Written and edited by Norm Scott:
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Massive screw up by DOE leading to judge to dismiss the case
against Dewey HS principal Elvin -- who engaged in massive credit
recovery schemes, according to voluminous evidence, to boost HS
graduation rates. This story was well-documented and reported on for months by the NYP, the Daily News, and Marcia Kramer of CBS News. Since
DOE refused to invalidate the credits nor to provide any back up
evidence of the charges, the judge threw the case out before it even
came to trial. More evidence of incompetence on the part
of OSI, which dragged its feet for months, DOE's internal audit Dept
(which apparently failed to find fault with the credits of the fake
courses) and the legal department at DOE. ... Leonie Haimson, NYCEdNews listserve
I know a lot about the Elvin/Dewey story (do a search for Elvin on Ed Notes and you will see pages of posts) since I had sources in the school and was updated regularly on the back story.
Elvin was a monster of a manipulator and brutalized teachers, especially young ones, including a vicious discontinue of a single mom army vet who had complained about some ridiculous school policy.
Elvin demanded that teachers grade and enter the grades of Do Nows every day - an insane amount of wasted work. When grievances were filed she back off tenured teachers but forced the nontenured to do them. She walked into one classroom and in front of the class demanded the teacher show her his Do Nows. Already having graded them and entered the grades he had tossed them in the trash. He nervously pointed to the trash can and Elvin, in front of the kids went rummaging through the trash to find them and slammed them on the desk. Surely a performance worthy of Captain Queeg and his missing strawberries.
According to the NY Times account of Elvin's exoneration, CSA head Ernie Logan, a UFT ally, who apparently sanctions this way of treating teachers
suggested that the original complaints were ginned up because
Ms. Elvin was “a very proactive supervisor” who was trying to turn the
school around. “We’ve found that, as a principal starts to push hard,
sometimes the staff is not happy,” he said.
We know that the way so many teachers are treated poorly by so many of Logan's members is of no concern of his but we do give him more credit than the UFT in defending his members over anything they might do no matter how outrageous. Logan did charge the DOE with using tainted OSI investigators - we know many of these people are criminals themselves so on that we are not surprised.
What an outrage to blame teacher gripers who were reacting to the crimes being perpetrated by Elvin who was prevented from closing down Dewey and getting rid of the teachers she didn't like by the UFT lawsuit. So she found other ways.
Elvin created shadow classes that didn't really exist. The DOE knew all about this for a long time but chose to do nothing about it - until articles began appearing in the press and on blogs. People at Dewey were telling me that the posts on Ed Notes were having an impact and a source told me that Elvin was reading the comments that kept coming up and reacting. One retired Dewey teacher recently credited Ed Notes with playing a big role in Elvin's temporary downfall.
You can inform the DOE that a principal is cutting kids hands off but unless the mainstream press picks up a story they will do nothing.
students had received credit in the 2013-14 school year for courses in
which they simply completed packets of work but received no
instruction, in violation of department policy.
However,
an audit of the courses, conducted in October by the new
administration at Dewey and Education Department officials,
contradicted the investigation’s findings, the arbitrator wrote in his
ruling. It concluded that the courses had, in fact, met department
guidelines and that the students had been properly credited.
Yes the DOE knew and in essence sanctioned what was going on and they are now hoisted on their own petard. If Elvin goes back to Dewey, I can't imagine the mayhem and the DOE will do whatever it can to avoid that outcome.
As to the role the UFT played at Dewey in retarding the kind of actions that could have buried Elvin, I will have a lot more to say in a follow-up.
Here is the Times article.
Brooklyn Principal Removed From Post Is Cleared of Charges
In a rebuke to the New York City Education Department and its investigative unit, an arbitrator has dismissed all charges against a high school principal who was removed from her post last July, after being accused of inflating the school’s graduation rate by giving makeup classes without content.
The arbitrator ruled that Kathleen Elvin, the former principal of John Dewey High School, in Brooklyn, should be immediately reinstated and that the department should pay her the wages and benefits that she lost as a result of her suspension.
An inquiry conducted last year by the department’s Office of Special Investigations found that students had received credit in the 2013-14 school year for courses in which they simply completed packets of work but received no instruction, in violation of department policy. Ms. Elvin was removed, and the department in September brought charges of misconduct and neglect of duty against her, in an attempt to fire her.
