CTPF Censure

Chicago Teachers Pension Fund Censures 3 Minority Board Members

By Jim Vail

CTPF Vice President Trustee Mary Sharon Reilly was reprimanded for
being a racist on the pension fund which resulted in an apology.

Core and Members First trustees on the Chicago Teachers Pension Fund teamed up to punish and publicly admonish three of its minority board members and reprimand a fourth white member for being a racist.

Members First teacher trustee Phil Weiss, who upset a Core candidate in the pension fund election last fall, introduced the motion on behalf of pension fund president and interim director and Core trustee Jeffery Blackwell to censure the three trustees Gervaise Clay, Tina Padilla and Maria Rodriguez for disrespectful and unprofessional behavior on the fund.

Weiss proceeded to read the resolutions at the May 20 pension board meeting like a judge handing down harsh sentences. He warned of harsher penalties in the future should they not follow the board's guidelines to correct their actions.

"Whereas the Board of Trustees censured Trustee Maria Rodriguez on Sept. 19, 2019, for conduct towards Fund employees, and a fellow Trustee that was aggressive, hostile, unprofessional and disrespectful behavior."

He did not state what the aggressive or hostile action that occurred two years ago was that necessitated the public shaming.

The same resolution was read out to all three trustees. Guilty trustees Tina Padilla and Gervaise Clay both ran on the Core ticket while Rodriguez was an independent.

A reprimand resolution was also read out loud by Weiss to trustee Mary Sharon Reilly for racist behavior toward another trustee.

Clay wanted to know why the board choose to punish her and the other two minority trustees more harshly than the white trustee who was admonished for being a racist.

Weiss quickly replied that it was because Reilly apologized.

Clay countered at the meeting that she had no idea what she was supposed to apologize for nor was she given the chance to do so.

Reilly will be running in the next pension board election on the Core ticket. The interesting question will be if Core, which has made the fight against racism the center of its platform, will still back Trustee Reilly in the next election.

The trustees who voted in favor of the censure resolution included President Blackwell, teacher trustees Jackie Price Ward, Jim Cavallero, and Phil Weiss, retired principal trustee Jerry Travlos, and retired teacher trustee Mary Sharon Reilly. The Chicago Board of Education trustees Miguel Del Valle and Dwayne Truss abstained, while retiree trustee Lois Nelson was not present for all three votes. Rodriguez, Padilla and Clay all voted no to their censuring.

The same vote pattern repeated in passing the reprimand resolution against Mary Sharon Reilly, although Padilla and Clay showed a sign of party solidarity (all three are Core members) by abstaining rather than voting yes with the other trustees.

The guilty must attend two trustee sensitivity training sessions and refrain from any further alleged aggressive, hostile, unprofessional or disrespectful conduct, and make a public apology at the next board meeting. "If not, there may be more serious consequences," Weiss warned at the meeting.

Tina Padilla told her executioners they had no evidence about any of the accusations. 

"This is misrepresentation and fraudulent," she told the board, adding she will be getting an attorney. "This whole board is out of order!"

Rodriguez said during the board meeting that she and Gervaise Clay had not been interviewed before the resolution to censure them.

The kangaroo court board meeting last week resulted after President Jeffery Blackwell warned last summer that there was a "cabal of evil" permeating the pension board where a culture of intimidation, misinformation, discrimination, slander, misogyny, fearmongering, blatant racism and retaliatory actions are prevalent.

But Blackwell himself has shown a contempt for ethics when he voted himself in as the interim director of the Chicago Teachers Pension Fund (CTPF) while he continues to serve as a trustee who oversees the fund's operation. 

"Jeff made a scandal where there is none and is creating controversy that is unnecessary," a former pension board trustee told Second City Teachers. The trustee said the pension fund has been a beacon in minority hiring and is to be commended for this.

Which makes this latest show trial at the pension board that more resembled a kangaroo court in a Kafka novel all the more bizarre.

Padilla and Rodriguez are both female Latinas while Clay is an African American female. And they are at the center of Blackwell's charges of racism and misogyny? Meanwhile, their executioners are Phil Weiss, who is white, and Jeffery Blackwell, who is African American. They are also both males!

Do you get the feeling we're not in Kansas anymore?

Anybody who closely follows the CTPF meetings will see that there is a political element to this latest purge and public shaming. The fund was recently hit with a lawsuit by a current employee (we incorrectly reported that the lawsuit filed against the fund was by a former employee while in fact he still works for the fund). Accountant Albert Thomas accused the pension board management of retaliation after he pointed out accounting errors dating back to 2012.

One trustee questioned the timing where the actions allegedly happened one or two years ago. Both Clay and Rodriguez are up for re-election this year in November.

Rodriguez, Padilla and Clay are the only trustees who regularly challenge the leadership and ask questions on behalf of the members. Blackwell has been observed by this reporter to make snide remarks to show his contempt for the three female trustees. For example, during the last board meeting after the censure and reprimand resolutions passed, Blackwell said in response to an apology from one of the convicted trustees for asking a question out of order: "That's okay, we're accustomed to it." Other trustees who support Blackwell will join in the subtle bullying of Padilla, Rodriguez and Clay. One trustee mockingly told trustee Rodriguez, "Are you chastising us?"

Amazingly, these remarks followed a roughly two hour presentation by a consultant about what constitutes racist and unprofessional bullying in the workplace. 

"Clearly this is a political witch hunt for power and control of the CTU and CTPF," Trustee Maria Rodriguez said. "Core and Members First are vying for control of both the Chicago Teachers Union and the Pension Fund, while members are the victims and only three women on the Board of Trustees are asking questions to ensure transparency at the Fund."

She noted at the meeting that she and the other guilty ones were not allowed to have an attorney to refute the allegations.

"We don't rubber stamp everything, we're strong women" Rodriguez said at the meeting. "We were not allowed to bring an attorney. We didn't even know the allegations. This is unbelievable."

