A Decade of Cover-up at PS 106: Who Protected Marcella Sills?

My column for The Wave, to be published Feb. 28, 2014.

A Decade of Cover-up at PS 106: Who Protected Marcella Sills?

By Norm Scott

The media seems to be enthralled over Marcella Sills’ magic disappearing act as principal of PS 106 in Far Rockaway ever since the NY Post reported the story a short time after Bill de Blasio and Carmen Fariña took over the running of the school system from the Bloomberg/Walcott/Joel Klein team. Remember, Sills came out of Klein’s Leadership Principal training academy to take over at PS 106 in 2005 when Kathy Cashin was running Region 5. Michelle Lloyd-Bey became District 27 Superintendent not long after.

A Google search reveals many articles and much commentary on the story on my part and others in The Wave and on my blog (Ednotesonline.org – plug, plug) going back at least 6 or 7 years. I contend the extremely pro Bloomberg ed policy NY Post had the story long before they printed it. Why did they wait so long? To protect the Bloomberg administration from having to answer questions. And to dump the story in the lap of their successors, whose policies the Post so adamantly opposes. After the Farina visit to the school people were upset that Sills was not removed immediately. But that’s not the way due process works – both for teachers and principals. Though I really don’t get this due process thing for people who are bosses who have enormous power to affect the lives of students, parents and staff. An investigation was launched by the corrupt Office of Special Commissioner (SCI), which often takes a very long time. With the media scrutiny they came back with a scathing report in record time. Sills must go through a 3020a hearing before she can be terminated (the word the DOE uses.)

Most of the stories in the media don’t scratch the surface when they focus on Sills’ lateness or non-attendance. Actually, Sills was performing a humanitarian act when she didn’t show up because the school was a so much healthier place when she wasn’t there.

But then again, does the media care that Sills destroyed or tried to destroy the careers of so many teachers?  To many in the media, if not for the time card issues, Sills’ driving out those high-salaried lazy incompetent senior teachers would make her a hero. But we do see some exceptions and once the NY Post and reporter Sue Edelman got their teeth into the story they ran with it. (Hey Sue, how about some kudos to The Wave and EdNotes for breaking so much of the story years in advance?)

The Post allowed Patricia Walsh, a  27 year and special education teacher at PS 106 from 2003 to 2009,  to tell the real story. Walsh asks: “Where did the money go? PS 106 received millions in extra school funding to help low-income kids.  It didn’t go to pay for teachers who left and weren’t replaced. It didn’t go to the payroll secretary Sills didn’t have so no one kept track of her absences.”

Every year PS 106 was given over $3000 for library books and that money was diverted with no accountability. Superintendent Michelle Lloyd-Bey was informed year after year.

Walsh puts much of the blame on the Bloomberg/Klein/Walcott administration.

“To show just how clueless and uncaring the administration was — in December 2013, PS 106 received a glowing report. At the time, there was no mandated gym, no special-education teacher (I had left and wasn’t replaced), no books, no art and no extended-day services! Sills opened state exam booklets earlier than allowed and asked teachers to discuss how to read a passage to help students better understand it, which was cheating. When told it was illegal, she had a fit.”

In Atlanta, Superintendent Beverly Hall, a former supervisor in the NYCDOE, and 34 others were indicted in a massive cheating scandal. Sills will be lucky not to go to jail.

Walsh points to common tactics used by bully principals like Sills.

“You were either a friend of Sills or an enemy, and if she didn’t like you, she’d rip you apart in reviews. Retaliation was common. When a teacher signed her name to a letter sent to officials expressing her concerns about educational practices that are adversely affecting children in our school, she was reprimanded for more than one hour by two supervisors from the Department of Education. Teachers learned to remain anonymous.”

The teacher transfer rate grew to 60%. Higher ups were notified and kept protecting Sills.

“Letters began to flood the district office, superintendent’s office, mayor’s office, chancellor’s office, UFT and the special commissioner of investigation just three months after Sills took the leadership position. But rather than addressing our concerns and dealing with the cause, the staff was reprimanded and scolded for not signing individual names. Now see why! Sills strategically targeted and harassed staff.”

