Bronx principal of Fordham High School for the Arts fined $7.5G for teacher grade scam

[Starry Messenger]

http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2011/01/22/2011-01-22_bx_principal_fined_75g_for_teacher_grade_scam.html#ixzz1BoNaaNYe

A Bronx principal told her assistant principals to give specific teachers unsatisfactory ratings - before even conducting observations of their work, investigators found.

City officials released records yesterday showing they had substantiated the disturbing charges against Iris Blige of Fordham High School for the Arts.

She was fined $7,500 as part of settling the disciplinary actions, but she was allowed to keep her job.

Blige directed her assistant principals to get rid of certain teachers before any observations of their work were completed, the investigators found.

Fined, not fired. That should really send a message. :sarcasm:


http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:1iVWM3OOqOcJ:nycrubberroomreporter.blogspot.com/2009/05/principal-from-hell-iris-blige-starts.html+iris+blige&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

Another former AP, Osvaldo Mancebo, told the New York Teacher that Blige had a list of teachers who she wanted to rate Unsatisfactory even before any observations took place.

<snip>


"She treated chapter leaders like garbage," the official said. "She was paranoid. I heard her say many times that she would destroy the union."

The chapter leader, too, was released with no charges filed after spending two years in the rubber room.

Teachers say that Blige uses the rubber rooms as a way to punish them when they defy her "my way or the highway" management style. She has sent seven teachers to the rubber rooms.

It isn't true that if you just do your job diligently as a teacher that you'll have nothing to worry about, and don't need seniority and tenure.

[virgogal]

1. The rubber room thing is appalling. These teachers

just sit all day,doing nothing,and getting full pay.

What an insult to many good teachers.

[Starry Messenger]

2. They are often put there by vindictive supervisors.

They are not "doing nothing" by choice, but to be punished by power-hungry administrators. As a teacher, I would be scandalized if they had to do it for free.

[EFerrari]

3. Right. Being punished with enforced idleness by an out of control autocrat is appalling.

[petronius]

4. "$7.5G"? Never seen that before, is it a cool new way of expressing the number?

:shrug:

Sounds like she got off very easy...

[Starry Messenger]

5. I thought about changing it.

Some people get really angry when you change the official titles of news stories though.

I think she got off way too easily. Lots of comments about this principal at the news story here: http://gothamschools.org/2011/01/21/bronx-principal-keeps-her-job-after-imperiling-the-jobs-of-others/#more-53158


One trenchant example--

Principals like Blige who ruin lives, ruin careers, rule by fear and intimidation. Signaling the robotic foolishness of Cathie Blacks talking points, Blige is an example of how the dedicated, vibrant, caring new teachers that Black wants to save from layoffs ate the ones whose careers were cut short by the vindictiveness of this principal. Bishop, Hidalgo, Street, Troy, all popular and well-liked young teachers, were cut down early in their promising careers. On one occasion a student at the school asked me “why does Ms. Blige get rid if all our favorite teachers?”

So harsh were the conditions under her tyranny that from 2007-2008 she had a turnover rate of 70.5%. Dozens of teachers have left every year since 2004 because of this principal. Of the more than a dozen APs in her school in fewer than since 2004, at least ten have left many testifying against her in this investigation and others. Evaluations, which are designed to improve instruction in the classroom, were being instead subverted into a tool to intimidate teachers and stifle dissent.

The fact that the DOE doesn’t terminate Blige should serve as a dire warning for anyone who believes that the can evaluate leadership for our schools. Principals like Iris Blige are not instructional leaders but people who maintain their power by using their authority to rate staff to impose their will.

Iris Blige who, when she was not giving out unjust ratings and firing new teachers, was sending them to the rubber room for petty or no reason
A former UFT chapter leader, Rick Coscia, spent two years on trumped up charges which were ultimately dropped. Fannie Davis, a twenty-seven year award- winning teacher, spent two years on an allegation coerced from AP Ahmed Edwards. There were never any charges, investigation, or decision. Her “crime” was that she exercised her right to file a Step 2 grievance for improper excessing. When she returned from the hearing, Blige had her promptly shipped to the rubber room by forcing Edwards to say Davis threatened her or she would deny him tenure.

