History of IDEA
Jeannie Oakes, Founder and Former Director
Youth Voice in School Finance
NEW REPORT: Los Angeles' road to A-G for all
Without Dollars and Sense Powerpoint
Past Educational Opportunity Reports
The scaled down contract: Boon or bane to the teaching profession?
- 07-22-2011
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Guest blog by Moira Saucedo/Education Week
My interest was sparked by a June, 2011 notice on Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation's website of a $500,000 grant to the Future Is Now Schools, (FIN) a charter schools management organization founded by Steve Barr. FIN has been recently re-branded (some say divorced) from the LA-based Green Dot Public Schools, founded by Barr, and from Green Dot America, an effort by Barr to open charter schools nationally. The purpose of the grant is "to provide national support for the use of a scaled-down collective bargaining contract and to amplify the voice of reform-minded teachers in select cities by sharing organizing expertise." he "scaled-down collective bargaining contract" phrase gave me pause. Our nation has just gone through a harrowing year of stripped-away collective bargaining agreements (CBAs), and rollbacks of pensions and benefits. Since the mid-term elections there have been increased attacks on workers in states such as Wisconsin, Ohio, New Jersey, Indiana, Tennessee, Idaho and Florida. Was this grant concrete evidence of Bill Gates jumping on the anti-union, anti-collective bargaining bandwagon? (more...)
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