Weiss said the censure and reprimand resolutions will be published in the CTPF newsletter.

The Chicago Teachers Pension Fund has been losing money every year  and is currently underfunded at near 45 percent. Members First ran on the promise to stop the fund from hemorrhage more money, while Core boasted that the CTU restored the pension levy to stop the funding decline that resulted from years of the board of education not paying into the fund.

The business community represented by Greg Hinz of Chicago's Crain Magazine is closely following the teachers pension fund's latest saga. There are people inside the fund feeding him information about the infighting - a dangerous strategy. Hinz uses this information to write why the teachers pensions which he says cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars should be nixed because of scandals like this. He represents multi-millionaires, not teachers!

Kafka Education

USING KAFKA

By Stephen Wilson

 

How Kafka's stories may help people perceive their own problems from many different angles.

  

 

'People are tied together by ropes, and it's bad enough when the ropes around you loosen and he drops somewhat lower than the others into empty space: ghastly when the ropes break and he falls. That is why we should cling to others'.

 

Kafka's letter to Oskar Pollak, 1903

 

 

In Russia there used to be a strict custom dictating how a person told a story. The storyteller could not be interrupted or fail to finish his story. He had to complete the story to the end. Unless he told the story to the end misfortune would fall upon him. This was because the story was told not only to the living listeners but to the dead ancestors of the storyteller. The story was not just told for entertainment but to bring good luck and health to the listeners. Andrei Sinyavsky told of a legend held by the Khakasses, who live in the Altai mountains where a storyteller stopped midway between a story and went outside. He came across a bogatyr who had got stuck in a mountain with his horse. The deeply offended bogatyr scolded the storyteller with the words, "Why have you left me like this, inside the mountain?" Soon after the storyteller died, but warned other storytellers never to stop telling the story to the end. For the aim of telling the story was to also keep evil outside the community.

 

The Czech writer Franz Kafka is reputed to have failed to finish many of his stories such as 'The Castle' and 'America'. Of course he did not die of an illness for failing to end many of his stories. On the contrary, premature illness prevented him from finishing many of his stories by weakening him and Kafka was something of a perfectionist who was never completely content with his stories. This is why on his death bed he asked for many of his stories to be burnt. The reason for not finishing the stories was not because he adopted some anti-narrative perspective where he believed our lives don't mirror stories and are devoid of any inherent telos or meaningful structure.

 

The facts are that humans are endowed with a narrative identity. We are the stories we tell ourselves even if there seems at times a radical discrepancy between some stories and our lives. By stories we mean that there is a beginning where the hero has to fulfill some aim or purpose, an agreed criteria which allows us to distinguish between facts and falsehood as well as a resolution to some problem which has loomed up. Now some thinkers deny this. For instance, Louis O.Mink claims 'Stories are not lived but told. Life has no beginnings, middle or: endings: there are meetings, but the start of an affair belongs to the story we tell ourselves later,and there are partings only in the story" Life only seems like a story in retrospect after someone has written it. My response to this is, "Have any of those critics heard of death?" For death marks the end of any narrative.

 

When people fail to acknowledge their own narrative identity they are in danger of impoverishing their own self. They can be making one step into dissolving and breaking up their very identity! For a strong sense of narrative identity is essential to providing a person's life with a clear and coherent meaning which strongly motivates him or her to affirm life as an adventure. I believe that the stories of Kafka can help us to develop a more stable and secure narrative identity where life becomes dynamic rather than static. The stories, parables and letters of Kafka can help us to better understand why we should tell stories and how. Secondly, since Kafka compares our life as going on a journey through a complex labyrinth or maze it is worth asking what obstacles stop, impede or imprison us in this maze.

Thirdly, Kafka bravely grappled with all kinds of acute social and psychological problems such as isolation, low self esteem as well as a profound loss of meaning. He suggests how we radically transform ourselves through our relations with others and are easily exposed to losing our way and minds.

 

Some may argue that Kafka is the last writer one would want people who have problems to read. Isn't this author too dark, despairing and depressing? But this would be to misread his works. Since some of the stories are unfinished we might ask readers how they would want the stories to end. There is a lot of humor. In actual fact you might even argue that Kafka's works are not that dark as compared to horrific events after his death. The experience of the the main character in 'The Castle' is not as stressful as either being held and tortured in Guantanamo Bay or as an Englishman who has been born in Britain can't find his documents and so is deported to the West Indies. Just read Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine and you'll discover that Kafka is pretty tame. The main character in the Castle is not arrested, deported or relentlessly tortured.

 

1. Kafka offers wise advice on how stories should be told. Firstly, a story should be told from the soul. It should not be over descriptive and full of artificial metaphors which sound pretentious and artificial. Such needless descriptions often smother and stifle the narrative of unfolding events. If you can use three words to describe something instead of hundred then use three words. He avoided the errors of the Kunstwart stories which strove to shock people by narrating events by using the language in a false and insincere way. You just have to read the beginning of some of Kafka's stories such as 'Metamorphosis' As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed into a gigantic insect'. In one neat sentence Kafka takes the reader straight to the heart of the story. In his story 'The Burrow', it begins 'I have completed the construction of my burrow and it seems to be successful'. But this word 'seems' is so important because the mole feels endless anxiety about being attacked by predators. But Kafka's work as a lawyer made him well acquainted with the art of rhetoric. This very art encompasses storytelling as in many of his novels the drama which looms up involves acute arguments between the characters {the term for this is stychiomythia}. 

