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Republicans are slashing funding to federally-funded literacy education program in grades K-12. Read letter below from NCTE and write your local Congress person today!

Federal legislation for Striving Readers and the National Writing Project passed in both the House and Senate and signed by the President zeros out funding for these two important programs. Unless legislators are convinced by an outpouring of outrage, these programs have little chance of being restored.

NCTE members need to call or write their Representative and Senators NOW to explain the importance of funding these programs in the final budget.

Striving Readers enables the currently established 44 state literacy teams to apply for federal funds; then each state’s neediest districts can apply to the state for funding for local literacy projects in preschool, elementary, middle, or secondary schools.

The National Writing Project provides summer institutes in local communities that reach 65,000 students annually and other professional development activities for 130,000 educators who reach 1.4 million students each year.

Call or write immediately for the most impact. We need thousands of NCTE members to take action.

Restore funding for the Striving Readers Program.

Restore funding for the National Writing Project.

While a causal relationship has not yet been proven, some of the data below suggests higher student achievement for states with teacher unions. There are other factors to consider. Read excerpt below from the Truth-o-meter, and judge for yourself:

Consider Wisconsin’s third-place ranking in the SAT. It sounds great — but only 4 percent of graduates in the state took the test in 2010, and those that did likely did so because they had a particular need to take the SAT as they applied to certain colleges. And that means that Wisconsin SAT takers were a self-selecting group, probably more academically advanced than average.

As a result, it’s fairer to look at Wisconsin’s ranking on the ACT, which was taken by 67 percent of graduates in 2009. And that ranking was 13th in the nation — not bad, but well short of the 2nd place finish cited in the Facebook post.

Meanwhile, in the five non-collective-bargaining states, the SAT was the more widely taken test, and in those rankings, the non-union states placed between 34th and 49th nationally. Meanwhile, for the ACT — where participation ranged from 15 percent to 50 percent — the rankings in the non-union states ranged from 22nd to 46th.

So, on neither test did the five non-collective bargaining states perform as well as Wisconsin did, and in general those five states clustered in the bottom half of the national rankings. Given these statistics, it’s reasonable to say that Wisconsin outperformed the other five states significantly — but not as overwhelmingly as the blog and Facebook posts suggest.

After we contacted the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, Melissa Baldauff, the party’s research director, wrote us to say that “after further investigation, we determined that the data was not the most up-to-date. Accordingly, we have removed the post from our Facebook page.”

We should add another key question: What does SAT and ACT data actually tell us about the connection between collective bargaining rights and student achievement? The answer is a little — but not very much.

Looking only at these six states, there’s a suggestion that lack of collective bargaining rights for teachers is mildly correlated with test scores, even though the linkage is a lot less striking than the Facebook post suggests. Still, it’s impossible to know whether collective bargaining has any role in causing test scores to rise. That’s because countless other demographic, economic and cultural factors play a role in shaping a state’s test scores.

“Most of the states that don’t have teachers’ unions are poorer than Wisconsin and have more English Language Learners in their schools, and rank higher for other demographic factors that make strong academic performance less likely,” Johnston wrote. “Rich kids in a school with a teacher’s union will do better than poor kids in a school without one, generally, but that doesn’t have much to do with the union itself.”

Consider just one statistic — the percentage of residents living below the poverty line. Wisconsin ranked 38th in the nation, similar to Virginia (39th), and well below Texas (8th), South Carolina (9th), Georgia (13th) and North Carolina (15th). The fact that many fewer Wisconsin residents, proportionally, were impoverished almost certainly had an impact in shaping the states’ comparative test results.

This leads me to the question of how does New York City compare in terms of poverty level of its students. According to a recent letter from Michael Mulgrew, president of the United Federation of Teachers of New York, “Half the households in our city have incomes of less than $30,000 a year and more than 10 percent live in deep poverty on incomes of $10,500 or less.”

Surely, UFT teachers are working very hard to level the playing field with good curriculum and instruction while, according to Mulgrew, “At the same time, the top 1 percent of city households average $3.7 million each year, or $10,137 a day.” In fact, recent research studies prove that public school teachers are doing more with less funding (compared to charter schools) to educate the city’s children. And the Mayor refuses to tax members of New York’s millionaire club. Instead, he wants to lay off 5,000 teachers next September!

