Rafe Esquith is one of the nation’s most celebrated teachers. He teaches fifth grade in Los Angeles. Each year, his class produces a complete play by Shakespeare. They are known as the Hobart Shakespeareans.
Esquith was suspended for making a joke. Here is the story. Unbelievable.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Diane…maybe you could ask Steve Zimmer why this happened. Even the LA Times has written about this remarkable teacher. But the BoE, as always, does their dirty deeds in complete secrecy.
You are right, Ellen, there is plenty of blame to go around–including the Los Angeles Times. Just look at this old article about a teacher who has been cleared of the ridiculous charges against him. He was pulled from his classroom, investigated for financial shenanigans having to do with tshirt sales, and cleared after weeks and weeks of public outcry. http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-teacher-union-jail-20141217-story.html The reason I am posting it here is to show what an agenda there is to demonize teachers in Los Angeles. If you click on the link, and look in the upper right corner of your screen, you’ll see the tags that the LATimes has attached to this article (for search engine purposes): “Sexual Misconduct” and “Mark Berndt” among them. Those things have nothing whatsoever to do with this article. Yet, they’re trying to keep the storyline going of teachers as predators.
That is what Teacher Jail is all about. It relies on secrecy, shame and fear. It needs to end–NOW.
Thanks Karen…apropos of nothing, the LA Times chose to conflate this story and make it seem that this stellar teacher equates with one who was a molester. Shame on you, Howard Blume.
UTLA’s Media Relations just posted a video about Rafe, in support of him:
In the video, UTLA President Alex Caputo-Pearl talks about how, in their handling of the affair, violated the new contract language dealing with teachers accused of misconduct.
UTLA is backing Rafe, but it’s up to him to enlist UTLA or not.
It includes a crowd of Rafe’s supporters at yesterday’s school board meeting, and one of Rafe’s students addressing the board.
Again, Rafe’s union, United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) is not standing idly by in all this.
Here’s a statement UTLA released:
http://utla.net/node/5724
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“UTLA Supports Due Process for Teacher Rafe Esquith
“LAUSD’s decision to place Hobart Boulevard Elementary School teacher Rafe Esquith on administrative leave has generated media attention in Los Angeles and across the country. UTLA has reached out to Esquith, as we do with any educator and UTLA member who finds him or herself in this type of situation, but he has retained outside counsel and we respect his decision to do so. UTLA stands ready to support Esquith’s due process rights. All educators are entitled to due process—which includes being informed in a timely manner by the District of any allegations that are being investigated.
“UTLA has organized around the issue of the ‘teacher jail’ system that ballooned under former Superintendent John Deasy. We negotiated important changes and they appear in our new collective bargaining agreement with LAUSD. We expect the agreement to be followed.
“Any educator who is temporarily reassigned pending investigation must be notified in writing within three work days of the reason for the reassignment. Administrative investigations are to be completed as quickly as possible—with a goal of ninety work days. The employee is to be notified of the outcome of the investigation within fifteen days of its completion.”
All rigging and facade. Deform is unfair and unreal.
Clearly someone desperately wants this man out of the classroom, and has resorted to extreme, measures to do so.
I don’t think anyone has a clue why this all happened. However, we have certainly read reports from the media when a teacher is charged with crimes against children. However, nothing like this has been mentioned. We need to remind everyone about the science teacher who was removed last year because of a project that was misinterpreted as being a “concern”. There was tremendous push back by the students and parents, and he was eventually reinstated. Maybe a lawsuit is the only way to uncover the many cases of similar false accusations made against teachers, mostly close to retirement, and the horrific way they are treated while waiting months and sometimes years before their cases are finalized. In the meantime, many quit or retire early to just get the whole mess over with. Is LAUSD hoping that Esquith will just quit too?
And add to this the world famous Crenshaw HS music teacher who two years ago was put in teacher jail because she took some of her choir students to Europe to perform, at their own expense, during summer break. Her choir had sung at the White House. This BoE, and others in the past, can be drunk with power, and make such bad choices…like voting for $1 Billion iPads and unformulated Pearson curriculum. Their Prez, Vladovic, should make public why this male award winning teacher has been vilified. Now it is the music, the science, and the literature teachers who have been subjected to this disgrace…the first two were reinstated after they were defamed.
As I asked before, perhaps Diane will get to the truth of all of this by asking Steve Zimmer, who wants to be the next Board Prez, to explain.
Go Mark Geragos, lawyer for Esquith!
Sounds like there’s not enough informational text in his classroom…
That district officials questioned students runs against the district’s policy of mandating reporting. If there is suspected abuse, the police are supposed to do the questioning not district officials with an axe to grind.
He’s being targeted because the joke was at the expense of the district overlords. They’ve been upset that he’s asked for resources for his productions for years. They’ve refused. The pissing match has come to a head. And this will make sure he never asks for resources again. Heaven help us if creative teachers in schools without massive PTO budgets were to actually get their requests funded by their overlords. Just think of all the other teachers that would want monies if we gave this guy what he asked for.
From the article:
“Meiselas said district officials pulled some of Esquith’s students out of class and questioned them intensely about what Esquith had said and anything he might have done to them, without first seeking the permission of their parents.”
At my school we had a “new” principal (best buddy of the new supe who was hired two years ago) this year that used the same tactic. Taking students out of class and literally drilling them about what teachers had said, calling the students liars (at least that is how the students involved perceived it) if the students didn’t say what the admin wanted to hear and doing other coercive actions that the students found highly threatening.
The admin wasted my students’ time, even though I retired at the end of the year by pulling some of my students out of other classes asking them if I had mad disparaging remarks about the school. Needless to say some of the students let me know about what went on. And nothing came about from the “investigations” but the atmosphere, the undercurrent (which said principal didn’t know what that meant when I told him about it) of the school right now is atrocious. About 30 of 65 or so teachers left after this year!
I’ve tried to explain to administrators over the years just how intimidating it is to the students just to be called down to an admin’s office. For the admin, it’s his/her working environment, usually dressed up in some semblance of down-homedness (if you know what I mean) by the admin. The students, though, usually only “see” or better said “feel” the atmosphere as one of intimidation even though for the admins it is their “home” base. What goes on in the school everyday is what ends up determining that atmosphere and unfortunately in my now former school it is one of fear and intimidation-and I have told the principal that trying to counsel him out of using such tactics. But there is no doubt in my mind that he is just the extension of the supe and is implementing what the supe says to do.
Rafe Esquith is only the latest.
What he represents to his kids and his style of brave, engaging, invigorating teaching is the endgame of Education Reform’s corporatization of the classroom.
The leadership of LAUSD has failed the community in so many ways over the last four years.
It failed its students.
It failed its teachers.
It failed the taxpayers.
It failed thoughtfulness.
It failed decency.
It failed common sense.
It failed sound pedagogy.
There is more than enough blame to go around and its shocking the complicity of the most powerful economic and media institutions who have supported the wholesale destruction of public education in Los Angeles.
While they give a completely different sort of education that they advocate for the working class kids of color in LA.
There is no brave individuals in positions of power who embrace the cliche of “critical thinking” that lazily falls off their lips all the time. They do not truly understand the power and meaning behind those words and concept.
And so we get Rafe Esquith in teacher jail for months and months. General Counsel David Holmquist has an enormous trophy case full of the heads of hundreds of teachers his administration has zealously hunted in the name of the “safety of the children.”
In so many cases it is for the political livelihood of his career and LAUSD’s belief of what the role of a teacher should be.
His case, and hundreds of others, need to be made public so that the community can examine for themselves the black box of secrecy that LAUSD operates in.
Rafe Esquith IS the metaphor for how LA’s Education power structure sees what education should be…for other people’s kids.
Meanwhile, Apple and Pearson and Viagara are showered with ticker tape in the inner sanctums of Beaudry and given the red carpet through the classrooms of the city they ineptly supervise.
According to the story I read a fellow teacher dropped a dime on him to the Administration and later told him that they hoped his proceedings had a good outcome.
