To be direct and to be blunt, we're getting our butts kicked in messaging. Excuses are NOT acceptable. Getting our butts kicked will equal more ridiculous demands on our teaching time, which, by the way, equals less effective time helping our kids.
The messaging on our side has been not had the best effect, to use the obtuse language of obfuscation preferred by policy makers of the relatively affluent social classes controlling too much of education policy.
In the last week, we SPS teachers have been fired or not fired by letters which didn't exist and which now exist. The maybe 79 cert rifs or maybe 300 cert rifs (recall Dr. G-J's email of Wed. 22 Apr) turned into the Tuesday Tsunami, and on Thursday we the peee-ons still don't know exactly what happened, except that many of our friends are on the street come End Of Day 19 June.
I've had so many snippets of water cooler chat in the last week, and there is a lot of confusion and there is a lot frustration amoung us working high school teachers. Regardless of whether people completely distrust the JSCEE, or people figure the last week's events are just the latest song and dance from a hugely dysfunctional bureaucracy, or people are somewhere in between, MOST people are scratching their heads over the SEA/WEA messaging.
I do NOT know what is the best messaging.
I do know that I wasn't hired to do messaging.
I do know that since I was a 20 year old 4 buck an hour cook in 1980, my political side's approach to messaging has been to whine that unprincipled corrupt monied interests are ... corrupt and unprincipled.
I do know that, according to the Statistical Abstract of the United States, table 291, there are tens of thousands of communication style graduates a year. (*)
I do know that some kind of effective message SHOULD be front and center, daily, or whoever is in charge of messaging should be looking for a new job.
We're losing, and when we lose, our hard to do jobs are harder to do, and the kids we're hired to serve are served even worse.I have 2 more observations which I'll put into comments so that this diary isn't too long. The comments detail the hodgepodge of 'communications' from the SEA, and a recommendation for some of the mechanics of messaging.
beatrice
(*) http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/cats/education.html
There should be 3 kinds of messages -
ReplyDelete1. the kind telling us what is up, and, this message is the end of the story.
2. the kind updating us, it should follow the form:
SUBJECT: ABC XYZ - Update.
blah blah blah.
NEXT UPDATE in X hours or Y days (at a specific time)
+++++++++++++++
Imagine if, when you're stuck at the airport, they told you
"we don't know what / we don't know how long, BUT, we'll update in 2 hours.
(we might still say we still don't know what / or how long, BUT, we'll give you another update target.)"
now you can make that phone call or take a nap and not feel like you'll be left behind.
beatrice.
Here is a record of the 'messaging' from the SEA / WEA over the last week.
ReplyDeleteNote the randomness.
2 emails in my personal email.
Several emails forwarded from hard working AR's when they were able to forward the messages.
T.V. and print quotes at random times.
WHAT are we waiting for now?
beatrice
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
start beatrice's comments
FIRST Communication, Email, At School
end beatrice's comments
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
Sent: Fri 5/8/2009 2:57 PM
To: !XXXXX Teachers
Subject: FW: Bargaining News: District proposes more administator control
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: xxx@WashingtonEA.org
Sent: Thursday, May 07, 2009 9:35 PM
Subject: Bargaining News: District proposes more administator control
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
start beatrice's comments
SECOND Communication, Media Interview, Local TV News
end beatrice's comments
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
I don't recall which station's and which times.
Fri evening / Sat evening?
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
start beatrice's comments
THIRD Communication, Media, Local Newspaper
end beatrice's comments
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
this was sat in the PI and the times?
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
start beatrice's comments
FOURTH Communication, Email, At Home
end beatrice's comments
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
From: Olga Addae xxxxx@WashingtonEA.org
Subject: Seattle School District Nonrenewal Letter
To: XXXXXXX@yahoo.com
Date: Saturday, May 9, 2009, 4:31 PM
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
start beatrice's comments
FIFTH Communication, Email, At Work
end beatrice's comments
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
Sent: Mon 5/11/2009 12:14 PM
To: !XXXXX Teachers
Subject: FW: Seattle School District Nonrenewal Letter
From: xxxxx@WashingtonEA.org xxxxxx@WashingtonEA.org]
Sent: Monday, May 11, 2009 9:39 AM
To: WA-Seattle-Mail@edu-root.org
Subject: Seattle School District Nonrenewal Letter
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
start beatrice's comments
SIXTH Communication, Email, At Home
end beatrice's comments
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
From: xxxxx@washingtonea.org
Subject: Update to nonrenewal next steps
To: XXXXXX@yahoo.com
Date: Monday, May 11, 2009, 4:45 PM
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
start beatrice's comments
SEVENTH Communication, Media, PI
end beatrice's comments
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Last updated 7:50 p.m. PT
Seattle Public Schools to lay off employees
By NICK EATON
SEATTLEPI.COM STAFF
Seattle Public Schools confirmed Tuesday that the district is laying
off teachers.
The teachers union estimates that 160 to 170 teachers will lose their
jobs this summer, said Glenn Bafia, executive director of the Seattle
Education Association.
"I guess we were a little surprised that it was going to be that
high," Bafia said.
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
start beatrice's comments
EIGTH Communication, Email, Work
end beatrice's comments
++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++
From: xxxxxx@washingtonea.org
Sent: Tuesday, May 12, 2009 1:54 PM
Sent: Wed 5/13/2009 7:54 AM
To: XXXXX Teachers
Subject: FW: Important information regarding RIF'ed employees
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteLife is work. Whether one is an amoeba, a squirrel, or a human being
ReplyDeletelife is work. Work is required to ensure survival. An amoeba's
ability to understand and to impact all the variables that impact its
survival are not as great as a human being's. The work human beings
perceive as necessary for their survival is so vast and so varied that
one person can not do all the work necessary to survive.
Human beings have arranged ourselves into specialized workers. We
trade our work sometimes directly but mostly in units of agreed upon
chits. Bottom line our work, our ability to work, our productivity is
our survival effort. Our survival effort to procure nourishment,
shelter, defense from predators(all kinds of predators from microbes
to same species predators), reproduce successfully are all what work
is whether one is an amoeba or a squirrel or a human being.
A union is the community effort of specialized workers to defended its
members' survival actions. A union is the voice of it's members' in
the society to advocate for the survival of its members. A union is
the hand of it's members extended to society to help society survive.
Human society cannot survive and should not survive if it does not
recognize the basic right of its members to utilize all the variables
available to the members to survive. Human society cannnot and should
not survive if it does not maximize the oportunities for human beings
to work. Human society cannnot and should not survive if it does not
accept all work is essential for individual and collective survival.
And unions must represent their specialized members knowing that
work is not a four letter word but the most basic survival skill,
trait, ability. And unions must represent their specialized members
knowing that negotiations are not about benefits or dollar amounts or
appropriate workplace respect alone or even most importantly. Unions
are setting the terms for which members are trading the only things in
this world anyone ever owns: time, knowledge, skill and physical work.
Time which there is only ever less of and therefore is priceless is
being traded for survival.