Dr.

Bill Cala
Superintendent, Fairport Central School District

Good Morning!
This weeks State of the State address by Governor Cuomo was what most of us expected. It was
an all-out assault on public education, teachers, children, families and local control. It appears that
breaking teachers is his solution to poverty, income inequality and inadequate school funding.
As we have experienced on a first-hand basis over the past few years, the APPR system is indeed a
fatally flawed proxy for genuine evaluation done at the local level. The governors solution is to up
the ante by increasing the tenure period to 5 years and making state test scores 50% of a teachers
evaluation. Given the already bogus cut score setting process for the state exams, we are assured
of a whole new wave of unreliable ratings designed to crush teachers, close schools and open the
door to his other reforms, such as lifting the cap on charter schools and creating a tax credit for
private schools and charters and increasing the amount the state gives charters per pupil. This last
item of increasing charter aid is especially interesting as there are no strings attached. The regular
public schools will only get an increase in aid if the legislature approves all of his draconian
measures mentioned above. Two major studies have demonstrated with great clarity that charters
perform worse than public schools and only 17% of charters perform equal or better to publics
(CREDO 2013). Apparently, thats fine.they get increases in spite of their failing performance.
Lets be clear that the governors agenda has nothing to do with what is good for kids. Far from it. It
is what is good for his financial supporters: the corporations who are making billions of dollars on the
tests, the texts, the technology, the corporate professional development and the data collection,
retrieval and distribution.
As this country gets poorer and poorer and the few get richer and richer the pride of our nation, its
public schools, are being disassembled while Bill Gates, The Waltons, The Koch Brothers, Eli Broad
and other scavengers are feasting at the table of greed.
While the situation may seem hopeless, I believe parents are able to bring this tyranny to a
screeching halt. Assessments should be used only for the benefit of students..nothing else. Last
year over 60,000 parents in New York refused the 3-8 tests. This year it is expect that number will
triple. The refusal movement will indeed collapse the evaluation system and the governors plan to
dismantle public education.
Parents will play a critical role. What role will we play? How will we speak out? This is our
profession. These are our children. This is our responsibility.
Action and activism takes courage. Last week I spoke of my hero Rosa Parks. Let her courage and

actions inspire us. I will close with the wisdom and inspiration of Frederick Douglass.
Where justice is denied; where poverty is enforced; where ignorance prevails, and where any
one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress,; rob and
degrade them; neither persons nor property will be safe.
Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops
without plowing up the ground.
Time to start plowing.
Peace,
Bill