You ask where was the union? Helpless at best, or joining the protection racket at worst (UFT District Reps during this period: Marilyn Cooper and Marilyn Manley.) Walsh says, “Meetings, letters, e-mails, reports to the teachers union . . . all proved.. futile. Every letter, every complaint reiterated her absence, lateness, inappropriate interaction with children, parents, staff, even falsification of reviews. Sills was never held accountable.”

In addition to Dist 27 Supt. Lloyd-Bey, Children First (or Last) Network 531’s William Colavito (WColavito@schools.nyc.gov) and Joseph Blaize (JBlaize@schools.nyc.gov) and Cluster 05 leaders Debra Maldonado (718-935-2480) must have their feet held to the fire. And UFT District Reps during this period, Marilyn Cooper and Marilyn Manley.

DOE and SCI Coverup in Investigation of PS 106 Principal Marcella Sills

Only for time cards??? What happened to a financial audit??? Why does [Supt] Lloyd-Bey get away w covering up for her??? This is pure corruption in D27... former PS 106 teacher.

I was just running out when the news broke on CBS. Time cards? She was late? The school ran better when she wasn't there.

The DOE covers up for thug principals who ruin the careers of teachers and run schools like banana republics.

No time for putting up links now - if you want background search ed notes for them.

PS 106 Update: Retired Teacher Writes to Farina About Principal Marcella Sills' Leadership

When will Farina end the misery? If this were about teachers they would be out of there in the blink of an eye. Let me point out once again, that this information has been out there for many years and the NY Post missed it -- until their pals BloomKleinCott were gone. And by the way, that licensed librarian who put so much into the library and the school and was a wonderful teachers is a friend of mine. (There's even more to that story that makes Sills look even more disgusting than she even appears here but I won't go there now.)

Was this school in a devastated area of Rockaway flourishing before Sills arrived? Surely not. But it was a solid school community that Sills as a Leadership Acad grad went in to consciously destroy. In my world that is a criminal act.

Chancellor Carmen Farina 52 Chambers Street New York, NY 10007 January 16, 2014

Dear Chancellor Farina,

I am a retired Reading/ Writing teacher of District 27Q. I worked at P.S.106Q for about twenty-two years, providing AIS under six principals. (I have enclosed my resume so you have an idea of who I am, and how I have served the children and staff in my district.)

I must tell you how thrilled I was to hear that the new Chancellor of NYC DOE was a person of integrity that “came up through the ranks” of the education system. It is this fact, and your reputation of course, and the recent revelations in the media, that have inspired me to pen this letter to you.

I am one of the teachers who was unfortunately disrespected, abused and suffered greatly under the incompetent leadership of Principal Marcella Sills at PS 106Q. As a matter of fact, at this writing I am still involved in a grievance against Ms. Sills going back to 2009 and awaiting resolve of the issue. Ms. Sills neglected to sign and send in a Medical Leave form that I completed and gave to the payroll secretary. Ms. Sills actually claimed that she never received it. This is a grave untruth and I have a signed statement from the school payroll secretary, stating that she indeed gave her the form for signature. As a result of Ms.Sills’ negligence and deliberate retribution, I now suffer the consequences of possibly losing this grievance.

This would result in a loss of three months of pension monies. I am currently repaying the DOE for minus attendance days of my last year of service, during which time I struggled with breast cancer and underwent several surgeries.

I and my colleagues were quite disheartened by the appointment of such an unknowledgeable and incompetent school administrator (graduate of the PLA), to PS 106. It is the opinion of the majority of staff, those who left, were forced out or chose to retire as early as possible from PS106, that this Principal was unintelligible, dishonest, uninterested in the students and their well- being, and simply vicious toward others.

We did make several attempts to follow protocol via the UFT, to gain DOE notice of what was happening at PS 106, but alas to no avail. None of the staff members could understand how Ms. Sills remained in her position after exhibiting pedagogically poor judgment in decision making and a lack of basic pedagogic knowledge; (not to mention the inability to write or speak coherent and grammatically correct English). We have all been appalled at what the NYCDOE considered an appropriate “leader” of an educational facility.

After Hurricane Irene flooded our Early Childhood Academy, we were never asked to submit any lists of professional and teaching materials that were destroyed. Nor were we asked what we needed in basic supplies for our classrooms. Surely, any competent school administrator would have done so, and would have attempted to obtain resources from the DOE and community at large. I can’t even begin to list the injustices to the children, parents and staff of PS 106, that were incurred as a result of ineffectual leadership over a period of eight or more years.

