TAKING BACK OUR SCHOOLS

My guest blogger today is David Greene, Chair Taking Back Our Schools Rally Committee, Save Our Schools Treasurer, and Author of DOING THE RIGHT THING: A Teacher Speaks

60 Years Ago

May 17, 2014 will mark the 60th anniversary of the Brown Decision to integrate American public schools. What better day is there for a Rally to TAKE BACK OUR SCHOOLS from the corporate reformers who seem to defy that landmark Supreme Court Decision regardless of the civil rights rhetoric they use.

Save Our Schools, the organization that was a pioneer in the anti corporate reform and privatization movement, brought us a March and Conference in Washington DC that rallied approximately 7,500 parents, teachers, and students from around the nation.

Unfortunately that was the summer of 2011 and so much has gone on since. As a result the steering committee of SOS decided on a new action, this one centered on the New York metropolitan area because of three important reasons.

The first is that it is the media capital of the world. The second is that is has the most diverse population in the country. Finally, the third is that it includes a huge population of parents who have opted out their children from standardized tests.

http://saveourschoolsmarch.org/event/nyc-metro-spring-action/

Our Vision and Mission:

Vision:  Create and sustain a public school system that provides a fully funded equitable community based education for every child.  Involve families and professional educators in democratic decision-making about our children’s schools, free of corporate and political intervention.

Mission:  Educate teachers, parents, students and communities on the dangers of corporate driven reform that leads to privatization, high stakes testing, mandated curriculum, unfair teacher evaluation practices, school closures and a two tiered education system.  

We hope thousands will show up to support their public schools and hear our variety of speakers who represent all of the constituent groups from the entire metro area; from NJ, to Long Island, to The Hudson Valley, and to NYC itself.