Blige claimed that Raqnel James also threatened her. After an unblemished eight-year teaching career, this beloved teacher found herself facing deportation when Blige falsely charged her as well. The District Attorney has now asked for twelve postponements over two years as James is dragged through the court system.

After over 400 students, teachers, and even administrators demonstrated against her in March 2009, she threatened every student who partcipated. She sent a guidance counselor to tell them they would not get their diplomas. She told them they could not participate in student activities. She threw one girl off the School Leadership Team. Robert Small, the OSI investigator was given a list of 13 such students to interview.
The result? A fine. Good luck NYC.

[WinkyDink]

31. 'Cause the abbreviation is "K".

[Gaedel]

32. Usually

You would say $7.5K as in "kilobucks"

[Starry Messenger]

37. Yes, I'm aware of that.

But it is the title of the news story, and like I said, some people here go absolutely batshit if you alter a single element of the print source. I don't know why the NYDN wrote it that way, but they did.

[sakabatou]

6. What is a rubber room exactly?

[Recursion]

9. Here's a good radio story about it

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/350/human-resources

The first part, at least.

Teachers that for whatever reason (sometimes legitimate, sometimes illegitimate) somebody wants to take out of the classroom are sent to an office where they sit and do nothing.

[Starry Messenger]

10. They are reassignment centers.

A teacher who is suspended pending some disciplinary action is not given home leave, but required to check in each day for the hours they would work to these "rubber rooms". They are paid their wages, but not allowed to teach. Teachers unions have been criticized for the long amount of time some teachers are "allowed" to "sit in the rubber room doing nothing and getting paid", but it is a punishment. Teachers don't want to go there. The funny (not ha-ha) thing is that Joel Klein created the rubber rooms in their first place, and then demonized the teachers who were put in there as freeloaders.

http://mets2006.wordpress.com/2010/02/09/rubber-rooms-are-inflexible-teachers-are-pawns-in-the-bloombergklein-push-to-weaken-tenure-and-teacher-unions-is-this-war-interminable/

Rubber rooms, aka, Teacher Reassignment Centers, are a political, not an educational issue. Many of the six hundred or so teachers are pawns in a struggle to weaken the teacher union and erode tenure.

<snip>

For Joel Klein the major obstacle to implementing his “reforms” is the teacher union. Keeping pressure on the union, newspaper article after newspaper article in the local dailies and the national magazines frames the union as defending the undefendable. If only the union’s grasp can be loosened we can rid the system of the ”losers” and create a truly child-centered system, avers Joel.

The long delays in investigating accusations and scheduling hearings is the fault of the Department, the contract sets forth an expedited process,

1. The parties are committed to having these cases heard in an expeditious manner. For this reason, absent extraordinary circumstances, arbitrators are not to adjourn hearing dates. It should be noted that normally attorney or party scheduling conflicts are not extraordinary circumstances.
2. In all cases, as delineated in Education Law §3020-a the final hearing shall be completed no later than 60 days from the pre-hearing conference and the written decision must be rendered within 30 days from the final hearing date.


And, who is at fault if the Department cannot prove their accusations before well regarded arbitrators selected jointly by the Union and the Department?

(As discussed and agreed upon, all parties would be served better by the implementation of a permanent arbitration panel. The panel members must be agreeable to both sides,.

Panel members shall serve for a maximum of a one-year term. At the expiration of such term, the parties must agree to have arbitrators continue to serve on the panel, and if not, replacement members will be elected by the method outlined above. Removal prior to the end of the one-year term must be for good and sufficient cause upon mutual agreement of the parties.)

Pre-Klein, under specific circumstances teachers were removed from teaching duties, usually at full pay while the precipitating event was investigated. The teacher either sat in the district office, or, was assigned to administrative duties. Currently teachers fester in rubber rooms without any duties.

Arrest for felonies specified in the contract allow for suspensions without pay,

[Smarmie Doofus]

18. Go here and click the link at the bottom of the OP:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=219x12348

[Hannah Bell]

7. this is how much those new snazzy teacher rating systems are worth.

now that the goal of firing teachers and destroying unions is supported by the ptb, principals can decide who they want to fire & evaluate accordingly -- or not evaluate at all & say they did.

