New York got an indication of where the power in public education resides these days — and it’s perhaps not with with US Education Secretary Arne Duncan.
Try Randi Weingarten.
It’s been nearly a year since New York’s longtime teachers-union boss moved to Washington to take over the powerful American Federation of Teachers — yet she’s still nursing petty grudges against successful city principals who made her union look bad.
So she threw a fit of pique, and Duncan knuckled under.
This was startling, because the education secretary — and, by extension, President Obama — are hugely enthusiastic supporters of public-school reform generally, and of charter schools in particular.
In fact, Duncan was in town yesterday to drum up support for a bill that would more than double the number of charter schools statewide — which teachers unions are fighting tooth and nail.
After visiting a Brooklyn charter school, he was supposed to wrap up with a press conference at Brooklyn’s PS 65, a wildly successful traditional public school.
But as The Post’s Carl Campanile reported, the conference was hastily moved after Duncan got a call from Weingarten complaining about the school’s principal, Daysi Garcia.
No surprise that Garcia is the sort of principal Weingarten can’t abide.
For one thing, she makes her teachers work — and she demands results.
According to a recent New Yorker article, Garcia’s been unafraid to label incompetent teachers as such — and plow through the mountains of red tape required to get them out of the classroom.
And guess what? She’s achieved a remarkable turnaround at PS 65: In 2002, a mere 30 percent of students passed state tests in reading, and even fewer were proficient in math. In 2009, 75 percent passed in reading, 96 percent in math.
Little wonder the union is apoplectic. But why did Duncan go along?
“President Obama wants charter schools to flourish,” he said yesterday. But wouldn’t it have been better if he had publicly endorsed principals like Garcia — especially given Weingarten’s temper tantrum?
Anyway, the entire episode should be an education for New Yorkers.
Lesson one: It’s not just charter schools that get the union’s goat — it’s any school that gives kids a decent education by holding teachers accountable.
Lesson two: The union will fight to the very end.