This story proves that it is dangerous to get your information about American education from New York City’s tabloids. Campbell Brown, journalist extraordinaire. has now apparently become an education expert, based on her close reading of New York City’s tabloids. To be precise, the story says she read “the headlines.”
If you are a regular reader of Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post, you would be convinced that all charters are miracle schools and all public schools are disaster zones that destroy the lives of innocent children. Furthermore, you would feel certain that the public schools were overrun with teachers who were sexual predators and that these monsters don’t deserve a hearing. They need to be fired the moment they are accused!
I well remember a story that filled the local media when I was living in Washington, D.C., in the early 1990s. Six or seven middle school students accused their teacher of molesting them. The man’s name was published, and the number of accusers seemed to seal the case. But after a week or so, the accusers admitted to the police that they had lied. They were angry at the teacher because they thought he was a hard grader. They wanted to get even with him. The lesson I took from that story was that accusations are not proof; that teachers and others need due process; that charges should be aired before an impartial investigator; and that people who are accused are innocent until proven guilty.
It’s an old-fashioned idea, but it sill seems valid. Even for journalists like Campbell Brown.
By the way, I note that she was allowed to testify to the Cuomo Commission on education reform while Carol Burris, the principal who was a leader in organizing more than one-third of the state’s principals against the state testing regime, was denied that opportunity. There was time for the opinionated but ill-informed Brown, but no time for the experienced and knowledgeable Burris.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
All lies in jest, still a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest.
I used to think that was just men …
http://www.songfta.com/songs/X0013_boxer69.html
You really can’t make this stuff up. I don’t actually believe she thinks schools are full of sexual predators; this is a calculated act to attack due process and push the legislature that removes union control and influence…and the email inciting a twitter campaign to attack Randi Weingarten…another calculated act. This is another example of FUD…at its best. She’s helped create a certain level of hysteria because, surprisingly enough, people actually took her article at face value. Everyone should be protected against false accusations, and the only way to ensure that, democratically, is through due process. This is nothing new (so called “experts”-and business-likes trying to eliminate union strength…therefore the power of the people)…this has been tried before, and they will continue to chip away at it until they have control over a system they have not succeeded at gaining complete control.
Yes and evidently she is slated for the Piers Morgan show soon. Possibly it has already been taped, but maybe we can put some questions together for Piers to ask
Campbell.
She also never mentioned her husband is on the Board of Student First….I wonder who put her up to this staged event?
See comments posted on this Gotham Schools article:
http://gothamschools.org/2012/08/02/campbell-browns-abusive-teachers-war-preceded-twitter-spat/
Interesting that someone pointed out that she didn’t mention the recent confirmed cases of sexual abuse at the nearby Horace Mann private school. I wonder if she is worried about those kids too or just the ones stuck in public schools:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/10/magazine/the-horace-mann-schools-secret-history-of-sexual-abuse.html?pagewanted=all
Here is a story on two teachers, including the Montgoemry County one you mentioned. His accusers dropped their accusations. They were sent to different schools, he returned but retired at the end of the school year.
http://articles.latimes.com/2000/apr/02/news/mn-15083
Similarly,
His reputation sullied, teacher commits suicide
False accusation leads to tragedy in Virginia city
By Timothy Dwyer, Washington Post | February 15, 2004
ROANOKE, Va. — The two-lane bridge that Ron Mayfield Jr. came to on the morning of his death stands almost 200 feet above the flowing waters where his father took him fishing as a boy and where, years later, he spent hours with his own son, casting for catfish and perch.
He made two final calls on his cellphone, gasping out a farewell to his wife and dialing 911 without saying a word. Then he lay the phone beside the road and straddled the knee-high metal bridge railing.
At an hour when the school day was just getting started 6 miles away at Woodrow Wilson Middle School, Mayfield leaned sideways and let go, falling into the river.
The note he left tucked in the Bible, on the front seat of the car he left properly parked in the rest area by the bridge, began this way:
“I am so sorry for what I have done, but there is no way I could carry on, absolutely no way.”
The apology was for taking his own life. He had no need to apologize for what drove him to his death, because Mayfield knew it was untrue.
A student at Woodrow Wilson told authorities that he had been assaulted by Mayfield, 55, who taught English to nonnative speakers. Mayfield denied it, but his word, his reputation, and his spotless record were not enough. He had been suspended, and police were called in to investigate.
What Mayfield did not know as he mounted the bridge that morning was that police had cleared him of wrongdoing.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/02/15/his_reputation_sullied_teacher_commits_suicide/?page=full
Headlines accuse and cause damage that can cause a person to end their life Negative headlines sell papers. Headlines are all that some people read. When it comes to education, the headlines always appear negative. What a shame that the media has such mind control over citizens.
See Fred Klonsky’s take on Campbell Brown fiasco, excerpt and link:
So, when the faux-reporter Campbell Brown writes a bullshit expose on how the New York teachers’ union defends perverts, what was there to doubt about its veracity?
By resisting almost any change aimed at improving our public schools, teachers unions have become a ripe target for reformers across the ideological spectrum. Even Hollywood, famously sympathetic to organized labor, has turned on unions with the documentary “Waiting for ‘Superman’” (2010) and a feature film, “Won’t Back Down,” to be released later this year. But perhaps most damaging to the unions’ credibility is their position on sexual misconduct involving teachers and students in New York schools, which is even causing union members to begin to lose faith.
Wow. Even Hollywood.
Shouldn’t the Wall Street Journal have had the journalistic ethics to disclose that Brown is married to Dan Senor, Romney advisor and board member for MichelleRhee’s (that’s not a typo. Since MichelleRhee doesn’t want to put a space between words, I’ve applied that rule to her name) anti-union corporate reform group, StudentsFirst.
What? How naive am I?
Of course, her article is so over-the-top sensationalized nonsense.
But it also feeds into common, if often unspoken (and not always unspoken), prejudice.
http://preaprez.wordpress.com/2012/08/02/male-teachers-are-sexual-predators-and-the-union-protects-them/
Not only Ms Brown, Diane, but three other experts…from TFA, E4E and Students First NY were allowed to testify while practicing principals and teachers were not. All called themselves CEO’s. their average age was about 32. Yet the principal of Francis Lewis HS, a principal from Rockland county and I could not even testify during the open remarks (which werecancelled). I “signed in” at exactly the same moment as Ms Brown. All three principals had requested to testify on teacher/ principal quality, as had two of the teachers from my school.
Why Ms Brown was placed on the panel is odd, because her testimony did not fit the description. We all had to send in our testimony ahead of time.
My teachers learned a lot that morning about the so called reform agenda….
These accounts and comments shoud be sent to Governor Cuomo.
What a charade!
What’s next, will the teachers’ unions be accused of harboring Marxists, Leninists, Stalinists, Maoists, Castroistas and satanists? Oh wait, commenter momwithabrain has already done that, never mind.
Thanks for the comic relief. (I needed that.)