However, an audit of the courses, conducted in October by the new administration at Dewey and Education Department officials, contradicted the investigation’s findings, the arbitrator wrote in his ruling. It concluded that the courses had, in fact, met department guidelines and that the students had been properly credited.
In a decision released on Tuesday, the arbitrator, Jay Nadelbach, wrote that “the D.O.E. cannot effectively maintain both of two incompatible positions.”
He concluded that the department’s decision to certify the credits that the students earned validated “the sufficiency of the classroom instruction given.”
Devora Kaye, a spokeswoman for the Education Department, said, “We are disappointed with this decision, and we are continuing to review our options.”
At a news conference on Wednesday, the president of the principals’ union, Ernest Logan, celebrated the dismissal of the charges while accusing the department of “a pattern of reckless bullying” of administrators.
In 2012, during Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s administration, Ms. Elvin was brought into the school, which was struggling with rising violence and declining graduation rates. Her efforts produced an increase in the four-year graduation rate, to 79 percent in 2013-14 from 72 percent in 2011-12.
In 2014, six anonymous complaints about Ms. Elvin and other Dewey administrators were made to the Special Commissioner of Investigation for the school district. A social studies teacher at the school, Alan Lerner, also made a complaint. Her accusers said, among other things, that Ms. Elvin was improperly allowing students to make up courses.
The Special Commissioner of Investigation referred the complaints to the department’s internal Office of Special Investigations.
Ms. Elvin, for her part, said she was “living evidence of what character assassination is.” As for whether she wanted to return to Dewey, she said that while she had never wanted to leave, she did not know if, given the turmoil, it would be possible to go back now.
Mr. Logan suggested that the original complaints were ginned up because Ms. Elvin was “a very proactive supervisor” who was trying to turn the school around. “We’ve found that, as a principal starts to push hard, sometimes the staff is not happy,” he said.
I know that the UFT supposedly helped the Dewey teachers -- but I
also know how they didn't seem to have the same sense of urgency the
teachers had. What of the Discontinued under Elvin? What of the forced
retirements? What of the years of misery so many teachers suffered? Those teachers had to sign a confidentiality agreement not to discuss the changing of their ratings.... NY Post
Yes, they don't want these people to talk about it. Where was the UFT in protecting the rights of these teachers to talk about their own cases? Where is the UFT calling on more investigations of cheating and other abuses as scores of schools with monster principals? The UFT is best friends with the DeB/Farina regime and also with the CSA which represents principals so don't expect much from them.
The problem is there are hundreds of principals like Elvin who
retaliate against teachers, many of them removed for numerous reasons,
yet the ratings are allowed to stand. And that happened going back to the old U rating system -- I could see that in the 3020a hearings I attended -- the Peter Zucker case was an example - and he is losing 4 months pay on suspension over what was clearly a set-up.
One MORE member - a
chapter leader - received 2 U ratings for union activity under a lunatic
and was about to get a 3rd and be fired but she was mercifully removed
and replaces by a benign principal - yet the history of these U ratings
remain - and that school is now a renewal school and the CL may have to
find a job with that history training behind.
The UFT should call on every teacher with a poor rating in a school with a suspect principal be reviewed. I would go back to the early days of BloomKlein.
Given an "ineffective" rating for refusing to participate in fraudulent behavior involving grade-fixing.
Gee, that doesn't sound like an "objective" evaluation system to me.
And NYSED admits as much by overturning at least four of the "ineffective" ratings of tenured teachers who appealed them.
There may be more overturned ratings - we don't know the exact number because of the confidentiality agreements
But what we do know is this - if Elvin and her assistant principals used
APPR as a weapon against teachers to perpetrate their fraud, other
principals and assistant principals can use APPR as a weapon against
teachers for other reasons as well.
Had Elvin not been exposed in the grade-fixing scandal, these teachers
at Dewey would still be working with "ineffective" ratings on their
records.
You can bet there are other administrators elsewhere who have handed out
"ineffective" ratings for a variety of reasons that have nothing to do
with the effectiveness of the teacher.
