Belleville, New Jersey, is the scene of a major battle between a heavy-handed supervisor and the district’s teachers. Although the district has a financial deficit, and many classes lack up-to-date technology and textbooks, the administration spent $2 million to install a state-of-the-art surveillance system for students and teachers.
“Perhaps the worst decision the district made over the last few years was to install a state-of-the-art surveillance system in all of its buildings; yes, a “surveillance” system, not a security system. Every classroom in every building is wired for both video and sound — including the teachers lounges! That’s right, my fellow teachers: in Belleville, a camera and microphone monitor every word uttered in the teachers break room! But that’s not all: all Belleville faculty, high school students, and middle school students must have special ID cards with them at all times. These ID’s include “RF-tags,” which are radio frequency devices similar to what you’d find in an EZ-Pass. They were originally used to track cattle: now, they track the positions of all staff and all students at all times. That’s right, my fellow teachers and parents: in Belleville, the movements of students and faculty are tracked at all times! Big Brother better not find out if you snuck off to the bathroom before the bell…”
Teachers were angry about the new surveillance system. Their union leader spoke up. “Mike Mignone, as president of the union, started speaking out. A 13-year veteran math teacher with a spotless record, beloved by his students and fellow teachers, Mignone wasn’t going to just sit by and watch his members continue to be harassed and intimidated. He demanded that the board and the superintendent explain themselves: where did they get the funds for the surveillance system? Why was the time between the advertisement of the bid and the final decision less than two weeks? Why did the entire bidding process stink of nepotism?”
Mignone learned about the surveillance system in October. He spoke out in November. Tenure charges were filed against him in December. He was accused of answering students’ questions about the surveillance system. That was his fireable offense.
Jersey Jazzman writes: “Golly, I wonder how the board knew Mignone had talked to his students about whether someone was listening in on their classroom conversations….If New Jersey didn’t have tenure laws, Mike Mignone would have been fired on the spot — all for the sin of daring to stand up for the taxpayers and teachers of his town. Mignone’s case is the perfect illustration of how tenure not only protects teachers, but also taxpayers.”
Jersey Jazzman was impressed by the turnout at the rally for Mignone: a thousand teachers, firefighters, parents, and students: “Tonight was amazing. Not only was the Belleville community out in full force: there were teachers in their local union shirts from Mahwah, Glen Rock, South Brunswick, Summit, Ramsey, Bergenfield, Mercer County Vo-Tech… everywhere around the state. It was an amazing show of support for one man who has been grievously wronged by trying to do right. This is how we fight back. This is how we make them pay for striking at us. This is how we win. When they go after one of our own, we all have to get together and say: “Enough.” When a good man and a good teacher pays a price for speaking out, we must all demand that justice be done. We simply can’t afford to stand by idly anymore and let others fight for us. We must have each others backs — all of us.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
So isn’t school choice a good thing to allow parents to escape Belleville which Mr. Jazzman describes as…
“…very poorly managed. The district’s budget is so bad that the state appointed a fiscal monitor this year to try to restore some financial sanity. Teachers and parents both told me that the schools lack contemporary textbooks, modern computers, and even the infrastructure necessary to administer the Common Core-aligned PARCC tests mandated by the state for next year.”
Sounds like instead of being the center of the community, this public school district is ruining it. Not every parent has the resources to move to escape a horrible academic environment like this and parents with school age children don’t have years to await possible changes in the school board or school administrators.
So, the answer is to let in realistically unregulated, unaccountable “school choice” charter schools? Because they have such a better record?
What is your answer? Let the families suffer with no choice? Teachers can easily flee a horrible district by changing jobs. Families cannot.
Cynthia, They are tricking parents with the “school choice” option. Charter schools executives pocket the money that the public schools would use for your children. Your children will get a far better education in the public schools than these crooked charter schools. These charter schools are for profit, and nepotism is in full force – fully employing entire families to make a profit on the taxes you pay. One of the biggest charter schools in Ohio is closing due to nepotism and extremely low test scores.
