Well, it seems that disgraced former Principal Kathleen Elvin of John Dewey High School had her charges dropped by the State Arbitrator in her 3020-a hearing because the DOE apparently approved her "easy credit" plan to goose the graduation rate by 13%. Despite their own OSI investigator's document showing that packets of material, without instruction was used to give students multiple credits that violated State and City "credit recovery" requirements, the DOE approved all the credits and accepted the graduation rate without requiring these students to actually do real work. In other words, they agreed to the academic fraud of the "easy pass" system. Read the New York Post article Here.
The question that needs to be asked did the DOE realize that if they allowed these students who were academically unprepared to graduate without giving them real courses to make up, that they, in effect, approved Principal Elvin's "easy credit" plan? Obviously, the State Arbitrator believes so and dismissed the charges against her. It almost seems that the DOE did everything possible to sabotage their case against former Principal Elvin when they refused to provide an actual audit as evidence against the academic fraud. Was the DOE's failure to provide an audit simply incompetence or done with the purpose of not exposing the academic fraud that is not confined to only John Dewey High School? In fact a DOE task force found 36 high schools abused the "credit recovery" system and yet no disciplinary action was taken.
It seems to me that the DOE didn't want their systematic "credit recovery" program abuse exposed at the 3020-a hearing and deliberately sabotaged the case against former Principal Elvin. Moreover, had the DOE's "dirty laundry" of academic fraud were exposed at the 3020-a hearing, it could mean the downfall of the Carmen Farina Chancellorship and a black eye to Mayor Bill de Blasio. Finally, it would also show that Carmen Farina's failure to "clean house" of the Bloomberg policymakers that permeate Tweed allowed the academic fraud to continue complete with a bogus graduation rate of academically unprepared students for the real world after high school.
The more the union leadership claims that the DOE has changed the more those changes are an illusion. It's still the same old Bloomberg DOE.
18 comments:
One thing that has not changed is the way the School Quality Guide (used to be the Progress Report)measures schools on credit accumulation and graduation. These reports do not care if a school did better than it did the year before. They are about how the school does in comparison to 40 other schools the DOE says are the "peer group." Until the DOE switches to comparing schools to their own prior performance, there will always be pressure to boost rates which can lead to cutting corners.
We have a similar 'program' of 'credit recovery' in my current school. My previous school dittos. Little packet of work - get full credit for the course. Now I don't like it, and I would not accept the same for my own children, but everyone needs to understand that we are in a Brave New World now where all bets are off.
Our society is on life support. Western civilization - and all the standards and expectations that go along with it - matter nothing to all the non-whites (save for some Asians) who have their own cultures and attitudes about life. Back in the day, we were all taught to work hard and fly right and we could get ahead. That was in a virtually all-white world where everyone spoke the same language, followed the same general culture and had similar values.
Now we are enriched (overwhelmed) with diversity and blessed (inundated) with cultures that look upon us as the strange ones. My school is almost 100% latino. I am the foreigner to them, preaching to them to adopt my knowledge and the values I grew up with (i.e. American values). They are having none of it. I was in a nearly all-black school a few years ago. The same thing was there too. I and the culture I represent did not exist in their day to day lives.
When we 'pass them' it is because we have no other choice. Dequan and Pablo do not care about the knowledge created by old, dead white men. Period.
The UFT had the evidence for a long time and instead of releasing it to the press (I offered people at Dewey Ed Notes if they wanted it out there and if the press didn't bite) they went the OSI route knowing full well it would take a long time and delay any action. So the staff suffered under Elvin while the UFT pursued a back door strategy of first going to Farina - who did nothing - and then in exasperation after 6 months of doing leaks to the press. So the upshot is that the UFT purposely went OSI to cover for Farina - they could claim that the "process" worked. But everyone - except maybe the UFT - knows OSI is corrupt and often incompetent. Now they are bragging on ed notes how they saved Dewey from Elvin.
Dwarka at Bryant, and her tool APs, need press time.
For me the big story here is that the UFT was willing and able to throw its members, those teachers at Dewey, under the bus to save Farina. The students aren't even an afterthought. Why? For DeBlasio, of course. DeBlasio's numbers are sinking faster than the REAL stats (you're more likely to see a Tasmanian tiger, than those numbers) of most NYC public high schools. The UFT always hitches it's cart onto the losing horse.
Granting Dewey teachers immunity would have won the case against Elvin. When I was ATR-ing there in November 2014, I heard many stories about teachers who falsified grades under Elvin's pressure. They wanted to blow the whistle but they were warned by our craven union not to talk lest they themselves be charged for going along.
Mulgrew could have made a public case for immunity. City law guarantees whistleblower protection for teachers. Instead our President said and did nothing. And this is the guy who proposed a Truth Commission at the 2013 Spring Conference?
Of course, if the DOE were not so corrupt, it would automatically offer immunity to teachers in such circumstances.
Word out there that the UFT is protecting the corruption for Dwarka.
The system needs to get rid of Fariña, and Mulgrew.
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The UFT us protecting all the crooked principals. Cruz,Dwarka, Kwait, and now ELvin.
CORRUPTION IN FULL SWING!
The DOE has instructed them to engage in these corrupt antics....Elvin and Dwarka admitted when they were trapped in a corner.
Now they go after teachers with integrity.
I was really happy when Farina took over. I was actually thinking things would turn. I gave her the benefit of the doubt. Now I realize she's a disaster and really doesn't want to improve the system. Her elderly sway can really manipulate you and make you feel that she's doing the right thing, a grandmotherly feeling. However she is just as corrupt as them all. She actually knows about credit recovery and knows it's a sham. Kids are writing an essay or someone is writing it and they are getting credit. This has been going on for years. Same ol same ol. Shes not changing anything and De Blaz loves it because he can show the public the boost in graduation. It's all false. The whole system is false. There's violence every day, grounds for suspensions but the DOE will show the best year ever with zero suspensions. This system is fake! I can't believe this is happening.doesn't everyone realize this DOE is a hoax? People think this is real?
dwarka is "double dipping" credit for graduating seniors taking "earth science" and "geology".
dirty skank
@ 12.45
Yup...it's Banana Republic time...
The UFT Queens Office is full of corruption, and is not doing what is right for their members.
11:45,
That's a direct result of segregated schools. NYC public are most segregated schools in the country. The only white people these kids know are us and the nasty views given out from rap and TV.
I hear the Dewey Principal was already retired before she was asked back by Bloomberg to ride-herd on Dewey's staff. Is this true? I mean, talk about double-dipping. How much does she make?
Mulgrew and Fariña should step down, they are doing too much damage.
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