While serving on the SLT, we were never privileged to see a copy of the budget for PS106. It was as if we were lame duck committee members. We felt that our school should have had a financial audit under Ms. Sills, but it never happened. We were told there were no funds for supplies in the past few years, despite the fact that Ms. Sills ordered in hot breakfasts and lunches for staff and a catered BBQ at the end of the school year, which took place on the schoolyard.

There are a few catering places that refused to deliver to our school again, after Ms. Sills did not remit the incurred expenses. In the past three years, parents were requested to purchase reams of copy paper along with their children’s school supplies, so that teachers could duplicate teaching materials. What happened to all the funds amassed from the daily sale of ice cream at the school? Why weren’t these funds directed to purchasing a store of school supplies for families that could not afford to purchase any for their children?

Under Ms. Sills as principal, parents were asked to pay $12 to cover the costs of buses and a movie ticket for a June excursion to a movie theater. (Note: there are no free buses in June.) Was it an educational event? Was it an appropriate film for all grade levels? Can Pre-K and Kindergarten children sit that long in a movie theater? Was it necessary to send the entire school to a movie on the day the fifth grade had their stepping up program, (which was out of the building)? This is an example of how funds were disbursed at PS 106.

Ms Sills chose to close the PS106 Library. The library was sorely needed as a source of available free books to our students, many of whom were not taken to the Public Library by their parents. For several years, the library remained unused and the licensed librarian on staff was assigned to a classroom. What happened to the allocated funds to purchase new books for our library?

The IEP teacher hired personally by Ms.Sills, a friend of her mother’s, is totally unknowledgeable and incapable of the tasks required of his position. Yet, he is there as one of the Principal’s “cheer leaders”. This can be validated by all personnel involved with assessment, SBST, and Special Education.

On a personal note, for one entire school year, Ms. Sills refused to list my name on the Organization sheet and did not allow me to provide needed AIS services, in what was perceived as retribution for filing a grievance with the UFT. I did receive my salary for the year, but the students in the primary grades did not receive any support instruction in literacy that year. The grievance went as far as meeting with the Principal at the American Arbitration Association in New York City.

Ms.Sills, however, did not appear and claimed she had a family emergency. Please be aware, that Ms. Sills was at school instead. The city had to pay the cost of the appointed meeting. At the beginning of the next school year, Ms.Sills gave me the use of a small storage closet to use as an instructional area. I was able to make use of the space until the Fire Department declared it unsafe for children.

It is probably not beneficial to continue to list more examples of what appears to be poor leadership; you may be well aware of other examples yourself. I feel certain you will conduct a thorough investigation, including the apparent cover-up by District 27 leadership, of Ms. Sills’ actions and her gross incompetence as a principal of a NYC school.
 
Thank you for your ear.
Respectfully,

Miriam Baum Benkoe Retired Reading Teacher 

PS 106 Update: Why There's No Payroll Secretary

Who is responsible from above Marcella Sills after a decade of this kind of stuff? Will the NY Post blame Farina?

From a source:

Our last payroll secretary who had retired teturned to PS 106 part time after being begged by [Principal] Sills to return. But Sills was so nasty to her and treated her with gross disrespect. Finally the payroll secretary told her she was leaving due to the way Sills treats her and speaks to her. On her way out of the office  the secretary got a call from Sills who screamed at her to leave her school building or Sills would summon the police!  No school secretary lasted under Sills and there hasn't been a payroll secretary nor any other at PS106 in several years. Sills actually placed school aides in the office and assigned them to secretarial duties including handling confidential files and paperwork.

NY Post Editorial Tries to Shift Blame for PS 106 From Bloomberg to de Blasio

It was pretty clear to me that with the history of PS 106 having been out there (on ednotes and The Wave) for over 6 years) Sue Edelman and the Post waited until the real culprits were out of office and could no longer be held accountable.

Mike Bloomberg’s education policy wasn’t perfect, or PS 106 wouldn’t have fallen through the cracks as long as it did. But Bloomberg was pretty clear about what he wanted to do with failing schools: He wanted to close them down.... NY Post Editorial

This was as clear a hit job as we've seen. In as an astounding an editorial one can imagine, the NY Post today managed to ignore a decade of BloomKlein mismanagement of schools like PS 106 and protection for principals like Marcella Sills who as a Leadership Academy (Klein's Rosemary's baby) went after teachers with a vengeance.

