During the mayoral campaign in New York City, former CNN anchor Campbell Brown led a campaign against what she portrayed as a serious number of sexual perverts and deviants among the city’s teaching force. Mother Jones decided to investigate what was happening, who was behind the campaign, and here are its findings.
“Shortly after it was launched in June, PTP [Parent Transparency Project] trained its sights on the New York mayoral race, asking the candidates to pledge to change the firing process for school employees accused of sexual misconduct. When several Democratic candidates declined, perhaps fearing they’d upset organized labor, PTP spent $100,000 on a television attack ad questioning whether six candidates, including Republican Joe Lhota and Democrats Bill de Blasio and Anthony Weiner, had “the guts to stand up to the teachers’ unions.” The spot stated that there had been 128 cases of sexual misconduct by school employees in the past five years, suggesting that nothing had been done in response. “It’s a scandal,” the ad’s narrator intoned. “And the candidates are silent.”
“Before founding PTP, Brown raised this issue in a Wall Street Journal op-ed in July 2012. But what she failed to disclose was that her husband, Dan Senor, sits on the board of the New York affiliate of StudentsFirst, an education lobbying group founded by Michelle Rhee, the controversial former Washington, DC, chancellor. Rhee made a name for herself as public enemy No. 1 of the teachers’ unions and has become the torchbearer of the charter school movement. In 2012, her “bipartisan grassroots organization” backed 105 candidates in state races, 88 percent of them Republicans. (Senor was also the spokesman for the Coalition Provisional Authority following the invasion of Iraq and served as a foreign policy adviser to Mitt Romney in 2012.)…
“But there is much more about PTP that is less than transparent, including its sources of funding and its overall agenda. As a 501(c)(4) nonprofit, PTP may keep its donors’ identities secret and spend money in electoral campaigns, so long as political activity doesn’t consume the majority of its time and money.
“Despite its nonpartisan billing, Brown’s nonprofit used Revolution Agency, a Republican consulting firm, to produce the mayoral attack ad. Its partners include Mike Murphy, a well-known pundit and former Romney strategist; Mark Dion, former chief of staff to Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.); and Evan Kozlow, former deputy director of the National Republican Congressional Committee. The domain name for PTP’s website was registered by two Revolution employees: Jeff Bechdel, Mitt Romney’s former Florida spokesman, and Matt Leonardo, who describes himself as “happily in self-imposed exile from advising Republican candidates.”
“Another consulting firm working with Brown’s group is Tusk Strategies, which helped launch Rhee’s StudentsFirst. Advertising disclosure forms filed by PTP list Tusk’s phone number, and a copy of PTP’s sexual-misconduct pledge—since scrubbed from its website—identified its author as a Tusk employee. (Tusk and Revolution declined to comment. Brown referred all questions to her PR firm—the same one used by StudentsFirst.)….
“Brown’s group paints the unions as the main obstacles to a crackdown on predators. Yet Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, says that the union’s New York City chapter already has a zero-tolerance policy in its contract, and that AFT only protects its members against “false allegations.” New York state law also mandates that any teacher convicted of a sex crime be automatically fired. It is the law, not union contracts, that requires that an independent arbitrator hear and mete out punishment in cases of sexual misconduct that fall outside criminal law. The quickest route to changing that policy may be lobbying lawmakers in Albany, not hammering teachers and their unions.”
If Ms. Brown hobnobs with Mr. and Mrs. Rhee predators are closer than she knows.
Wise up Campbell….spread your outrage to your own social circles.
They are closer than you think. Beware and be aware:
Click to access Phoenix_Police.source.prod_affiliate.4.pdf
When informed that her now fiance Kevin Johnson had been accused of inappropriate sexual conduct, Rhee promised to make it “her number one priority” and to “take care of the situation”. She then met with a federal inspector general, calling Johnson “a good guy”.
http://www.dcurbanmom.com/weblog/2009/11/22/rhee-walpin
Thanks for posting this information. I have been wondering what happened to the investigation. Guess Rhee”s clout is pretty strong. Sarcasm intended.