All of this money which is being channeled to these poorly run charter schools need to be put into an account for our middle class college students who are having trouble getting financial aid and student loans for college. My neighbor boy, who is the son of educated parents (both have master’s degrees in Education) has no money for his sophomore year of college. His parents tell me that they do not know what they are going to do. They suffered a financial setback due to health, and they have been rejected for the Parent Plus loan which covers the huge financial gap of each year of college. Even with his scholarships and a full time summer job (and a part time job throughout the year), this promising young man, who graduated with a 3.8 from high school has no way to continue his college education. He cannot get away from his parents’ financial information until he is 24 years old.
Good money is being wasted on these losing charter schools. We need to use this money for our public schools and help those middle class kids who cannot get any money for college. The poor and rich kids are taken care of. The soaring college costs are taking a college education away from the middle class students. It is a crisis that no one is talking about. Our middle class is dying. There are college educations being denied to very smart middle class kids as we speak.
Sad Teacher,
You seem to put no faith into letting parents decide what school is best for their children whether it is charter, private, magnet, open enrollment or homeschooling. That truly is sad.
No, Cynthia, the problem is spending public money on such alternatives, especially privately managed ones. Parents are free to use their own money on such alternatives.
No, dear, the solution is to properly fund the public schools. Not further undermine them by sending all their funding to unregulated, undemocratic charter schools.
Charters are not the only school choice. What about open enrollment? Would you support that?
As far as funding I do not see where anyone is claiming that Belleville is underfunded. Aren’t New Jersey schools some of the best funded in the US?
Belleville is underfunded because they spent all that money on BIG BROTHER surveillance rather than new computers, new books and new supplies. Not to mention the yearly maintenance costs of that surveillance system.
The Board overspent their $62 million budget by nearly $5 million, and it wasn’t because they were underfunded.
$2 million went to a surveillance system nobody asked for or wanted, that was pushed through from bid (proprietary bid, no less) to acceptance in less than 2 weeks.
Then a further $1.2 went to the same company for “technology services”, in a district whose technology infrastructure is in The Stone Age. Some computers (out of the ones still working), are literally 20 years old, and running on Windows 95 or 2000.
Then the big finale is the 153 additional hires they made in just the last 18 months.
That was the Belleville Board of Education’s new “Friends and Family” career placement program they created in the district.
I have published extensive coverage in the last 3 months on what’s been happening in Belleville (over 100 pages and counting). And regardless of if you are looking at the school district, or municipal politics, they are all closely linked to a small roster of individuals.
http://nutleywatch.com/
Greed and nepotism nearly destroyed this town, until ordinary townspeople stood up to it.
The power of the internet at work.
Regards,
Griff
Having a voice is the first step in fixing the problems–yet this district is trying to squelch that voice among its employees. They are meeting opposition in the advocates for the public’s rights–this opposition is a very powerful tool.
Now instead of laying down and letting the public school die, why wouldn’t a community rally around its public institution? You seem to think that “a choice to abandon the public institution” is the only choice. Don’t be duped into thinking that privately managed schools are giving the community any voice. Stand beside your public institution and say no to the kinds of places where adequate funding is only available to a handful of people.
How many rallys should parents attend and how long should a parent wait to ensure that their children are receiving a quality education from their local district? As someone else mentioned school board members and district administrators have the best tenure plan around.
Cynthia, that’s your first take away from this appalling story? Teachers at charter schools have no tenure protection and probably no union, so they can be fired for any trumped up reason.
Who said charters? Open enrollment is school choice.
Any form of school choice, including open enrollment, only sounds the death knell for Belleville and the families stuck there. Open enrollment only benefits those who have the means to get their child to a school further from home and the sophistication to do so – usually the most affluent and functional. So the least affluent and least functional would be stuck in Belleville with even less voice to do anything about it.
The solution when a public school is not being run properly for whatever reason is not to abandon it but to fight to save it.
Dienne,
Your child only gets one shot at kindergarten, one shot at first grade, one shot at second grade…
No choices are worse than the ones initiated by privatization power houses and TFA folks appointed by governor Chris Christie.
