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1) Barricade a Classroom, Become a
Folk Hero. Friday is usually a slow news day,
which is the only reason I paid any attention when I learned that a
Bronx middle school teacher had barricaded himself in his classroom,
causing the evacuation of 1,200 students because of fears – later proved
unfounded – that he had threatened to blow up the building.
SWAT teams, snipers and hostage
negotiators were dispatched to the scene. After three hours of tension, the
teacher surrendered without further incident. No one was injured.
As soon as the name of the teacher,
Francisco Garabitos, was released, I did an Internet search and turned up
some strange stuff.
I posted the details of what I found and the relevant links on Intercepts.
I won't repeat all that here, but I was amazed at the number of people who
defended Garabitos and his actions. You can see some of their comments on
Intercepts, and in the comments section of the New York Times
story.
The general tone of these comments was
that the school is in a tough neighborhood, the parents don't control their
kids, Garabitos was unjustly accused of strangling a student, and the
principal is some kind of tyrant. When Garabitos was released the next day
without bail, he was interviewed by the New York Post.
I posted that video and some key quotes, including "I am actively
pursuing change. This is a political movement by the union, too. The union
wants change on the school administration. And we actively pursue those
things. We negotiate, but when they don't pay attention, we try to do
something dramatic to bring attention." He added, though that the United
Federation of Teachers "does not approve those type of tactics."
Far from being crazy – at least the
drooling, barking mad kind of crazy we first thought he was – Garabitos
claims he made a cool, calm, reasoned decision to "go on strike." His
purpose, he told police, was to draw attention to the problems at the
school, and to get the principal reassigned.
Let's give him the benefit of every
doubt and assume all is as he says it is. Now let's see if he accomplished
what he set out to do.
Did he draw attention to problems at the
school? Absolutely. The story went around the world in a matter of hours.
Was it an appropriate response to his
problem? Definitely not. He was about to be sent to the rubber room, which
is the place the city sends teachers it wants kept away from kids for the
time being. To protest this action, he barricaded himself in a room away
from the kids. It made as much sense as barricading himself in the rubber
room.
Did he do it without endangering the
students or other adults? No. While the initial report of a bomb threat was
apparently due to panicky staffers and not Garabitos himself, he did not
surrender himself immediately when the police arrived, and he must have used
some vague language about his intentions in order to keep them at bay for
three hours. By his own admission, he knew the campus would be evacuated.
Though the teachers, staff and police performed heroically to evacuate the
students safely, the smallest bit of bad luck could have caused a disaster.
What if a child had been hurt while Garabitos was grandstanding?
Did he get the principal reassigned? No.
And what's more, he probably made the principal invulnerable to any
disciplinary action. The very last thing the district and the city can do is
be seen rewarding Garabitos' actions. Instead of investigating the
principal, the powers-that-be will be watching his fellow teachers for signs
of similar desperate intentions. And the support he has received from
teachers will only worry them more.
Did he draw attention to the poor
performance of the principal, Dorald Bastian? Highly debatable. I have no
idea if Bastian is a saint or Beelzebub, but what difference does it make?
New York City principals are unionized. One of the most surreal moments
of this entire surreal event was when UFT and the principals' union were
pointing fingers at each other for defending unhinged members. Garabitos was
the UFT chapter chairman for his school. He must have known that Bastian has
as many protections from dismissal or reassignment as he does.
Garabitos says he did not snap. He
soberly decided to do what he did – just like the frat boys in Animal
House: "I think that this situation absolutely requires a really futile
and stupid gesture be done on somebody's part."
2) More Neat Stuff Added to EIA
"Declassified" Page. Reaction to last week's
release of various union documents was so positive I have created a "Declassified"
page on the EIA website and added several documents. These include:
*
Greenberg Quinlan's Power Point debrief after November 2008 election.
This presentation contains information on NEA's communications strategy and
results among members in key battleground states. (1.42 MB)
*
National Education Association Campaigns & Elections PowerPoint debrief
after November 2008 election. (14.6 MB)
*
Celinda Lake's PowerPoint debrief after November 2008 election. (1.39
MB)
There are now a total of 15 documents
posted.
3) Roving Through ROVE 2009.
NEA is alerting its activists to a website called "Republicans Opposing
Voucher Efforts" (http://www.ROVE2009.org).
And while there certainly are Republicans who oppose voucher efforts, it's
more than a little strange to find them organizing around the issue… under a
Democratic President and Congress… who have already killed the DC voucher
program. So, considering
NEA's previous efforts in creating front groups, a little more
investigation is in order.
Unsurprisingly, there is
no indication on the website itself about the identities of the people
behind it, though there was also a ROVE2008 website last year (update those
page titles, dudes). A search of the
Whois database reveals the client name is hidden, but the domain name is
registered to
720 Strategies in DC.
It won't shock you to learn that NEA is
a client of 720 Strategies, having paid the firm almost $15,000 last year
for "legislative policy development." The company's president is
Pam Fielding, who for eight years worked at NEA as its manager for
cyberadvocacy.
None of this is probative of course.
Perhaps one of Fielding's other clients is behind ROVE. Say, National Public
Radio or Southwest Airlines or Harrah's Entertainment. I'm just providing
additional information to help you make an informed judgment – which is more
than ROVE2009 will do.
4) California Teachers Association
Employees File Notice of Dispute. While the
California Teachers Association is campaigning to overhaul the state's
budget system, its executives are having some trouble overhauling their own
employees' pension system. Last week, unions representing CTA employees
filed a notice of dispute with the Federal Mediation and Conciliation
Service. The form is a formal notification to the feds that management (in
this instance, CTA) has proposed an alteration to the contract and the
workers (in this case, the CTA staff unions) have not agreed to it.
At issue is CTA's insistence that
employees contribute to their retirement trust or face cuts in benefits they
currently enjoy.
5) Contract Hits.
Wherein we highlight a contract provision from the current agreement between
the National Education Association and its largest staff union. This is
Article 15, Section 4:
"NEA shall reimburse an employee for
loss or damage of such personal items as are necessary and appropriate for
travel on official NEA business and/or the performance of assigned functions
(e.g., clothing, baggage, etc.), except when such loss is due to the proven
negligence of the employee. Reimbursement shall be at fair market value and
shall be limited to that portion of any loss that is not otherwise
reimbursed by insurance or any other non-NEA source."
6) Last Week's Intercepts.
EIA's blog,
Intercepts, covered these topics from April 21-27:
*
Francisco Garabitos and the Primal Network Brain. Your single stop for
everything relevant to the Bronx Barricader story.
*
Garabitos Says Other Teachers Knew About His Plan. He's not crazy, but
he is disturbing.
*
Campaign Quotes Are Fickle Friends. Selective citation.
*
Of Salary Schedule Slopes and Climbs. The construction of a salary scale
affects retention and retirement.
7)
Quote of the Week.
"CTA went behind closed doors and cut a secret deal with the governor
without talking to anybody." – California Federation of Teachers political
director Kenneth Burt, discussing the California Teachers Association's
support for Proposition 1A. (April 23
Los Angeles Times) |
