L.A .Teachers Vote No Confidence in Deasy and Their Own Union

The Los Angeles times reported that LAUSD teachers “overwhelmingly expressed ‘no confidence’ in superintendent John Deasy last Wednesday, the first time such a vote has occurred in the nation's second-largest school system.

It is certainly significant that a majority of LA teachers voted no confidence in their superintendent—and not at all surprising, considering Deasy’s war on teachers. Under his watch, LAUSD has implemented teacher evaluations based on student test scores. There have been numerous charter school conversions, furloughs and layoffs, as well as ongoing budget shortfalls. There have also been abuse scandals in which the district has covered up misconduct or obstructed investigations and then punished teachers en masse for the wrongdoings of one or two teachers, while trying to redirect blame onto the union.

However, it would be a gross exaggeration to say that teachers overwhelmingly supported the no confidence vote. Only about 17,770 teachers (slightly more than half of UTLA’s 32,000 members) participated in the vote. Of those who voted, a whopping 91% expressed disapproval. Yet, as a percentage of the total membership, this only constitutes slightly more than 50%. Looked at differently, one could say that nearly half of Los Angeles teachers did not feel strongly enough to vote at all.

Low voter turn-out for UTLA is nothing new (see here and here). Poor organizing by the union is one likely explanation. Simply placing “vote no confidence” posters on its website is not enough to get teachers to actually participate in the vote. They should have had organizers talking to teachers at every site and agitating for action, should the vote go their way, because in the end, a vote of no confidence has no teeth. If LA teachers want Deasy out, they’ll have to drive him out. Indeed, Deasy responded to the vote by asserting he was too busy trying to provide quality education to needy children to be bothered with such “nonsense.”

Another likely reason for the low voter turnout is general discontent with UTLA by its members. As bad as Deasy has been, UTLA has been complicit with many of his policies, including evaluation reform and furloughs.

Ironically, another measure on the same ballot that criticized UTLA only won 77% approval (probably because the teachers most frustrated with their union didn’t bother to vote). This resolution explicitly criticized UTLA for “weakening and dividing” its members, and for not organizing and mobilizing its members and community allies. The measure called for a reduction in standardized tests for evaluating teachers and an end to reconstitution of staff at low-performing schools.

The Times reports that UTLA president Warren Fletcher embraced the second resolution, despite its criticism of his leadership. Question is, will he do anything about it?

Michelle Rhee Joins L.A. School Board Funding Free For All

Huck/Konopacki Labor Cartoons

Michelle Rhee’s organization, StudentsFirst, has contributed $250,000 to support the campaigns of incumbent Los Angeles school board president Monica Garcia, as well as those of Kate Anderson and Antonio Sanchez. The donation comes on the heels of a $1 million donation to the same candidates by New York Mayor Bloomberg, and several $100,000 donations by L.A. billionaires Eli Broad and A. Jerrold Perenchio.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Rhee believes her involvement in Los Angeles could advance her school reform agenda statewide. This agenda includes the conversion of public schools into charter schools, increasing reliance on high stakes tests, and tying teachers’ evaluations to student test scores.

Rhee is not unique in this belief. All the big outside money is intended to influence the free market school reform agenda statewide and even nationwide. One of their goals is to weaken teachers unions, both as a voting bloc and as an impediment to their money-making scams. Garcia and Anderson, for example, are outright union busters and the United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA) has indicated it would spend millions of dollars to defeat them. (Garcia said that if she were president of UTLA she would go on a rampage and fire all “ineffective” teachers and eliminate seniority). Sanchez has been more subtle. Consequently, he was won the support of UTLA, despite having made comments that suggest he intends to bully the union into submitting to the will of the free market reformers. For example, he said he wants to “break” the divide between unions and school choice and accountability advocates, which is just a politically strategic way of saying he wants the union to accept harmful concessions.

All three of the candidates supported by Rhee, Bloomberg and the Coalition for School Reform are backers of privatization and charter school conversions. LAUSD already has one of the largest numbers of charter schools of any district in the nation, as well as its own sordid history of charter school scandals (see here and here).

Considering LAUSD’s history of budget shortfalls, low student achievement and administrator scandals, it would seem politically irresponsible to give away even more oversight and revenue to private education management organizations which can run charter schools with only minimal district oversight and which have a track record that is no better (and often worse than traditional public schools. Then again, it should be obvious by now that promoters of charter schools, vouchers and parental “choice” have no interest in improving educational outcomes. Rather, their motivations are purely financial: increase profit-making opportunities for themselves and for the funders of their political careers.  

NY Mayor Buys LA School Board Race, Starts Arms Race With UTLA

Huck/Konopacki Labor Cartoons

One might well wonder why New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg is spending $1 million of his own hard-(hardly)-earned cash to influence the Los Angeles school board race (the largest donation yet in this hotly contested race). Yet it is not just Bloomberg—several other billionaire outsiders have also ponied up large sums to help their favorite candidates win and it is not because they care about the wellbeing of LA’s children. Los Angeles Unified (like New York) is a battleground school district in the quest by wealthy investors and entrepreneurs to siphon off tax dollars from public education and crush their biggest enemy—the unions. What goes down in LA, they hope, will soon follow throughout the country, aiding their ability to weaken or destroy public sector unions, while increasing their share of the profits.