If the Mayor wanted to increase revenue so teachers can keep doing their job all he has to do is renew the millionaire’s tax next year. Mulgrew writes that that move “would bring in $1 billion this year and $5 billion next year.”
What can you do? Call 311 and tell the mayor to say no to layoffs and skyrocketing class sizes. Sign up to participate in the UFT’s growing grassroots campaign at www.uft.org/jointhefight.

In their zeal to cut the federal budget, members of Congress are recommending budget cuts that would end promising reading and writing programs, namely Striving Readers and the National Writing Project. Many school districts and cities have already adopted these programs both of which include professional development sessions and coaching for teachers.

Read the letter below from Millie Davis of the National Council of Teachers of English and send your letter to your local representative and Senator:

Dear Jeanette Toomer,

The House of Representative’s recommended spending cuts in their recently passed FY 2011 Continuing Resolution would end funding for many literacy programs, including Striving Readers and the National Writing Project (NWP).

As an NCTE member who supports solid reading and writing instruction and teacher professional development, please send messages to your Senators asking them

•to support funding for Striving Readers and
•to support funding for National Writing Project.
Without Striving Readers, our nation will have no dedicated program to improve writing and reading instruction. Striving Readers offers the possibility of comprehensive, aligned literacy plans in every state. Already 44 states have assembled teams to coordinate literacy learning birth through grade 12. High need communities will be hit especially hard if Striving Reader funds are cut because these funds are directed at improving reading and writing instruction to enable all students to graduate from high school well prepared for college or the work force.

Without the National Writing Project, schools would annually lose 3,300 new teacher-leaders who attend intensive four-week summer institutes each year in local communities across the country; the ability to reach 65,000 students and provide them with high-quality writing skills through NWP teachers annually; and more than 7,000 professional development activities delivered by NWP teachers to an additional 130,000 educators who reach 1.4 million students every year. NWP is a national network of more than 200 local sites, located on college and university campuses in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

What are you reading? According to researchers, teachers and English educators on the NCTE (National Council of Teachers of English) Connected Community (www.ncte.org) reading is the key to improvement in students’ academic achievement. Reading more also helps to improve students’ writing skills.
Read it for yourself. You do not need to be a NCTE member to read the NCTE Connected Community blog. If you do want to respond, you can join the NCTE for a $40 individual membership fee.
– written by Jeanette Toomer

The best theater of this past season honored two trailblazers-one in theater and the other in the international music scene. The Broadway revival of August Wilson’s “Fences” introduced new audiences to Wilson’s poetic and culturally-rich theatrical landscape. As a result, the lead actors, Denzel Washington and Viola Davis, took home the top Tony honors for lead actors in their respective e categories.
“Fela!” arrived on Broadway to much acclaim. This unique musical told the story of the rise of Fela , the Nigerian Afrobeat creator and songwriter. Director-choreographer Bill T. Jones also reaped his second Tony award for this innovative West-African inspired choreography.
At the National Black Theater Stephanie Berry’s one person show, “The Shaneequa Chronicles” drew large audiences and warranted an extended run.
The low point of the year was the transfer of the minstrel musical, “The Scottsboro Boys” to Broadway. This show drew protests from many for its racist and insulting display of minstrelsy culminating in a finale where the black actors performed in blackface. Thankfully, it did close in December after 49 performances.
More recently the New York Times printed an article that reported that the producer of “The Scottsboro Boys” sought to re-open the musical on Broaday and sought reaction from readers for a $99 ticket price. According to the blog postings on the New York Times ArtsBeat article (www.newyorktimes.com) most readers could not afford to pay $99 or repudiated the idea of “The Scottsboro Boys” because of its blatant racist content.
– written by Jeanette Toomer
– written by Jeanette Toomer

During Black History Month the National Council of Teachers of English sponsors an “African American Read in” which endorses teachers having students read books by African American authors. Teachers can organize book talks, book projects or other events celebrating the books that they read. For more information, visit ncte.org. NCTE provides certificates for teachers to give to students who participate.
– Jeanette Toomer

