A “UNITY MOMENT” BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE UNIFIED TEACHERS PARTY.


Unity’s candidate (above) for the upcoming 2007 election is similar to the sitting ruler: both display a rampant disregard of democracy, and believe that preserving the absolute Unity monarchy is more important than fair and adequate representation for those that pay their dues.

The Unity monarchy is built on the cornerstone of self perpetuation. The business of Unity is the preservation of the caste system that they have created, and maintain, in the United Federation of Teachers. The business of the UFT is the UFT.

The monarchy is built on a bedrock composed of many things: retirees, preventing reform information from reaching others, the single-minded subservience to Unity with absolute disregard to issue or problem, the emergency appointment of District Representatives and the cessation of their election, and so on. In short, the party comes first; the rank and file are far, far behind. Who else could offer a second rate contract to those that they are paid to represent, tell them that it’s the best they could do and they’ve got to accept it, and then, finally, give themselves a raise for their effort?

Reform is the UTP issue. Unity is the greedy myopic monster that feasts at the table and leaves scraps for those that work in the classrooms and in the schools. Instead of embracing reform and growing stronger, Unity keeps everything for itself. If they fought the Bloomberg-Klein axis with as much determination as they do reform, we would all be better off.

DEMOCRACY AND THE DISTRICT REPRESENTATIVES

One major issue affecting the rank and file of the UFT is the decrease of democracy. The fact that District Representatives are appointed by the president, and no longer elected, is of great concern. Appointed DRs are answerable to the executive who appoints them, and not to the union members in the districts they ostensibly represent. This has diminished their effectiveness. Clearly, there is too much concentration of power in the executive.

Why is this so important to rectify? With monthly dues exceeding $80, members should have a say in who performs liaison among the chapter leaders, the union leadership, and the DOE. If the UFT is truly committed to strengthening teacher activism, democratizing the DRs is an excellent place to begin. The new contract has placed greater obstacles in the paths of the members, so we must meet these challenges head on, by ensuring that DRs get more involved in the day-to-day struggles of teachers in each district. The plain truth is that elected representatives will work harder to please their constituents, than appointed ones.

What needs to be done? The simplest solution is for Randi Weingarten to use her powers and see to it that District Reps are elected by the members in their districts. There is no question that Randi has the wherewithal to accomplish this. Such a rebirth of democracy will strengthen activism within our union, and improve morale and working conditions in the schools.

If Randi is unwilling to make this reform, there are other means to accomplish it. But why fight among ourselves? That only weakens us relative to City Hall.

-UTP Director, Joe Mudgett.

UTP Commercial!

Maybe it's time for a change!

Ladies and gentlemen, we're proud to announce the debut of our UTP commercial. Its focus is the exorbitant salary paid to our UFT leader. (See the UTP statement of ideology regarding our belief about union officials' salaries.)

Visit http://www.theutp.com to see the commerical, or link directly to it here: http://www.theutp.com/utpcomm.mov


If you would like to add this to your own site or blog, please let us know and we will send you the source code. I had quite a bit of trouble trying to copy and paste the code to this blog.

(Edit: You can try the below. If you have no luck, send us a message.)

<br /><br /><object classid="clsid:02BF25D5-8C17-4B23-BC80-D3488ABDDC6B" codebase="http://www.apple.com/qtactivex/qtplugin.cab" width="240" height="194" hspace="10" vspace="10"><br /><param name="src" value="http://www.theutp.com/utpcomm.mov" /><br /><param name="controller" value="true" /><br /><param name="pluginspage" value="http://www.apple.com/QuickTime/download/" /> <br /><br /><embed src="http://www.theutp.com/utpcomm.mov" width="240" height="194" hspace="10" vspace="10" controller="true" autoplay="true" pluginspage="http://www.apple.com/QuickTime/download/indext.html"> <br /></embed> <br /></object><br /><br /><br />

Happy New Year!

Here's to a happy, healthy, and prosperous 2006. Here's also to archiving those December posts. No more scrolling!

Here's a great new blog. http://edzup.blogspot.com