In case you missed Meryl Tisch's self deluded exit interview the other day it pretty much boiled down to a paraphrasing of Steve Carrel's ingeniously self deluded character Michael Scott of The Office explaining to his boss how his strengths are his weaknesses. In Meryl's estimation she "tried to do too much too fast" and can't really be faulted for that. Conveniently, the cigarette billionheiress forgets that she opted into Obama's asinine Race to the Top scheme, a Faustian gotcha that ended up costing the poor "winners" who took its money more in mandates than it paid out in edu-bucks. She somehow forgot to mention her own personal involvement in the hiring of grossly unqualified data nerd John King whose people skills as Commissioner of NYSED led him to being booed, heckled and told to sit down and STFU when Tischy, Wheezer Bennett and Lil John tried to do a little barnstorming tour of the state. She famously opined on another occasion that "we all needed to jump into the deep end" meaning we should abandon ourselves and our common sense and leap into bed with Common Core and all of the insidious test and punish mandates it entails.
Tisch was the poster dame for out of touch wealthy white Manhattanites as she putzed around New York with those other two dolts desperately trying to convince the unwashed masses or "special interests" --as Kinger called them when they shouted him from the stage in Poughkeepsie-- to shut up and take their test and punish medicine. It was excruciating to watch. Meryl Tisch also took $1,000,000.00 from the tin box full of soap scraps under her bead at home and spent it to create her own little private army of ed reform stooges whom she dubbed "The Regents Fellows." Outrageously, she put them to work writing policy and sending out imperatives to Superintendents around the state. These "fellows" were not state employees nor did they possess any authority or credentials to do the things Tisch had them doing. They were Meryl's own little Blackwater if you will, a private army put to work to influence public education policies and shape them according to Meryl Tisch's grossly out of touch sensibilities. One of Meryl's minions sent an imperious missive to then B-Lo Superintendent Pamela Brown and BTF Pres. Rumore and I wrote about it at the time: Full Post
I recognized one of the names listed as a Regent Fellow from an article I read in the Buffalo paper when NYSED and Cuomo were both pretending they'd never heard of such a thing as an M.O.U. before and accused Buffalo Teacher's Federation of circumventing their screwjob APPR. Listen to the tone of the letter from the lovely Julia Rafal whose totally precious wedding announcement can be seen in the NY Times here. Does this sound to you like a brainy "fellow" offering a helping hand or is this the voice of a deputized NYSED Marshall putting the smackdown on Buffalo's union President and its Schools Superintendent? Referring to the Memo of Understanding between the Union and Superintendent stating that test scores would not be used to fire teachers for the 2011-2012 and 2012-2013 school years. Regardez :
The state does not consider that letter to be part of the district’s annual professional performance review plan, wrote Julia Rafal-Baer, executive director of the state’s Office of Teacher and Leader Effectiveness, Policy and Programs.
“Accordingly, the department considers void any other previously signed agreements between and among these parties and does not recognize any such agreements as part of the Buffalo Public Schools’ approved Jan. 17, 2013, plan,” Rafal-Baer wrote.
The state reserves the right to revoke its approval of the district’s plan, she wrote – and if that happens, the district stands to lose not only its $33 million increase in state aid, but nearly $14 million in various other funding, she wrote, and could jeopardize tens of millions in additional funding.
In a follow-up letter to Brown on March 25, Rafal-Baer again expressed the state’s objections to the agreement between the district and the BTF.
The state does not consider that agreement to be part of Buffalo’s teacher evaluation plan, Rafal-Baer wrote.
“The department considers void any other previously signed agreements between and among those parties,” she wrote. “The Buffalo Public Schools must implement the terms of its approved [annual professional performance review] plan.”
Isn't that just darling? Meryl's angels paid $200K by Gates and Co and Meryl's piggybank just to keep the rabble in line and bend state education policy to suit her whims.
No, Meryl, your fault wasn't that you tried to do too much too fast. Your fault was that you lined up on the wrong side of public education and worked against it every chance you had. You were a tuned out oligarch and you thought the small people just needed to shut up and listen to their betters -- meaning you. But you were wrong, wrong, wrong. And now we're glad to be shut of you. So go back to your lunch dates and private islands and "the club" wherever it may be and we'll go about trying to repair the mess you left behind. And if ever there's a next time you should memorize this. I sounds a hell of a lot better than you did.
Tisch was the poster dame for out of touch wealthy white Manhattanites as she putzed around New York with those other two dolts desperately trying to convince the unwashed masses or "special interests" --as Kinger called them when they shouted him from the stage in Poughkeepsie-- to shut up and take their test and punish medicine. It was excruciating to watch. Meryl Tisch also took $1,000,000.00 from the tin box full of soap scraps under her bead at home and spent it to create her own little private army of ed reform stooges whom she dubbed "The Regents Fellows." Outrageously, she put them to work writing policy and sending out imperatives to Superintendents around the state. These "fellows" were not state employees nor did they possess any authority or credentials to do the things Tisch had them doing. They were Meryl's own little Blackwater if you will, a private army put to work to influence public education policies and shape them according to Meryl Tisch's grossly out of touch sensibilities. One of Meryl's minions sent an imperious missive to then B-Lo Superintendent Pamela Brown and BTF Pres. Rumore and I wrote about it at the time: Full Post
I recognized one of the names listed as a Regent Fellow from an article I read in the Buffalo paper when NYSED and Cuomo were both pretending they'd never heard of such a thing as an M.O.U. before and accused Buffalo Teacher's Federation of circumventing their screwjob APPR. Listen to the tone of the letter from the lovely Julia Rafal whose totally precious wedding announcement can be seen in the NY Times here. Does this sound to you like a brainy "fellow" offering a helping hand or is this the voice of a deputized NYSED Marshall putting the smackdown on Buffalo's union President and its Schools Superintendent? Referring to the Memo of Understanding between the Union and Superintendent stating that test scores would not be used to fire teachers for the 2011-2012 and 2012-2013 school years. Regardez :
The state does not consider that letter to be part of the district’s annual professional performance review plan, wrote Julia Rafal-Baer, executive director of the state’s Office of Teacher and Leader Effectiveness, Policy and Programs.
“Accordingly, the department considers void any other previously signed agreements between and among these parties and does not recognize any such agreements as part of the Buffalo Public Schools’ approved Jan. 17, 2013, plan,” Rafal-Baer wrote.
The state reserves the right to revoke its approval of the district’s plan, she wrote – and if that happens, the district stands to lose not only its $33 million increase in state aid, but nearly $14 million in various other funding, she wrote, and could jeopardize tens of millions in additional funding.
In a follow-up letter to Brown on March 25, Rafal-Baer again expressed the state’s objections to the agreement between the district and the BTF.
The state does not consider that agreement to be part of Buffalo’s teacher evaluation plan, Rafal-Baer wrote.
“The department considers void any other previously signed agreements between and among those parties,” she wrote. “The Buffalo Public Schools must implement the terms of its approved [annual professional performance review] plan.”
Isn't that just darling? Meryl's angels paid $200K by Gates and Co and Meryl's piggybank just to keep the rabble in line and bend state education policy to suit her whims.
No, Meryl, your fault wasn't that you tried to do too much too fast. Your fault was that you lined up on the wrong side of public education and worked against it every chance you had. You were a tuned out oligarch and you thought the small people just needed to shut up and listen to their betters -- meaning you. But you were wrong, wrong, wrong. And now we're glad to be shut of you. So go back to your lunch dates and private islands and "the club" wherever it may be and we'll go about trying to repair the mess you left behind. And if ever there's a next time you should memorize this. I sounds a hell of a lot better than you did.
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