One of US did this! Teachers who are jealous and lack the ability to compete with, “Teacher Stars,” have done more harm to our cause and create an atmosphere where bullying of fellow faculty members can flourish. Of course, they never think it will happen to them because they are on the ‘good side’ of the Administrator.
This is an issue that merits lots of attention by teachers; how our own work against their own best interests.
I think that’s what happened to a beloved band teacher at my local high school. He was suddenly suspended and then fired within four weeks, just before Christmas. He had taught in the district for 22 years. I suspect that this derailed into a power trip by two other music teachers in the department. It’s devastated by band-loving son. Ruined his whole junior year, actually.
I wish teachers were all supportive of each other. I hope they are less guilty of stabbing co-workers in the back than some other competitive environments, but I’m not sure that’s true. Administrators can also blow minor incidents into major events if they so choose. Isn’t it interesting that when the reformsters get a teacher who can arguably be called one of the bestest, they find a way to bring him down? I would really recommend to Rafe that he start cultivating a life of his own independent from the classroom. He has done exactly what is expected of stellar teachers, taken vows pledging himself to teaching. If they strip him of his profession, what will be left?
Given the current school-to-prison pipeline, no one should be surprised that stellar teachers (who tend to be pesky study advocates), are also on this conveyer belt to incarceration of one form or another.
What kind of society considers its children and educators collateral damage in the pursuit of profit and power? Oh right, a fascist one. Or, at the least a morally bankrupt one…
“Fill your bowl to the brim
and it will spill.
Keep sharpening your knife
and it will blunt.
Chase after money and security
and your heart will never unclench…”
…The Tao
Good luck to this teacher and his attorney in their case. If hundreds of other teachers in teacher jail had the ability to hire a high profile lawyer to handle their cases, many valuable, veterans would still be in their classrooms. Don’t get it twisted, this case is not about this curriculum issue, its about getting rid of older teachers who speak out against the system for their students and colleagues, these people LAUSD do not want. It’s political witch hunting and its having a devastating effect on our classrooms and local schools. The chickens will come home to roost for LAUSD, let’s hope this BOE hasn’t destroyed the chicken coop by that time.
This is par for the course in education. Law suits and probable law suits run the show. It isn’t just L. A. It is one reason to stay away from kids anywhere. People always looking for a gotcha moment. Sanity does not rule. Young people go into the field naively. It is very difficult to censor everything you say or every moment to avoid upsetting some one’s “values.”
The fact that the superintendent of the school said there was “serious issues” and that “they go beyond the initial investigation” means they found something on him. Obviously, Esquith and his lawyer have no idea what that is. I don’t think they have the right to know what those issues are until the conclusion of the investigation, or maybe I am wrong. I assume if they are still investigating other allegations they don’t have to tell him yet.
If they do have something on him, lets say he does drugs or something like that, then if he is fired will all of you who criticized the school come out and apologize? I doubt it.
If Rafe Esquith has done something wrong, the facts should be known. He should be charged with something, the evidence should be made available to him, and he should learn who accused him. That’s called due process of law.
There will be and this is, due process of the law. He will be told what they know. No one, not even in a criminal law, do they tell the person being investigated EVERYTHING at the moment. During the trial or when they talk about the evidence (I forgot the technical term, discovery??) is when it comes out. From what I read, they are still investigating him.
Besides, this isn’t criminal law. Not sure what kind of law applies to work related investigations but I’m sure there are some differences.
Diane, if he is found at-fault for something serious and due process was done and fired/resigned, will you make an apology?
Cortines is a smart guy. If they had nothing on the teacher, they would have let him go. My gut is they got something BIG on him. Not sure if it is related criminally but definitely big that they don’t trust him back in the classroom AND they feel strong enough that if it got to the press, people wouldn’t support Esquith.
To whom should I apologize? I didn’t insult anyone. I pass no judgment until the facts are known. But it stinks to suspend a person from their job without telling them why. Rage gets attention because he is famous. How many others suffered the same treatment?
dianeravitch: InventYourOwnfFacts is merely helping us follow doctor’s orders—
“A day without laughter is a day wasted.”
¿What doctor? Charlie Chaplin, of course, PhD in Laughology with a specialization in putting bullies and frauds to ridicule.
This day, certainly, has not been wasted.
And a metric? Well, there is a 98% “satisfactory” [thank you, Bill Gates!] chance of certainty that this is all a sendup.
😏
Because if it’s not, I feel a whole lot of word salad and cognitive dissonance coming our way…
😎
Whomever this Knowthefacts person is, he/she is too cowardly to use a real name. And he/she is too ignorant to have read about all the other excellent teachers the Sups. of LAUSD past and present, defamed with no evidence. When these brave and faultless teachers are reinstated, the get NO apologies from the district. I always admire how Diane can restrain herself in light of such ignorance posted on her site.
No. Administrators can literally make up charges and get away with it. Administrative law is not real law and these hearings aren’t real courts.
You got it right, Susan. I observed the hearing of Pi Lian Tu, a superb tenured teacher who taught immigrant Chinese 4th graders to speak and write English…in on year….her way… and refused to use the absurd mandates for ‘balanced literacy and word walls…. I sat in the ‘chamber’ at lunch, and watched as the presiding hearing officer banned with the prosecution and the defense. I watched as ms Tu never got a chance to defend herself, even as parents and students lined up to refute the same allegations. I watched as the incredibly successful test scores were never introduced. I watched as a lying principal;s testimony was allowed to stand, and the nYSUT attorney for Tu never stood up an objected,or demanded that Tu be able to speak!
She lost everything. They are kangaroo courts, and my dear, THE UFT IN NYC ALLOWED THIS HAPPEN on Randi’s watch… and I have file full of evidence to support this in my own story. I also have Tu’s hearing transcript!!!!
Rafe has been pretty outspoken in his denunciations of Common Core, so that may have prompted someone in the administration to say, “He said WHAT??!! Nail him!!! We’ve got to make an example of him!”
Check out this quote:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/07/16/the-worlds-most-famous-teacher-blasts-school-reform/
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RAFE ESQUITH: “And to the veteran teachers who really understand what’s going on, every month it’s a new [school reform] flavor of the month. The Common Core [State Standards initiative] isn’t going to do anything. They are spending tens of millions of dollars but it isn’t going to do anything. In my classroom you still have to put a period at the end of a sentence…. I don’t need a new set of standards to make that clear to me.
“The obsession with testing. We always gave tests, but basically now it’s the entire day. Basically if it’s not on the test don’t teach it. Teachers spend hours and hours and hours trying to figure out what’s going to be on the test. They will teach that there are four chambers of the heart, but not why we have a heart or why it works…. The data you are looking at — I feel like the emperor has no clothes. Somebody has to say this stuff. I think teachers will feel better to see in print what they think all the time.”
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or from this Jay Mathews piece:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/class-struggle/post/why-top-teacher-ignores-latest-reform-directives/2013/07/14/42ce61a0-ec0d-11e2-a301-ea5a8116d211_blog.html?wprss=rss_class-struggle
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JAY MATHEWS: The system, “rather than encourage and support you, . . . actively works to discourage you,” (Esquith) writes. “Every few years a new ‘game changer’ is announced as the newest set of standards are introduced, but the system never really changes. Veteran teachers know that these standards are no different from the old ones. Taking a page from the politburo, leaders stand in the front of the room at professional development meetings making demands and predictions for their ‘New World Order.’ Good teachers don’t know whether to laugh, cry or quit.
“The most recent sermon on the mount has come to us in the form of Common Core Standards. I am not making this up: the presenter at our first training explained that our job as teachers was ‘to prepare the children to be a part of the international workforce.’ We were also told that the emphasis on imaginative literature was going to be scaled back because children need more nonfiction.”
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Stating this is sacrilege to the corporate reformers embedded in LAUSD’s “Beaudry (administration) Building”. The bad joke Esquith allegedly or admittedly told may have just been the phony pretext or excuse for getting at him.
