Charles S. Isaacs - Inside Ocean Hill–Brownsville: A Teachers Education, 1968-69

Praise for Inside Ocean HillBrownsville

Inside Ocean HillBrownsville makes a vital contribution to a much-needed reinterpretation of the epochal struggles over community control of the New York City public schools in the 1960s, and the divisive UFT fall 1968 strikes in opposition to that community-based movement. Writing from the firsthand perspective of a young Jewish math teacher at JHS 271, Isaacs brings this important story vividly to life with insight, candor, and humor. He evokes the attitudes and actions of a rich array of ordinary teachers, administrators, students, and parents who fought to defend the community-control experiment in the face of the lies and distortions perpetrated by UFT officials and the mainstream press. A must read for anyone interested in creating successful public schools, this book helps us remember what democratic public education might look like.

Stephen Brier, The Graduate Center, City University of New York

Charles Isaacss Inside Ocean HillBrownsville is a firsthand account of the dramatic events of New York Citys greatest school crisis. Isaacs debunks many of the popular myths of black militants waging assaults on teachers. Instead, he demonstrates that the episode in Ocean HillBrownsville was a case of black and Latino parents, with the support of a number of teachers at JHS 271, struggling for the education of their children and for a more democratically run educational system. These parents faced one of the most powerful unions in the city and a bureaucratic board of education that wanted to protect the status quo. There have been many books written on the 1968 teachers strike, but Isaacss well-written, detailed account is by far the best.

Clarence Taylor, author of Knocking at Our Own Door: Milton A. Galamison and the Struggle to Integrate New York City Schools

Inside Ocean HillBrownsville

A Teachers Education, 196869

Charles S. Isaacs

Cover Photo: Children pass through a police gauntlet to the doors of JHS 271 (Fall 1968)

Published by State University of New York Press, Albany

2014 Charles S. Isaacs

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.

Excelsior Editions is an imprint of State University of New York Press

For information, contact State University of New York Press, Albany, NY
www.sunypress.edu

Production by Diane Ganeles
Marketing by Kate McDonnell

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Isaacs, Charles S., 1945
Inside Ocean Hill-Brownsville : a teacher's education, 196869 / Charles S. Isaacs.
pages cm. (Excelsior editions)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4384-5296-8 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Strikes and lockoutsTeachersNew York (State)New York. 2. Ocean Hill-Brownsville Demonstration School District (New York, N.Y.) 3. Discrimination in educationNew York (State)New York. 4. Isaacs, Charles S., 1945 5. TeachersNew York (State)New YorkBiography. I. Title.
LB2844.47.U62N485 2014
331.88'113711dc23

2013042569

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

This book is dedicated to the memory of

Bill Birenbaum
Thelma Hamilton
Major Owens
Annie Stein
Jitu Weusi
Preston Wilcox
Teachers Warriors Friends

This experiment does not concern just New York City, but the whole nation, wherever people tried to make democracy work.

Rev. C. Herbert Oliver
The New York Times (November 1, 1969)

The 1968 battle over school decentralization in an obscure Brooklyn district called Ocean HillBrownsville ripped apart New York City as nothing has before or since.

John Kifner
The New York Times (December 22, 1996)

Over forty years (later), Jews and African-Americans relationship remains deeply affected by the Ocean HillBrownsville strikes This episode looms large in the American collective consciousness because it solidified the national splintering and collapse of generations of collaboration.

Melissa Weiner
Power, Protest and the Public Schools (2010)

I have never done anything but write, but I dont possess the vocation or talents of a narrator, have no knowledge at all of the laws of dramatic composition, and if I have embarked upon this enterprise it is because I trust in the light shed by how much I have read in my life.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Memories of My Melancholy Whores

This book was written without a publishing contract, or even a reasonable expectation that it would ever be published. Three experienced, sympathetic literary agents predicted that it would never see the light of day. I had no experience with book publishing, no agent, no interns or researchers, and no financial assistance, university post, or any other reliable source of income. What I did have, and what proved indispensable, was the ongoing support of good friends and old colleagues who believed that this was a story worth telling, and who kept my spirits up when clouds of pessimism gathered. My thanks to Lynne Slater, Fran Barrett, Mac Barrett, Alan Shulman, Carol London, Dorothy Williams, and Maurice Reid; to my sons, Marc and Steven Stern; and particularly to Wayne Barrett, Helen Birenbaum, Steve Bloomfield, Dr. Stephen Brier, Monifa Edwards, and Jitu Weusi, each of whom took the time to read drafts or excerpts and offered valuable, though sometimes conflicting, comments and suggestions. Its also about time that I thanked my JHS 271 colleague, Steve Mayer, who contributed many of his own experiences back in 1969.

I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Steve Brier, whose interest in the subject first triggered the idea for a book. Steve held my hand throughout the entire process. He digitized some of my old notes; he showed me the modern methods of referencing sources; he copyedited my first draft (without being asked); he opened doors at publishing houses; and he gave me thoughtful answers to an endless series of questions. Without his expertise and his patience, as well as his own commitment to this story, it would never have been told.

My wife, Carole, and I were brought together by the Ocean HillBrownsville struggles. She has put up with me for almost forty years now. Carole was the first to encourage me to take on this project, and her enthusiasm never flagged for a moment. She was always available for sounding out ideas, and for good advice based on her own deep community organizing experience. Never once did she suggest that my time would be better spent in a more remunerative activity.

The writing of memoir has a Rashomon-like quality to it. Since we experience the world solely through our own individual senses, and filter the input through our own mindsets, no two narratives can be exactly the same. I am grateful to each of my interview subjects for broadening my story by offering their own perspectives and viewpoints.

Filling out the context of the memoir required research. Once I exhausted my own library, Vassar College gave me complete access to its vast collection, including borrowing privileges. NYUs Tamiment Library opened its Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives to me. The staffs at both institutions were knowledgeable, helpful, and patient to a fault. I think librarians are the worlds nicest people.