We learned from Chancellor Farina this week that APPR is a sham when she
acknowledged that "effective" teachers can have their ratings adversely
affected by switching schools and going to teach in a school with high
poverty/high homelessness demographics.
Even the noted anti-union Post reporter, Carl Campanile, given the Post claims an exclusive on the Dewey story -- too bad they don't read Ed Notes -- takes a - sort of - pro-teacher position. Here is Campanile's story:
I confronted Farina about her double standard for teachers and principals like Elvin when she pulled David Rosen out of his classroom and sent him to the rubber rooms (they still exist) because his kids protested at a city council hearing. https://youtu.be/eH8YblzFbSM
Farina says an investigation = lasting a lifetime - is on tap -- but actually Elvin is doing exactly what Farina wants - and needs - keeping up with the phony grad rates from the Bloomberg/Klein years. Imagine if the grad rates fell - equivalent to the crime rate going up -- and the next thing you will see is the very same NY Post hammering de Blasio for being a failure at running the school system and therefore mayoral control should not be in effect - until a mayor like, say Eva Moskowitz, is in charge.
As for the crime rate - I still think there were way more murders under Bloomberg and he is just stashing the bodies somewhere.
Teachers at Brooklyn’s scandal-plagued John Dewey HS say they are being punished with bad performance evaluations for standing up to the principal, who they say lets students slide with a grade-inflation system nicknamed “Easy Pass.”
A Post analysis found that half of the teachers at the school were given failing grades from Principal Kathleen Elvin, even though the graduation rate has been soaring.
State education records show that out of 101 teachers, 16 earned “ineffective” ratings and 35 got “developing” ratings last year, a failure rate of 50 percent.
Only 8 percent of teachers citywide received marks that low, leading some Dewey teachers to claim that the game is being rigged by the administration to get back at educators who object to alleged grade inflation.
“This doesn’t make sense. Something is wrong here,” said one teacher, who was rated “ineffective.”
Part of the reason the teachers are blaming the principal is that they had been rated “effective” based on their students’ improvement on state exams.
But when subjective observations by Elvin and her fellow administrators were factored in, their grades sank.
“She has a personal vendetta,” the teacher said. “She’s using the teacher observations as a weapon against teachers. It’s her way to force teachers to leave or retire.”
He said some of the teachers who got the bad reviews were the same teachers who would not alter grades to pass failing students.
The school is under investigation for fixing grades with easy extra credit so it could post higher graduation rates. Students derisively call the system “Easy Pass.”
“I have integrity,” the teacher said. “I refused to give kids credit who didn’t deserve it.”
Only 49 percent of Dewey teachers surveyed by the city agreed that Elvin is an effective manager. She declined to comment and directed inquiries to the Department of Education.
Department spokeswoman Devora Kaye said “Principals must rate teachers fairly and accurately,” but did not address the dispute at Dewey.
United Federation of Teachers grievance director Ellen Gallin Procida called the poor ratings a “red flag.”
“This is the first year we have had this process, but the fact that one school stands out the way it does is noteworthy,” she said.
How do those phony Bloomberg grad rates look? Let's explode the bullshit whenever the press puppets the story that Bloomberg raised grad rates from 50-67%. Three quarters of that is based on lies like the Dewey case. Every time Chalkbeat talks about the rise in grad rates under Bloomberg, leave a comment saying "Bullshit credit recovery -- and other slick tricks".
Ed Notes readers are well aware of the John Dewey story and Kathleen Elvin. There has been a lot I have not been able to talk about in order to protect my sources at the school - we've been waiting for this DN Gonzalez piece. One thing we do know is that Tweed and Carmen Farina have been told what is happening for almost a year and have done nothing. It is much worse than credit recovery, as there has been a general assault on teachers by the administration, especially the nontenured. One story is that they have to give Do Nows and mark then and enter the grades every day. Farina was informed of this waste of time 6 months ago. Her recently installed superintendent is as big a shit as the one he replaced - Amy Horowitz who was given an even bigger job at the DOE.
By the way, the investigations at Dewey have been going on forever and somehow nothing gets resolved. How about expedited investigations of principals instead of teachers?