A performing storyteller should use rhetoric to interact with his audience by pausing and asking them questions as well as addressing them directly. That Kafka understood this is mentioned in one entry to his diary, in 1911, where he mentions meeting a lively American lawyer. Kafka stated the lawyer was a good storyteller because of his vivacious and steady speech as well as his interactive approach. He wrote 'The listener is personally drawn in, questioned, while alongside the plot of the story thickens ... the listener is flattered and drawn into the story and given a special right to be a listener'.{pages 74-76,The Diaries of Franz Kafka, edited by Max Brod ,Penguin 1972}

 

2. Some of the most important themes raised by Kafka are how a person's aims and aspirations are constantly thwarted by all kinds of insurmountable obstacles. Those obstacles might be all kinds of confusion, misunderstanding and farce. Two themes which emerge are how pointless many of our actions are because some of the tasks are impossible to finish. The task is impossible to finish because of oppressive authority, disorientation, lack of time or know-how. Life is essentially fleeting and fragile. We are ensnared in a labyrinth where any wrong turning can be fatal. I think that it is worth asking students in reading or discussion groups to examine Kafka's smallest works to illustrate a number of themes. You might get them to read 'A Chinese puzzle'. Kafka tells how children often bought an inexpensive toy which was a piece of flat wood painted reddish brown with blue labyrinthine paths cut in which they all led to a small hole. There was a tiny ball in this game and you had to shake the toy to get it into the hole. In this tale Kafka imagines a ball has a mind of its own and might not like going along those preconceived paths. The ball might want a break or prefer to go on another path. With this story you might ask what kinds of paths do you feel you are forced or obliged to go along? For instance, do you feel under pressure to go to university or to obtain a job with a particular level of income? Are there other paths we can find in the labyrinth of life? 

In the story of 'The Next Village ' the author narrates that 'My grandfather used to say: Life is astoundingly short. To me, looking back over it, life seems so foreshortened that I scarcely understand, for instance, how a young man can decide to ride over to the next village without being afraid that - not to mention accidents- even the span of a normal happy life may fall short of the time needed for such a journey'. I would ask the students 'What do you understand by the next village? and 'What kind of fears and accidents might be suggested by the author?'

 

3.  A teacher might ask his students how they would define success or failure and whether the price is worth paying. I think that the story 'Reflections for Gentlemen Jockeys' is relevant in this respect. Kafka begins the story, "When you think it over, winning a race is nothing to sigh for.' The success of winning is made bitter by the envy of your opponents and the insincere congratulations of people who have won bets on your horse. But the last line states, 'And finally from the now overcast sky rain actually begins to fall'. This indicates that things we can't control can render us ridiculous or impotent. The petty rudely ruins the profound. We might easily conclude that there is no 'total success' or 'total failure'. This is why calling someone 'a loser ' is so myopic and misleading.

 

The challenge of Kafka is that the readers should interpret the meaning of the stories in their own way and in deed, concerning his unfinished stories, why shouldn't the students be invited to invent their own endings? For example, in the unfinished novel 'The Castle', what if the land surveyor actually mended his relationship with Frieda or simply gave up his quest to take up a position in the Castle? What happens to the mole in 'The Burrow?' Does the unseen predator finally confront him? How does he react? What happens to the two mysterious alive balls which have turned up to haunt the' Elderly Blumfield?' Do the balls get on with the children he gave them to as a present?

How does one reach the next village? All too often we are faced with having no mentors, no guidelines or even a secure belief system or community from which to find a secure anchorage! In Kafka's stories you feel as if something terrible has happened to the characters before the story has even begun.

I think the main challenge is that we not only have to finish telling stories to the very end. We should also summon up the courage to go on the road and affirm life as an alluring adventure. Life should be dynamic, daring and audacious! We should at least attempt to reach the next village!

Russian School Massacre

NO FUNDS FOR SECURITY ?

By Stephen Wilson 

School shootings are now going global. This 19 year old
shot up a school in Kazan, Russia and killed children & teahers.

           "I was surprised to hear a report on Russian state channel that  the security forces reacted well to this attack on the school in Kazan. For five minutes this attacker was able to run around the school killing and injuring many children and staff. I heard ten died and many were injured and they describe the security as perfect," stated a Russian school teacher in sheer amazement at this bizarre claim. 

The school teacher was referring to a horrendous incident on the 11th May when a 19 year old casually walked into school number 175 in Kazan, Russia, with a Hatsan Escort 12 calibre semi automatic rifle  and recommenced shooting in school. As many as seven 8th grade students and two teachers have been reported dead and over twenty injured. The victims included school children aged 13 to 14 years old as well as a Russian English teacher and a math teacher. The reports of children and adults trembling in fear and crying, and experiencing intense fear as well as jumping from windows to escape this killer has shocked people all over the World. The reaction has been largely disbelief, disgust and astonishment at this horrendous event. 

While travelling in the metro I noticed how sad and sullen many passengers seemed. I had witnessed such moods before after terrorist attacks. A mother of two children Tanya asked me, "Why are we witnessing so many recent attacks? Is this because of some young person who can't handle the transition to adulthood? I think all this comes from America! We didn't use to have such mass shootings!"

 

People are asking 'Why has this happened?' It seems plainly obvious that this was the act of a mad man who had lost it. Before attacking the school the 19 year old made a public announcement on a social network with a cap saying, "I am God, and you will be my slaves," and stating how he hated people and the world. In recent days people acquainted with this person reported how he had begun to lose his temper, knock aggressively on the doors of people and burst into rants. Some reports claim that medical examinations found proof of brain damage.

 

Many newspaper reports describe the shooter as 'a terrorist'. This can confuse the issue. This term is usually used in relation to politically-motivated acts. The use of such terminology certainly does not improve our understanding of the motives. I remember while I was studying psychology at university we had to answer an exam question on, 'Is there a typical profile or psychological type which offers a typical profile of a terrorist?' Psychologists could not come up with an answer. There was no typical terrorist. All the explanations offered could be easily refuted by lack of empirical evidence. Since it was the easiest question to answer in the exam I chose it. It was a piece of cake. The question still baffles people. As for school shooters we hear explanations such as the negative influence of computer games which desensitizes people, lack of emotional intelligence of the killers for potential victims and the profile of the lone wolf killer incapable of holding or forming relationships with people. The favorite expression is 'inadequate' person. But this begs the question as to why so many so-called 'inadequate ' people don't turn into mass murderers? And some 'inadequate 'people actually become adequate!  A highly pessimistic person might say there is nothing humanity can do to protect himself against such people. It is inevitable! this notion is highly questionable as well as morally objectionable.

