My Quote in Chalkbeat on John Dewey HS Elvin Firing - They didn't include my hammering of Farina for Covering up

Why does it take a year for OSI to issue a report? And why are teachers pulled immediatly while OSI investigates while principals like Elvin are allowed to stay  in their jobs and continue to destroy teachers and students lives? If not for the publicity, Elvin would have been kicked upstairs to run some DOE program instead of being fired. The press should look at how many slugs who were disasters as principals who are in high end positions today at the DOE.

(I posted the complete 22 page OSI report in google docs.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8qnFCTQLOqoUXNNMTdhUGRINTQ/view).

I'm glad that MORE got some credit for the behind the scenes support for the struggle at John Dewey - I was the point man and the CL Michael Solo who was a main cog in the battle is a MORE member. We used Ed Notes to bludgeon Elvin - the Dewey stories get numerous hits every day. Taking the story public in this way moved things along. Michael filled me in all along and we had to keep most of what was going on behind the scenes private. And I'm still not at liberty to tell the entire story.

Cover up

I do know that Michael put his career at risk since Elvin and her crew were monsters at retaliation. Michael was not an activist until they tried to close Dewey 4 years ago. At that time we were in a pre-MORE stage of GEM and we went down to support them and Michael got involved in GEM as it morphed into MORE.

But the story here is that Farina covered up - and the NY Times indicates so when she said recently there was nothing there. I made that clear in the interview - and the UFT was informing Farina and her people about what Elvin was doing on a number of issues at the school.

Chalkbeat seems to think that Farina acted quickly by firing Elvin instead of bumping her to another position as they do with principals. But the Marcia Kramer pieces on TV forced Farina's hand -- the publicity of reassignment would have been too damaging -- but if there was no pub they Elvin would be running something at the DOE for sure.

 I challenged Farina at a PEP meeting. https://youtu.be/eH8YblzFbSM

Norm Scott, an activist with the Movement of Rank and File Educators, a caucus of the city teachers union that waged a public campaign to remove Elvin, said the city’s actions were long overdue. He said Fariña — who has said for months that she was awaiting the results of the investigation — was informed about problems at John Dewey by teachers there in her first months on the job.
“A year too late,” Scott said. “Kids and teachers have suffered enormously.”
He didn't include the part where I hammered Farina for duplicity and gave him background info on how she knew what was going on for almost a year but protected Elvin while teachers were being hammered.
http://ny.chalkbeat.org/2015/07/08/principal-tapped-by-bloomberg-to-turn-around-john-dewey-hs-yanked-after-probe/#.VZ5krkV0G_B

The UFT deserves credit for their work behind the scenes with MORE member Michael Solo. A real cooperative effort.

GRADE-FIXING PROBE

The principal of John Dewey High School who was tasked with turning around the troubled Brooklyn school is in the process of being fired after a city investigation found that she allowed students to receive credits toward graduation with no instruction from teachers.

• Chalkbeat,
• New York Times,
• NY1,
• SchoolBook,
• New York Daily News,
• New York Post,
• Capital Pro

The grade-fixing scandal at John Dewey High School “may be just the tip of the iceberg,” writes the Post editorial board, and the only way to hold schools more accountable is to have more school choice.

• New York Post