I’ve seen many other teachers say worse, all in an innocent if botched attempt to be entertaining his/her students, with the administration responding—appropriately and in proportion, in my opinion—with a verbal caution, or at most a “Conference Memo” that never leaves the school site. This changed, however, in the Deasy era, when the flimsiest of allegations were responded to with the dreaded “Teacher Jail.” Some kids who got wind of this, sometimes just made stuff up… out of mischievous and/or vindictive motives. In some cases, the teacher or an ally of the teacher read what the students allegedly said in the write-up documents, then approached the student, who denied ever saying that. In other instances, the sole witness was the administrator himself or herself, with no other corroboration.
As it was originally conceived, “Teacher Jail” was reserved for the most serious of allegations—those that, if true, indicated that the teacher posed a threat to the students well-being. The teacher allegedly made some sort of physical contact, or said something so troubling or offensive that he needed to be removed, pending an investigation. That went right out the window when Deasy came in. The tiniest of non-physical incidents sent teachers—later proved innocent—to the teacher jails. Actions or comments that could never be construed as posing a threat were enough to get teachers sent to “Teacher Jail.” Often, teachers sat in “Teacher Jail” for months before ever finding out what the accusations were.
The goal was to get the teacher, usually a higher-paid veteran, to quit. Teachers sat all day in a cubicle, some going crazy or cracking from the stress. Some just quit. Again, this was working just as it was designed. Deasy even bragged about the numbers of teachers fired or removed each year. He bragged this raw statistic—not teachers who deserved to be fired/removed, mind you—but look how many I got rid of as the heroic protector and defender of children.
There seemed to be an age-ist component to this as well, as the older veterans higher on the seniority scale got sent to Teacher Jail, while the lower-paid newbies who said something equally or more inappropriate were given a tap on the wrist. One UTLA official said visiting teacher jail was “like going to an A.A.R.P. meeting, with everyone 50 and over.” Rafe is in this category.
The fact that Rafe’s kids were taken out of the class, and then subjected to an open-ended line of questions that had nothing to do with the bad joke is troubling. The recent Jay Mathews’ article on that states that Rafe told Mathews that, since his removal, he was getting questions from LAUSD about the financial details—funding, expenditures, etc.—of the out-of-town field trips Rafe takes with his students. This indicates that, after these grillings of kids did not produce what had been hoped for—i.e. “Mr. Esquith touched me wrong”—the administrators then went after the funding/spending of the out-of-town trips as possibly being Rafe’s Achilles’ Heel.
In either case—a bad joke, or field trip finances—this did not warrant removal of Rafe, as neither indicated that Rafe continuing teaching posed a threat to the students.
The music teacher at Crenshaw was in a similar situation. Her award-winning school choir and she had just returned from an overseas tour, which included a performance at the White House. The accusation was that she improperly filled out some paperwork, and did not include an itinerary that was sufficient in its detail. No student or parent voice any complaint. Some administrator with an agenda then went after her.
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Texas Education.
The superintendent , Corfines, retired from LAUSD because he was being accused of sexual harassment by an employee he had groomed and hired for a job. . I believe that money was paid out by the district on this. Then he was re hired for a year after Deasy was fired for corruption with the I pad mess. So here you have two basically serious charges swept under the rug and ignored versus this amazing trumped up charge to a teacher of obvious skill, talent and deep caring for his students. The hypocrisy is boggling. Some malicious teacher reports an innocent joke, a joke only, not a testament, not an observation of abuse or corruption ,not a parental complaint; Just a joke, and this goes to the principal who gives it to the superintendent and the witch hunt begins. God help us all, it’s like a trial with without a charge, so they have to dig and dig and make one up. Is that even allowed under the constitution? Thank God he’s got a tiger for a lawyer. And where is the union in all of this why aren’t they crying foul? It’s like the thugs are ruling the world and the good people are being brought to task for being good.
What has been written online is that LAUSD paid $250K in the first case to make it go away before Cortines’ retirement. This new case was filed with the courts about 8 weeks ago, and the filing can be found online. It is a public record. There is little that this charged teacher could have done to compare with the allegations in the filing against the interim Supt. And it seems, according to online accounts, that his defense will be paid for, once again, by the taxpayers who fund LAUSD.
Assuming this whole affair is due to
some impropriety in the field trip
paperwork and/or finances,
the comparison of Rafe’s situaiton to
that of the Crenshaw High music teacher
is apt, as this article from THE NATION
(BELOW) shows:
It was published in
April 2014, when Dr. Stevenson was
still languishing in teacher jail,
and written by one JoAnn Wypijewski.
It deals with former LAUSD Superintendent
John Deasy’s exploiting the “sex”
and “child molestation” angles as a
dishonest way to crush innocent veteran
teachers—the highest paid naturally—
and simultaneously destroy teacher
unions’ ability to protect innocent teachers
unjustly accused of something.
http://www.thenation.com/article/179605/where-shame-policy-inside-las-teacher-jail
Here’s the opening paragraphs: (check out the parallels to Rafe’s case)
————————————————————————-
JoAnn Wypijewski of THE NATION:
“Iris Stevenson hurt no child, seduced no teenager, abused no student at Crenshaw High School in Los Angeles. This is what her supporters say in rallying outrage that this exemplary teacher has languished for months in the gulag of administrative detention known as ‘teacher jail’: she doesn’t belong there.
“And she doesn’t.
“Days before being removed from her music classes in December and ordered to spend her workdays isolated on a floor of the LA Unified School District (LAUSD)HQ with other suspect teachers, Stevenson, a legend in South LA and beyond, was at the White House directing the renowned Crenshaw Elite Choir as it sang for President Obama.
“She has not been officially informed of the charges against her. Unofficially, Stevenson is said to have swept off the choir to perform first in Paris and then in Washington without permission—an absurd claim, since parents had to consent, and Stevenson has conducted such foundation-supported field trips untroubled for decades. District authorities say only that Stevenson is under investigation.
“If she were a de facto kidnapper, police should have been called long ago. But, no, this is not about criminality or even misconduct; it is about a larger game of control being played by School Superintendent John Deasy. That game owes quite a lot to sex, because a few years ago a scandal tripped the panic button, which Deasy has kept his finger on ever since, exploiting justified public anger over a classroom pervert to pursue a war on teachers.
“The political question, then, is not just whether Stevenson belongs in teacher jail but what this institutionalized containment regimen, this sub-bureaucracy of punishment, exists for in the first place, and how the specter of sex is the cowing excuse to go after anyone.”
———————————–
And it goes on from there… Read the whole thing at:
http://www.thenation.com/article/179605/where-shame-policy-inside-las-teacher-jail
Check out this video of Deasy addressing the Teacher Jail situation during the Iris Stevenson affair:
Also, Deasy makes the bizarre claim that 80-90% of the accusations against teachers deal with accusations of “(drug) trafficking and molestation… prostitution.”
Again… a total fiction.
Go watch the video from 00:07 on…
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00:07 – 00:55
DEASY: “I would say… overwhelmingly… like 80% or so, or 90%, an outside agency notifies us of the issue… Either the LAPD, the FBI, or the (L.A. County) Sheriffs… they bring to our attention an issue that has occurred, and unfortunately, those issues are very serious.
“This person is accused of (drug) trafficking or the intent.
“This person is accused of molestation.
“This person has is of trafficking drugs, prostitution, et cetera.”
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Also, Deasy’s “prostitution” accusations are pretty bizarre. I’m an ed policy junkie—reading everything I can on the internet—and talk to UTLA officials who defend teachers all the time, and I have never heard of an LAUSD teacher being accused of prostitution, and when I asked those folks at UTLA, they likewise claim to have never heard of such a thing.
“If this would have happened, I think someone in my position would have heard of it,” said one UTLA official, “But you never know.”