Let's keep an eye on the teacher with guts, Wade Goria, and how the vindictive admin comes down on him. I'm betting they will find a reason to rubber room him -
Last spring, a teacher at John Dewey High School in Brooklyn was assigned to oversee 16 students in a single class who were seeking credit for subjects they’d previously failed. The topics included Earth science, global studies, trigonometry and English — 14 in all — yet the teacher was only certified as a math instructor. A second teacher became her own virtual high school. Records obtained by the Daily News show she was put in charge of a course titled Project Graduation. Students in the course had failed 35 different subjects, including U.S. history, geometry, living environment, Earth science, global studies, algebra, art and Spanish. But the teacher’s license was for special education. How is it possible to teach so many subjects simultaneously — all outside your expertise?
Well, it’s not. Pupils assigned to Project Graduation simply had to show up and fill out individual “course packets,” according to several teachers who were assigned to the course.
It was part of a brazen scheme by the school’s administrators to inflate graduation rates by manufacturing bogus “credit recovery” — a practice now being probed by the school system’s office of special investigation.
Just as test prep has overwhelmed elementary schools, with the politicians demanding higher standardized test scores, “credit recovery” will likely be the next big high school scandal. At Dewey, The News obtained class rosters, individual student records and school emails, and interviewed a dozen teachers who claim sham credit recovery has gone on for years.
The documents show teachers were often assigned to grade students out of their expertise, supervisors altered failing grades to passing without consulting the original teacher, and students were passed without even attending class, all in violation of state and city education regulations. What’s happening is incredibly fraudulent and criminal,” said Wade Goria, a social studies teacher at Dewey who is about to retire. Goria was willing to be quoted, but many of his colleagues who gave evidence to investigators asked not to be identified for fear of reprisals.
The News asked Goria about a student of his who graduated last year despite receiving a failing grade in a government course — one required for graduation. “The student was absent more than half the time and had no idea of what was going on,” Goria said. “In no way, shape or form could I justify passing him. “The next thing I knew, the boy was on the graduation line,” Goria said. School records obtained by The News show that on July 1, a few days after graduation ceremonies, Goria’s student received a 65 in government from a supervisor as part of credit recovery. “No one came to me about him,” Goria said. “There was no discussion whatsoever. He just passed.”
As you might expect, Dewey’s graduation rate soared since Principal Kathleen Elvin took over in early 2012. It was 61% in June 2011, and 74% last June. Elvin declined to comment and referred all questions to the Department of Education.
“The integrity of our academic programs is of the highest importance and the Department of Education takes any allegations of this sort extremely seriously,” said Devora Kaye, spokeswoman for Chancellor Carmen Fariña. “This matter is under investigation.”
Records obtained by the Daily News show a teacher was put in charge of a course titled Project Graduation. Students in the course had failed 35 different subjects, but the teacher’s license was for special education.
Bryan Pace/for New York Daily News
A teacher at John Dewey High School in Brooklyn was assigned to oversee 16 students in a single class who were seeking credit for subjects they’d previously failed.
Part of the reason the teachers are blaming the principal is that they had been rated “effective” based on their students’ improvement on state exams. But when subjective observations by Elvin and her fellow administrators were factored in, their grades sank. “She has a personal vendetta,” the teacher said. “She’s using the teacher observations as a weapon against teachers. It’s her way to force teachers to leave or retire.” ... NY Post
How about this? A NY Post piece taking the side of teachers.
Of course ed notes has been on the Elvin/Dewey case. (For background see links below the Post article.)
Teachers at Brooklyn’s scandal-plagued John Dewey HS say they are being punished with bad performance evaluations for standing up to the principal, who they say lets students slide with a grade-inflation system nicknamed “Easy Pass.”
A Post analysis found that half of the teachers at the school were given failing grades from Principal Kathleen Elvin, even though the graduation rate has been soaring.
State education records show that out of 101 teachers, 16 earned “ineffective” ratings and 35 got “developing” ratings last year, a failure rate of 50 percent.
Only 8 percent of teachers citywide received marks that low, leading some Dewey teachers to claim that the game is being rigged by the administration to get back at educators who object to alleged grade inflation.
“This doesn’t make sense. Something is wrong here,” said one teacher, who was rated “ineffective.”
Part of the reason the teachers are blaming the principal is that they had been rated “effective” based on their students’ improvement on state exams.
