From Linda Hall, Connecticut resident:
The latest from the CT Mirror:
In April, the state board approved an independent study created for Vallas by the University of Connecticut as a valid program. But the judge said Friday that the short, independent study he completed in May at UConn was merely a simultation.
“There is no doubt that Vallas received preferential treatment,” the judge wrote in her 27-page decision.
Vallas is in his 17th month of leading the 21,000-student school system.
The judge also noted that Vallas lacked the required prerequisites to enroll in the regular UConn program in the first place, and that such an independent study hadn’t been approved for anyone else in the last decade. Additionally, the university’s governing board had never approved an independent study program.
“Ultimately, the course standards were reduced,” the judge wrote. “The court accepts Vallas’ testimony that the work, although done over the course of 10 weeks while fulfilling his employment as acting superintendent, could have been completed in a week.”
The judge also ruled that Pryor, the state’s education commissioner, improperly waived the certification requirements.
“The evidence submitted at trial established that Pryor did not adequately vet Vallas when evaluating whether he was ‘exceptionally qualified’ because Pryor was unable to provide specific details of that process in his testimony,” the judge wrote.
It is unclear what the ruling means for Vallas’ three-year contract with the Bridgeport school board. Vallas, who is being paid $234,000 a year, has led the Chicago, Philadelphia and New Orleans school systems.
Carmen Lopez, a Bridgeport resident and former judge who filed the lawsuit, called the decision a “triumph.”
“We are still a nation of laws, and not of men, which I am sure comes as a shock to Paul Vallas and Stefan Pryor. The message of this decision is simple — no one is above the law,” she said.
“Fortunately, when the executive branch is arrogant and unresponsive, citizens can still have redress in the courts in order to check unrestrained abuses of power,” Lopez said.
This is the second time in the last two school years that the state’s involvement in the governance of a school district has been overturned by a judge. After the state ousted the former, locally elected Bridgeport Board of Education, the state Supreme Court ruled that that takeover was illegal because the proper steps were not followed.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Is Vallis also a product of the Broad Academy?
LikeLike
misspelled his name…sorry, meant Vallas.
LikeLike
Coined here by Jon Pelto as Vallas in Wonderland.
LikeLike
Is that in the same genre as “Debbie does Vallas”?
LikeLike
And this honest lowdown from a Bridgeport educator should make everyone disgusted:
I don’t know where or from whom you get your information Mr. Lee, but there is no time left to tell for Bridgeport students. They must be freed now from this gang of thieves. Here is Vallas’ legacy: Go into any of the three high schools and see the apathy, frustration and fear in the students. The students know that they are not getting an education. They are sad and starving for discussion and essays, for reading and questioning real literature and historical and topical documents. They wonder where their teachers have gone. They spend day after day completing tests and being called out of class for rap sessions with college students, for pilot programs for test companies, comprehensive test practices for textbooks and curriculums and to visit college courses and support fund raisers.
Teachers are left out of all district decision-making. Questions to the administration are met with anger and punishment and sarcasm. It is a clear “like it or leave it” atmosphere. Courses that have had high enrollment and were successful are eliminated because they didn’t start with the Vallas gang and replaced by the same class with a new name. Music, drama, and specials have no budget. Certified staff and faculty positions for Graphic Arts, Electronics, Print shop, Woodshop, Clothing, Foods and Child Care have been or are being eliminated. Guidance counselors, nurses, drug counselors, librarians, literacy and math coaches are being cut or totally eliminated.
There has been zero funding for libraries and little or no funding for pencils, toner, general school supplies, copy paper or basic classroom materials. Substitutes are rarely called so students are herded into the gym or cafeteria or auditorium with few if any certified staff. Student IDs were never completed this year. Special Ed records were never brought up to date because the new Vallas software never quite worked.
What ever happened to “Safe Corridors”?