I’m not saying it didn’t happen… but given the bias of the media, if an LAUSD teacher had been moonlighting and working in the “the world’s oldest profession,” this story would have come to light… nay, it would have blown up on all the media. Whatever the case, for Deasy to make the “prostitution” claim the third thing out if his mouth misleads the audience into thinking it’s more routine than it actually is.
At 00:53 , the FEMALE MODERATOR calls Deasy on this claim that only serious and credible accusations prompt a teacher’s removal from the classroom. She cites a well-known example who allegedly kicked the wheels of his car, or his car’s muffler, or whatever, and was removed and thrown in teacher jail as he was treated the same as an alleged pedophile.
This prompts applause from the teachers and parents in the room
It’s interesting to watch the controlling and manipulative Deasy attempt to win back the room by
1) shaming them, pressing their “Guilt Button” through the use of a thought-terminating cliche.
2) play the “I’m-Defending-Abused-Children-but-You’re-Not CARD”…
Deasy never answers this question, and successfully changes the subject.
At one point, Deasy says, “I’m not uncomfortable discussing the rights and safety of children. It is first and foremost (inaudible) we do in LAUSD.”
However, at 00:53 , Deasy is quite uncomfortable answering the Female Moderator’s question—a question he clearly did not expect or appreciate—as evidenced by his desperate attempt to change the subject.
————————————————————————————————-
————————————————————————————————–
00:53 – 01:44
FEMALE MODERATOR: “What if it (the accusation) didn’t come from the police and sheriffs? Let me pick another case where a teacher was accused of something by a parent that wasn’t even criminal. It was more like kicking a muffler in a parking log, and they were moved, and they didn’t even know why they were moved until – ”
(HUGE APPLAUSE)
DEASY: “I think it’s bizarre that people will clap when we are looking at ensuring childhood safety.”
(He actually pronounces the word bizarre “biz-zahhh”… gotta love that Boston accent)
AUDIENCE MEMBER: “It’s an important question!”
DEASY: “Sir, don’t raise your voice to me! I don’t raise my voice to you.”
AUDIENCE MEMBER: “Don’t lie to us, then!”
FEMALE MODERATOR: “I… I’m trying to – … ”
(DEASY turns from the FEMALE MODERATOR
then forcefully addresses the audience)
DEASY: “We’ll always make the decision to err on the rights and safety of children whether people are comfortable with that or not… ”
————————————————————————————————-
————————————————————————————————–
Like Pavlov’s dogs hearing a bell ring, this gets applause from part of the audience. Deasy successfully short-circuits their capacity for critical thinking this way.
This is a rhetorical trick or fallacy used in propaganda… the false dichotomy… by implication Deasy is the righteous defender of children, while anyone who dares disagree with him is not.
Deasy continues with a manipulative attempt to trigger the emotions of the audience… i.e. his experiences “looking into the eyes’ of abuse children, and then employs a particularly clumsy sentence construction… is the child being “molested with his parents” watching, or “molested” along with his parents?
————————————————————————————————-
————————————————————————————————–
01:46 – 01:55
DEASY: “You don’t look in the eyes of a child who has been molested with his parents. I do!”
AUDIENCE applauds
————————————————————————————————-
————————————————————————————————–
Once again, the Pavlovian applause response from playing the Abused-Child-Card, and the propaganda trick of false dichotomy.
In effect, he’s communicating:
“I, John Deasy, care about abused children. Anyone who refuses to back me 100% does NOT, and are a bunch of pedophile-enablers.”
This guy sits up in a luxury office on 24th floor of LAUSD’s Beaudry Building, while it’s the teachers who interact with the students for 7 hours (or more… i.e. after-school tutoring, homework clubs, extra-curriculars, etc.) each day.
I’ve seen those same tears from abused children, Dr. Deasy. We teachers have to report any and every suspicion of child abuse to police and child protection authorities, or face being fired and loss of credential. We do it all the ding-dong time.
I and countless fellow teachers have looked into the eyes of those abused children on many occasions, and done my duty, as have countless administrators, filling out the SCAR (“Suspected Child Abuse Report”) Form, and staying late for hours… off-the-clock, and I”m happy to do so….meeting with authorities to give details on what the child reported to me.
Again, let’s get back to he muffler-kicking incident at
00:54
At one point, Deasy claims that he’s “not uncomfortable” discussing his handling of child abuse accusations, but throughout the night, he ducks the hard questions, diverts attention, and plays the “Abused Child Card” over and over to avoid answering these questions
However, the moderator’s question about the” kicked muffler” makes him pretty “uncomfortable” discussing these things.
(forgive me it this is repetitive)
——————————————-
00:54 – 02:38
FEMALE MODERATOR: “What if it (the accusation) didn’t come from the police and sheriffs? Let me pick another case where a teacher was accused of something by a parent that wasn’t even criminal. It was more like kicking a muffler in a parking lot, and he was moved, and they didn’t even know why they were moved until –
(AUDIENCE breaks into applause… Deasy has just lost the crowd, or part of the crowd.)
At this point, notice how Deasy diverts attention from this question, and never answers the question. He tries to shame the teacher for “raising his voice.”)
EASY: “I think it’s bizarre that people will clap when we are looking to ensure childhood safety.”
AUDIENCE MEMBER: “It’s an important question!”
DEASY: “Sir, don’t raise your voice to me! I don’t raise my voice to you.”
AUDIENCE MEMBER: “Don’t lie to us, then!”
FEMALE MODERATOR: “I… I’m trying to – … ”
(DEASY turns from the FEMALE MODERATOR
then forcefully addresses the audience with his
“only I care about abused children” canard.)
DEASY: “We’ll always make the decision to err on the rights and safety of children whether people at schools (inaudible) or not… ”
FEMALE AUDIENCE MEMBER: “What about the Crenshaw music teacher?”
FEMALE MODERATOR: “I don’t want to get into specifics, because this is not really the forum for that right now.”
DEASY: “No, we should NOT talk about other individuals. It is their private right to either go to their attorney, or to their union.”
FEMALE AUDIENCE MEMBER: “What about … (inaudible.. but I believe the parent or teacher in the audience is complaining about how, since Deasy took over, the investigation process… a process that returns innocent teachers to their classrooms… has gone from taking mere days… to taking weeks… to taking months… and now years to wrap up… meanwhile those teachers are cracking under the strain, and giving up and quitting… Deasy’s goal when dealing with the high-paid teachers, by the way…. lower the line item of salary, and replace them with docile newbies with no connection to the union.)
DEASY: “LAUSD will take as long as necessary to do its investigation, to protect the rights of both the employee, or the teacher. Thank you.” (I think he meant to say the “student and the teacher.”
—————————————–
Again, this above back-and-forth refers to the high-profile case of Dr. Iris Stevenson, a nationally-renown music teacher from Crenshaw High School who was unjustly removed from her classroom.
Her Crenshaw High student choirs perform all over the country.
Dr. Stevenson and her student choir singers had just returned from a performance for President Obama at the White House. Upon landing in L.A., she was thrown in teacher jail and never told what the allegations against her were. At the time of this forum in the video, Dr. Stevenson was still stuck there. There were rumors that she was there because she didn’t fill out all the required paperwork for out-of-town student trips. She claimed that she DID do all the required paperwork, just as she had done dozens of times before.
The public outcry against this led to her eventually being returned to her position in August.
Instead of being “not uncomfortable” discussing the high-profile matter—and admitting he screwed up—Deasy, in the above video, ran from the question. This Stevenson affair was a major embarassment for Deasy and his corporate reform backers. Throughout her incarceration, Dr. Stevenson was never told of what she was being accused of, or given any documentation whatsoever.
Here’s some coverage about Dr. Stevenson, who was finally
returned to the classroom recently:
http://www.thenation.com/article/179605/where-shame-policy-inside-las-teacher-jail
… and here’s L.A. School Report’s coverage of Stevenson’s exoneration and return to the classroom:
http://laschoolreport.com/crenshaw-choir-director-released-from-teacher-jail/
ONE FINAL NOTE: to this day, other than vague statements or rumors, Ms. Stevenson HAS NEVER BEEN INFORMED OF, OR BEEN GIVEN ANYTHING IN WRITING AS TO THE REASON WHY SHE SPENT SIX MONTHS LANGUISHING IN TEACHER JAIL.