The reality is that unless any student is entirely free to attend any school he or she chooses, school choice (at least as a mechanism for improving schools) is an illusion. Any outside barriers to choice (exclusive enrollment, tuition cost, class size limits, transportation, etc.) insulate schools against market pressures by stratifying ‘competition’. As long as these barriers exist, suggesting that there is true market competition between schools is like suggesting there is market competition between a Ferrari Spider and a Ford Fiesta because they are both cars. Most people who are seriously considering purchasing a Ferrari (and realistically capable of doing so) would not even consider buying a Fiesta. Likewise, most people seriously considering buying a Fiesta, simply don’t have the option of buying a Ferrari. That’s not to imply that a Fiesta is a bad car… Simply that it is designed for economy while the Ferrari is designed for lavish luxury. Obviously this analogy is more closely related to ‘competition’ between the elite private schools and public schools than it is between public and charter schools, for example, but the principle is still the same. Any time there is exclusivity in any form (in this case meaning any factors outside the student’s own control that prevent him or her from attending a particular school), school ‘choice’ is simply another version (albeit much less overt) of school segregation. (This is a very rough overview of this point that clearly does not fully explore the issue, but doing so would require a book. I’m hoping it is sufficient to make the point though.)
Wait. So the answer to reformsters coming in and making everything worse is to go with the reformsters’ school choice initiatives? It’s not to clear out the reformsters and clean up the corruption? Just let that stay in place and choice yourself on over to another school? Interesting.
Cynthia, as I said, I have barely begun to tell the story of Belleville. But here’s part of it: the school board, following a change in NJ law to move what are supposedly non-partisan elections to November from April, is now closely aligned with the Essex County Democratic machine. This machine, incidentally, has made a trace with Chris Christie; the Essex Democratic chair Joe DiVincenzo, endorsed Christie in the last election.
Because money and machine politics have corrupted democratically held elections in places like Essex County, it is increasingly difficult to get elected even to a school board without being a part of the ruling machine.
The solution to Belleville’s problems is free, fair, transparent elections. Choice has nothing to do with it.
By the way, if you think charters are immune from political machinations, Google “Robert Treat Academy” and “Steve Adubato.”
Mr. Jazzman,
Excellent job reporting on this. Looking forward to your follow-up.
So what you are saying is that parents whose live in this district and teachers have no possible chance to affect change in Belleville.
Wouldn’t choice (charters, open enrollment, empowerment scholarships [gasp], etc) give Belleville families a fighting chance to get a quality education and give teachers another choice for employment in a supportive environment? Couldn’t choice force the Belleville to address the competition and possibly affect change for the better?
Finally, I made no claim about charters and immunity from politics above.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Cynthia, yes, for sure, this article shows some problems with the public schools in Belleville, NJ. Let’s imagine that instead, Belleville students were scattered among charter schools supported by the same public funds– each with its own parent group, none of whom have access to the finances of their individual schools, let alone the details regarding monitoring of teachers & students, teacher qualifications or their firings.
How would you even know you were being ripped off?
The district is poorly managed, so the answer to that problem is: take away teacher tenure? Non sequitur.
How creepy! These teachers were being forced into being the “Stepford Teachers.” Honestly, nothing surprises me anymore. Everything is following Scripture. Jesus said we would feel end times. I feel end times. End times are all around us.
You don’t need tenure until you need it. I think everyone would agree with that. I needed my continuing contract during my 28th year of teaching. I never needed it until then. But, I knew my due process was there if I ever needed it. Everyone needs to realize that beloved principals move on, and you never know when you are left with a vindictive, uncaring principal who does not know you – and does not want to get to know you. It saddens me to hear some teachers say that they don’t need tenure/continuing contracts because they are always good teachers. Being a good teacher has nothing to do with it. OUTSTANDING TEACHERS BECOME INCOMPETENT TEACHERS OVERNIGHT DUE TO AGE DISCRIMINATION. OUTSTANDING TEACHERS BECOME TOO EXPENSIVE TO KEEP.