Bloomberg’s donation to Coalition for School Reform was meant to aid incumbent L.A. school board president Monica Garcia, in District 2, challenger Kate Anderson, in District 4, and Antonio Sanchez, who is fighting for an open seat in District 6. Each of these candidates has been a strong supporter of Superintendent Deasy’s reform agenda and two (Garcia and Anderson) have been vocal critics of the teachers union, United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA).

While Bloomberg’s $1 million has been the largest single donation, Coalition for School Reform (CSR) has also raised more than $1.5 million in smaller donations, according to the LA Times, from other billionaires ($250,000 each from veteran free market education “reformer” Eli Broad and former Univision chief A. Jerrold Perenchio). CSR also includes Megan Chernin, who runs a nonprofit formed by Deasy to raise funds for LAUSD schools and who used to head L.A.’s Promise, which managed three LAUSD charter schools. A smaller donation of $10,000 was made by Steven Prough, the current head of L.A.’s Promise.

The coalition has also received six-figure donations from Lynda Resnick, creator of POM Wonderful juice, and journalist Jamie Alter Lynton, who is on the board of Deasy’s nonprofit and who is married to Michael Lynton, chairman and chief executive of Sony Pictures Entertainment. Lynton has used her journalism connections as a bully pulpit to criticize UTLA and its defense of due process rights for its members. Former New York City schools Chancellor Joel Klein has also ponied up $25,000 to support the cause.

The Coalition for School Reform is a pro-charter and pro-accountability outfit that Mayor Villagairosa set up to fund his pro-privatization candidates back in 2011. In that election, the coalition raised over $1 million from right wing billionaire Phillip Anshutz (a “reactionary that makes the fascist-friendly Koch Brothers look moderate” wrote Robert Skeels), as well as billionaires Eli Broad, Jerrold Perenchio and others. Skeels, an education and social justice activist who writes for Schools Matter and Solidaridad, is also running against Garcia, but has raised his comparatively infinitesimal funding entirely through small donations and community organizing.

So who are the candidates the coalition is supporting in this current election and what is their agenda? Let’s start with current Board President Monica Garcia, a raving union-buster, who said that if she were president of UTLA she would go on a rampage and fire all “ineffective” teachers and eliminate seniority. This only shows that she has no clue how school districts actually operate (e.g., the district is the boss, with the power to hire and fire; the union is the employee of the teachers, with the responsibility to defend their interests and no ability to fire teachers). More significantly, it implies that she despises teachers, presuming great numbers of them to be incompetent, or at least an expensive burden, who should be replaced en-masse by lower-paid and more compliant novices.

The coalition’s candidate for District 4, one of LAUSD’s more affluent districts, is Kate Anderson, an attorney who once worked for Munger, Tolles & Olson, a high-powered law firm with members who are currently working in President Obama’s cabinet and who have served (or who currently serve) as CEO’s and directors of large investment firms, like Salomon Brothers and Berkshire Hathaway. One of the coalition’s priorities for District 4 is “stand[ing] up to special interest groups that make it impossible to remove poorly performing teachers.” In other words, they are counting on Anderson to attack collective bargaining and weaken the union by eviscerating teachers’ due process rights. Anderson’s supporters include Ben Austin, founder of Parent Revolution, the astroturf group behind most of LAUSD’s Parent Trigger battles, and another charter school advocate and profiteer.

Anderson, like Garcia, has publicly expressed ignorance about how the school district operates, calling into question her credibility as a future board member. She was quoted in the L.A. Weekly saying “I’m really frustrated by the lack of a teacher evaluation system. . .” though LAUSD does in fact have a teacher evaluation system, one that was negotiated by the district with the union and signed into a contract by both parties. Like Garcia, she, too, is disdainful of teachers, saying “We need a system that. . . when appropriate, helps teachers gracefully exit from the system.” This is essentially a euphemism for, “we need a more efficient way to get rid of teachers.” It is probably safe to presume she is referring to expensive veterans, union organizers, student advocates, charter school critics, and others who stand in the way of CSR’s privatization schemes. Ironically, Anderson’s opponent, Steve Zimmer, is a Teach for America alumnus who is supported by both UTLA and several charter schools.

In response to the large donation by Bloomberg, UTLA has asked for outside funds from the state and national teachers unions to help it support its own favorite candidates for the L.A. school board and has said it planned to spend several million dollars on the election.  As of last week, the NEA was unwilling to get involved, but the California Teachers Association and AFT have left the possibility open, according to the LA School Report. Regardless, it is unlikely that UTLA will be able to keep up the coalition’s spending, as it has no billionaire supporters.

The third candidate being pushed by CSR is Antonio Sanchez, another Villaraigosa ally, who also once worked for the County Federation of Labor, making him seem like a pro-union (rather than pro-privatization) candidate. Indeed, the Daily News reports that several unions have endorsed Sanchez, including UTLA and SEIU. However, despite his labor credentials, Sanchez supports much of Villaraigosa’s “reform” agenda, according to the L.A. School Report, saying that he wants to “break” the divide between unions and school choice and accountability advocates. This ought to give UTLA pause, as “breaking the divide” means getting the union to accept harmful concessions. For example, Sanchez supports the use of student performance data in teacher evaluations.