[Starry Messenger]

12. And not be fired even if found clearly in the wrong.

$7500 is 6% of Ms. Blige's salary. I'm sure there will be others who will decide it is worth that "risk". Another of the comments from Gotham Schools:

Although OSI imposed a $7,500 fine on Ms. Blige, the complainants should still pursue it further with SCI and with the Human Rights Division. It has always been the policy, as per the chancellor’s subtle directives to OSI, not to terminate principals, but to only terminate teachers on those insignificant incidents.

Ms. Blige, whose background is in counseling and psychology, used her perverted, but persuasive, means of intimidating those in positions of no power. I find it appalling that Ms. Blige was only imposed a $7,500 fine for emotionally victimizing and destroying the careers of those innocent professionals. Isn’t the protection and respect of teachers’ dignity, integrity and professionalism worth more than a $7,500 fine against Ms. Blige, which is only 6% of her annual salary? Is OSI’s decision to the public saying that a principal can lie, threaten, intimidate, and ridicule their employees as long as the principal just pays a fine? So Blige is nothing else but a common criminal who managed to beat the system that Klein created through the Leadership Academy.

It is time for all staff members at a school to watch your back because other nefarious principals will now follow suit especially since it only costs $7,500 to shake down teachers because they still keep their $135,000 salary.

[Hannah Bell]

13. only teachers need to be fired, you know. bad, cheating principals have no effect on schools.

in fact, deformers like them.

seems like the deformers here at DU have no comment.

[Starry Messenger]

17. I was waiting for the brilliant ripostes!

All the reasons that this is justified so we don't encourage a "culture of mediocrity" or complacency or whatever it was today.

[Hannah Bell]

25. i practically cried when i read that article about how student essays are scored.

speaking of encouraging a culture of mediocrity.

[Starry Messenger]

33. If there were fewer rules here

there would be a few folks I would blister with gale force. There is so much abuse like this going on, and teachers here are being subjected to absolutely unearned hate here and in the outside world. The test scoring is a glaring example. Teachers are being held to a standard set by scamming private *for-profit* testing companies and people think that's just fine and dandy. Thank you for keeping this kicked and for the additions to the thread.

[Hannah Bell]

35. i would too. it makes me sick at heart to have to deal with the stupid games they play here

when what is happening is a power play, using manipulative tactics & wealth to force the result the players want -- nothing to do with bettering anyone's lives but the lives of the rich & their hired lapdogs.

[dkf]

23. Bad principals and bad teachers need to be fired.

Who wants to defend bad administrators?

[Hannah Bell]

24. gee, but good teachers are being fired, & bad, cheating principals in the pockets of ed

deformers get to stay.

where's the accountability, as the deformers are always screaming?

they don't know the meaning of the word.

they lie & cheat constantly, & they're never held accountable.

this lying & cheating is the new model for success in america.

[MedicalAdmin]

40. That's why I no longer teach.

I had a principal who decided he wanted me gone for personal reasons and then got rid of me. To this day I wouldn't piss on the man if I found him on fire. He also blacklisted me so I never even got another interview.

I'm still bitter. I miss my kids and teaching. Education is dead in America.

[snagglepuss]

8. Blige was even promised a "neutral letter of reference to any potential employer"

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/bronx/principal_blunt_ax_ofn8ZbU9z0euCR3K8PKmcL#ixzz1BvNU2ECB


:puke:

[Starry Messenger]

15. Wow, lots of good comments there too.

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Blondie

01/23/2011 12:34 AM

Older NYer is right. My husband was going to be transferred to Texas. When I interviewed for a job I thought that I would encounter resistance being from NY. Not the case. They called even after the transfer did not go through.
The schools are no different from industry. Chatty Cathie will discover that there are administrators who want to get rid of experienced teachers who want experienced older teachers out to make way for their friends who will back the lame administrator. Oh, wait, that is how she got her job , isn't it?
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Older New Yorker

01/22/2011 11:56 PM

This story is nothing new. Has been going on in the New york City Schools since 2007.

My daughter worked on West 134 St. in a Middle School.

The new Principal was an inexperienced and unqualified administrator. When it became to much for her to handle she resorted to becoming a TYRANT. The City now has 8 of her former teachers sauing the city for 11 million dollars.