I wrote this http:///rlratto.wordpress.com/2012/08/02/this-ones-for-campbell-brown/ when she began her campaign against teachers’ unions. I said she practices Yellow Journalism and I guess with new article by Mother Jones I was right on the mark!
The Teachers Union that represented the teachers in the school district where I taught for thirty years also had a clause that any teacher accused of sexual misconduct would not be supported by the union in any way until after they were found innocent in court. Only after the court rules that the teacher is innocent, would the union provide attorneys to represent the teacher for a wrongful accusation by the school district.
During those thirty years I can think of three cases of teachers being accused of sexual misconduct. One had to do with a love letter a teacher wrote to one of his student assistants. There had been no physical contact. There had been no teacher student dates. The teacher admitted his guilt and resigned after having taught for more than twenty-five years.
The other two teachers hired their own lawyers and went to court; both were found innocent. But as soon as students accused them of sexual misconduct, they were both put on leave without pay.
In both cases, the testimony of the students was found to be false. Eventually the students admitted they had lied to get even for poor grades of being written up for behavior problems.
The teachers were reinstated, the district covered the court costs and back pay while the teachers were out of work.
In all three cases, the union did not offer any support to the teachers. The settlements to the two teachers who were found innocent was between the teachers and the district.
Its very easy for students to accuse teachers of sexual misconduct, but that doesn’t mean the accusations are true. In man cases, the kids are getting even with a teacher due to grades or earning referrals for unacceptable behavior.
The teachers’ unions I belonged to was NEA/CTA/REA
Teachers deserve their day in court too unless the teacher admits they were guilty. But in the United States innocent until proven guilty often doesn’t apply to teachers. The double jeopardy law also doesn’t apply to teachers. A teacher may be found innocent in a court trail and still lose their credential to teach.
There is something wrong with a union policy that assumes a teacher is guilty until proven innocent. I can understand a leave of absence but withholding pay and giving no support before judgement is contrary to everything we teach about our justice system. I know of several cases where teachers were unjustly accused. The impact on them was profound and career damaging.
“There is something wrong with a union policy that assumes a teacher is guilty until proven innocent.”
YES, 2old!
I think the unions have no choice. The war against teachers and their unions has been going on for more than thirty years and any ammunition you hand the critics will be twisted out of context and used to bash the teachers and unions more.
Therefore, the teachers become a group that is singled out, raked over the coals and discriminated against—sort of like the Spanish Inquisition.
“asking the candidates to pledge to change the firing process for school employees accused of sexual misconduct.”
What kind of nut job would agree to do anything (other than investigate the issue) to someone who was only accused of something?
What about the charter sector? Given the frequent reminders of lax oversight and transparency of charter schools regarding so many matters, wouldn’t that be a more fruitful area of investigation? [For just the tip of the iceberg, go to Jonathan Pelto’s blog for examples from his neck of the woods, especially regarding Dr. Steve Perry’s edubusinesses.]
Or could it be true that some “public” schools are more equal than others: genuine public schools get all the scrutiny while the, er, “other” public schools called “charters” get a free pass?
Just remember: when it comes to $tudent $ucce$$, double standards make a lot of ₵ent¢.
Rheally!
And really!
😎
Campbell Brown is on the board of the Success Academy Charter Schools, Check Wickipedia for interesting biographies of her and her husband Dan Senor. Very interesting, Lots of fascinating connections with G W Bush, neocons, Rupert Murdoch (New York Daily News, Wall Street journal, Fox News).
I’m so glad that some victims of the Miramonte scandal in Los Angeles have refused to “settle.” When this case is litigated, citizens will see that the perpetrator of these heinous crimes against children were allowed to continue teaching because ADMINISTRATORS failed to call the police, even after repeated complaints from parents and children.
