMBER 26, 2007 : TWEED COURTHOUSE
REMARKS TO BE DELIVERED AT THE NOV 26 CANDLE LIGHT VIGIL
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 2007
David Pakter, M.A., M.F.A.
Decorated by Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani in City Hall
for "OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN THE FIELD OF EDUCATION"
ESTEEMED MEMBERS OF THE NEW YORK CITY EDUCATION COMMUNITY:
WE HAVE COME TOGETHER TO UNITE, SUPPORT AND HONOR
THE DEDICATED TEACHERS OF NEW YORK CITY
I wish to speak today about an issue that affects the most valuable resource this great City of ours possesses- that is to say, the education of our children.
Almost two score years ago I entered the honorable field of Education because it was my conviction that all children, whether children of the rich or of the poor, and regardless of the color of their skin, are created equal and are entitled, not as a privilege, but as a fundamental human right, to be educated as equals.
And clearly for that high aim to be accomplished, teachers, who are entrusted with that noble mission, must be allowed and empowered to carry it out, free of any pressure from outside forces or groups. Free from political or any other special interest organizations which might harbor an agenda that is antithetical to the success of the above named mission.
Now we are engaged today, at a pivotal moment in the history of New York City, which will test whether those who love this great City will show the leadership, wisdom and yes- courage, to rise up as one and call a halt to the attacks upon, and scapegoating of, the tens of thousands of dedicated teachers of this City who have given their all to the children of New York and especially those countless numbers of teachers who have suffered grievous reprisals because they had the courage to speak out and report practices that were not in the best interest of New York City's children.
I am one of many such teachers, sometimes referred to as Whistle-blowers, if such a term is what people should apply to a person who simply takes upon himself or herself, the responsibility of recognizing his or her fiduciary responsibility of protecting our children. For that is the responsibility of every teacher in this great city.
Because I reported unethical, discriminatory, and yes- even illegal practices in the school where I had created a Medical program for highly gifted Minority students, I was viciously attacked, removed from my position of over twenty five years, and was banished to what have come to be known as the NYC Dept of Education's infamous "Rubber Rooms". I was exiled to a Rubber Room for documenting, on film, Federal Civil Rights violations and for refusing to surrender that filmed evidence.
And let us call these Rubber Rooms what they are- political gulags. Not that different from the political gulags that existed under Stalin, where people are sent who are perceived to be a threat to those who govern and control the system.
Thus, most of the innocent teachers Railroaded into the Rubber Rooms on trumped up charges, outright lies and perjurious statements that in a fair world would merit jail time, are not a threat to the children they teach. But on the contrary, rather a threat to the brute, naked, bullying power of those who consign those countless innocent teachers to the infamous, often dark, windowless Rubber Rooms that have been set up all over New York City to warehouse teachers that stand up and speak out in defense of the children they are duly sworn to protect.
The Rubber Room gulags of the NYC DOE, are set up as a cautionary warning to other teachers everywhere to keep in line, eyes front, lips kept tightly closed, never volunteering an independent thought or creative idea, never saying anything that might be construed as a criticism or even a suggestion that something might be done differently- or done better.
Welcome to the dark world of George Orwell. Welcome to the modern version of Dante's Inferno. Welcome to the Rubber Room gulags of the NYC Dept of Education, where teachers, removed from their schools, report and sit each day, sometimes for years, awaiting their teacher trials that can end their career.
The message of the Rubber Rooms is that no teacher should have the audacity to
question the authority of their so-called "supervisors", principals and assistant principals, who over time, have aggrandized such unlimited power in their hands, that they can destroy even a highly decorated teacher's whole career, virtually with complete impunity. Even a "Teacher of the Year", even an educator honored in New York's City Hall by former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, a candidate now running for President of the United States, is no longer safe from attack.
All the safeguards, both engendered in common labor law practice and even the rights and safeguards contained in the United States Constitution and the Bill of Rights no longer seem to apply to New York City's teachers once they pass through the school house door. This is the state of affairs that exists under the current NYC Dept of Education as controlled by Chancellor Joel Klein, Esq.
Who is this Chancellor? A former Washington, DC, Federal Prosecutor who never spent a full year in a classroom in his entire life. How is it possible, that in a City and in nation that contains so many celebrated career Education Experts, that a mayor would appoint such a person to head the nation's largest school system. A person so ill prepared to be a school's Chancellor, that the mayor had to seek and obtain a Special Waiver from the Commissioner of Education in Albany, so that he could be appointed to an office for which he possessed zero credentials.
And this schools Chancellor, named Joel Klein, Esq. has decided that what is needed to improve the school system of New York City is his own personal brand of what in essence is a "Reign of Terror" approach lifted directly from the guide book of the former President of a giant US corporation.
That is to say: 1) Eliminate all dissenters or anyone who questions anything. 2) Create a general ongoing climate of fear in the workplace and 3) Continuously keep removing/eliminating/firing large numbers of employees to keep the rest terrorized.
Now, we meet here today to condemn the final and most incredible outrage of all.
The final insult that has been perpetrated on the long suffering teachers of New York City, forced to work under an incompetent and dysfunctional Dept of Education that has gone to immense lengths to create, to manufacture, a climate of fear, a climate of intimidation, to silence dissent in the schools and ensure that teachers believe they are only safe if they pretend to be walking zombies that see no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil.
In a cynical attempt to further shift the blame for any failings in the NYC school system, away from Chancellor Joel Klein, Esq.'s incompetent administration, bursting at the seams with clubhouse hacks, political cronies, assorted stooges, expensive "consultants", and countless lackeys and hatchet men and women at the school level, the NYC Dept of Education has now hired a team of lawyers and former principals to help "build" cases against tenured teachers who they will attempt to portray as incompetent for the purpose of firing them from the school system.
