DC Teachers Union Event Turns Raucous

Washington Teacher union officials hardly sound “professional” in this recounting of the National Day of Action protest in Washington, DC.  The event, well advertised on radio and other media outlets, turned into a free-for-all.  All, that is, except teachers and those who want real reform. Saul Alinski would have been proud.  Melinda Hennenberg has the story in the Washington Post.

The main point of the whole raucous evening was spelled out on the blue-and-white sign given center stage at Eastern High School on Monday night: “Our voices matter,” it said. Teachers’ voices, it meant.

The several hundred District teachers and activists crowding the auditorium at the union-sponsored event made clear that they think the opposite is true, thanks to what they repeatedly called “so-called school reform.”   And in their frustration — over closed schools, ousted teachers and an evaluation process that they say is designed to “ridicule” them, they hooted, booed and shouted down the mayor and most of the mayoral aspirants who had come to answer their questions on a snowy night.