Without tenure/continuing contracts, I honestly do not see how older teachers will reach retirement. They will be “canned” at about their 23rd year of teaching or even earlier. How many professions do you know of that do not allow their older people reach retirement age? My family doctor has solid white hair!
In addition, teachers have no mobility with their careers. When the crooked administration begins to “can” the older teachers, we have nowhere to go. We cannot get work anywhere. A teacher who is “let go” even after their 7th year of teaching has nowhere to go. That teacher cannot get another job 10 minutes away across the county. That teacher’s career is over. Stick a fork in it. They have to continue to pay payments on a student loan on a totally dead career. So, when the rich billionaires want to take away our continuing contracts on a low paying career – there is no reason to go into the teaching profession. We will have no way to feed, clothe, or shelter our children. Our careers and livelihoods can be taken away in a split second for no reason.
“You don’t need tenure until you need it.”
Succinct and true. And unfortunately, that’s used to divide and conquer. Tell all the fresh-faced, bright-eyed new “elite” teachers how wonderful they are, especially compared to those old entrenched LIFO-lifers and how only those bad old LIFO-lifers need tenure because they’re just not up to snuff, and pretty soon you have all those dewey-eyed newbies giving up the very rights they don’t know they’ll need in a few years all for 30 pieces of silver, er, I mean, a few thousand extra bucks.
Agree.
Can’t tell you how many young teachers begin with, ” well, I will never need a lawyer ( or dismissal protections, or whatever), because I am a good teacher.”
Usually only takes a year or two until they see some other ” good teacher” being tossed under the bus by the administration and the tune changes.
“How many professions do you know of that do not allow their older people reach retirement age?”
The legal profession.
” A teacher who is “let go” even after their 7th year of teaching has nowhere to go. That teacher cannot get another job 10 minutes away across the county. That teacher’s career is over. Stick a fork in it.”
Why can’t a teacher in this situation get a job elsewhere, assuming that they weren’t “let go” for gross incompetence or harming students?
“How many professions do you know of that do not allow their older people reach retirement age? My family doctor has solid white hair!”
The severe shortage of primary care doctors means that yes, you’ll find the occasional brave, thick-skinned soul who’ll practice well into his seventies. With respect to virtually every other private sector profession, I can only respond to your question with: “are you freaking kidding me? / “did you just come out of a 25-year-long coma?” (tie)
“How many professions do you know of that do not allow their older people reach retirement age?”
Well, nearly all of them, nowdays. I’m all for tenure, but let’s not be unrealistic. Most private sector employees are at will employees. They can and will be let go at any time and for any reason or for no reason. This includes such reasons as the ability to do the job with cheaper, younger employees, which happens all the time. See technology companies for a great illustration of this. Tenure has needed reform for some time and if we teachers don’t play an active role in that reform, it will be done (or done away with) by those on the outside.
Wait a minute. Because we have given teachers the right to due process (which I think is the right of all public employees) we should go backwards and take it away because the all hallowed private sector has been systematically eviscerating employee rights? Misery loves company, huh? I won’t go into the whole list of reasons not to go this route. This post points out several considerations. As a teacher who never had tenure and was “aged out” of consideration for a job (Try to prove age discrimination! What a joke!) I am acutely aware of what older workers face and would never consider taking due process away from those who have it.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Tenure reform already happened in NJ (the location of this post) in 2012; probationary period extended from 3 to 4 yrs, pprwk/process for firing tenured teachers shortened & streamlined (by virtue of VAM – 2 yrs deemed ‘inefficient’ by virtue of student test scores on state tests means you’re fired– altho state is looking to delay that aspect for 2 yrs…)
The point is, the state wants to fire this guy for whistle-blowing 2mm taxes wasted on Kafkaesque surveillance tech.
If you didn’t have a union, where would you go to tell the taxpayers what’s up with that, while hoping to still stay employed?
On the ID card issue: Radio-frequency ID cards are common in the workplace. They serve a basic security function: mainly, opening locked doors for a closed set of authorized people. They also transmit data: specifically, whose ID card was used to unlock what door at what time.