 

Tighter security and strictly gun license control can at least decrease the damage if not completely prevent such acts. Why was it so easy for a 19 year old to purchase such a lethal weapon as a Hatsan Escort semi automatic weapon at the inexpensive price of between 30 to 70,000 rubles? How on earth could this person legally obtain a gun license? Just over two years ago a lone killer burst into a college in the Crimea on 17th October 2018 and killed 21 people with the exact same weapon! Gun control and the security of institutions of education were supposed to be strictly reviewed.

 

In the case of school number 175 there was not a single security man. The janitor who tried to prevent the killer from entering was shot but managed to press the security alarm. Why were there no security guards employed at this school? The school claimed that it could not afford to employ security guards! The security around schools has been privatized as the government refuses to provide enough funds. Over the last few years the school had made a contract with some private security companies and they requested that security in the school be maintained by electronic passes and video cameras. As far as Kazan is concerned the security of schools has become monopolized by one company 'Your Security'. From 2014 to 2016 this company won contracts with 440 out of 517 educational institutions which dealt with children. In 2020, this company secured two year contracts with as many as 500 city schools, kindergartens and clubs including school 175 which was the subject of this attack. Should the lives of school children be subject to private companies seeking to make a lucrative profit? Is it not the role of the government to provide sufficient funds for the protection of school children and staff?

 

The security in schools can be anything from very strict to lax. I once worked at a Russian school where two odd guys walked past the security man who did nothing to stop them entering my class and interrupting my lesson to try and haggle a price for English lessons. The security of schools is often given to pensioners and people with no real training in security. The pay for being a security man can sometimes be a pittance. For instance, at school number 88 in Kazan the pay is currently 12,000 rubles. This is hardly going to attract professionals. Not anyone can be employed as a security person. This should be regarded as an important profession. A security man should have training in self defense and should at least know one of the martial arts as well as how to effectively shoot. He should also be highly familiar with how to react in emergency situations and how to communicate with people. However, all too often, in Russia as well as other countries, this work is left to amateurs and this profession is not respected as much as it deserves. But I have witnessed some companies who take security very seriously. As a teacher I used to drop into the huge building of the company Yandex. While waiting for my student I noticed that every morning, a head of security would line up his staff and give a lecture on what to do in emergency situations like an outbreak of fire or terrorist incidents. The guards were encouraged to ask questions and ask for advice. I was impressed by the professionalism of the head. He seemed to have his head screwed on to his shoulders and took his job seriously. Of course, you might maintain that schools don't have the funds to employ such conscientious staff. Really??! The government actually has sufficient reserve fund as well as huge resources in lucrative companies from which it can draw good money. A price can't be put on the life of a single school child or staff member!

 

This article acknowledges the influence of Novaya Gazetta , number 50{3204} 12.05.21

Not Enough Money for Security Guards by Vladimir Prokushev

AUSL Dead

The Corrupt Management Company AUSL is Gone

By Jim Vail

Multimillionaire venture capitalist Martin Koldyke's Academy of 
Urban School Leadership or AUSL is no more after years of
corrupt inside deals to close and 'turnaround' as many black schools
on the South Side, to complement the real estate plan of Chicago's 
elite to purge the poor working class and make it safe for the rich.

The darling of corporate education reform that was called upon by the big guns to help destroy then privately manage public schools in Chicago  - the Academy for Urban School Leadership or AUSL - is no more.

It was once called Turnaround - introduced during the Mayor Daley corporate reform years - where a public school was determined to be "failing" so the city had to fire everyone in the building, from teachers and administrators to janitors, cooks, heck even the guy who came in to check the water meter. They were all part of a culture of failure that Chicago's elite had to exterminate.

The Chicago reform model was to close as many public schools, mostly in poor black neighborhoods on the South Side, and hand over others to a private management company called AUSL run by a multimillionaire venture capitalist, Martin Koldyke.

George Schmidt, the late/great editor of Substance News, called out this scam from the beginning:

"The most prominent corporate booster of "turnaround" (which is not even a legal term in the State of Illinois; Marshall High School is about to be reconstituted, a policy which has been deemed a failure since the late 1990s by the reputable analysts of public education) in Chicago is the Academy of Urban School Leadership (AUSL). While AUSL's claims about its successes as a so-called 'turnaround' specialist are widespread (and have even been parroted by the President of the United States (Barack Obama) and the current U.S. Secretary of Education (Arne Duncan)), the factual basis for AUSL's marketing claims has never been established. AUSL is Martin Koldyke's baby. Everyone in Chicago knows it. Koldyke is not neutral in education policy circles in Chicago, but one of the bigger players on the side of the debate that claims a so-called "business model" is necessary to improve public education. "Turnaround", as your Business reporters know well, is a widely discredited term in corporate America, thanks in a large part to the fraudulent way it was practiced some time ago by charlatans like "Chainsaw" Al Dunlap, whose career as a media darling ended when he destroyed Sunbeam (once a major Chicago corporation) a decade ago... Koldyke is still trying to whitewash the history of "turnaround" - at least for the public schools."

Like so many well-meaning corporate frauds, AUSL originally started as a training program for teachers, but then was twisted into a vehicle to privatize the public schools. And its fraudulent ways eventually spelled its doom.

According to Chalkbeat Chicago, which covers the Chicago public schools and is under their control, the district stated that the Chicago Principals & Administrators Association aired grievances about the treatment of principals and said a managing director, Jarvis Sanford, at the nonprofit is under investigation by the district's Inspector General.

AUSL had privately managed 31 public schools that were "failing" on the South and West Sides of the city. Like many public schools, their enrollment had fallen 12 percent. And it cost a lot - CPS spent between $2 million to $5 million more on administration costs to oversee this privately managed public schools that needed help. This is part of the privatization scam in Chicago - paid higher management fees to corrupt charter schools while spending less on staff and materials for the students. Aspira and Acero charter school directors were making more than the CPS CEO. 

