monday may 19, 2015 i attended a collaboration of educators hosted by caucus of working educators at central high school. http://www.workingeducators.org/ great day filled with free professional development workshops and workshops on the teachers role in advocacy. heartbreaking learning how public education is being dismantled piece by piece during the #optout workshop.

teachers are under attack and the school district of philadelphia have become brute when teachers advocate for the families that they service. parents and teachers are living in fear because of what happened to Hope Moffet in 2011, when she publicly spoke against privatizing the school in which she taught.

District exiles outspoken Audenried teacher

By Benjamin Herold on Feb 17, 2011 11:54 PM

COMMENTS (161)PRINT

The letter reassigning Audenried teacher Hope Moffett.

For the past week, a group of students, teachers, and community members at Audenried High School have been vocal in their opposition to the District's plans to convert their school into a charter.

Today, say some, the District struck back.

Hope Moffett, a third-year English teacher at Audenried who has been particularly outspoken in her criticism, told the Notebook that she received a letter today from the District informing her that she is "being temporarily assigned to the High School Academic Division (AD-1) located at 3133 Ridge Avenue."

Philadelphia Federation of Teachers President Jerry Jordan, reached late tonight, confirmed that a second staff member at Audenried was also reassigned today.

The Notebook has obtained a copy of the terse four-sentence letter to Moffett, which is signed by Assistant Superintendent for High Schools Linda Cliatt-Wayman.

It states that Moffett faces further sanction for disclosing the letter's contents.

"You are directed not to discuss this matter. Failure to follow this directive will result in disciplinary action," it reads.

Asked to comment, the District provided a written statement.

"As a standard practice the District does not comment on personnel matters," it said.

"Academic time is intended to be used for just that. ... We believe in creating institutions of greatness. To do this we believe teachers must be responsible and provide a safe and academically focused environment for all students, especially during classroom time."

Several teachers at the school, all of whom wished to remain anonymous for fear of retribution, spoke highly of Moffett.

"Everything I've ever seen her do has been about and for those kids," said one colleague.

"She is possibly the most passionate teacher I've ever worked with," said another.

Despite the threat of further discipline, Moffett said she feels compelled to speak out.

"I honestly just am tired of the District coming in and trying to intimidate our teachers, principals, and students," she said.

"I knew exactly what I was getting into. I [am speaking to the press] because I think what I did was right."

PFT President Jordan, who was traveling Thursday, said he would be briefed by his staff on the situation Friday."If there was an attempt to intimidate the teacher, we will not tolerate it - absolutely not," he said. "I will be personally involved in this case."

Over the past nine days, Moffett has on several occasions publicly criticized the District's plans for Audenried under the Renaissance Schools initiative.

http://thenotebook.org/blog/113364/district-exiles-outspoken-audenried-teacher

the dismantling of public education and building slave driven prisons is coming to an end with the national #optout campaigns that allow families to legally not have their youth stressed out about a test looking to test what the student doesn't know versus what the student has learned. public education should be more than teaching to a test that means absolutely nothing to the higher education facilities. teaching to a test created by hedge funded organizations turning public education from a human right to develop productive safe citizens to a privatized industry making trillions of dollars on test made to fail under resourced communities. for more information about testing results please visit: http://www.eseafedreport.com/

alison mcdowell is an educator and parent who is working hard to inform philadelphia families about their human rights to optout of the pennsylvania mandated keystone exam. alison created opt-out-philly@googlegroups.com A group of parents, teachers, students, and community members interested in discussing the effects of high-stakes, standardized testing on public education and exploring alternatives to such tests. Opting out is not a requirement to participate. It's fine to simply have an interest in the topic. amazing information sharing assist in building awareness of what is going on in our schools.

These brave students are facing serious penalties. Please watch the video, listen to what they have to say, and let us continue to work diligently to remove the Keystones as a graduation requirement. They deserve no less.

Alison

alison also informed us about senate bill 838 a moratorium of keystone exams .

http://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/billinfo/billinfo.cfm?syear=2015&sind=0&body=S&type=B&bn=0838

you can learn more about pennsylvania #optout movement here: http://optoutpa.blogspot.com/?m=1

i also met ken derstine creator of defend public education a blog dedicated to inform us about what is going on in public education. http://www.defendpubliceducation.net/ for a weekly digest send email to pa.ed.crisis@gmail.com @publiceddefense fb/defend.public.education

i met jesse walking man turner on facebook and was able to have him come to philly and be part of a collaboration of educators. before coming to the collaboration jesse spoke on morning feed with ed feldman and jill saul at g-town radio gtownradio.com. you can hear their informative conversation by clicking this link: https://www.mixcloud.com/MorningFeed/morning-feedjessewalking-man-turner-walking-for-justice-not-just-tests/

https://www.facebook.com/events/297723840427078/