Thursday, March 25, 2004.

Randi Weingarten, UFT President.

Delegates who might otherwise have spent Thursday evening watching Donald Trump on "The Apprentice" got another version of the hit television show from the head of the union that represents beleaguered New York City teachers.

UFT president Randi Weingarten used the show's popular catch phrase to describe for delegates the penalty facing anyone who displeases New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. "If you do something he thinks is wrong ..." she said with a pause. "You're fired," some 2,000 delegates screamed.

"Think you can work for the city and express an opinion?" Weingarten asked. A worker who commits that folly might hear .... "You're fired," the crowd replied.

Just hours before delegates were scheduled to take to the streets to protest the lack of contracts at UFT, the Professional Staff Congress at CUNY and the United College Employees at FIT, Weingarten fired up the crowd with tales of micromanagement by an administration that counts staples on school bulletin boards.

"Thank God for tenure," Weingarten said. "If we didn't have tenure what do you think would happen?"

The crowd's response was predictable: "You're fired," they replied in unison.

UFT members are "demoralized by the administration's rule by fiat and fear," Weingarten said.

She accused the Bloomberg administration of looking to turn the clock back to 1898, "when the idea that teachers were entitled to any rights, much less any professional treatment, was not even" on the table.

In its eight-page contract proposal, the administration is seeking to wipe out "every right, every precedent, every regulation, every statute, every grievance decision since 1898," she said.

Aside from union recognition, non-discrimination and layoff seniority, Weingarten said, "Everything else - bye-bye," including such child protections as class size limits and health and safety regulations.

Just two hours before the RA was called into session, Weingarten said, 900 UFT delegates came to union headquarters to say "enough is enough." The union asked the Public Employment Relations Board to declare impasse in contract talks.

Speaking of her members, Weingarten said, "I told them tonight, you are going to be marching on their behalf tomorrow. You can bear witness better than anyone else that contracts don't impede learning, that teacher contracts are things that help education and help children."

On behalf of the UFT and the other two New York City unions under siege, Weingarten told delegates: "We all need your help once again to do exactly what you would do in your own districts in terms of fighting the fight to let teachers teach and showing that contracts are not only not an impediment to education, but a strong union and a strong contract can save public education."