The Chicago Teachers Union pointed out that the AUSL method led to the purge of Black educators under the guise of "failing" schools, when in reality, mayoral control of CPS had long starved these schools of resources.

"Our mission remains to reverse the harm of racist policies like turnarounds, and move our bosses to provide school communities the resources required to support every student's needs," CTU President Jesse Sharkey said in an email statement.

The Chicago corporate education model went nationally during the President Barack Obama years when he installed turnaround lover and former CPS Chief Arne Duncan to wreck havoc on the public schools across the country. Suddenly every teachers was being threatened to be fired, purged for the unforgiveable sin of low test scores - no matter how great their lessons are to teach children more than filling in bubbles on test.

The late George Schmidt of Substance News called
out the bs of AUSL corporate reform nonsense.

George Schmidt called it out in Chicago when Mayor Richard Daley first tried the 'Small Schools' model funded by the Gates Foundation to improve the rough public high schools like Orr on the West Side. When the city suddenly switch course to the 'turnaround' policy, George asked Daley at a press conference if he would apologize to the teachers they would fire because his small schools program was a failure. The Mayor and his rainbow color of aides then abruptly ended the press conference. I guess the powers that be are not used to journalists asking questions on behalf of the teachers, and not the elite as Tribune and Sun-Times reporters are trained to do.

"Ironically, the announcement that Gates would henceforth be funding "turnaround" (instead of small schools) took place at a press conference, featuring then Mayor Richard M. Daley and the same AUSL honchoes, at the so-called "Sherman School of Excellence," Schmidt wrote in 2012. "One of the elementary schools AUSL touted (at the time) as an example of their successful turnaround "model".

"Sherman is still on probation in 2012, and even on the day Daley appeared at Sherman, only one of the two Sherman buildings was under control. When reporters tried to visit the south building (which contained the upper grades) security blocked the door, but not tightly enough to prevent two reporters, this reporter included, from hearing someone shout "Motherfucker" inside the building."

Schmidt further wrote that these fraudulent education scams engineered from the top were helped by some of Chicago's media who wrote about the successes of the turnaround (including Chalkbeat's predecessor Catalyst), "counting on the media to ignore the bigger picture."

"As early as the 2008 - 2009 school year, the Chicago Tribune dispatched reporter Stephanie Banchero (now with the Wall Street Journal) to do a series of stories about how things were going during the first year of the AUSL "turnaround" at Sherman. Banchero's stories, some of which were droll to any experienced inner city teacher. At one point, the Tribune reported on a "pajama party" for students at a teacher's apartment, complete with a Page One photograph of happy black girls jumping on a bed, without noting that a regular teacher who held a "pajama party" at home for kids would probably be investigated and fired. The upshot of the Tribune series was that the AUSL "superteacher" left at the end of the year to take a job in the suburbs. Although The Wall Street Journal continues to reflexively promote Chicago's corporate school reform model, anyone can ask their main education reform reporter (who was at the February 22, 2012 Chicago Board of Education meeting) about the ground level reality of the Chicago model, as opposed to the pre-packaaged corporate hype that AUSL is still feeding into the news stream."

Aspira Fight

Roosevelt & River North Public Schools Fight Against Aspira Charter

By Jim Vail

Roosevelt High School teacher Jim McIntosh is helping organize resistance to 
Aspira Charter High School's attempt to move into a nearby school building.

Roosevelt High School and River North Elementary public schools are fighting hard against Aspira Charter School.

The Aspira Charter High School is trying to move into the Aspira Charter Middle School located at Leland and Lawndale Avenues in Albany Park.

"We want to protect our neighborhood schools," stated Brenda Lleyva, a Roosevelt High School graduate and member of the school's local school council at a press conference organized near the school on Tuesday, March 18.   

About 100 people including parents, students and teachers from the River North and Roosevelt schools gathered at the corner of Leland and Wilson to denounce the corrupt charter school's latest attempt to hoodwink the public by moving its charter high school into a public school building.

River North is an elementary school near Kedzie and Montrose Ave. that rents space in the Our Lady of Mercy Catholic Church where there is little room for the overcrowded school. A physical education teacher told the crowd that they have very little space for physical activities and use a small basement in the church. He said several times during the year he has to ask about 30 kids in his class to maintain silence during their activities because there is a funeral upstairs. He then turned around and stated, "But here there would be so much space to run around, play basketball and even play golf frisbee!"

But not over Aspira's dead body! When River North petitioned the Chicago Board of Education to allow their overcrowded high achieving school to share space with the grossly underenrolled Aspira Charter Middle School, several Chicago Public School (CPS) bureaucrats, including the Network 1 Chief Julie McGlade, said no way, Jose. North River cannot relocate to Aspira.

A crowd of about 100 people in support of neighborhood schools Roosevelt and River North attended a press conference on Tuesday, May 18, to denounce Aspira's attempt to relocated a few blocks away.

Meanwhile, the crafty charter operator with political connections to current Board of Ed President Miguel Del Valle, suddenly announced that their high school was going to relocate inside the middle school.

That was when the Roosevelt and River North communities kicked into overdrive and organized resistance to the insider deal.

"Roosevelt is doing an incredible job," stated 33rd ward Alderman Rosanna Rodriguez at the press conference. 

Rodriguez said she is in full support of her local high school and against the move of Aspira High School down the street that many believe would siphon students away from Roosevelt and thus endanger it's programs, including its highly touted culinary arts program.

Aspira has a history of making inside deals that bypass the community. The Haugan Middle School was originally built about 15 years ago to relieve the overcrowded Haugan Elementary School. It was assumed the teachers would move with their middle school students to the new school. But like a dark wolf that appears out of nowhere, Aspira swooped in and claimed the middle school at the height of CPS charter corruption and dirty privatization deals made behind closed doors.