It was pretty clear to me that with the history of PS 106 having been out there (on ednotes and The Wave) for over 6 years) Sue Edelman and the Post waited until the real culprits were out of office and could no longer be held accountable before publishing the story so they could now say:

All of which makes PS 106 an excellent field trial for de Blasio’s education “reforms.” If he and his chancellor are unwilling to close down a school as rotten as this one, surely they have an alternative that will turn things around quickly. We emphasize quickly — because children stuck in failing schools today can’t afford to wait years.
Chancellor Farina says the situation at PS 106 is “unacceptable.” The mayor admits it’s “deeply troubling.”
But it’s something else, too: It’s their problem now. And they’ll be judged on whether they can fix it.

Maybe Farina and de Blasio will come up with the kind of solution other than closing the school: remove a principal that was allowed to rise on the very back of the BloomKlein deforms that defended almost any principal no matter how awful and bring in the resources that a real principal will know how to use for the benefit of the children instead of for a personal political agenda like Sills did. (We'll get to the library destruction story another time.)

PS 106: Telemundo Video Report - Including Me Not Speaking Spanish

Reporter Pablo Gutierrez got in touch after googling my articles on PS 106 from 2008 (something Sue Edelman of the Post didn't do) and since he and his cameraman were on the way out to Rockaway they stopped over at my house to interview me. Then these hard-working guys spent the rest of the day around the school and caught Marcella Sills leaving. I can't understand Spanish but they got a bunch of parents to speak.

I hear Sills was with her lawyer -- it must be Take Your Lawyer to School Day.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3_vtDw4VBc



Here are some more stills:

Farina Punts on PS 106 Story

Teachers ought to try working the hours PS 106 principal Marcella Sims did and see if they get the same reaction from Farina. What I find outrageous by the coverage is the ignoring of the way Sills destroyed the careers of teachers. Once again the DOE seems to be sliding into a "defend principals" at all costs. Shame.

 

Where is the accountability of Superintendent Lloyd-Bey who covered up for Sills for a decade? A teacher called today to tell me about how Sills removed her from her licensed reading instruction job and when she wrote letters to everyone, including Joel Klein she was called in to meet with Lloyd-Bey and Cashin who some say was Sill's protector. Cashin told Lloyd-Bey to offer the teacher the same job at another school for the rest of the year to shut her up. The teacher took the job but when she came back to PS 106 the next year Sills left her off the organization sheet the entire year and an experienced teacher in reading support spent most of the year sitting at PS 106 doing nothing but getting paid. All this known by Lloyd-Bey and Cashin. Nice work if you can get it,

'Students are learning' at P.S. 106, Fariña says

By Eliza Shapiro
8:10 p.m. | Jan. 13, 2014
Despite "significant room for organizational improvement," schools chancellor Carmen Fariña said Monday evening, P.S. 106 is functioning.
Fariña issued a statement after she dispatched deputy chancellor Dorita Gibson to visit the school, which the New York Post reported was a rat-infested wreck where the principal is rarely seen and students spend the day watching television.
Fariña said a field staffer will visit the school weekly to ensure that organizational changes are implemented. "We are going to relentlessly support this school and marshal our resources until we see the results we expect from our students," she said.

Exclusive: PS 106 Library Funds Diverted by Sills as Llloyd-Bey Ignored Complaints

I'm heading down to PS 106 right now for The Wave - I was just interviewed in my house by Telemundo who sent their truck over to the school. I just got a call from a teacher who told me how the school was allocated about 3 grand a year for books but the books never arrived. Someone complained to Superintendent Michelle Lloyd-Bey every year and she did nothing. So no wonder there is no functioning library - beside the fact that a highly qualified librarian was working in the school.

Farina Responds to NY Post on PS 106 Rockaway Story Which Was 6 Years Behind Ed Notes/WAVE Stories

Capital NY is reporting that Carmen Farina is already responding to the Post story on PS 106 in Rockaway (see below) in contrast to how Tweed, Region 5 and Superintendent of District 27 Michelle Lloyd-Bey not only ignored but protected Marcella Sills when we wrote about PS 106 and its Leadership Academy principal in the past - March 11, 2008.