Next year the high school schedule is absurd. Students at Central will have 4 full days of straight classes and one full day of essentially substitutes or study hall. This is to allow their teachers to meet for a day of PD. What PD will it be? Will it be the latest Gates or Broad flavor of the month? Will it be purchased to funnel more Bridgeport public money into a private corporation? More money being spent on out of state/ out of district snake oil programs. Also do you remember state mandated School Governance Councils? They were mocked and ignored. The Parent Center dismantled.
There are no directors for areas of academic discipline; therefore no one oversees the English, history, art, music, reading or math departments. No department meetings. No sharing of ideas or lessons. No one is responsible for the reading programs in the elementary schools or for any professional development or training. A comprehensive and completely new curriculum along with very expensive textbooks was purchased, but no training or practice was ever completed. In fact no teachers were a part of the decision making in the purchasing. But highly paid, $300.00 -$500.00 a day consultants from Vallas’s out of state coterie sit in empty and unstaffed libraries reading education articles on their computers and meeting teachers to hand them the articles.
This administration hired a football coach with a record that includes rule breaking, suspensions and cheating. But at some point even he had to get a certificate to be a coach. Mr Lee, if all this doesn’t make Bridgeport parents and taxpayers realize this administration has only contempt for them, I don’t know what will.
It is apparent Vallas is neither academically nor morally qualified to lead children? Bridgeport students and residents are and will continue to be his victims if we don’t heed the verdict.
Mr Lee, the state certifies, licenses or credentials nurses, manicurists, lawyers, arborists, LPNs, hair colorists and so many more, but perhaps with regard to our students no license need exist as long as one is a friend of Malloy or Pryor. (As is certainly the case in most Connecticut charter schools.)
The last 18 months have been chaotic, confusing and demeaning. There is no time to tell any more.
And please tell me what in God’s name does this mean?
They have been visualized, set in motion, communicated to many publics and are working their way forward by a QUALIFIED individual. Who is truly taking on the tasks of the “kids in the classroom”?
http://onlyinbridgeport.com/wordpress/judge-bellis-rules-against-vallas-qualifications-to-serve-as-school-chief/#comment-59390
LikeLike
It would be interested to know how Arnie Duncan reacts to this situation. Vallas was highly regarded when he was in Chicago from what I can recall.
LikeLike
P.S. Arnie Duncan is current Secretary of Education and former superintendent in Chicago.
LikeLike
Vallas is one of the first out of the “Broadfather’s” Academy. Broad also gave him almost $4 million when he was in Philadelphia. This is typical and what seems to have happened is that this case got in front of a judge who “The Boys” did not have control. Now it goes from political to legal. He is now in trouble and he has broken the states laws. This is outside of him being a district ruiner such as in Philadelphia, Chicago and the Lousianna Recovery School . How is it that the worse you do the higher you go???? This has to stop. When Daley and Vallas took over Chicago in 1995 there was a surplus. What happened? They had great financial controls finally going in and then. Poof, is what. Now it is blame everyone else for their own failures and take it out on the youth and their parents and communities. Good P.R. isn’t it? Lucky for Chicago and the rest of us for Karen Lewis and all her dedicated co-organizers. No one can do this on their own. Let us hope this judge is not overturned as Vallas is saying he is going to appeal. Now the political fun begins. Watch the wheels turn. See what they now do. Let us hope that Vallas loses and maybe then he will be finished. He is now receiving a lot of money for a not so big school district.
LikeLike
The problem as I see it is that our elected leaders continue to defy the will of the people that they have been elected to represent. This is happening throughout the country. People are elected, and then do as they wish or follow an agenda totally irrelevant to the wishes of the people. We need to start standing up to this in all levels of government.
LikeLike
These two judges ought to be moved into your list of Heroes! Wow!
LikeLike
Yes, I would certainly second that. Carmen Lopez has been a steady and brilliant force for justice and education in Bridgeport. Judge Bellis looked for evidence and wrote about the lack of it. It is amazing at how much Vallas has been “trumpeted” as a success in Bridgeport with no evidence presented. This move can no longer be made so easily. The two judges (and many others, including the four “independent” members of the BOE) deserve much credit, respect, and GRATITUDE.
LikeLike