Several teachers complained about harassment and corrupt actions including an illegal strip search of students at Aspira. The community has been frustrated because unlike a regular public school, Aspira is a private charter operator that does not have a local school council.

Having two high schools located within a couple of blocks of each other makes no sense at all. Rodriguez said Roosevelt is at about 75 percent capacity. 

"Albany Park does not need another high school," read one sign at the rally.

The 33rd Ward Working Families group passed out a flyer at the rally against the Aspira Charter relocation that stated: Moving ASPIRA so close to Roosevelt could threaten enrollment and funding at Roosevelt, ASPIRA has a problematic track record with parents, students and teachers and 71 percent of new charter schools opened between 2000 and 2012 were within 1.5 miles of the 49 schools that would be closed due to low enrollments in 2013 and Aspira has a youth development center named after Board of Ed President Migues Del Valle.

The Chicago Board of Education could make a decision on allowing ASIRA to relocate at their scheduled board meeting May 26th.

Pension Fund Lawsuit

Former Employee Sues Chicago Teachers Pension Fund

By Jim Vail

CTPF Chief Financial Officer Alise White

The Chicago Teachers Pension Fund (CTPF) has been a hot news item ever since current interim director and President Jeffery Blackwell accused fellow trustees of racism and intimidation against staff and vendors last summer.

Numerous whistle blower complaints have been filed against current trustees alleging racism and other egregious acts. 

The question this news blog raised was whether or not these accusations were politically motivated in order to silence those raising questions.

Former CTPF accountant Albert Thomas filed a lawsuit against the pension fund last month alleging retaliation and racial and age discrimination, according to FundFire, an investment management website.

Thomas had accused the pension fund of making accounting errors in 2019 that went back to 2012, and then the pension fund retaliated by denying him promotions and paying him less than other non-African American employees, FundFire reported. Thomas is African-American.

After Thomas raised these accounting errors to the fund's chief financial officer, his boss urged him "not to do anything or report anything to anyone," the lawsuit stated. The financial officer was later terminated. Thomas then raised the accounting errors to his new boss, who told him the same thing - keep your mouth shut.

Thomas reported the errors to three more people at the fund, and when nothing was done, he took legal action in 2019. That year he applied for a role as operation manager of accounting but was denied the opportunity to pursue the new position because the fund intentionally withheld information from him, FundFire reported.

Last year he applied to be an account manager but was denied an interview.

The CTPF Chief Financial Officer is Alise White who was hired by Chuck Burbridge in 2015.

CTPF director Charles Burbridge was the director of the fund while Thomas was working there. Burbridge was accused by trustees and others of running an operation beholden to him where employees were given raises and other perks if they supported him, while shunned or fired should they question his practices. He abruptly quit the fund last October, and was replaced by Mary Cavallaro, who then also abruptly resigned in January. Cavallaro, who was promoted by Burbridge, claimed the boardroom was filled with "chaos and toxicity" and "vile disrespect and insults" were directed at her allegedly by trustees. She quit after one trustee questioned why accounting errors happened under her watch.

This lawsuit begs the question about why numerous whistle blower complaints are being filed against trustees whose fiduciary responsibility is to making sure the $12 billion fund is run properly on behalf of the teachers and other Chicago Teachers Union employees invested in the retirement fund.

Whistle blower complaints have also been filed by staff members against the fund's leadership. 

May HOD

CTU House of Delegates Meet to Discuss Budget & Successes

By Jim Vail

CPS CEO Janice Jackson denounced the CTU
 & its ugly politics after she announced she would
 step down as head of the Chicago Public Schools.

The Chicago Teachers Union House of Delegates May 5, 2021 meeting presented the budget and outlined accomplishments.

CTU trustees Tammie Vinson and Jackson Potter, both members of Core, outlined the accomplishments of the union which included adding a record number of members despite the attack on the unions membership after Janus was passed that allows members to opt out of paying union dues, adding almost $1 million to the budget. They said the CTU is on the verge of passing the first elected school board (although the legislature is mulling Mayor Lightfoot's proposal that would considerably water down an elected board by giving her control to select most of the board members), they forced the city to declare a TIF surplus to give money back to the schools (the Tax Increment Finance or TIF took money from the schools to finance development), restored the pension levy, unionized many of the city's charter schools and restored bargaining rights for the union.

Budget director Kathy Catalano said as of the end of Feb. the CTU was over budget for the Contract Campaign, Member Defense and Professional Fees. Three pay dates with dues deductions in March will reduce the deficit.

For the proposed budget to begin in July there is an expected increase of $475,000 in dues (above the pass through increase) and assumes a 1% growth in membership. The CTU has a roughly $29 million budget.

CTU will still have 61 employees, paying rent for the Merchandise Mart will end in Oct. (resulting in a savings of about $620,000) and the election of officers will cost $250,000. She noted that the union took a hit with the pandemic in sales of merchandising, where union t-shirts and other union items have been a big hit.

VP Stacy Gates said the three top CPS officials who are leaving, including chief Janice Jackson, could not stand sitting at the table on an equal footing with the union.

"We don't celebrate this departure," Gates told the delegates during a teleconference. "It's pitiful and sad."

She added that they are upset the city is about to once again have an elected school board and their beloved AUSL management team that took over closed public schools after everyone in the buildings were fired is now gone. "Privatization has grounded to a halt!"

President Jesse Sharkey added that the departure of Jackson was different from the departure of former CPS Chief Forrest Claypool, a political hack who Mayor Rahm Emanuel hired after he helped privatize the Chicago Park District that he headed for a number of years battling their unions. Claypool fired Sarah Chambers and other activists for leading a protest to opt out of the punitive PARCC exam.

"I felt glee when Claypool left," Sharkey said, "but I don't feel glee that Jackson is leaving."

Jackson did not want nurses in every school or extra 30 minute prep time for the teachers. Jesse said Jackson didn't say mean things, while her boss Mayor Lori Lightfoot said the CTU push to get all teachers vaccinated was taking vaccines away from the elderly people.