One of the stories about Sills I wrote about was her forging a teacher's name on a fake observation. The teacher was so outraged she called the cops and notified the higher ups. It seems Sills wanted to give the teacher a low rating but never observed her so she just made one up and signed it for the teacher. The upper uppers protected Sills.

Oh, and where was/has theDistrict 27 and Queens UFT been on this decade old story? Well, Randi did do a show visit but no follow-up.

PS 106 Redux.   I have links in that story to a running account I kept on PS 106 news on my other blog, here.

I have a friend who left teaching rather than work one more day under Marcella Sills, her career in ruins from a nasty, vindictive Sills who took money specifically geared to a program and used it to -----fill in the blank.

But this story is not new to us.
Read it all but here are some quotes from my March 2008 ednotes piece:

Will the PS 106 story ever die? Guess not. There’s so much going on – much of which we can’t write about to protect people from retaliation. To summarize: My Feb. 8 column (Queen Bee Meets Queen Bee) talked about Randi Weingarten’s visit to the school where she was not given the warmest welcome by principal Marcella Sills, who has created a war-like atmosphere in the school between her and many teachers and teachers and parents. We also reported the charges by teachers that she forged their names to observations that never took place. A week later, The Wave printed a story abut a parent protest over some things Weingarten supposedly said at the meeting (PS 106 Parents: UFT Says 'Sabotage Test Scores'), which was looked at as a vote of confidence in Sills, though few parents attended the protest (the PA president pointed out the low turnout was due to the short notice given to parents who have to work.) Some teachers feel the “protest” had Sills’ fingerprints all over it. Teachers report that of the things Sills did upon taking over the school was drive out the old PA and put in her own brand, but this is standard operating procedure for many principals in schools without a very active parent base.

Sills is a graduate of the dreaded Leadership Academy, where prospective principals are trained with an attack dog mentality to go after experienced (higher salaried) teachers using certain techniques that may include water boarding. Baum better wear a scuba mask. You know the drill: immediately target some teachers for harassment, mostly senior, to put fear into the rest of the staff and start forcing people out. If you have to use forgery, go right ahead. Bring in younger inexperienced, teachers who will be easily intimidated.

So how funny to read Susan Edelman's "expose" in today's post regarding PS 106 principal Marcella Sills -- by the way, appointed when Kathy Cashin was in charge if Region 5. Let's call out the network and Superintendent Michelle Lloyd-Bey, one of the major sluggettes in the DOE for a very long time -- we wrote a lot about her too in the past but these people just seem to linger for ever no matter what they do.

Sue Edelman adheres to the Post support for darling Joel Klein and Tweed who put Sills into power and empowered her to live the life of a Queen Bee. And she doesn't call out any of the people who should be questioned. (Watch the Post try to pin this on Farina and de Blasio.)

Superintendent

LLOYD-BEY, MICHELE

and the network people.

CHILDREN FIRST NETWORK 531

COLAVITO, WILLIAM/Blaize, Joseph

WColavito@schools.nyc.gov; JBlaize@schools.nyc.gov Cluster 05 (CEI-PEA) CL53

Cluster Leader Name	Cluster Leader Title	Cluster Leader Phone
MALDONADO, DEBRA	Cluster Leader	718-935-2480

Someone should also question Kathy Cashin to see what she knew and when she knew it.

Here is the Capital City Hall piece on Farina response:

Fariña sends deputy to P.S. 106 after 'Post' report

By Eliza Shapiro
7:20 p.m. | Jan. 12, 2014
Schools chancellor Carmen Fariña will send a deputy chancellor to P.S. 106 on Monday in response to a New York Post article that called the Far Rockaway school the city's "worst."
In a statement released Sunday, Fariña said she spoke with Mayor de Blasio about the report on Sunday and will have deputy chancellor Dorita Gibson report back on the conditions at P.S. 106 as soon as possible. "What was reported in today's news account is unacceptable, and if true will be immediately addressed," Fariña said.
The Post reported that the school's principal is often absent and that students spend most of the day watching movies.
Read the Post story here: http://goo.gl/YEH4ap

And the NY Post piece below the break.

Race on the Table – Globally and Locally

Excerpt of my column that appeared in The Wave (www.rockawave.com) on April 4, 2008.