When asked for any documentation relating to her incarceration in Teacher Jail, LAUSD, in effect, says to Ms. Stevenson, “Look, we’re not releasing any o’ that. Just be lucky your job back. Now just shut up and go back to work!”
Watch these testimonials from students for Ms. Stevenson:
Rafe’s kids can and will do likewise if Rafe is not likewise returned to the classroom.
On the YOUTUBE video, do you notice the superimposed advertisement for “K-12” on-line schools?
Here’s another bit from the article from THE NATION: (the last sentence sums it up)
http://www.thenation.com/article/179605/where-shame-policy-inside-las-teacher-jail#
———————————
THE NATION:
“Presumed to be a danger to children, most disappear in silence, their reputations swinging in the wind of conjecture. Some of those ‘housed,’ as the district puts it, are assigned to a room all day, or a cubicle, or an auditorium, or their home. Since their number has mushroomed, some report for short shifts and spend the rest of the workday under a form of house arrest.
“Some sit elbow to elbow facing a wall, in a bloc within district HQ, overseen by Specialists, who report to Directors. Non-detainees working in their midst are not to make eye contact or speak to them.
“One, walking past the room and seeing detainees through glass windows, said, ‘Oh, creepy; these are the weird people.’ Some detainees may not read books or use the Internet or have a phone; others elsewhere may do some or all of those things. Some may be yelled at just for whispering; others may talk with no consequences.
“The assault on their identities, the limbo of secret, open-ended investigation, have driven some older teachers out, retiring early and sacrificing lifetime benefits. Justifying the regime, Deasy recently told parents and others, ‘A teacher could be accused of drug trafficking, child molestation, prostitution, etc.’
“Fear is a useful tool; under its cover, a profession is suspect, budgets balloon to pay disciplinary costs, and ‘education reformers’ are handed an opportunity.”
Thank you Jack for following up and expanding on my few lines yesterday on various posts on this site, on Iris Stevenson, a highly respected and beloved teacher at Crenshaw HS who also was defamed by the spiteful and dangerous Supt. Deasy, who probably should have been indicted on various charges himself, but had the best lawyer who cut him a deal letting him resign.
This is par for the course at LAUSD. Hysteria and overreaction as with tarring all teachers at Miramonte by closing the school…which cost the district over $167,000.000 in law suits, some frivelous. In all, the Deasy reign cost taxpayers about $671,000,000. What a waste caused by this Broad Academy troll!
And now Cortines follows in Deasy’s footsteps and with innuendo, seems to deflect the public attention from the lawsuit filed against him, yet again, for sexual harassment, with 14 counts of obscene behavior.
Seems as though, at LAUSD, if you are the top administrator, or in his golden circle, the BoE and the legal system lets you get away with anything, but if you are a teacher, you rot in teacher jail generally for doing nothing. I hope Mark Geragos and his law firm ferret out everyone of these teachers and joins them in the class action.
It is not enough that they make teaching such a horrible experience that so many of our best teachers quit.
NOW they put that on fast track.
WHAT is this country coming to – or have we already arrived?
From the book banned in most countries, The Emporer’s new clothes by Hans Christian Andersen
“But he hasn’t got anything on,” a little child said.
“Did you ever hear such innocent prattle?” said its father. And one person whispered to another what the child had said, “He hasn’t anything on. A child says he hasn’t anything on.”
“But he hasn’t got anything on!” the whole town cried out at last.
The Emperor shivered, for he suspected they were right. But he thought, “This procession has got to go on.” So he walked more proudly than ever, as his noblemen held high the train that wasn’t there at all.
Great analogy, TC.
Rafe Esquith tells the same story I have heard from other teachers:
“…district investigators never explained the allegation of misconduct lodged against him but said they were not short of questions when he was interviewed. They asked, for example, the names of teachers who may not like him, the women he dated in college and whether he was counseled as a teenager for pushing someone at summer camp.
‘I asked them, ‘Have you talked to my students?’ and they absolutely said to me, ‘We’re only looking to talk to people who don’t like you,’ ‘ Esquith said.”
Today, Esquith’s attorneys filed a claim putting the school district on notice of a class-action lawsuit because they have heard from dozens of teachers since this story first broke: http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-lausd-teacher-20150623-story.html#page=1
‘I asked them, ‘Have you talked to my students?’ and they absolutely said to me, ‘We’re only looking to talk to people who don’t like you,’ ‘ Esquith said.”
Ah-HA! There you have it! Disgruntled, jealous fellow teachers and others who wish his downfall. That unctuous statement made by the person who made a big deal of that joke and reported it, just reeks of perfidy.
This has nothing to do with children and everything to do with the adults. Teachers should NEVER be a party to contributing to another teacher’s undoing, but way too often we are.
Teachers are under legal obligation to report factual info that brings real harm to children.
Ellen Lubic: I DO understand the legal obligation of teachers, but an off-hand quip does not seem like it would be something that would harm children.
It’s part of a nationwide witch hunt against veteran teachers and particularly those with “star status” as well as teachers of color.
The teacher who reported that gave the administration an opening from which they could spin tales was probably jealous of Rafe’s status. I still feel there is co-opting from within our ranks by Administration for many reasons. This is an issue teachers must face one way or another.
This story cuts deeply with me because Iris Stevenson was someone I knew at Oberlin College and Comservatory of Music. She finished a couple years ahead of me, but she was great and destined to be a legend even then.
This should not have happened to her or to Rafe.
Ellen. In my case, students A,B,C.D & E were interviewed. The names were confidential, I was told at the first meeting I had… which was, BTW, the very FIRST meeting IHAD SINCE I WS REMOVED FROM MY CLASSROOM, and it was also the very meeting when I was told that I HAD ALREADY BEEN FOUND GUILTY OF A CRIME…and i was FAMOUS beyond Mr Esquiths’.
Fait Accompli. The process at work!
Elaine Fink, before she ran off to San Diego (on the laurels that my work as th ePew cohort provided,) got me for blowing the whistle on the incompetent first director of the school 8 years previous… her girl friend.
In a totally lawless workplace —which by the way—is most schools san union legal support — a top down administrator can replace a court of law and find an American guilty of a crime… for you see, corporal punishment is a crime. (of course, as my expensive attorney pointed out –as the union top honcho was mute) even if I had cursed at this child, it is not Corporal punishment.
In LAUSD the same process, lawless was it is has not been challenged by the ATTORNEY GENERAL!
http://citywatchla.com/8box-left/6666-lausd-and-utla-complicity-kills-collective-bargaining-and-civil-rights-for-la-s-teachers
As per MY UFT/NYC contract, if the child who alleged this, and her parent, were present at a first step grievance, the allegation WOULD NEVER HAVE STOOD, as I don’t curse, and there were 30 kids present– not just the alphabet soup…of which FYI –>only TWO (her good friends) backed up her fairy tale!
That, dear colleagues, is the 6th amendment at work in the workplace, so that a teacher can get back to teaching. It, not tenure IS THE REASON WE HAVE COLLECTIVE BARGAINING. Lenny addresses this in LAUSD,/
http://www.perdaily.com/2014/03/lausd-and-utla-collude-to-end-collective-bargaining-and-civil-rights-for-teachers-part-2.html
In NYC, my contract included step 2 and step 3 grievances which make it certain to get to the truth at the school level…. and then.if this fails, a teacher can go to a ‘hearing’ which is supposed to substitute for a courtroom, but is corrupt to the core.
It often comes 3 years after removal from the sire… no right to a speedy trial… but at least a teacher is not found guilty by a sixty year old, short, bitter, low esteem, egotistic, superintendent flush with some ‘power.OOPs…sorry… couldn’t resist! (after all my ‘verdict’written and issued by a managerial ‘Queen’ of the Kingdom.)
