BREAKING: Baltimore Teacher's Union votes to commit mass suicide

[Stinky The Clown]

At 6.35 EST, the local news reported that the teacher's union membership voted to accept the City's proposition that does away with all step raises and raises tied to education and replaces them with a performance based pay scheme that is tied to student performance (test scores).

I wish all teachers well. This vote simply astounds me. The Charter School Movement, Inc is now firmly ensconced in this city that still has no idea what harm is about to befall them.

This link will update. At the time I posted it, the link had a 1 hour old story and a flashing "Breaking" note that the vote passed: http://www.abc2news.com/dpp/news/region/baltimore_city/baltimore-teacher%27s-union-vote-wraps-up





Note to Mods, while this is breaking news, I posted here in GD instead of LBN because I wanted to put my own disgusted editorial spin on it.

[leftstreet]

1. wow

Thanks for posting this

[WinkyDink]

2. Talk about "will rue the day"!! Well, this proves to me that teacher ed. has gone down-hill.

[MadHound]

5. Not that teacher ed has gone downhill,

But rather that teacher desperation has gone up, way up.

I recently graduated with a couple of education degrees, and the fact of the matter is that this administration helped screw me out of a job this year. Last year's stimulus didn't cover education over into this year, and the only money available from the the Feds was that travesty of Race to the Top. Teachers were laid off throughout the country as a result. True monetary assistance didn't come until it was far too late, in September this year, after all the hiring and firing decisions had been made.

What these teachers are doing is looking into a real bleak future and trying to hang onto their jobs by any means necessary. It was probably accept this now, or face massive layoffs in the spring. After all, those government faves, TFA grads, are ready and willing to fill those vacant spots for pennies on the dollar.

[erodriguez]

3. More of Typhoid Randi's work

She did it in NYC. She did it in DC. Now, she is doing it in Baltimore.

You'd think that these teachers would wake up out of the haze and see what is happening in other parts of the country.

http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2010/11/is-uft-dead.html

[Starry Messenger]

4. Wow, wtf?

That is total insanity. What happened there?

[immoderate]

6. Especially horrible that the teachers voted for it!!

This is teacher roulette.

--imm

[SoCalDem]

12. Were there grandfathered issues attached to it?

If so, I would guess that the ones protected by grandfathering voted for it in enough numbers to torpedo the ones who missed the cut.

This is how awful things get passed. All they have to do is to split the group into factions who will then vote against the smaller group.

There are probably still enough teachers-of-a-certain-age to counterbalance the younger, less-tenured ones:(

[Angry Dragon]

7. I feel the blame for the desperation can be placed

in the lap of duncan and Obama

When all is said and done you will end up with a
tiered education system .......... at least 2 tiers
maybe up to 4

I call it the dumbing down of American youth
and factory education

[senseandsensibility]

8. What is their reasoning?

I can not imagine this.

[Reader Rabbit]

9. Were those votes tabulated on Diebold machines?

I can't imagine any other way teachers would vote in such an idiotic idea. Seriously. Your headline is not hyperbole. That is what these teachers have done—shot themselves.

[madrchsod]

10. with duncan/obama`s assault on public education and the unions...

they did what they could do to stay alive. organized labor better wake up and realize obama is not their friend.

[FrenchieCat]

11. does away with all step raises and raises tied to education????

"Raises Tied to education"?....what does this actually mean?
How was "education" measured to provide these raises?

[knitter4democracy]

13. It's that, with the usual step system, a teacher with an MA makes more.

The teacher with the most seniority and a PhD is at the top of the scale. The more education you get (Master's degree, etc.), the higher your pay at your years level.

[liskddksil]

14. Education as in the their career development / graduate degrees

all things that should be valued in some way, not the scores of some flawed standardized test.

[knitter4democracy]

15. I wonder what the options were.

The vote makes sense if the only other option was mass layoffs or something worse.

[Stinky The Clown]

16. "This puts Baltimore at the fore of a movement that could change the face of education"

Two of our local nooz stations used this very same headline for the noozreader.

>snip<

Seniority and graduate degrees will no longer be rewarded with higher pay. Instead, teacher salaries will be based on student performance and training outside of the classroom or professional development. The four-tier career ladder allows teachers to advance quicker.

"Whatever you are doing after school that teachers normally do and don't get paid for, now you can get achievement units and you move intervals so you can move two steps within one year instead of waiting a year, two, three to move, so that's what's exciting," said Patricia Cook-Ferguson.


>snip<

"I've never met people who don't want to do their job well. I've met people who don't do their jobs well. They're trying their best and paying them more is not going to make them do better," said teacher Iris Karsh.

>snip<

http://wjz.com/local/new.contract.teachers.2.2013646.html

[Hannah Bell]

17. This is the second vote. The first vote came out the wrong way & the union made the teachers

vote again.

Which shows you where the union leadership stands & how much use they are.

Workers need to get a clue.

[Stinky The Clown]

18. You're right. The union head was on teevee for weeks telling everyone how wonderful . . . .

. . . . the school board and City were to allow them this great opportunity.

It was DISGUSTING. The unions are broken. They're corporate tools, pure and simple. Infiltrated.

[Tatiana]

19. Rank and file members should have told their leadership to go Cheney themselves.

They had it right the first time. This is just the beginning towards the demeaning and de-professionalization of teachers in Baltimore.

***Sigh*** I feel bad for those teachers in B-more. Clearly they were scared into voting this way the second go-'round.

[xchrom]

20. This is probably the saddest story I'll read this week. Nt