RFID cards are a “surveillance” system in the same way that any security log is a surveillance system, assuming that RFID cards are used solely to unlock doors, or to pass through entrance/exit checkpoints. Is there any indication that RFID cards were being used at this school for any other purpose? I didn’t see any such indication in the source link.
Do you imagine that the student cards serve to unlock doors?
Yes, at a minimum. But I don’t know — like I said, I didn’t see anything in the source link that indicates what the specific technology is or what it’s actually being used for.
Wow.
I cannot imagine middle schoolers with “keys to the building”, heck, my high schoolers either.
Lost cards, stolen cards, loaned cards, damaged cards, numerous prank opportunities …
Seems like expense and problems looking for a place to happen.
Boggles the mind of this teacher.
This is what you get with the “safety at any cost” mentality that spreads after terrible events like 9/11 or Sandy Hook. And as the financial cost of this technology continues to drop, it’ll get more and more pervasive. I fully expect that sometime in my lifetime, barring economic catastrophe, there will be a camera in every room, on every body, and even *within* many bodies, all connected through networks.
Whether the cards are used to open the bathroom or the classroom and supposedly monitor where people go, the money spent on this supposed update could be better spent (future upkeep and ongoing expenditures for this technology will only add more to the price tag for a district that is financially on the rocks); the reek of nepotism and other ethical issues are all over this mess; and the board’s retaliation tactics and financial irregularities are strong indications of poor district management (this is why the state has recently appointed a financial advisor and has started an investigation into this).
But this situation is the norm in New Jersey, right?
The following link adds new meaning to a safe place to do one’s business: http://nutleywatch.com/758/rfid-system-locks-teacher-in-bathroom/
“I fully expect that sometime in my lifetime, barring economic catastrophe, there will be a camera in every room, on every body, and even *within* many bodies, all connected through networks.”
Yikes.
At what point do you think we will realize that none of this really makes us safer?
(See under “security theater” at the airport)
However, I suppose it will greatly enrich the consultants and tech companies pimping this mess.
We all had ID cards at the high school where I last worked, students and staff. Teachers’ cards allowed them access to the building, not students. Student IDs were scanned upon entrance and were used for library checkouts and lunch accounts. They could be used by Security to check where a student without a pass was supposed to be. I suppose they could have listened to any classroom they wanted since we did have open mic intercoms. We used them for emergencies, but that doesn’t mean someone couldn’t listen in if they chose to. It never dawned on me that they might, and I don’t think it had dawned on them. We had cameras in all the halls, not in the classrooms. The security system really did help to reduce gang activity and fights became infrequent over time. My first year, fights were a daily occurrence and often became widespread brawls. While it is unfortunate that such measures have to be taken, they were not as a rule abused. The students understood the school was safer. They no longer had to worry so much about the gang banger who brought a gun to school.
If someone wants to do something wrong, they will figure out how to do something wrong. They will use the system to beat the system.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx obviously ID cards are not the only method being employed: “in Belleville, a camera and microphone monitor every word uttered in the teachers break room!”
Is it an elected school committee or school board? Or is the Mayor involved? Or other elected officials? Or does the School Superintendent have a different kind of “tenure,” sitting on a platform with a crown?
Demonstrations are very good to “demonstrate” to those with “authority” to make a change, but you’ve got to get your ducks in order. Noise with no audience is silence, and where are the videos? where is the YouTube evidence? where are the kids’ support? where is the local college who trains most of the teachers? Schools are part of a larger system, and to make substantial change, that system has to be responsive. Has anyone drawn in the ACLU to investigate a crooked contract for the surveillance system? A local law school? Local techies? Parents?
There are many videos of Mike Mignone facing the school board at different times: Video of Mike Mignone confronting the school board in May. I can only wish to have half the courage of this man:
The ACLU was very much engaged, in every aspect of Clarity.
They told us for weeks on end that they were “working on it”. They made their own OPRA requests based on information we shared with them. They lead us to believe they were gearing up for a major entrance into the fight, they just needed time to finish up their due diligence.