But when subjective observations by Elvin and her fellow administrators were factored in, their grades sank.
“She has a personal vendetta,” the teacher said. “She’s using the teacher observations as a weapon against teachers. It’s her way to force teachers to leave or retire.”
He said some of the teachers who got the bad reviews were the same teachers who would not alter grades to pass failing students.
The school is under investigation for fixing grades with easy extra credit so it could post higher graduation rates. Students derisively call the system “Easy Pass.”
“I have integrity,” the teacher said. “I refused to give kids credit who didn’t deserve it.”
Only 49 percent of Dewey teachers surveyed by the city agreed that Elvin is an effective manager. She declined to comment and directed inquiries to the Department of Education.
Department spokeswoman Devora Kaye said “Principals must rate teachers fairly and accurately,” but did not address the dispute at Dewey.
United Federation of Teachers grievance director Ellen Gallin Procida called the poor ratings a “red flag.”
“This is the first year we have had this process, but the fact that one school stands out the way it does is noteworthy,” she said.
Dewey has one of the highest number of ineffective rated teachers by Elvin while at the same time she claims enormous success due to fraudulent credit recovery schemes. Red flag anyone? Here are the latest comments:.
Gerard Papa, 61, who runs Flames, a basketball tournament and mentoring program for 700 kids ages 8 to 19, says Kathleen Elvin, the principal of John Dewey High School, closed off the school's secondary gym last ...
Based on the comments, a major issue is a phony credit recovery scheme and some ridiculous work rules imposed by the Elvin administrators, some of whom seem to be so awful. Hearing about how these slugs continue to ...
Are Elvin and Creveling the local version of ISIS, using this teacher as a hostage in retaliation for actions taken by the union - beheading the teacher, economically, by taking her job. The actions of Principal Elvin, along with ...
The NY Post has a story today about John Dewey HS that has been all over Ed Notes for 9 months. Double DUHHHH! And I love how good old anti-teacher and union reporter Carl Campanile threads the needle:
Teaching kids takes so much effort, staffers at John Dewey HS
in Brooklyn have found a quicker way to fix persistent failure rates...
Schmuck. Principal Elvin and her APs set up a fear factory and set policy and force people to adhere to it, especially the untenured - which Carl and his paper are so opposed to. Double schmuck.
Oh, la di da -- some "staffers" decided they didn't want to put effort into teaching children and out of the blue came up with a scheme. Triple schmuck.
When the DOE, which has been informed about these schemes for over a year or more -- but only when contacted by the press - and the Post is not the only one doing a story on this -- did they act like it was news to them.
Here are just a few Ed Notes posts on the Dewey and Elvin story -- in case Carl Campanile and the rest of the press want to really know what's going on.
Dewey
has one of the highest number of ineffective rated teachers by Elvin
while at the same time she claims enormous success due to fraudulent
credit recovery schemes. Red flag anyone? Here are the latest comments:
Based
on the comments, a major issue is a phony credit recovery scheme and
some ridiculous work rules imposed by the Elvin administrators, some of
whom seem to be so awful. Hearing about how these slugs continue to ...
Gerard
Papa, 61, who runs Flames, a basketball tournament and mentoring
program for 700 kids ages 8 to 19, says Kathleen Elvin, the principal of
John Dewey High School, closed off the school's secondary gym last ...
Are
Elvin and Creveling the local version of ISIS, using this teacher as a
hostage in retaliation for actions taken by the union - beheading the
teacher, economically, by taking her job. The actions of Principal
Elvin, along with ...
“We're
sorry you won't have health insurance for your child and thank you for
serving your country. You're fired!” • Single Mother • Iraq War Veteran •
Teaching for Only Four Months This is who Elvin and the AP of
English ...
Kathleen
Elvin was sent into John Dewey HS as a closer a few years ago - to make
sure to drive the final nail in Dewey's coffin and remove many of the
teachers, mostly senior. But the UFT lawsuit stopped that process
over ...
Mrs
Elvin, who was behind the non-stop attack on this teacher all last year
and this year, was suddenly eulogizing her over the loudspeaker, and
making sure everyone knew she was so deeply, deeply saddened by the loss
of ...
