From early 2010 until now, this website fell silent. Even before then, full-time teaching and union work made it difficult to keep the writing up. That year I became even more fully consumed with a (losing) fight against the closure of my high school, followed by a long period of upheaval and harassment, courtesy of Oakland Unified School District administration.
A massively documented grievance and Unfair Labor Practice charge eventually backed them off. I ended up at a middle school in the hills with a far more diverse student body–racially and economically–than I’d seen in nearly two decades in Oakland’s poorest Black and Latino neighborhoods. Not coincidentally, conditions in the hills school were much better than where I’d taught before, though far from adequate to meet the needs of every student.
I retired from full-time teaching in 2014 and now substitute occasionally, while remaining very active in OEA. In 2016, Real School Reform will become a real website again, with regular posts and recorded interviews. Stay tuned.