I applied to Donors Choose to fund my “Studying Shakespeare with Julius Caesar” project to purchase the books, Julius Caesarfor my students to read. I am happy to report that people did donate funds to purchase the books. Thank you for your kindness.
– Jeanette Toomer

Tyler Perry’s cinematic adaptation of Ntozake Shange’s Broadway hit, “For Colored Girls,” sets a new standard and reaches new heights for ensemble dramas in motion pictures. Part poetry and part narrative “For Colored Girls” cleverly weaves in the personal conflicts and internal struggles of nine black women living in Harlem. Perry chooses fourteen of Shange’s poems to make the center of his dramatic tale and then successfully develops character, story and dialogue to make her Broadway choreopoem an awesome and riveting film.
Written and directed by Perry, the movie stars a dynamic cast in Oscar-worthy performances. Kimberly Elise portrays Crystal, a mother and abused girlfriend at the epicenter of this drama. Her tormentor is her live-in unemployed boyfriend, Beau Willie, played with a terrible menacing persona by Michael Ealy. Crystal works as an executive assistant for Jo, a snobbish, high-class magazine editor. Elise’s Crystal carefully masks any hurts while she works for her demanding boss. As Jo, Janet Jackson convincingly plays an ice princess who only demonstrates feelings for her emotionally-absent down-low cheating husband. Of course, Jo doesn’t find out until the end of the movie, but the audience catches glimpses of his wanderings early in the picture.
Loretta Devine’s character, Juanita, is the unifying factor among these women because she leads a comprehensive health center and discussion group for women. Juanita approaches Jo for a donation to support her center and she coldly denies her. Devine provides some of the humor as she continues to nurse a fragile relationship with a sometime boyfriend. Soon thereafter, the grave nature of these women’s stories surface as Nyla, a graceful dancer, suffers through a sudden rapist attack. In a traumatic climax Elise loses her children at the hands of her abusive boyfriend while Jo, Juanita, Kelly and Gilda, the nosey neighbor played by Phylicia Rashad, helplessly stand by and watch.
How these women survive these and other troubling events between a mother (Whoopi Goldberg) and daughters (Thandie Newton and Tessa Thompson) make up the moving and unforgettable angst of “For Colored Girls.” Kerry Washington plays Kelly, a concerned child protective services social worker. Macy Gray appears frightening as an alcoholic back-door abortionist. Perry’s heavy-handed direction gets in the way of perfection a few times along the way, but the actors’ performances and Shange’s timeless words carry this movie through these uneven sequences.
The Oscar-worthy performances of Kimberly Elise, Thandie Newton and Anika Noni Rose stand out. Overall, it is the ensemble nature of this cast that deserves applause and Academy award recognition.
As for the men appearing in supporting roles, Hill Harper, Khalil Kahn, Omari Hardwick and Richard Lawson, subtly add dimension to thinly-written characters. Ealy deserves special recognition for the scary portrait of an abusive boyfriend and psychotic father.
“For Colored Girls” features the lyrical and compelling poetry of Ntozake Shange. Her words are the buried treasures of this movie. Not only do you see a compelling story, dynamic performances but listen to moving lyrics and unique phrases that touch your heart. “For Colored Girls” opens Friday, November 5th at a theater near you.
– by Jeanette Toomer

Two one person shows you must see are Stephanie Berry’s “Shaneequa Chronicles” at the National Black Theater on 125th Street and “Through the Night” with Daniel Beatty at the Union Square Theater. Both feature powerful performances and strong playwriting. “Shaneequa” has been extended through the end of October while “Through the Night” has seen dwindling audiences and needs more people to attend in order to keep this show open. Keep it alive and support the theater!
– Jeanette Toomer

We started a new school year with little to no supplies to teach our high school students. At my school there is a paper shortage and chalk is hard to come by. When does the “Race to the Top” funding trickle down to my classroom? We need it!!! Now that we are divided into small mini-schools, there is more order in the hallways and students arrive to class on time. Now, we need more books and paper!!!
– Jeanette Toomer