Schools Chancellor Finds Common Ground With Principals on LIFO
Wednesday, March 16, 2011 - 04:18 PM
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Cathie Black, city's controversial schools chancellor, toured schools in the five boroughs on Jan. 3 (Fred Mogul/WNYC)
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New Schools Chancellor Cathie Black came off a bit nervous at times during a conference with 120 city principals at Fordham University on Wednesday, but there was at least some common ground: the need to be able to fire bad teachers more easily.
Richard Bost, the principal of the Fordham Leadership Academy in the Bronx, told the chancellor at the Graduate School of Education's annual leadership conference for principals that he has to "hide" certain teachers by giving them assignments out of the classroom.
"There's a large overhead in the whole Department of Education at all levels of people who maybe should be doing something else," said Bost. "And the reality is we don't really have a society now that can afford to have people with guaranteed jobs the rest of their life."
When another teacher raised the same issue, complaining about the long process needed to dismiss an under-performing teacher, Black said, "I couldn't agree with you more," and added that progress on ending the last in, first out policy protecting senior teachers was being made.
"It looks as though we are making progress on seniority as of last night with a bill that passed the senate to work on, to move quicker," she said.
The Assembly's leadership has opposed this legislation, however.
But on other matters, there was less agreement. Black said severe budget cuts demanded that the Department of Education take back 30 percent of any money principals have put aside for next year because of the huge cut the city is facing in school aid. She noted that the DOE had earlier told principals it would take back 50 percent of the surplus funds, a figure it lowered after she heard from principals.
Some principals said afterward they still were not convinced, including Denise Spina, who heads P.S. 30 in Staten Island.
"I think that every single penny that principals get should be kept for the children," said Spina. "Absolutely, unquestionably."
Comments [6]
Richard Bost is probaly the world's most incompetent and tyrannical principal in the country. He has taken a position without experience and abused his power to rid himself of people who dare to suggest common sense approaches or people who deny his unbridled power in his own diabolical kingdom. He is still at his command post, still incompetent and points the finger at everyone but himself. The staff (except those who play his spy game on their peers for rewards of ignoring their incompetence or monetary gain) . The state knew the deal; he was made responsible for the destruction of the school that had such spirit and potential. This is an educational tragedy.
Everyone knows that the community does not want an incompetent teacher in the classroom, especially the teachers who want the best for their students. However, Bost is forgetting that an incompetent teacher stays in the classroom if administration doesn't do their part. Administration grants tenure to teachers; administration must make sure that their decision to grant tenure is based on evidence of the teacher's competency. Secondly, administration would see quality education and a highly qualified teacher from a mile away because of that administrator has years of teaching experience. Only a master teacher who becomes a principal would have the ability to see another qualified teacher. However, administrators like Bost have no experience in the classroom, have been brought up on charges for sexual harassment, has failed his own school miserably, by placing in the Persistently Low Achieving list because his vision was not on education but on perversion. Was Bost planning to raise the students’ scores or planning to score with the women?
If Chancellor Black listens to Bost's comment on the issue of LIFO, then she's a fool who will have egg on her face when Bost is finally arrested or terminated for the sexual harassment of the female teachers at his school.
Let's consider the source here folks! This guy Bost is easily the worst principal in NY, and he's the one who wants to be ablwe to fire teachers. Sure, so he can settle scores like he's doing with Mike Mullen. He has been terminated for sexual harassment, then reinstated by somebody in Tweed. He's under at least a hlf dozen investigations for everything to sexual harassment, mismanagement of funds, sexual harassment of parents, and who knows what else. If its sleazy, he's done it! And this is the only guy WNWC could find for an interview? And howabout Cathie Black, why don't you educate yourself first before you start jumping on board with the likes of Bost.
Mr. Bost is a principal, therefore, he already possesses the tools to "get rid of" bad teachers. But there's a difference between a truly bad/ineffective teacher and one who is simply not "as good" as the teacher down the hall. Mr. Bost has to perform his own job by observing and evaluating teachers, by providing sufficient professional development to give "bad teachers" a chance to improve, and collect, keep, and file proper documentation in the event that that teacher really needs to be let go.
And it's not just teachers. If LIFO goes, cops and firefighters better watch their backs, because they're NEXT.
Ins't it terrible that teachers can't be fired like and illegal cleaning girl or nanny...
Fordam Leadership Academy? Isn't that one of the new specialized schools the DOE started very recently? Principals would love to just give anyone who doesn't agree with them a "U" rating, and to fire any teacher at will. ALL NEW TEACHERS, ARE YOU LISTENING, YOU ARE NEXT ON THE HIT LIST>
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