Tilden and Lafayette: A Tale of 2 Chapters...

....What a farce 3

The response from the Unity gang at Lafayette to the posts of comments by current and former teachers at the school is so indicative of how Unity operates. They brag about how they got rid of the doctor even though the patient died. And add on some egregious statements that confirm the charge of one teacher about how they play both sides against the middle.

Unity: The DOE had the support of the Alumni.
ICE: They distributed to all staff the recent op-ed by well-known Lafayette alumnus Jerry Della Feminina denouncing Klein for closing Lafayette and calling for a rally of alumni to keep the school open.

Unity: Support the 2005 contract and denounce the ICE person at the school for being anti-union for opposing the contract.
ICE: They ostentatiously denounce the 2005 contract as the "worst" contract ever.

The anon. Unity comment "the ICE guy MELTED during the fight against Rohloff" is interesting considering he was the one who openly was quoted in the NY Post about the lack of textbooks in articles as he stood up despite Rohloff's attacks. That has to be put in the context of the comments from the teachers who were attacked by Rohloff (as posted in both What a Farce items below) that they did not feel the Unity people really fought for them. Besides, as one of the fairest-minded people I know, the ICE guy always felt that, though Rohloff was so wrong-headed, he felt she had some positive things about her and never gave up the idea of getting her to function in a better way. Idealistic? Maybe. But he kept his eye on the prize - keeping the school open.

Contrast the actions of the Unity people at Lafayette with the way the Tilden chapter responded as both scenarios played out at the same time. Weingarten, who in the initial stages did not respond at Tilden, was forced to do so when the chapter activated itself to engaged in an active fight to keep the school open, a fight that they are still engaging in, as Meredith Kolodner pointed out in last week's article in The Chief.

I posted a series of articles on the evolving situation in Tilden on this blog. (Do a search of the blog for the Tilden tag to read them, in particular the comments of ICE's John Lawhead, one of the leaders of the fight keep Tilden open.

Of course having a user-friendly principal at Tilden helps, so the cases are not exactly equal. But the ICE person tried to get the chapter at Lafayette to unite behind the idea of keeping the school open.

When Weingarten said that Lafayette should be closed -

"It is no secret that there have been problems at Lafayette, so its closing is not surprising. We are working with the DOE to create a redesigned school - and potentially two new schools - that parents will want to send their children to and where educators will want to teach."

-that was the death knell for any action by the Unity reps there to engage in such a fight. The Unity gang owe allegiance to Unity and the leadership over the members at Lafayette - remember, there are free conventions to attend and other perks. So when the leadership decided getting Rohloff's scalp took priority over a battle to keep the school open, it was game, set and match for the demise of Lafayette. The people at Tilden may not win the fight and end up being closed anyway, but they are still in the game.

The Unity "victory" over Rohloff has resulted, and will result, in many of the teachers at Lafayette ending up as ATR's. The anon. Unity commented,

"As the unity folks at Lafayette have seniority, more than 60 years combined in teaching, they have a right to remain until excessed. Or do you and the ICE person begrudge them that?"

With the Unity abandonment of seniority, resulting in so many senior teachers under attack despite, and maybe because of their high salaries, this comment shows they are not too worried. Just another perk of being in Unity.

What a farce II...

... a response to Unity

Yesterday's "What a Farce" posting resulted in a comment by an anonymous Unity person, most probably one of the 2 Unity people referred to in the response below:

I read the "What a Farce" item on your blog, and your facts are correct. The note from "anonymous" purports to be for the record, but it attempts to muddy the record. The ICE person tried to do just what you said he did, get the chapter to ease up on the relentless ad null campaign against Rohloff in order to focus the chapter's energies against the closing and the long-term negative impact on the school of this strategy since as long as the closing was a fait accompli, Rohloff was gone anyway. That's the kind of "support" for Rohloff, in order to challenge Weingarten's capitulation to Klein's small school, break the union strategy. The ICE person asked for a truce in the battle against Rohloff and that would have built a stronger chapter that could have also checked Rohloff's U-rating binges.

As you suggest, the two [Unity] prime movers of the "Rohloff is the root of all evil" demarche, remain secure in their jobs, at least for now. Meanwhile, they ostentatiously denounce the 2005 contract as the "worst" contract ever, without even mentioning that they supported it, stuffed the mailboxes for Unity, and attacked ICE for being anti-union [because ICE opposed the 2005 contract].