Then, they completely went dark. We haven’t heard a peep from the ACLU in nearly two months. No explanation, nothing. Meanwhile, the Clarity system and the manner in which it is being utilized, could be one of the biggest “Big Brother” stories in recent memory.
It’s certainly a more important fight than the vast majority of what I see on their Twitter feed. On top of everything, this directly harms the education of the children of Belleville.
Here are some of the articles I have published about the surveillance system in the Belleville school district. Several more are on their way in the next week or two.
http://nutleywatch.com/tag/clarity-surveillance-system/
We will relentlessly pursue justice for what’s been happening to the educators and the residents of Belleville.
One way, or another.
Regards,
Griff
Oklahoma City’s Broadie started down that path before he was dumped. He told me he wanted to monitor instruction in every class by video from his desk.
There are plenty of us who are still in the classroom thanks to tenure. Unfortunately, administrators are able to employ other methods to try to rid themselves of quality teachers who dare to speak out. The tried and true “involuntary transfer” comes to mind…
Was the principal’s office bugged? Nurse’s office, social worker’s, school psychologist’s? What’s next, public school lavatories having TV/audio monitoring?
Cynthia Weiss said: “Teachers can easily flee a horrible district by changing jobs. Families cannot.” Not really, jobs are hard to find. Maybe the younger teachers with only 2 to 4 years of experience can pick up stakes and leave as well as the older teachers close to retirement. But most teachers who have already invested 5 to 10 years and well beyond (11 to 40 years) cannot leave a school district because they probably have many more financial obligations and their chances of finding a new teaching job are nearly impossible because they are priced out of the market. School districts would rather hire a newbie who is much cheaper than hiring a teacher with 5 or 6 years of experience who would be more expensive since those additional years of experience must legally be honored.
Joe,
Do the teacher contracts in New Jersey make it difficult and\or costly for teachers to switch districts?
A quick search shows 500+ jobs for licensed teachers in NJ at just one web site.
http://k12jobspot.com/Licensed-Teaching-jobs-in-New-Jersey
And of course we are all interchangeable. If NJ does it anywhere near the way Illinois does, the candidate is shuffled to an online application where candidates can and are eliminated just by looking at the years of experience. If you get past the computer winnowing, administrators have another set of tools to knock down the pool of candidates. This is not a complaint exactly. I imagine it is quite similar in other “industries.” It is just to point out that after a relatively short while, experience becomes a liability. If that’s what you want, see what it gets you. Anybody who goes into teaching now has to have a Messiah complex. Then they can look on the abuse as God’s will.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx You are simply not being realistic. What is your profession? Are you that interchangeable? What if I were to say to you, you’ll be laid off tomorrow; no doubt you can shortly find another job [without selling your house & moving & your kids going to a different school]– how is that different from your insistence that ‘families cannot’ flee a horrible district by changing jobs?
“Tenure charges were filed against him in December. He was accused of answering students’ questions about the surveillance system. That was his fireable offense.”
This is outrageous if true.
I can only report what Mignone himself told me, FLERP! I hope to be getting a response from the district soon.
Do with this statement what you will, but: I’m self-trained to assume that any unsourced statement of substance, whether in a blog or print newspaper, cannot be relied on unless it’s a first-person, eyewitness account. But it was not clear to me that your post was based solely on what Mignone had told you. I don’t have any reason to doubt what he says, but why wouldn’t you use the classic “according to Mr. Mignone” to qualify what you wrote?
“At what point do you think we will realize that none of this really makes us safer?”
Some of it does make us safer, but that doesn’t mean it’s worth it. I think people are already very ambivalent about the surveillance implications of technology. In 30 years, the idea that we are being monitored at every moment will probably be conventional wisdom. At the same time, I think that ordinary people will be the ones driving the movement toward total surveillance, as the technology becomes cheap and ubiquitous and is eagerly adopted by consumers seeking greater and greater levels of self-surveillance. This is how the nodes of the surveillance network are deployed so quickly and deeply.
