PAA en Espaňol:
La  Voz de los Padres

PAA endorses May 17th Save Our Schools March in NYC

PAA has joined New York State Allies for Public Education (NYSAPE), MORE, Change the Stakes, BATs, Lace to the Top, FairTest, NY Principals, Students United for Public Education and other advocacy groups in calling for community activists, parents, educators, and lawmakers to join together and march in support of a developmentally appropriate and equitably funded public education free from the influence of corporate reform and high stakes testing.

This rally is the culmination of growing resistance to corporate reform as evidenced this spring by over 33,000 test refusals throughout New York State, resistance of high-stakes testing rallies led by NYC principals, and parents, superintendents and school board members coming together to oppose inBloom and student data sharing. Kicking off the event will be renowned education scholar and activist, Dr. Diane Ravitch. In addition to Dr. Ravitch, those attending the Rally will hear from a diverse panel of speakers who have been actively working to resist corporate reform policies. Speakers include Carol Burris, PAA's Leonie Haimson, Brian Jones, Jeanette Deutermann, Dao Tran, Mark Naison, Joe Rella, Jose Vilson, Bianca Tanis and many more.

Leonie speaks at Nov. 2014 Chicago inBloom forum

WNYC quoted Leonie in its news story:

Here's Leonie's statement on the New York Public School Parent's blog.

NC districts win court challenge

Parents Across America founding member, Natalie Beyer, a school board member for the Durham, NC, school district, reports excellent news for North Carolina schools.  

Yesterday Guilford and Durham County Schools in North Carolina won a preliminary injunction from Special Superior Court Judge Richard Doughton to halt the 25% contract requirements imposed by the General Assembly.   

Those requirements would give teachers who sign the new contract a small raise in return for giving up due process protections. Judge Doughton said that the 25% contract law required school officials to act unconstitutionally and he rejected the argument from the state that local school boards could not sue to stop unconstitutional laws.  

School board member Natalie Beyer said Doughton's ruling was "excellent news." "I'm encouraged that Judge Doughton is taking this concern very seriously on behalf of all North Carolina teachers," Beyer said.

Read the story and Natalie's quote here in the Durham Herald-Sun.    

PAA founders publish again!

We are very proud that two of PAA's founding members, Dora Taylor and Pamela Grundy, have written chapters for the new book,  Digital Networking for School Reform:  The Online Grassroots Efforts of Parent and Teacher Activists. The book is edited by Alison Heron-Hruby and Melanie Landon-Hays. 

Here's the publisher's blurb:  

"This book provides first-person accounts from parents and educators in the United States who have negotiated for a prominent role in current conversations about school reform. Heron Hruby and Landon-Hays argue that it is important to both theorize and document grassroots efforts at a time when digital networking in the Untied States allows a range of people - not just those in conventional positions of corporate or political power - to garner widespread support for education policy. In particular, the book focuses on the shifts in power that take place when teachers and parents are able to carve out successful wide-spread campaigns against high-profile policy movements, specifically the present movement towards charter school proliferation and value-added measures of teacher quality advocated by a growing number of political leaders, political action committees, and privately funded ad hoc advocacy groups. "

Dora, PAA's President and founder of PAA-Seattle, wrote the chapter, "Beginning at the Blog: Moving From Kitchen-Table Plans to National Political Activism Using Digital Narratives."

Pam, leader of PAA North Carolina affiliate Mecklenburg ACTS, wrote "A Community Battles Testing Madness in Charlotte, North Carolina: The Role of Local Knowledge in Spurring Online Collaboration for Change."

Pam notes that the book is priced for academic markets (i.e. a bit high), but check it out for yourself!