"It was the case of good cop/bad cop," Sharkey said.

How many teachers across this city can relate to this strategy in their own schools where horrible principals are offset by personable assistants or vice versa. Butter them up, then go for the throat!

The CTU has fought the mayor tooth and nail during the last teachers strike and reopening of schools during the pandemic. But they decided to turn the other cheek after Janice Jackson blamed the CTU for its ugly politics after she announced her resignation.

The question of whether the schools will reopen fully next school school was addressed. Sharkey noted that CPS will ask the state to demand that the schools be forced to reopen in person but it is still unclear. He said that Covid is still a problem in the schools, with about 15 - 20 cases being reported in the schools every day. He said there should be better contract tracing, so that colleagues and others can be notified sooner by bypassing certain bureaucratic roadblocks.

Working People

Working People Oppose US War & Policing! 

Statement of the Chicago Anti-War Coalition (CAWC)

    It is working people who pay for the U.S. government’s aggression on people around the world and here at home. The government’s attacks benefit banks and corporations—not us.

 

    It’s our youth who are recruited into the military when they see no job future. Then they are trained to kill people who have done them no harm. And they are recruited into racist and violent and militarized police forces.

 

    It’s we who pay high taxes to pay for wars and police violence. 62% of the discretionary federal tax dollars go to the military. 40% of the Chicago City budget goes to the police. All the while social programs are cut.

 

    U.S. aggression and wars bring in high profits for the rich when the U.S. government steals oil and other resources from countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya etc. At home people are pitted against each other in a divide-and-conquer method that keeps wages low and working conditions bad.

   

     Working people in general don’t want to be involved in this sort of thing. We are not bullies who take advantage of others.

 

   So we have to think for ourselves and see through the lies that the media—which are owned by a few corporations—try to feed us. The capitalist ruling class fears that if we find out what’s really going on, we might rise up to challenge the criminal decisions by the ruling elite.

 

   Let’s keep in mind:  We are not the ones who make decisions in the U.S.  It is the politicians dependent on the big corporations and banks—whose election campaigns are funded by the rich-- who make decisions without public debate that presents all sides of issues.

 

    International Workers’ Day is a good time for us to have our own discussions and plan what to do. 132 years ago, the Workers International began to commemorate the memory of the American workers who were killed in 1886 by the U.S. ruling class and its Chicago police as they were in the midst of the struggle for the 8-hour working day. May Day was called as a day of solidarity of workers of all countries. It is an official holiday in more than 66 countries and celebrated in many more, including in the U.S.

 

We must pledge on this day to oppose the unjust and illegal U.S. wars abroad and the attacks on working people here at home, which is part of the way the ruling class operates every day. And so we express solidarity with all those in struggle.

 

And we raise the question about the need to change the ruling class system to public ownership. No more rule by the big banks and corporations. Instead, control by the oppressed and exploited people in the U.S., the working class and others. We need a government and economy of, for and by the people that will stand for peace and justice.

 

                                               Chicago Anti-War Coalition

                                      ChicagoAntiwarCoalition@gmail.com

                                www. facebook.com/chicagoantiwarcoalition

Russian Artist

A CALL OF THE HEART

ROBERT FALK EXHIBITION

By Stephen Wilson

      At last Russians can see more of the works of the Avant- Garde artist Robert Falk. The exhibition which began on the 22nd January ends on the 23rd May at the New Tretyakovskaya Gallery at Krimski Val in Moscow. Don't make the mistake of missing it!

 

"I don't like painting successful people. For me unfortunate folk have a kind of mysterious magnet draw," declared the Russian artist Robert Falk {1886 -1958}. This perhaps sums up much of the philosophy of the artist who painted portraits of people not for popularity, or money, but because ''I like to paint ...my kind of people." The main thing was to do a brilliant piece of work from the soul. Falk painted people from all kinds of backgrounds, such as beggars, circus performers, old woman and dying woman. What he attempted to depict was the inner soul of the person which the subject's appearance or mannerisms hinted at. Falk also painted wonderful scenes of nature with incredible tones of color. A cultural official called Lebedev, who visited Falk's studio in Moscow perceptively remarked -"Yes Falk always wins with color. What incredible color, look at that! " 

Olga Stefanova, a Bulgarian teacher based in Moscow who visited the exhibition agreed. She not only marveled at Falk's sense of color, but was surprised at how prolific he was. The artist seemed to be full of an inexorable and inexhaustible energy! Olga stated, "I didn't expect so many pictures and that he had such a great collection and since spring is here we need a lot of bright colors especially when the weather can be horrible and there are not many colors. All in all, I liked his paintings." 

As many as around 200 works are on display, which comprises 100 paintings, drawings and designs for the theater. However, it is important to point out that this represents less than 10% of the artist's creativity as he painted well over 1000 works.  

 

GOOD ORGANIZATION

 

The good thing about this exhibition is that the works are arranged in a chronological order from his early works [1905-1909}, the Jack of Diamonds{1910-1916} ,and then around his work 'The Red Furniture {1917-1921} ,Back to the Masters {1922-1927}, the Parisian period {1928-1937}, Back to the U.S.S.R :Crimea {1938}, Samarkand {1938 to 1944} and the late period {1944-1950}.

