Last night in NY, mayoral control of the schools becomes the latest target of the occupation.
October 26, 2011
Photo: Anna Philips
The Occupy Wall street movement expanded to classroom politics, as a group disrupted a special meeting of the panel for education policy in Manhattan on Tuesday night.
The public meeting at Seward Park High School at 350 Grand Street was supposed to be a meeting for parents to learn about new curriculum standards.
But as soon as Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott began speaking through his headset microphone, a different type of microphone drowned him out.
Called the “People’s Microphone,” the protesters’ call-and-repeat chants, now a trademark of the Occupy Wall Street movement, derailed the Department of Education meeting.
Walcott continued to introduce the scheduled speaker, despite the chanting, but curriculum specialist David Coleman quickly gave up trying to speak over the call-and-repeat chants.
Advertisement
3 Comments
leave one →
While I’m not crazy about the idea of OWS splintering into offshoot groups, I’m happy that this is being exposed in some way, and hope that more meaningful dialog can take place. It has been my experience that the situation ITSELF and its participants will become the issue, just as the police brutality issue may possibly garner tioo much attention in OWS Philadelphia.
IF the “people’s microphone,” as they call it alentates the parents who are also “the people”, your mission will backfire. I admire the tenacity of OWS, but their short and long range tactics need to be examined.
Parents have to know what the issues ARE, and have the opporotunity to express themselves, before Occupy whatever cuts off the speaker. Am I alone in this philosophy?