“Breaking the divide” between teachers’ unions and “reform” advocates is one of the main goals of CSR and its billionaire funders. As the reform movement sees it, the unions’ opposition to evaluation reform, Value Added Measures (VAM) and charter schools is irrational, selfish and meritless—and something that can be whittled away with persistence and finesse. They have good reason to believe this. UTLA—as well as CTU, in Chicago, and UFT, in New York—have all acquiesced to the use of student performance data or actual test scores to evaluate their teachers, despite the fact that such data is inconsistent, unreliable and correlates more strongly with students’ socioeconomic backgrounds than with teacher quality.

Another Domino Falls--UTLA Rolls Over and Accepts Student Test Data to Evaluate Teachers

United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA), which represents teachers at the nation’s second largest school district, recently signed what some are calling a landmark agreement to use student test scores to evaluate teachers. 66% of the 16,892 members who voted approved the agreement, the Los Angeles Times reported, bringing L.A. in line with Chicago, New York and many smaller cities in using student test data in teacher evaluations.

The Times is calling it a victory for the union, because the agreement limits the use of value-added measures (VAM), which supposedly measure how much a teacher influences students’ gains or losses on test scores from year to year. Instead, the agreement allows for the evaluation of teachers based on raw state test scores and district assessments.

In reality, this can hardly be considered a victory. The reason that VAM should be opposed is that it cannot accurately or consistently attribute student progress on tests to anything their teachers may or may not have done. When used correctly (e.g., taking the average of students’ scores over three consecutive years and factoring out variables outside the teachers’ control, like poverty), VAM scores may be consistent for teachers at the extremes (i.e., the very best and very worst), but is essentially useless for the vast majority of teachers who fall somewhere in between. Yet few school districts average the scores over this length of time, particularly those that are on one-year evaluation cycles. Even those on two-year cycles rarely do this.

Even when VAM is not used, all use of student test data to evaluate teachers suffers from most of these same problems. There is no scientifically accurate or consistent way to know why a child’s test scores improve or decline over time. Their socioeconomic status not only has a large influence on their baseline scores, but also on how quickly they improve over time. School and community cultures and attitudes can affect how seriously students take the tests. Student’s prior teachers and prerequisite knowledge and school-readiness influence how much they learn and how successful they are with future teachers.

The new evaluation plan will also include the use of student and parent feedback and teachers’ contributions to the school community, both of which are fraught with potential for bias. Students and parents are not only untrained to evaluate teacher quality, but they are not objective, either. They can and do provide negative feedback on teachers for vindictive and petty reasons, like refusing to change grades or for holding a child accountable for school or class policies.

With respect to the “school community,” teachers are already expected to participate in committees and extracurricular activities and several of the California State Teaching Standards address this. What remains unclear is whether this is just a reiteration of what already exists in the standards (in which case it need not be mentioned in this new agreement) or if it is an expectation that teachers contribute even more time outside of their teaching responsibilities. If the latter is true, this could lead to a bias in favor of those teachers who kiss up most to administrators or who volunteer most for administrators’ pet projects.

Not surprisingly there was no consensus among LA teachers in favor of this deal.  Only about half of the teachers participated in the vote (according to Ed Source), with about 66% of those voting in favor, which means only one-third of the district’s teachers actually approved the measure. While it is impossible to know why turnout was so low, one can speculate that many teachers were ambivalent to the point that they were willing to accept whatever their colleagues decided. Indeed, Cheryl Ortega, the union’s director of bilingual education, said she wanted to vote no, but voted yes because she feared the state would mandate something worse.

The decision by UTLA to push this terrible deal likely influenced many members to support it and it amounts not only to a sellout of its own members, but a threat to all teachers in the state. That UTLA and LAUSD were at the bargaining table in the first place was the result of a recent court ruling that the state’s Stull Act required the use of student test data in teacher evaluations. However, not only was the court ruling flawed (the Stull Act requires the use of student data—not necessarily the use of high stakes exams), but it was an attack on collective bargaining, which is supposed to be between a union and its members’ employer (in this case LAUSD, not the courts or the state legislature).

Yet even if the Stull Act did mandate the use of high stakes student test data, this would not justify UTLA rolling over and accepting it. The fact remains that the use of student test data is unreliable, inconsistent and inappropriate for evaluating teachers and will likely lead to many good teachers receiving poor reviews and potentially losing their jobs, while doing little to identify, let alone remediate bad teachers. Thus, it is also potentially detrimental for schools and children. UTLA (like the UFT and CTU did in response to similar legislation in New York and Illinois) chose to take the easy, passive, risk-free road of obedience, rather than fighting for the interests of their members or the interests of children.

Now that the three biggest district unions have accepted the use of student test data to evaluate their teachers without a serious fight, states will be emboldened to shove it down the throats of other school districts.