Did you know that 5,000 teachers marched on the White House yesterday?
You know about the Save Our Schools march Since you read this blog. But if you have friends who rely on the traditional corporate news media, they don’t know a thing about it.
Nothing in the NY Times.
Nothing on the networks.
There was reporting by CNN and the ever-reliable Valerie Strauss at the Washington Post.
Not even celebrities like Matt Damon speaking (and introduced by his mom who is a teacher) got any attention from the Rupert Murdoch-like felons who rule our info world.
As for our Wyoming travels, we joined 50,000 others in Cheyenne for a Toby Keith concert. It was good, although at times it seemed to be more like a Ford F-150 truck commercial.
I miss the days of Waylon, Willie and the boys.
We do the rodeo today. Denver tonight. Home tomorrow.
It was a hot July day in Washington, D.C. when the 3,000+ educators and parents gathered together to show our support for public education and teachers. The message was clear. Teachers are not the problem. Testing and the privatization of public education are serious challenges to our democracy. The corporate takeover of our public educational systems is clearly evident when you talk with colleagues from across the country. This must be stopped now and can only be done through mass collective action on our part.
During the march on the White House, I found myself in the midst of the Wisconsin delegation. There was a lot of energy, commitment, and willingness to enthusiastically voice what resonated with me as valuable and truthful messages.
While I did stumble across some folks from Illinois, namely Rockford, Plainfield, and Chicago, I was struck by the lack of organization and cohesion within our “delegation.” States from across the nation had a system of gathering together those folks from their own state. Illinois was notably absent from the effort to gather together it’s own people. Some of us managed to find each other, but purely by accident. It seems to me that this would have been a great opportunity for the IEA/IFT to have had an organized presence to begin to develop a sense of solidarity. Certainly the individuals that were present would have benefited from the opportunity to develop a network of resources. While this was not a “union” rally, I think the IEA in particular missed a great opportunity to reach out and help educators and parents from our state connect. It’s time the IEA decided to take some initiative that is apparent and visible to others like myself. It’s time the IEA reached out to parent groups like Parents Across America. It’s time the IEA reached out to retired educators for help. It’s time the IEA planned ahead, engage others in the planning process, and developed ownership among of a wide-range of education constituents. If they do not, it’s clear to me that Illinois is likely to suffer the same fate that others are in terms of onerous legislation for teachers and retirees. I’m a great believer in collective action, but I have to say that it seems to me that IEA has failed to look ahead, be serious about building coalitions, and do the heavy lifting that needs to be done to represent both sound educational practices and employment rights. It’s time IEA reassessed it’s role, responsibility, and advocacy for students and educators.
While Save Our Schools is not a “union” movement, it seems to me that active engagement in this type of coalition building would make a lot of sense. Parents and educators working together in solidarity for support of public education makes a lot of sense to me. I found the support of parent participants for union educators to be outstanding at the SOS conference.
It is Sunday morning, and I’m headed to a planning meeting for next steps. It will be interesting to see what that might look like.
There was also a mainstream (not by Valerie) report in the Washington Post print edition, and a pretty good report in the Christian Science Monitor, though it quoted your BFF Jonah Edelman as the pro-reform source without mentioning his recent newsmaking. Here in San Francisco, the Chronicle, which is normally VERY poor on reporting about national education policy, picked up the Washington Post story. That makes it seem likely that other newspapers did do.
There’s an article about it on the front section of today’s washington post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/teachers-march-on-washington/2011/07/30/gIQAz48zjI_story.html
. All political power is latent, Fred. The less of it you appear to need, the more you have.
I for sure thought you were going to be eaten by bears.