Without the union as the teacher’s legal arm,, the only successful goals reached, are that of administration to :
1- REMOVE THE TEACHER IMMEDIATELY;
2- Ensure that the passage of time is great so that any and all people who can speak for the teacher are gone , or the incident is log out of memory.
3- Tarnish the teacher’s reputation, so as to silence their voice in important decisions, such as what fiction or non-fiction should be purchased for the event grade.
4- Eventually to remove the teacher’s salary and benefits A HUGE SAVINGS FOR THE SCHOOL AND DISTRICT BUDGET (as this link explains)
http://www.perdaily.com/2015/06/there-is-a-great-deal.html
And in my case,
*5- Offer failed human beings who reign as Rulers of a Fiefdom to treat teachers any way their damaged ego can conceive.!
Like at the banks, when the CEO is rewarded an don one goes to jail, there is not a shred of accountability… and ACCOUNTABILITY is the NAME OF THE GAME!
Ironically, the person who offered this view of NYC DOE administrators was the very head honcho of the UFT, Ivan Tiger, who when it his turn to stand up for me, sat mute–EVEN AS that alphabet soup of ‘witnesses’, and that ‘verdict’ was allowed to be read.
One last little laugh for you. This happened under the Klein region of error, not under his predecessors, RAMON CORTINES AND RUDY CREW…. recognize the name.
They take this lawless process from one fiefdom to another because they can!
No one stops them.
NO one (but me> Lenny, Karen, Lorna, Norman, Betsy, Leonie, Anthony, Rene and now Francesco) exposes their criminality. (Karen Horwitz wrote “White Chalk Crime, exposing this racket, after running the NAPTA site which offers the true stories of hundreds of teachers who went through EXACTLY THE SAME THINGS DESCRIBED ON THIS SITE TWO DECADES LATER.
Here is the NAPTA story by Francesco Portelos, when his traumatic story began.
http://www.endteacher abuse.org/Portelos.html
So if no one here has gone to that site to read the tales of teacher woe,
http://endteacherabuse.org/
then NOTHING CHANGES, becasue can we cannot expect the general public to know this 2 decade civil rights lawlessness exists —– when the media does its thing with impunity.
http://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/HAVE-REPORTERS-BECOME-POLI-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Media_Media-Bias_Media-Blackout_Media-Corruption-140322-673.html
The hardest part to accept or understand is the role other teachers play in the destruction of their colleagues.
*** BREAKING *** … and this is BIG!
Esquith is filing a lawsuit that is
“class action”, and will embrace
and include ALL teachers wrongfully
assigned to teacher jails.
Though pro-union, Rafe always stays
out of the union-management fray,
being content merely to focus on his
students…
… until NOW, that is: (read both of these)
http://laschoolreport.com/most-famous-teacher-plans-class-action-suit-over-lausds-teacher-jail/#more-35283
http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-lausd-teacher-20150623-story.html#page=1
The ramifications of this latest
development—particularly with
a law firm as powerful and as
high-profile as Geragos’ involved
on teachers’ behalf taking on
LAUSD—are enormous.
Here’s the text of the L.A. School Report article, written by
Craig Clough, with assistance from Vanessa Romo:
=======================
” ‘Most Famous’ Feacher Plans Class Action
Suit Over LAUSD’s ‘Teacher Jail’
“— Posted on June 23, 2015 3:32 pm by Craig Clough
“If opponents of LA Unified’s controversial disciplinary process known as ‘teacher jail’ were looking for an ideal case to fight it, both in a court of law and in the court of public opinion, they may get it.
“High-profile attorney Mark Geragos, representing one of the most famous active teachers in the country, Rafe Esquith, told the Los Angeles Times he intends to file a class action lawsuit on behalf of ‘scores’ of district teachers who say they have been denied due process rights. Geragos said he had filed a legal claim on Monday, which is a precursor to a lawsuit.
“The lawsuit could have enormous implications for the district, given the public stature of Esquith, who is a best-selling author, and Geragos, who has represented numerous celebrities and high-profile clients, including Michael Jackson, Winona Ryder and convicted killer Scott Peterson.
“Geragos did not state how many teachers may be a part of the possible suit and did not respond to a request for comment. LA Unified General Counsel David Holmquist said in an email to LA School Report that …
” ‘You would have to talk to [Esquith’s] attorney about his plans for a class action suit to determine if he believes it is a precursor.’
“The district has not publicly released any information on the case so far, other than Superintendent Ramon Cortines‘ saying the investigation had raised ‘serious issues.’
“Esquith told the Times that he was put under investigation in April and removed from the classroom for making a joke that referenced a passage from the novel ‘HUCKLEBERRY FINN.’ He said he told his class they may have to perform nude like a character in the story if he wasn’t able to raise enough funds, and that another teacher complained about it.
“Esquith acknowledged making the joke, and Geragos said that was the extent of the original complaint against him but the district’s investigation expanded to focus on Esquith’s nonprofit, THE HOBART SHAKESPEARIANS, including its process of permission slips, chaperons and whether it makes clear it is not affiliated with the district, the Times reported.
“Esquith is an author of several books on teaching and has worked at Hobart Avenue Elementary School for decades. He has received national recognition for his work with his nonprofit, which raises money for his students to put on Shakespeare plays. His work has been profiled by PBS, the CBS Evening News, Time, People and other national outlets. Washington Post education columnist Valerie Strauss described him as ‘the most famous teacher in the world.’
“Esquith’s case is thrusting the issue of ‘teacher jail’ into the spotlight once again, where it has been numerous times since the Miramonte Elementary sex abuse scandal broke in 2011 and former teacher Mark Berndt was ultimately convicted of multiple counts of committing lewd acts on his students. The Miramonte case also led to the district’s record-breaking $170 million in civil lawsuit payouts.
“In the aftermath of the scandal, the LA teachers union, UTLA, complained that the district began investigating teachers at a much higher rate. Hundreds of teachers, sometimes more than 300, have been reported to be barred from the classroom at a time in recent years.
“Teachers can fall under investigation for anything from serious accusation of sexual misconduct to a simple violation of district policies. The district used to house all teachers under investigation in administrative offices during working hours, and they were often often given nothing to do, which gave rise to the ‘teacher jail’ term. In 2014, the district switched policy and began sending most of the teachers home, but the term has come to often apply to any teacher that is barred from the classroom with pay while the district investigates them.
“The investigations can take months, and teachers are often not informed of the accusations against them. UTLA made the district’s disciplinary process an issue in its negations for a new contract agreement, reached in April, that calls for the district to give teachers under investigation more rights.
“ ‘ The teacher jail issues, which ballooned under Deasy, was a huge part of our contract negotiations and we got first-time contract language, making sure due process is followed, and time limits are followed in investigations,’ UTLA President Alex Caputo-Pearl told LA School Report.
” ‘So we want to make sure that the district is following those very common sense guidelines that are now contractual language. We want to make sure that they’re following them in this case of Rafe Esquith.’
“Caputo-Pearl did say that the speed of teacher investigations has improved under new Superintendent Ramon Cortines.
“ ‘Cortines, to his credit, has worked with us on a number of different cases where we were able to cut through some red tape,’ Caputo-Pearl said.”
– – – – – – – – – – – – –
“—Vanessa Romo contributed reporting to this story.”
—————————————————————————–
NOTE: I’m usually not a big fan of much of what comes out of L.A. SCHOOL REPORT—i.e. Publisher Jamie Alter-Lynton’s pro-corporate reform Op-Eds—but in this case, I have to give them some props for telling it like it is.
Wow!
Now I am listening, and will try to explain my news stie, why this is so exciting to watch…after two decades where this abuse is hidden behind the media propaganda. and the silence of the UNION!