I hope to be able to report one day on some of the stuff going on behind the scenes at Dewey. Based on the comments, a major issue is a phony credit recovery scheme and some ridiculous work rules imposed by the Elvin administrators, some of whom seem to be so awful. Hearing about how these slugs continue to operate a year after Bloom/Klein/Cott are gone is more than discouraging. Until the UFT goes head to head with Farina to rid the system of these people, nothing will change.
Here is the latest comment to celebrate Xmas - I some of it but some effort was put into it so it is worth sharing up top.
1. Work harder to create a "Workers' State
Island" at The John Dewey High School Campus;
2. create a link with the
soon-to-be-commercially-viable-for-American capital Cuba's Tourist
Dept. and propose an "Ineffective- Teacher- Non-Stop- Balsero -Caravan
to Mariela Harbor (with the hope of renaming it "Catalina Harbor" in the
future!);
3. contact Denis Rodman to come and give a "pep talk" at the
next Faculty Enhanced -Information-Gathering Session (i.e. "Faculty
Meeting") on the topic of "Using Sports Teams and Personalities to
Promote Healthy Groveling Before Maximum Leaders";
4. create a bulletin
board for "Dewey Honors Ferguson's Finest", with an auditorium event
featuring the Principal's hero, Officer Darren Wilson, interviewed by
Our First Lady herself, via Skype;
5. Inaugurate the Joel Klein-Kathy
Black Memorial Garden, with a flower bed reserved for future
to-be-deceased-staff members (purchaseable by staff with their Teacher
Choice funds);
6. break ground for the first-ever "I Can't Breathe Fun
Run" ,and schedule the Gym for an upcoming weekend (now that those
bothersome Flames are out of the picture!);
7. Hold a combination
"Hedgefund Wedding" (to replace that odious "Hippie Wedding"!) and Cross
Burning on the Athletic Field honoring personal "galpals" Eva Moskowitz
and a sensational robotized effigy of a "pregnant" Eva Braun, (created
under School Safety's armed "persuasion" by Dewey's very own Robotics
Team!) and culminating in the "immaculate/digitalized conception" of
"The Sapphic Kathleen", a rabid unbreakable cholera-spewing "doll" that
will birthe at the entrance to The Loading Dock on the anniversary of
"Dewey's Dowager Queen"'s first working day at Dewey ;
8. funnel all
remaining ATR's and "3020A"ers into the former Teachers' Lounge on the
2nd floor, and rechristen it "The UFT Waiting-To-Be-Terminated Room";
have supervisors escort all OSI "visitors" into the former Teachers'
Lounge on the 3rd floor, and run continuous relays of hash brownies and
mescaline-dowsed smoothies from the former Teachers' Cafeteria into the
locked-from-the-outside room;
9. sharpen the Cook's knives in the Student
Cafeteria;
10. have the Parent Coordinator start a rumor that the
Dishwasher is having an affair with the Cook's wife;
11. schedule a
"behind-the-scenes tour" of the cafeteria upon the Parent Coordinator's
return from her assignment;
12. contact NBC to see if they could use a
highly- effective high school principal for the next season of
"Undercover Boss", and buy an Imelda Marcos mask in anticipation of the
episode, so as to work unsuspected side-by-side with the rodents- I mean
the teachers...
let's stop at 12 in honor of "The 12 Days of
Christmas"!!!
Corrected and Updated
These comments on our earlier post (John Dewey Principal Kathleen Elvin Discontinues Iraq War Vet and Mother) provides some more detail on the reasons behind the discontinued Iraq war vet and mom. Are Elvin and Creveling the local version of ISIS, using this teacher as a hostage in retaliation for actions taken by the union - beheading the teacher, economically, by taking her job.