Barack Obama’s speech on race has opened up a long-needed area of discussion, not only on the national level, but out here in Rockaway. Howard Schwach’s editorial on March 28 on the Democratic primary being about race and gender touched a chord. Sure, 50 percent of white voters voted for Clinton and an even higher percentage of black voters are for Obama. We should also say that in Italian areas and Jewish areas, candidates of those persuasions also garner votes based on how people identify with them. So, yes, all political campaigns are based to some extent on race, gender and ethnics.

[Wave Editor] Howard Schwach’s presentation of how Geraldine Ferraro was forced to resign for “telling a political truth” as a comparison of Obama’s relationship to his pastor a bit simplistic. I detected something petulant in Ferrara’s position along the lines of “look at all the advantages blacks have.” Obama did address white backlash over these issues in his speech. Sometimes I don’t get it. Obama is half white and half black and somehow the white half disappears when people talk about him.

PS 106 and Race
I bring race up in a column focused on schools because of PS 106 PA President Joyce Bunch’s It’s My Turn column in last week’s Wave in which she castigated PS 106 teacher Miriam Baum (unfairly, I believe) for her recent column on the schools in which she expressed the extent of teacher satisfaction with Principal Sills. Rather than get into the details of whether UFT President did or do not call Sills a bitch at a UFT meeting (she probably did – but she’s called me much worse and recently called a high school principal in Manhattan an A-hole.) Or the so-called “slanderous” comments about Sills forging a teacher’s signature on a faked observation – which I heard about literally the day it happened and have discovered has happened in more schools than we want to imagine, especially with Leadership Academy principals, which leads us to think about exactly what kids of training they are being given.) Joyce Bunch is basically defending Sills, and that’s her right.

Of more interest to me was points of anger she expressed at racial attitudes people may have towards kids and their parents in black communities. This touched a real nerve, given the debates going on about race and how that might affect the education process or the relationships between what is often white teachers and poor people in a black community. The idea has been raised by some that black kids would be better served by black teachers. But some people in the black community have also talked about the attitudes of middle class black teachers being much closer to those of white teachers when it comes to poor kids. Results in communities with a majority of black teachers like Washington DC (overwhelmingly,) Chicago and Bed-Stuy have not been any better.

Bunch points out that the community around PS 106 is not homogeneous, stating that she is an attorney and other parents are professionals. She says, “If someone receives a welfare check, so what?” As a white, Jewish young man who entered teaching in 1967 with a whole mess of preconceptions and received a wonderful education by the children and their parents, most of whom were on welfare, I agree wholeheartedly. And I continue to learn, working with current and former teachers of various races to try to reform the system in a way beyond the current corporate, market based driven schools based on a ridiculous competitive model that unfortunately people like Joyce Bunch and Principal Sills seem to have signed onto.

When I mentioned Bunch’s article to a young activist friend of the same mixed race as Obama, she said, “You cannot write about race and schools without reading Lisa Delpit’s “Other People’s Children” which I immediately bought and will follow up with in the future.
Bunch closes her article with an invitation for me to sit down with the PS 106 PTA to create a dialogue and I would be happy to do so. (My email is at the end of this article.) But I want to get one more thing clear…

Bees in my bonnet
I put 35 years in the system as a teacher/activist/reformer in a Hispanic/Black community in which I stood with local activists against an ethnic/white dominated school board, so I have some sensitivity to the issues Bunch raises. I’m proud to have been a teacher and the overwhelming majority of my colleagues were decent, well-meaning and competent. Thus column is aimed at teachers. When Bunch says I have a bee in my bonnet about Sills that is partially due to some of the things teachers (who I respect enormously) tell me. But it also goes to the one personal contact I had with her during the massive battle over the ratification of 2005 contract that took place between the UFT leadership and groups opposed to the contract.

With the UFT doing everything it could to keep the opposition out of the schools, we went around the city with leaflets to put in teacher mail boxes to provide them with both sides of the issue. I went to a hundred schools and in just about every one I was given the courtesy of being allowed to reach out to teachers. And when a principal felt uncomfortable, they were unfailing polite (for instance the principal of PS 114 asked to look over the leaflet and then said “OK.”) Some said they would check and asked me to come back. But not Sills, who was incredibly nasty and abusive over my request, refused to listen to even a 10 second explanation and ordered me off the premises immediately. (The person who was told to escort me out was horrified and said, “Don’t worry, that’s’ the way she treats people.”) When you have contact with so many people over so many years and you meet the rarity of someone treating me like Sills did, you get an inking that something is not right. But maybe she was just having a bad day. I look forward to the dialogue with Joyce Bunch and her colleagues if they are still interested.