I want to know how to get involved in this lawsuit? I was put in teacher jail 4 years ago for a misunderstanding with a student. Several of my colleagues were out to get me and lied about the facts of the misunderstanding. Off to jail for me. After 29 years with a stellar record with the LAUSD and 3 months after the Miramonte incident, I was being investigated. 4 years later, my case, because I decided to fight it, is still not settled. Nearly time for me to retire early just so I can get it over with. Thinking about it makes me sick! Even sicker, it takes a well known teacher to have a similar issue before there is public outrage! It is time to do something about this abuse!
You should read my commentary here at this blog, and go to my author’s page at OEN.
http://www.opednews.com/author/author40790.html
I was one of the most famous and successful teachers in nYC SIXTEEN YEARS AGO, when they did that to me, and I wrote this.
http://www.perdaily.com/2011/01/lausd-et-al-a-national-scandal-of-enormous-proportions-by-susan-lee-schwartz-part-1.html
You need to know that this process was practiced& perfected LONG ago, and took out the first largest district NYC, and then moved on to LAUSD the second. I WROTE THIS IN 2004.
http://www.perdaily.com/2011/01/lausd-et-al-a-national-scandal-of-enormous-proportions-by-susan-lee-schwartz-part-1.html
The media remained mute on the civil rights abuse, and the union LET IT HAPPEN..COMPLICIT. How else can it happen to YOU all these years later. The puppet masters KNOW that there are 15,880 districts and few people know what is afoot in the on next door, let alone across the nation. It works of them. THEY KILLED THE TEACHING PROFESSION with a war on teachers, in order to end democracy.
http://www.speakingasateacher.com/SPEAKING_AS_A_TEACHER/The_Insane_War_on_Teachers_and_Democracy.html
http://www.perdaily.com/2014/07/former-ctc-attorney-kathleen-carroll-lays-out-unholy-alliance-between-union-and-public-education-pri.html
Do read this so you can see how they used charges to lower the school budgets by getting grid of YOU.
http://citywatchla.com/8box-left/6666-lausd-and-utla-complicity-kills-collective-bargaining-and-civil-rights-for-la-s-teachers
and this from the one who chronicled FOR A DECADE what happened to you and all the teachers in LAUSD for A DECADE.
http://www.perdaily.com/2015/06/there-is-a-great-deal.html
http://www.perdaily.com/2015/01/were-you-terminated-or-forced-to-retire-from-lausd-based-on-fabricated-charges.html
begin by contacting lenny isenberg at his blog, and read this
http://www.perdaily.com/2015/01/were-you-terminated-or-forced-to-retire-from-lausd-based-on-fabricated-charges.html
Here’s the L.A. TIMES’ article on Rafe’s class action lawsuit (and like Karen Wolfe, it’s disgusting to see links to other sexual misconduct cases—totally unrelated to Rafe’s situation—next to this article).
My favorite part. Regarding the presumably objective and unbiased LAUSD investigators (you might add “profoundly stupid”), Rafe said,
“I asked them, ‘Have you talked to my students?’ and they absolutely said to me,
” ‘We’re only looking to talk to people who don’t like you.’ It just seemed incredibly unfair.”
Ya think?
http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-lausd-teacher-20150623-story.html#page=1
==================================
“Teacher Files Claim Against L.A. Unified,
Blames Controversy On Joke
“— by Zahira Torres
“From his modest classroom at Hobart Boulevard Elementary School in Koreatown, Rafe Esquith became an education superstar. His teaching techniques brought him worldwide recognition, and his books became models for how to engage young students.
“But for the last two months of school, Esquith was sidelined. The Los Angeles Unified School District launched an investigation in March into allegations of misconduct by the popular teacher.
“His attorneys said the investigation is related to comments about nudity that he made to students. In addition, they said L.A. Unified also is looking into Esquith’s nonprofit, the Hobart Shakespeareans, a drama group for students.
“The decision to put him on leave — and keep him there for so long — has outraged supporters. But district officials have not backed down, saying that regardless of his celebrity, they won’t send him back to school until their investigation is completed.
“The standoff comes as the school district struggles to recover after a series of scandals involving teachers and administrators accused of sexual misconduct with students. L.A. Unified last year paid a record $139 million to the victims of a Miramonte Elementary School teacher who was allowed to stay in the classroom even after complaints about his behavior with students.
“Some see the Esquith case as part of the district’s effort to reform in the wake of the scandals. But whether it is an overcorrection remains a matter of much debate.
“In his first interview since he was pulled from his fifth-grade class, Esquith told The Times on Monday that controversy stemmed from a joke he made in the classroom.
“He said he quipped with students that if he could not raise enough money for the annual Shakespearean play, they would all have to perform their parts naked like the king in Mark Twain’s ‘THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN.’
“After another teacher complained, he said he explained the context of the joke to his principal at Hobart Boulevard Elementary. The principal, he said, told him he had nothing to worry about. Nonetheless, Esquith was removed from the classroom in April.
” ‘We overreact to everything. That’s the American way and I’m a victim of that overreaction,’ Esquith said. ‘I want to fix this system. I want to make sure that teachers do not have to go through the same thing that I went through.’
“Mark Geragos, an attorney for Esquith, filed a claim Monday against L.A. Unified, a precursor to a lawsuit. The claim gave notice of class-action litigation involving scores of teachers in similar situations who say they have been denied due process rights.
“Leaders of the teachers union said the number of instructors pulled from classrooms after allegations of misconduct increased after a child abuse scandal at Miramonte.
“Since last June, 89 teachers and others have been taken out of the classroom pending an investigation.
“Colleen Schwab, a vice president of United Teachers Los Angeles, said district officials have become so concerned with making sure that they do not miss serious crimes against children that the pendulum has swung too far in the opposite direction.
“Schwab said L.A. Unified and the teachers union reached an agreement in April requiring that the district present teachers accused of misconduct with the allegations against them and that they receive speedy investigations.
“District officials declined to provide details of the investigation, which Supt. Ramon Cortines said includes “serious issues that go beyond the initial investigation.”
“Cortines said in a statement last week that the district won’t be ‘rushed to make a decision and will complete our investigation with the highest level of integrity. The safety and security of every district student will remain our No. 1 priority.’
“In an interview Monday, L.A. Unified General Counsel David Holmquist added that the school system will not sacrifice students’ safety or a thorough investigation simply because the public and employees want a quick resolution.
” ‘When it comes to student safety, we’re going to choose students over adults every time,’ Holmquist said.
“Education historian Diane Ravitch who has followed the debate over Esquith’s removal, said that when such a nationally known instructor is removed from the classroom, the community expects answers.
” ‘If the facts of the case are what’s in public, it sounds absurd,’ said Ravitch, a research education professor at New York University. ‘If there are other things that haven’t been revealed, then the district should reveal them so that people don’t think they’re making a very harsh and hasty decision.’
“Esquith, who has written three books, including ‘TEACH LIKE YOUR HAIR’S ON FIRE’: THE METHODS AND MADNESS INSIDE ROOM 56,’ has received national recognition for his teaching abilities. He was the focus of a PBS documentary and won the National Medal of Arts award in 2003. At Hobart, which enrolls mostly low-income and minority students, he stresses the importance of the arts and the classics, including Shakespeare and Twain.
“He has also criticized what he considers to be too much standardized testing and scripted teaching methods.
“Esquith is being paid while he awaits the results of the district’s investigation. It is expected to be completed before school starts in August.
“He said district investigators never explained the allegation of misconduct lodged against him but said they were not short of questions when he was interviewed. They asked, for example, the names of teachers who may not like him, the women he dated in college and whether he was counseled as a teenager for pushing someone at summer camp.
RAFE ESQUITH: “I asked them, ‘Have you talked to my students?’ and they absolutely said to me, ‘We’re only looking to talk to people who don’t like you.’ It just seemed incredibly unfair.”
“In the claim against the district, Esquith’s attorneys said the investigation has now turned to the Hobart Shakespeareans, which performs a Shakespeare play annually, offers field trips and provides free SAT preparation.
“Board members for Esquith’s nonprofit sought legal counsel after investigators began asking questions about permission slips, whether the organization clearly indicated that it was not affiliated with the district and the number of chaperons taken on trips.
