catalyst-chicago.org

Chicago Teachers Union's allies in community organizations are on the offensive. The coalition, Communities Organized for Democracy in Education, which comprises several community groups, announced Saturday that it is launching a campaign for an elected school board that will include a city ballot initiative, a lawsuit, and legislative efforts in Springfield.

The strike authorization vote comes as Communities Organized for Democracy in Education announces a new, three-pronged push for an elected school board. The first part is a non-binding measure asking for an elected board that organizers hope will garner enough signatures to get on the November ballot. It was announced at a Saturday rally at Luther Memorial Church in Lincoln Square. Afterward, Jitu Brown says, 13 teams of canvassers gathered enough signatures in one day to get the measure on the ballot in that ward’s 21st Precinct. Doing so citywide, however, would require 65,000 signatures. (Catalyst)

Late Monday night the Tribune reported Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis said the union's three-day vote to authorize a strike was an "indictment" of the increasingly strained relationship between teachers and Emanuel's hand-picked administration at Chicago Public Schools. Nearly 90 percent of Chicago Teachers Union members, some 23,780 city employees, voted to support a strike if one is called. (Tribune)

A Tribune editorial calls the strike authorization vote an "overwhelming vote is a roar of teacher anger and frustration."

IN THE NATION
In a tentative ruling that could potentially transform California teacher evaluations, a Los Angeles judge ordered the L.A. Unified School District to use student academic progress in reviewing instructors. (Los Angeles Times)

Education Week looks at how President Obama has used economic-stimulus money and his own executive power to drive his education initiatives.

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney said if elected he would seek to overhaul the federal government’s largest school programs into a voucherlike system, replacing top-down Washington mandates. His proposals are the clearest sign yet that Republicans have executed an about-face from the education policies of President George W. Bush, whose signature domestic initiative, the No Child Left Behind law of 2002, required uniform state testing and imposed penalties on schools that failed to progress.  (The New York Times)

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is spending about $1.1 million to develop a way to physiologically measure how engaged students are by their teachers’ lessons. This involves “galvanic skin response” bracelets that kids would wear so their engagement levels could be measured. The Washington Post's Valerie Strauss says, "If this tells us anything, it is that the obsession with measurement and data in school reform has reached new nutty heights."