PS 106 Redux

Here is a section of a piece that appeared in my School Scope column in The Wave on Friday, March 7. The rest of the column included sections published on this blog here (Why Doesn't Queens borough pres. appoint a member of the PEP) and here (Tweed closes UFT, opens 6 unions in its place).

Will the PS 106 story ever die? Guess not. There’s so much going on – much of which we can’t write about to protect people from retaliation. To summarize: My Feb. 8 column (Queen Bee Meets Queen Bee) talked about Randi Weingarten’s visit to the school where she was not given the warmest welcome by principal Marcella Sills, who has created a war-like atmosphere in the school between her and many teachers and teachers and parents. We also reported the charges by teachers that she forged their names to observations that never took place.

A week later, The Wave printed a story abut a parent protest over some things Weingarten supposedly said at the meeting (PS 106 Parents: UFT Says 'Sabotage Test Scores'), which was looked at as a vote of confidence in Sills, though few parents attended the protest (the PA president pointed out the low turnout was due to the short notice given to parents who have to work.) Some teachers feel the “protest” had Sills’ fingerprints all over it.

Teachers report that of the things Sills did upon taking over the school was drive out the old PA and put in her own brand, but this is standard operating procedure for many principals in schools without a very active parent base.

In that same Feb. 15 edition, Michael Catron, a learning leader/certified volunteer – what exactly is that – wrote a letter castigating me for my column, even calling me a moron. My joke response on Feb. 22 that I was a moron – more-on than off – GET IT – about events at PS 106 – apparently gave the wrong impression I was agreeing with Catron. Teachers have said it is not clear what exactly Catron does at the school. But they raise the same questions about others in the building who are close to Sills and seemingly have duties that are hard to pin down.

The story continued last week in The Wave’s “My Turn” column with teacher M. Baum, a reading specialist at PS 106, taking both Catron and the parent protest to task with a scathing critique of Sills, a very gutsy thing to do. Baum is an 18-year vet who teachers say has been sitting in the school without being given an assignment. Our independent inquiries are that she is a very caring, extremely capable teacher who is on the wrong side of the political tracks.

Here is a brief section from her extensive report:
Mr. Cantron refers to Ms. Sills being covered with tears, snot and vomit during the course of a day. This is so absurd, it’s actually funny. Ms. Sills spends most of her day in her office with minimal close contact with the early childhood population who might possibly get to soil her suits, however with a school nurse on premises, this is highly unlikely.

There has been an awful lot of mud-slinging going on of late. Our teachers have been “bad mouthed” and slandered before the parent body. Spreading false rumors about professional hard working staff is hitting me and my colleagues below the belt as well. Sending letters to parents claiming teachers are abusing students (unproven and undocumented) is not only underhanded and deplorable, it is pure slander. This is a way to initiate a riot and negative impressions and it is not reflective of an interest into an honest investigation to seek the truth.

Sills is a graduate of the dreaded Leadership Academy, where prospective principals are trained with an attack dog mentality to go after experienced (higher salaried) teachers using certain techniques that may include water boarding. Baum better wear a scuba mask.

You know the drill: immediately target some teachers for harassment, mostly senior, to put fear into the rest of the staff and start forcing people out. If you have to use forgery, go right ahead. Bring in younger inexperienced, teachers who will be easily intimidated.

Make sure to purge the former parents association, which might have allegiance to the old principal and set them against those “horrible” teachers.

It is only a rumor that LA people are given a pet animal which they must kill before they are allowed to graduate.

Word is that the Wave stories have sparked some interest from the higher ups, who couldn’t give a crap until stuff gets into the press. They want people to cool it, but this will not happen without an olive branch from Sills, whose future career cannot be helped by these revelations.

Sills is not without her supporters amongst the teachers – the very same newer people she has brought in. Word to the wise: when all the older teachers have been purged, watch out! Your turn will come.

Follow the entire PS 106Q chronology and on going story here. The link is also posted on the sidebar.

PS 106 Q in Rockaway

...it's all here in chronological order.