The actions of Principal Elvin, along with Emily Crevling, the Assistant
Principal of the English Department in John Dewey High School,
regarding the termination of a untenured teacher, who was teaching a
mere 4 months, should be viewed as nothing less than malfeasance. The
teacher was hard-working, followed school policies, and the students
attended her class because she established a rapport with them. Her only
misstep was voicing a difference of opinion and questioned Ms. Crevling
on a particular matter. I suppose this teacher would have needed more
than 4 months to realize that in John Dewey High School one never
questions Kathleen Elvin or her puppet assistant principals. This
teacher, had she been given the opportunity to continue to teach in John
Dewey, would have quickly learned that Principal Elvin prides herself
on running a tight ship. So tight, that staff is not allowed to disagree
with her or else she will find a way to retaliate. So tight, that she
has managed to bring on [the blog post] John Dewey Principal Kathleen Elvin Discontinues Iraq War Vet and Mother
This is just the latest disgusting
act of this power-mad, vengeful, menacing, and roundly-hated "Closer"
Principal, who I have sent out diatribes about many times, to no avail.
Elvin has not only gone after teachers who she takes a dislike to, like
this one, for no explicable reason, but has decimated entire Dept's.
since her arrival 3 years ago: there are at least 5 tenured teachers who
are internally " rubber-roomed" through 30-20a terminations, and many
others, including myself, who were forced out, through retirement as in
my case, or by transferring to a less dangerous school administration.
Now, I heard that she changed the locks on all the teacher' s lounges,
just for sheer spite, and staff are left to eat/ get down-time in their
own classrms (not very private!), or their cars!!! She has used
sycophantic and spineless and heartless and careerist dept supervisors
like Creveling, as well as her emasculated APO Messenger, who was an ATR
up til last school year, to terrorize and destroy those on her
Blacklist ( which includes other supervisors,paras, aides, as well as
teachers ), and she has ruined a great school with paranoia,
divisiveness, and a mania to " know everything"....a Stalinesque horror
show. She must be curbed, and exposed for the true crimes she goes on
committing against hardworking staff , who are virtual prisoners.
“We’re sorry you won’t have health insurance for your child and thank you for serving your country. You’re fired!”
• Single Mother • Iraq War Veteran • Teaching for Only Four Months
This
is who Elvin and the AP of English wanted to terminate this past June.
Termination would have meant that she could no longer teach in any New
York City Public School. She dared to have her own ideas. She dared to
want a voice. So charges based on nothing of any real consequence were
brought against her. In fact, most of us believe they were trumped up..... Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "No Change of Tone at John Dewey HS: Principal Kat...":
I've known about this case since the Discontinue at the end of June. Every teacher who came into contact with this woman praised her and people would have been shocked she was Discontinued and had her license lifted so she could no longer teach in the DOE - except they know the vicious retaliatory principal, Catherine Elvin, plays games with people's lives for political reasons. The story I heard was that this teacher, given some bullshit idiocy to do asked why and what was the point. Enough! You dare to ask a question? End of job. End of career.
I heard the teacher's former commanding officer spoke up for her for the appeal - which are pretty much useless with people who are associated with the principal making the decision.
My suggestion was for the teacher to show up at a PEP in full military uniform with her child and confront Farina and the panelists - along with teachers testifying in her behalf.
Kathleen Elvin was sent into John Dewey HS as a closer a few years ago - to make sure to drive the final nail in Dewey's coffin and remove many of the teachers, mostly senior. But the UFT lawsuit stopped that process over the summer and Elvin had to switch gears.
The principal was at first resistant to having the UFT
Rep there as "witness" to the "transaction", but, even the "server" said
he had never served papers in 3 years of doing it where the UFT Chair
was not present- he himself seemed shocked at the attempt to do it
without a union presence!... Martin Haber, teacher, John Dewey HS
John Dewey principal Kathleen Elvin is more subtle than Bryant HS Principal Dwarka. (We've heard about Kathleen Elvin in the past - See Diane Ravitch post below.) Until Farina deals with people like her the school wars will continue even as the UFT tries to cover them up and make nice about there being peace at the top.
The more I hear about Elvin, the more she moves into my POS pool of human beings. Elvin uses humiliation as a tool.
Before you read the report below from Haber, one of the senior teachers, I want to expand on the outrage of her trying to keep these teachers from having their union rep present and the comment from the DOE official that in his 3 years of doing the work of serving 3020a papers to teachers, he had never encountered a principal who tried to deny them even this basic right.
What would motivate Katheen Elvin to function the way she has? There's a special place in Principal from Hell for people like Elvin. And don't forget her little band of assistant principals - use the comment section to name and shame them.
