The Offical Website of the PJSTA

Posted on October 12, 2013 by thepjsta

NYSED Commish John King is a Coward!

Last night, at a PTA Town Hall meeting upstate, NYSED Commish John King was absolutely lambasted by parents and educators for the reform agenda that he has forced onto New York State Public Schools. As a result, King, who is a coward and a crony of Senator John Flanagan, has canceled all remaining PTA Town Hall meetings.

Via the New York State PTA’s Facebook page…

Dear PTA Members and Friends,

The NY State Education Commissioner’s office has requested suspending the remaining Town Hall meetings on the Common Core scheduled for:

Tuesday, October 15-Garden City HS, 170 Rockaway Ave, Garden City

Wednesday, October 16- Shenendehowa HS West, 970 Rt 146 Clifton Park

Thursday, October 24- Williamsville North HS, 1595 Hopkins Rd Williamsville

Wednesday, October 30-New Hartford SHS, 33 Oxford Rd,New Hartford

While our goal was to provide an opportunity to learn and share, based on review of the initial October 10 meeting, the Commissioner concluded the outcome was not constructive for those taking the time to attend. Please know that NYS PTA will continue to work with all education and child advocacy partners to keep our members updated and informed on education, health, safety and welfare issues affecting children and families.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and express our sincere appreciation to those who have given their time to assist with organizing this initiative.

New York State PTA

This is absolutely unthinkable. It’s one thing to ignore the pleas of educators over the last few years. But now the commissioner has essentially told parents that he doesn’t care what they think either. He and his merry band of reformers will just shut us all out and continue to jam the reforms down our throats. Nothing will stand in his way of pleasing the plutocrats behind this agenda. Not teachers, not parents, and certainly not children. If this does not enrage you, then you should be checked for a pulse.

Every educator and parent in New York State should be bombarding their legislators this weekend telling them to “Fire John King!”

Here is King being skewered last night…

Welcome to Bizarro World

So who is on the other end of the line John?

Just when you thought things couldn’t be more off the wall than they already were, NYSED begins directing EngageNY users to a phone sex line. Yes, you read that correctly.

Via lohud.com…

The state Education Department’s EngageNY website was directing people with tech support problems to a telephone number for an engagement of a different kind Thursday.

Instead of getting help to log on, people who call the number are greeted with a perky female voice announcing, “Welcome to America’s hottest talk line! Ladies, press 1 to talk to interesting and exciting guys. Guys, press 2 to talk to hot ladies!”

I’m speechless.

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Posted on October 10, 2013 by thepjsta

Obama Hates Unions

Labor Haters: Rahm Emanuel and Barack Obama

President Obama, who is trying to destroy the industry in which we make our living, was at it again yesterday. He was comparing the GOP to striking workers who should be fired.

Via the Washington Examiner…

President Obama again compared Republicans in Congress to workers going on strike, telling reporters Tuesday that GOP lawmakers had no more right to shut down the government than factory workers had to walk off their jobs.

The president made similar remarks at an event in Rockville, Md., on Thursday. He even referenced that event in his remarks Tuesday.

Both times, he compared GOP lawmakers to hypothetical striking workers. He argued those workers would be rightfully fired if they tried to shut down a plant to extract concessions from management.

In each case, Obama seemed unaware that the worker activity he was describing was a classic organized labor strike, a federally protected activity under the National Labor Relations Act. The law was signed by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1935 and is considered one of the era’s major liberal victories.

It makes you wonder why labor has endorsed him in the last two elections. Unions may want to start paying attention to a politician’s actions when choosing who they endorse, rather than just handing over the endorsement to anyone who pays them lip service. Despite claiming to support unions in the past, Obama has proven to be nothing more than another anti-labor neoliberal pandering to the corporate dollar.

Thursday’s Assembly Hearing

Via the Suffolk PAC: NYS Assembly Hearing – Testing

Please don’t forget about the forum being held by members of the NYS Assembly on the issues of high stakes testing and common core which will take place in Suffolk county on Thursday, October 10, from 4:00 to 8:00 PM at the Sagtikos Arts and Science Building at Suffolk County Community College in Brentwood NY.

We would like to thank all of you who have helped us find speakers for this Thursday’s hearing and have gotten the word out to your members. If we haven’t heard from you please be sure your local is represented in the audience. We need to show our legislators that we really care about these issues.

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Posted on October 4, 2013 by thepjsta

Reign of Error Book Club

A reminder that next Wednesday, October 9th will be our first book club meeting for Diane Ravitch’s new book Reign of Error. We will be discussing the first four chapters of the book on Wednesday night. Anyone is welcome to attend. Details can be found here. If you haven’t already picked up a copy of the book, make sure you do this weekend! It debuted at #10 on the NY Times Best Sellers list.

Also, be sure to catch Diane on “All In with Chris Hayes” tonight at 8:00 pm on MSNBC.