After reading this story I guess the city is about to be served with another Notice of Cause as to the soon to be coming multi million dollar lawsuit.

The metro area sits there and scratches there heads as to why young New York State trained teachers are flocking to other states totally abandoning the metropolitan area. "WORDS GONE OUT" THROUGH THE NYS University Alumni Associations to "Avoid City Schools" especially "Charter Schools."

Over 50% of the teachers in my daughter's southern state school were trained at New York State University or at Boston University. The southern states cannot get enough NYS University trained teachers!
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tonysam

01/23/2011 11:50 AM

I hate to say this, but this kind of problem exists all over the country. If you think by taking a job in the southern states or out in the west will spare you, you have another thing coming. Teachers have utterly no rights in these "right-to-work" states; the unions are junk and collude with school districts. The principals are as bad if not worse in other parts of the country. Iris Blige is, unfortunately, the rule rather than the exception for principals in the United States. It is just that she got caught, albeit she received a slap on the wrist. It is virtually impossible to fire principals in this country. Teachers, contrary to myths perpetuated in the media, are easily gotten rid of and their lives destroyed. They don't have to do something truly egregious or dangerous to be removed. All a principal has to do is fabricate charges with the knowledge the school districts and thus taxpayers will ALWAYS back them up clear through the hearings and into the various courts of appeals. It isn't the same as in private industry because managers and even CEOs are fired all the time for wrongdoing because they pose a threat to the bottom line. Lawsuits can bankrupt a company, unlike a school district. Lower level employees have more job security in the private sector than those higher up the chain. Public education is a completely different ballgame because of the fact there is always a flow of cash and no bottom line to worry about. "Tenure" really needs to be tenure; right now administrative law is treated like toilet paper by school districts around the country; they openly flout the law with the knowledge teachers are typically too destitute to fight. Usually teachers wind up taking piddling settlements, and if they do so, they risk losing unemployment benefits, not to mention "resigning" in lieu of termination is seen by other school districts as an admission of "guilt." Teachers need far more rights, not fewer, because of the nature of the work.
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PostMan

01/23/2011 1:05 AM

In case you have not figured it out New York, this has been standard operating procedure of the DOE for the past few years. Principals are encouraged to get rid of the expensive (aka experienced )teachers and turn them into ATRs (teachers witout positions) by U rating them through any means possible. The attack on the teaching profession has become simply shameless.

Witness Cathie Black's piece in this same paper two days ago. She clearly states that the ATRs should be fired (despite the fact that the DOE creates the ATRs by closing down traditional schools to replace them with for-profit charter schools). Research shows the charters are no better (and in most cases actually worse performing than traditional schools.) But that doesnt matter. The point is that rich people can make more money this way as they open more charter schools. Taxpayers are being duped and the charter CEOs and managing companies are laughing all the way to the bank.


Ed Greenspan

01/22/2011 11:55 PM

Burnt 13- How correct you are. Let's investigate the schools where principals are handing out tons of u-ratings. These u's have gone to teachers teaching for 15-20 years. Thank the Lord I retired. Yes, Blondie- this is real discrimination. Taught for 33 years before retiring. You should see the 2nd principal I had. Practically, the entire staff left. This is nothing new. Toni,the principal I'm talking about went after Jewish teachers in particular. When she finished with them, she went after people of her own race.
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Ed Greenspan

01/22/2011 11:49 PM

Now, you know why we need tenure. There are plenty of these kinds of principals floating around. She probably came out of the Leadership Academy-the institution that graduates people to become principals despite the fact that they never taught! What a disgrace! Imagine if teachers told one another to rate pupils poorly.
Blige should be shown the door.


Heartening to see support for teachers after reading abuse here at DU all day about teacher tenure. Thank you snagglepuss!

[proud2BlibKansan]

11. That's probably about a month's pay.

Woop Dee Doo

[Starry Messenger]

20. Looks like it's being spread out over months.

http://jd2718.wordpress.com/2011/01/22/ruining-careers-for-475month-18-month-term/

Ruining careers for $475/month (18 month term)

Iris Blige will pay a fine, less than 5% of her salary, for ruining the careers of good teachers, of developing new teachers (and of APs). She tried to ruin even more careers.