We know what this process looks like because it’s happening right now. The computers will keep getting smaller, more powerful, and more connected. We’ll carry them in our pockets, install them in our homes (appliances, light bulbs, etc.), strap them on our wrists, wear them in our clothing, implant them in our bodies. We’ll feel uneasy about it but we’ll do it all willingly.
“Some of it does make us safer,”
Perhaps.
But only some.
Some of the surveillance does make us somewhat safer in some situations.
But some are getting very wealthy playing up (stoking up) our fears, while slashing the budgets and refusing regulations of things which would actually make us safer.
Accessible, affordable public mental health care for example may cut down on some shooting sprees. Especially when coupled with reasonable gun laws, many of us might actually be safer at school.
Oh, never mind.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx my previous comment was for flerp. I totally agree that an aggressive approach to mental healthcare (i.e. mandated & well-funded talk therapy, w/meds only where psychiatrists & psychologists are working together!) plus– oh please!– major gun-control laws– could make a huge difference in QOL for Americans.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx I totally agree. Watch BBC suspense shows? 20 yrs ago they were showing us how easy it is to catch felons with street-camera surveillance on every block. Today they’re trying to convince us that anarchists can be outsmarted as long as we’ve got cameras on every street-front store, all matrixed into the gov’s surveillance system! Let’s hope US can show Europe that right to privacy has some stats weight against big brother.
So will lawyers’ offices be bugged? Aren’t lawyer/client proceedings (in the lawyer’s office) privileged and private or supposed to be private? Oh right, we’ll all do this willingly.
As a taxpayer, I would want the superintendent’s office bugged, and I would want to have the right to hear every word he says, in every room. If a teacher can be monitored like that, a student like that, than it should be totally reasonable that all administration, up to the sups, should be monitored.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx well, yeah, if… better none of them should be auio-monitored [nuggrf].
sadly, on the flip side, once or twice I have wished for cameras in my classroom. Fights during class time would be probably minimized and I would have a record of how I handle myself, if there was ever any question to the contrary.:(
TOTT,
There are cameras in your classroom. They are called cell phones.
The problem is, this Board doesn’t ever use the security system to come to the defense of the teachers, or in any way for their benefit.
The Board has created an environment of fear and retaliation, and uses the surveillance system to keep the educators in line, or at the very least, quiet about what’s going on.
Despite pleas from the teachers to work together, there simply is no collaboration.
It’s their tool to use against you, and not something you can leverage for your own protection.
While i disagree with the premise (that teachers need a union), the goings on in the school district are absurd. The gross mismanagement indicates that the system will collapse in time. Residents will vote with their feet or wallets: the piper will be paid.. The issue of why the citizens of this town don’t get their arms around the stupidity of the school system is the real question in my mind.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx maybe they will, given teachers’ unions, & Jersey Jazzman, this blog, & one can only hope, the Star-Ledger. If the newspaper media insists on remaining deaf/dumb/blind, it’s going to be up to us online folks…
We’ve been at this relentless for 3 months straight, waging an information crusade on our blog, and all over social media.
Before that, you were hard pressed to find even a mention of this anywhere, much less in depth coverage. The Star Ledger, much like other local news, only got interested when we finally convinced the State to come and kick in the door.
The tide has turned now, and we’re all talking about it because of a handful of dedicated residents using the internet to get the truth out.
We certainly welcome Jersey Jazzman to the fight!
Griff
http://nutleywatch.com/
After reading this post by the Jazzman, I must ask. Is Mark Weber a member of your honor roll Ms. Ravitch?
New Jersey owes the nation an apology for Our Governor, our former and current Education Commissoners (Chris Cerf & David Hespe) and for Princeton alum Wendy Kopp. But we have also given the educational world Bruce Baker and Mark Weber!
Please consider putting the Jazzman from Jersey on your honor roll. Our fine state can use some reimaging after five years with Governor Snooki Saprono!
Galton, you are right.
It happens, not as often as it used to, but it does happen. 🙂
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx & let’s not forget an apology for that embarrassing co-conspirator, Cami Anderson.