It is impossible to pigeon hole Falk. Falk absorbed all the influence of Impressionists, Expressionists, Neo-Primitivism and Cubism. And this is just to name but a few. Despite being one of the leading lights of the Avant Garde movement in Russia, he did not despise past works of art but declared, "I keep turning back to the old masters". By old masters he meant Vermeer, Courbet and Cezanne. His deep reverence for Cezanne is indicated by one portrait he did of his wife on a sofa which has a portrait of Cezanne in the background. Olga Stefanova stated, "His works remind me of Cezanne". Falk was closely connected with the art movement known as 'The Jack of Diamonds". One of the aims of this artistic movement was to shock people out of their complacency and render art more accessible and less confined to a small elite of critics and academics. 'With our art we wanted to destroy the whole lifelessly painted world," stated the artist Ilya Mashkov. For the first 3 decades of the 20th century Russia experienced a tremendous renaissance in philosophy and the arts. It was an unprecedented era of free experimentation and innovation that was finally ended by the rise of Stalin. The words of Kasimir Malevich capture the excitement of this lost era. He theatrically declared with gusto that, "The thunder of the October cannon helped us to become innovators. We came to clean out the academic paraphernalia surrounding the individual so as to burn away the fungus of the past in the brain and to restore time, space, tempo, rhythm, and movement, the fundamental elements of the present day". A student of Art history, Natasha told me, "The name Jack of Diamonds was chosen to intentionally shock people. It was based on the name given to convicted prisoners. The idea was to claim that artists are not necessarily 'good' or 'nice' people but could be as 'bad' as criminals". The notion challenged lofty and elitist notions of artists which were often held by the public.

A Grey Day

One of the notions of the artists was that the form of the painting should not be constrained by the frame of the painting and that painted figures could seem to be moving or about to drop out of a picture. Conventional forms of time and space were subverted. You can readily see this in some of the pictures on display as 'A Grey Day,' 1911, when the pier seems to be bent and tilting in such away that you feel the painted figures might fall off or even out of the painting. One of the classic paintings on display is 'Red Furniture' {1920} where a table with a wine bottle is surrounded by distorted red armchairs and a sofa. Falk did not trust bright colors and even preferred grayish colors. In this respect he is like Andre Platonov who in his fairy tale 'Finist the Bright Falcon' writes that the feather of the Fire bird was simply an ordinary gray. Falk felt even gray had beauty. Oksana Chebotareva, who visited the exhibition told me, "I was struck at how the forms in the pictures were not restrained by the frames and looked as if they might drop out of the picture. That picture which shows only half a woman's face while the other part of the face is unseen suggests it has gone beyond the frame or eluded it".

 

An EMBARRASSING LENIN LOOK ALIKE

 

Every picture can tell a story! And thanks to the memoirs of Falk's third wife Angelina Shchekin Krotova, we can learn about some stories behind the figures he painted. {see Memoirs ,Lyrical Commentaries on the Exhibition of Robert Falk. } For instance, in one picture 'Old Woman' {1931} his wife recalls how one day in France, Falk went to a forest to pick mushrooms. He was being led by a clever cat who was loudly meowing the way to where mushrooms were hidden. He suddenly clashed into an old woman who was collecting bundles of firewood to save money on purchasing coal. When both saw each other they were stunned by each others odd appearance. They both found each other strange. Falk persuaded the old woman to pose for one of his pictures. 

In another picture which you can see at the exhibition called 'The Beggar',{1924} a beggar stares at you with piercing and intelligent eyes from a strangely shaped Socratic skull. The story goes that Falk noticed this beggar on the street cursing and swearing at a crowd in the city. He was ranting against the Soviet government who he blamed for making him poor and destroying the peasants. He told Falk, "The more you swear and curse, the more that kind people will give to you". When he noticed Falk doing a sketch of him he rudely shouted, "Hey Artist, do you want to paint my portrait? What is in it for me?" Since Falk was fascinated by this beggar he invited him to his studio to be his model. The beggar charged astronomical fees. Each time he visited Falk, he stole things from the artist. He finally stole Falk's toolbox. Falk went out to see if he could find the beggar, but he was not at his favorite spot. He had vanished. Falk never saw him again. Falk had great difficulty trying to sell this picture or getting a gallery to display it. They would not even accept it as a gift. Finally, the Russian Ambassador to Paris bought it and put it up on the walls of the embassy. That was a mistake. Every time a French visitor saw the picture they would say "O so that is your Lenin". They took the picture down and asked Falk to give them another picture to replace it.

One sad story is behind the picture 'A Greek Woman'. This woman was living in great poverty in a very cold attic suffering from tuberculosis. When he finished the painting he told the woman, 'Now you must rest. I must have worn you out'. The woman gave a sad smile and said, "Now I will have nothing to live for. At least I had something to do". Soon after the woman died.

 

Falk painted a portrait of the Russian poet Ksenia Nekrasova. When she saw the picture she complained, "Why did you paint me like a cleaning maid? I am refined". The artist retorted "Ksenia dear, you are better than refined. You are of the people, and more than that, you are a poet". From some accounts of how the artist was approaching his work we learn that unlike many artists, Falk did not view his subjects as objects for their experiments to be manipulated for his own ends, but was befriending them and letting them tell him about their own lives. He often helped cure his subjects of melancholy.

 

A NEGLECTED ARTIST

 

Unfortunately, the Soviet government refused to let the artist display his works. They regarded his works as being 'dangerous' and 'undermining' the canons of Socialist Realism. For years Falk's work was never open or announced to the public. 

Even after his death, Khrushchev slandered the artist's work 'Woman in nude' as 'obscene'. An idea of how badly the artist was treated by officials is given by his wife who recalled the visit of two officials to their home. She stated, "I was ill with pneumonia. Our guests stood in the middle of the room and looked around with disgust ..." Falk immediately showed the officials pictures he thought might be acceptable to the officials. One official Lebedev who saw the pictures told him, "Yes, Falk always wins with color. What incredible color! Look at that! "But then Sysoev interrupted him, frowned menacingly and said, 'It's not the color that is important. This landscape is not Russia. Our birches are tall, even slender. This birch is parochial, all bent and crooked". Falk left the room and I turned to the guests and said, "Goodbye, he won't be showing you any more pictures".

 

This is why Tretyakovskaya's exhibition of Robert Falk's works is more than welcome. It is high time that real justice was granted to this brilliant artist. He has been neglected for too long. The people who organised this display deserve great praise. It is hoped that there will be more exhibitions devoted to Robert Falk as many of his works have never been seen in public. Falk deserves better!