In California, a teacher accused of sexual misconduct against a child must (by law) be placed on immediate leave. Once the police are called, the case comes under the jurisdiction of the legal system, and not “the unions” or the district. Of course, all this depends on someone calling the police.
In my 42 years of teaching, two teachers were accused of molestation. The first one (in 1966) disappeared from school one day and was never seen again. The second one (in 1998) was arrested, tried and acquitted. Because there had been other allegations throughout the years, the superintendent asked the state to pull his credential, which they did. In the first case, the teachers were horrified. In the second instance we were all confused because we had never seen anything remotely suspicious and the judge declared, “This case should never have been brought to court.” Still, I can’t think of a single teacher who protested the superintendent’s actions because we were afraid that she knew something we did not. Yes, we were afraid that an innocent man had been denied his credential but we erred on the side of student safety. That’s the way teachers are.
As we saw with Penn State, many schools will try to sweep serious allegations under the rug. This is the real problem and I’ll bet Campbell Brown knows it too. If she really wants to know how these things are covered up, she should investigate the Kevin Johnson situation. That’s more the norm.
Schoolteachers in general are very law-abiding citizens. To imply that these protectors of children would cover for a child molester is despicable.
As someone else said, these criminal situations are in the hands of the justice and legal systems. If there is a loophole, then laws need to be changed. One thing that won’t change is due process. Like everyone else, a teacher has a right to be heard in court. John Deasy wants to fire a teacher who has been accused of wrongdoing. Well, this is still the United States of America.
Linda Johnson: speaking from personal/work experience, I underscore the following:
1), administrators are critical in catching, or overlooking, child abuse. Why are teachers taking all the heat?
2), teachers in general are very law-abiding.
3), the vast majority of teachers (and school staff in general) are among the first to not just condemn covering up child abuse—they went into public education to protect and nurture young people. It takes a sick mentality to assert otherwise.
4), due process protects the first line of child advocates: the educators (professional and paraprofessional) in public school classrooms across the country. Take away due process, and you make it much more difficult (as can be seen increasingly in charters) for teachers and aides to defend and speak up for students.
Thank you for your comments.
😎
Never forget these cases:
False Accusations Make Teacher’s Life a Nightmare
Behavior: Seven students accused him of sexual touching, then admitted they lied. Regrets fail to explain conduct.
http://articles.latimes.com/2000/mar/26/news/mn-12749
and
His reputation sullied, teacher commits suicide
False accusation leads to tragedy in Virginia city
By Timothy Dwyer, Washington Post | February 15, 2004
http://goo.gl/gqhXt
Campbell Brown cannot ignore personal bias when it comes to covering education issues. She needs to be re-assigned–however, that would never happen due to the sensationalism she can deliver as she spins this story out if control.
CNN would prefer to get viewers (and keep its corporate connections happy) instead of preserving any journalistic integrity,
One of the more seedy elements to this story is the failure of her fellow Professional Education Reformers to condemn her perfidious libel.
Andrew Rotherham, founder of several reform consulting groups and a member of the Virginia state board of education when it was producing faulty data, has promoted Campbell Brown at his Eduwonk.com site.
When several commentators pointed out that Campbell Brown “facts” were wrong , Andrew went on the attack and called them clowns. (In person, he was vulgar in his description).
Andrew is another example of the hypocrisy and moral relativism of the Education Reform crowd. 3 years ago when evidence emerged that Michelle Rhee lied about her success as a teacher and ignored evidence of cheating at over 100 of her DCPS schools, Andrew tried to mount his high horse and dismiss the charges. For him, honesty is not a characteristic to be valued (no surprise to know that he was an advisor on education to President Bill Clinton).
Andrew’s children attend an Arlington County, VA public school where class size is capped at 20, every classroom has a teacher and a aide who is a college student or graduate. The PTA runs supply drives for the 70% of the mainly hispanic children who are poor. The 30% fund raise by shopping at Harris Teeter, a high end grocery store.