Iris Blige’s Fordham HS for the Arts was my model for the kind of school a new teacher should avoid. Do Not Apply, I wrote, this school ends careers. It was true.

Two years ago hundreds of high school teachers from across the Bronx protested yet another instance of baseless discipline against a teacher. In that instance, Blige took advantage of the teacher’s immigration status to try to get her deported.

Finally OSI found this August that what we already knew was true: that Blige ordered APs to U teachers without any attempt to evaluate them, that she chose to go after, and found reasons afterwards.

The penalty? Iris Blige and Elena Papaliberios signed a stipulation just after Thanksgiving, agreeing to a $7500 fine spread out over a year and a half. Is there any word about the teachers whose careers were ruined? The question certainly needs to be brought straight to the UFT.

She might have to give up foamy latte trentes for a while. :sarcasm:

[Smarmie Doofus]

14. The only thing that makes sense here is that she must have....

...have directed her APs in *writing* ( i.e. email) and that one of them turned her in.

The DOE investigatory apparatus is... like everything else in the NYC DOE.... highly politicized and it would *never* go after this principal ( who is plainly well-connected) for this infraction ( Does anyone doubt that principals don't punish teachers who challenge them by giving them bad job evals? Come on. ) unless it was absolutely forced to.

[Starry Messenger]

19. I'm not sure SD.

The complaint just said "substantiated". The pdf of the complaint is here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/47337692/F7191-OSI-Report

[Smarmie Doofus]

41. Some of the APs arreared to go on record re. meetings

where she told them verbally to fail the teachers pre-observation. But I strongly suspect someone had something in writing that set the thing into motion.

This sort of harassment ... and even destruction of political undesireables by principals goes on commonly in this system. It's astonishingly rare that anything is doen about it. There must have been a smoking gun that forced OSI's hand. And/or Blige alientated the AP's in the same way.

Or it could be that this particular constellation of APs were an unusually ethical bunch. ( I think that's really unlikely. It just doesn't work that way in this system)

[Starry Messenger]

42. I've been really lucky.

My principal has been a peach. The scenario in this horror show just seems so wrong and nightmarish. I think if I taught in NY I'd be up for first degree murder.

[Smarmie Doofus]

16. Hey! Check out the first "comment" in the NY Post link:

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/bronx/principal_blunt_ax_ofn8ZbU9z0euCR3K8PKmcL#ixzz1BvNU2ECB

[proud2BlibKansan]

21. ...

:)

[LooseWilly]

22. 6% of salary as a fine?... that's a corporate punishment, not an individual one.

Is this principal incorporated? (An LLC perhaps?)

I want a job where I can fuck over scores of people and only face a 6 percent fine if multiple counts are proven against me... :+

[Hannah Bell]

26. anyone on the side of power can do anything. they're all honorary corporations.

[era veteran]

27. Just what do you have to do to get fired?

This sends a great message to students. Public education is so bad across the country. I feel sorry for the teachers but sorrier for the students.

[Hannah Bell]

28. this is the ed deform contingent, not "public education".

[Hannah Bell]

29. Blige specifically went after union chapter leaders, Klein knew about it, union didn't didn't defend

their members.



Klein knew all about Blige and the recantation of an Assistant Principal because I wrote about it in the Spring of 2009 for the New York Teacher. It didn’t take a special Condon “investigation” to uncover the Blige horror show, supported by Mulgrew and Weingarten.

I quoted members who said Blige specifically went after chapter leaders and sent them to the rubber rooms on trumped up charges-they were never charged with anything and were all sent back to the classroom.

That was the last article I was allowed to write about Blige.

When the union had a rally on March 13, 2009, Weingarten sent out a press advisory (I have a copy) knocking the total number of protesters down to 50 after she was told that 500 would attend. So even then the union was protecting Blige.

The worst case of the Weingarten- Mulgrew Vichy collaboration involves the teacher accused of leaving a letter in Blige’s mailbox threatening to murder her! The letter said there was a “gang” led by the teacher who would kill the principal and her son.

Fifteen cops came to the school, interviewed no one except the teacher, lied to her and said they had her on video leaving the letter in the principal’s mailbox and had her fingerprints on the letter.