Dear Friends:
4 tenured teachers were summarily removed from their teaching
assignments in the 4th period (of 8 periods) on Friday, the 13th (!), at
my school, John Dewey HS in Bklyn. A guy in a Yankees cap was sitting
in what once had been a Guidance Suite with rows of documents aligned
across the table; these were 3020a papers, and this dude was there to
serve them to my colleagues. The way it was done was, to my mind,
especially brutal and humiliating, and intentionally so: everyone knows
it is something sinister when the APO or one of his gopher AP's comes in
mid-class to "cover" your class while you are told to report to an
Administrative room; students see it, colleagues find out within
minutes, and, of course, every Management Team member is already in the
loop beforehand. The principal was at first resistant to having the UFT
Rep there as "witness" to the "transaction", but, even the "server" said
he had never served papers in 3 years of doing it where the UFT Chair
was not present- he himself seemed shocked at the attempt to do it
without a union presence! He also was vague at first about what he was
doing and who he was, but then relented.
I am putting out this info to see if yesterday was "D Day " for any
other Chapters, or just Dewey? And to see if the "process" is as bad or
worse in other sites. Michael was able to at least establish that the 3020-a process leaves the weight of proof on the DOE side, since the new
Eval system has not even issued its first ratings....so that was at
least welcome news amid the gloom. This is another dark day at John
Dewey HS, where tenured teachers continue to be
scapegoated/harrassed/bullied/
profiled until they leave the
school, and the system. A principal from lower regions of hell. A
collection of sycophantic managers ready and willing to sell their
first-born to get brownie points from her. So, a typical NYC high school
of 2014!
(Also check out South Bronx expose of James Quail - a former principal and Supt in my old district 14 -
And here is the Ravitch post from a student almost 2 years ago.
Can’t anyone volunteer to be a principal? One who actually cares about
the school? Not Elvin and her inexperienced crew. Shockingly, some of
the new appointed AP’s have never taught/are not teaching any classes.
A Student at John Dewey Speaks By dianeravitch September 21, 2012 I wrote a post about the NYC Department of Education’s determination to destroy once-esteemed John Dewey High School in Brooklyn. The post was called “The Ugly Face of Reform in New York City.”
First, they turned it into a dump for the low-performing kids rejected by their small schools and charters. Then they began systematically starving it of needed resources. As this comment shows, even the students know the score:
I am currently a student at the school. Many people don’t realize how hurt we really are, we lack so many things. Our budget is dry, insufficient equipment, low enrollment, slashed programs and classes, new inexperienced teachers replacing traditionally great ones that have been their for DECADES before I was even born! We’re turning into a typical high school. A conventional one at that, and that’s not a good thing. There’s no such thing as bands or cycles anymore. Where is the liberty we used to have of changing our schedules to fit our own needs academically? Where is the freedom of being metal detector free (even though many high schools throughout NYC are implementing metal detectors anyway) and where are all the students on the campus?
It’s exasperating. We did not deserve this. I personally try my best to make a number higher in that school, my 92 average is for the school, and for my family. Not necessarily for me. I want to turn that 62% graduation rate into a 63, and I want my classmates to want the same thing. I don’t want Dewey to be another school on the list that reads “Closed Schools Due to Poor Performance” and I certainly do not want Dewey to be restructured into small schools with a sugar coated name. I also do not want another Insideschools page that reads “This school was closed in due to poor performance.” in the header. And no, I hope the administration doesn’t win this time. They’ve closed enough schools, far too many, and this is the breaking point!
Can’t anyone volunteer to be a principal? One who actually cares about the school? Not Elvin and her inexperienced crew. Shockingly, some of the new appointed AP’s have never taught/are not teaching any classes. The DOE knows the demise of Dewey, but they’re purposefully ignoring it. And they can get away with it, like the corporate rats because the people are sheep. A herd of sheep. They would rather kiss *** than to speak up for themselves. It’s sad. This is not like me, I don’t even know how I managed to type this much. Just know this proves my anger, as a Dewey student. This will not be the end for us. Trust me, we’re in this too deep and we’ve fought too much to go down now. The DOE picked the wrong school to mess with. The worst part is that this corruption is not only happening in NYC, but also in Chicago, and other cities.