"Anonymous" further claims that the Alumni, as well as one politician approved the takeover of Lafayette by the High School of Sports Management and two other schools. Yet "Anonymous" also distributed to all staff the recent Post (?) op-ed by well-known Lafayette alumnus Jerry Della Feminina denouncing Klein for closing Lafayette and calling for a rally of alumni to keep the school open. I hope more alumni write your blog and let you know how much they "approve" of the closing of Lafayette!

What a farce.....

We get letters:

A teacher who asked for help with a friend who is fighting to keep her license wrote:

All the NYSUT lawyers say to either pay the fine or resign. It's time for a coup d'etat at the UFT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Another teacher posted the message below to ICE-mail. She was U-rated by the infamous Jolanta Rohloff and embargoed from working under her high school license. She is trying to regain the license. What does the system have to lose in letting her keep the license if there are principals willing to hire her? A pound of flesh is not enough. At least she is currently working in the NYC system under a different license.

As for the UFT's role...ugh! Instead of focusing on keeping the school open, they focused on getting Rohloff removed so they can claim a pelt on their belt. Weingarten herself said the school should be closed. An ICE person, who had also been U-rated by Rohloff, tried to get the chapter leader to address the school closing, but as a Unity Caucus clone, he had his own agenda and attacked the ICE guy as being anti-union. Jeff Zahler and Leo Casey must be writing his material. I bet he makes out pretty wel in the closing while the ICE guy was excessed into ATR'dom.

One side story. This teacher got a now-defunct UFT transfer after 4 years of teaching in the Bronx (she lived in Brooklyn) before Rohloff took over at Lafayette that summer. In August, she decided to go to school and introduce herself. The very first words out of Rohloff's mouth to her were, "Don't you think I should be able to hire my own people?" Welcome to the school. Within the first weeks she was being given U-observations, clearly one of Rohloff's chosen pre-determined targets. Rohloff had stated on her first day at the school there would be a rain of U's.

Her assignment to Lafayette as principal even caused smiles among her colleagues at the Leadership Academy, who had clearly seen in her performance there that she would not be appropriate as a principal. It's pretty interesting that even people in the belly of the beast speculated that Rohloff got the assignment because it was clear that her difficult personality would finish Lafayette off. Now the Tweedles have targeted Manhattan Center on the upper east side as Rohloff's next victim, another school that will driven into closure to make room for charters. Teachers there are already passing around petitions.

Here is the teacher's letter. Hard to decide whether to place more blame on the DOE or the UFT. Maybe a tie?

My hearing with the DOE to argue my discontinuance regarding my high school license was held in February ( I was at Lafayette High- 'nuff said).

Though clearly evidence regarding my discontinuance was in my favor (again, those that know of the goings on at Lafayette would agree), the LIS has decided to uphold the discontinuance. This I expected, as I feel the DOE rarely reverses itself, regardless of the justice or injustice of a situation.

Today, I called the UFT. I was told that no further appeals can be carried out by the UFT. I must obtain a lawyer myself to initiate an Article 78 proceeding, if I wish to appeal the DOE decision. After researching what I need to do, it appears that the process is quite lengthy and costly. Again, basically, I was told: "Tough luck"...

WHY doesn't the UFT undertake such appeals on behalf of its' members? Isn't that WHY we have a union in the first place, to protect the members in the case of such events? The UFT rep that I spoke with could not even recommend a lawyer!

More and more, I see the futility of the UFT as a viable organization designed to represent teacher issues vis- a- vis labor problems with the DOE. WHY do we even HAVE a union in the first place, if the Union does not even fulfill its' most basic functions, that of representing
the members in the face of unfair management and labor practices?

What a farce.....

U-Rating Hearing Notes from Lafayette HS

Ed Note:
Our correspondent received a UFT transfer into Lafayette in the summer of 2005, one of the last UFT transfers before the onerous contract eliminated them. She came to the school during the summer to meet the principal (who she assumed was the old one) only to find Rohloff. Her first question was, "Don't you think I should pick my own people?" - a typical response from a principal to a UFT transferee, who are all assumed to be questionable no matter what their abilities. By the 2nd week of Sept. the teacher was under attack as Rohloff clearly had made up her mind to not have a UFT transferee in her building and the teacher underwent a year of hell. The teacher had previously had 3 years of successful teaching in special ed in very difficult schools but that counts for nothing in the world of Rohloffdom and BloomKleindom.