Then they changed the story to say it was her handwriting on the letter, which was announced by an Assistant Principal- tape recorded by a member- one week later- that was in February, 2009.

Now: think Tucson and the attempted murder of Congresswoman Gabby Giffords: What happened to the teacher after one “expert” detective said it was the teacher’s handwriting?

NOTHING!

It is a New York State felony to threaten the murder of a public official.

Nothing happened to the teacher until eight weeks later, in April, 2009, after I called Blige for a comment on my story.

The next day, the teacher was arrested and charged with a misdeameanor. (Even if she is found guilty, she will serve 15 days of community service picking up garbage on the Grand Concourse).

The Bronx D.A.- elected with help from the UFT- did not ask for bail, didn’t ask for the teacher’s passport to be lifted and the principal never asked for extra police protection for Blige, parents, students and the staff.

Despite my urging, Weingarten refused to call the D.A. and ask that he personally look at the case. There was no police probe of the gang. The teacher -this horrible accused murderer beloved by her students and colleagues-- was sent back to the rubber room.

Nearly two years later, after the D.A. Robert Johnson asked for 15 postponements, there has been no trial and the case is still open.

What would have happened if a teacher wrote a letter like that to Bloomberg or Klein?

The teacher ultimately lost her job because neither Mulgrew nor Weingarten nor NYSUT lawyer Claude Hirsch lifted a finger to help her. She never had a 3020A hearing. Klein used a loophole in the law saying he could refuse to approve her application for a work visa if she was merely “accused” of misconduct.

Incredibly, Weingarten and Mulgrew allowed this shanda, like so many others they were complicit in, to stand unchallenged. So the only question still open is: what did they get out of it for themselves and their UFT cronies?

My editor Deidre McFadyen and staff director LeRoy Barr denied me a vacation day-for the first time since I worked at the union- so I could attend the teacher’s court hearing on my own time--to give her moral support (I have the Barr email).

Weingarten pulled my story the day after the teacher got arrested; Weingarten, Barr, Mulgrew and others all said she was guilty- because she had been arrested. Weingarten told me the teacher was “guilty” because she had “heard” ---from another UFT Staff Director Garry Sprung- that the cops had the teacher’s fingerprints on the letter. I asked Weingarten when the grand jury met, when the teacher was indicted, when she was convicted and when she had exhausted all her appeals.

I had to shame Weingarten the Lawyer/ part-time “teacher” into finally running the story-two weeks after the arrest- after I reminded her about the 6th Amendment (Weingarten told me that most teachers in the rubber rooms were guilty and crazy, which is why I was allowed to run only one rubber room story-in October 2007).

When an Assistant Principal wanted to tell me the story about how she helped frame the teacher, Mulgrew, Barr and McFadyen refeused to let me run the story and Mulgrew wouldn’t even call the D.A. to say he was sending over an important witness to help clear the teacher.

So it is clear- I have lots more on this story and other Weingarten-Mulgrew cover ups of corruption outside and within the union- that the UFT leaders were protecting Klein and the members could
go to hell in a hand basket.

http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/

[Reader Rabbit]

30. But teachers still shouldn't be allowed due processes.

'Cause it's that damned tenure that is really the problem.

:sarcasm:

[Starry Messenger]

34. " 'Cause only bad teachers have something to worry about!!11"

Sounds like the Bushies with the Patriot Act, doesn't it? "If you didn't do anything wrong, this shouldn't worry you!" lol

[xchrom]

36. recommend

[Tatiana]

38. "Only bad teachers are fired. Tenure is the problem! Teachers unions are EVIL!"

Or so the ed deformers love to chant....

Perfect illustration of a) a vindictive administrator, b) a weak union, and c) no consequences for administrative authorities behaving badly.

And don't kid yourselves. Stuff like this happens ALL THE TIME in public education. That is why school districts love to replace seasoned, experienced teachers and administrators with young, cheap, inexperienced stooges who don't know about employee rights and don't care.

[Starry Messenger]

39. Bingo!

And increasingly, preferably TFA teachers. In and out in a couple of years, that person will never get hooked into the evil teacher union in a big way. :sarcasm: