‘Occupy’ protesters join teachers and parents on Tweed steps
by Rachel Cromidas, Gotham Gazette
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More than 100 activists took to the steps of Tweed Courthouse shortly after 5 p.m. today to repeat the Occupy Wall Street-inspired protest-style that cut short an October Panel for Education Policy meeting.

Calling themselves “Occupy the DOE,” the protesters included a Baruch College professor, a trio of high school students from Paul Robeson High School, a Brooklyn College graduate student, and teachers from across the city. They mingled with veteran education activists from the Grassroots Education Movement and Occupy Wall Street organizers in front of the Department of Education headquarters for two hours while more than one dozen police officers looked on.

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The protesters were there to hold a “general assembly” — the term for the regular public meetings that have become a fixture of the Occupy Wall Street movement and involve individuals taking turns speaking while listeners parrot back what they say to ensure that all participants can hear.

The protest was tame, but tensions between organizers and police rose at times when officers repeatedly reminded the organizers to keep off of the sidewalk in front of Tweed — a sidewalk that has been the host of countless protests and press conferences in the past — so pedestrians could pass.

Though the protesters did not propose an agenda at the meeting, the speeches touched on many oft-repeated themes, from a shortage of textbooks and locker space at schools slated for closure, to criticisms of mayoral control and the standardized testing system.

“Let me tell you some of the things that go on at a school with an A-rating. On days when quality reviewers show up, students are mysteriously suspended. students are put into special education classrooms for engaging in normal teenage behavior,” said a woman who identified herself as Sarah. “All of these students … are of color. Most of them are poor.”

The way to change the situation, she said, is “to take back the Department of Education, to take back the teachers union.” At that, crowd members lifted their hands and waved their fingers, a sign for applause used in the Occupy movement.

Karina García, a math teacher at the Facing History School, said she brings her high school students to Zuccotti Park, the locus of the movement, once a week.

“We have been inspired,” she told the crowd while a couple of her students looked on. “You show that the people have the power.”

Inspired by Wall St. protest, activists vow to ‘Occupy the DOE’
by Rachel Cromidas, at 5:47 pm
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Since the first protesters arrived at Zuccotti park nearly five weeks ago, the Occupy Wall Street movement has ignited protests from California to the United Kingdom. The city Department of Education could be next.

Calling Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott a member of the maligned “1 percent,” city education activists say they are planning to bring hundreds of protesters to next week’s school board meeting for an “Occupy the DOE” action.

The idea to form ODOE came to organizers, many of whom are city public school teachers, during a Sunday afternoon “grade-in” for educators at Occupy Wall Street, according to Leia Petty, an organizer who works as a guidance counselor in a Bushwick high school and is a long-time activist.

As the teachers discussed how the OWS movement intersected with public education, she said, they united around a shared concern that educators and families have been shut out of DOE decision-making process. So they decided to protest the entity that does ratify DOE decisions: the Panel for Educational Policy, which is holding a special meeting next week about new academic standards.

Petty said ODOE protesters will fill the 350-seat auditorium and draw attention to the PEP’s track record of ignoring public testimony before approving the DOE’s proposed policies. Most of the panel’s members were appointed by Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

“The main concern people have, and why the PEP is being targeted, is we feel that it is an unelected and unrepresentative body making decisions on behalf of us. Teachers and students don’t have a voice in the DOE,” Petty said.

City education activists aren’t the first to think about taking over public education buildings in the spirit of OWS. Yesterday in Los Angeles, a handful of educators camped out infront of the headquarters of the Los Angeles Unified School District.
One goal of getting OWS more involved in education issues, Petty said, is to draw people into the conversation on public education who don’t usually participate in public meetings. “That goes, not just for other OWS protestors, but also for parents, students and teachers who don’t go to PEP meetings unless their school is up for closure.”

Tomorrow evening Diane Ravitch, an outspoken critic of the DOE, will speak to OWS protesters in Zuccotti Park about the relationship between economic inequality and school reform, according to organizers.

Julie Cavanagh, an organizer with the Grassroots Education Movement who will be participating in ODOE, said the OWS message and practices reflect education activists concerns.

“There is no greater representation for the lack of democracy in what’s happening in public education policy right now than the PEP,” said Cavanagh, who works a special education teacher. “It’s a group of people who believe they are accountable to one man as opposed to 1.1 million school children. that’s wrong. We want the representational democracy we’re entitled to.”