“District officials this month required Esquith to cancel a trip with students to attend the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. In a letter to him, officials said the trip had not been authorized or sponsored by L.A. Unified.
” ‘ It’s clear that the initial allegation was this Mark Twain passage … they realized that they hit a dry hole on that, and now they are doing anything and everything to come up with something to justify this because they realize that they have egg on their face,’ Geragos said.
“After more than three decades teaching, Esquith said, he simply wants to get back to the classroom to be with his students.
RAFE ESQUITH:
“I have had many friends say, ‘You know what, Rafe? Enough is enough. Get off the cross, go into the private sector and make a lot of money.’
” ‘ It’s tempting, but you haven’t seen the damage done to my classroom. You haven’t seen the mail that I’ve gotten from these kids. I have to go back to heal them.’ ”
zahira.torres@latimes.com
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==============
What’s really jumps out in this article is when Rafe’s attorney says this is not just about Rafe, but about ALL the teachers in LAUSD’s teacher jail, and that the lawsuit will not stop with Rafe’s reinstatement, but will have as its goal to fix the system.
Rafe echoes him, saying, “I want to fix this system. I want to make sure that teachers do not have to go through the same thing that I went through.”
I bet that LAUSD is now regretting their actions against Rafe.
Here’s a comment from the L.A. Times article
about the witch hunt perpetrated on Rafe
and other teachers in Teacher Jail:
http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-lausd-teacher-20150623-story.html#page=1
———————————————-
pdeecool:
“The point here if you have been following this
story or any information on teacher jail is when
is the district overreaching in trying to find
misconduct on teachers.
“If, as a teacher, you are alleged to have committed
misconduct,and no misconduct exists for that allegation,
the district probes deep into your past to fabricate some
type of misconduct.
“If we did that with administration, no one would be left.
“This and teacher jail is nothing but a political witch
hunt to get rid of older teachers, teachers who question
the system and speak up for parents and students.
These are the people the district does not want in LAUSD.
“As a taxpayer, these are the people I want to
represent my interest and those of my community.
“Does the community, parents, students, teachers, local
public schools mean anything to this faceless,money-grubbing,
deformifying administration at LAUSD?
“Or can we just replace these groups whenever they
aren’t doing what the hierachy wants them to?
“I suggested before, during and after DZ (John Deasy’s tenure),
get rid of this BOE.”
Check out this bit:
http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-lausd-teacher-20150623-story.html#page=1
=====================================
“(Esquith) said district investigators never explained the allegation of misconduct lodged against him, but said they were not short of questions when he was interviewed. They asked, for example, the names of teachers who may not like him, the women he dated in college and whether he was counseled as a teenager for pushing someone at summer camp.
RAFE ESQUITH: “I asked them, ‘Have you talked to my students?’ and they absolutely said to me, ‘We’re only looking to talk to people who don’t like you.’ It just seemed incredibly unfair.”
=====================================
I can’t imagine how surreal or insane this must have seemed to Rafe.
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LAUSD INVESTIGATOR #1: “Could you please provide the investigation with the names of the teachers here at Hobart who may not like you?”
RAFE: “Excuse me? Why would you need to know-?”
LAUSD INVESTIGATOR #2: (interrupting) “Refuses to answer.”
—(writes in his notebook)
LAUSD INVESTIGATOR #1: “Next question: Could you please provide the investigation with the names of the women you dated in college?”
RAFE: “Whoa.. what? ‘What does that have to do with-?”
LAUSD INVESTIGATOR #2: (interrupting) “Refuses to answer.”
—(writes in his notebook)
LAUSD INVESTIGATOR #1: “Next question: when you were a teenager, were you ever counseled for pushing a child?”
RAFE: (jaw drops): “Was I WHAT???!!!”
LAUSD INVESTIGATOR #2: : “Refuses to answer. DOES NOT DENY!”
—(writes furiously in his notebook)
RAFE: “Have you talked to my students??
LAUSD INVESTIGATOR #1: “No. We’re only looking to talk to people who don’t like you… and what’s more, WE’RE asking the questions here, NOT YOU.”
——————————————————
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Okay, maybe that’s a little hyperbolic—I”m a DRAGNET fan—but still…
“Unbelievable!”
That is exactly what Dan Rather said to me in 1998, when I was put in teacher jail with accusations of corporate punishment! When that failed ( I filed an expensive –to me– lawsuit) they charged me with incompetence!….
Of course, no one reported this, although I was the NYS English Council’s “Educator Of Excellence” and the chosen COHORT for the real National Standards research (Pew funded, Harvard research) for 2 years, and I have a book offer by Stenhouse publications. http://www.opednews.com/author/author40790.html
because my work was chosen among six others, –from the tens of thousands– to go around the nation as an example of how teachers created UNIQUE CURRICULA TO MEET THE LEARNING STANDARDS!MY kids were at the top of every NYC test, and third in the state on the new (at that time) ELA test (of writing) at the time that 3/4 of NYC failed. I was in teacher jail when this was announced.
Those of us… the thousands of us, who experienced this ‘gotcha’ experience have been forgotten and ignored.
I am happy, that at last, Diane is shining a light on the civil rights abuse that this nonsense represents. BUT, if you want to see what the ‘gotcha squad in NYC looks like… go here.
http://nycrubberroomreporter.blogspot.com/2009/03/gotcha-squad-and-new-york-city-rubber.html
I mean, David Pakter brought in a plant!
That insubordination put into teacher jail, this celebrated educator who brought the medical arts curriculum to the NYC High School of Fine Arts, leaving him to fight in courts with his own money to keep his pension and benefits, even if his job was gone…POOF
How many of you know, that Betsy Combier chronicled the outrageous abuse that took out the teachers in THE LARGEST DISTRICT INTHE COUNTRY… Read it and weep!
http://parentadvocates.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=7501
long before this process was used to empty the veteran professional in the SECOND LARGEST… LAUSD.
Hey…it worked! They are still using it… if any of you are following the present agony Francesco Portelos http://www.endteacherabuse.org/Portelos.html
Yes, they put him in JAIL! http://protectportelos.org/does-workplace-bullying-continues-my-33-hrs-behind-bars/
You can follow him on Facebook.
Parents are fighting here http://protectportelos.org
His story needs to be a focus here, too.!!!!
NO one said a word as teachers like David and myself went POOF! Gone! What happened in NYC was the result. This video ain’t short… but if you have never seen The Inconvenient Truth Behind Waiting For Superman… a Grassroots video….here is what happens when you take the quality professionals out of the classroom.>>>
So Bravo, Diane, for ensuring that this tragedy to our professional is no longer INVISIBLE.
I tis no JOKE that this fine teacher is no longer educating the mostly ethnic population in LAUSD… it is a tragedy and part of the plan!!!
He costs too much money. School districts pull this garbage all the time because they can.
I wasn’t LAUSD, but I went through the same thing with the rigged hearings, etc. Never have gotten back in a regular teaching gig after seven years.
But Susan, this is a process. I wrote this in 2004, and Lenny put it up in 2011
http://www.perdaily.com/2011/01/lausd-et-al-a-national-scandal-of-enormous-proportions-by-susan-lee-schwartz-part-1.html
… and I was famous, too.
No one goes back… that is how they reduced th budget at the same time as the ensure no professional would have a voice when they put out the common core crap!
I remember witnessing a judge incredulously questioning a prospective juror who stated that a person on trial must have done something wrong or the police would not have made the arrest. Everyone in the room knew that the prospective juror made that statement just so that she would not have to spend time in court. The judge excused the juror and berating her for such an obvious ploy. And here I see a comment stating that Cortines is a bright guy and Esquith must have done something wrong. Does anybody truly believe that all the charges brought against teachers must have a kernel of truth or they wouldn’t have been brought? If this is not just a cynical ploy, I would be saddened by such ignorance.
It is a troll writing that… this site has trolls, too, that like the sound their own voices, big egos and little information. ignore them