AP [X] had been placed in the rubber room for some connection to a teacher changing a score by a point in order to allow a student to graduate. Since then, AP [X] has been demoted to a teacher as an ATR.

AP [X] was noted for following Rohloff's orders and there are reports he gave 4 U ratings last year. In the end, AP [X] got burned on the cross he helped create. But he still has a job. When chapter leader Maria Colon of JFK HS found her bosses changing piles of regent scores it was she who was sent to the rubber room for a year and a half and had her job gone after. (She is clear now and back teaching as an ATR.) Her bosses got off scot free.


Thought I'd give you the details of my hearing. Essentially, the hearing was held to fight the "U" rating I received. The true issue basically is about class management, not my knowledge of content, or my credentials as a teacher.

Hearing was to commence at 9 a.m. 6 people were present, my UFT rep, me, a DOE Chairperson, a Superintendent representative from Region 7, a rep from the Chancellor's office and an impartial (?) observer. I question the impartiality of the observer, simply because she appeared to be on very familiar terms with the representative from the Region 7 office, and exchanged a number of pleasantries that would indicate a friendship with the Superintendent's rep.

Also present (by phone connection) were: Jolanta Rohloff, Principal, Ms. Makintosh (LIS, Region 7), AP [X] ( A.P. Social Studies)

We were to commence the hearing at 9 a.m. This was not so, because there were problems in calling Lafayette ( no one picked up the phone there). The rep. from District 7 offered as a reason that this was so , because today is the first date back from Regents grading, and a new semester, so having a hearing on this particular date ( today) was very poor timing.....As for AP [X], when the question came up about where he was, so that he could be cross examined, again, all concerned ( with the exception of my UFT rep and me) had to scramble to get information on where AP [X] was located, his now exact position, how he could be reached.

We finally connected with Rohloff- when asked by my rep where AP [X] was, Rohloff told my rep that "he ( meaning AP [X]) was no longer at the school". Rohloff went on to say that she had the authority to speak for him. My rep shot that down, another long search went on to connect with AP [X]. When questioned as to his whereabouts, Rohloff continually stated that "he was not at the school." My rep refused to carry on the hearing until AP[X] was located, correctly stating that AP [X] was the one that gave me the ratings, not Rohloff, who was not in the classroom with us at the time the ratings were given. When the panel found out where AP [X] was located, the rep from the Chancellor's office inadvertently blurted out: "He's in the "rubber room"!" The impartial observer and rep from the Region both made comments that the remark was inappropriate. My UFT rep and I said nothing. Finally, a private cell phone number was obtained for AP [X], the connection was made.

The UFT rep then cross examined AP [X], Rohloff, and the LIS on the Log of Assistance, did they model lessons for me, other questions along that line of reasoning. Rohloff blatantly lied about the assistance she offered me, AP [X] did not have the appropriate documents at his disposal, the LIS admitted that she knew that Rohloff had intended to "U" rate me for the year, prior to observing me. My rep brought up the point that if the LIS knew that I was to be "U" rated, would that affect her decision? The LIS said that it did not.

My observations during the hearing- The UFT rep was very much on point - kept all participants on point through his cross examinations. When it was time for Rohloff and the LIS to question me, apparently they asked questions that drew the agreement from the other reps that their questions were not germane to the hearing. One such question from the LIS: "Describe differential learning". I was not required to answer that question, as it relates more to philosophy than the issue at hand, which apparently, was more classroom management. Another question: What outside professional development seminars did I attend, which I answered. The LIS summarized that " since I did not seek professional development on my own, it's an indication of my lack of professionalism and planning". Rohloff concurred. As you know, we attended a number of PD's on a voluntary basis that were assigned to us.

As for my summary, I deferred to the UFT rep. All other present stated:" On the record".

That was it. After the hearing, the UFT rep and I spoke. I'm of the opinion that the hearing went towards my favor, however, the UFT Rep feels that even if we "won" on points, the DOE will still doggedly stand by their initial decision.

So, what was the point? Could there be a "miracle"? Is the DOE capable of retracting a decision that clearly smacks of an injustice? As for AP [X], I'm sure that the DOE Chairman knew of his situation, as well as the Regional rep., yet, this was not brought up, either by them, or the UFT rep. I was biting my tongue to bring up the situation, but the UFT rep feels that no matter how wrong the administration is, the DOE reps at the hearing would not be swayed by bringing such a situation to light.