It is the oldest political con game in political con game history. When things are not going well or going right, find the nearest available scapegoats at hand and shift all the blame and responsibilty upon that group. Who better to blame for all the failings of his current policies and administration, than the almost 100,000 dedicated educators of New York City?
In fact, Chancellor Joel Klein, Esq. initiated his war against the hard-working teachers and loyal members of the United Federation of Teachers from his first day in office.
For Mr. Klein, Esq., the very idea of organized labor is repugnant. Perhaps, he imagines that in the back of every teacher's weekly plan book, is a communist manifesto, that speaks of worker rights. And/or, God forbid, a copy of the United States Constitution and The Bill of Rights that speak of inalienable rights and due process.
No one could ever doubt for a moment that Mr. Klein's concept of "due process" is a blindfolded teacher standing at the end of a ship's plank and being asked by one of his countless lackeys: "Do you prefer to jump or be pushed- the choice is yours ?"
Mr. Klein, Esq. identified who would serve as his convenient scapegoats early on. New York City's dedicated teachers.
The story of the world, the long history of people on this earth, has been the history of what may be called "Tipping Points". Points where the delicate balance of human events makes it clear that things will go one way or the other.
After years of teacher bashing and teacher blaming, after years of Whistle-blower retaliation and the consigning to Chancellor Joel Klein, Esq.'s Rubber Room gulags of any and every teacher on some incompetent administrator's shortlist of convenient teacher scapegoats, we say now finally today- in a loud and clear voice- "enough".
We say "enough" to the bullying, "enough" to the retaliation, "enough" to the shredding by Mr. Klein's countless lackeys, of the simple human dignity of tens of thousands of hard-working UFT members. We say "enough" to Chancellor Joel Klein, Esq.'s Reign of Terror perpetrated over the tens of thousands of selfless educators who have devoted their lives to the children of this great city of New York.
We say "enough" to the madness of having to be bossed and berated by a Chancellor who has not a single credential, legal, moral, experiential, or otherwise, to be the head of the nation's largest school system of over a million children,- a million children Chancellor Klein did not want his own children to share a lunch table with or drink at the same school water fountain.
We hard-working teachers of New York City, we loyal UFT members, will no longer suffer the indignity of being used as the scapegoats for the abysmal failure of Chancellor Joel Klein, Esq. and the NYC Dept of Education to address and confront the real issues and the real problems that exist in the Public Schools of New York City.
Shall we start with the inhumanly over-crowded classrooms that are both underfunded and under supplied as just one of the thousands of real impediments to New York City's children getting anywhere near the type of quality education Chancellor Joel Klein, Esq.'s own children enjoyed via their elite private school education.
We say to you Mr. non-credentialed Chancellor Joel Klein, Esq. the following:
Stop making thousands of dedicated NYC teachers the Scapegoats for your own failures.
Cease the obscene and illegal war against New York City's most senior, experienced teachers.
Halt your obscene Gestapo scare tactics intended to intimidate, harass and retaliate against Whistle-blower NYC teachers who report wrongdoing and corruption in your NYC Dept of Education.
Stop passing the buck and lower class sizes so NYC children have the same fighting chance to learn, -as your own children had, attending elite NYC private schools.
Stop squandering millions of tax payer dollars on yet more schemes to deflect the public's attention away from your own incompetent failures.
Be a Legend in your own mind, somewhere else, so that a real education expert Chancellor can come in and begin to clean up the mess you have made of the NYC Public Schools system.
Nearly one hundred thousand hard-working, dedicated NYC educators are mad as Hell and we are not going to take it anymore. Our patience with your unbounded Ego and Hubris grew thin quite some time ago
.
The people of New York City can spot a phony a mile away. And you do not need to create another $ 1,000,000.00 Search Committee, made up of lawyers and former Federal Prosecutors to find out who is incompetent on the job. A seventy nine cent mirror from Duane Reade, will more than do the job, Mr. Klein.
Will people be able to say you left an indelible "mark" on The New York City Dept of Education, when you are gone, Chancellor Klein ?
I believe we all know the answer to that question already, right now.
But is not a grade anyone would wish to take home and show to his Mother.
We are professional teachers who have given our all to the children of this great city.
You will not make us the scapegoats for your own failures Mr. Klein. Not today, not tomorrow, not ever.
Unlike your administration lackeys and thugs, we build people up. We do not tear them down.
We are New York City's dedicated teachers.
Our mission in life is to create hope where there was hopelessness. Not kick people when they are down.
We are New York City's dedicated teachers.
Our mission in life is to build healthy, suuccessful and productive futures for New York's children. Not terminate people from their jobs, make them lose their homes and livelihoods and throw them in the street.
If the Police Officers of this great city represent " NEW YORK'S FINEST "
And if the Firemen represent " NEW YORK'S BRAVEST "
Then the Teachers of this city represent " NEW YORK'S MOST DEDICATED "
We UFT Members are New York City's proud and dedicated teachers.
Our mission in life is the most important and far reaching mission anyone could ever have on God's earth and under God's Heaven. We are dedicated to improving and positively affecting the future. Not destroying the futures of New York City's most dedicated servants.
We are New York City's teachers.
We know who we are Mr. Joel Klein, Esq. We are the proud teachers of New York City. We are the UFT. We were here long before you. And we will still be educating, nurturing and protecting the more than one million children of New York City, long after you are gone.
David Pakter, M.A., M.F.A.
TEACHER OF THE YEAR
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